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Shimbo et al. (2000) conducted PSP measurements on an 8%-scaled model of the Mitsubishi MU-300 business jet at the Mach numbers 0.6-0.8 and the angles-of – attack 0-4.6 degrees in the 2-m transonic wind tunnel at the National Aerospace Laboratory (NAL) in Japan. The main objective of their tests was to examine the feasibility of PSP combined with TSP for correcting the temperature effect of PSP. The model was equipped with 32 pressure taps in four rows on the upper surface of the starboard wing. A water-cooled 14-bit CCD camera (1008×1018 pixels) attached with optical filters was used. A xenon lamp was used as an excitation light source and the light was introduced through optic fibers to light reflectors. Each light reflector had an optical filter such that only the UV light went through for paint excitation. The classical PSP, PtOEP in GP-197, was applied on the upper surface of the starboard wing for pressure measurements, whereas a typical TSP, EuTTA in PMMA, was applied on another wing for temperature measurements. Since the emission peaks of both PSP and TSP were close in the emission spectra, the luminescent intensity from both PSP and TSP were acquired on the same image using the CCD camera mounted on the ceiling of the test section. Assuming the flow symmetry with respect to the model centerline, Shimbo et al. (2000) used the temperature distributions on one of the wings obtained by TSP to correct the temperature effect of PSP on another wing. Using porphyrin-based PSPs (FIB, Uni-Coat, Sol-gel, FEM, and PAR paints), Mebarki and Le Sant (2001) studied the pressure fields on the supercritical wing of a Dash 8-100 aircraft model at the cruising Mach number 0.74. Experiments were conducted in a blow-down pressurized tri-sonic wind tunnel at the Institute for Aerospace Research (IAR) of National Research Council (NRC) in Canada. At Mach 0.74, the total pressure of flow was changed from 1.4 bar to the maximum value of 3.1 bar, and accordingly the unit Reynolds number from 18.7 to 49 millions/m. The duration of a run depended on the Mach number and total pressure p0. At Mach 0.74, the run duration varied from 11 seconds at Rec = 8.51×106 and p0 = 3.14 bar to 37 seconds at Rec = 3.81×106 and p0 = 1.41 bar, where Rec is the Reynolds number based on the mean chord. The start-up time to establish stable flow was 2 seconds. The supercritical wing without a nacelle had a zero swept angle at the 60% chord line. The steel wing with an aluminum half fuselage was mounted on an external sidewall balance. The overall length, wingspan and mean chord of the model were 1.73, 1.1 and 0.203 m, respectively. The airfoil sections were designed to sustain extensive laminar flow on the surface. The wing was equipped with four rows of 32 pressure taps (stations A, B, C and D), which were located at 11%, 27%, 35% and 57% of the wingspan, respectively. The ceiling of the test section was equipped with 20 optical windows. To provide fairly uniform and stable illumination, 16 cooled green halogen lamps (Iwasaki JY 1562 GR/N/CG 50W) with filters (color filter KOPP 4-96) were used for all the PSP formulations since they used the same porphyrin molecule (PtTFPP) as a probe. A 12-bit CCD Photometrics camera (1024×1024 pixels) and an Infrared Agema 900 camera (136×272 pixels) were mounted in the plenum shell. The CCD camera, equipped with two interference filters (Andover 650FS40 and Melles Griot 03FIB014) in parallel, recorded the luminescent emission of PSP from the wing root (station A) to approximately 85% of the wingspan. The infrared camera focused on three rows of taps (from station B to D), thus covering 30% of the wingspan. Of the porphyrin-based (PtTFPP) PSP formulations used, the PAR PSP from IAR and FEM PSP from NASA Langley were not commercially available, and three other paints, the FIB PSP, Sol-gel PSP and Uni­Coat PSP, were commercially produced by Innovative Scientific Solutions Inc. (ISSI) in Dayton, Ohio. imperfections near the leading edge of the wing. Fluorescent oil flow visualization on the surface confirmed this observation. As shown in Fig. 9.27, infrared thermography visualizes a surface temperature change induced by the flow separation at these stations and indicates that small turbulent wedges are generated by surface imperfections at the angles of attack of 0, 1 and 3 degrees. However, these turbulent wedges did not significantly alter the pressure distributions. In addition, using the Uni-Coat PSP, they studied the Reynolds number effect on the pressure distribution on the wing. Mebarki and Le Sant (2001) evaluated the accuracy of PSP measurements at Mach 0.74 for all the PSP formulations through in-situ calibration. Table 9.1 summarizes the accuracy of the PSP results in terms of the absolute difference in Cp and the percentage error (%FS) over the full-scale range of Cp that is defined as the maximum range of Cp measured during a run on the wing upper surface by 39 pressure taps. The exposure times of the camera used for the PSP formulations are also listed in Table 9.1, depending on the luminescent intensity of a particular paint. Generally speaking, the accuracy was fairly good for all the PSPs at different Reynolds numbers despite their different temperature sensitivities, because a temperature variation over the wing chard during a run was relatively small (less than 2oC). Engler et al. (2001b) measured the pressure distributions and aerodynamic loads on an AerMacchi M-346 Advanced Trainer Aircraft model at the angles of attack from -4° to 36° and the angles of sideslip from -13° to 13° over a Mach number range of 0.6-0.95. Their experiments represented a good example of PSP application to a complex model with flaps, air brakes, rudders and ailerons in a production wind tunnel, which utilized a two-luminophore PSP, eight CCD cameras and 16 fiber optics illumination heads. In addition, control of PSP hardware and interface with a standard wind tunnel data acquisition/processing system became an operational issue in a production wind tunnel. Experiments were conducted in the industrial wind tunnel with a 1.8×1.8 m test-section at DNW-HST in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The AerMacchi M – 346 advanced trainer aircraft model had a 1.2-m length and a 1.0-m span. Figure 9.20 shows a surface grid and a painted model with exchangeable flaps, air brakes, rudders and ailerons. Since a total of 19 configurations were tested, 20 additional model parts were painted besides the basic model. All the parts of the complex model were illuminated and captured by CCD cameras placed around it in order to measure the aerodynamic effects at high angles-of-attack and angles of sideslip for maneuvers influenced by flaps, air brakes, rudders and ailerons. To overcome the problems of shadows and inhomogeneous illumination for excitation, the Pyrene – based two-luminophore B1 PSP from OPTROD was employed. In addition, since this PSP had weak temperature dependency, the error due to the temperature effect could be reduced. As shown in Fig. 9.21, at each of four observation directions, an UV light source connected to four 20-m long optic fibers; thus, a total of 16 fiber optics heads connected with four UV light sources illuminated the whole model from all the four directions. Eight cooled 12-bit CCD cameras were used for image acquisition. At each observation direction, a twin-CCD-camera unit with different filters was used to acquire in parallel the pressure signal at 450-550 nm (blue) and reference signal at 600-650 nm (red). Figure 9.21 shows a twin-CCD-camera unit and illuminator heads installed on the wall of the test-section. The use of the twin – CCD-camera unit eliminated a filter-shifting device that could not be immune from unsteadiness of the light sources. In this arrangement of cameras and lights, the exposure time was typically 15 seconds for a camera placed at 1 m away from the model. As PSP was integrated into a standard wind tunnel measurement system, accurate and rapid acquisition and transmission of data became an important issue to decrease the wind tunnel run time. An automatic trigger and data exchange system was used. After acquisition of a set of ‘blue’ and ‘red’ images by the four twin-CCD-camera units (eight CCD cameras), a TTL ready signal from the PSP system was sent to the wind tunnel control/data system, and the flow parameters and model attitudes were adjusted and recorded for next run. After the above process was completed, a TTL trigger signal from the tunnel control/data system activated all the cameras and lights for new PSP measurements. Given limited illumination sources (16 illuminator heads) for the complex model, shadows were inevitably generated mainly by vertical rudders on the fuselage and horizontal tails. The effect of shadows was largely eliminated using the ratio-of-ratios approach for the pressure (blue) and reference (red) images in the wind-on and wind-off cases (four images in total). In some areas without PSP like registration markers, screws and damaged spots, pressure was given by a proper interpolation scheme from PSP data around these areas. Figures 9.22 and 9.23 show the distributions of the pressure coefficient Cp on the upper surface of the model for the clean configuration and the configuration with positive and negative ailerons at Mach 0.6 and the angle-of-attack of 14o. It can be seen that the pressure distribution is significantly altered from one configuration to another. The pressure distributions along the lines on the wings indicate a symmetric pressure field with respect to the model centerline for the clean wing configuration, in contrast to the asymmetric one for the configuration with the positive and negative ailerons. Figure 9.24 shows a typical pressure field mapped onto a 3D grid of the model. PSP data were first mapped onto the upper, lower, left and right parts of the model grid, and then these parts were merged into a complete 3D surface of the model. From the 3D PSP data on the model surface, Engler et al. (2001b) calculated the coefficients of the normal force (CN), pitching moment (CPM), rolling moment (CRM), wing root torsion moment (CTM), outboard droop hinge moment (ODHM), and horizontal tail normal force (CNHT). Figure 9.25 shows the aerodynamic force and moment coefficients obtained from PSP along with data given by a balance at Mach 0.95 on the configuration with the leading edge droop set to zero. In Fig. 9.25, D1 denotes the data obtained by a six-component balance during PSP tests and D2 denotes balance measurements on the same model without PSP in previous wind tunnel tests. The PSP-derived aerodynamic loads were in reasonable agreement with the balance data except for the horizontal tail normal force. Previous balance data indicated the existence of the forebody side force at high angles-of-attack, which was caused by the asymmetric boundary layer separation and vortex system. In these cases, PSP indeed showed the asymmetric pressure fields on the wings. Most PSP measurements were conducted in high subsonic, transonic and supersonic flows since PSP is most effective in a range of the Mach numbers from 0.3 to 3.0. Experiments on various aerodynamic models with PSP in large production wind tunnels have been made at three NASA Research Centers (Langley, Ames and Glenn), the Boeing Company at Seattle and St. Louis, AEDC, and Wright-Patterson in the United States. Also, PSP has been widely used in wind tunnels at TsAGI in Russia (Bukov et al. 1993, 1997; Troyanovsky et al. 1993; Mosharov et al. 1997), British Aerospace and DERA in Britain (Davies et al. 1995; Holmes 1998), DLR in Germany (Engler et al. 1995, 1997a, 2001b), ONERA in France (Lyonnet et al. 1997), and NAL in Japan (Asai 1999). Besides predominant applications of PSP in external aerodynamic flows, PSP has been used to study supersonic internal flows with complex shock wave structures in turbomachinery (Cler et al. 1996; Lepicovsky 1998; Lepicovsky et al. 1997; Taghavi et al. 1999; Lepicovsky and Bencic 2002). This section describes typical PSP measurements in subsonic, transonic and supersonic flows. Torgerson et al. (1996) conducted PSP experiments in a low-speed impinging jet to determine the limiting pressure difference that can be resolved using a laser scanning system combining an optical chopper or acoustic-optic modulator with a lock-in amplifier. They tested three PSP formulations, Ru(dpp) in GE RTV 118, PtTFPP in model airplane dope and PtTFPP/Green-Gold in dope. Ru(dpp) in GE RTV 118 had a relatively low temperature sensitivity of 0.78%/°C compared to 1.8%/°C for PtTFPP-dope PSP. PtTFPP/Green Gold in dope was a two – luminophore PSP where Green Gold served as a pressure-insensitive reference dye. They compared the intensity ratio method, phase method and two-color ratio method to evaluate their feasibility for low-speed PSP measurements. The paint was coated on a white Mylar film attached on an aluminum impingement surface that was located at 10 mm away from a 5-mm diameter nozzle. A laser beam modulated by an optical chopper provided illumination for PSP at 457 nm. A 0.2­mm laser spot was scanned across the impingement plate. The luminescent emission was detected using a PMT through a long-pass filter (>600 nm). The PMT signal was input into a lock-in amplifier connected with a PC either to reduce the noise for intensity-based measurements or to extract the phase angle for phase-based measurements. For Ru(dpp) in GE RTV 118, a typical chopping frequency was 500 Hz with a lock-in time constant set to 200 ms. Pressure was calculated from the intensity ratio and the phase angle after five scan ensembles were averaged. Figure 9.19 shows the pressure distributions on the impingement plate converted from the intensity ratio of Ru(dpp) in GE RTV 118, where the lateral coordinate is normalized by the nozzle diameter. These results indicated that the laser scanning system, working with Ru(dpp) in GE RTV 118, was able to measure an absolute pressure difference as low as 0.05 psi with a reasonable accuracy. However, it was found that the PtTFPP-dope PSP exhibited a stronger temperature effect distorting significantly the pressure distribution near the shear layer region of the impinging jet. Phase measurements in the wind-off case for Ru(dpp) in GE RTV 118 and PtTFPP in dope led to a somewhat surprising finding that the phase angle showed a repeated variation or pattern over a scanning range even when pressure and temperature were uniformly constant. The phase variation introduced a considerable error in low-speed PSP measurements although it might not be significant for PSP application to high-speed flows. The phase variation was attributed to microheterogeneity of a polymer environment around a probe molecule that locally altered the luminescence and quenching behavior. To correct this intrinsic pattern of the phase angle (or lifetime), a ratioing process is still needed. Similarly, for the two-luminophore paint PtTFPP/Green-Gold in dope, a two-color intensity ratio was not constant over a scanning range because the two dyes were not homogeneously mixed into the binder. In this case, a ratio – of-ratios of the signals was used to remove this effect. PSP measurements on delta wings, swept wings and car models at low speeds were performed at ONERA in France and DLR in Germany to optimize their paint formulations, hardware and software for low-speed measurements (Engler et al. 2001a). It is realized that PSP measurements at low speeds require the accuracy of 0.1% over a pressure range of 800-1000 mb. This accuracy is difficult to achieve using a typical PSP with a temperature sensitivity of 1%/K because a temperature change of 0.1 K could produce an error as large as a required pressure resolution. Furthermore, the accuracy of PSP is further reduced due to the camera noise and variation of the excitation intensity during a test run. The most common procedure to deal with the temperature effect is application of in-situ calibration to correlate the local luminescent intensity to the corresponding pressure tap data under an assumption that the temperature distribution on a model is uniform. In this case, the temperature-induced error is absorbed into an overall fitting error in in-situ calibration. Even though some systematic errors are removed, it is impossible for this procedure alone to reduce the error to a level equivalent to that caused by a temperature change of 0.1 K on a non-uniform thermal surface in wind tunnel tests. After investigating low – speed PSP measurements in large production wind tunnels at NASA Ames, Bell et al. (1998) pointed out that the most significant errors were due to the temperature effect of PSP and model motion. Therefore, a better solution is the combined use of in-situ calibration with a temperature-insensitive PSP. An illumination field should be measured in order to correct both the spatial and temporal excitation variations on a surface. Furthermore, a large number of images (up to 64) should be averaged to reduce the camera noise. Engler et al. (2001a) tested three Pyrene-based PSP formulations for low – speed measurements. One was the B1 PSP developed by OPTROD in Russia, in which a pressure-insensitive reference dye was added to correct the excitation variation when performing a ratio between the pressure and reference emissions. The temperature sensitivity of the B1 PSP was 0.5%/K which could not be neglected when a high accuracy for pressure measurements was required. Another was the PyGd PSP developed at ONERA, containing Pyrene as a pressure-sensitive dye and a gadolinium oxysulfide as a reference component. The two components absorbed the ultraviolet excitation light and emitted the luminescence at different wavelengths. Besides its high sensitivity to pressure, the PyGd PSP displayed a very low temperature sensitivity of 0.05%/K because the temperature sensitivity of the reference component was almost the same as Pyrene and thus an intensity ratio between the two components compensated the temperature effect of Pyrene. Therefore, this paint was suitable to low-speed PSP measurements. The PdGd PSP, developed at ONERA mainly for transonic flows, was also tested to evaluate its feasibility and accuracy of measurements at low speeds. This paint was a mixture of PSP and TSP, containing a pressure – sensitive component Palladium octaethylporphine (PdOEP) and a temperature – sensitive component Gadolinium oxysulfide having a temperature sensitivity of 1.5%/K. Illumination system used was a Mercury light filtered in a UV range (325±15nm or 340±35nm) and a xenon-flash lamp equipped with four optical outputs with 25-Hz repetition rate (308 nm); the lights were connected to liquid light guides to illuminate models. Cooled CCD cameras (512×512, 1024×1024 or 1340×1300 pixels) with back illuminated detectors were used. A filter holder was placed in the front of the lens or the CCD chip. The filters separated the emitted lights from the pressure component (430-510 nm) and from the reference component (615-625 nm). For the PdGd paint, the third filter was required for the temperature-sensitive component at 480-520 nm. The exposure time was typically 1-30 seconds, depending on the illumination source, camera, and size of a test section. Filter-shifting device and two-camera system were developed to acquire the pressure and reference images. Preliminary measurements at low speeds were made on a delta wing to identify the major error sources and evaluate the performance of different paints (B1, PyGd and PdGd) under the same flow conditions. The delta wing with a 500-mm chord and a swept angle of 75° was successively painted with the three PSPs. The model was mounted in the ONERA low-speed research wind tunnel having a test section of 1-m diameter and the maximum speed of 50 m/s. The model was equipped with 47 pressure taps used to assess the accuracy of PSP. Ten images for each filter setting (blue or red filter) were taken using the CCD cameras (512×512 and 1340×1300 pixels) for frame averaging. using the PyGd PSP are in good agreement with the pressure tap data and less noisy compared to those given by the B1 and PdGd PSPs. This is due to not only much higher luminescent emission from the PyGd PSP, but also very low temperature sensitivity of the PyGd PSP. Spatial averaging was applied to the PSP data over a 3-pixel-radius circle around each pixel. Since a 3-pixel radius in a 512×512-pixel camera corresponded to a larger area on the surface, spatial averaging on the image plane was more effective for the 512×512-pixel camera, which was evidenced by a reduced noise level of the results. Since the PdGd PSP was a mixture of PSP and TSP, the temperature fields were also obtained, indicating a temperature increase of 0.2 K on the wing surface from the left to right. Moreover, by comparing the TSP images taken before and after the test, a temperature increase of 1.6 K was observed in a test run of 30 minutes due to the heat dissipated by the motor of the wind tunnel. Other researchers also measured the pressure distributions on delta wings using PSP at low speeds (Morris 1995; Shimbo et al. 1997; Le Sant et al. 2001a; Verhaagen et al. 1995). The flow over a delta wing is particularly suitable to testing the capability of PSP at low speeds since there is a relatively large pressure change induced by the leading edge vortices on the upper surface. Measurements on swept wings were performed in the Low-Speed-Wind-Tunnel (LSWT) of Daimler-Chrysler Aerospace at Bremen in German. This Eiffel-type wind tunnel with a 2.1×2.1 m test section was operated in a range of velocities from 30 to 75 m/s. Images were acquired at 10 minutes after the tunnel was turned on to stabilize flow temperature and minimize the temperature effect on PSP. During the tests, all ambient light sources were covered and the test section was painted black to minimize reflection of the luminescent light on the walls. After preliminary tests on a swept constant-chord half-wing model to examine the performance of the PSP system, PSP measurements were made on an Airbus A340 half-model. Figure 9.12 shows the wing of the Airbus model coated with different paints including ‘Gottingen Dyes’ (GD) PSPs and B1 PSP of OPTROD. A large number of pressure taps on the wing were available for comparison. Figure 9.13 shows a raw blue image of the wing of the Airbus model illuminated with a 308­nm diffuse lamp when the integration time of the CCD cameras was 32 s for 16 images acquired. The GD146 PSP gave the most sensitive signal. Figure 9.14 shows a comparison of PSP measurements with pressure tap data along a chord at the spanwise location AB indicated in Fig. 9.13 on the Airbus model at 60 m/s and the angle of attack of 16o. Figure 9.15 shows a similar comparison between PSP and pressure taps for the wing/slat configuration of a swept constant-chord half­wing model at 60 m/s and the angle-of-attack of 16°. The resolution of ACp = 0.02 was achieved on the swept wings at 60 m/s. 9.18 presents a comparison between PSP and pressure taps on the rear window of the PSA Peugeot Citroen model at 40 m/s along the left-hand sideline A and the centerline C equipped with pressure taps. In this case, the absolute pressure accuracy was better than 1 mb. There was an interesting difference between the pressure distributions along the sideline A and centerline C. There was only one pressure minimum point along the centerline C through the roof/window junction. In contrast, two pressure minimum points existed along the sideline A, which corresponded to the roof/window junction and a vortex system around the car, respectively. PSP was able to visualize the pressure signatures associated with complex flow patterns that were completely missed in pressure tap data such as a pressure peak between the two pressure minimum points along the sideline A. PSP measurements are challenging in low-speed flows where a change in air pressure is very small. The major error sources, notably the temperature effect, image misalignment and CCD camera noise, must be minimized to obtain acceptable quantitative pressure results at low speeds. Brown et al. (1997, 2000) made baseline PSP measurements on a NACA 0012 airfoil at low speeds (less than 50 m/s). The experiments systematically identified the major error sources affecting PSP measurements at low speeds and developed the practical procedures for minimizing these errors. After all efforts were made to reduce the errors, reasonably good pressure results were obtained at speeds as low as 10 m/s. basecoat was lightly buffed to reduce surface roughness. The sufficiently thick PSP topcoat applied to the basecoat was insured to be as uniform as possible. After completing the PSP application, a hot-air gun was used to raise pSp above its glass transition temperature of about 70oC. This annealing process reduced the temperature sensitivity of PSP. The first set of tests (Case I) provided useful PSP testing experience to identify the potential problems. The airfoil was secured onto the tunnel test section with the angle of attack of 5o. The camera and two UV lamps were secured onto a rigid double U-frame surrounding the test section mounted on the ground floor by bolts, which were approximately 18 inches away from the test section. The camera viewed perpendicularly the airfoil on which ten registration marks were placed for image registration. The total thickness of the basecoat and PSP was about 34 |am and the roughness of PSP was about 2.6 |am. The tests were run at 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 m/s. For each tunnel run period, the tunnel settling temperature was recorded just priori to and just after image acquisition. The temperature change was within 0.17oC during a single period of image acquisition, depending on the flow velocity. The typical results for a speed of 30 m/s and the angle of attack of 5oare shown in Figs. 9.1-9.3. Figure 9.1 is the in-situ Stern-Volmer plot for PSP obtained using pressure tap data, indicating a large variation and a poor correlation between the luminescent intensity and pressure. The corresponding PSP image is shown in Fig. 9.2, where flow is from left to right. Although the low-pressure region near the leading edge is visible in the PSP image, apparent striation patterns and granular features corrupt the quality of the PSP data. This random spatial noise can be clearly seen in the chordwise pressure distribution at the mid-span, as shown in Fig. 9.3. The PSP data at speeds of 10, 20, 40 and 50 m/s had similar noise patterns. Several problems were identified that might contribute to the large spatial noise. First, scratches on the tunnel plexiglass wall caused the streaky patterns. Secondly, PSP suffered from a considerable thickness variation due to poor application of the paint. The effect of the surface roughness could not be completely corrected using the image registration technique for the non-aligned wind-off and wind-on images. The third problem was related to model motion with respect to the lamps. Since the lamps were fixed on the ground floor, the test section underwent a lateral oscillation estimated to be on the order of 10 Hz relative to the lamps. If the model moved in a non-homogenous illumination field, the effect of the motion could not be corrected using the image registration technique. Also, this problem exaggerated the second problem associated with the surface roughness. Note that these problems might not be serious for PSP measurements in high subsonic, transonic and supersonic flows. temperature change between the wind-off and wind-on images, the experimental procedure was revised such that the tunnel was run for one hour and the wind-off image was taken immediately after the wind-on image. In this way, the temperature distribution on the model in the wind-off case was close to that in the wind-on case. Figures 9.4-9.6 show results obtained in Case II tests for a speed of 30 m/s and the angle of attack of 5o. The in-situ Stern-Volmer plot in Fig. 9.4 has a better linearity and an improved correlation with the pressure tap data. The PSP image in Fig. 9.5 is also considerably improved, clearly showing not only a correct chordwise pressure profile, but also the 3D effect near the airfoil edges. The pressure tap gutter lines are also visible in the image since the gutter line epoxy has a different thermal conductivity from the stainless steel such that a small temperature difference exists. As shown in Fig. 9.6, the chordwise pressure distribution at the mid-span clearly shows a reduced noise level compared to the corresponding result in Case I. In Case III tests, careful application of PSP led to a further reduction of the paint roughness to 0.46 pm. To increase the statistical redundancy in image registration, all 16 pressure taps were used in images as registration marks, in addition to the original eight registration marks applied to the paint surface. For better in-situ calibration of PSP, 32 ‘virtual pressure taps’ located at 10 pixels above and below the spanwise location of the actual taps were created and used in images under the assumption of two-dimensionality of flows near the mid-span. As shown in Fig. 9.7, it was found that the use of the additional virtual taps provided an accuracy of 10% better than that achieved by using the actual taps only in least-squares estimation for in-situ calibration. The results of Case III tests are shown in Figs. 9.7-9.9 for a speed of 30 m/s and the angle of attack of 5o. Overall, the results indicate the improved quality of the PSP data and a reduced noise level compared to Case II. The valuable lessons learned from this study of low-speed PSP measurements are summarized as follows. (1) Vibration and model movement with respect to cameras and lamps must be minimized to reduce the image registration error. (2) The temperature-induced errors must be minimized. Not only the tunnel test section, but also the model surface should reach a stable equilibrium state of temperature priori to acquisition of the wind-on images. It is highly suggested that the wind-off image should be acquired immediately after the corresponding wind – on image as soon as the tunnel is shut down. (3) The quality of application of both the basecoat and PSP topcoat to a surface is critical and the paint roughness must be minimized to obtain good results at low speeds. (4) In-situ PSP calibration utilizing a sufficient number of pressure taps is required to eliminate the systematic errors and obtain quantitative results. (5) Image registration is critical to reduce the spatial noise. (6) Scientific-grade CCD cameras (14 and 16 bits) should be used, and averaging a large number of images should be performed to reduce the photon shot noise and other random noises. Note that some of the above procedures for controlling the error sources are not generally applicable to large production wind tunnels. for this cooling process is t3 = kh/( aThc), where hc is the average heat transfer coefficient of the impinging jet and h is the paint thickness. Figure 8.18 shows an experimental setup for step jet impingement cooling. A 475-nm blue laser beam was used for illumination at the impingement point. The luminescent intensity was measured using a PMT and then was converted into temperature using a priori calibration relation. To achieve a small response time, a sub-zero temperature impinging Freon jet generated by a Freeze-it® sprayer was utilized, where a mechanical camera shutter was used as a valve to control issuing of the jet. After the shutter opened within 1 ms, the Freon jet impinged on the surface of a hot soldering iron (about 100oC) which was coated with a 19-|jm thick Ru(bpy)-Shellac TSP. Figure 8.19 shows a rapid decrease of the surface temperature on the thin paint coating to the minimum temperature of about 44oC. The measured timescale t3 of TSP for this cooling process was 1.4 ms. Cool air impingement jet was also tested; the measured timescales were 16 ms and 25 ms for 19 |jm and 38 |jm thick Ru(bpy)-Shellac TSP coatings, respectively. The characteristic timescale for the laser heating is t1 = n2m /(4aT ). Eq. (8.36) describes an exponential decay of the averaged temperature, which gives the characteristic timescale t2 = knm /(2aT hc) for the cooling process due to natural convection. temperature increases rapidly after heating at the film and then decays due to natural convection. To estimate the response times, the asymptotic solutions Eq. (8.32) and Eq. (8.36) were used to fit the experimental data. The response time of TSP for the laser heating process was t1 = 0.25 ms, while the time constant for the cooling process by natural convection was t2 = 12.5 ms. conductivity and hc is the convective heat transfer coefficient. In general, the thermal diffusion time is much larger than the luminescent lifetime for many TSP formulations, and therefore thermal diffusion limits the time response of TSP. In contrast to PSP where oxygen diffusion always obeys the no-flux condition at a solid boundary, heat transfer to the substrate through a non-adiabatic wall inevitably affects the thermal time response of TSP in actual experiments. Hence, the timescale of TSP depends on not only the thermal conductivity of the paint itself, but also the boundary conditions in a specific heat transfer problem for TSP application. To measure the time response of TSP to a rapid change of temperature, Liu et al. (1995c) conducted experiments of pulse laser heating on a metal film and step-like jet impingement cooling.
2019-04-23T16:01:01Z
http://heli-air.net/category/pressure-and-temperature-sensitive-paints/page/3/
Find a Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation Program near me in Baltimore, MD. Drug and alcohol rehabilitation in Baltimore, Maryland is going to be the most effective process if somebody has the opportunity to fully invest themselves into it. Short-term and outpatient programs in Baltimore, Maryland could be the most appealing choice because it seems like a quick and convenient option, but neither have very high rates of success at helping clients due to the insufficient intensity and length of rehab offered at such programs. For instance, anyone who has recently abstained from alcohol or drugs is going to have cravings for many months, and after 30 days these cravings can still be very intense. To send someone home at this time is setting them up to fail with an inevitable relapse. This can be the common outcome after short stints in alcohol and drug rehabilitation in Baltimore, Maryland, but one which may be avoided if a quality inpatient or residential facility in Baltimore is chosen instead of a more seemingly convenient choice. So meet with an alcohol and drug treatment counselor in an alcohol and drug rehab facility in Baltimore today which offers inpatient or residential long-term rehabilitation to hear about the benefits of choosing this type of center. If someone outright refuses to go to alcohol and drug rehab in Baltimore, this doesn't mean they don't want help. Their hesitancy to go to drug and alcohol treatment in Baltimore, Maryland may just be because they are scared about the possibility of having to cope through life without alcohol and drugs after having done so for so long, or it could be because they will have to be accountable for everything that happened through the course of their substance abuse that may be incredibly overwhelming. An intervention is usually necessary to help them overcome these fears in addition to their hesitancy, to allow them to possess a quality lifestyle that doesn't rely on chemicals. Speak with an interventionist or drug and alcohol treatment counselor in Baltimore, Maryland to hold a drug intervention without delay. Household and Income Statistics in: Baltimore, MD. Pressley Ridge is located at 25 North Caroline Street Baltimore, MD. 21231. This is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. They accept Medicaid. The phone number is 410-576-8300 x22701. Serenity and Wellness Clinic is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Adolescent Treatment, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 1133 Pennsylvania Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21201 and phone number is 443-640-8231. Man Alive Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders. The address is 2117 Maryland Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 410-837-4292. Pine Heights Comp Treatment Center is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 888-668-9194. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Private Insurance. They are located at 3455 Wilkens Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21229. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Assistance For Hearing Impaired. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Payment Assistance. Located at 1111 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD. 21201. The phone number is 410-837-2050. Specialized in Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare. Located at 5920 Eastern Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21224. The phone number is 410-631-2772. Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. This facility accepts Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Military Insurance - located at 5200 Eastern Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21224. The phone number is 410-550-0016. New Vision Behavioral Health Servs Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-254-4343. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment. They are located at 5718 Harford Road Baltimore, MD. 21214. Baltimore Crisis Response Inc is located at 5124 Greenwich Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21229. This is a specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. They accept Medicaid, Payment Assistance. The phone number is 410-433-5255. Lane Treatment Center is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-244-7350. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Dui/Dwi Offenders and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Military Insurance. They are located at 2117 Maryland Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21218. JHBMC Creative Alternatives is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 1821 Portal Street Baltimore, MD. 21224 and phone number is 410-631-6148. Specialized in Adolescent Treatment, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Payment Assistance. Located at 5807 Harford Road Baltimore, MD. 21214. The phone number is 410-444-2100. Open Arms LLC is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Adolescent Treatment, Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Military Insurance - located at 4201 Belmar Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21206. The phone number is 443-627-3593. Specialized in Assistance For Hearing Impaired. Payment forms accepted: Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance. Located at 4201 Primrose Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. The phone number is 410-764-8560. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Various Payment Options - Contact Facility. Located at 140 West Street Baltimore, MD. 21230. The phone number is 410-752-4454. Addiction Treatment Services is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Assistance For Hearing Impaired. The address is 5200 Eastern Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21224 and phone number is 410-550-0051. Center for Addiction Medicine is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Methadone Detox, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-225-8240. They specialize in Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance. They are located at 827 Linden Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21201. Apex Counseling Center LLC is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-522-1181. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Spanish Speaking and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, Private Insurance. They are located at 3200 Eastern Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21224. I Cant We Can is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Short-Term Drug Rehab, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders. This facility accepts Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance - located at 4432 Park Heights Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. The phone number is 410-728-5174. Dayspring Village is located at 1125 North Patterson Park Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21213. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Adolescent Treatment, Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Women, Residential Beds For Client's Children. They accept Medicaid, Medicare, Private Insurance. The phone number is 410-563-3459 x100. Located at 5710 Bellona Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21212. The phone number is 410-878-6404. Jewish Community Services Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-466-9200. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Military Insurance. They are located at 5750 Park Heights Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. Healthy Lives LLC is located at 2323 Barclay Street Baltimore, MD. 21218. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Adolescent Treatment, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment. The phone number is 443-219-7901. ABA Health Services Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders. The address is 3939 Reisterstown Road Baltimore, MD. 21215 and phone number is 410-367-7821. Johns Hopkins Hospital is located at 1800 Orleans Street Baltimore, MD. 21287. This is a Hospital Inpatient Drug Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Assistance For Hearing Impaired, Spanish Speaking. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Military Insurance. The phone number is 410-955-5280. Focus on Recovery LLC is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Dui/Dwi Offenders. The address is 2115 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 443-414-0917. Therapeutic Soulutions Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Spanish Speaking. The address is 809 East Baltimore Street Baltimore, MD. 21202 and phone number is 443-869-6512. Tuerk House is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Long-Term Drug Rehab that can be reached at 410-233-0684 x104. They specialize in Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Assistance For Hearing Impaired, Spanish Speaking and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. They are located at 730 Ashburton Street Baltimore, MD. 21216. Change Health Systems Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-233-1088. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare. They are located at 2401 Liberty Heights Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. Total Healthcare Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Assistance For Hearing Impaired. The address is 1501 Division Street Baltimore, MD. 21217 and phone number is 410-383-8300 x20845. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicare, Sliding Scale Payment. Located at 3218 Belair Road Baltimore, MD. 21213. The phone number is 443-813-5677. Chrysalis House Inc is a with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 4500 Park Heights Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215 and phone number is 410-483-8870. Hebron House Inc is located at 2300 Garrison Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21216. This is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. The phone number is 410-233-1990. Specialized in Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. Located at 1515 East Biddle Street Baltimore, MD. 21213. The phone number is 410-534-2141. Located at 2225 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD. 21218. The phone number is 410-366-4360. Belair Road Health Solutions is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 4825 Belair Road Baltimore, MD. 21206 and phone number is 410-509-0205 x151. Neuropsychiatry Program at is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 443-444-4540. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, Private Insurance. They are located at 5601 Loch Raven Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21239. Glass Health Programs Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 817 North Calvert Street Baltimore, MD. 21202 and phone number is 443-290-6424. All Walks of Life LLC is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Criminal Justice Clients, Spanish Speaking. The address is 107 East 25th Street Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 410-558-0019. Medstar Union Memorial Hospital is a Hospital Inpatient Drug Rehab with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 201 East University Parkway Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 410-554-2193. Changing Lives at Home Mental Health is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Military Insurance - located at 4805 Garrison Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21215. The phone number is 443-463-9523. No Turning Back is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. This facility accepts Self Payment, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance - located at 2826 Oakley Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. The phone number is 443-708-5249. Maryland Community Health Initiative is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-728-2080. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. They are located at 2410 Pennsylvania Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21217. Gaudenzia Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 443-453-9075. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients, Assistance For Hearing Impaired and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. They are located at 4450 Park Heights Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. Located at 500 Woodbourne Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21212. The phone number is 410-248-0257. Center for Child and Family Traumatic is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 443-923-5900. They specialize in Assistance For Hearing Impaired, Spanish Speaking and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Private Insurance, Military Insurance. They are located at 1750 East Fairmont Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21231. Madonna Healthcare Services Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders. This facility accepts Medicaid - located at 2300 Garrison Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21216. The phone number is 410-233-4039. Dynamic Healthcare is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. This facility accepts Medicaid, Medicare, Payment Assistance - located at 516 South Conkling Street Baltimore, MD. 21224. The phone number is 410-864-8874. Park Heights Health Services Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Short-Term Drug Rehab with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 5260 Park Heights Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215 and phone number is 443-352-8622. NIH NIDA is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 800-535-8254. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Payment Assistance. They are located at 251 Bayview Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21224. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. Located at 7 West Randall Street Baltimore, MD. 21230. The phone number is 410-385-1466. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. Located at 1002 East 20th Street Baltimore, MD. 21218. The phone number is 443-854-7442. Woodbourne Center Inc is a specializing in Treatments for addicts that are LGBT. This facility accepts Medicaid, Private Insurance - located at 1301 Woodbourne Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21239. The phone number is 410-433-1000. Regional Institute for Children and is a with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 605 South Chapel Gate Lane Baltimore, MD. 21229 and phone number is 410-368-7800. Payment forms accepted are Medicaid, Private Insurance, Military Insurance, Payment Assistance. Specialized in Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. Located at 5900 York Road Baltimore, MD. 21212. The phone number is 443-873-8958. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Men. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Private Insurance. Located at 1 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD. 21202. The phone number is 443-449-2996. JHH Houses is located at 2122-2126 Mura Street Baltimore, MD. 21213. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Treatment for Women. They accept Self Payment, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. The phone number is 410-522-1142. Specialized in Treatments for addicts that are LGBT. Payment forms accepted: Medicaid, Medicare, Private Insurance. Located at 5601 Loch Raven Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21239. The phone number is 443-444-3848. My Life Behavioral Health System LLC is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 443-415-7413. They specialize in Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men and accept the following forms of payment: Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Payment Assistance. They are located at 23-25 East North Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21218. Institutes for Behavior Resources Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-752-6080. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients, Spanish Speaking and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Private Insurance, Military Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. They are located at 2104 Maryland Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21218. Marthas Place is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Long-Term Drug Rehab with a focus on Treatment for Women. The address is 1928 Pennsylvania Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21217 and phone number is 410-728-8402 x201. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Military Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. Located at 2520 Pennsylvania Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21217. The phone number is 443-438-4546. House of Change Behavioral Health Ctr is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Short-Term Drug Rehab, Long-Term Drug Rehab with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 5209 York Road Baltimore, MD. 21212 and phone number is 410-323-3500. Recovery Health Services LLC is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 3800 Frederick Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21229 and phone number is 410-233-1400. VA Maryland Healthcare System is located at 10 North Greene Street Baltimore, MD. 21201. This is a Hospital Inpatient Drug Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Criminal Justice Clients. They accept Various Payment Options - Contact Facility. The phone number is 410-605-7000. Sinai Hospital is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Assistance For Hearing Impaired. The address is 2401 West Belvedere Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215 and phone number is 410-601-5355. Urban Behavioral Associates PA is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 700 Washington Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21230 and phone number is 410-779-3102. Specialized in Adolescent Treatment, Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Women, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Assistance For Hearing Impaired. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. Located at 1107 North Point Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21224. The phone number is 410-284-3070. Bridge House Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Long-Term Drug Rehab that can be reached at 410-675-7765. They specialize in Treatment for Men and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. They are located at 30 South Broadway Baltimore, MD. 21231. New Vision House of Hope Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment - located at 200 East Lexington Street Baltimore, MD. 21202. The phone number is 410-466-8558. Weisman Kaplan House is located at 2521-2523 Maryland Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21218. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. They accept Self Payment, Private Insurance, Payment Assistance. The phone number is 410-467-5291. Specialized in Adolescent Treatment, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Assistance For Hearing Impaired. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. Located at 2517 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD. 21218. The phone number is 410-366-2123 x115. People Encouraging People Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Criminal Justice Clients, Assistance For Hearing Impaired. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, Payment Assistance - located at 4201 Primrose Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. The phone number is 410-764-8560. Friendship House is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance - located at 1435 South Hanover Street Baltimore, MD. 21230. The phone number is 410-752-2475. Light of Truth Center Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid - located at 2233 Orleans Street Baltimore, MD. 21231. The phone number is 443-393-2109. Reflective Treatment Center is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Methadone Detox, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment - located at 301 North Gay Street Baltimore, MD. 21202. The phone number is 410-752-3500 x113. Specialized in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. Payment forms accepted: Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Military Insurance. Located at 2901 Druid Park Drive Baltimore, MD. 21215. The phone number is 410-467-6600 x38. Contemporary Family Services Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 3455 Wilkens Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21229 and phone number is 410-525-8601. Bridging the Gap Services LLC is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment - located at 1043 South Hanover Street Baltimore, MD. 21230. The phone number is 410-528-8692. University of Maryland is located at 701 West Pratt Street Baltimore, MD. 21201. This is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Assistance For Hearing Impaired. They accept Medicaid. The phone number is 410-328-3522. Deborahs Place is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Dui/Dwi Offenders. The address is 28 East 25th Street Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 443-857-7987. Specialized in Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance. Located at 3243 Eastern Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21224. The phone number is 410-276-0153. University of Maryland Medical Center is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Seniors, Criminal Justice Clients, Assistance For Hearing Impaired. The address is 701 West Pratt Street Baltimore, MD. 21201 and phone number is 410-328-2207. Bon Secours Next Passage is located at 3101 Towanda Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Dui/Dwi Offenders, Assistance For Hearing Impaired. They accept Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance. The phone number is 410-728-8901. Turning Point Clinic is located at 2401 East North Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21213. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Methadone Detox, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Spanish Speaking. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance. The phone number is 410-675-2113 x226. Essential Behav Health Servs Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-617-8026. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment. They are located at 2204 Maryland Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21218. Essential Behavioral Health Servs Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 2204 Maryland Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 410-617-8026 x114. Northern Parkway Trt Servs Inc is located at 3007 East Northern Parkway Baltimore, MD. 21214. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid. The phone number is 443-475-0737. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Women. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare. Located at 3612 Falls Road Baltimore, MD. 21211. The phone number is 410-467-4357. King Health Systems Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 3502 West Rogers Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215 and phone number is 410-578-4340. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Self Payment, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. Located at 28 South Broadway Baltimore, MD. 21231. The phone number is 410-675-7765. Native American Lifelines is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Treatment for Women. This facility accepts Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Payment Assistance - located at 106 West Clay Street Baltimore, MD. 21201. The phone number is 410-837-2258. Key Point Health Services Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 443-216-4800. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, Military Insurance. They are located at 1012 Soth North Point Road Baltimore, MD. 21224. Deaf Addiction Services at Maryland is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 443-462-3416. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients, Assistance For Hearing Impaired and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Payment Assistance. They are located at 1001 West Pratt Street Baltimore, MD. 21223. Located at 3425 Sinclair Lane Baltimore, MD. 21213. The phone number is 410-366-1151. Chesapeake Wellness Collaborative LLC is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Treatment. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment - located at 5900 York Road Baltimore, MD. 21212. The phone number is 410-589-0999. Healthcare for the Homeless Inc is located at 421 Fallsway Baltimore, MD. 21202. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Assistance For Hearing Impaired, Spanish Speaking. They accept Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. The phone number is 410-837-5533. BNJ Health Services LLC is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare - located at 2701 Washington Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21223. The phone number is 410-624-7894. Specialized in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Criminal Justice Clients. Payment forms accepted: Medicaid, Payment Assistance. Located at 5411 Old Frederick Road Baltimore, MD. 21229. The phone number is 410-744-8100 x103. Baltimore City Counseling Center is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 3301 Belair Road Baltimore, MD. 21213 and phone number is 410-732-0983. Concerted Care Group is located at 428 East 25th Street Baltimore, MD. 21218. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Dui/Dwi Offenders. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid. The phone number is 410-617-0142. Mi Casa Es Su Casa is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Long-Term Drug Rehab with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 3921 Old York Road Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 855-652-7376. Echo House Multi Service Center Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Dui/Dwi Offenders. The address is 1705 West Fayette Street Baltimore, MD. 21223 and phone number is 410-947-1700. Bon Secours Baltimore Health System is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Partial Hospitalization/Day Treatment that can be reached at 410-362-3524. They specialize in Drug and Alcohol Treatment and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, Private Insurance. They are located at 2000 West Baltimore Street Baltimore, MD. 21223. Hidden Garden Keepers Club at is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-764-2266 x7642. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment. They are located at 4120 Patterson Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. Bon Secours Hospital is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-945-7706 x2235. They specialize in Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. They are located at 2401 West Baltimore Street Baltimore, MD. 21223. Helping Up Mission is located at 1029 East Baltimore Street Baltimore, MD. 21202. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Treatment for Men. They accept Payment Assistance. The phone number is 410-675-7500. MedMark Treatment Centers is located at 821 North Eutaw Street Baltimore, MD. 21201. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid, Private Insurance. The phone number is 410-225-9185. Baltimore Cares Behavioral Health Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Dui/Dwi Offenders. This facility accepts Self Payment, Medicaid, Sliding Scale Payment - located at 2300 Garrison Boulevard Baltimore, MD. 21216. The phone number is 410-233-3111. Behavioral Health Clinic is located at 2310 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD. 21218. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Halfway House, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance. The phone number is 410-844-4110. Mi Casa Es Su Casa Behaviorial Health is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Long-Term Drug Rehab with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Men, Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 411 Millington Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21223 and phone number is 443-219-7855. JR Healthcare is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 2310 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD. 21218 and phone number is 410-844-4110. Located at 2401 West Belvedere Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21215. The phone number is 410-601-5461. Johns Hopkins Hospital Broadway Center is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Drug and Alcohol Detox, Methadone Detox, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program that can be reached at 410-955-5439. They specialize in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Assistance For Hearing Impaired and accept the following forms of payment: Self Payment, Medicaid, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. They are located at 911 North Broadway Baltimore, MD. 21205. Fresh Start Comprehensive Center is located at 1 East Mount Royal Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21202. This is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Long-Term Drug Rehab specializing in Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Drug and Alcohol Programs for Pregnant Women, Treatment for Women, Treatment for Men, Dui/Dwi Offenders, Criminal Justice Clients. They accept Self Payment, Medicaid, Medicare, State Financed Insurance, Private Insurance, Sliding Scale Payment, Payment Assistance. The phone number is 443-671-1414. A Step Forward Inc is a Drug and Alcohol Rehab, Halfway House, Outpatient Drug Rehab Program, Long-Term Drug Rehab with a focus on Co-Occurring Mental And Substance Abuse Disorders, Treatment for addicts with Hiv/Aids, Treatments for addicts that are LGBT, Treatment for Seniors, Treatment for Men, Residential Beds For Client's Children, Criminal Justice Clients. The address is 807 North Fulton Avenue Baltimore, MD. 21217 and phone number is 410-462-6001. Glory Health Center Inc is an Outpatient Drug Rehab Program with a focus on Drug and Alcohol Treatment. The address is 4705 Harford Road Baltimore, MD. 21214 and phone number is 410-444-0779.
2019-04-18T13:22:29Z
https://www.drugrehabmaryland.com/drug_treatment_city/Baltimore.htm
We kick off the first round of changes coming with the Commander Revamp by looking at the British Forces. As with all December Balance Preview changes, the changes proposed below are NOT FINAL and will be put through weeks of iteration as we listen to your feedback and continue to test the changes in action. We encourage the community to test and play these changes as much as possible and give any feedback they may have in the Commander Revamp Feedback thread located in the Balance Feedback section of these forums. If you would like to test these and all upcoming Commander Revamp changes, make sure to SUBSCRIBE to the December Balance Preview on the Steam Workshop. The major limiting factors of the Commandos Regiment commander is that, most of the abilities are extremely map-dependent. At the same time, we feel that the low accessibility of the Commandos, as well as Commando’s poor synergy with the faction hurts the commanders versatility. While Mortar Cover and Air Supremacy are extremely strong abilities by themselves, we feel this commander fails to provide any long-term sustainable abilities. The commander has been reworked to support aggressive infantry-oriented play. Since the commander is extremely munitions based, most of the abilities have been reworked to provide a smaller, but more concentrated effect for an affordable cost. We feel that one of the issue of infantry-oriented British builds is the lack of field presence that stems from lack of on-map reinforcement options. Commandos’ most powerful ability is throwing gammon bombs. We find that the Commando SMGs suffer from poor moving performance and tends to typically under perform. At the same time, Commandos’ ambush “bonus” which triggers a non-voluntary sprint is extremely powerful vs weapon teams and Grenadiers, but is becomes a liability vs OKW infantry. Finally, Commandos earn little benefit in terms of combat bonuses with their veterancy. We are changing this ability to benefit all British squads but, again, keep its scope small, targeted and sustainable. The ability now revolves around ambushing, and making advances over enemy territory using smoke. All infantry units will cloak during the duration of this ability, when in cover. Light cover smoke is dropped on non-commando infantry every 15 seconds. Does not apply to commandos. We are changing the way the ability works to give it a more offensive nature. Accuracy bonus and speed increase now affects all infantry squads. A recon plane will now fly over the area before being followed by autocannon armed Typhoons that will strafe vehicles and infantry once. Three heavy bombers will follow up afterwards, bombing the area. * Cost reduced from 50 to 40. * Effects end when the vehicle is fully healed. We are readjusting some of the most extreme risk-reward elements of the ability to allow it to be integrated in more strategies. Command Vehicle no longer affected by a speed penalty or a received accuracy penalty. Still retains the -50% accuracy and the +100% reload time modifier. Loiter time reduced from 90 to 45. Steadily drops 8 shells over 12 seconds at the target position. Part 2 of the Commander Revamp hits the battlefield with some changes coming to the Eastern Front Commanders. As always, we encourage everyone to playtest and give feedback on these changes via the December Balance Preview mod (V1.5 now available) found on the Steam Workshop. Recon Loiters are being adjusted to be more cost effective given their likelihood of being shot down after their first pass. We are enhancing the utility of Shock Troops to reduce their long-time bleed and make them equally viable against both Axis factions. We are also improving the performance of the Shock Troops’ grenade to be on par with other anti-infantry specialists. Hit the Dirt is being adjusted to allow Conscripts to better hold their positions behind cover. Accuracy is lowered to compensate as a trade-off for increased defense and immunity to suppression. We are giving Guards a slight adjustment to improve their damage against infantry and survivability on the field. Their grenades are also being improved to make them better in line with their intended role and performance. The purpose of the new Veteran ability is to allow Guards to provide additional firepower when they are being used in their intended role as a ranged support unit. Increases range by +2.5 to ensure all Guard models can engage targets units on the edge of their maximum range. We are increasing the number of planes to two to improve survivability and increase the number of targets that can be suppressed. Damage and tracking has been adjusted to prevent the IL-2 from wiping lone squads. In order to add more depth to the doctrine, we are expanding its theme to cover a range of techniques used by the Red army to ambush and destroy Wehrmacht tanks and be less reliant on masses of Conscripts armed with PTRS rifles. PTRS Packages are being changed from a simple weapon upgrade to an item that changes the role of Conscripts into an anti-tank unit that can locate and ambush armour at the cost of anti-infantry and anti-garrison power. Requires the squad to be stationary. We are combining Salvage Kits and PMD-6M Mines into one package and reducing the high cost of the Salvage Kits due to the changes in wreck values. AT Gun Ambush Tactics is being given a First-Strike Bonus to improve the ability’s potency when firing from stealth. To benefit other aspects of the army, Tank Hunters is gaining a new ability to allow the commander’s vehicles to also ambush hostiles. Credits for the animations go to the “Wikinger: European Theater of War” mod team. Detection range of 20 for medium/heavy tanks, 15 for light armor. The doctrine primarily relies on strong field presence with multiple Osttruppen squads. However, the lack of scalability of the Osttruppen into the late game hurts the viability of the commander. Thus, to give this commander some staying power, we are changing how the Artillery Officer, Osttruppen, Trenches, and Supply Drop operate. Ostruppen are a cost-efficient utility-oriented infantry that performs well for their cost. To prevent Ostruppen from becoming too powerful when picking up weapons, we are restricting their accuracy bonus to only apply to their rifles. At the same time, we are giving them access to weapon upgrades at Battle Phase 3 to improve their late game scalability. We find that the Artillery Officer has low synergy with the rest of the faction (including all of the doctrines the officer is in). To address this, we are giving the officer a better combat-oriented role, which will allow Wehrmacht players to be slightly more aggressive, even when picking a defensive-oriented doctrine such as the Osttruppen. Squad size increased from 4 to 5. Can temporarily increase squad’s own RA and moving bonuses to allow the officer to assault/draw fire. Does not share a cooldown with smoke. All abilities but Victor artillery remain active should the officer go down. Squad can pick up dropped weapons with 1 weapon slot. Given the doctrine’s reliance on support weapons to deal damage in the later stages, we are giving a supply drop that allows players to make use of the Osttruppen’s ability to cheaply recrew team weapons. We are increasing the utility gained from the doctrine by allowing all infantry to construct defenses. This will give the doctrine more staying power later into a match. G43s are having their timing adjusted to be more in line with other weapons, while being made more useful for elite German troops. Now takes up both weapon slots for Panzergrenadiers and Stormtroopers. As a way to supplement troops in the field, the doctrine is being given a special Panzergrenadier squad that has a number of abilities to support attacks. The following changes iterate on the changes released in the Commander Revamp Part 2. Sprint is being removed from team weapons and snipers to ensure flanks are rewarded. We are increasing the way the commander enhances the utility of Soviet squads to provide better anti-tank support. To prevent Assault Grenades from being a downgrade to the standard Anti-tank grenade, we are reducing their aim time so that more grenades can hit the intended target. The AT Ambush damage bonus is being replaced by a bonus to reload speed, reducing the time to kill approaching vehicles. The damage bonus is being removed due to its potency against infantry. In return, vehicles will be allowed to slowly rotate, allowing assault guns to adjust should units be out of their arc. The IL-2 strafe is being adjusted to be more effective in its role as an anti-infantry weapon that causes suppression. Further adjustments have also been made to spread out the damage inflicted more evenly. Osttruppen are receiving adjustments to allow weapons they pick up to scale better. Their LMG's price is also being adjusted to better match its value. We are adjusting this unit to be less powerful while making it more accessible. The squad now better fills its intended role as a utility and disruption unit. The final segment of the Commander Revamp preview has arrived and is now playable in the December Balance Preview. The changes below focus on the Western Front Commanders of the OKW and USF while expanding and iterating on previous changes of the British, Soviet and Wehrmacht. As always, be sure to test the proposed changes below thoroughly and then give your feedback in the Commander Revamp Feedback thread located in the Balance Feedback section of these forums. The changes below intend to address the performance disparities of the commander without altering its feel. Thus, the commander will continue to perform its role of light-armour support while improving on its effectiveness throughout the course of a match. We are improving the combat capacity of the Greyhound, allowing it to perform as an AI specialist unit that can accompany heavier armour in late-game pushes. The arrival time of the unit has been pushed off to allow opponents to better defend against it. Command Points from 3 to 4. Now has access to a M2HB Mount. Same performance as the M4 Medium, but with 40 range. Canister now targets an area rather than the squad. A collection of cluster bombs will drop over an area detonating on impact. We are changing the air-dropped combat group ability to allow players greater flexibility when designing their army composition. To add the unit some flavour compared to Airborne commander, Support Paratroopers trade access to the Thompson upgrade for a special bazooka upgrade. The paratrooper squad drops no longer drops with random weapons and it is up to the player to decide their loadout. The performance of the special bazookas that paratroopers now get is half-way between vanilla bazookas and panzerschrecks in terms of firepower. The commander has been altered towards heavier vehicle play thanks to improvement to the Dodge’s scalability, M3’s utility and the commander's late game power via more powerful tanks. Furthermore, the commander now includes the benefit of a mortar half track to bring rapid indirect fire to the battlefield and to support mobile advances. In order to offset the commander's newfound power we are removing access to the off-map ability. We will continue to monitor the commander's performance to evaluate whether the presence of an off-map is necessary or not. We are giving the dodge a more scout-oriented harassment role in the early game, allowing it to harass infantry via .50 cal upgrade and mark target vehicles to improve its viability later in a match. We are experimenting with adding light artillery options to the commander. We are adjusting the Mortar HT performance to make it better able to support a mobile army when advancing. We are turning the M3 assault group from a reinforcement halftrack to a unit that will offer the faction flexibility and viability throughout a match. Healing crates will help USF infantry to heal up at a rate much faster than afforded by the ambulance, and allow them to stay in the fight for longer. The new commander ability will help the commander offer some additional offensive options into the late-game. We are changing the main focus of the doctrine from fire abilities to also support aggressive close combat engagements. In order to make up for the doctrine’s lack of late-game super-heavy armour, we are experimenting with adding mobile reinforcement options and smoke. Volksgrenadier infantry can buy the upgrade to change their role and support the aggressive orientation of the doctrine. Largely due to the unit's fixed turret, we find that the unit is under performing for its price. Range increased from 32 to 35. We find that the ability has a high likelihood of failing to destroy stationary targets, for its cost. We find that Luftwaffe Air Support is overly focused on Fallschirmjagers to the detriment of providing strong unit synergy. We are making modifications to the doctrine to allow for a combination of defensive play (fortifications) and abilities that assist in taking and controlling territories. Higher accessibility of smoke and an off-map strike will now improve scalability of the commander. To prevent infiltration Fallschirmjager squads from being overly efficient at wiping squads when spawning out of ambient buildings, we are lowering the initial squad member-count on spawn. This change will allow the target a better chance to flee and also make poorly-planned infiltration missions riskier. * Now also drops smoke. We are improving the performance of field fortifications to allow greater flexibility to the doctrine. In order to avoid needless experimentation, we are giving the emplacement’s weapon strength to match that of the Flak HT. A cost decrease with a small duration decrease will allow the ability to be used more more often,but more tactically when it is needed. The ability, while useful for providing the doctrine with enough infantry presence fails at supporting assaults. The fact that the attack can only occur at territory points make this extremely map-dependent. To prevent infiltration commando squads from being overly efficient at wiping squads when spawning out of ambient buildings, we are lowering the initial squad member-count on spawn. This change will allow the target a better chance to flee and also make poorly-planned infiltration missions riskier. We find the passive tank detection ability available to this squad over performs for an already powerful squads. To offset the reduction in performance we are reducing the cost of the ability to match similar abilities. The reduced duration on Rapid Conscription will make the ability more of a tactical choice. In addition, due to the performance changes to Conscripts, we felt this ability over performs. Our initial testing has found that while the commander lacks strong measures to draw opponents in to take advantage of the commanders ambush capabilities. In order to resolve this we are adding the ML-20 howitzer to the commander. To improve the commander's competitiveness and to provide a unit that can absorb hits for both their infantry and armor, we have added the KV-1 tank. We find that the KV-1 is under performing for its cost. By locking the unit to the Soviet T4 building, we are preventing the unit from being overused as a call-in, while making it available earlier for those who fast tech. The ability is adjusted due to the performance of the Ostruppen squad. We find that the commander ability is over performing vs buildings and stationary non-vehicle targets. We find that the ambush camouflage bonus (+50% accuracy) is now too easy to trigger, especially in the late game where craters are abundant. Nevertheless, we believe that the changes to stealth and the addition of sprint already make this commander ability highly worthwhile. We are making the officer less reliant on his abilities to perform their intended combat role. To prevent the officer from become too powerful, we are preventing them from benefiting from the Coordinated Fire aura. For all core faction changes released in the December Update, check out the Company of Heroes 2 Changelog. Infiltration is being adjusted to be less potent by forcing all abilities to be on cooldown. This will prevent players from spawning a unit and throw a grenade before the other player can respond. A number of units have been changed from call-ins to requiring appropriate tech to be built. This will make the following units less dominant in 1 vs 1 scenarios where the punishment for the lack of teching is not as severe. Equally, these units will now arrive to the field earlier in larger game modes, making them more accessible. Loiters would sometimes last longer than the denoted duration, and could even acquire targets outside the visual indication. Shock Troops have been adjusted to have lower bleed effects on a player’s manpower due to their short-range while their grenade has been improved to assist with flanks and dislodging team weapons. The ISU is being made more reliable against both infantry and armor, while lowering its potential to wipe out squads in a single shot. We are adjusting the IS-2 to be more reliable against infantry due to its slow rate of fire. The ML-20’s high manpower cost is being offset by moving a portion of it into fuel. Damage has been adjusted to be more reliable with lower wiping potential. Loiters are being adjusted to be more cost effective as they are more vulnerable to being shot down after the first pass. With the general changes to repair, Soviet repair stations are being given a manpower price to limit a player’s ability to mass produce them without sacrificing unit production. The reduced duration on Rapid Conscription will make the ability more of a tactical choice. The adjustment was necessary due to the altered performance of the Conscript squad. Duration from 60 to 45. We are making the Forward HQ provide fewer bonuses to units fighting around them and requiring these structures to be converted in friendly territory. Cost has been slightly to compensate. Due to KV-8 now requiring tech, the tank's armour is being increased to improve its role as a breakthrough unit. The DShK is being adjusted to be less potent in terms of raw suppression and damage to match its appropriate cost. We are reinforcing some of the pre-existing abilities of the commander to also revitalize numerous other overlapping Soviet Commanders. In addition to this, we are introducing the KV-1 tank as an armor option to increase the viability of certain commanders. Hit the Dirt is being adjusted to allow Conscripts to trade mobility for survivability. Accuracy is lowered to compensate as a trade-off for increased defense and immunity to suppression. To give the KV-1 a more defined role as a breakthrough unit, we are slightly increasing its durability, and significantly increasing the rate at which it can get repaired. The following changes will result in KV-1’s being 25% faster to repair. Guards are gaining slight adjustments to their damage against infantry and survivability on the field. Their grenades are also being improved to make them better in line with their intended role and performance. New ability: Hit the Dirt. Replaces Trip Wire Flares. Grants 0.75 weapon cooldown and +2.5 range, but renders squad immobile. 2 Second delay, 25 second recharge recharge upon deactivating. To benefit other aspects of the army, Tank Hunters is gaining a new ability to allow the commander’s vehicles to also ambush hostiles. Credits for implementing the bush animations (AKA "Bush Tech") go to the “Wikinger: European Theater of War” mod team. The Elefant is having its damage adjusted to be less capable of quickly bursting down medium tanks, in turn it is receiving improved accuracy to compensate. The leFH’s high manpower cost is being offset by moving a portion of it into fuel. The Pak 43 high manpower cost is being offset by moving a portion of it into fuel. The dive bomb is being made less potent and more costly due to its pinpoint nature and lack of warning flares. No longer deals an instant death critical to infantry. Stuka CAS will now punish armor for being in the area, but be less capable of knocking tanks out in a single loiter attack. We have adjusted the AT strafe to be less potent against non-vehicle targets to prevent it from wiping out infantry, howitzers, and structures in one pass. We have lowered the duration to make the choice more tactical for the player using this ability. Model death count increased due to the stacking effects of later Osttruppen squads. Smoke has been adjusted to be a multi-purpose ability and strengthen the doctrines it is in. The doctrine primarily relies on strong field presence with Osttruppen. However, the lack of scalability of the Osttruppen into the late game hurts the viability of the commander. Thus, to give this commander some staying power, we are changing how the Artillery Officer, Osttruppen, Trenches, and Supply Drop operate. Osttruppen have been adjusted to limit their ability to swarm the field in the early game and be less potent with fallen weapons. In return they can be upgraded to allow them to scale into the late game. Osttruppen call-in ability now starts on cooldown. Cover bonus for slot items from 300% to -25%. The AF officer has received a major overhaul to allow this unit to not only provide a potent support role, but also act as a unit that can lead an assault to help breakthrough the enemy lines and push away infantry units at close range. New ability: Diversion. Reduces squad’s incoming received accuracy by 20%. 25 munitions. Coordinated Barrage ability from 80 to 45. Coordinated Barrage no longer affects mortars. Coordinated Barrage causes on-map artillery to fire at the target location regardless of range. Now has 1 weapon slot. Veternacy 1 Medical Kits replaced with Heavy Mortar Barrage.Drops 5 120mm mortar shells into the selected target area. 30 munitions. Given the doctrine’s reliance on support weapons to deal damage in the later stages, we are giving a supply drop that allows players to make use of the Osttruppen’s ability to cheaply recrew team weapons. Credits to Wilderstreit for the animator set up. Now drops 1 unmanned MG 34 and 1 unmanned Pak 40 at the target site. We are increasing the utility gained from the doctrine by allowing all infantry to construct defenses. This will give the doctrine more staying power as Osttruppen start to become obsolete. The newly-introduced Jaeger Infantry Command Squad will allow players to overcome the traditional munitions-heavy bottleneck the commander has been traditionally suffering from while additional changes have increased this doctrine’s focus on heavy infantry play. Now provides 3 G43s for Panzergrenadiers. Takes up both weapon slots. * Camouflage cost from 30 to 20. * Camouflage now works when moving. Requires all squad members to be in cover. * Infantry can now use the Sprint ability. No upgrade required. Snipers and weapon teams cannot sprint. * Ambush bonus requires squad to be stationary and must have been out of combat for 10 seconds. * 67% damage penalty against team weapons and structures. Pathfinder have been adjusted to better reflect their in-game performance. Beacons have been adjusted to allow more diverse strategies with paratrooper doctrines. The Priest has been adjusted to deal more reliable damage outside of direct hit, but can no longer be decrewed, similar to the Calliope. The Easy-Eight will still have lower moving scatter than most other tanks; previously the E8 had no scatter penalties for moving. The following change will make rocket attacks more accurate, against stationary targets that could previously avoid rockets by being centered with the incoming plane. Our changes aim to allow Recon the ability to have potent scouting units on the field with the advantage of light armor and combat groups that can provide rapid reinforcement, particularly in the late game when squads need to be replaced and/or additional Anti-tank is needed. The goal of this ability is to allow players to capitalize on the presence of light armour and allow infantry to better scout out positions before attacks. We find that this unit is too valuable for Recon company to only provide utility. Thus, the changes allow the unit to perform basic combat roles and scale better into the mid to late game. We are improving the combat capacity of the Greyhound, allowing it to perform as a powerful anti-personnel unit. The arrival time of the unit has been pushed off to allow for opponents to defend against it due to its potency. We’ve given the commander a light form of artillery. While much less potent than Pathfinders and easily dodged, this ability will help the commander shift defensive positions and deny territory. We are changing the air-dropped combat group ability to allow players greater flexibility and add onto their current army composition. Paratroopers no longer spawn with random equipment; stats standardized with regular paratroopers. Still able to plant mines, but cannot use Timed Demo Charges. Any Paratrooper with a Bazooka gets the improved variant. The commander has been altered towards heavy vehicle play thanks to improvement to the WC51's scalability, M3’s utility and the late game power via more powerful tanks. Furthermore, the commander now includes the benefit of a mortar half track to bring rapid indirect fire to the battlefield and to support mobile advances. The WC51 has been modified to be able to fulfill a support / transport role at a low cost by hitting the field with no combat capabilities. Furthermore, The low cost will also allow the WC51 to be repurchased late game to act as a support unit with its MG upgrade and abilities. Deploys a recon plane while target vehicles receives -25% armour and +25% received accuracy. Drops a 155mm artillery barrage into the target area. With the M32 Mortar HT, the goal is to give the Mechanized Doctrine the ability to maintain a strong vehicle composition rather than be forced to rely on infantry based support teams. We are making this unit a more attractive purchase by lowering the cost and making the Assault Engineers more of a side addition to the ability. The half-track has also been improved to provide better support capabilities. Assault Engineers are being boosted to better reflect their short-range nature and their support role. The addition of this ability will give the commander better late game power through the use of more powerful Shermans and ensure that obstacles cannot stall the commander's mechanized nature in the late game. Allows M4A3 76mm tanks to be deployed from the Battalion Command Post; same stats as the M4C, can use Smokescreen ability. Panzerfusiliers have been adjusted to better reflect their performance as a six man squad that can deal with a variety of situations when upgraded. Veterancy 4 accuracy bonus removed. The unit's dominance in team games vs allied armour has been toned down while its Supporting Fire capabilities have been improved to assist the unit's viability against infantry heavy builds. The Sturmtiger is being adjusted to better match its performance to its cost while making it more consistent. We find that Luftwaffe Air Support is overly centered around Fallschirmjager squads to the detriment of the rest of the doctrine's abilities. We are making modifications to the doctrine to allow for a combination of defensive play and abilities that assist in taking other territories. Fallschirmjager are being adjusted to have better stock performance with only minor changes to their veterancy. Now paradrop into the field instead of infiltrating. Recon run is being adjusted to provide more utility. We are improving the performance of field fortifications to allow greater flexibility to the doctrine. In order to avoid needless experimentation, we are giving the emplacement an identical weapons used by the 251 variant. A cost decrease with a moderate duration decrease will allow the ability to be used more more often as a core part of the doctrine to support offensives. We are removing Fallschirmjager drops from the Airborne assault activity of the doctrine to make the ability more accessible. We are changing the main focus of the doctrine from primarily fire related abilities to allow it to support aggressive close combat engagements. In order to make up for the doctrine’s lack of late-game heavy armour, we are adding mobile reinforcement options and smoke. Volksgrenadier infantry can buy the upgrade to change their role and support the aggressive nature of the doctrine. Allows le.IG 18s to fire 5 incendiary rounds into the target area; molotov damage over time, moderate scatter when fired in the FOW. 35 munitions. In order to assist the doctrine’s aggressive role, we are adding a mobile reinforcement option. High speed, but limited maneuverability and light armor 240 health. Due to the unit's fixed turret and low maneuverability, we found it to be highly situational, struggled on close quarters maps and generally under performed for its price. To prevent Infiltration Commando squads from being too efficient at killing squads without warning, we are reducing the squad's initial potency. A lower member-count on spawn will both allow the target a better chance to flee, and also make poorly-planned infiltration missions riskier. We are adjusting Infiltration Commando squad performance to match that of other Commando squads. * Heroic Charge has been adjusted to match other aura based buff. The Artillery’s regiment’s Concentration Barrage has been adjusted to be like other artillery abilities that require LOS while also being less reliant on Anvil to be used to its full potential. The change will make rocket attacks more accurate, against stationary targets that could previously avoid rockets by being centered with the incoming plane. We have adjusted the commander so the abilities are less map dependent to support heavy infantry play with the Commando Glider now playing a key component. Abilities have also been adjusted to be less costly, but also less potent, shifting them from an ‘All or Nothing’ scenario. The glider is being made cheaper to deploy and will now allow the player to be aggressive when using Commando Regiment through its ability to reinforce infantry anywhere on the field. Commandos have been adjusted to be more potent and less reliant on throw their Gammon Bomb to deal damage. They will now scale slightly better with veterancy and be able to blind enemies through their improved smoke grenade. Smoke Grenade and Gammon bomb now share ability cooldown. We have adjusted Smoke Raid to allow for the Commando Regiment to launch incursions into hostile territory while keeping their enemy guessing by providing infantry with smoke cover during the duration of this ability. Smoke has been adjusted to provide cover and the stealth mechanic now requires squads to be in cover. Now delivers smoke at the target location. Mortar Cover has been made less potent in terms on strength, but has also been modified to be less map dependent and can be used in conjunction with an assault to displace enemy forces. We have adjusted Air Supremacy to be less powerful in terms of damage, but now the ability will be more readily available with Typhoons being launched to lead the air raid. The abilities have been adjusted to now be more readily available to the player; they now have greater control of their repair abilities and now have access to a reliable off-map that will support their command vehicle and AVRE. Crew Repair has been adjusted to be more focused on individual vehicles to provide greater control of which vehicles need to be repaired for a considerably lower munitions cost. We have adjusted the Command Vehicle to be more in-line with other aura-based command vehicles. Given that the player must sacrifice a vehicle’s combat potential, we have lowered the direct penalties on the vehicle itself while providing a potent aura to other vehicles to compensate. Two seperate auras for vehicles and infantry. The AVRE has been modified to be more durable against head-on attacks, but also more vulnerable to flanks, requires the tank to expose itself to fire its mortar, and with more down time between shots. This situational ability has been adjusted to be less map dependent and will act as a tool which can displace infantry and weaken structures prior to an assault.
2019-04-24T08:55:17Z
https://community.companyofheroes.com/discussion/244493/december-commander-revamp-changlog/p1?new=1
Continuous exposure to noise can lead to premature hearing loss, reduced cognitive performance, insomnia, stress, hypertension, cardiovascular diseases and stroke. Road noise affects the health of >125 million people in the European Union and Member States are required to map major noise hotspots. These strategic noise maps are usually derived from traffic counts and propagation models because large- scale measurement of the acoustic environment using conventional methods is infeasible. In this study, the authors surveyed the entire city of Southampton, UK using a mobile survey technique, capturing spatial variations in street-level sound characteristics across multiple frequencies from all sound sources. Over 52,000 calibrated and georeferenced sound clips covering 11 Hz to 22.7 kHz are analysed here to investigate variations in sound frequency composition across urban space and then applied to two issues: the definition of naturalness in the acoustic environment; and perceptions of social inequity in sound exposure. Clusters of acoustic characteristics were identified and mapped using spectral clustering and principal components analysis based on octave bands, ecoacoustic indices and dBA. We found independent patterns in low, mid and high frequencies, and the ecoacoustic indices that related to land use. Ecoacoustic indices partially mapped onto greenspace, identifying naturalness, but not uniquely, probably because urban anthropogenic sounds occur at higher frequencies than in the natural areas where such indices were developed. There was some evidence of inequity in sound exposure according to social deprivation and ethnicity, and results differed according to frequency bands. The consequences of these findings and the benefits of city-wide sound surveys for urban planning are discussed. Noise pollution is a serious environmental stressor affecting human health, second only to ultra-fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in its impact (WHO 2011). Noise may be defined as unwanted and unwelcome sound which causes nuisance and irritability, or more simply as sound out of place (Murphy and King 2014, Beutel et al. 2016, DEFRA 2016). About 75% of Europe’s population lives in urban areas and with increasing urbanisation, population density and associated daily human activity, urban environments are becoming noisier and complaints against environmental noise are increasing (EEA, 2014a). Approximately 20% of the European population is exposed to unacceptable noise levels (WHO 2011, EEA 2014a). Road traffic is the main cause of noise pollution in urban settings (Sørensen et al. 2012, EEA 2014a, Brown 2015, Margaritis and Kang 2017) followed by rail and air traffic and industry (EEA 2014a). Beyond Europe the situation may be even worse since in those countries noise pollution is not always considered an environmental problem (Murphy and King 2014). Although people are generally quite resilient to noise exposure, the level of adaptation (which is never totally complete) differs substantially from individual to individual (Sørensen et al. 2012). Long term exposure can lead to annoyance, stress, sleep disturbance and daytime sleepiness, affect cognitive performance in schoolchildren, and the performance of staff and patient outcomes in hospitals (Ramirez et al. 2004, EEA 2014b, Kraus et al. 2015, Leighton 2016). Apart from causing hearing loss and tinnitus, exposure to noise is also linked to the occurrence of hypertension and an increased risk of heart attack, stroke, ischemia and other cardiovascular diseases (Beutel et al. 2016, Fecht et al. 2016, Wang et al. 2016). Noise pollution is characteristically a spatial and temporal phenomenon, largely shaped by urban form and land-use. Considering the elements of urban form in the assessment of urban noise is undoubtedly important for understanding exposure to noise at the street scale (McAlexander et al. 2015, Hong and Jeon 2017). It is widely accepted that the mapping and modelling of noise and sound across space is crucial for visualising and quantifying potential impacts in urban environments (Tang and Wang 2007, EEA 2014a, Murphy and King 2014, Torija et al. 2014). Yet, despite all the evidence and the ability to measure it precisely, the amount of averaged energy or peak levels of noise pollution that people are exposed to in cities has been neglected (Basner et al. 2014). Even less is known about the spatial pattern of the various sound frequency bands that make up the acoustic environment in urban areas. Indeed, very few large-scale surveys have been carried out to capture urban sounds and noise from all sources at street level in a spatially-explicit manner, most noise maps being based on traffic data and sound propagation modelling (Can et al. 2014). Assessing the acoustic environment of an entire city is important because the city is often the management and governance unit within which planning decisions are made. If planners knew the entire landscape they were managing, more informed decisions could be made. However, traditional large-scale acoustic surveys and soundscape assessments are complex, expensive and time-consuming to mount (Kogan et al. 2017, Votsi et al. 2017). Most involve measurement at a small scale (Maria Aiello et al. 2016) at either fixed locations or at stops along soundwalks (Jeon et al. 2013) where sound (or noise levels) and peoples’ reactions are recorded for at least five minutes per location (Hong and Jeon 2017, Kogan et al. 2017). In this paper, the authors present a different approach, using mobile acoustic surveys (Can et al. 2014) made by walking observers. Using this rapid survey approach, we were able to record ~52,000 sound clips across an entire city (~52 km2) and report here the findings from a data mining analysis of the spatial patterning in sound pressure levels according to frequency bands and band combinations. To illustrate the value of a city-wide sound survey, we consider two applications: one related to biodiversity conservation and human well-being; and the second to studies of environmental social equity. Concern about the negative health and well-being consequences of noise has led many authors to ask where its impacts are least felt (Votsi et al. 2017), and this is especially relevant to urban greenspace (Taylor and Hochuli 2017) as a key provider of ecosystem services (Haase et al. 2014, Andersson-Sköld et al. 2018). There is also growing recognition that acoustic environments that are good for humans may also benefit urban biodiversity (Francis et al. 2017, Hedblom et al. 2017). The linking concept is “naturalness”, recognised as a desirable but elusive property in biodiversity conservation since the 1970s (Anderson 1991) and now applied in studies of well-being (Knez et al. 2018). Methods to characterize naturalness in the acoustic environment have come from soundscape ecology (Pijanowski et al. 2011, Sueur et al. 2014) although they have been developed mainly for natural areas (Fairbrass et al. 2017). Frequency bands have been divided into the characteristic sounds of the biotic world, human sources and the physical environment, known as biophony, anthropophony and geophony respectively (Joo et al. 2011, Sueur et al. 2014, Eldridge et al. 2016, Hong and Jeon 2017). There remains doubt, however, whether this classification is fully applicable to urban areas because of the potentially different spectral composition present (Devos 2016, Fairbrass et al. 2017). If ecoacoustic indices could be applied in urban areas, they could offer a useful way to characterize the spatial pattern in naturalness within cities (but also see Kogan et al. 2018). One of the potential consequences arising from spatial pattern in the acoustic environment is social inequity in exposure (Havard et al. 2011, EEA 2014a, Casey et al. 2017, Leijssen et al. 2019). This applies not only to noise but also differential exposure to the various frequency components. There is often a general presumption that socially disadvantaged groups are more exposed to environmental stressors including noise (Mueller et al. 2018, von Szombathely et al. 2018) although this view has not been supported in some studies (Havard et al. 2011, Leijssen et al. 2019). Again, such questions are challenging to address at the whole-city scale and most studies have focused only on road traffic noise (Tonne et al. 2018) rather than sounds from all sources at street level. Using the data gathered from our rapid survey approach, we consider whether perceptions of inequity depend on the sound frequency bands being studied and not only the usual A-weighted noise levels (dBA). How does sound frequency composition differ across urban space? How useful are ecoacoustic indices at characterising naturalness across the city? Do perceptions of social inequity to sound exposure differ according to the frequency bands considered? Sound data were collected in the city of Southampton on the south coast of the UK and covered the whole area (51.8 km2) within the administrative boundaries of the City Council. Much of Southampton lies on a peninsula formed by the Itchen and Test rivers which funnel traffic towards the city centre and the busy freight and passenger terminals at the port. The city’s traffic congestion causes air pollution and noise problems yet is contrasted by many quieter areas of greenspace amounting to c.11.0 km2. This varied urban form might be expected to lead to a similarly varied acoustic environment. Using a spatially-stratified sampling scheme based on land characteristics (see details below), continuous sound recordings were made by walking surveyors within the period 14 July to 25 August 2016 during the morning rush hour (7:00–9:00), afternoon (13:00–15:00) and evening rush hour (16:30–18:30). It was not practicable to define precisely the routes taken by surveyors due to road closures, traffic and other constraints beyond our control. Instead, start and finish points were defined and surveyors were asked to walk through as many land cover types as possible along their route. The data for all time periods have been merged for the analyses in this paper and temporal differences are not considered further. Recordings were made using Fostex FR–2LE and TASCAM DR–40 recorders, with PCB sensor signal conditioners and microphones. Equipment was carried inside rucksacks, with the microphone mounted above the shoulders at a height of 1.65–1.70 m from the ground. To minimise impact on recordings, surveyors wore soft-soled shoes, soft clothes, no jangling accessories such as necklaces, and walked at a constant pace. Surveys were not carried out during windy and rainy days, although variations in wind during surveys were inevitable. The location of the walking observer was logged every ten seconds as a track using a Garmin Oregon 400t GPS unit. The recording sampling rate used was 96 kHz to ensure coverage of the ultrasonic range, theoretically to 48 kHz but limited to 22.7 kHz here due to microphone sensitivity. Microphones were calibrated using a Brüel & Kær sound level calibrator type 4230 emitting 94 dB at 1000 Hz, at the beginning or end of survey days. Both low and high frequency components showed some difference between equipment sets and therefore an empirical calibration was additionally used with corrections of around 1 dB below 44 Hz and 2 dB above 5.7 kHz. Sound clips were saved as uncompressed wav files. Custom-written routines in Matlab used Fast Fourier Transforms to calculate the sound pressure levels (SPL) in octave bands (Table 1) for non-overlapping 10-second clips from each sound recording, centred on the timestamp of each stored GPS coordinate. SPLs were then used to calculate dBA (A-weighted decibel levels) through the logarithmic addition of the factors in Table 1. Octave bands used for analysing the frequency composition of city sound clips and conversion factors for A-weighting (dBA). Many ecoacoustic indices have been proposed (Joo et al. 2011, Sueur et al. 2014, Eldridge et al. 2016, Villanueva-Rivera and Pijanowski 2016) based on weighted combinations of SPL in frequency bands. However, most use narrow bands of 1 kHz in contrast to the octaves used here. Biophony is often defined as sounds between 2 and 8 kHz, and anthropophony as sounds between 1 kHz to 2 kHz (e.g. Gage & Napoletano, 2001). The nearest equivalent for biophony calculated from octaves would be bands 9 and 10 (i.e. 2.8 to 11.4 kHz) and anthropophony bands 7 and 8 (710 Hz to 2.8 kHz). In calculating approximations to ecoacoustic indices based on octave bands, here they have been re-named using the word “octave” to avoid confusion. Specifically, a Normalized Difference Octave Index (NDOI) was calculated as: NDOI = ([B9 + B10]–[B7 + B8])/(B7 + B8 + B9 + B10), where Bx refers to band x in Table 1. An Octave Diversity Index (ODI) was calculated using the Shannon-Weiner function as: ODI30 = –∑px ln px, where px is the proportion of energy in band x, included only if its SPL was >30 dB. (The 30dB cut-off was simply used to focus the index on higher SPLs). For both indices, the calculations were made on linear measures of power, e.g. an SPL of 50 dB was first converted using 10(50/10) before manipulation. These measures are not equivalents of the usual ecoacoustic indices but have some of the same characteristics. Two approaches were used to detect patterns in the sound pressure levels among octaves within the sound clips. First, treating the dB levels in the 11 octave bands as variables, a variant of spectral clustering was used to identify natural groupings of the sound clips while making minimal assumptions about the data. Spectral clustering is a non-parametric eigenvector approach based on graph theory that is unaffected by outliers, noise in the data or the shape of clusters, and which often outperforms traditional clustering methods (Von Luxburg 2007, Hastie et al. 2009). It becomes computationally unfeasible, however, when the sample size and number of variables are large. To overcome this, we used the novel implementation in the R package SamSPECTRAL (Zare et al. 2010, Zare and Shooshtari 2015) which combines a faithful sub-sampling scheme with spectral clustering through a modification of the similarity matrix based on potential theory. Furthermore, it integrates an objective, data-driven method to identify the optimum number of clusters in contrast with techniques such as K-Means clustering or Kohonen’s self-organising maps that require the user to predefine the number of clusters to extract. In SamSPECTRAL this is achieved through two tuning parameters which determine the resolution in the initial spectral clustering stage, and then the extent to which the identified clusters are finally combined (Zare and Shooshtari 2015). After randomizing the order of sound clips to remove dependencies, the tuning parameters were defined on a random sample of 5000 clips for efficiency, and then used for clustering the entire data set of 52,366 sound clips based on the 11 octave variables. The result in our case is an objective definition of how many different patterns of SPL exist across the octave bands within the city. In the second approach, standardized principal components analysis (PCA) was applied to identify linear combinations of the dB levels in the 11 octave bands that best summarised the variance across all sound clips. A varimax-rotated solution was chosen to provide good separation of octaves among principal components (PCs), and all PCs with eigenvalues greater than 1.0 were extracted. A second PCA was also run including the 11 octave bands plus dBA, NDOI and ODI30 since, according to Devos (2016), ecoacoustic indices are naturally co-linear with each other and other acoustic information. The aim here was to reduce the octave bands and ecoacoustic indices to fewer, zero correlated factors to ease interpretation and to facilitate mapping. The PCs and sound frequency components were mapped in ArcGIS 10.4 and interpolated to 30 m resolution using Inverse Distance Weighting (IDW) with a power of 2 and fixed radius of 200 m. A resolution of 30 m is appropriate because the sound clips were gathered during 10 seconds of walking, positioned using GPS with 5–10 m error, making the longest axis of the sampled space around the recorder about 20–30 m in length. Each sound clip was assigned membership to a cluster identified by spectral clustering and a majority rule used to map the modal cluster per 30 m pixel. To interpret the maps in terms of land use and land cover (especially relevant to the consideration of naturalness), we overlaid the sound data on OS MasterMap 1:1250 scale topographic vector data (downloaded 10 Mar 2015 from the EDINA Digimap Ordnance Survey Service http://digimap.edina.ac.uk). The vector data were rasterized to 1 m resolution and then aggregated to 30 m resolution, resulting in a % land cover classification based on 900 sample pixels. Only the % of vegetated cover is used here as a generalized gradient of urbanisation. In addition, we used the OS MasterMap Greenspace product (Ordnance Survey 2007) to identity polygons of greenspace within the city. To focus on vegetated areas, we removed the polygons whose primary function was classified as ‘Land Use Changing’ or ‘Private Garden’, and areas where the primary form was listed as ‘Beach Or Foreshore’, ‘Inland Water’ or ‘Multi Surface’. To derive evidence on whether certain sections of society live in areas with less favourable acoustic conditions (European Commission 2016, Casey et al. 2017), we examined the relationship between sound characteristics and ethnicity or social deprivation for the 766 Output Areas (OAs) in Southampton. Output Areas are the UK’s base geographic unit for census data, comprising spatial clusters of a minimum of 40 resident households and 100 resident people, designed to have similar population sizes and to be as socially homogenous as possible. For the analyses here, ethnicity was collapsed into a single metric “% self-declared white” and deprivation into “% with no deprivation”, based on the 2011 Census returns (data available at https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/). Spatial multiple regression models (predicting three different sound characteristics from ethnicity and deprivation) were created using the R package spdep (Bivand and Piras 2015), spatial weights being defined using queen contiguity and spatial dependency calculated using Moran’s I and Lagrange Multiplier tests. The choice between spatial lag and spatial error models was based on the decision rules of Anselin (2005). Specifically, we first compared the probabilities associated with the Lagrange Multiplier tests for spatial lag and spatial error terms. Where these were both significant, we chose the spatial model based on the smaller of the probabilities when Robust Lagrange Multiplier tests were applied instead. In the one case where a spatial lag model was selected over a spatial error model (see Results), we ran both models (not shown here) and found no material difference in their interpretation, meaning the outcome was robust to the model used. A workflow for the entire analysis is given in Figure 1. Data analysis workflow. Input data are shown in blue boxes and outputs (with corresponding Table and Figure numbers) are given in pink boxes. Calculation stages are shown in parallelograms. With the settings used (see Methods), spectral clustering classified 52,341 of the 52,366 sound clips into five natural groupings, the remaining 25 sound clips being unresolved. Of the classified clips, 45.7% fell into the first cluster, 35.7% into the second and 18.5% into the third, the remaining two clusters making up less than 0.1% of clips. The mean frequency profiles of the 99.9% of clips comprising clusters 1, 2 and 3 showed a gradual decline in SPL across the octaves (Figure 2), all profiles showing a slight peak in band 7 (710 to 1420 Hz). Clusters 4 and 5 were very different, showing a wide peak in octaves 7, 8 and 9 for cluster 5, and a pronounced single peak in octave 10 for cluster 4 (Figure 2). The elevations of the lines in Figure 2 show strong differences in the overall SPLs between clusters and this was also evident for dBA for the three dominant clusters (Figure 3). With the sample size being so large, p-values are unreliable indicators of differences between groups, but 95% confidence intervals for the means of dBA, ODI30 and NDOI did not overlap for clusters 1, 2 and 3. Effect sizes (eta squared) were 77.2%, 4.7% and 1.6% respectively for dBA, ODI30 and NDOI, meaning that despite the differences in spectral composition, the dominant feature differing among sound clips was loudness. Mean frequency response profiles for the five clusters recognised by spectral clustering. The light blue, grey and orange profiles made up 99.9% of sound clips. Frequency distribution of SPL (dBA) by spectral cluster. The means were 68.0, 49.7 and 58.8 dBA respectively for clusters 1, 2 and 3 (n = 52,296). Principal components analysis extracted three rotated PCs from the 11 octave bands accounting for 48.8%, 31.3% and 14.2% of the variance respectively (Table 2). PC1 was dominated by mid-range frequencies from 177 to 11360 Hz, whereas PC2 featured frequencies below 117 Hz and PC3 high frequencies from 5.7 to 22.7 kHz. Note that PC1 included all the frequency range defined as characterising either biophony or anthropophony, without distinguishing them. Rotated component matrix for the PCA on the 11 octave bands using varimax rotation with Kaiser Normalization. Highest weightings are emphasised in bold. When the PCA was repeated including the ecoacoustic indices, PC1 was dominated by SPL in the frequencies from 117 Hz into the ultrasonic region, and overall SPL (dBA). PC2 again focused on lower frequencies whereas PC3 captured NDOI and PC4 the ODI30 (Table 3). As PCs are orthogonal, this is confirmation that NDOI and ODI30 represent characteristics not captured by the octave bands or each other, although together they accounted for only 17.5% of variance. Component matrix for the PCA on the 11 octave bands, dBA and two ecoacoustic indices using varimax rotation with Kaiser Normalization. Highest weightings are emphasised in bold. PC1 in Table 3, which represented all octave bands 5 to 11 and overall dBA, showed strong spatial patterning in the city and was, in fact, indistinguishable from an interpolated map of dBA alone (Figure 4). Although some quiet areas corresponded to greenspace (e.g. the Common outlined in panel b of Figure 4), others were simply suburban neighbourhoods and areas with less traffic. The main road network is obvious as the primary source of broad-spectrum urban noise in the city. Almost identical spatial pattern in PC1 from Table 3(panel a) and dBA (panel b). The Common lies within the dashed polygon in panel b. High octave diversity (as represented by PC4 in Table 3) visually correlated with the occurrence of trees in the city (red areas in Figure 5). This was especially obvious on the Common (marked on Figure 4). Whether the source of more diverse sounds is the trees themselves (e.g. the rustling of leaves) or associated birdlife is not known. However, this relationship was not universal and other parts of the city without trees also had high octave diversity. As the ODI30 index only included bands with an SPL >30 dB, these areas might simply be noisier across a wide spectrum of frequencies, but further research is clearly needed. Spatial pattern in PC4 in Table 3 which mostly correlates with acoustic diversity above 30 dB (ODI30). Red colours show greater diversity in sound frequencies. NDOI (PC3: Table 3 and representing the contrast between biophony and anthropophony) also showed strong spatial patterning although its interpretation was not always clear (Figure 6). By overlaying areas defined as greenspace in the city, it is apparent that not all greenspace has acoustic characteristics that might be regarded as natural (Figure 6b) and, equally, not all acoustically natural areas were greenspace (Figure 6a). This might partly be explained by the presence of major roads which are clearly highlighted by cluster 1 from the spectral clustering (also plotted on Figure 6) as the major source of noise in the city with a mean SPL of 68 dB and high frequency components. Spatial pattern in PC3 from Table 3 (cf. NDOI) that lies outside areas defined as greenspace (panel a) and within greenspace (panel b). Cluster 1 from Figure 3 is overlaid as black pixels and shows a close match to the main road network. Figures 7 and 8 focus on opposite ends of the sound spectrum. The hotspot map in Figure 7 shows areas with the highest SPL in frequencies from 5.6 kHz into the ultrasonic range. The pattern is difficult to explain but some city locations with high SPL appear to coincide with industrial and commercial premises while others might be transient sounds from road vehicles (e.g. motorbikes). The map of low frequency sound (11 to 88 Hz) in Figure 8 includes noise below the level of normal human hearing. The concentration of high SPL in the south-west might be related to port activity such as heavy goods vehicles and loading cranes, but sounds at this frequency are the ones most affected by wind noise and need careful attribution to source. Other locations with high SPL at low frequencies appear to be redevelopment sites undergoing building work. Hotspot map of high sound frequencies concentrated at 5.7–22.7 kHz (PC3 in Table 2). Red colours show higher SPL. Hotspot map of low sound frequencies concentrated below 88 Hz (PC2 in Table 2). Red colours show higher SPL. When the fraction of vegetated land cover was binned into 20% quantiles and the mean SPL extracted for each octave band, there was a tendency for band means to decline with vegetated cover (Figure 9). The separated components for biophony (bands 9 and 10), anthropophony (bands 7 and 8) and dBA generally declined with vegetated cover over 60%, although there was little difference in the NDOI or ODI30 as vegetated cover increased suggesting that the greenest pixels tended to be quieter rather than possessing different frequency characteristics (Figure 10). Mean SPL profiles across 11 octave bands for sound clips grouped according to vegetated cover within the 30 m pixel where the recording was made. Sound characteristics grouped by percentage of vegetated cover within the 30 m pixel where the recording was made. If sound characteristics are analysed only against the land cover in the immediate 30 m pixel, sound sources beyond the pixel are ignored, for example, an adjacent road. By relating the sound characteristics to clusters of pixels (Table 4), it is possible to account for the composition of neighbouring pixels too. Here there was a slight tendency for the percentage of vegetated cover to differ according to sound clip clusters both within the 30 m pixel where the recording was taken and in windows of 3 × 3, 5 × 5 or 7 × 7 pixels i.e. up to a distance of 195 m away (Table 4). Cluster 2 showed a slightly elevated percentage of vegetated cover at all patch sizes and cluster 5 was especially distinct although based on the smallest sample size. These results suggest there is some relationship between the sound characteristics identified by the clusters and vegetated land cover at the landscape scale. This further supports the visual interpretations of the maps (Figures 5 and 6) given earlier. Percentage of vegetated land cover within pixel groupings associated with the sound clip clusters derived from spectral clustering. Values are mean % ± the standard deviation followed by the sample size of sound clips (slight differences between columns due to missing pixels in the land cover data). The different spatial patterns in Figures 4, 7 and 8 (dBA, high frequencies and low frequencies respectively) suggest the possibility of different levels of sound exposure by residents across the city. If, in addition, those residents are spatially clustered according to socio-economic metrics, there may be different patterns to inequity of exposure depending on which sound frequency bands are used. To assess this, we applied multiple ordinary least squares (OLS) and spatial regression models to predict their mean values according to census Output Areas (OAs), using the percentage of self-declared white residents and percentage of residents showing no deprivation as the predictor variables (Table 5). Evidence of social inequity in noise exposure as assessed by Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) and Spatial Lag or Spatial Error models. AIC = Akaike’s Information Criterion. ns = not significant, * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001. –ve or +ve indicate the sign of the regression coefficient. (For technical details of the tests applied see Anselin, 2005; Bivand & Piras, 2015). For the three sound frequency groupings, Moran’s I showed highly significant spatial autocorrelation among Output Areas and highly significant spatial lag coefficients in the regression models (see rows 6, 12 and 15 in Table 5). This indicates strong bias if OLS is used to analyse these data instead of the spatial models. For example, the apparent highly significant difference in dBA and low frequencies according to the percentage of self-declared white residents disappeared to non-significance when spatial dependency was adequately modelled. Despite this, dBA and sound pressure levels at low frequencies differed significantly according to the percentage of the population showing no deprivation. As the regression signs were negative, this indicates decreasing SPLs and less noisy environments as the percentage of the population showing no indicators of deprivation increased. The sound pressure levels at high frequencies also differed significantly (p < 0.05) according to the percentage of self-declared white residents, again with a negative sign indicating lower SPLs as the percent of white residents increased. Some caution is needed in interpreting these results as the effect sizes were small and errors showed some signs of heteroskedasticity. Also, although the multicollinearity condition number (Table 5, row 7) was below the critical threshold of 30 (Dormann et al. 2013), a closer look at social deprivation and ethnicity as independent predictors may be warranted. The crucial point here though is evidence of different spatial patterns in perceptions of inequity according to which sound frequency band groupings are used. In this paper, the authors mapped the acoustic environment of an entire city using a rapid field survey technique as opposed to the more usual traffic count and propagation modelling or spot measurement approaches. By recording sound on the move rather than at static recording stations, it was possible to gather over 52,000 georeferenced sound clips of 10 seconds duration each within a six-week survey period. Based on an average walking speed of 1.4 ms–1, the surveyors covered 733 km and produced 145 hours of sound recordings. These figures may help future researchers to decide whether a similarly extensive survey is appropriate in their setting. Short duration sound recordings show greater between-clip variation than longer recordings, and some form of spatial averaging (such as the Inverse Distance Weighted interpolations used here) is necessary to smooth out chance events (Can et al. 2014). More work is needed on the equivalence of mobile and static surveys (Guillaume et al. 2019) but we believe that our approach was successful in addressing the need for better information on the measured levels of sound energy citizens are exposed to from all sources at the whole city scale (Basner et al. 2014). Furthermore, extensive surveys can go some way to overcoming the limitations highlighted by Fairbrass et al. (2017) that arise when studying only a few land cover types. The outputs produced in this paper are largely consistent with expectation (e.g. dBA tracking the main road network – Figure 4) but with additional information across a wide frequency range. An important refinement for the future would be to include the temporal component of the acoustic environment (Hong and Jeon 2017), omitted in this paper for brevity. No attempt was made here to consider the human perception of sounds in the city. Our survey therefore focused on the acoustic environment, defined in ISO 12913-1:2014 as the “sound at the receiver from all sound sources as modified by the environment”. In contrast, the term “soundscape” (formerly used in a general sense to indicate the combination of sounds in a landscape) is now reserved for the “acoustic environment as perceived or experienced and/or understood by a person or people, in context” (see ISO 12913-1:2014 and Hong and Jeon 2017). There is thus a distinction between studies that focus on perception (a psycho-acoustic problem) and those that consider exposure to levels of sound which may or may not be perceived. For example, there are potential health impacts from ultrasound which lies beyond the range of human hearing and therefore cannot be perceived by the individual being exposed (Leighton 2016). Human acoustic perception is also irrelevant in biodiversity studies. By undertaking an empirical study of an entire city rather than at selected study sites, it was possible to address a number of research questions at the scale relevant to urban planners. To address our first research question (whether sound frequency composition differs across urban space), two approaches were used to identify groupings in the sound pressure levels among octave bands within the sound clips. In the first, spectral clustering was applied to find natural groupings in the data, implemented using the R code SamSPECTRAL (Zare et al. 2010, Zare and Shooshtari 2015). This code was developed for large flow cytometry data sets and we know of no other application to sound data. Despite the need to set a scaling parameter and separation factor, we found the number of clusters defined after the initial separation and then final combining stages was always low. SamSPECTRAL is good at separating rare and overlapping clusters (Zare et al. 2010), which are often challenging for other algorithms, and we therefore accept that only a few distinctive clusters exist in the city. In fact, at observer level, Southampton is dominated by broad-spectrum noise that naturally clusters 99.9% of locations into just three groups with mean levels at 50, 59 and 68 dBA (Figure 3). As these are averaged levels along the routes our surveyors walked, some routes taken by pedestrians are likely to include far higher noise levels that could potentially impact on human health. The cluster of locations with the loudest sounds were characterised by a broader shoulder at frequencies below 88 Hz and the largest difference in sound pressure levels between clusters occurred at around 710 to 1420 Hz, within our definition of anthropophony. This, plus the fact that the commonest cluster mapped neatly onto the main road network (Figure 6), leaves little doubt that road traffic is the principal source of noise in the city and, in our experience, there are few places where the sound of traffic is not audible. Further work is encouraged using spectral clustering on sound data, for example, examining how choice of similarity graph and associated metrics affect the outcome (Hastie et al. 2009). As an alternative to spectral clustering, the simpler (but less robust) principal components analysis was also applied to the sound data as an unsupervised classifier (Hastie et al. 2009). Two key findings emerged: (i) that when octave bands were used alone, the first three principal axes extracted corresponded to mid, low and high frequencies; and (ii) when ecoacoustic indices and dBA were also included, these fell onto their own principal components. By definition, these findings indicate weak correlation between the SPLs in the low, mid and high frequency ranges that translate into different spatial patterns in sound frequency components. The PCAs also indicate that the ecoacoustic indices contain information that is unique between them and in comparison with octave band combinations such as dBA. This somewhat counters the view that ecoacoustic indices are colinear with each other and other acoustic metrics (Devos 2016). Thus despite the overwhelming nature of noise in the city, principal components analysis was able to recognise distinctive contributions (totalling ~17% variance) from the ecoacoustic indices used here. This suggests that some signal of the natural acoustic environment might be detected although in combination with anthropogenic sounds its influence in terms of SPL is weak (Devos 2016). In examining our second research question, whether ecoacoustic indices are useful for characterising naturalness across the city, we found some (but not a unique) correspondence between the principal component summarizing NDOI and greenspace across the city (Figure 6). Furthermore, analysis showed some tendency for noise to decrease when vegetation cover was over 60% although this could be an artefact of those areas having fewer roads rather than an attenuating effect of vegetation. In reality, many areas of greenspace are affected by adjacent road traffic noise and there are few places where it is quiet enough to appreciate the sounds of nature (biophony: Joo et al. 2011, Pijanowski et al. 2011). This should not be seen as a failure of NDOI to recognise naturalness, but rather that other factors are involved. Possibly of more concern was the finding that NDOI was capable of suggesting naturalness where there was no greenspace. Although most anthropogenic sounds occur at low frequencies (Joo et al. 2011), even the upper frequencies more characteristic of biophony appeared to be dominated by human-generated sounds in Southampton’s urban environment. Thus NDOI (an index of biophony and anthropophony) showed limited value as a measure of naturalness when used in isolation. A similar conclusion was reached by Fairbrass et al. (2017) who found London’s urban environment to be dominated by a wider frequency range of anthropogenic sounds than occur in the more natural habitats where ecoacoustic indices were developed. One limitation of the data analysed here is that surveys took place only in the summer months when the breeding season of birds is over and they are less inclined to sing; this may have weakened the prominence of biophony in the recordings. A further complicating factor is the lack of a single definition of greenspace (Taylor and Hochuli 2017) and this is especially problematic in cities. We used as our starting point the OS MasterMap Greenspace product (Ordnance Survey 2007) but removed private gardens (and a few other features – see Methods) because gardens are mixed surfaces of unmapped composition which dominate the city. While some definitions of greenspace include private gardens, others consider only publicly-accessible land (Taylor and Hochuli 2017). However, in terms of the acoustic environment and indeed for biodiversity, gardens may actually function as “natural” habitats and could explain some of the anomalies in Figure 6a. More work is clearly needed on the role of private gardens in the urban acoustic environment. These findings have implications for Southampton City Council’s Green Space Strategy which has the admirable aims of enhancing economic value, social inclusivity and cohesion, health and wellbeing, and biodiversity (SCC 2008a, 2008b). Neither document mentions the impact of noise or sound on greenspace and our data suggest that many green urban areas may simply be too narrow to preserve a natural acoustic environment. If the city were to devote space to soundscape design for the public good (Brown and Grimwood 2016) and for biodiversity, one obvious large location would be the Common (Figure 4) which already has protected status as a Site of Special Scientific Interest. (Opportunities for creating new greenspace are almost non-existent). However, the heavy traffic that travels north-south along the Avenue bisects the Common, lessening the chance for the development of a natural acoustic environment (see the dominance of noise in Figure 4b). The incursion of some noise into greenspace, however, may not lessen its benefits to human well-being (in contrast to biodiversity) since the perceived benefits of vegetation in noise reduction far outweigh the actual attenuation achieved (Van Renterghem 2018). Very little appears to be known about the difference between exposure to the acoustic environment and its perception in non-human species. The fact that wild species occupy noisy urban areas in which sounds interfere with their ability to breed (Warren et al. 2006, Halfwerk et al. 2011) might suggest that species perceive a site as suitable breeding habitat when it is not, an example of an “ecological trap” (e.g. Hale & Swearer, 2016). Our third research question asked whether perceptions of social inequity to sound exposure differed according to the frequency bands considered. We found that residents living in different parts of the city partitioned by census Output Area were exposed to unequal levels of noise and from different frequency components. The strongest effect (but still relatively weak) was that those living with social deprivation were exposed to noisier environments at low frequencies. The difference was less significant for dBA and not significant (at p < 0.05) for high frequencies. There was also a very slight tendency for exposure to noise to be lower in areas with a higher percentage of white residents but only at high frequencies (once adjustment had been made for spatial autocorrelation). Other European studies have found similar inequity in noise exposure in London (Tonne et al. 2018), Hamburg (von Szombathely et al. 2018) and Bradford (Mueller et al. 2018), but not in Paris (Havard et al. 2011) or Amsterdam (Leijssen et al. 2019). However, none of these studies considered differences in exposure according to frequency band because measurement data were lacking. Given the relationship between the characteristics of the acoustic environment and urban land use, our findings for Southampton are possibly a consequence of the unequal access to greenspace experienced by different societal groupings, an effect previously noted for Leicester (Comber et al. 2008). The variation in people’s responses to sounds (Sørensen et al. 2012) makes it difficult to generalise about what the consequences of differential exposure to sound frequency components might be and also what might be regarded as a bad or a pleasant soundscape. This is something that might itself vary with experience and ethnicity (Moscoso et al. 2018). However, having acoustic data across an entire city makes it possible to consider the impacts of alternative locations for developments on issues of equity within the planning process (Comber et al. 2008), an important step towards sustainable urban development. Surveys were conducted by TAS, PEO, Jerome Kreule, Dominika Murienova and Rodrigo Batistela, funded by the Excel and University of Southampton Placement Schemes. This work is part of the activities of the Energy and Climate Change Division and the Sustainable Energy Research Group at the University of Southampton (www.energy.soton.ac.uk). It is also supported by EPSRC under grants: EP/J017698/1, Transforming the Engineering of Cities to Deliver Societal and Planetary Wellbeing, EP/N010779/1, City-Wide Analysis to Propel Cities towards Resource Efficiency and Better Wellbeing and EP/K012347/1, International Centre for Infrastructure Futures (ICIF). This study was conceived and designed by TAS, PEO and PW. Fieldwork was organised and led by TAS. PW wrote the Matlab routines and TAS and PEO undertook the data analyses. TAS generated the maps in ArcGIS and all authors contributed to writing the manuscript. Anselin, L. 2005. Exploring Spatial Data with GeoDa: A Workbook [online]. Available from: http://www.csiss.org/. Bivand, R and Piras, G. 2015. Comparing Implementations of Estimation Methods for Spatial Econometrics. Journal of Statistical Software [online], 63(18). Available from: http://www.jstatsoft.org/v63/i18/. DOI: https://doi.org/10.18637/jss.v063.i18. Brown, AL and Grimwood, CJ. 2016. Loci for urban soundscape planning, design and management Loci for urban soundscape planning, design and management. In: The 22nd International Congress on Acoustics Soundscape. Defra. 2016. Noise Mapping England [online] [viewed 10 Nov 2016]. Available from: http://services.defra.gov.uk/wps/portal/noise/about. Devos, P. 2016. Soundecology indicators applied to urban soundscapes. In: Inter Noise 2016, 177–184. Hamburg. Available from: http://pub.dega-akustik.de/IN2016/data/articles/000498.pdf. EEA. 2014a. Noise in Europe 2014 [online]. Luxembourg. Available from: https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/noise-in-europe-2014. EEA. 2014b. A Quarter of Europe’s Population Exposed to Harmful Traffic Noise [online]. Copenhagen. Available from: http://www.eea.europa.eu/highlights/a-quarter-of-europe2019s-population. European Commission. 2016. Links between Noise and Air Pollution and Socioeconomic Status [online]. Science for Environment Policy: In-depth Report. Bristol. Available from: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/integration/research/newsalert/pdf/air_noise_pollution_socioeconomic_status_links_IR13_en.pdf. Hastie, T, Tibsharani, R and Friedman, J. 2009. The Elements of Statistical Learning Data Mining, Inference and Prediction. Second Edition. The Mathematical Intelligencer. Springer Series in Statistics. Leijssen, JB, et al. 2019. The association between road traffic noise and depressed mood among different ethnic and socioeconomic groups. The HELIUS study. International Journal of Hygiene and Environmental Health [online]. [viewed 10 Jan 2019]. Available from: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijheh. Murphy, E and King, E. 2014. Environmental Noise Pollution Noise Mapping, Public Health, and Policy. Elsevier. Ordnance Survey. 2007. OS MasterMap Greenspace Technical Specification [online]. Southampton. [viewed 8 Jan 2019]. Available from: www.os.uk. Ramirez, JM, Alvarado, JM and Santisteban, C. 2004. Individual differences in anger reaction to noise. Individual Differences Research [online], 2(2): 125–136. Available from: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a9ec/04eede4a7512bc984d5497ad69a7a9fa5f1c.pdf. SCC. 2008a. Green Spaces Great Places: Technical Document [online] [viewed 8 Jan 2019]. Available from: https://www.southampton.gov.uk/policies/green space strategy technical document 2008_tcm63-366688.pdf. SCC. 2008b. Green Spaces Great Places: Summary and Action Plan [online] [viewed 8 Jan 2019]. Available from: https://www.southampton.gov.uk/policies/green space strategy summary and action plan_tcm63-363566.pdf. Villanueva-Rivera, LJ and Pijanowski, BC. 2016. Soundscape Ecology. http://ljvillanueva.github.io/soundecology/, CRAN [online], 14. Available from: http://ljvillanueva.github.io/soundecology/. WHO. 2011. Burden of Disease from Environmental Noise: Quantification of Healthy Life Years Lost in Europe [online]. World Health Organization – Regional Office for Europe. Copenhagen. Available from: http://www.who.int/quantifying_ehimpacts/publications/e94888/en/. Zare, H and Shooshtari, P. 2015. Package ‘SamSPECTRAL’.
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https://futurecitiesandenvironment.com/articles/10.5334/fce.54/
v.44 - Even though Jonathan was saved by the power of the people, as it were, it would seem that he was still under the curse which had never come to his ears. It seems frightening to me to think that such a situation could exist. Could we be punished for not obeying a law we had never heard? Within the law of the land this is certainly possible. Let us be sure to study God's law and save ourselves this possible embarrassment. v.45 We see an example of how Saul was swayed by the people. He was not in control. Of course he would have been foolish to have killed Jonathan. However it was the people, and not Saul. who saw the folly of his words. v.6 gives us an insight into Jonathan as a man of great faith and courage. May we learn from him. 14:2 We learn that Saul had 600 men with him. This is so also in 13:15. Why do we find such a small number of men with Saul? Was it that the kingdom was really fragmented or was it that the people would not align behind Saul? Whatever the reason we must realise that it was a very small number of men. In many ways we are like Jonathan. We are not in a position to do great things - to lead the whole of Israel against the enemy, but we can do what we are able to, within our sphere of influence. By controlling ourselves and being proactive in our own lives, we will motivate others to do the same and to follow our lead. Then, from small beginnings, we may be able to achieve great things with the help of the LORD our God. Wasn't Saul foolish in cursing any of the people who eat food? (1Sam 14:24) It very nearly cost him the life of his son Jonathan - or it could have cost him the kingdom, in the light of the rising of the people against him, and in Jonathan's defence (1Sam 14:45). Vs.31,32 A great decimation of the Philistines occurred and great spoil was taken. The Philistines had the latest weapons, such as the two-edged long iron sword. We have no further information, but would this not be a golden opportunity for the Israelites to gather the armour of the dead Philistines? V.6 It may be that the Lord will work for us: This expression did not imply a doubt; it signified simply that the object he aimed at was not in his own power, but it depended upon God; and that he expected success neither from his own strength nor his own merit. Jonathan put God to the test in this incident. It was as if Jonathan blackmailed the Heavenly Father. Option 2 spelled certain death! The very sign that Jonathan had chosen to show that God wasn't with them, was designed by Jonathan to be the signal of their own death. Jonathan had given God an all or nothing ultimatum. "Refuse my request, and lose me as well", or in other words "if you want to save me, save Israel too!". This is a very key principle. The same principle exists in the approach of Esther to King Ahasuerus. She gave him an ultimatum "revoke your irrevocable commandment, or you will lose me" or in other words "if you want to save me, save Israel too!" (Est 7:1-4). This principle is called mediation, and it is based upon using your confidence in the Love that God has for you in order to persuade, or even compel Him to save others. Jonathan was so confident that the LORD loved him and wouldn't want to lose him, that he could gamble his own life, and the life of his companion. This principle has its most perfect fulfilment in Jesus Christ, who with his death was declaring "if you want to save me, save my brethren too!". 14:18 More correctly Saul called for the ephod – the ark had been in the land of the Philistines and returned to obscurity in Israel by this time. V.36,37,41 Saul seeks to act without first enquiring of the Lord by Urim and Thummim according to the Septuagint's rendering of v41 "Why have you not answered your servant today? If the fault is in me or my son Jonathan, respond with Urim, but if the men of Israel are at fault, respond with Thummim." 14:21 The seeming casual comment that there were Hebrews with the Philistines indicates the depths to which Israel had sunk. Not only were they afraid of the Philistines but they actually went and fought with them against Israel. As we read through this chapter we clearly see that Saul's main concern was for his personal victory, even at the expense of the needs of the people. The people had spent all day chasing the Philistines, until they could go no further owing to the lack of strength, because of the decree issued by the king forbidding the eating of food. Jonathon, because he did not hear the order of his father, ate of the honeycomb. Once the time expired of the kings decree, we see that the army commenced killing and eating the animals without waiting for this to be done according to the law. (Lev 3:17). Saul's hasty and unnecessary decree caused the army of Israel to sin. V.2 The pomegranate tree (more like a large bush) was brought to this region from Carthage. Its red fruit was used in making spiced wine as well as in the manufacture of Morocco leather. Morocco leather is made from sheepskin. The grain side of the hide is dyed red (pomegranate juice) and then the hide is tanned by hand. This whole effect produces the unique bird's-eye pattern. V.21 The word Hebrews here does not indicate whether these people were deserters or captives. The Septuagint states slaves rather than Hebrews. V.24 By making this ridiculous command, we see Saul's questionable mentality. Mental sickness (evil spirit) would later be imposed upon him by Yahweh (1Sam 16:14). 14:1-2 Notice Jonathan is involved in the battle but Saul is hiding away in a distant part of Gibeah! Vs.11,12 The mighty Philistines would not expect any under-manned and under-armed Israelites to actually attack their military post. And so, they probably thought that Jonathan and his armourbearer were deserters. There were men of Israel who had deserted and joined the Philistines. With that assumption in mind, the Philistines welcomed them to come into the command post. Vs.13,14 The Philistines’ guard was down, and Jonathan took them by surprise. All twenty men in the command post were killed, with divine help. The size of the command post was listed as half an acre. The measurement half an acre was probably a colloquial expression denoting a small area and not an exact measurement.. Vs.15,16 This unbelievable event sent shock waves through the people as the story spread. The camp of the Philistines was in commotion and disarray, and men began to disperse in all directions. The angels of Yahweh were at work just like they would be later against the Syrians (2Kin 7:5-7). V.19 The priest’s hands had been raised to invoke Yahweh. Saul heard the increasing noise of confusion in the Philistine camp and perceived that the prayer had been answered. Now was the time to act. Vs.20-22 Israel gathered itself together, joined by the Hebrew deserters from the Philistine camp and the fugitives who were hiding in the mountains of Ephraim. V.24 The battle would last the whole day. Saul had sworn an oath that none of his soldiers should eat anything until the battle was over. This was a stupid and senseless thing to do as his soldiers would become needlessly weak. Vs.29-31 Jonathan, who had inadvertently eaten the honey, thought his father’s oath was stupid, and said so. V.32 The famished troops ate raw meat which contained blood. Eating blood was a sin (Deut 12:15,16). V.35 All previous altars had been built by Samuel. V.45 The soldiers’ conscience would not allow a foolish vow to kill the hero of the day. The king (God’s appointed) had been challenged, but there was no complaint from Yahweh. Saul was showing poor leadership. 14:16-18 Saul would not have needed the priest to tell him what was happening if he had bothered to lead the people into battle – like the kings of the nations round about did – he would have known what was happening. It is all too easy for us to sit on the sidelines and ask others what is happening rather than getting involved ourselves. 14:6 Jonathan’s description of the Philistines as ‘these uncircumcised’ is matched later by David – 1Sam 17:36 – clearly, as will become clear later in the record, Jonathan and David were of the same mind. Hence their immediate friendship. 14:7 What a wonderful armour bearer – after all he would be in the forefront of any action. A man who shared Jonathan’s faith, it seems. 14:6-15 Jonathan and his armour bearer’s victory against the Philistines shows that God will fulfil His promise – Lev 26:8 – that a large army would not be required to gain the victory if faith was shown. 14:12 Jonathan, against all that one might expect given the circumstances, sees God at work because the sign that he has asked for was given to him. 14:8-10 Jonathan, having made a decision to fight the Philistines, seeks a sign from God, showing that he placed his trust in God. 14:45 In telling us that Saul took any “valiant man” to himself we realise Saul behaved like a king of the nations. He was concerned to strengthen himself militarily. However it indicates also that Saul did not place his trust in God. 14:47-48 This inspired summary is about the most positive thing said of Saul in the whole of his reign. 14:3 No show, no ceremony for Jonathan. Simply he and his armour bearer left the camp quietly. When we see a job that needs to be done maybe we could learn from Jonathan. Just get on with it. No fuss. No need to draw attention to what one is doing. v. 5-7 - Here we have a similar contrast between man's thinking and God's thinking to the ones put forward by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. There are lots of aspects of the New Covenant in these last chapters of Isaiah, where the inclusion of the Gentiles is paramount. Here is another aspect of Old Testament teaching that leads directly to the New Covenant which is powered by love. Matt.25:35-40, Luke 11:41, 19:8, Rom.12:20,21. v.6 - The only time that God asked the people to afflict their souls was on the day of atonement [Leviticus 16:29]. The day of atonement marked the beginning of each year of release and jubilee. Hence 'let the oppressed go free' catches the language of the year of release also. Isaiah 37:30 also uses language of the year of release when it speaks of eating that which groweth of itself. [Leviticus 25:11]. Around the time of the Assyrian invasion there was a year of release which Isaiah alludes to on these two occasions. Despite the wonderful deliverance Yahweh gave them at that time the people did not think about His deliverance and so were unwilling to keep the law with respect to their slaves. v.8 is full of pictures of the way God cares for His own. We see the crossing of the Red Sea where God protected them as their rereward, keeping the Egyptians at bay until they were all safely across - what great faith was required by those at the back! - We also see the salvation in Jesus, who is the great bringer of the light. A complete picture of salvation in one verse. 58:14 Ride upon the high places of the earth echoes Deuteronomy 32:13 which was a promise that Moses made by inspiration at the end of the wilderness journey. :1-2 The whole context of the day of atonement here is set against the nation coming to God as if they were faithful but living a sinful life. Their actions belied their words. Whilst the day of atonement was for the forgiveness of sin it was of no benefit to those who only gave God lip service. Likewise for us. We must not only say we are new creatures. We should also live as new creatures. 58:3 We saw on a previous occasion that Isaiah is speaking of the day of atonement. A time when the nation were released from their burdens and sins - but they still require their servants to work for them - see RV mgn and AV mgn. V.9-11 For us, the message is that faith without works is dead. The work of righteousness is peace; peace with God. Had they attempted to carry out the ordinance of God , the result would have been different. God was not pleased with Israel’s supposedly pious attitude. Isa 58:3-7 describes the people who did fast, and did wear sackcloth and ashes, but they did it for show. What God really wanted was for them to help others in God’s Name, to encourage sinners to repent, and to “break every yoke”. There’s a great lesson about practical Christianity for us, there. God doesn't respond well to proud demands. In v3 we see this attitude displayed by Israel. In effect they were saying "we've done good things, so why aren't you rewarding us?". Sometimes our own religion can get a bit like that don't you think? God doesn't reward the proud for the good they've done. Instead He calls to mind all the evil they have done and brings them to account for it (v3-5). It is much better for us to quietly go about doing good without drawing attention to it. This way God will notice and reward us openly (v6-8). 58:3 So Israel, at a time when they should have been showing compassion were oppressing their brethren – see the marginal rendering and the RV marginal rendering. 58:13-14 The prophet, against the background of the way in which Israel had made a mockery of the feasts of God, speaks of the blessing that will follow on from obedience. V.4 Contentious attitudes should give way to generous attitudes (vs.6,7). The formalities of worship mean nothing unless the attitude is right. From the right attitude come the right actions. This applies to us as it did to the Israelites. 58:4 Israel had an outward show of piety but their actions showed what was truly in their hearts. Their hearts were busy practicing mischief making the outward show of no avail at all. There is no point just going through the motions. We can pray, fast, read the Bible, attend the meetings and even give of what we have, but if all we are doing is just performing a religious duty, there is no value in it. Going through the motions of religious duty means that we do these things because they are a habit, because they need doing, or just because we feel we should. What God really wants from us is our heart. He wants to see spontaneous, loving action from us toward him and toward each other. Let's not be left wondering what it would have been like if we had not just gone through the motions. V.1 A trumpet was used to demand attention (Exo 19:16). Yahweh reacts loudly against hypocrisy. V.2 Israel went through the motions of worship thinking that they were pious, yet their action did not back them up (Prov 25:14). V.3 Israel was fasting in mock modesty but feeling self-satisfied (Prov 16:5). V.5 Fasting for show instead of for humble intent is not acceptable to Yahweh (Matt 6:16-18). Vs.6,7 Yahweh demands justice not religious window dressing (Psa 82:3). V.8 This verse makes an allusion to Yahweh’s care of His people as they exited Egypt (Exo 14:19,20). V.10 See Psa 37:6; 112:4. V.12 Here is an allusion to the Kingdom age (Amos 9:11,12). Vs.13,14 The heritage of Jacob is the Promised Land (Gen 13:15; Psa 135:12). It is natural, when appraising our worship, to focus on what we do for God. So we might ask the question in v3 "we've worshipped you in the way you asked, so why isn't his enough for You?". But our focus instead should be to take the rest of the advice in this chapter to heart (v6-7, 9-10, and 13) for which the rewards are great (v8-9, 11,14). 58:3 So Israel fasted so that God could see their behaviour. How often do we do things to appear good in God’s eyes? We should do things because we love Him. 58:3Whereas the KJV has ‘exact all your labour’ the margin has ‘things wherewith ye grieve others’ which seems to catch what was happening. The people were observing the Day of Atonement but not showing mercy to others. 58:12 That there would be one who would repair the breaches clearly, ultimately, looks to Jesus. However the way in which Nehemiah appeals to this passage – Neh 6:1 – shows that Nehemiah was expecting the people to see, at least, a partial fulfilment of this promise in their own days. 58:3-6 It would appear that Israel were keeping a fast – possibly the day of atonement. However whilst the nation were going through the motions required by the law of Moses their hearts were not tuned to the requirements of the law. Their hearts were Godless and self-seeking. So even though the outward appearance of what they were doing might have indicated that they were faithful God knew otherwise. This is a warning for us Going to worship of itself is not sufficient. We should desire to go and focus on what we are doing. 58:6-7 The Day of Atonement could have been seen in Israel as a time for having a depressing view of oneself. The feast recognised that even though animal sacrifices for sin were offered all year round there was still the need for the people to annually confess their sins. It could have been quite depressing. God, through Isaiah, presents a better picture. A picture of generosity towards others. Why? Well the person who had experienced God’s generosity in forgiveness should be very willing to extend his own generosity to others as realisation of the generosity that God had shown him. 1. the second synague reading for the Day of Atonement is Isa 57:14-21 to Isa 58:1-14. 2. Isa 58:1 - the trumpet and the shofar sounded at the Feast of Trumpets and 10 days later to bring in the Day of Atonement; the prophets were commanded by God to be watchmen to the house of Israel (Eze 33:1-33); the sins of the house of Jacob are to be declared. 3. Isa 58:2-6 - V2 pretending to sincerely seek out God and His ways; VS 2-6 unacceptable fasting (Matt 6:16;Matt 9:11-17), only an outward show in approaching God (2Tim 3:5), but they oppressed the labourers and the poor, and they indulged in strife and debate; V4 God will not hear the voices of people who are sincere in their fasting; V5 God's dissatisfaction regarding their 'efforts' on the Day of Atonement; V6 fasting, the Day of Atonement and the Year of Jubilee should have been about the giving up of self to help others break free from the yoke of oppression, "to let the oppressed go free" in the year of Jubilee (and future ultimate deliverance). 4. Isa 58:6-7 - the proper type of fast was exemplified by Jesus who fed the needy literally and in offering his life feeds his friends with the bread of life spiritually; two types of attitudes in worshippers (Luke 18:9-17); V7 helping the hungry, poor and unclothed naturally and spiritually (Israel was expressing a hypocritical formality vs a sincere devotion and didn't truly care for the needy - Matt 25:35-36). 5. Isa 58:8,10- your light breaking forth as the dawn, combined with healing, righteousness and the glory of the Lord as a reward reminds me of the resurrection. 6. Isa 58:9-10 - V9 "Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer"; V9 "thou shalt 'cry<7768>', and he shall say, Here I am" (Mark 14:37;John 20:9-19); V9 the yoke (associated with oppression in V6); VS 9-10 "If...And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon day" (Isa 53:12 Christ poured out his soul unto death, but will be given a portion among the great;John 15:13), during the millennium there will be very little darkness. 7. Isa 58:11 - (if you chose the path of light) the Lord will guide you and you will be like a watered garden (suggestion of Eden before the curse?) and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not (John 7:37-39;John 4:7-15;Eze 47:1-12;Rev 22:1-5). 8. Isa 58:12 - (KJV) "they that shall be of thee" (Thy people);(NIV) "Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins"; (KJV) "repairer of the breach" (this was literally done with Nehemiah, but will be spiritually accomplished when the sin and death is repaired during and at the end of the millennial kingdom era to come (Acts 1:9-11;Mic 4:1-4;Isa 11:1-12;Isa 9:6-10). 9. Isa 58:13 - but so far these conditions have not been adhered to, the observance of the Sabbath has degenerated into a largely superficial meaningless performance mixed with rabbinical superstition (Luke 13:13-17;Col 2:16-17). 10. Isa 58:14 - When Christ returns he will be recognized (Zech 12:10) by many and there will be joy in the Lord and a feasting on the inheritance of your father Jacob (Gen 27:19-29;Gen 28:10-15). Isa 58:5-7 The transgression of the house of Jacob were such that they their fasting was done with outward show. Heads bowed like drooping bulrush, dressed in sackcloth and ashes scattered around (v.5). However, true fast that the LORD respected is defined as “…to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?”(verse 6). “Is itnot to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?(verse 7). True fasting, that is acceptable to the LORD, has nothing to do with our choice of eating habits or abstinence from food on certain days. Rather it is our committment to abstain from sin and transgressions and to feed the hungry and relief of burdens of others. Jesus, by his example, showed us the fasting that pleases the LORD. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”(Matt 11:28-30). 58:6 God sought to lift “heavy burdens” off the shoulders of Israel in the provision of the Day of Atonement. By contrast – Matt 23:4 – the Jewish leaders in Jesus’ day sought to increase those burdens by reproving the people and requiring them to observe men’s traditions which were designed to afflict the souls of the people. It is possible that we, in our talking about God, might oppress our fellows rather than edify them. Care must be taken to present a balanced Scriptural picture when speaking about Him and His message of salvation . 58:1-3 When Israel were astray form God they did not recognise that fact. Indeed they thought their approach was completely acceptable. However measured against God’s yardstick they were found wanting. We have to ask ourselves whether we truly appreciate what it is to obey God. It is more than giving assent to a set of rules. It has to be seen in the daily living of a Christ-like life. “The prophet was not sent to the surrounding heathen to tell them of their sins, but to Israel—God’s own people. Sin is by no means confined to those who know not God. The need for condemning sin exists as much, and in a certain sense, more, within the house of God than in the outer darkness. The outer darkness is insensible to appeal; wickedness is its normal condition, so to speak. It knows not God and cares for none of His ways, and reproof would be altogether objectless. But the house of God is professedly founded on submission to the expressed and enjoined will of God. And the people composing it are in danger of resting on this collective profession while individually acting inconsistently with it. Thus it was with Israel: ‘They seek me daily, says the Spirit of God by Isaiah, ‘and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God.’ They crowded the temple at the appointed times; they brought the sacrifices and kept the feasts, and took a certain delight in these things, but privately, they acted in opposition to the spirit on which the whole institution was founded. Jesus tells us what this spirit was. He says, ‘All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets’ (Matt 7:12; Matt 22:37-40). All these things happened unto them as ensamples; and are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are comes. Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall” (1Cor 10:11,12). 58:5-6 As with the feasts that God commanded Israel to keep they saw keeping the feast as some sort of virtue without realising that the feasts – on this occasion the Day of Atonement – that the feast was to be kept to remind them of their sinfulness that they might appreciate God’s willingness to forgive the repentant sinner. 2 v. 23 - This verse speaks as though Nazareth was not the original dwelling place of Joseph and/or Mary, but in fact a place that they settled in having fled Judea for fear of Archelaus (v.22), which brings about, we are told, a direct fulfilment of a prophecy, even though it is a prophecy which appears not to be recorded in our Old Testament. 1:1 - The mention of David and Abraham marks the two important milestones in the purpose of God. Abraham, through whom the promises were given and David the king to whom further promises were given. Both of these men had promises made to them of a singular seed who was to come [Gen 22:17, 2Sam 7:12] Both of these promises are applied in the New Testament to Jesus. Genesis 21 in [Rom 9:7] and 2 Samuel [Heb 1:5] Notice the preponderance of occasion where Jesus is spoken of as The son of David in Matthew. Matt 1:1,20, 9:27, 20:30,31, 21:9,15 Compared with Mark and Luke. [Mark 10:47,48, Luke 3:31, 18:38,39] It is a phrase never found in John. 1:3 - Whilst it is not strictly necessary to record the twin son that Tamar bare to Judah he is here. Num 26:20-21, 1Chron 2:3-4] Show that Zara is the twin son of Judah by Tamar. The inclusion of Pharez in the line would indicate that Judah took Tamar to be his wife. Thus, I presume, the second son is mentioned here to make the point clear that the irregularity was cleared up. This section of the genealogy quotes exactly [Ruth 4:18-20] In fact it is the only part of the family tree in Matthew which can be seen to be drawn from a specific area of the Old Testament. Ch 2 - Matthew records the visit of the wise men whilst Luke records the visit of the shepherds. These two events took place some time apart. The wise men visited Jesus when the family had gone back to Nazareth. ch 2 - There are a number of parallels between the narrative of the birth and death of Jesus. Having gone through the entire forty two generations leading up to Christ, we find in verse 16 that they were the forefathers of Joseph, whom in verse 25 we’re told had nothing to do with the birth of Christ! After tracing Joseph right back to his forefather Abraham, in verse 20 the angel calls him the son of David, when surely Abraham was more significant? In verse 23 we’re told that “they shall call his name Immanuel..”, and then in verse 25 they name him Jesus! These things must have been put there by God to make us think about them, but why? A virgin conceiving isn’t actually uncommon. We should not mistake conception with birth. When this prophecy was made in the time of Isaiah, the people may not have been expecting a miracle. The prophecy may have had its fulfilment immediately in Hezekiah’s mother. Here in Matthew the wording of the prophecy is changed from “the virgin shall conceive and bear a son” (Isaiah) to “the virgin shall be with child”, which is of course a miracle! Did you know all the women mentioned in the genealogy of Jesus weren’t virgins, neither were they with their first partners when they begat their sons, except for Mary? 2:1-6 Here we find the reason why Jesus is called “the son of David” in Chapter 1. Jesus is shown to be the promised king of Micah 5v2. But why in verse 3 was all Jerusalem, including Herod, troubled at the thought of the promised Messiah coming? Surely they should have been glad? Herod's plan to kill the baby seems to have been done through popular demand (see verse 4). The prophecy in verse 6 may give us a clue to this: “..a ruler who will shepherd My people Israel”. Would this remind the current shepherds of Israel that if the true shepherd were to come, then their deeds would be exposed? There is a clue in the word “shepherd”, which doesn’t appear in the quotation from Micah. The word of God seems to be giving us a flag to where we ought to look for illumination. In the search the scribes made of Christ in the books of the law, they would have found Jeremiah 23:1-6 which shows that wrath would be executed on the evil shepherds by the promised King, and replaced by good shepherds. Note how this prophecy is in the context of the return of the Jews to their own land, an event which had recently occurred. In verse 23 we find that the prophet had said “he shall be called a Nazarene”. As far as I know the only place where we can find this is Judges 13:5 speaking of the birth of Samson. How can this apply to Christ if it was spoken of Samson, or am I looking in the wrong passage of scripture? 1 - The five women :3,5,6,16 all could be described as being unsuitable women to be in the line of Christ. Matthew could have left them out and the genealogy would have been complete. Therefore we have to conclude that the inclusion of these women is significant. It would, at least, teach the Jews, that their perception of purity in a genealogy was unsound. One wonders how often we judge people on the basis of their pedigree. 2 - Herod was an Idumean – that is a descendant of Abraham through Esau. So the antipathy Herod had towards Jesus was the continual hatred of Edom of Israel. Synoptic means seeing together. They look at the same events from different vantage points. Thus, to understand an incident fully, the three accounts should be cross-referenced. The four Gospel accounts mirror the four major Prophecies. Matthew claims that there are fourteen generations between Abraham and David; fourteen between David and Babylon; and fourteen between Babylon and Christ (1:17). Actually there are more but Matthew has been selective with the genealogy. The reference to Jesus' being a Nazarene in the Old Testament seems not to be found (2:23). But it is. Isa 11:1 designates Jesus as being the Branch. Branch in Hebrew is netzar. Coming from the same word, Nazareth also means branch. And so, there is the link. Matt 2 From the very first there was indifference on the part of some towards Christ, and from others out and out hostility V.3-8 But it needed another thirty years, and another Herod before their scheme came to fruition. We are comforted how ever, that the hostility Christ encountered will be done away with in the near future with His return, and establishment of His Kingdom. 2:11 Matthew uses the word 'house' to speak of the place where the Magi worshipped Jesus. Luke 2:7calls the place an 'inn' where the shepherds saw Jesus. Thus the precision of Scripture demands that the two visitations occurred at different places. 2:4 The chief priests and the scribes would have been the Sanhedrin. This is the first time that they are called together to deal with Christ, they were able at this time only able to identify the place of his birth. The Sanhedrin, at there full complement, numbered seventy two. They provided Herod with knowledge that would be a stepping stone toward finding the child, and killing him. It was the highest tribunal, and did eventually condemn Christ to death. 1:22 This is the first of many times that Matthew uses the phrase 'that it might be fulfilled' or a similar phrase. It always worth following up the quotation which will be found noted in the marginal references. Maybe it would be helpful to underline the phrase whenever it occurs in your Bible. 2:5-6 That the religious leaders were able to cite Mic 5:2 to show where Messiah would be born shows that there was an active interest in, and Bible knowledge of, Messiah’s birthplace. Their problem was that they did not know the true nature of messiah – they anticipated a conquering king, not a sacrificial lamb. 1:19 Joseph who was ‘just’ did not rush thoughtless into dealing with the matter of Mary being pregnant. He ‘thought on those things’. Herein a lesson for us. Notice the first thing he did was not to talk about it with others. He applied his mind to the Biblical principles before doing anything. How we could learn from that! It is all too easy to make a snap decision – after all the case was quite clear with Mary. She was with child and the Law was very clear on this point. Of course the relevant thing was that the circumstances need to be thought through. It was the circumstances which cleared Mary of guilt though Joseph did not know this when he ‘thought’ about the issue. We would benefit from doing likewise, even when the matter seems so clear cut. As you read through the Gospels, note how many prophecies about Jesus were made in the Old Testament (Luke 24:27). 1:21,25 Jesus is the Greek form of the Hebrew yeshua which means Yah saves. The Greek for wise men is magi from which the word magic comes. 2:1 Herod the Great was the Edomite who was made king by the Romans. Jesus was born in the year of his death. This fulfils the prophecy of Gen 49:10. 2:22 Archelaus took over from his father Herod the Great. However, the Romans gave him the position of ethnarch over Judea, Samaria, and Idumea. He was never granted the position of king. Archelaus did such an unfavourable job of governing that the Romans banished him to Vienna in Gaul. After that, the Romans governed the area as a Roman province. Thus, Gen 49:10 remained true. 2:2 By the time Jesus was born there had been a long time since the promise of ‘Messiah the prince’ Dan 9:25 – and a time period was specified. We also know that there were people at the time of Jesus’ birth looking for ‘the consolation of Israel’ – Luke 2:25– and others looking for ‘the kingdom of God’ - Luke 2:38 so the question about the birth place of ‘the king of the Jews’ was not really an unusual question to ask – doubtless it was a topic of conversation among the faithful Jews at that time. 4:11 Right at the start of his ministry, God sent an angel to minister to Jesus. This is undoubtedly an indication of what the temptation had taken out of him. A similar event occurred right at the end of his ministry Luke 22:43 when, again, much effort had been expended. 2:11 When the ‘wise men’ worshipped Jesus they were the first gentiles to do this - a foreshadowing of the response of gentiles to Jesus. The Jewish shepherds were the first Jews. So both Jew and gentile worshipped the young child Jesus. There are three titles of Christ named in Matthew 1: Christ, Jesus and Immanuel. As Matthew concludes his genealogy, he climaxes it with "Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ." (Matt 1:16) Christ is the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew, Messiah, which means "The Anointed One". At the end of the genealogy listing the kingly line it is appropriate that Jesus is named as the Christ, our Anointed king. When Joseph was told that Mary's child was from the Holy Spirit, he was told, "She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." (v.21) Jesus is the Greek form of the Hebrew Joshua, which means "The Lord Saves". Jesus is our Savior. And in the prophecy Matthew quotes from Isaiah we learn that "'The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel' - which means 'God with us'." (v.23) As Immanuel Jesus brings us into the presence of God. What a blessing it is to know him - the Son of God, Anointed by God to be our king, our Savior and the One who brings us back into the presence of God. While Matthew begins his genealogy with Abraham and ends with Joseph and the birth of Jesus Christ, born of Mary (not begat by Joseph), Luke reverses his genealogy and begins with Christ at age 30, “as was supposed the son of Joseph…” and ends in Adam, the son of God (Luke 3:23,28). Clearly, Matt 1 and Luke 3 offer different genealogies for Jesus. Matthew gives the genealogy of Joseph, who was descended from the line of David, but the line he came from was banned from any further kings reigning over Judah after King Jechoniah. Jeremiah declares: “Thus saith the LORD, (Yahweh), Write ye this man childless, a man that shall not prosper in his days: for no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling any more in Judah” (Jer 22:30; Eze 21:27). Jechoniah was the last king of Judah before the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem in 586 B.C. All the recorded names after Jechoniah reveal the truth of this. No descendant of David after Jechoniah occupied David’s throne, and no one ever occupied the throne that was not a descendant of David. Joseph's ancestry did not disqualify Jesus' claim to the throne, not being his biological son, and thus Matthew concludes his genealogy as Jesus who was born of Mary. Iraeneus, a Biblical scholar of the 2nd century wrote: "But besides, if indeed He had been the son of Joseph, He could not, according to Jeremiah, be either king or heir…” Since Jechoniah's descendants were forbidden to fulfill their heir-ship to the throne, it is not surprising Matthew stated upfront that Joseph was not the father of Jesus (Matt 1:18-19,25). We read in v. 24 that Heli was the son of Matthat, who was the son of Levi. This identifies him with the priestly tribe of Levi and descended from Aaron (Num 18). Luke by recording his genealogy right down to Adam reveals Christ’s both kingly and priestly line. Mary’s genealogy merged the priestly line of Levi with the Davidic royal line of Judah! According to Jewish custom, though, the actual genealogy of Joseph was the legal pedigree of Jesus, but Mary’s was the actual bloodline of Jesus as recorded in Luke 3. 2:13 The way in which Joseph is given the dream immediately after the visit of the wise men may cause us to think that these events happened in Bethlehem. However some time had elapsed since the events in Bethlehem and Joseph and Mary are back in Nazareth. 2:12 Isn’t it interesting that these gentile men could differentiate between a God given dream and the normal dream that man has? What may this "star of Bethlehem" have really been? Thanks to bro. Harry Whittaker, Studies in the Gospels, for a nice answer for this one. So they came to Jerusalem, seeking the King, and perhaps somewhat mystified that the entire nation was not in a state of excitement over the appearance of Messiah's star. But, of course, it was not a star at all. A good deal of guesswork and a tremendous amount of futile mathematical computation has gone into attempts to establish that this star was a brilliant nova, or the planet Venus, or the conjunction of two, or maybe three, major planets. All such approaches fall down badly over one simple fact: the star "came and stood over where the young child was". In other words, it guided the wise men to the very spot. But if at the same moment two people ten miles apart both attempt to identify the star which is immediately overhead, they will both pick the same star thus because of the fantastically great distances between the stars and the earth, compared with their negligibly small base line. This consideration by itself dictates the conclusion that, whatever the star was, it hung comparatively low down in the sky, say, as low as the flight of a helicopter - this, at least. Thus all astronomy is ruled out. "Arise, shine, for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee...the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising (the word for "east" in Mat. 2 also means "rising") ...they shall bring gold and frankincense, and they shall shew forth the praises of the Lord" (60:1-3,6). This prophecy hints at "myrrh" also, for the Hebrew text of the last phrase sounds like" "his drinking of myrrh shall shew the Lord" although the K.J.V. translation is correct. Here, in Isa. 60, was evidently the Scripture, known to the wise men, which dictated their journey. If the star of the wise men were the Shekinah glory, it becomes easy to see why there was no excitement in the rest of the populace and no attempt by others to follow the star as the wise men did. On an earlier noteworthy occasion the Glory of the Lord was "a cloud and darkness" to the Egyptians, but "it gave light by night" to Israel (Exo 14:20). The same kind of thing could well have happened in Judea. 2 When we read this and the previous chapter about the early life of Jesus and his parents we are forced to appreciate that Godly people are not guaranteed an easy life. It was of God that Joseph and Mary had to make the arduous journey to Egypt and then back and find accommodation in Nazareth because of the wickedness of both Herod and Archelaus. 2:3-8 Herod’s instructions to the wise men highlights Herod’s paranoia. He was fearful that his position and status was in question and that he might be removed from his position of privilege. He is the first person who felt their position and status was challenged by Jesus – but he was not the last. Joseph probably could have had quite a pleasant life. His plan was to get married to Mary, have children, work in his carpenter's shop and be the model of a family man for others to see. They may not have been rich, but they would have had a pleasant, comfortable and stable life. But Joseph kept hearing from God. Firstly he had to get married to a pregnant woman, who was pregnant with a child that was not his. The shame and the wagging tongues would have followed him, and of course no one would have believed him when he said that it was God's child. Then, after settling in Bethlehem, where the gossip was less, he suddenly had to get up in the middle of the night to flee to Egypt. Any business aspirations were left behind in the rush to exit Bethlehem before Herod killed their new baby. Joseph couldn't even settle in Egypt. After another short period of time God told Joseph to move back into Israel and then go and live in the slums in Nazareth. No, Joseph was never going to get ahead now, and all because he listened to the Lord. The point is this: When God spoke, Joseph obeyed. No matter what the consequences, Joseph obeyed God first of all. It is often hard to do, but it is important that we follow the example of Joseph and obey God in small things and in the big things, whatever he tells us to do. 2:16 The way in which the record speaks of Jesus being born might seem a little cumbersome. However it is precisely this description which forces us to understand that Mary was the mother and Joseph was not the father. My reply: We are on very dangerous ground if we conclude from these incidences that lying is justified if it is for a "good cause" and take it upon ourselves to decide, which is which! This is opening Pandora’s Box. We need to stick to what Scripture reveals in this regard and act accordingly. We are told Rahab acted in faith. Rahab knew that her actions against the King and soldiers were treasonous, the penalty being death, and risked her own life in so doing. On the other hand, Rebecca and Jacob demonstrated a lack of faith that what God had promised (Gen 25:23), He is able to perform (Rom 4:21), and went about in a deceptive way in taking matters into their own hands. Rahab: While it is said that Scripture no where condones Rahab’s “lie,” just her faith and works, it does not condemn it either! In fact, Rahab’s words and actions cannot be separated; she acted on her words, and if her faith and actions are praised, why are her words condemned by us? Our thoughts reveal our actions and our words. The type of actions, as outlined in Mark 7:20-23 and spoken by Christ, makes this very clear (cf. Prov 23:7). It was out of the abundance of her heart, her mouth spoke (cf. Luke 6:45) and brought forth good fruit and was rewarded (cf. Josh 6:23)! Rahab married Salmon, a Prince of the House of Judah, who was the father of Boaz who married Ruth. She is in the genealogy of Christ and the only other woman mentioned next to Sarah in the hall of the faithful! The apostle Paul describes her actions as an act of faith (Heb 11:31; cf. Josh 2:9-13), James describes her actions as works justified by her faith (James 2:25; cf. Josh 2:8-13). We, on the other hand, describe her faith and actions as resulting from her lying! The Bible no where tells us Rahab “lied,” we do, along with numerous other Bible commentators. We base this on various Scriptures like, Exo 20:16; Prov 6:12-19; 12:22; Acts 5; Col 3:9 etc. and then take the incidence of Rahab and bunch it in – out of context! Rahab did none of these things, nor did she usurp God’s authority. Rebecca and Jacob: Both were deceptive and Jacob also lied to his father, Isaac, and all done at the behest of his mother. In acting on their words, which proceeded first in their thought processes, Rebecca had to send Jacob away for fear Esau would kill him, and she never saw him again! Jacob, himself, was deceived by his uncle, Laban, when learning he first married Leah and not Rachel. Their lying was motivated by fear and acted on, which is contrary to faith, trust and love. Their lies and deception is what the Bible warns us against and as a result were not left unpunished. Jacob would have received the promise, regardless. God did not need their ‘help’ to accomplish it! The differences between these two incidences are so significantly different! Consider further the following passages: Exo 1:15-21; 1Sam 16:1-5; 21:1-3; 27:8-12; Jer 38:24-27, which makes this principle very clear! 2:7 In saying Herod called the wise men “privily” we see a man using secrecy to plan his evil massacre of the one heralded to the wise men possibly indicates that Herod thought that the chief priests would not be in agreement with his policy. Whilst maybe they were not at the time of Jesus’ birth they certainly were towards the end of Jesus’ life. 1:19 “just” Joseph, understanding the principles of Prov 12:16 did not shame Mary.
2019-04-19T00:24:55Z
https://www.dailyreadings.org.uk/default.asp?act=notesdisplay&displaytype=day&m=7&d=2
One reason why students do poorly in mathematics problem solving tasks and on achievement tests is a lack of good reading, comprehension, and writing skills. Therefore, Assisting Readers is designed to provide resources that should help you, if your K-12 students are struggling with reading and language arts, or if you'd just like to better connect math to reading. Approaches to K-12 Reading Instruction --a brief essay. The Common Core Standards require changes in approaches to instruction for English Language Arts and Literacy, as well as for mathematics. "Across the English language arts and mathematics standards, skills critical to each content area are emphasized. In particular, problem-solving, collaboration, communication, and critical-thinking skills are interwoven into the standards" (About the Standards, FAQ section). Research has shown the link between reading skills and students' problem-solving abilities. What are the most effective approaches to reading instruction? In A Synthesis of Quantitative Research on Reading Programs for Secondary Students, Baye, Lake, Inns, and Slavin (2018) noted other approaches for reading used with middle and high school learners, which they grouped into categories: tutoring, cooperative learning, whole school approaches, writing-focused approaches, content-focused approaches, strategy instruction, personalization approaches, and group/personalization rotation approaches. Their findings suggested, "secondary readers benefit more from socially and cognitively engaging instruction than from additional reading periods or technology" (p. 2). In Common Core Standards: Starting Now, David Liben and Meredith Liben (2012) provided strategies and resources related to implementing the ELA-literacy standards, beginning with a recommendation to read the standards themselves. Anchor standards for reading include the role of text complexity, in which they noted that syntax plays a role in understanding complex text. "A solid academic vocabulary is essential not only to reading complex text successfully, but also to becoming proficient at writing, speaking, and listening" (Academic Vocabulary section). Students will need to expand the scope of their reading to include more informational texts. Provide a description, explanation, or example of the new term. Engage students periodically in activities that help them add to their knowledge of the terms in their vocabulary notebooks. Periodically ask students to discuss the terms with one another. One-to-one tutoring by teaching assistants. The most effective tutoring uses teachers, however. Volunteers and paraprofessionals can also be used. Small-group remediation (e.g., groups of 3-6 students) works less well than one-to-one. Valerie Chrisman (2005), who conducted a study of California's primary and secondary reform program schools, reported on the benefits of teaching academic English to students learning English as a second language and for those who were academically below grade level. Teachers in successful schools "presented instruction that directly reinforced the students' understanding of how the English language works instead of teaching students conversational English" (p. 19). They taught students how to use root words, suffixes, prefixes, and verb endings and believed this focus on academic English gave all their students an advantage on the state test. K-N-W-S: Students create a four-column chart for the word problem in which they identify "what facts they know (K), what information is not relevant (N), what the problem wants them to find out (W), and what strategy can be used to solve the problem (S)." SQRQCQ: This acronym stands for survey, question, read, question, compute or construct, question. Students begin by skimming the problem to get a general idea as to its nature. They ask what the problem is about and what information is needed to solve it. They read the problem again to highlight details needed to solve it. They question again what is needed to solve it (e.g., what operations, with what numbers, units needed, strategies). They then compute the answer, set up and solve an equation, or construct any needed graphs, tables, diagrams, and so on. Finally, they question again about the correctness and reasonableness of their answer. Three-level guide: This is a graphic organizer with three parts. Early-on the teacher creates this, but later as students become familiar with the strategy they might create it and share with others. It addresses literal, interpretive, and applied comprehension. In part 1, there is a set of true-false facts suggested by information given in the problem. Part 2 has the math concepts, ideas, or rules that might apply to the problem. Part 3 contains specific calculations/methods that might be used to solve the problem. In each part, students decide which element(s) in the list can help solve the problem. Word Problem Roulette: This is a collaborative strategy in which groups of three to four students solve a word problem jointly. Then each takes a turn to write the steps in words for its solution. The first member writes a step, then passes the group solution paper to the next member of the group who writes the next step, and so on. Groups then present their solution to the class. As a group member reads the words, another puts the math symbols on the board. When all groups who tackled the same problem have presented, methods and solutions can be compared. Process Logs: Students write about their thinking during the problem-solving process answering question prompts found on a writing-math worksheet, which guides them through the process. They can use ordinary language and math language. Note that the RAFT method is also useful for formative assessment. You'll find examples within our Math Methodology: Assessment Essay. In Building Mathematical Comprehension: Using Literacy Strategies to Make Meaning Laney Sammons (2011) applies reading comprehension strategies and research into mathematics instruction to help in building students' mathematics comprehension. Chapters address comprehension strategies for mathematics, recognizing and understanding mathematics vocabulary, making mathematical connections, increasing comprehension by asking questions, the importance of visualizing mathematics ideas, making inferences and predictions, determining importance, synthesizing information, monitoring mathematical comprehension, and the guided math classroom. Districts might consider the Four-Blocks® Literacy Model, available for grades 1-3 (shown) and 4-8, which incorporates four different approaches to teach children how to become better readers, writers, and spellers: guided reading (comprehension), self-selected reading, word study, and writing. The program was designed primarily for learners in lower elementary grades. Canton City Schools in Ohio adopted this model for curriculum alignment for reading instruction, and tied Ohio's academic content standards closely in classroom instruction. They used technology for whole class instruction, and adopted the engaging, adaptive technology content of Riverdeep's Destination Success (Reading and Math) program, all of which contributed to a substantial increase (124%) among grade 3 learners in passing the Ohio Achievement Test for Reading at one of its elementary schools (Eaton, 2005). [Readers should note that Riverdeep merged with Houghton Mifflin in 2006 and the company later became known as Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.] Dr. Andy Johnson provided a brief overview of the Four Blocks Literacy model in his YouTube video. Richard Allington (2007), past president of the International Reading Association, shared another view on assisting struggling readers. He proposed intervention all day long, as new hope for struggling readers, rather than the current situation in many schools where struggling readers are provided 30–60 minutes of appropriate supplemental reading instruction with a reading specialist. Students "then spend the remaining five hours a day sitting in classrooms with texts they cannot read, and that cannot contribute to learning to read, let alone contribute to the learning of science or social studies" (p. 7), and, I would add, any other content area. Allington (2007) noted that "too often, the texts in students’ hands are appropriate for the highest achieving half of the students" and "only the best readers have books in their hands that they can read accurately, fluently, and with understanding. All students need texts of an appropriate level of complexity all day long to thrive in school. Once we have a more differentiated set of curriculum materials, then we might expect a better balance of whole-class, small-group, and side-by-side lessons. While all students benefit from small group and side-by-side teaching, it is the struggling readers who seem to benefit most, perhaps because they have the greatest need for explicit teaching and scaffolded, personalized instruction" (p. 13). Screen all students for potential reading problems at the beginning of the year and again in the middle of the year. Regularly monitor the progress of students who are at elevated risk for developing reading disabilities. Provide differentiated reading instruction for all students based on assessments of students’ current reading levels (tier 1). Provide intensive, systematic instruction on up to three foundational reading skills in small groups to students who score below the benchmark on universal screening. Typically these groups meet between three and five times a week for 20–40 minutes (tier 2). Monitor the progress of tier 2 students at least once a month. Use these data to determine whether students still require intervention. For those still making insufficient progress, school-wide teams should design a tier 3 intervention plan. Read: Evaluation of Response to Intervention (RtI) Practices for Elementary School Reading by Rekha Balu, Pei Zhu, Fred Doolittle, Ellen Schiller, Joseph Jenkins, and Russell Gersten (2015). Per the Executive Summary: "This report provides new information on the prevalence of RtI practices in elementary schools, illustrates the implementation of RtI practices for groups of students at different reading levels, and provides evidence on effects of one key element of RtI: assigning students to receive reading intervention services." Among findings for the school year 2011-2012, "For those students just below the school-determined eligibility cut point in Grade 1, assignment to receive reading interventions did not improve reading outcomes; it produced negative impacts" (p. ES-1). Do you have a learner with dyslexia? Several websites provide reading resources for learners with dyslexia. It can be difficult to help such learners to read and write, if you have no experience with this disability. When reading, words and letters can jump around on the page, as seen in this realistic simulation of reading with dyslexia (Ritschel, 2017). The University of Oregon is home to the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) to assess reading progress. DIBELS is "a set of standardized, individually administered measures of early literacy development. They are designed to be short (one minute) fluency measures used to regularly monitor the development of pre-reading and early reading skills." Download the materials for free, along with instructions for administering and scoring. The University of Oregon also has posted 5 Big Ideas in Beginning Reading, along with resources for addressing each: phonetic awareness, the alphabetic principle, fluency with text, vocabulary, and comprehension. Do you need apps for reading? Graphite.org is a free service from Common Sense Media "designed to help preK-12 educators discover, use, and share the best apps, games, websites, and digital curricula for their students" (About Us section). Ratings are provided by teachers. Search by type (apps, console and PC games, websites), subject areas, grade level, and price (free, free to try, paid). When searching for apps, you can also select app devices that include iPad, iPod Touch, iPhone, Android, Kindle Fire, and Nook HD. Graphite also offers Common Core Explorer to help with locating tech resources in its database aligned to the Common Core Standards. See a list of its top 8 Apps to Introduce Reading posted at T.H.E. Journal (2014, February 20). As grade 3 is thought to be a transition grade between learning to reading and reading to learn, Biancarosa (2012) recommended "reading instruction after 3rd grade should target skills, strategies, and behaviors that research has identified as central to reading in digital environments" (p. 26). Such skills would include teaching search strategies and text structures of informational websites so that learners can find their own background information on a topic rather than relying on the teacher to provide it, how to gather relevant information from targeted reading, and how to gain efficiency when reading digital content, as reading online is slower than reading digitally for deep meaning and developing higher-level literacy. Further, "online reading comprehension includes the online reading and communication skills required by texting, blogs, wikis, video, shared writing spaces (such as Google Docs), and social networks such as Nings" (para. 2). ORCA resources are available for this endeavor, including classroom lessons on reading to locate, evaluate, synthesize, and communicate. There is also a Checklist of Online Reading Skills. ORCA provides its alignment with Common Core Standards. Become familiar with issues surrounding use of print-based texts versus digital or e-texts. Read Points to ponder on pixels and paper by Patricia Deubel (2006, October 4) in T.H.E. Journal. You'll find features of an ideal e-textbook and concerns about using e-textbooks. Read Print versus digital texts: understanding the experimental research and challenging the dichotomies by Bella Ross, Ekaterina Pechenkina, Carol Aeschliman, and Anne-Marie Chase (2017, November 3) in Research in Learning Technology. The authors elaborate on benefits of print-based texts, the importance of a reader's preference for print-based or digital text and use based on familiarity with a particular technology, the advantages of e-texts, and recommendations for impactful e-text learning. Center on Instruction contains publications and presentations on reading, the research syntheses, and exemplars of best practices in reading arranged by grades K-3, grades 4-12, special education, and English language learning. Early Readers from the Pacific Regional Education Laboratory includes a set of early reader books for K-3, which can be downloaded or printed in any of nine Pacific languages and English. Some also include an audio version. English Biz includes pages devoted to writing better essays and writing to inform, persuade, argue, describe, explain, review, and so on. Punctuation, grammar essentials, and better spelling are included. Parts of this site are devoted to English literature for secondary learners. Get Ready to Read from the National Center for Learning Disabilities contains free early literacy and early math resources for preschool children. Users will find early literacy games, webinars, checklists, and tips for parents. The site contains screening tools, a transitioning to kindergarten toolkit, skill-building activities, and early learning and childhood basics. International Reading Association has numerous resources on topics and issues as adolescent literacy, beginning readers, children's and young adult literature, critical literacy, language and cultural diversity, No Child Left Behind, reading assessment and comprehension, struggling readers and writers, teacher education, technology, and urban education initiatives. KidsAndReading from the UK contains numerous articles for helping children to learn and enjoy reading. Also find classroom methods, tools and techniques, reading games, printable puzzles, and more. The section on encouraging your child has suggestions for books for boys and girls and teens and helpful tips. A special concerns section deals with learning to read when learners have ADHD, autism or dyslexia, are struggling readers, have parents who cannot read, or have English as a second language. Learning First Alliance is a partnership of 12 educational associations that have come together to improve student learning in America's public elementary and secondary schools. Through the website, visitors may download Every Child Reading: An Action Plan, and Every Child Reading: A Professional Development Guide, which provide reading tips for parents, teachers, and schools. Lexile Framework for Reading helps connect your students to books of interest based on the students' reading levels. "The Lexile Framework for Reading is a scientific approach to reading and text measurement. There are two Lexile measures: the Lexile reader measure and the Lexile text measure. A Lexile reader measure represents a person’s reading ability on the Lexile scale. A Lexile text measure represents a text’s difficulty level on the Lexile scale. When used together, they can help a reader choose a book or other reading material that is at an appropriate difficulty level. The Lexile reader measure can also be used to monitor a reader’s growth in reading ability over time." There is an extensive database, also with books for educators on mathematics teaching and learning. Math and Reading Help for Kids is an American Library Association corporate member. While there are several sections at this site, the reading section "covers several age groups ranging from early childhood to high school. Topics range from building strong literary skills to suggested reading lists for all age groups." National Institute for Direct Instruction (NIFDI) has a comprehensive collection of information of direct instruction research. According to NIFDI, "Direct Instruction (DI) is a model for teaching that emphasizes well-developed and carefully planned lessons designed around small learning increments and clearly defined and prescribed teaching tasks. It is based on the theory that clear instruction eliminating misinterpretations can greatly improve and accelerate learning." National Reading Panel Publications: One such document is Put Reading First: The Research Building Blocks for Teaching Children to Read, which includes the findings of the National Reading Panel Report. This booklet provides analysis and discussion in five areas of reading instruction: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and text comprehension. Each section suggests implications for classroom instruction. Promoting Reading Strategies for Developmental Mathematics Textbooks by Anne E. Campbell, Ann Schlumberger, and Lou Ann Pate (1997) of Pima Community College includes three reading and study strategies designed to facilitate student comprehension of and learning from developmental mathematics textbooks. The discussion includes a preview, predict, read, and review reading strategy; concept cards; and a Question Answer Relationship technique. For example, concepts cards can include definitions, characteristics, examples, and nonexamples. Common kinds of concept cards in math include: (a) strategy cards for solving problems; (b) fact cards that include rules, laws, or theorems; and (c) cards for symbols and specialized vocabulary. Readability is a free tool that educators might use to help readers better focus on the content of web pages they encounter. It removes the clutter on web pages. The installation provides a button to put on your browser's tool bar. Clicking on the button will convert content on the page to show only text on a white background. Settings can be adjusted, including font-size and margins. Readability also stores articles you find on the web to read at a later time. Reading Resource.Net: Stephen Griffin and Katie Appel provide free resources and materials for teaching children with dyslexia or other reading difficulties to read. They say, "We can explain why children can't read and tell you what you can do to improve their reading skills. Whatever you are seeking, be it reading strategies, teacher resources, reading activities or just a better understanding of the causes of dyslexia and reading problems themselves..." ReadWriteThink.org, supported by the National Council of Teachers of English, is devoted to free standards-based resources for reading and language arts instruction. It also contains resources for high school students. The ReadWriteThink Webbing Tool is particularly useful "free-form graphic organizer for activities that ask students to pursue hypertextual thinking and writing. The tool provides a quick way for students to trace out options and rearrange connections. Students can use the Webbing Tool to analyze readings as well as a prewriting activity and flowcharting tool." Activities using the tool are provided. The graphic organizer can also be used for math activities and is freely available. Results can be printed. A site search reveals several classroom resource lessons for elementary grades exploring math and literacy.is particularly useful "free-form graphic organizer for activities that ask students to pursue hypertextual thinking and writing. The tool provides a quick way for students to trace out options and rearrange connections. Students can use the Webbing Tool to analyze readings as well as a prewriting activity and flowcharting tool." Activities using the tool are provided. The graphic organizer can also be used for math activities and is freely available. Results can be printed. A site search reveals several classroom resource lessons for elementary grades exploring math and literacy. Reading is Fundamental contains resources for parents and educators, including articles on the latest reading research, books, activities, web resources, advice and tips. Rewordify.com "helps with reading comprehension and vocabulary development by simplifying English to a lower reading level. It lets you reword a sentence or reword a paragraph. It will simplify English by reducing text complexity. It's a dictionary alternative that will improve comprehension and teach vocabulary. It's an important part of reading instruction and vocabulary instruction for ESL students, people with reading disabilities, people with a learning disability, or anyone who wants to improve reading skill" (Site Summary). The software creates the easier version and words changed are highlighted. Clicking on those words allows users to hear and learn the original harder words. This free site was developed by teacher Neil Goldman. Sightwords.com includes free resources to help educators and parents teach sight words to kids from Pre-K to 4th Grade. Features include sight word games (e.g., Bingo, Go Fish) that can be customized and printed, customizable flash cards, and classroom-tested lessons with "how-to" videos. The Georgia Preschool Association is noted as a sponsor of this site. SpellingCity.com: Along with learning to read and write well is the need for learning to spell. This site enables students to practice spelling with their own personalized lists, rather than just random spelling words. Students can see their list in flashcard format, hear them spoken by a real human voice, play games with the words, and even take practice spelling tests. The site also has a database of over 37,000 words and eight spelling games. It was selected for a Parents' Choice Recommended Award in 2008. In The Common Core: Teaching K-5 Students to Meet the Reading Standards , Maureen McLaughlin and Brenda Overturf (2012) explain the CCSS reading standards and align them with appropriate research-based reading strategies. They show how to use those and include classroom applications and student examples. McLaughlin and Overturf have similarly written The Common Core: Teaching Students in Grades 6-12 to Meet the Reading Standards (2013). Part I highlights what comprehension is and how to teach it, including the principles that guide practice, a review of recent research, and a new section on assessment. Part II contains lessons and practices for teaching comprehension. Part III, Comprehension Across the Curriculum, deals with comprehension strategies and includes chapters on social studies and science reading, topic study research, textbook reading and the genre of test reading. Part IV has Resources That Support Strategy Instruction. Literacy Strategies for Grades 4-12: Reinforcing the Threads of Reading by Karen Tankersley (2005) includes five chapters. Chapter 1 is on Struggling Readers, chapters 2-5 address Fluency, Vocabulary, Comprehension, and Higher Order Thinking. There is also a study guide for this 202-page book. Effective strategies for improving reading skills are provided, along with suggestions for doing well on high stakes tests (see this latter in chapter 5). Supporting Web site links for additional information are provided throughout. The author's Web site is http://www.threadsofreading.com/ Threads of reading include phonetic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, comprehension, and higher order literacy (i.e., reading for analysis, synthesis, interpretation, and evaluation). Consider linking mathematics to literature. The Best Children's Books features Math for Kids: Children's books that build a love of math. This collection was created by teachers. You'll find engaging books ranging from basic operations, to telling time, money, geometry, fractions, probability, graphing, and so much more. Chart of children's literature featured in the Math Solutions Publications series Math, Literature, and Nonfiction, listed with grade levels (K-8) and topics. Mathicalbooks.org features award-winning fiction and non-fiction books for kids aged 2-18, sure to inspire them to see math in the world around them. "Award-winning Mathical titles are selected by a nationwide committee of mathematicians, educators, librarians, early childhood experts, and others. Each year’s selections joins a growing list of stories ranging from picture books and graphic novels to chapter books and young adult literature. Do you want evidenced-based reading programs? Best Evidence Encyclopedia, created by the Johns Hopkins University School of Education's Center for Data-Driven Reform in Education, includes a list of programs to consider for what works for struggling readers, which are based on reviews of research conducted by Robert Slavin and colleagues. You'll also find top rated reading programs for beginning, upper elementary, elementary, middle/high school, and English language learners. Additional reports on the effects of technology use on reading achievement in K-12 classrooms and the effects of technology use on reading outcomes for struggling readers are available. Additional research by Robert Slavin (2016) revealed at least 24 proven programs for elementary struggling readers that meet the new ESSA evidence standards. Of those 24, 14 met the "strong" ESSA criterion, eight met the "moderate" standard, and two met the "promising" standard. In A Synthesis of Quantitative Research on Reading Programs for Secondary Students, middle and high school, Baye, Lake, Inns, and Slavin (2018) found 17 programs (see Table 12, p. 79) meeting ESSA evidence standards with strong (n=16) and moderate (n=1) ratings. These were grouped into categories: tutoring, cooperative learning, whole school approaches, writing-focused approaches, content-focused approaches, strategy instruction, personalization approaches, and group/personalization rotation approaches. Evidence for ESSA is a free website from the Center for Research and Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University, which began in 2017. It's purpose is to provide educators with the most up-to-date and reliable information regarding K-12 programs (e.g., in math and reading) that meet the strong, moderate, and promising evidence criteria per the Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015. Accelerated Reader from Renaissance Learning has research evidence for its effectiveness, such as that noted at What Works Clearinghouse and the National Center on Student Progress Monitoring. Students choose books at their reading level; this computer-managed program helps assign those readings, then provides quizzes to help monitor students' reading performance and vocabulary growth; immediate feedback is provided. Students do not work directly on the computer, however. For a discussion on Accelerated Reader see Slavin, Cheung, Groff, and Lake (2008). Book Adventure "is a FREE reading motivation program for children in grades K-8. Children create their own book lists from over 7,000 recommended titles, take multiple choice quizzes on the books they've read, and earn points and prizes for their literary successes. Book Adventure was created by and is maintained by Sylvan Learning," according to the website. BrightStar Reader from BrightStar Learning is an internet-based "game-like program that improves reading fluency and focus by enabling reluctant, slow, dyslexic readers to effortlessly and automatically recognize sight words. The BrightStar Reader also helps those who have been diagnosed with dyspraxia or visual attention deficit disorders" (What is BrightStar Reader? section). The program is recommended for learners at least 8 years old. An assessment suite helps to customize the program to the individual and there is progress tracking. There is a fee for this program. Failure Free Reading, a research-based program, targets and is most effectively used with At-Risk and English as a Second Language Students, nonreaders, Special Education students with severe learning difficulties and others in the lowest 10% of the reading population. Fast ForWord is a product of Scientific Learning designed for K-12 students who are reading below grade level. "The Fast ForWord program develops brain processing efficiency through intensive, adaptive exercises." The program is based on more than 30 years of neuroscience and cognitive research. Istation: Reading and Writing is a comprehensive internet based reading and intervention program that helps ensure students reach their reading potential through continuous progress monitoring and layered instruction and intervention. It is designed for students in grades preK-12, including English Language Learners and at-risk students. Istation Math is also available, which "offers game-like computer-adaptive formative assessments appropriate for Pre-kindergarten to 8th grade students and adaptive online instruction appropriate for Pre-kindergarten to 5th grade" (Math section). Lexia Reading Software: The What Works Clearinghouse rated this program, which is from Lexia Learning in Concord (MA), as “potentially positive” for comprehension and alphabetics, based on data from three studies involving 314 students in kindergarten and 1st grade. See the WWC report for additional details. Mindplay software is for struggling readers, including mainstream students, ESL, ELL, and students with learning disabilities (e.g., dyslexia, ADD,and ADHD). It's award-winning and based on scientifically-based research. MightyBook "specializes in children's illustrated, animated read-aloud eBooks and Story Songs for ages 2 to 10, plus children's sing-along songs" (More About MightyBook section). QuickReads from Pearson is a research based program for students in grades 2-6, designed to increase fluency, automaticity, and comprehension. Text length corresponds to grade-level reading rate for 1 minute. Read 180 from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is a research-based intervention program for students in grades 4-12 whose reading level is below proficient. Students using Read 180 have shown gains at least double the equivalent control groups. For a discussion on the research for Read 180 see Slavin, Cheung, Groff, and Lake (2008). In its November 2016 update on Read 180, the What Works Clearinghouse stated, "READ 180 was found to have positive effects on comprehension and general literacy achievement, potentially positive effects on reading fluency, and no discernible effects on alphabetics for adolescent readers" (Evidence Snapshot section). Reading A-Z has over 1000 leveled books in multiple genres spanned across 27 levels of difficulty. Books and resources are correlated to the Common Core Standards and primarily for K-6, although they can be used with a "range of grade levels in special education and special needs, remedial reading, ESL, and ELL" (About section). Guided reading lesson plans, worksheets, and assessments are available. There are resources for phonics, fluency, vocabulary, poetry, assessment, and the alphabet. Reading Bear, a WatchKnowLearn.org project, "is a fun way to learn to read." You'll find over 1,200 vocabulary items and 50 presentations that cover all the main phonics rules. Best of all--it's free. Reading Horizons provides a systematic, explicit, sequential, and multi-sensory approach to teaching reading via the 42 sounds of the alphabet, 5 phonetic skills, and 2 decoding skills. Products are available for K-3 instruction, K-12 intervention, special education, ESL instruction, adult literacy, and home use. Interactive reading software helps differentiate instruction for each learner. Per its description, "scripted, non-consumable direct instruction materials make it possible to provide research-based, multisensory reading instruction that easily adapts to whole-class, small-group, and one-on-one instructional settings." Resources include articles on reading strategies, blended instruction, dyslexia, early literacy, and more. There's also a blog. Reading Recovery: The Reading Recovery Council of North America describes this reading program as a research-based "short-term intervention for first graders having extreme difficulty with early reading and writing" (Reading Recovery section). Reports on effectiveness are incuded. Reading Rockets offers strategies for kids who struggle, strategies for teaching reading, books, free reading guides, reading research, blogs about reading, PBS shows on reading, and so much more. ReadWorks is a "FREE, research-based, and Common Core-aligned reading comprehension curriculum for grades K-6." ReadWorks delivers "lesson plans directly to teachers online" and "provides over 1,000 non-fiction reading passages with question sets to support reading activities." Starfall is a free site designed to teach children how to read. Select one of the online books with its associated activities. StudyDog is designed for K-6 struggling readers. There is also a free online placement test that is appropriate for children Pre-K through 1st Grade, and struggling readers in 2nd and 3rd grades. Success for All includes reading programs for preK-8. For example, The Reading Edge is the reading component of the Success for All middle school program. See Slavin, Cheung, Groff, and Lake (2008) for discussion on its effectiveness. You'll also find PowerTeaching: Mathematics for middle school at Success for All. This program is "an instructional approach that links Common Core, state standards and school curricula to research-proven instructional strategies and classroom resources that promote rigor and student engagement" (Overview section). SuccessMaker from Pearson Education is an "adaptive and prescriptive scheduling intervention program delivering both reading and math curriculum" (SuccessMaker description). It was rated by the What Works Clearinghouse. In its November 2015 updated review of 10 studies, SuccessMaker “was found to have no discernible effects on comprehension and reading fluency for adolescent readers." See the WWC report for additional details. Superkids Reading from Rowland Reading Foundation (WI) is primarily for grades K-2. It integrates learning to read, write, and spell and features explicit, systematic phonics and multimodal instruction. Studies of effectiveness have been conducted. Text Project offers free, downloadable informational books for students with summer reads, a beginner series, talking points for kids, and read-aloud favorites. Voyager Passport from Voyager Sopris Learning is a comprehensive K-5 reading intervention that meets the needs of all struggling readers. It was reviewed by Slavin, Cheung, Groff, and Lake (2008). Note: The latest version is aligned with Common Core standards. Biancarosa, G. (2012). Adolescent literacy: More than remediation. Educational Leadership, 69(6), 22-27. Chrisman, V. (2005). How schools sustain success. Educational Leadership, 62(5), 16-20. Eaton, C. (2005). Sparking a revolution in teaching and learning. T.H.E. Journal, 32(13), 21-24. Marzano, R. (2009). Six steps to better vocabulary instruction. Educational Leadership, 67(1), 83-84. Shaywitz, S., & Shaywitz, B. (2007). What neuroscience really tells us about reading instruction. Educational Leadership, 64(5), 74-76.
2019-04-24T12:38:06Z
http://www.ct4me.net/reading.htm
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You agree that you must evaluate, and bear all risks associated with, the use of any User Content, that you may not rely on said User Content, and that under no circumstances will BrewerySoul be liable in any way for any User Content or for any loss or damage of any kind incurred as a result of the use of any User Content posted, emailed or otherwise made available via the Service. You acknowledge that BrewerySoul does not pre-screen or approve User Content, but that BrewerySoul shall have the right (but not the obligation) in its sole discretion to refuse, delete or move any User Content that is available via the Service, for violating the letter or spirit of the TOS or for any other reason. User Content (including any that may have been created by users employed or contracted by BrewerySoul) does not necessarily reflect the opinion of BrewerySoul. We reserve the right to remove, screen, edit, or reinstate User Content from time to time at our sole discretion for any reason or no reason, and without notice to you. We have no obligation to retain or provide you with copies of User Content, nor do we guarantee any confidentiality with respect to User Content. D. Advertising. BrewerySoul and its licensees may publicly display advertisements and other information adjacent to or included with User Content. You are not entitled to any compensation for such advertisements. The manner, mode and extent of such advertising are subject to change without specific notice to you. E. No Submission of Ideas. In your communications with BrewerySoul, please keep in mind that we do not seek any unsolicited ideas or materials for products or services, or even suggested improvements to products or services, including, without limitation, ideas, concepts, inventions, or designs for music, websites, apps, books, scripts, screenplays, motion pictures, television shows, theatrical productions, software or otherwise (collectively, “Unsolicited Ideas and Materials”). Any Unsolicited Ideas and Materials you post on or send to us via the Service are deemed User Content and licensed to us as set forth below. In addition, BrewerySoul retains all of the rights held by members of the general public with regard to your Unsolicited Ideas and Materials. BrewerySoul receipt of your Unsolicited Ideas and Materials is not an admission by BrewerySoul of their novelty, priority, or originality, and it does not impair BrewerySoul’ right to contest existing or future intellectual property rights relating to your Unsolicited Ideas and Materials. Don’t Share Other Peoples’ Personal Information. Your User Content should not reveal another person’s address, phone number, e-mail address, social security number, credit card number, medical information, financial information, or any other information that may be used to track, contact, or impersonate that individual, unless, and in the form and by the method, specifically requested by BrewerySoul. If you submit User Content that BrewerySoul reasonably believes violates these Rules, then we may take any legally available action that we deem appropriate, in our sole discretion. However, we are not obligated to take any action not required by law. We may require, at any time, proof of the permissions referred to above in a form acceptable to us. Failure to provide such proof may lead to, among other things, the User Content in question being removed from the Service. (iii) Alerting Us of Violations. If you discover any content that violates the TOS, then you may report it to us via email at info@BrewerySoul.com. It is often difficult to determine if your copyright has been infringed. BrewerySoul may elect to not respond to DMCA Notices that do not substantially comply with all of the foregoing requirements, and BrewerySoul may elect to remove allegedly infringing material that comes to its attention via notices that do not substantially comply with the DMCA. Without limiting BrewerySoul’ other rights, BrewerySoul may, in appropriate circumstances, terminate a repeat infringer’s access to the Service and any other website owned or operated by BrewerySoul. You acknowledge that BrewerySoul may establish limits concerning use of the Service, including the maximum number of days that Content will be retained by the Service, the maximum number and size of postings, email messages, or other Content that may be transmitted or stored by the Service, and the frequency with which you may access the Service. You agree that BrewerySoul has no responsibility or liability for the deletion or failure to store any Content maintained or transmitted by the Service. You acknowledge that BrewerySoul reserves the right at any time to modify or discontinue the Service (or any part thereof) with or without notice, and that BrewerySoul shall not be liable to you or to any third party for any modification, suspension or discontinuance of the Service. You agree that BrewerySoul, in its sole discretion, has the right (but not the obligation) to delete or deactivate your account, block your email or IP address, or otherwise terminate your access to or use of the Service (or any part thereof), immediately and without notice, and remove and discard any Content within the Service, for any reason, including, without limitation, if BrewerySoul believes that you have acted inconsistently with the letter or spirit of the TOS. Further, you agree that BrewerySoul shall not be liable to you or any third-party for any termination of your access to the Service. Further, you agree not to attempt to use the Service after said termination. You may terminate the TOS at any time by closing your account, discontinuing your use of the Service, and providing BrewerySoul with a notice of termination. We grant you a limited, non-exclusive, revocable, non-assignable, personal, and non-transferable license to create hyperlinks to the Service, so long as: (a) the links only incorporate text, and do not use any Trademarks, (b) the links and the content on your website do not suggest any affiliation with BrewerySoul or cause any other confusion, and (c) the links and the content on your website do not portray BrewerySoul or its products or services in a false, misleading, derogatory, or otherwise offensive matter, and do not contain content that is unlawful, offensive, obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, violent, threatening, harassing, or abusive, or that violate any right of any third party or are otherwise objectionable to BrewerySoul. BrewerySoul reserves the right to suspend or prohibit linking to the Service for any reason, in its sole discretion, without advance notice or any liability of any kind to you or any third party. THE SERVICE IS MADE AVAILABLE TO YOU ON AN “AS IS”, “WITH ALL FAULTS” AND “AS AVAILABLE” BASIS, WITH THE EXPRESS UNDERSTANDING THAT BREWERYSOUL MAY NOT MONITOR, CONTROL, OR VET USER CONTENT. AS SUCH, YOUR USE OF THE SERVICE IS AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION AND RISK. BREWERYSOUL MAKES NO CLAIMS OR PROMISES ABOUT THE QUALITY, ACCURACY, OR RELIABILITY OF THE SERVICE, ITS SAFETY OR SECURITY, OR THE CONTENT. ACCORDINGLY, BREWERYSOUL IS NOT LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY LOSS OR DAMAGE THAT MIGHT ARISE, FOR EXAMPLE, FROM THE SERVICE’S INOPERABILITY, UNAVAILABILITY OR SECURITY VULNERABILITIES OR FROM YOUR RELIANCE ON THE QUALITY, ACCURACY, OR RELIABILITY OF THE BUSINESS LISTINGS, RATINGS, REVIEWS (INCLUDING THEIR CONTENT, ORDER, AND DISPLAY), OR METRICS FOUND ON, USED ON, OR MADE AVAILABLE THROUGH THE SERVICE. BREWERYSOUL MAKES NO CLAIMS OR PROMISES WITH RESPECT TO ANY THIRD PARTY, SUCH AS THE BUSINESSES OR ADVERTISERS LISTED ON THE SERVICE OR THE SERVICE’S USERS. ACCORDINGLY, BREWERYSOUL IS NOT LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY LOSS OR DAMAGE THAT MIGHT ARISE FROM THEIR ACTIONS OR OMISSIONS, INCLUDING, FOR EXAMPLE, IF ANOTHER USER OR BUSINESS MISUSES YOUR CONTENT, IDENTITY OR PERSONAL INFORMATION, OR IF YOU HAVE A NEGATIVE EXPERIENCE WITH ONE OF THE BUSINESSES OR ADVERTISERS LISTED OR FEATURED ON THE SERVICE. YOUR PURCHASE AND USE OF PRODUCTS OR SERVICES OFFERED BY THIRD PARTIES THROUGH THE SERVICE IS AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION AND RISK. BREWERYSOUL EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WARRANTIES AS TO THE PRODUCTS OR SERVICES OFFERED BY BUSINESSES LISTED ON THE SERVICE, AND IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. NO ORAL OR WRITTEN INFORMATION OR ADVICE PROVIDED TO YOU BY A REPRESENTATIVE OF ONE OF BREWERYSOUL SHALL CREATE A REPRESENTATION OR WARRANTY. YOUR SOLE AND EXCLUSIVE RIGHT AND REMEDY IN CASE OF DISSATISFACTION WITH THE SERVICE, RELATED SERVICES, OR ANY OTHER GRIEVANCE SHALL BE YOUR TERMINATION AND DISCONTINUATION OF ACCESS TO, OR USE OF THE SERVICE. BREWERYSOUL’ MAXIMUM AGGREGATE LIABILITY TO YOU FOR LOSSES OR DAMAGES THAT YOU SUFFER IN CONNECTION WITH THE SERVICE OR THE TOS IS LIMITED TO THE GREATER OF (i) THE AMOUNT PAID, IF ANY, BY YOU TO BREWERYSOUL IN CONNECTION WITH THE SERVICE IN THE 12 MONTHS PRIOR TO THE ACTION GIVING RISE TO LIABILITY, OR (ii) $100. BREWERYSOUL DISCLAIMS LIABILITY FOR ANY (i) INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, PUNITIVE, EXEMPLARY, RELIANCE, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, (ii) LOSS OF PROFITS, (iii) BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, (iv) REPUTATIONAL HARM, OR (v) LOSS OF INFORMATION OR DATA RESULTING FROM ANY ASPECT OF YOUR USE OF THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR THE SERVICE, WHETHER THE DAMAGES ARISE FROM USE OR MISUSE OF THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR THE SERVICE, FROM INABILITY TO USE THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR THE SERVICE, OR THE INTERRUPTION, SUSPENSION, MODIFICATION, ALTERATION, OR TERMINATION OF THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR THE SERVICE. SUCH LIMITATION SHALL ALSO APPLY WITH RESPECT TO DAMAGES INCURRED BY REASON OF OTHER SERVICES OR PRODUCTS RECEIVED THROUGH OR ADVERTISED IN CONNECTION WITH THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR THE SERVICE OR ANY LINKS ON THE BREWERYSOUL SITE, AS WELL AS BY REASON OF ANY INFORMATION OR ADVICE RECEIVED THROUGH OR ADVERTISED IN CONNECTION WITH THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR THE SERVICE OR ANY LINKS ON THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR SERVICE. THESE LIMITATIONS SHALL APPLY TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW. In some jurisdictions, limitations of liability are not permitted. In such jurisdictions, some of the foregoing limitation may not apply to you. ALL EXPRESS AND IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT OF PROPRIETARY RIGHTS ARE EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMED TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, BREWERYSOUL DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTIES FOR THE SECURITY, RELIABILITY, TIMELINESS, ACCURACY, AND PERFORMANCE OF THE BREWERYSOUL SITE AND THE SERVICE. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, BREWERYSOUL DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTIES FOR OTHER SERVICES OR GOODS RECEIVED THROUGH OR ADVERTISED ON THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR SERVICE, OR ACCESSED THROUGH ANY LINKS ON THE BREWERYSOUL SITE AND SERVICE. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, BREWERYSOUL DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTIES FOR VIRUSES OR OTHER HARMFUL COMPONENTS IN CONNECTION WITH THE BREWERYSOUL SITE OR THE SERVICE. Some jurisdictions do not allow the disclaimer of implied warranties. In such jurisdictions, some of the foregoing disclaimers may not apply to you insofar as they relate to implied warranties. You agree that: (1) we may give you notices of new, revised or changed terms and other important matters by prominently posting notice on the home page of the Service, or in another reasonable manner; and (2) we may contact you by mail or email sent to the address provided by you. You agree to promptly notify us if you change your email or mailing address by updating your Profile Settings. If you have a question regarding using the Service, you may contact BrewerySoul Customer Support by sending an email to info@BrewerySoul.com or calling our number at 844-BrewerySoul. You acknowledge that the provision of customer support is at BrewerySoul’ sole discretion and that we have no obligation to provide you with customer support of any kind. Without limiting any other provisions of the TOS, this section is specific to the use of BrewerySoul downloadable software application(s) (the “Application”). (i) To the extent that you are accessing the Service through an Apple Device, you acknowledge that the TOS are entered into between you and BrewerySoul and, that Apple, Inc. (“Apple”) is not a party to the TOS other than as third-party beneficiary as contemplated below. (iii) You acknowledge that BrewerySoul, and not Apple, is responsible for providing the Service and Content thereof. (vi) Notwithstanding anything to the contrary herein, and subject to the terms in the TOS, you acknowledge that, solely as between Apple and BrewerySoul, BrewerySoul (and not Apple) is responsible for addressing any claims you may have relating to the Service, or your possession and/or use thereof, including, but not limited, to: (i) product liability claims; (ii) any claim that the Service fails to confirm to any applicable legal or regulatory requirement; and (iii) claims arising under consumer protection or similar legislation. By sending us any ideas, suggestions, documents or proposals (“Feedback”), you agree that: (i) your Feedback does not contain the confidential or proprietary information of third parties, (ii) we are under no obligation of confidentiality, express or implied, with respect to the Feedback, (iii) we may have something similar to the Feedback already under consideration or in development, and (iv) you grant us an irrevocable, non-exclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, worldwide license to use, modify, prepare derivative works of, publish, distribute and sublicense the Feedback, and you irrevocably waive, and cause to be waived, against BrewerySoul and its users any claims and assertions of any moral rights contained in such Feedback. You agree to, and you hereby, defend, indemnify, and hold BrewerySoul harmless from and against any and all claims, damages, losses, costs, investigations, liabilities, judgments, fines, penalties, settlements, interest, and expenses (including attorneys’ fees) that directly or indirectly arise from or are related to any claim, suit, action, demand, or proceeding made or brought against BrewerySoul, or on account of the investigation, defense, or settlement thereof, arising out of or in connection with, whether occurring heretofore or hereafter: (i) your Use Content; (ii) your use of the Service and your activities in connection with the Service; (iii) your breach or alleged breach of the TOS or any Additional Terms; (iv) your violation or alleged violation of any laws, rules, regulations, codes, statutes, ordinances, or orders of any governmental or quasi-governmental authorities in connection with your use of the Service or your activities in connection with the Service; (v) information or material transmitted through your Device, even if not submitted by you, that infringes, violates, or misappropriates any copyright, trademark, trade secret, trade dress, patent, publicity, privacy, or other right of any person or entity; (vi) any misrepresentation made by you; and (vii) BrewerySoul’ use of the information that you submit to us (including your User Content) (all of the foregoing, “Claims and Losses”). You will cooperate as fully required by BrewerySoul in the defense of any Claim and Losses. Notwithstanding the foregoing, BrewerySoul retain the exclusive right to settle, compromise, and pay any and all Claims and Losses. BrewerySoul reserve the right to assume the exclusive defense and control of any Claims and Losses. You will not settle any Claims and Losses without, in each instance, the prior written consent of an officer of a BrewerySoul. Certain portions of this Section 18 are deemed to be a “written agreement to arbitrate” pursuant to the Federal Arbitration Act. You and BrewerySoul agree that we intend that this Section 18 satisfies the “writing” requirement of the Federal Arbitration Act. This Section 18 can only be amended by mutual agreement. A. First – Try to Resolve Disputes and Excluded Disputes. If any controversy, allegation, or claim arises out of or relates to the Service, the Content, your User Content, these TOS, or any Additional Terms, whether heretofore or hereafter arising (collectively, “Dispute”), or to any of BrewerySoul’ actual or alleged intellectual property rights (an “Excluded Dispute”, which includes those actions set forth in Section 18(D)), then you and we agree to send a written notice to the other providing a reasonable description of the Dispute or Excluded Dispute, along with a proposed resolution of it. Our notice to you will be sent to you based on the most recent contact information that you provide us. But if no such contact information exists or if such information is not current, then we have no obligation under this Section 18(A). Your notice to us must be sent to: BrewerySoul Media, Inc., 41 Discovery, Irvine, CA 92618 (Attn: Legal Department). For a period of sixty (60) days from the date of receipt of notice from the other party, BrewerySoul and you will engage in a dialogue in order to attempt to resolve the Dispute or Excluded Dispute, though nothing will require either you or BrewerySoul to resolve the Dispute or Excluded Dispute on terms with respect to which you and BrewerySoul, in each of our sole discretion, are not comfortable. B. Binding Arbitration. If we cannot resolve a Dispute as set forth in Section 18(A) (or agree to arbitration in writing with respect to an Excluded Dispute) within sixty (60) days of receipt of the notice, then ANY AND ALL DISPUTES ARISING BETWEEN YOU AND BREWERYSOUL MUST BE RESOLVED BY FINAL AND BINDING ARBITRATION. THIS INCLUDES ANY AND ALL DISPUTES BASED ON ANY PRODUCT, SERVICE OR ADVERTISING CONNECTED TO THE PROVISION OR USE OF THE SERVICE (WHETHER BASED IN CONTRACT, STATUTE, REGULATION, ORDINANCE, TORT – INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, NEGLIGENCE, FRAUD, ANY OTHER INTENTIONAL TORT OR COMMON LAW, CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISION, RESPONDEAT SUPERIOR, AGENCY OR ANY OTHER LEGAL OR EQUITABLE THEORY – AND WHETHER ARISING BEFORE OR AFTER THE EFFECTIVE DATE OF THE TOS. The Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) shall govern the arbitrability of all disputes between BrewerySoul and you regarding the TOS (and any Additional Terms) and the Service, including the No Class Action Matters section below. BY AGREEING TO ARBITRATE, EACH PARTY IS GIVING UP ITS RIGHT TO GO TO COURT AND HAVE ANY DISPUTE HEARD BY A JUDGE OR JURY. BrewerySoul and you agree, however, that Ohio or federal law shall apply to and govern, as appropriate, any and all claims or causes of action, remedies, and damages arising between you and BrewerySoul regarding these TOS and the Service, whether arising or stated in contract, statute, common law, or any other legal theory, without regard to Ohio’s choice of law principles. A Dispute will be resolved solely by binding arbitration in accordance with the then-current Commercial Arbitration Rules of the American Arbitration Association (“AAA”), except as modified herein, and in accordance with the AAA’s Supplementary Procedures for Consumer Related Disputes. The arbitration will be administered by the AAA. If an in-person arbitration hearing is required, then it will be conducted in the “metropolitan statistical area” (as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau) where you are a resident at the time the Dispute is submitted to arbitration. You and we will pay the administrative and arbitrator’s fees and other costs in accordance with the applicable arbitration rules; but if applicable arbitration rules or laws require BrewerySoul to pay a greater portion or all of such fees and costs in order for this Section 18 to be enforceable, then BrewerySoul will have the right to elect to pay the fees and costs and proceed to arbitration. The arbitrator will apply and be bound by the TOS and any Additional Terms, and will determine any Dispute according to applicable law and facts based upon the record and no other basis, and will issue a reasoned award only in favor of the individual party seeking relief and only to the extent to provide relief warranted by that party’s individual claim. Issues relating to the enforceability of the arbitration and class action waiver provisions contained herein are for the court to decide. This arbitration provision shall survive termination of these TOS or the Service. You can obtain AAA procedures, rules, and fee information as follows: 800.778.7879 and http://www.adr.org. D. Injunctive Relief. The foregoing provisions of this Section 18 will not apply to any legal action taken by BrewerySoul to seek an injunction or other equitable relief in connection with, any loss, cost, or damage (or any potential loss, cost, or damage) relating to the Service, any Content, your User Content and/or BrewerySoul’ intellectual property rights (including such BrewerySoul may claim that may be in dispute), BrewerySoul’ operations, and/or BrewerySoul’ products or services. E. No Class Action Matters. YOU AND BREWERYSOUL AGREE THAT EACH MAY BRING CLAIMS AGAINST THE OTHER ONLY IN YOUR OR ITS INDIVIDUAL CAPACITY, AND NOT AS A PLAINTIFF OR CLASS MEMBER IN ANY PURPORTED CLASS OR REPRESENTATIVE PROCEEDING OR AS AN ASSOCIATION. Disputes will be arbitrated only on an individual basis and will not be joined or consolidated with any other arbitrations or other proceedings that involve any claim or controversy of any other party. There shall be no right or authority for any Dispute to be arbitrated on a class action basis or on any basis involving Disputes brought in a purported representative capacity on behalf of the general public, or other persons or entities similarly situated. But if, for any reason, any court with competent jurisdiction holds that this restriction is unconscionable or unenforceable, then our agreement in Section 18(B) to arbitrate will not apply and the Dispute must be brought exclusively in court pursuant to Section 18(F). Notwithstanding any other provision of this Section 18, any and all issues relating to the scope, interpretation and enforceability of the class action waiver provisions contained herein (described in this “No Class Action Matters” section), are to be decided only by a court of competent jurisdiction, and not by the arbitrator. The arbitrator does not have the power to vary these class action waiver provisions. G. Federal and State Courts in Franklin County, Ohio. Except where arbitration is required as above, small claims actions, or with respect to the enforcement of any arbitration decision or award, any action or proceeding relating to any Dispute or Excluded Dispute arising hereunder may only be instituted in state or Federal court in Franklin County, Ohio. Accordingly, you and BrewerySoul consent to the exclusive personal jurisdiction and venue of such courts for such matters. H. Applicable Law. The TOS and any Additional Terms will be governed by and construed in accordance with, and any Dispute and Excluded Dispute will be resolved in accordance with, the laws of the Ohio, without regard to its conflicts of law provisions. The TOS constitute the entire agreement between you and BrewerySoul and govern your use of the Service, superseding any prior agreements between you and BrewerySoul. BrewerySoul reserves the right, without any limitation, to: (i) investigate any suspected breaches of its Service security or its information technology or other systems or networks, (ii) investigate any suspected breaches of the TOS and any Additional Terms, (iii) investigate any information obtained by BrewerySoul in connection with reviewing law enforcement databases or complying with criminal laws, (iv) involve and cooperate with law enforcement authorities in investigating any of the foregoing matters, (v) prosecute violators of the TOS and any Additional Terms, and (vi) discontinue the Service, in whole or in part, or, except as may be expressly set forth in any Additional Terms, suspend or terminate your access to it, in whole or in part, including any user accounts or registrations, at any time, without notice, for any reason and without any obligation to you or any third party. Any suspension or termination will not affect your obligations to BrewerySoul under the TOS or any Additional Terms. Upon suspension or termination of your access to the Service, or upon notice from BrewerySoul all rights granted to you under the TOS or any Additional Terms will cease immediately, and you agree that you will immediately discontinue use of the Service. The provisions of the TOS and any Additional Terms, which by their nature should survive your suspension or termination will survive, including the rights and licenses you grant to BrewerySoul in the TOS, as well as the indemnities, releases, disclaimers, and limitations on liability and the provisions regarding jurisdiction, choice of law, no class action, and mandatory arbitration. The failure of BrewerySoul to exercise or enforce any right or provision of the TOS shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. If any provision of the TOS is found by an arbitrator to be invalid, the parties nevertheless agree that the arbitrator should endeavor to give effect to the parties’ intentions as reflected in the provision, and the other provisions of the TOS remain in full force and effect. Any failure on BrewerySoul’ part to exercise or enforce any right or provision of the TOS does not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. The failure of either party to exercise in any respect any right provided for herein shall not be deemed a waiver of any further rights hereunder. The TOS, and any rights or obligations hereunder, are not assignable, transferable or sub-licensable by you except with BrewerySoul’ prior written consent, but may be assigned or transferred by us without restriction. Any attempted assignment by you shall violate the TOS and be void. © 2016 COPYRIGHT BY GasketMedia. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
2019-04-20T22:46:43Z
http://www.brewerysoul.com/brewerysoul-terms-conditions/
Later, as it is recorded in Acts chapter 21 at verses 20 through 22, it is clear that Paul and James had a disagreement over whether going forward the Judaeans, those who are born to parents in the law, should be brought up under the rituals of the law. However there was never any dispute concerning those who were not Judaeans. Ostensibly, in spite of the agreement which the apostles had come to which is recorded in Acts chapter 15, there were still Judaizers coming out from Judaea who sought the contrary and had maintained the same attitude seen with these earlier Judaizers at Antioch in Acts 15:5. 3 Yet not even Titos who with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised 4 by those privily introduced false brethren, such who infiltrate to spy out our freedom which we have in Christ Yahshua, in order that they may enslave us; 5 to whom not even for a minute did we yield in subjection, at which the truth of the good message would persevere for the sake of you. The Greek phrase πρὸς ὥραν, which is here “for a minute”, in our modern English idiom may just as well be read “for a second”. The word ὥρα (Strong's # 5610), which is also the origin of the Latin word hora and our English word hour, did not at that time exclusively denote an exact segment of the day, but was also used to mean “any time or period, whether of the year, month, or day...a part of the year, a season...a part of the day” (Liddell & Scott). Titos is not at all referred to by that name in the Book of Acts, although Paul mentions his presence with him several times in his second epistle to the Corinthians. He is also ostensibly the same Titos seen in 2 Corinthians, and who is the recipient of the epistle addressed to Titos. In the past I have imagined that this Titos is the same man whom some of the better manuscripts identify as Titios Ioustos, or in the King James Version only as Justus, at Acts 18:7. This is a possibility, however if it is true then it would mean that Paul knew Titios Ioustos long before Paul had arrived in Corinth, where Ioustos was living when Paul began his ministry there. So the two individuals are not necessarily the same person, but the possibility does indeed exist. It is evident that where Paul said “then after fourteen years I had again gone up to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titos along also”, that he must have been referring to the events of Acts chapter 15 because he and Barnabas had also split right after that time, as it is recorded in Acts 15:39, and had gone their separate ways. Where Titos accompanied Paul and Barnabas to Jerusalem, there were certainly others as well, including Luke himself, but Luke had only written that “Paul and Barnabas and some of the others among them” had made the trip, as we see in Acts 15:2. So here in Galatians Paul gives us two periods of time, where we see that three years had transpired between his conversion on the road to Damascus and his first appearance in Jerusalem, a period which covers only some of the events recorded in Acts chapter 9, and then there is a period of fourteen years which can either include or which can be added to those first three, since Paul's language is ambiguous. So there are either fourteen years between Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus and his going to Jerusalem recorded in Acts chapter 15, or there are seventeen years if his intent is to add the fourteen years mentioned here to the first three years rather than considering them inclusively. However the events can be dated, and we learn that the total time could only have been fourteen years, and not seventeen. Luke chapter 3 informs us that the ministry of Yahshua Christ began in the 15th year of Tiberius Caesar, from which we can reckon it to have begun in the late summer or perhaps early fall of 28 AD. Having had a ministry of three-and-a-half years, which is determined from the recounting of the Passover feasts mentioned in the Gospel of John and also from other sources, the Crucifixion most likely took place in the Spring of 32 AD. Therefore we do not have enough time for the events of Paul's ministry to consume 17 years between the crucifixion and the events of Acts chapter 15, and then according to the narrative of Acts chapters 15 through 17, at least a couple of additional years to the beginning of his 18-month sojourn in Corinth, which must have begun no earlier than either mid 49 and no later than early 50 AD [for Gallio to be in office towards the end of the 18 months]. This is especially true since after the first Christian Pentecost, the stoning of Stephen and then the events on the road to Damascus which led to Paul's conversion probably require at least a year to have transpired as they were described. But if we understand Paul's 14 years as being inclusive of the first 3 year period which he mentions here, and we understand that Paul was converted in 33 or maybe 34 AD, everything falls into place and the events described in Acts chapter 15 very likely took place in 47 AD. This also establishes the fact that this letter to the Galatians, and Paul's subsequent visit to Galatia anticipated here, must have been written not only after the events of Acts chapter 15, but also after Paul had an opportunity to visit Antioch once again. This we shall see in the balance of this chapter. 6 Now from those reputed to be something, whatsoever they were then makes not one difference to me. Yahweh does not receive a man’s stature, therefore to me those of repute are conferred nothing. The Greek word πρόσωπον (Strong's # 4383), is “the face, visage, countenance...one’s look...outward appearance, beauty” (Liddell & Scott), and therefore it is stature here. It refers to the look of a man, or to his status in life, and not to the person himself. Paul’s adversaries in Acts 15 were not James and Peter, but the Judaizing Pharisees which we had seen mentioned in verses 2 and 5 of that chapter. Yet here Paul certainly seems to say that even if James and Peter, “those reputed to be pillars” as he calls them here in verse 7, had supported the Pharisees in the matters which had been disputed there, Paul would not have capitulated to them and violated the meaning of the Gospel as he had come to understand it. The word rendered as message in verse 8 is the Greek word ἀποστολή (Strong's # 651), which can refer to either the message or to the mission of the person bearing the message, so it is apostleship in the King James Version. Here Paul informs us that instead of supporting the Judaizing Pharisees, “on the contrary”, as he puts it, the apostles accepted his position as being the legitimate position, and offered him their friendship. Quite often, the critics of Paul of Tarsus portray the division which is described here as a two-party division, or Paul versus the so-called “real Christians” who were the apostles in Jerusalem. In fact, it is clear from the records that there were three parties involved, Paul and Barnabas and those who were with them, and then the Judaizing Pharisees, and then the original apostles who were called to intervene and after investigating the matter they chose the side of Paul. Therefore it was a three party division which quickly melted into two parties, and only the critics of Paul are left on the side of the Pharisaical Jews! 9 and knowing the favor being given to me, Iakobos and Kephas and Iohannes, those reputed to be pillars, had given right hands of fellowship to me and to Barnabas, that we are for the Nations, and they for the circumcised; 10 only that we should remember the poor, the same thing which I had then been anxious to do. The Codex Alexandrinus lists only James and John in verse 9, where the 3rd century papyrus P46 has James and Peter and John, and the Codex Bezae (D) has Peter and James and John (which seems to be a result of Roman propaganda); the text follows the Codices Sinaiticus (א), Vaticanus (B), Ephraemi Syri (C), Freerianus (I 016), and the Majority Text. The commission which Paul is referring to here, received by himself and Barnabas, is mentioned even earlier in the accounts in Acts. First, we see at the very end of Acts chapter 11: “27 And in those days prophets came down from Jerusalem into Antiocheia. 28 And there arose one of them named Hagabos who indicated through the Spirit that a great famine is going to come upon the whole inhabited world, which happened in the time of Klaudios. [Claudius was emperor from 41 to 54 AD. Herod Agrippa I, the Herod of Acts chapter 12, died in the Spring of 44 AD.] 29 Then of the students, just as anyone prospered, each of them set aside for supplies to send to those brethren dwelling in Judaea, 30 which they then did, sending to the elders by the hand of Barnabas and Saulos.” Then we see at the very end of Acts chapter 12: “25 And Barnabas and Saulos returned to Jerusalem [from Antioch] completing the supply, taking along with them Iohannes who is called Markos.” [So this very likely happened in 44 AD shortly after Herod died.] This seems to be what Paul is referring to here in Galatians chapter 2 where he says in verse 10 “only that we should remember the poor, the same thing which I had then been anxious to do”, and then we read in the very next verse, the beginning of Acts chapter 13: “1 And there were throughout the assembly which was in Antiocheia prophets and teachers, namely Barnabas and Sumeon who is called 'Niger' and Loukios the Kurenaian, and Manaen a childhood companion of Herodas the tetrarch, and Saulos. 2 And upon their performing services for the Prince and fasting, the Holy Spirit spoke: 'Now set apart for Me Barnabas and Saulos for the work which I have called them.' 3 Then fasting and praying and laying the hands upon them they released them.” This is where the ministry to the uncircumcised is begun by Paul and Barnabas, but the “work [for] which I have called them” must have already been determined, as well as the agreement among the original apostles, as Barnabas and Saul are connected to the account given in Acts chapter 11 where Peter professes the realization that the Nations should receive the Gospel of Christ (cf Acts 11:21-26). 11 But when Kephas [D and the MT have “Peter”; the text follows א, A, B, C, and H] had come to Antiocheia, I had confronted him personally because he was condemning himself: 12 for before some who were [P46 has “one who was”] to come from Iakobos, he [P46 has “they”] had eaten in common with the Nations, but when they came [P46, א, B, and D have “he came” (P46 is consistent with its previous variation in this verse, while א, B, and D are not); the text follows A, C, H, and the MT] he withdrew and separated himself, being in fear of those of the circumcised; 13 and also the rest of the Judaeans had acted with him, so that even Barnabas had been led away by them in hypocrisy. These events which Paul describes here are not recorded in the Book of Acts, or anywhere else. But we do learn from the account at the end of Acts chapter 15, and especially from Acts15:35, that after returning from Jerusalem to Antioch, that Paul and Barnabas had indeed spent a considerable time there before Barnabas sailed to Cyprus with Mark, and Paul had departed with Silas for Syria and Cilicia and points further west. We are only told up to this point that Paul had a disagreement with Barnabas over the value of Mark to the ministry, and that for that reason they each went their own way, which is recorded in Acts 15:37-39. This is all that we see recorded, and so far as we can tell from Luke's language in Acts chapter 16, seeing that he was with Paul then, Luke was also very likely here with Paul in Antioch to record whatever had transpired. We have already compared the chronology and the records of Acts with all of the comments regarding the events related by Paul in regards to his ministry found up to this point in his epistle to the Galatians. Here it is evident, that up through Acts chapter 15 Paul had the revelation that the formerly pagan Christians, upon turning to Christianity, should not take upon themselves the rituals found in the law of Moses. With this the apostles agreed in Acts chapter 15. So, as he describes here in Galatians chapter 2, if Paul had confronted Peter in Antioch before this point in his ministry where he circumcised Timothy, he would have been a hypocrite for having circumcised Timothy. But there is no indication in Acts chapter 15 that Paul had already developed the idea that Judaeans should part from the rituals of the law, and then in Acts chapter 16 Paul made certain to have Timothy circumcised because his mother was a Judaean, and on account of the Judaeans. So Paul must have developed the idea that Judaeans should also depart from the works of the law at a time later than the sojourn in Antioch recorded in Acts chapter 15, and the encounter where Timothy was circumcised as it is recorded in Acts chapter 16. Furthermore, as in Galatians chapter 4 Paul reflects back on his having been to Galatia in the past, where he said he had preached the Gospel, and since the first record of his being in Galatia is in Acts 16:6, then this epistle must have been written after the events which are recorded in Acts 16:6. In Acts chapter 21, in an account which transpired over ten years after the account in Jerusalem recorded in Acts chapter 15, we see that same fear of the circumcision in James, at Acts 21:18-26, which Paul exhibited in Acts chapter 16. Only in Acts chapter 21, at verses 20-22, we see it being acknowledged that Paul was teaching Judaeans to depart from the rituals of the law. Therefore the events described here, where Paul relates his confrontation with Peter, must have taken place some time after the circumcision of Timothy, and before Paul wrote this epistle. There is evidently only one opportunity left in Paul's ministry for that. In Acts chapter 18, Luke is not with Paul, for Paul had left Luke behind in Philippi after his arrest which is recorded in the latter parts of Acts chapter 16. Yet, although none of the details of his stay are recorded in Acts, in chapter 18 it is mentioned that Paul once again visits Antioch, and for the last time. This is the only opportunity he had in which to meet Peter as he describes having confronted him in here Galatians chapter 2. Evidently he also saw Barnabas here, as we see in Galatians 2:13. We also see in Acts 18:23 that Paul had spent “some time” in Antioch on this visit, which could be days or weeks, or even months: there is no telling. It is also apparent, although it cannot be asserted with absolute certainty, that it is here in Antioch that Paul wrote this epistle to the Galatians. Paul says in chapter 4 (4:20) of this epistle “I have desired to be present with you even now, and to change my tone, because I am perplexed with you”, and he indeed goes on to visit them after leaving Antioch, which is only briefly recorded in Acts 18:23. Aside from expressing his desire to visit the Galatians later on in chapter 4, Paul says here in verse 11 of this chapter: “But when Kephas had come to Antiocheia”, as if he was still in Antioch when he wrote those words. This must be contrasted to the statement in verse 6 where Paul reflects back by saying “whatsoever they were then”, speaking of the past. This may be dismissed as being circumstantial, however for the many other reasons given here, I feel safe in asserting that the epistle to the Galatians was written at the time that Paul was in Antioch as it is recorded in Acts 18:22, and that is also when the confrontation with Peter must have occurred. 14 But when I had seen that they did not walk uprightly, according to the truth of the good message, I had said to Kephas [D and the MT have “Petros”; the text follows P46, א, A, B, C, and H] before them all: If you, being a Judaean, live like a foreigner and not like a Judaean [P46 wants “and not like a Judaean”], how do you compel the Nations to imitate the Judaeans? As Paul had said above in verse 12, Peter “had eaten in common with the Nations” until “some who were to come from Iakobos”, meaning that some men sent by James had come to Antioch, upon which Peter “withdrew and separated himself, being in fear of those of the circumcised”. This James was the brother of Jude and both were the half-brothers of Christ through their common mother. It is these men to whom Paul refers as “the brethren of the Lord” at 1 Corinthians 9:5. Each of these men also wrote epistles which are found in the New Testament. James was one of the original 12 apostles listed by Matthew (chapter 10) and Luke (chapter 6) as James son of Alphaeus, but he is not mentioned by name in the Gospel of John. With this we should notice that Peter had never played the role of pope which the Roman Catholic Church much later and quite falsely ascribes to him, and from Acts chapter 15 we should also see that while Peter spoke first in response to Paul and Barnabas, James had the last word there as well. Therefore it seems that while there certainly is no Christian pope, James seems to have been the dominant personality among these apostles. So as late as 58 AD James was insisting that Judaeans who turned to Christ should continue to keep the law. But the Judaeans of the time were strictly keeping the law as we read it in Genesis chapter 17: “14 And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant.” We see this in practice in the opening verses of Acts chapter 11, of events which had transpired while Paul was still in Tarsus [so this cannot be what Paul refers to here in Galatians chapter 2], where after Peter had converted the Roman household of Cornelius we read “1 And the ambassadors and the brethren who were throughout Judaea heard that the nations also accepted the Word of Yahweh. 2 Then when Petros went up to Jerusalem, those of the circumcision contended with him 3 saying that 'You went in with uncircumcised men and ate together with them!'” Therefore, we see that the law precluded Judaeans from having any community whatsoever with the uncircumcised, and later in Acts chapter 15 all the apostles had agreed that the pagans of the Nations turning to Christ should not be circumcised. But keeping the law, James and all those in Jerusalem, even though they were professing to be Christians, would therefore not even eat with any of those dispersed Israelites of the nations turning to Christ since they were not being circumcised. This situation clearly creates a paradox, and Paul realized that. As we had often explained during our presentation of the Book of Acts offered here two years ago, the Book of Acts records a religious transition from the rituals of Moses to the Faith in Christ, and from the dispensation of the Levitical priesthood to the reconciliation of dispersed Israel. One cannot understand the full course of the transition without first understanding the chronology of Paul's epistles in relation to the accounts of the Book of Acts. Paul must have realized that there could not be two separate bodies of Christ, if Israel and Judah were ever to be made into one stick, as the prophet Ezekiel describes. Therefore once we understand what Paul meant by the term “works of the law”, we can see that Paul's position was the correct position when it is compared to the words of the prophets, especially in places such as Daniel chapter 9, Ezekiel chapter 37, and in Habakkuk. But there is also another dynamic which is evident in Paul's writing here. He is explaining that he had scolded Peter for having been eating with the uncircumcised and ceasing to do so once certain men had come to him from James. Then he says “If you, being a Judaean, live like a foreigner and not like a Judaean, how do you compel the Nations to imitate the Judaeans?” The Greek word for “live like a foreigner” is ἐθνικῶς, which means “to act like those of the nations”. Then below in verse 16 Paul infers that the Judaeans should know “that a man is not deemed righteous from rituals of law”. With this, Paul is actually inferring that the true Judaeans who have turned to Christ have abandoned the rituals of the law, and that those who insist on maintaining the rituals of the law are therefore acting like foreigners, and are not true Judaeans. The last clause may have been rendered “wrongdoers [or sinners] of the Nations”. Paul is saying that the true Judaeans are not sinners, but that the sinners are from among the Nations. Of course, all men are sinners, however the Israelites of Judaea keeping the law had propitiation for their sin until the passion of the Christ, and then upon turning to Christ He became their propitiation for sin. Furthermore, people who were never under the Old Covenant cannot sin, because as Paul explained in Romans, sin is not accounted where there is no law, and the law was given only to the children of Israel. The language Paul uses here further helps to establish that by “the Nations”, Paul is referring to the nations of the dispersions of the children of Israel, who abandoned the covenant to which they were bound and who therefore were considered sinners, because they had no propitiation for their sin until they had turned to Christ. In this context, only they could be considered “sinners of the Nations” since there is no Scriptural application for anyone else. we then have relied in Christ Yahshua in order that we would be deemed righteous from the faith of Christ, and not from rituals of law, since not any flesh shall be deemed righteous from rituals of law. And here Paul once again asserts that true Judaeans, relying in Christ, no longer relied on the rituals of the law, of which circumcision was a part. Therefore Paul is not considering to be true Judaeans any of those in Judaea who had not turned to Christ and who would claim to be keepers of the law for their justification. The words of Christ in the Gospel and in the Revelation inform us of this same thing. As for no flesh being justified by the law, we may read from Psalm 143, which is a prayer of David: “1 Hear my prayer, O LORD, give ear to my supplications: in thy faithfulness answer me, and in thy righteousness. 2 And enter not into judgment with thy servant: for in thy sight shall no man living be justified.” No man may be justified without the mercy of Yahweh found in Christ. Every man requiring the mercy of God for justification, should indeed be humble before God and men. In the Christogenea New Testament, the Greek word ἔργον (Strong's # 2041) is everywhere translated literally as either a work or a deed, except where Paul is explicitly referring to “the works of the law” where 16 times plural forms of the word ἔργον are translated as rituals (in phrases such as τὰ ἔργα νόμου), all of which are in the epistles to the Romans (3:20, 27, 28; 4:2, 6; 9:11, 32; 11:6), Galatians (2:16 [thrice]; 3:2, 5, 10) and Hebrews (6:1; 9:14). Paul, in the context of each of those passages, certainly means to refer to those rituals which the law prescribed in ordinances and which have been done away with in Christ (Ephesians 2:15; Colossians 2:14; Hebrews 9:1-10). The remarks made by Joseph Thayer in his Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament show that Thayer did not realize this application, because his explanations of ἔργον under these passages are odd considering the context in which the word appears in these cases. He basically only says that “in Paul's writings ἔργα νόμου, [are] works demanded by and agreeing with the law”, citing many of these same passages we have cited. By saying “agreeing with” in his definition, Thayer creates his own anti-nomian religion, because Paul never disagreed with the law. But Ferrar Fenton in his translation of the Bible did fully realize that the references made by Paul to “works of the law” were references to the prescribed rituals of the Old Testament, and his translation reflects that realization. In the Hebrew of the Masoretic Text there are several Hebrew words which are often translated into the English versions as work or service, however for this discussion none of them are important. But by examining the language of the Septuagint, we can indeed see precisely what Paul had meant by the phrase “works of the law”. Where the King James Version at Numbers 3:7 has the words “the service of the tabernacle”, it reads in the Greek of the Septuagint: τὰ ἔργα τῆς σκηνῆς, or “works of the tabernacle”. Similar phrases appear in the King James Version in Numbers 4:4, and at Numbers 4:30 and 4:39 where the same word often translated as service is work instead. In both places the Septuagint Greek has the phrase τὰ ἔργα, or “the works” (ἔργα is a plural form of ἔργον). We see the Greek word ἔργον three times in the Septuagint at Numbers 4:47 where the King James Version has “From thirty years old and upward even unto fifty years old, every one that came to do the service (τὸ ἔργον) of the ministry (τῶν ἔργων), and the service (τὰ ἔργα) of the burden in the tabernacle of the congregation”, and the words were spoken in reference to all the things which the priests did in the temple, pertaining to the rituals of the law. These are only a few examples, and there are many others throughout the Old Testament Scriptures. For instance, in Brenton's English Septuagint we read in 2 Chronicles 23:18: “And Jodae the priest committed the works of the house of the Lord into the hand of the priests and Levites, and he re-established the courses of the priests and Levites which David appointed over the house of the Lord, and he appointed them to offer whole-burnt-offerings to the Lord, as it is written in the law of Moses, with gladness, and with songs by the hand of David.” So the works, τὰ ἔργα, of the house of the Lord are the rituals which the priests performed in the temple. If the usage in the Septuagint of the word ἔργον, which is in the plural works, is not enough to prove that by “works of the law” Paul was referring only to the temple rituals and ceremonial ordinances of the law, there is further and contemporary evidence in the Dead Sea Scrolls. It can be established with all certainty that the writings of the Qumran sect found in the Dead Sea Scrolls were made during the period of Roman occupation in Judaea and prior to the final revolt of Jerusalem resulting in the destruction of the temple, which was between 65 BC and 65 AD. We have established that Paul was writing this epistle shortly after 52 AD, and therefore the Qumran scrolls almost certainly predate Paul's epistles. … in the Dead Sea Scrolls, there is a phrase which is a title for one of the more widely known scrolls usually identified as 4QMMT. This Scroll is sometimes called “The Sectarian Manifesto”, as it is in The Dead Sea Scrolls, A New Translation, by Wise, Abegg and Cook. In that volume, in an introduction to 4QMMT (which consists of the Dead Sea Scrolls fragments 4Q394 through 4Q399) the book says that “In all of antiquity only the Sectarian Manifesto and Paul's letters to the Galatians and Romans discuss the connection between works and righteousness.” Of course, we would assert that while it was not phrased in the same manner, a major component of the ministry of Christ had the purpose of illustrating that same distinction, as well as the epistle of James. The introduction in the book, found on page 454, continues by explaining that MMT, for the Hebrew words Miqsat Ma‘ase Ha-Torah, is “an acronym from the Hebrew words meaning 'some of the works of the Law'”. The subject of the scroll is, of course, the rituals of the law. Therefore we see that the phrase Ma‘ase Ha-Torah, or “works of the law”, was used by others at a time nearly contemporary to that of Paul in relation to the rituals of the Old Testament law. One place in the prophets where it is explicitly explained that the Messiah would do away with these works of the law is in Daniel chapter 9. There in a Messianic prophecy we read of the purpose of Yahweh explained to Daniel for Jerusalem that “Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.” Then it says in verse 27: “And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease”, whereby we see that the Old Testament sacrifices became invalid in Christ. The covenant being confirmed was the New Covenant promised in Jeremiah chapter 31 and in Ezekiel chapter 37. From Ezekiel 37:26: “26 Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them: and I will place them, and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore.” Similar language prophesying a new covenant is found elsewhere in the words of that prophet. The fulfillment of Daniel chapter 9 becomes manifest in Romans chapter 7, where it is realized that Yahweh God dying in Christ has freed Israel from the law to which the nation had been bound since Exodus chapter 19, and therefore in this manner did He Himself “finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness”. The children of Israel all sin, but they have an intercessor in Christ, as the apostle John explains in his first epistle, and as Paul also explained in Romans, where there is no law, sin is not accounted. So the children of Israel are no longer condemned by the letter of the law. That by the phrase “works of the law” Paul referred only to those rituals and ceremonies conducted by the Levitical priests is also evident in his explanation in the epistle to the Hebrews that Christ is a priest “after the order of Melchizedek”, and that “the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law”, as he asserts at Hebrews 7:12. But the commandments of the law have not changed, and Christ Himself professes that “if you love Me, keep My commandments”, which is something which Paul had also taught frequently in his epistles. Therefore, anyone who asserts that there is a requirement or that any ritual is necessary for the salvation of the children of Israel is a liar and a Judaizer, and that would include not only the sacrifices, but other rituals such as circumcision, water baptism or even any of the Catholic so-called sacraments. All rituals and ceremonial requirements for the propitiation of sin or the perceived attainment of righteousness are done away with in Christ. The history of Old Testament Israel should be sufficient evidence that man cannot propitiate God through rituals, and neither can he save himself by his own devices. However we shall never learn the lesson until we first learn to reject all of the lies of the Jews. 17 Now if seeking to be deemed righteous in Christ we ourselves are also found to be wrongdoers, then [here the manuscripts are divided between ἄρα (686, “then”) and ἆρα (687, an interrogatory particle expecting a negative answer), see Thayer, ἆρα, 2] is Christ a minister of failure? Certainly not! Here Paul's words are in accordance with those of the apostle John found in 1 John chapter 2: “1 My children, I write these things to you in order that you do not do wrong. And if one should do wrong, we have an Advocate with the Father: the righteous Yahshua Christ. 2 And He is a propitiation on behalf of our errors; yet not for ours only but for the whole Society.” And of course, since only the children of Israel were ever under the law, only the children of Israel could be referred to as being forgiven of sin. Now under the New Covenant, the law is only written on the hearts of the children of Israel, those of the houses of Israel and Judah. So John talks about not only the Judaeans, but for all of the “children of God scattered abroad”, as he refers to the ancient dispersions of the Israelites in his Gospel, in John 11:52, which are those Nations of the seed of Abraham that Paul describes in Romans chapter 4 and 1 Corinthians chapter 10. 18 For if I again build these things which I have destroyed, I continue a transgressor myself. If Paul abandons the righteousness which is in Christ for the persuasion that he could be justified by the rituals of the law, then he remains a sinner since there is no more justification in the law. As it says in Habakkuk chapter 2, in a passage which Paul had later quoted in Romans chapter 1: “3 For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry. 4 Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith.” Habakkuk had received those words as an answer to a prayer in which he had said “Therefore the law is slacked, and judgment doth never go forth”, where he also described the unrighteous sacrifices being made in Jerusalem. So Yahweh's answer to that prayer is that “the just shall live by his faith”, and not by the righteousness found in the law. 19 For I through law have died in law, in order that in Yahweh I shall live. I have been crucified with Christ. 20 Now I live no longer, but Christ lives in me. And that I now live in flesh, in faith I live: in that of the Son of Yahweh [P46, B, and D have “of Yahweh and Christ”; the text follows א, A, C, and the MT], who having loved me then surrendered Himself on my behalf. When we put all of these Messianic prophecies together, including those from Daniel chapter 9, we can only come to the conclusion that Yahweh God Himself became incarnate on earth as Yahshua Christ, and died as the Husband in order to free Israel the wife from the judgments of the law as Paul had explained in Romans chapter 7. Because He died to preserve Israel from a judgment of death, all Israel should consider themselves dead with him, as Paul also asserts, which is in accord with the prophecy of Hosea where it is said that “When Ephraim spake trembling, he exalted himself in Israel; but when he offended in Baal, he died” (Hosea 13:1) and also in Isaiah where Yahweh said “And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand” (Isaiah 28), and again “Ye have sold yourselves for nought; and ye shall be redeemed without money” (Isaiah 52). Therefore in the prophets, all of the children of Israel were accounted dead in the law, and they only have life by the mercy which is in Christ. This is what Paul was explaining to the Romans, Corinthians, Galatians and others: all of whom were Israel “according to the flesh”, but none of whom were ever Jews, who were Israel in name only because they were mostly converted Edomites. 21 I would not refuse the favor of Yahweh; if righteousness is through law, then Christ has died for no purpose. As it says in Isaiah chapter 45: “17 Israel shall be saved in the LORD with an everlasting salvation: ye shall not be ashamed nor confounded world without end…. 19 I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain: I the LORD speak righteousness, I declare things that are right…. 23 I have sworn by myself, the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, That unto me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear. 24 Surely, shall one say, in the LORD have I righteousness and strength: even to him shall men come; and all that are incensed against him shall be ashamed. 25 In the LORD shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and shall glory.” All of the seed of Israel shall be justified, even though when these words were spoken they were being put off in punishment and alienated from their God. But because justification is apart from the law, that does not mean that we should disregard the law, as Christ had said, “If you love Me, keep My Commandments”, Paul concludes: “31 Do we then nullify the law by faith? Certainly not! Rather we establish the law.” The apostle John was teaching the same thing in different words, in 1 John chapter 2. The Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament, together with the understanding that by “works of the law” Paul was referring to the rituals and ceremonial ordinances through which Israel had sought justification and failed, and not to the commandments themselves which Paul consistently upheld, completely vindicate all of the positions on sin and the law which were set forth by Paul of Tarsus.
2019-04-25T10:11:18Z
https://www.christogenea.org/podcasts/epistles-paul-galatians-part-2-works-law
"THE GREAT WORK IN SPECULATIVE FREEMASONRY" "There can be no rational doubt, however, that the moral influence of Freemasonry would be much more powerful and efficient if the sources of intelligence amongst the Fraternity were augmented, and a higher grade of science substituted for the meagre outline which at present prevails in our Lodges." THROUGHOUT the ages the spiritual doctrine which is concealed within the architectural phraseology of our modern Craft system has undergone the influence of many different traditions of the Ancient Wisdom. The student, therefore, who seeks to analyse Freemasonry as it stands to-day often finds himself lost in a bewildering maze of various tributaries of knowledge, and is apt to pore indefinitely over a mass of fragmentary facts without perceiving their inter-relation, or being able to coordinate them into one comprehensive scheme. In this Paper the attempt will be made to present, for the guidance of Masonic students, an interpretation of the Egyptian metaphysical tradition in harmony with the teachings set forth in what are called the Mysteries the Egyptian tradition will then be briefly discussed in the light of its transmission and ultimate incorporation in Speculative Freemasonry finally, reasons will be given in support of the theory, which we hold to be valid, that the Great Work ("Magnum Opus") of the Rosicrucians and Spiritual Alchemists is the same as that which is symbolised in our Masonic legend of H.A. Thoughtful students may find in the references to the Old Wisdom and the Mystery tradition an introduction to a great subject nor should the Mysteries be thought of only as institutions long vanished into the night of time rather their re-establishment is to be accepted as inevitable. In years to come a wiser generation will restore the sacred rites which are indispensable to the spiritual, intellectual and social security of the race. Meanwhile, preserving the witness, Freemasonry keeps burning the light of the perpetual Mysteries in a dark age. If, in comparison with former witnesses, Freemasonry is but a "glimmering ray" rather than a powerful beam of light, it is none the less a true ray a kindly light lit from the world's central altar-flame, and sufficient at least to lead some aspirants on amid the encircling gloom until the existing "state of darkness" is dispelled by the dawn of a new era. It is now generally acknowledged by those competent to judge, that of all the ancient peoples the Egyptians were the most learned in the wisdom of the Secret Doctrine indeed, there are some who would have it that Egypt was the Mother of the Mysteries, and that it was on the banks of the Nile that the Royal Art was born. We can affirm, without entering into any controversy on the matter, that the wisest of philosophers from other nations visited Egypt to be initiated in the sacred Mysteries Thales, Solon, Pythagoras and Plato are all related to have journeyed from Greece to the delta of the Nile in quest of knowledge and upon returning to their own country these illumined men each declared the Egyptians to be the wisest of mortals, and the Egyptian temples to be the repositories of sublime doctrines concerning the history of the Gods and the regeneration of men. To the earliest period of Egyptian metaphysical speculation belongs the fable of Isis and Osiris, and we find that the myth of the Dying God recurs in many of the great World Religions also it is an established fact that the life, death and resurrection of the immortal-mortal have become the prototype for numerous other doctrines of human regeneration. "Isis, according to the Greek interpretation of the word, signifies knowledge as does the name of her professed adversary Typhon (signify) insolence and pride, a name therefore extremely well adapted to one, who, full of ignorance and error, tears in pieces and conceals that holy doctrine, which the Goddess collects, compiles and delivers to those who aspire after the most perfect participation of the divine nature." We have in this passage a clear indication that Osiris is to be regarded as the personification of an Order of learning, because Plutarch identifies him beyond question with the "holy doctrine," or, in other words, the Mystery tradition. Hence, we may further deduce that since, in the Egyptian system, THOTH personifies the whole sphere of knowledge (and it was through THOTH that OSIRIS came into being), so Osiris embodies the secret and sacred wisdom reserved for those who were proficients in the ancient rites. To the Elect, therefore, Osiris represented "primordial knowledge," and He signified not only divine "at-one-ment" with the Absolute (which is the end of all illumination), but by his life, death and resurrection, He also revealed the means by which mortal consciousness could attain that end. Stated alternatively, the personality of Osiris typifies the Institution erected by the ancients in order to perpetuate the deathless truths of the soul. We will next examine the Egyptian historical tradition. According to this, Osiris is the first of the five children of the Goddess NUT He therefore corresponds with the first of the five divine kings of China and the five exoterically known Dhyana-Buddhas of Lamaism. The five children of NUT are otherwise the five traditional root races which have populated the five continents which have appeared upon the earth. Isis is represented as being born on the fourth day, and is connected with the fourth race (populating Atlantis-see Plato "Timaeus" and "Critias"), the tradition of Osiris (the primitive revelation of the first race) coming into Egypt through the Atlantean Mystery School, of which Isis is the symbol. From the Egyptian account of the reign of Osiris as King we glean the following philosophical history there was a time, the Golden Age, when truth and wisdom ruled the earth, and this aristocracy of wisdom was a benevolent despotism in which men were led to a nobler state of being by the firm kindly hand of the enlighted sage. This was the dynasty of the mythological Priest-Kings, who were qualified to govern humanity by reason not only of temporal, but of divine attributes through his priests, Osiris, representative of the hidden tradition, ruled the entire world by virtue of the perfection resident in that tradition. If, then, we may concede that Osiris is the positive pole of the universal life agent, Isis becomes the receptive pole of that activity He is the doctrine, She is the Church and as in Christianity it is customary to refer to the Church as the Bride of Christ, so in ancient Egypt the institution of the Mysteries was the Great Mother, the consort of heaven itself. From this interpretation we gain a deeper insight into the symbolism of the whole Osirian cycle. Isis signifies the temporal order of the priesthood, the cumulative body of Initiates She is personified as the Temple She is the Mother of all good, the protectress of right, the patron of all improvement She ensures nobility, inspires virtue, and awakens the nobler passions of the soul like the Moon as reflector, She shines only with the light of Her sovereign Sun, even as the Temple can only be illumined by its indwelling truth. In the Egyptian metaphysical system, TYPHON, the conspirer against OSIRIS, is the embodiment of every perversity He is the negative creation (the AHRIMAN of Zoroaster) He is black magic and sorcery, the Black Brotherhood and his wife, NEPHTHYS, is the institution through which He manifests. The traditional history relates that TYPHON lured OSIRIS into the ark of destruction, stated to be it chest or coffin (the symbol of material organisation-the imprisonment of the soul in a physical body), at the time when the Sun entered the house of Scorpio, i.e., the 17th day of the second month of the Egyptian year (corresponding to the month of November in our calendar) hence we know him to be the type of the eternal negative, the betrayer of the Lord, namely JUDAS. In the initiation rites Typhon is also the "tester" or "tryer" ("the Lord who is against us"), personifying ambition the patron of ruin. Typhon was assisted in his "impious design" to usurp the throne of Osiris by ASO (the Queen of Ethiopia) and seventy-two other conspirators. These conspirators represent the three destructive powers, "the three ruffians," which are preserved to modern Freemasonry as the murderers of the Master Builder they are ignorance, superstition and fear. Thus the advent of greed and perversion marked the end of the Golden Age, and with the death of Osiris, Typhon forthwith ascended the throne as regent of the world. It is further narrated that in consequence of the material organisation of the social sphere which followed upon the exile of Truth to the invisible world, Isis, the Mother of the Mysteries, was so defiled and desecrated by the profane, that her sages and prophets were forced to flee into the wilderness to escape the machinations of the evil one. At this stage, Isis, now represented by the scattered but still consecrated body of Initiates, began the great search for the secret that was lost and in all parts of the world the virtuous in "grief and distress" raised their hands to the heavens, pleading for the restoration of the reign of Truth. Continuing their search in all parts of the earth and throughout innumerable ages, the congregation of the just at last re-discovered the lost arcana and brought it back with rejoicing to the world over which it once ruled. In this manner, we learn, Isis by magic (the initiated priests were magicians), resurrected the dead God, and through union with him brought forth an order of priests under the collective title of HORUS. These were the HERJ SESHTA (the Brothers of Horus), the chief of whom wore the dog-headed mask of ANUBIS. Anubis was the son of Osiris by NEPHTHYS (the material world) and represents the divine man, or the mortal being who rose to enlightenment. Ambition, however, personified by Typhon, knowing that temporal power must die if divine power, in the form of Truth, became re-established in the world, put forth all its might to again scatter the doctrine, and this time so thoroughly that it should never again be re-discovered. If, as Plutarch has suggested, Typhon in one of his manifestations represents the sea, then it would appear that the second destruction of Osiris may refer to the Atlantean deluge (alluded to in the dialogues of Plato) by which the doctrine was swallowed up or lost, and its fragments scattered among all the existing civilizations of that time. According to the narrative, the body of Osiris (the Secret Doctrine) was now divided into fourteen parts and distributed among the parts of the world that is, it was scattered through the seven divine and seven infernal spheres (the "lokas" and "talas" of the Indian tradition), or by a different symbolism, through the seven worlds which are without and the seven worlds which are within. The parts of Osiris were now scattered so hopelessly that Typhon felt his authority to be secure at last, but wisdom is not so easily to be cheated, and in due time, we are informed, Isis succeeded in recovering all the parts except one, the phallus, which had been thrown into the river and devoured by three fishes. Failing to recover the phallus, Isis is said to have substituted a golden replica for the missing organ. In our interpretation of this symbolism we must infer that mankind itself is represented by the fish, the phallus being the symbol of the " vital and immortal principle," and so used in Egyptian hieroglyphics. The phallus, therefore, denotes the Lost Word (the three-fold generative power), and the golden replica of Egypt, which was rendered alive by magic, is the equivalent of the three-lettered word of our modern Freemasonry, concealed (in the Royal Arch Degree) under the letters A-U-M. It should here be noted that in the Egyptian rites, Isis, by modelling and reproducing the missing member of Osiris, gives the body the appearance of completeness, but the life power is not there recourse is therefore had to magic and the golden phallus is brought to life by means of the secret processes rescued from the lost "Book of Thoth." The allusion is to the restoration of divine power through the regeneration of man himself and the Initiation processes. the soul. The inner domain contains the unity of life and consciousness which, though once possessed, has been lost and must now be found again." In the Egyptian rites HORUS is the saviour-avengert son of ISIS, conceived by magic (the ritual) after the brutal murder of OSIRIS hence he is the posthumous redeemer. The destruction of TYPHON is to be accomplished by ISIS through her immaculately conceived son, HORUS, which is a term concealing the collective body of the perfected adepts who were "born again" out of the womb of the Mother-ISIS, the Mystery School. We can apply this analogy to our great modern system of Initiation, which has certainly perpetuated the outer form of the ancient rites. Freemasonry as an Institution is, in this sense, the modern ISIS, the Mother of the Mysteries, from whose dark womb the Initiates are born in the mystery of the second or philosophic birth. Similarly, all Masonic adepts (Master Masons) are, by virtue of their participation in the rites, figuratively speaking, "Sons of the Widow" they are the offspring of the Institution widowed by the loss of the living Word, and theirs is the eternal quest-they discover by becoming. The metaphysical significance of the death and resurrection of the Egyptian demi-god has for the most part been lost to the Craft, notwithstanding the undoubted fact that Masonic scholars of the calibre of Pike, Mackey and Oliver are in general agreement as to a definite association between the legend of Osiris and the drama enacted in the Third Degree. We may, however, attribute the failure of students to recognize the Egyptian origin of certain parts of Craft Lodge ritualism and symbolism to the transmission of the legend by way of the Hebrews who, naturally, superimposed their own terminology on the tradition they received from Egypt. In the Schools of Hebrew mysticism, the Mystery drama of the death and resurrection of Osiris became that of the slaying and raising of the Master Builder, and the Temple of Solomon took the place of the Egyptian " House of Light." With the Rabbinical mystics the erection and subsequent vicissitudes of Solomon's Temple provided a great glyph or mythos of the upbuilding of the human soul, and this secret lore also found partial, although cryptic, expression in the Hebrew public Scriptures in terms of building. "Forasmuch as ye are stones of a Temple, which were prepared beforehand for a building of God, the Father, being hoisted up to the heights by the working-tool of Jesus Christ, which is the Cross, and using for a rope the Holy Spirit your faith being a windlass, and love the way leading up to God. So then ye are all Companions in the way, spiritual temples, carrying your Divine principle within you, your shrine, your Christ and your holy things, being arrayed from head to foot with the commandments of Christ." The pronounced Masonic imagery used by St. lgnatius (who was martyred at Rome in A.D. 107) tends to corroborate the tradition that the Square, the Level and the Plumb-rule, now allocated to the Master and Wardens of a Lodge, were formerly associated with the Bishop, Priest and Deacon, when serving at the secret altars of the persecuted Christians. Put together, the three tools form obviously a Cross, which, on the worshippers being disturbed by the secular authorities, could be quickly knocked apart and appear as builder's implements. The Mysteries came to an end as public institutions in the sixth century, when from political considerations they and the teaching of the Secret Doctrine and philosophy became prohibited by the Roman Government, at the instigation of Justinian, who aimed at inaugurating an official uniform State-religion throughout the Empire. Since the suppression of the Mysteries, however, their tradition and teaching have been continued under various concealments, and to that continuation our modern Masonic system is due. To the early Middle Ages the inner Christian tradition appeared again in the Knight Templars and the Mysteries of the Holy Grail, and it is significant that these henceforth become associated with Speculative Freemasonry. But, the most profound influence which went to make Freemasonry what it is today was that of the mysterious Order of the Rosy Cross. The memory of this Rosicrucian influence is preserved, not only in the Eighteenth Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Rite, but also (and perhaps as much) in the Craft Degrees, especially in the Third Degree. We have the Mason Word and second sight." showing how intimately the two Orders were identified. We also have the later testimony of Dr. Sigismund Bacstrom, who claims to have been initiated into the Society of the Rosicrucians on the Isle of Maritius on 12th September, 1794, by the mysterious Comte de Chazal, and who has left extensive manuscripts setting forth his findings and opinions on matters of importance to Masonic students. The learned Doctor describes the transition through which the Ancient Brotherhood passed in the process of externalising certain parts of itself in the system we know as Speculative Freemasonry. His conclusions agree with the available evidence, all of which points to the fact that one definite group was behind the movement which projected the Craft system. To trace the genesis of this movement, which came into activity some two hundred and fifty years ago (our rituals and ceremonies having been compiled round about the year 1700), is beyond the scope of our present subject. It should, however, be stated here that the movement itself incorporated the slender ritual and the elementary symbolism which, for centuries previously, had been employed in connection with the mediaeval Building Guilds, but it gave to them a far fuller meaning and a far wider range. We may regard it as certain that the Craft received from this source much that the old Operative Lodges had never possessed, such as the Third Degree (with its highly mystical Opening and Closing) the Craft Legend or Traditional History the central part of the Installation Rite (now observed in the Conclave or Board of Installed Masters) and many other allusions to occult science, mysticism, and even magic. Centre, the Kingdom of Heaven, the pure essence of Mind, the Buddha-nature, the Inner Self, and the Christ within. In the light of the foregoing, it will be seen that Freemasonry depends for its life and strength on the Ancient Wisdom teaching which is enshrined in it a Teaching designed to answer those eternal questions as to the why, the whence, and the whither of all human existence. These, indeed, are the deepest problems of life, and ultimately we are concerned only with their solution, for sooner or later we are forced to enquire-why live at all, why exert ourselves in any personal or social endeavour, if we know not whither it all leads? The problems of the why and whither of human life are those which have ever occupied thinking men they are at the bottom of every philosophic system, and the systems themselves are but an attempt to answer them. And yet no words can ever fully answer these problems, for no language can express the Reality of Life this can only be experienced by the living soul of Man. As Emerson truly says: "The soul answers never by words, but by the thing itself that is inquired after." It is in the experience of Life that the answers are found, and only the man who has lived deeply is really wise. The wisdom of the sage is the sum-total of his human experience, but even he cannot impart his knowledge to others they, in their turn, must first experience the realities of Life, for only by such means do they attain to a wider consciousness. How, then, is it possible that anything so profound and intimate as what Freemasonry calls "the Centre " in Man, can be held fast as a permanent force acting in the world of phenomena? It is possible, in virtue of the special power represented by tradition. A spiritual tradition is never objective knowledge, nor practice which has become mechanical, but a living continuance of the living impulse which created it. Every great Initiation system, so long as its progress is guided by enlightened minds, distinguishes clearly between its Ritual and oral tradition. It is on the oral tradition that the main stress is laid tradition alone can teach how the text of the Ritual ought to be understood, which in the end is the only thing that matters. Whosoever claims that he can extract the original meaning from the text of the Ritual without the help of tradition, is really only reading his own meaning in to it and it is only if the two minds are specially congenial, or the one has a special gift for entering into the mind of another, that the new meaning in any measure coincides with the old. What is true of comprehension is even more generally true of being, for comprehension too is handed on as a state of being. Here the universally valid law is manifest, that everywhere like works upon like hence the eternal validity of the relation of Master and disciple, and the traditional reference in our Masonic Lectures "To seek for a Master and from him to gain instruction" (First Section, First Lecture). "But the Mysteries are delivered mystically, that which is spoken may be in the mouth of the speaker not in his voice, but rather in his understanding. The writing of these memoranda of mine, I well know, is weak when compared with that spirit, full of grace, which I was privileged to hear. But it will be an image to recall the archetype to him who was struck by the Thyrsus." Such an experience was of necessity always reserved for the few, but notwithstanding some shadow of it was also within reach of those who, although not fully qualified to become Initiates, were none the less genuine seekers for knowledge. For them there were the Lesser Mysteries, in which the actual change in consciousness did not take place, but something of its meaning was conveyed to the candidate by his participation in a series of rites in which the chief events of the Greater Mysteries were presented to him in dramatised form. "The Sages have been taught of God that this natural world is only an image and material copy of a heavenly and spiritual pattern that the very existence of this world is based upon the reality of its celestial archetype and that God has created it in imitation of the spiritual and invisible Universe, in order that men might be better enabled to comprehend His heavenly teaching, and the wonder of His absolute and ineffable power and wisdom. Thus the Sage sees heaven reflected in Nature as in a mirror and he pursues this Art, not for the sake of gold or silver, but for the love of the Knowledge which it reveals he jealously conceals it from the sinner and the scornful, lest the mysteries of heaven should be laid bare to the vulgar gaze." "But he knoweth the way that I take when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold." "Every man's work shall be made manifest for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is." (1 Corinthians 3, verse 13). The doctrine of Freemasonry in relation to the Rosicrucian mystery-teachings can best be appreciated after a preliminary statement of some of the basic principles on which, it is affirmed, rests all progress in the Royal Art. There is, however, independent evidence of the Rosicrucian influence on the genesis of the Craft system. Historical research indicates that the originators of Speculative Freemasonry, the members of the so-called " Invisible Society," simultaneously with launching the Craft, arranged for the formation of the Royal Society, which became chartered in 1662 for the advancement of scientific knowledge. Strictly in accordance with the Hermetic wisdom, therefore, the "Invisibles" projected two systems one (the Craft) intended to be devoted to mystical studies and personal spiritual development the other (the Royal Society) aiming at the promotion of natural science upon occult principles and under the guidance of qualified experts. Science, in the popular mind, represents nothing more than the body of those beliefs, conclusions, or generalizations, which individual scientists at various times put forth in a tentative way as landmarks, so to speak, in their endless search for increasingly valid formulations of Reality. It is to these conclusions, often called "facts," that we allude when we state that "science teaches" this or that. But strictly speaking science does not "teach" anything at all. It is a method rather than a body of conclusions, and it is scientific method in Speculative Freemasonry with which we are here concerned. Let us illustrate by a few specific examples. We live in a world which the ordinary man accepts as a reality, existing quite independently of himself. To him it is supremely real, and to doubt this fact would seem to be sheer madness. Yet he cannot fathom his own relation to this world, and he cannot adequately explain how he actually perceives it. Is it by means of the senses? If so, how does the sense impression affect consciousness? When we "see" an object, all we can be sure of is that something outside us has affected our eyes by means of vibrations of a definite rate that our optic nerves convey the impression to the brain-cells that a chemical change takes place there, and then-we "see" the object we are aware of a certain shape, various colours and textures. What mystery has taken place by means of which the chemical change in the grey matter of the brain has created in our consciousness the image of the object? And, having "seen," as we say what do we, after all, really know about the object? Similarly, in the attempt to formulate a philosophical exposition of the world and life experience, almost any first statement we may make can be seized upon and criticized as one-sided, and therefore untrue. The world is a unity the world is pluralistic. Time is continuous time is composed of irreducible atomic elements. The world comes to the individual from without the world of the individual is a world of inner experience. Each of these premises is admitted to be true in one respect or another. But how are they true? In what sense are they true? In what general point of view can be set up in accordance with which the apparent conflicts are resolved? Is this world a dream world-daily existence, friends, work-is it all a fantastic illusion. Yes and no. This is a paradox the world in which we live is Real and yet Unreal the mystery of its relation to us and its measure of reality can only be disclosed in the depths of our own consciousness. Plato compares ordinary men to prisoners bound in a cave, of which they can see only the back wall. On this wall fall shadows cast by those who pass the mouth of the cave. The play of shadows is the prisoner's world it is reality to them but whenever one of them succeeds in freeing himself, and sees the entrance, sees the Light and the real beings moving in it, then he realizes that he has lived in a world of illusion, that he has been "in a state of darkness," and that his eyes have been "hoodwinked." We must know ourselves in order to know the world. The man, therefore, who becomes proficient in "that most interesting of all human studies, the knowledge of himself," renounces the popular world and he gradually attains consciousness in a world described as "not to be touched by hand or to be seen by eye," but otherwise supremely real. Withdrawal from this world of illusion, however, involves a transition from the ordinary natural state and standard of living towards what is @n as the regenerate state, with its correspondingly higher standard. A word now upon the faculty to be employed in the apprehension of interior truth. It is often remarked @that a natural timidity affects those to whom is suggested a transition from old and familiar roads of study, comfortably charted and lit with the bright lamps of convention, to a new and unknown path of research striking away into the darkness of obscurity beyond the official boundaries of orthodox systems of knowledge. The earnest seeker after Truth, however, fortified by the imperative will to know, soon learns that the outer darkness on investigation reveals rare lights of its own, and is in fact but "darkness visible," although light of a quality hitherto undiscerned. In this difficult study, knowing depends entirely upon doing comprehension is conditional upon and the corollary of action " He that will do the will shall know of the doctrine " for the doing automatically liberates an inward faculty capable of directly cognizing self-evident truth. We know not how to describe a faculty which when awakened, exists and functions in complete independence of the physical organism. In our Masonic symbolism, as in other treatises of arcane psychology, it is described, in analogy with the natural luminary, as "the Sun, to rule the day," whilst the logical understanding is "the Moon, to govern the night" and direct the merely temporal affairs of life. This latter, embracing as it does the reasoning faculty and tie lower or objective mind, is appointed to serve as a light in the natural world, but, the gift notwithstanding, it forms a cloud of darkness as regards light from the spiritual element that is both within and without us, and indeed, may obscure all spiritual vision. Not until a man has learned to relegate this "lesser light" to its appropriate use in the natural world, can he, walking in darkness, hope to see the great luminary, which, invisible to the physical sense, but present in the central depths of his nature, lightens every man coming into the world, and which, to those who having clean hands and pure hearts, are fitted to evoke it, manifests in mental illumination and expanded consciousness. We turn now from the psychologic to the metaphysical aspect of the Great Work. The entire object of the Royal Art of the Rosicrucians and spiritual Alchemists is said to be the uncovering of the inner faculty of insight and wisdom, alluded to above, and the removal of the veils intervening between the mind and dividing it from its hidden divine root. Not only does this science envisage an individual in whom the several constituents of consciousness are united, but it aspires towards the development of an integrated and free man who is likewise building up in the present life what is known in the technical language of mysticism as the "resurrection" or "arch-natural" body. This is also the profound idea which governs our symbolic craft of Masonry the "raising of a superstructure, perfect in all its parts and honourable to the builder." As to the metaphysical material of which these structures are to be reared, the Hermetic and Alchemical schools adopted the mystical terms of Scripture and called it a "stone," the "philosopher's stone." It is, indeed, the "white stone" which is given "to him that overcometh" the lower nature, as that Apostle did who thereupon received the name that implies "a stone" for it is only then that the individual aspirant becomes a "foundation," a "rock" upon which may be erected a "temple," a personal sanctuary of the Spirit whose abode is the souls of men rather than temples made with hands. The teaching of the Alchemists demonstrates how this "stone" must be "confected," worked up in the individual by a "manual art" (like our Masonic "art" not to be understood in the literal sense) from chaos to perfection. They describe the work as undergoing three stages: the black, the white, and the red, which are the Alchemical equivalents of the three Degrees of Speculative Freemasonry. Thus as, psychologically, regeneration involves the three traditional stages of purgation, illumination, and union, so, metaphysically, there are three corresponding stages of corporeal development. To each of these may be added a fourth, although unlikely of achievement in this life the attainment of divine union in permanence, which during physical life can only be temporary and partial and the corresponding perfecting and consolidation of the arch-natural vesture perfect holiness belongs only to the Lord." The first stage in Alchemy "the stone at the black in Freemasonry a poor candidate in a state of darkness" is intended to typify the benighted mind and unclarified state of the soul's vesture at the outset of the Great Work. At this stage the physical nature must be accounted an integral factor in the "work," and is to be dedicated and employed accordingly. It is the vessel or crucible in which the alchemic change is to be wrought, but the regimen enjoined is "the renewing of your mind," not the maceration of the body for, in a deeper than the familiar sense, "corpus sanum" will ensue surely enough upon "mens sana." The second stage in Alchemy " the stone at the white" in Freemasonry "clothed in White Apron and gloves as emblems of innocence" signifies that the clouded mind and the soul's black vesture of "earth" have been cleansed by the baptism of "a fall of water"-the Alchemical remedy of "the Elixir of Life." The third stage in Alchemy "the stone at the red" in Freemasonry the sublime Degree" symbolises entrance into the sanctuary and denotes the aspirant whose purified soul enters the experience of the divine union. Following the Alchemical precedent Freemasonry recognizes that the third stage involves two "operations," known in Alchemy as the refining of silver and gold, and accordingly the three Degrees of Freemasonry also "include the Holy Royal Arch of Jerusalem" as their climax. The clothing, therefore, worn in the Master Mason Degree is distinguished by silver, the first of the "noble" or "precious" metals whereas in the Royal Arch Degree, "the completion of the Master Mason Degree," it is adorned with gold. The transmutation has now been effected in the Holy Royal Arch the soul is "all glorious within" and the clothing is of wrought gold " wrought," since gold indicates that holy ultimate substance, which, although always latent in each one of us, like gold-dust in common soil, needs mining, refining, and working up by skilful craftsmanship before becoming a "jewel" for the King's Treasury. Lastly, the "gold must be tried in fire" the growing celestial body must be perfected and fixated until capable of eternal endurance in the burning heat of the Divine "penetralia." This perfecting is scarcely to be looked for in the present life, but its achievement, as the state attained by those who become "king and priests unto God," is symbolically attested in Speculative Freemasonry by the robes worn by those who are called to corresponding rank in the outer Chapter the prince prelates of the Grand Sanhedrin, represented " in the persons of the three Principals." "If we speak and write, it is but as guides to those who long to see: we send them to the place itself, bidding them from words to the Vision: the teaching is of the Path and the Plan, seeing is the work of each Soul for itself."
2019-04-20T13:24:24Z
https://masonicshop.com/masonic-articles/article/?a=393
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TX - HB203 Relating to the authority of a county assistance district to impose a sales and use tax. TX - HB240 Relating to installment payments of ad valorem taxes imposed on certain residence homesteads. TX - HB263 Relating to an exemption from motor vehicle sales and use taxes for certain previously leased motor vehicles. TX - HB275 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of the residence homestead of the surviving spouse of a member of the armed services of the United States who is killed or fatally injured in the line of duty. TX - HB276 Relating to a deduction under the franchise tax for certain contracts with the federal government. TX - HB279 Relating to authorizing the Midland County Hospital District of Midland County, Texas, to impose a sales and use tax. TX - HB297 Relating to the elimination of certain property taxes for school district maintenance and operations and the provision of public education funding by increasing the rates of certain state taxes. TX - HB311 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for certain feminine hygiene products. TX - HB313 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for child and adult diapers. TX - HB315 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for condoms. TX - HB322 Relating to the establishment of a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that taxing units may impose on the residence homesteads of individuals who are disabled or elderly and their surviving spouses. TX - HJR13 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to allocate a portion of oil and gas production tax revenue to the counties from which the oil and gas originated. TX - HJR16 Proposing a constitutional amendment providing honesty in state taxation. TX - HJR17 Proposing a constitutional amendment prohibiting the taxation of the sale or use of certain prescription medicine. TX - HJR19 Proposing a constitutional amendment to provide for an exemption from ad valorem taxation by certain political subdivisions of a portion of the market value of the residence homestead of the parent or guardian of a minor who is disabled and who resides with the parent or guardian. TX - HJR20 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to exclude from the market value of real property for ad valorem tax purposes the value of any improvement, or any feature incorporated in an improvement, made to the property if the primary purpose of the improvement or feature is compliance with the requirements of standards that address accessible design of buildings or other facilities. TX - HJR23 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for an exemption from ad valorem taxation of all or part of the market value of the residence homestead of the surviving spouse of a member of the armed services of the United States who is killed or fatally injured in the line of duty. TX - HJR26 Proposing a constitutional amendment establishing a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that political subdivisions may impose on the residence homesteads of individuals who are disabled or elderly and their surviving spouses. TX - SB129 Relating to eligibility for the exemption from ad valorem taxation of the residence homestead of the surviving spouse of certain first responders. TX - HB360 Relating to the extension of the expiration date of the Property Redevelopment and Tax Abatement Act. TX - SB196 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of the residence homestead of the surviving spouse of a member of the armed services of the United States who is killed or fatally injured in the line of duty. TX - HB380 Relating to the authority of a district court to hear and determine certain ad valorem tax appeals. TX - HB383 Relating to the limitation on increases in the appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem taxation. TX - HB384 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of the total appraised value of the residence homesteads of certain elderly persons and their surviving spouses. TX - HB385 Relating to a sales tax exemption for certain items sold during a limited period. TX - HJR28 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to set a lower limit on the maximum appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem taxation. TX - HJR29 Proposing a constitutional amendment to exempt from ad valorem taxation the total market value of the residence homesteads of certain elderly persons and their surviving spouses. TX - HB388 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of real property leased to and used by certain schools. TX - HJR31 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation real property leased to certain schools organized and operated primarily for the purpose of engaging in educational functions. TX - HJR32 Proposing a constitutional amendment requiring certain tax bills to be approved by two-thirds of all the members elected to each house of the legislature. TX - HB451 Relating to an exemption from the sales and use tax for certain lightbulbs for a limited period. TX - HB453 Relating to a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a county of a portion of the value of the residence homestead of a physician who provides health care services for which the physician agrees not to seek payment from any source, including the Medicaid program or otherwise from this state or the federal government, to county residents who are indigent or who are Medicaid recipients. TX - HJR33 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a county of a portion of the value of the residence homestead of a physician who provides health care services for which the physician agrees not to seek payment from any source, including the Medicaid program or otherwise from this state or the federal government, to county residents who are indigent or who are Medicaid recipients. TX - HB457 Relating to the use of tax revenue by certain municipalities for the payment of certain hotel-related bonds or other obligations. TX - HB470 Relating to the calculation of the ad valorem rollback tax rate of a taxing unit and voter approval of a proposed tax rate that exceeds the rollback tax rate. TX - HB483 Relating to the selection of the board of directors of an appraisal district; authorizing the imposition of a fee. TX - HB484 Relating to the authority of an appraisal review board to direct changes in the appraisal roll and related appraisal records if a residence homestead is sold for less than the appraised value. TX - HB486 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB490 Relating to the administration of the ad valorem tax system. TX - HB491 Relating to the administration of appraisal review boards. TX - HB492 Relating to a temporary local option exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster. TX - HB493 Relating to a temporary local option exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster and reimbursement of a taxing unit for refunds the taxing unit pays to taxpayers as a result of the exemption. TX - HJR34 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for a temporary local option exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster. TX - HJR35 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for a temporary local option exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster and to provide for reimbursement of a political subdivision by the state for refunds the political subdivision pays to taxpayers as a result of the exemption. TX - HB499 Relating to the extension of the expiration date of the Property Redevelopment and Tax Abatement Act. TX - HB533 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HJR38 Proposing a constitutional amendment prohibiting the imposition of an individual income tax. TX - HB564 Relating to the definition of "heavy equipment" for purposes of the ad valorem taxation of certain dealer's heavy equipment inventory. TX - HB569 Relating to the information required to be included in or with a school district ad valorem tax bill. TX - HB605 Relating to a franchise tax credit for entities that establish a grocery store or healthy corner store in a food desert. TX - HB614 Relating to the additional tax imposed on land appraised for ad valorem tax purposes as agricultural, open-space, or timber land if the land is sold or diverted to a different use. TX - HB622 Relating to a temporary limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that may be imposed by a taxing unit on a residence homestead rendered uninhabitable or unusable as a result of a natural disaster. TX - HB627 Relating to the rate of the cigarette tax and the allocation of certain revenue from that tax to the foundation school fund; increasing the rate of a tax. TX - HJR41 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to limit for a temporary period the total amount of ad valorem taxes that may be imposed by a political subdivision on a residence homestead rendered uninhabitable or unusable as a result of a natural disaster. TX - HB631 Relating to exempting textbooks purchased, used, or consumed by university and college students from the sales and use tax for limited periods. TX - HB639 Relating to the eligibility of land used as an ecological laboratory for appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes as qualified open-space land. TX - HB648 Relating to the substitution of a local sales and use tax for property taxes imposed by certain local governments; authorizing the imposition of a tax. TX - SB320 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB705 Relating to the substitution of a local sales and use tax for maintenance and operations property taxes imposed by certain local governments; authorizing the imposition of a tax. TX - HB710 Relating to the computation of cost of goods sold for purposes of the franchise tax by taxable entities that transport ready-mixed concrete. TX - HB716 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of part of the appraised value of the residence homestead of a severely disabled veteran or the surviving spouse of a severely disabled veteran based on the disability rating of the veteran. TX - HJR44 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for an exemption from ad valorem taxation of part of the market value of the residence homestead of a partially disabled veteran or the surviving spouse of a partially disabled veteran based on the disability rating of the veteran and harmonizing certain related provision of the constitution. TX - SB335 Relating to community land trusts. TX - HB755 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for certain feminine hygiene products. TX - HB768 Relating to the reappraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of property damaged in a disaster. TX - HB791 Relating to the definition of volunteer fire department for purposes of certain motor fuel tax exemptions. TX - HB794 Relating to the repeal of the additional ad valorem taxes imposed as a result of certain changes in the use of open-space land appraised as agricultural land. TX - HB821 Relating to the information required to be included in or with a school district ad valorem tax bill. TX - HB827 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of an improvement that is necessary to support the continued use or existence of a historic site. TX - HB845 Relating to the eligibility of property used for a water desalination project for ad valorem tax benefits under the Texas Economic Development Act. TX - HB861 Relating to the calculation of penalties and interest resulting from the final determination of an ad valorem tax appeal that changes a property owner's tax liability. TX - HB878 Relating to a limitation on increases in the appraised value of real property for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HJR47 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to limit the maximum appraised value of real property for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HJR48 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation the total assessed value of the residence homestead of an unpaid caregiver of an individual who is eligible to receive long-term services and supports under the Medicaid program while the individual is on a waiting list for the services and supports. TX - HB894 Relating to the repeal of the allowance authorized for the administration and enforcement of motor fuel taxes. TX - HB905 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of the total appraised value of the residence homestead of an unpaid caregiver of an individual who is eligible to receive long-term services and supports under the Medicaid program while the individual is on a waiting list for the services and supports. TX - HB913 Relating to the calculation of the ad valorem rollback tax rate of a taxing unit other than a school district. TX - HB916 Relating to the exemption of rural transit districts from motor fuel taxes. TX - HB945 Relating to a limitation on increases in the appraised value of real property for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HB946 Relating to the limitation on increases in the appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem taxation. TX - HB947 Relating to exemptions from the motor vehicle use tax for a motor vehicle brought into this state by an active duty member of the United States armed forces or the member's spouse. TX - HB948 Relating to the period for which certain land owned by a religious organization for the purpose of expanding a place of religious worship or constructing a new place of religious worship may be exempted from ad valorem taxation. TX - HB950 Relating to the authority of an appraisal review board to determine the appraised value of property that is the subject of a protest to be an amount greater than the appraised value as shown in the appraisal records. TX - HJR50 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to limit the maximum appraised value of real property for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HJR51 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to set a lower limit on the maximum appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem taxation. TX - HJR52 Proposing a constitutional amendment providing for the valuation of property for ad valorem tax purposes on the basis of its market value. TX - HB966 Relating to providing a sales and use tax refund or franchise tax credit for businesses that employ certain apprentices. TX - HB983 Relating to a franchise tax credit for enterprise projects for certain capital investments. TX - HB994 Relating to the procedures for protests and appeals of certain ad valorem tax determinations. TX - HB1032 Relating to the establishment of a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that taxing units may impose on the residence homesteads of individuals who are disabled or elderly and their surviving spouses. TX - HJR53 Proposing a constitutional amendment establishing a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that political subdivisions may impose on the residence homesteads of individuals who are disabled or elderly and their surviving spouses. TX - HB1050 Relating to the procedure by which information required to be included in a notice of appraised value may be provided to a property owner by the chief appraiser of an appraisal district. TX - HB1056 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of leased motor vehicles that are not held primarily for the production of income by the lessee. TX - HB1058 Relating to the election of members of the boards of directors of certain tax increment reinvestment zones. TX - HB1060 Relating to the authority of a property owner to request that notice of a protest hearing before the appraisal review board be delivered by certified mail or electronic mail. TX - SB443 Relating to the period for which a property owner may receive a residence homestead exemption from ad valorem taxation for property that is rendered uninhabitable or unusable as a result of a disaster. TX - HB1062 Relating to the eligibility of the surviving spouse of an individual who is disabled to receive a limitation on the school district ad valorem taxes on the spouse's residence homestead. TX - HB1068 Relating to strategies for railroad relocation and improvement, including a franchise tax credit for certain railroad reconstruction or replacement expenditures. TX - HJR54 Proposing a constitutional amendment to allow the surviving spouse of a person who is disabled to receive a limitation on the school district ad valorem taxes on the spouse's residence homestead if the spouse is 55 years of age or older at the time of the person's death. TX - SB449 Relating to testimony by an appraisal district employee as to the value of real property in certain ad valorem tax appeals. TX - HB1077 Relating to public school finance, supporting public education funding through an increase in the state sales and use tax rate, and requiring a reduction in school district maintenance and operation ad valorem taxes; making an appropriation; increasing the rate of a tax. TX - HB1081 Relating to the correction of an ad valorem tax appraisal roll and related appraisal records. TX - HB1083 Relating to an exemption from the sales tax for certain beer or ale sold on July 4. TX - HB1089 Relating to the classification of certain entities as primarily engaged in retail trade for purposes of the franchise tax. TX - HB1102 Relating to a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that a school district may impose on certain residence homesteads following a substantial school tax increase. TX - HJR56 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to limit the total amount of ad valorem taxes that a school district may impose on the residence homestead of an individual and the surviving spouse of the individual if the individual qualifies the property as the individual's residence homestead for 15 consecutive tax years and the school taxes on the property increase by at least 120 percent during that period. TX - HB1144 Relating to sales and use taxes on e-cigarette vapor products to benefit the child health plan program; imposing taxes. TX - HB1148 Relating to the rate at which interest accrues in connection with the deferral or abatement of the collection of ad valorem taxes on certain residence homesteads. TX - HB1188 Relating to the appraisal of land for ad valorem tax purposes as qualified open-space land following a transfer between family members. TX - HB1192 Relating to the amount deducted from certain distributions of local tax revenue as the state's share. TX - HB1194 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation by a school district of certain property used to build low-income housing. TX - HB1195 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HJR58 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation by one or more political subdivisions of this state property located near a public school or within a municipal management district that is owned for the purpose of building low-income housing. TX - HB1197 Relating to the allocation of hotel occupancy tax revenue collected by certain municipalities. TX - HB1201 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of real property owned by a charitable organization for the purpose of renting the property at below-market rates to low-income or moderate-income individuals or families. TX - HB1213 Relating to the repeal of the additional ad valorem taxes imposed as a result of certain changes in the use of open-space land appraised as agricultural land. TX - SB533 Relating to the severance tax exemption for oil and gas produced from certain inactive wells. TX - HB1248 Relating to a credit or refund for diesel fuel taxes paid on diesel fuel used in this state by auxiliary power units or power take-off equipment. TX - HB2 Relating to ad valorem taxation; authorizing fees. TX - HB1254 Relating to the eligibility of land secured by a home equity loan to be designated for agricultural use for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - SB2 Relating to ad valorem taxation. TX - HB1259 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB1265 Relating to the transfer of a limitation established by a county, municipality, or junior college district on the amount of ad valorem taxes imposed on the residence homestead of an elderly or disabled person. TX - HJR60 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for the transfer of a limitation established by a county, city or town, or junior college district on the amount of ad valorem taxes imposed on the residence homestead of an elderly or disabled person. TX - SB579 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of certain property owned by the TexAmericas Center. TX - HB1313 Relating to the authority of the chief appraiser of an appraisal district to increase the appraised value of property in the tax year following the year in which the appraised value of the property is lowered as a result of a protest or appeal. TX - HB1333 Relating to the administration of the ad valorem tax system. TX - HB1409 Relating to the qualification of land for appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes as timber land or restricted-use timber land. TX - HB1414 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of property owned by a charitable organization that provides a meeting place and support services for organizations that provide assistance to alcoholics or their families. TX - HB1444 Relating to the calculation of the ad valorem taxes imposed on real property on the basis of the lesser of the appraised value of the property or the average appraised value of the property over a specified time period. TX - HJR65 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for the assessment of ad valorem taxes on real property on the basis of the lesser of the appraised value of the property or the average appraised value of the property over a specified time period and authorizing exceptions to the assessment of those taxes based on that method. TX - HB1484 Relating to the selection of the board of directors of an appraisal district; authorizing a fee. TX - HB1485 Relating to the selection of the chief appraiser of an appraisal district; authorizing a fee. TX - HB1486 Relating to the selection and administration of an appraisal review board; authorizing a fee. TX - SB687 Relating to the use of information obtained by a person from the comptroller that relates to a taxpayer subject to an audit by the comptroller. TX - HB1526 Relating to the treatment of a nursery stock weather protection unit as an implement of husbandry for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HB1534 Relating to the selection of the board of directors of an appraisal district; authorizing the imposition of a fee. TX - HB1543 Relating to methods to enhance the enforcement of the collection of the use tax due on certain off-highway vehicles purchased outside this state; providing a civil penalty. TX - HB1551 Relating to the selection of the chief appraiser of an appraisal district; authorizing a fee. TX - HB1557 Relating to the authority of a municipality to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB1558 Relating to the severance tax exemption for oil and gas produced from certain inactive wells. TX - HB1560 Relating to a tax on title insurance policies written by title insurance companies to fund housing programs and services; imposing a tax. TX - HB1596 Relating to a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a county, municipality, or junior college district of a portion of the appraised value of the income-producing tangible personal property owned by certain veteran-owned businesses during the businesses' initial period of operation in this state. TX - HJR69 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a county, municipality, or junior college district of a portion of the market value of income-producing tangible personal property owned by a veteran-owned business during the business's initial period of operation in this state. TX - HB1606 Relating to a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a county or municipality of a portion of the appraised value of real property of a business that provides, or pays for the provision of, certain services for honorably discharged veterans without cost. TX - HJR70 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the governing body of a county or municipality to adopt a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion, expressed as a dollar amount, of the market value of real property of a business that provides, or pays for the provision of, certain services for honorably discharged veterans without cost. TX - HB1607 Relating to a deduction under the franchise tax for certain contracts with the federal government. TX - HB1633 Relating to the imposition and rate of the county hotel occupancy tax in certain counties; authorizing the imposition of a tax. TX - HB1634 Relating to the imposition and rate of the county hotel occupancy tax in certain counties; authorizing the imposition of a tax. TX - HB1652 Relating to the public resale by means of a public auction using online bidding and sale of property purchased by a taxing unit at an ad valorem tax sale. TX - HB1703 Relating to the eligibility of a person to serve on the appraisal review board of an appraisal district. TX - HB1704 Relating to the eligibility of a person for appointment as an arbitrator in a binding arbitration of an appraisal review board order. TX - HB1707 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for certain feminine hygiene products. TX - HB1726 Relating to an exemption from the motor vehicle sales and use tax for certain military service members serving on active duty. TX - HB1727 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for United States flags and Texas state flags. TX - HB1729 Relating to the amount of the discount allowed for prepayment of sales and use taxes. TX - SB812 Relating to the application of the limit on appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem tax purposes to an improvement that is a replacement structure for a structure that was rendered uninhabitable or unusable by a casualty or by wind or water damage. TX - HB1743 Relating to the additional ad valorem tax and interest imposed as a result of a change of use of certain land. TX - HB1745 Relating to the authority of a property owner to bring suit to compel an appraisal district, chief appraiser, or appraisal review board to comply with a procedural requirement applicable to an ad valorem tax protest. TX - HB1802 Relating to a request for binding arbitration of certain appraisal review board orders. TX - HB1813 Relating to the use of tax revenue by certain municipalities for the payment of certain hotel-related bonds or other obligations. TX - HB1815 Relating to the deadline for filing an application for an allocation of the value of certain property for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HB1816 Relating to ad valorem tax protests and appeals on the ground of the unequal appraisal of property. TX - HB1841 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of a housing unit that the owner or a predecessor of the owner acquired from a community land trust. TX - HB1842 Relating to the application of the limit on appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem tax purposes to an improvement that is a replacement structure for a structure that was rendered uninhabitable or unusable by a casualty or by wind or water damage. TX - HB1875 Relating to the times and dates of meetings of the boards of directors of certain political subdivisions. TX - HB1882 Relating to a request for binding arbitration to appeal appraisal review board orders involving two or more contiguous tracts of land. TX - HB1883 Relating to deferred payment of ad valorem taxes for certain persons serving in the United States armed forces. TX - HB1885 Relating to the waiver of penalties and interest if an error by a mortgagee results in failure to pay an ad valorem tax. TX - HB1923 Relating to the exemption from the franchise tax and certain filing fees for certain businesses owned by veterans during an initial period of operation in the state. TX - HB1937 Relating to a franchise or insurance tax credit for certain low-income housing developments. TX - HB1965 Relating to the sales and use tax exemption for certain amusement services. TX - HB1970 Relating to the additional tax imposed on land appraised for ad valorem tax purposes as qualified open-space land if a change in use of the land occurs. TX - HB1977 Relating to a requirement that a fiscal impact statement be provided before a taxing unit may enter into a tax abatement agreement. TX - HB1978 Relating to the repeal of the additional ad valorem taxes imposed as a result of certain changes in the use of agricultural or open-space land. TX - HB1525 Relating to the administration and collection of sales and use taxes applicable to sales involving marketplace providers. TX - HB2008 Relating to the establishment of a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that taxing units may impose on the residence homesteads of individuals who are disabled or elderly and their surviving spouses. TX - HJR77 Proposing a constitutional amendment establishing a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that political subdivisions may impose on the residence homesteads of individuals who are disabled or elderly and their surviving spouses. TX - HB2040 Relating to the exclusion from total revenue for purposes of the franchise tax of payments received from certain insurance organizations. TX - HB2066 Relating to the sales and use tax exemption for the repair, remodeling, or maintenance of aircraft. TX - SB925 Relating to calculation of daily production for purposes of the oil and gas production tax credits for low-producing wells and leases. TX - HB2111 Relating to the period for which a school district's participation in certain tax increment financing reinvestment zones may be taken into account in determining the total taxable value of property in the school district. TX - HB2115 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for firearm safety equipment. TX - HB2121 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of real property that includes improvements used for the noncommercial production of food for personal consumption. TX - HB2124 Relating to the treatment for ad valorem tax purposes of property that was erroneously omitted from an appraisal roll in a previous year. TX - HB2129 Relating to the extension of the expiration of certain parts of the Texas Economic Development Act. TX - HB2153 Relating to a single local use tax rate as an alternative to combined local use tax rates for computing the amount of local use taxes remote sellers are required to collect and to the allocation of tax revenue collected at that rate. TX - HB2159 Relating to the correction of an ad valorem tax appraisal roll. TX - HB2160 Relating to the qualification of land for appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes as qualified open-space land. TX - HB2179 Relating to the grounds for imposing certain sanctions on certain persons for engaging in certain conduct in connection with the appointment of members of or the functions of appraisal review boards. TX - HB2180 Relating to the eligibility of a person to serve on the board of directors of an appraisal district. TX - HB2182 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of real property that includes improvements used for the noncommercial production of food for personal consumption. TX - HB2199 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - SB955 Relating to the matters that a taxing unit is entitled to challenge before an appraisal review board. TX - SB956 Relating to the correction of an ad valorem tax appraisal roll and related appraisal records. TX - HB2220 Relating to testimony by an appraisal district employee as to the value of real property in certain ad valorem tax appeals. TX - HB2254 Relating to a study by the Texas A&M Transportation Institute on the collection of road use fees from owners of alternatively fueled vehicles. TX - HB2256 Relating to procedures for tax auditing, determining amounts of overpayments, and obtaining reimbursements of overpayments of gas production taxes. TX - HB2257 Relating to the authority of an appraisal review board to direct changes in the appraisal roll for a prior year. TX - SB1006 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of income-producing tangible personal property having a value of less than a certain amount. TX - HB2272 Relating to the county hotel occupancy tax rate in certain counties. TX - SB1013 Relating to the calculation of the penalty for filing a late application for certain ad valorem tax exemptions and allocations. TX - HB2293 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB2338 Relating to the exemption from the taxes imposed on the sale, use, or rental of a motor vehicle for certain motor vehicles used for religious purposes. TX - HB2358 Relating to the payment of certain sales and use taxes by a retailer. TX - HB2394 Relating to the expiration of the municipal sales and use tax for street maintenance in certain municipalities. TX - HB2395 Relating to the treatment of a replacement structure for a structure that was rendered uninhabitable or unusable by a casualty or by wind or water damage as a new improvement for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HB2397 Relating to a sales and use tax refund and franchise tax credit for certain businesses that make investments in qualified opportunity zones. TX - SJR47 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for an exemption from ad valorem taxation of all or part of the market value of the residence homestead of the surviving spouse of a member of the armed services of the United States who is killed or fatally injured in the line of duty. TX - HB2407 Relating to the authority of a municipality to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB2431 Relating to the authority of the commissioners court of a county to impose an additional vehicle registration fee and the effect of the fee on county ad valorem tax rates. TX - HB2438 Relating to the extension of the expiration date of certain statutes authorizing ad valorem tax incentives for economic development. TX - HB2441 Relating to the entitlement of a person who is disabled and elderly to receive a disabled residence homestead exemption from ad valorem taxation from one taxing unit and an elderly exemption from another taxing unit. TX - HB2455 Relating to the limitation of certain special district tax on the homesteads of the disabled and elderly. TX - HB2456 Relating to a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of the residence homesteads of certain volunteer first responders. TX - HJR89 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of the residence homesteads of certain volunteer first responders. TX - HB2460 Relating to providing a sales and use tax refund or franchise tax credit for businesses that employ former offenders. TX - HB2480 Relating to a limitation on the total amount of ad valorem taxes that may be imposed by a taxing unit on the residence homestead of a lower-income individual that is located in a homestead preservation district. TX - HJR90 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the governing body of a political subdivision to limit the total amount of ad valorem taxes that may be imposed by the political subdivision on the residence homestead of certain lower-income individuals. TX - HB2543 Relating to exempting textbooks purchased, used, or consumed by certain students from the sales and use tax. TX - HB2545 Relating to franchise tax, oil production tax, and gas production tax incentives for certain desalination facility operations. TX - HB2574 Relating to the administration of the ad valorem tax system; authorizing a fee. TX - HB2611 Relating to the treatment of certain limited liability companies as passive entities for purposes of the franchise tax. TX - SB1214 Relating to the sales and use tax exemption for certain aircraft. TX - HB2647 Relating to the allocation of certain state hotel occupancy tax revenue. TX - HB2650 Relating to the procedure for the sale by auction of real property pursuant to foreclosure of a tax lien. TX - HB2666 Relating to the sales and use tax exemption for certain aircraft. TX - HB2684 Relating to an exemption from the sales tax for items sold by a nonprofit organization at a county fair. TX - SB1253 Relating to a public database maintained by the comptroller of information about certain political subdivisions. TX - HB2695 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of a residence homestead based on the average appraised value of all qualified residence homesteads located in the same county. TX - HB2702 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of certain property that was erroneously omitted from an appraisal roll in a previous year. TX - HJR93 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for an exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the assessed value of a residence homestead based on the average assessed value of all qualified residence homesteads that are located in the same county as the homestead. TX - HB2719 Relating to the election of the board of directors of an appraisal district. TX - HB2750 Relating to the selection of the board of directors of an appraisal district; authorizing the imposition of a fee. TX - HB2759 Relating to the decrease of the rates of the franchise tax under certain circumstances and the expiration of that tax. TX - SB1307 Relating to the use of hotel occupancy tax revenue by certain municipalities. TX - HB2770 Relating to the payment in installments of ad valorem taxes on a residence homestead. TX - SB1319 Relating to an annual report submitted to the comptroller by a county that imposes certain hotel occupancy taxes. TX - HB2788 Relating to the use of hotel occupancy tax revenue by certain municipalities, including the authority to pledge certain revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB2799 Relating to economic development. TX - HB2804 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of tangible personal property consisting of certain food products held by the owner of the property for sale at retail. TX - HJR94 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation tangible personal property consisting of food or food products held by the owner of the property for sale at retail. TX - HB2849 Relating to the imposition of a sales tax on ammunition, firearms, and firearms accessories to provide funding for a grant program for mental health services. TX - HB2859 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of precious metal held in a precious metal depository located in this state. TX - HJR95 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation precious metal held in a precious metal depository located in this state. TX - HB2864 Relating to the E-Z computation of the franchise tax. TX - HB2872 Relating to the collection, remittance, and administration of certain taxes on motor vehicles rented through a marketplace rental provider. TX - HB2915 Relating to state and local taxes and fees. TX - SB1393 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB2958 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of certain property owned by the TexAmericas Center. TX - HB2959 Relating to the authority of certain counties to impose a hotel occupancy tax. TX - HB2993 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of certain nonexempt property used for low-income or moderate-income housing. TX - HB2995 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for educational materials purchased by a teacher. TX - HB2996 Relating to the eligibility of land located in a residential subdivision for appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes as qualified open-space land. TX - HB3006 Relating to the administration of the mixed beverage sales tax. TX - HB3036 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB3067 Relating to an oil and gas production tax credit for oil and gas producers that provide produced water for recycling. TX - HB3072 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB3086 Relating to the sales and use tax exemption for property used in the production of motion picture, video, or audio recordings and broadcasts. TX - SB1467 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB3098 Relating to ad valorem taxation. TX - HJR102 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for the appraisal of certain real property for ad valorem tax purposes based on its purchase price, exempting all tangible personal property in this state from ad valorem taxation, and authorizing the legislature to permit legislators to appoint members of the board of equalization for an appraisal entity. TX - HB3113 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB3118 Relating to the titling of certain off-highway vehicles purchased outside this state. TX - HB3127 Relating to the maximum amount of the local option residence homestead exemption from ad valorem taxation by a taxing unit. TX - HB3143 Relating to the Property Redevelopment and Tax Abatement Act. TX - HJR103 Proposing a constitutional amendment requiring certain tax bills to be approved by two-thirds of all the members elected to each house of the legislature. TX - HB3160 Relating to an election in certain municipalities to convert all or a portion of a sales and use tax originally adopted for the purpose of sports and community venues to a sales and use tax for economic development purposes. TX - HB3168 Relating to the applicability of the prohibition on certain ad valorem tax incentives relating to wind-powered energy devices located near a military aviation facility. TX - HB3197 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB3208 Relating to providing a sales and use tax refund or franchise tax credit for businesses that employ persons with disabilities. TX - HB3225 Relating to the penalty for failing to file or failing to timely file a Dealer's Motor Vehicle Inventory Tax Statement. TX - HB3234 Relating to the deferral or abatement of the collection of ad valorem taxes on an appreciating residence homestead. TX - HB3241 Relating to the system for appraising property for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HB3243 Relating to the payment of certain ad valorem tax refunds. TX - HB3253 Relating to a study regarding ad valorem tax relief through the use of a circuit breaker program. TX - HB3255 Relating to a county sales and use tax in certain counties for transportation improvement projects; authorizing the imposition of a tax. TX - HB3256 Relating to the eligibility of an individual to be an employee of an appraisal district or to serve on the board of directors of an appraisal district. TX - HB3258 Relating to an authorization to increase the sales and use tax collected in an advanced transportation district of a metropolitan rapid transit authority. TX - HB3275 Relating to the repeal of the exemption from the severance tax for flared or vented gas. TX - HB3298 Relating to a periodic review and expiration dates of state and local tax preferences. TX - HJR106 Proposing a constitutional amendment requiring the periodic review of state and local tax preferences and the expiration of certain tax preferences if not reauthorized by law. TX - HB3348 Relating to the eligibility of land on which the Texas Animal Health Commission has established a temporary quarantine for ticks for appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes as agricultural or open-space land. TX - HB3355 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB3356 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB3358 Relating to the repeal of the additional ad valorem taxes imposed as a result of certain changes in the use of certain land. TX - HB3363 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB3364 Relating to sales and use taxes on electronic nicotine delivery system vapor products; imposing taxes. TX - HJR107 Proposing a constitutional amendment repealing the provision that subjects land designated for agricultural use to an additional tax when the land is diverted to a purpose other than agricultural use or sold. TX - HB3380 Relating to the inclusion of certain public safety facilities in a tax increment financing reinvestment zone and the making of improvements to public safety infrastructure in a zone. TX - HB3384 Relating to the authority of the comptroller to conduct a limited-scope review of an appraisal district located in an area declared by the governor to be a disaster area. TX - HB3386 Relating to the sales and use tax exemption for certain amusement services. TX - HB3413 Relating to the application of the franchise tax to and computation of franchise tax owed by certain entities that hold precious metals. TX - HB3423 Relating to ad valorem and franchise tax credits for donations to school districts to create or support career and technical education programs or courses. TX - HB3427 Relating to an increase in the state sales and use tax rate for the purpose of reducing school district maintenance and operations ad valorem taxes; increasing the rate of a tax. TX - HJR109 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for a credit against ad valorem taxes imposed by a school district on the property owned by a business entity that donates money to the district to create or support career and technical education programs or courses. TX - HB3437 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB3443 Relating to the rate of interest on certain tax refunds. TX - HJR110 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide that the appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem tax purposes is the market value of the property for the first year that the owner qualified the property for a homestead exemption or, if the owner purchased the property, the purchase price of the property. TX - HB3475 Relating to the administration, collection, and remittance of the cigars and tobacco products tax; requiring a permit. TX - HJR111 Proposing a constitutional amendment providing that a residence homestead is not subject to seizure or sale for delinquent ad valorem taxes. TX - HB3491 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for taxable items used to assist persons with an intellectual or developmental disability. TX - HB3493 Relating to a requirement that a purchaser of commercial real property disclose the sales price of the property to the appraisal district and to the use of that information by the appraisal district; creating a criminal offense. TX - HB3497 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB3520 Relating to the calculation of the penalty for filing a late application for certain ad valorem tax exemptions and allocations. TX - HB3579 Relating to the calculation, collection, and remittance of state hotel occupancy taxes. TX - SB1772 Relating to a temporary exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster. TX - SJR57 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for a temporary exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster. TX - HB3717 Relating to an oil and gas production tax credit for oil and gas producers that provide treated produced water to aquifer storage and recovery project operators. TX - HB3754 Relating to the collection of local permit and license fees authorized under the Alcoholic Beverage Code; authorizing a fee. TX - HB3764 Relating to the period for redeeming the residence homestead of an elderly person sold at an ad valorem tax sale. TX - HB3779 Relating to the collection of state, municipal, and county hotel occupancy taxes by a short-term rental marketplace. TX - HJR116 Proposing a constitutional amendment to lengthen the period for redeeming the residence homestead of an elderly person sold at an ad valorem tax sale. TX - HB3787 Relating to the application of the sales and use tax to certain property and services. TX - HB3793 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation by a school district for maintenance and operations purposes of the total appraised value of a residence homestead and the offsetting of the resulting revenue loss to school districts with state sales and use tax revenue. TX - HB3796 Relating to reducing the limitation on the maximum amount of gross receipts taxes collected for combative sports events. TX - HJR118 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation by a school district for maintenance and operations purposes all or part of the appraised value of a residence homestead and to use state money to offset the resulting revenue loss to school districts. TX - HB3822 Relating to the calculation of the ad valorem taxes imposed on property for the year in which the property is acquired by a governmental entity. TX - HB3823 Relating to a paid family care leave incentive for certain employers. TX - HB3829 Relating to the adjustment of the limitation on the amount of ad valorem taxes imposed by a school district on the residence homestead of an elderly or disabled person if the school district adopts, changes the amount of, or rescinds a local option residence homestead exemption. TX - HB3844 Relating to the period for which certain property acquired by a charitable organization to provide low-income housing may be exempted from ad valorem taxation. TX - HJR120 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for the adjustment of the limitation on the amount of ad valorem taxes imposed by a school district on the residence homestead of an elderly or disabled person if the school district adopts, changes the amount of, or rescinds a local option residence homestead exemption. TX - HB3864 Relating to the expenditure of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue allocated by certain municipalities for certain purposes. TX - HB3865 Relating to calculation of daily production for purposes of the oil and gas production tax credits for low-producing wells and leases. TX - HB3866 Relating to a franchise tax credit based on the ad valorem taxes paid by a taxable entity on certain inventory. TX - HB3868 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of tangible personal property held for sale at retail and a franchise tax credit based on the ad valorem taxes paid on such property. TX - HB3869 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of tangible personal property held for sale at retail. TX - HB3870 Relating to a franchise tax credit for ad valorem taxes paid by a taxable entity on certain inventory. TX - HB3917 Relating to the collection of delinquent ad valorem taxes. TX - HB3947 Relating to the authority of certain special purpose districts to use hotel occupancy tax revenue. TX - HB3954 Relating to motor fuel taxes applicable to gasoline and diesel fuel within the bulk transfer system. TX - HB3959 Relating to a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a school district of the total appraised value of the residence homesteads of certain elderly or disabled persons. TX - HB3968 Relating to a periodic review and expiration dates of state and local tax preferences. TX - HB4012 Relating to the procedure for qualifying for the exemption from ad valorem taxation of pollution control property. TX - HB4013 Relating to sales and use taxes on e-cigarettes and vapor products; imposing taxes; providing an administrative penalty; authorizing the imposition of a fee. TX - HJR125 Proposing a constitutional amendment requiring the periodic review of state and local tax preferences and providing an expiration date for certain tax preferences. TX - HJR126 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a school district of the total market value of the residence homesteads of certain elderly or disabled persons. TX - HB4032 Relating to the permitting and taxation of certain boats and boat motors; imposing a fee. TX - HB4042 Relating to the municipal hotel occupancy tax. TX - HB4043 Relating to a temporary exemption from the requirements regarding voter approval of a proposed ad valorem tax rate that exceeds a taxing unit's rollback tax rate following a disaster. TX - HB4072 Relating to the dissolution of the municipal sales and use tax for street maintenance. TX - HB4092 Relating to the maximum amount of the local option residence homestead exemption from ad valorem taxation by a school district and the effect of such exemptions on the provision of funding under the foundation school program. TX - HB4102 Relating to the use of tax revenue by certain municipalities for the payment of certain hotel-related bonds or other obligations. TX - HB4108 Relating to the required payment of taxes by an owner of a property used for nuclear electric power generation who appeals certain ad valorem tax determinations. TX - HB4135 Relating to the effect of certain residential structures on a residence homestead exemption for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HB4139 Relating to the authority of the governing body of a taxing unit to adopt an exemption from ad valorem taxation of an individual's residence homestead. TX - HJR127 Proposing a constitutional amendment to increase the maximum amount of the local option residence homestead exemption from ad valorem taxation by a school district. TX - HJR129 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the governing body of a political subdivision that adopts an exemption from ad valorem taxation of a percentage of the market value of an individual's residence homestead to set the minimum dollar amount of the exemption to which an individual is entitled in a tax year. TX - SB2137 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue by certain municipalities. TX - HB4152 Relating to use of hotel occupancy tax be certain counties. TX - HB4158 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB4180 Relating to the applicability of the prohibition on certain ad valorem tax incentives relating to wind-powered energy devices located near a military aviation facility. TX - HB4184 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of a percentage of the appraised value of the residence homestead of a partially disabled veteran and the amount of the exemption for the surviving spouses and children of certain disabled veterans. TX - HB4194 Relating to the interest rate on a refund of ad valorem taxes made following the final determination of an appeal that decreases a property owner's tax liability. TX - HB4198 Relating to the exclusion from total revenue of certain payments made by a performing rights society for purposes of computing the franchise tax. TX - HJR131 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation a percentage of the assessed value of the residence homestead of a partially disabled veteran based on the disability rating of the veteran. TX - HB4201 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to hotel projects. TX - HB4203 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue by certain municipalities. TX - HB4217 Relating to increasing the rates of the state gasoline and diesel fuel taxes. TX - HB4225 Relating to a franchise tax credit for investment in certain communities; authorizing a fee. TX - HB4228 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB4253 Relating to the eligibility of land for appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes as qualified open-space land on the basis of its use for wildlife management. TX - HB4281 Relating to a county motor fuels tax in certain counties for mobility improvement projects; providing authority to impose the tax, issue bonds, and impose penalties. TX - HB4295 Relating to default under a deed of trust or contract lien on certain residential property for the delinquent payment of ad valorem taxes. TX - HB4305 Relating to the use of hotel occupancy tax revenue by certain counties. TX - HB4326 Relating to imposing a local fee on the sale or lease of a new luxury motor vehicle in certain areas. TX - HB4329 Relating to the limitation on increases in the appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem taxation. TX - HB4338 Relating to a limitation on increases in the appraised value for ad valorem tax purposes of commercial real property. TX - HB4347 Relating to the use of certain tax revenue by certain municipalities for the payment of job training programs and the development of hotel and convention center projects. TX - HJR134 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to set a lower limit on the maximum appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem taxation. TX - HJR136 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to limit increases in the appraised value of commercial real property for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - SB2208 Relating to the use of hotel occupancy tax revenue by certain counties. TX - HB4352 Relating to an increase in the amount of the exemption of residence homesteads from ad valorem taxation by a school district, a reduction in the amount of the limitation on school district ad valorem taxes imposed on the residence homesteads of the elderly or disabled to reflect the increased exemption amount, and the protection of school districts against the resulting loss in local revenue. TX - HB4353 Relating to the exemption from ad valorem taxation of income-producing tangible personal property having a value of less than a certain amount. TX - HB4355 Relating to the correction of an ad valorem tax appraisal roll and related appraisal records. TX - HB4356 Relating to the matters that a taxing unit is entitled to challenge before an appraisal review board. TX - HB4363 Relating to an increase in the state sales and use tax rate for the purpose of reducing school district maintenance and operations ad valorem taxes and a study of additional changes to the rate and application of the state sales and use tax for that same purpose; increasing the rate of a tax. TX - HB4366 Relating to a sales and use tax exemption for school supplies purchased by certain teachers for a limited period. TX - HB4367 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of the residence homesteads of certain disabled first responders and their surviving spouses. TX - HB4373 Relating to the limitation on the amount of supplemental payments that a person may agree to provide to a school district or any other entity on behalf of a school district under the Texas Economic Development Act. TX - HB4376 Relating to the temporary exemption of certain tangible personal property related to certain colocation data centers from the sales and use tax. TX - HB4377 Relating to the authority of certain special purpose districts to use hotel occupancy tax revenue. TX - HB4387 Relating to the applicability of sales and use taxes to unprocessed sand, dirt, and gravel and the use of certain state revenue derived from those taxes for county road maintenance. TX - HJR137 Proposing a constitutional amendment to increase the amount of the exemption of residence homesteads from ad valorem taxation by a school district and to reduce the amount of the limitation on school district ad valorem taxes imposed on the residence homesteads of the elderly or disabled to reflect the increased exemption amount. TX - HJR139 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for an exemption from ad valorem taxation of all or part of the market value of the residence homesteads of certain disabled first responders and their surviving spouses. TX - HB4425 Relating to the exemption for depreciable tangible personal property used in qualified research from the sales and use tax and the tax credit for certain research and development credit activities for franchise tax purposes. TX - HB4433 Relating to a temporary exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster. TX - HJR142 Proposing a constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to provide for a temporary exemption from ad valorem taxation of a portion of the appraised value of certain property damaged by a disaster. TX - HB4482 Relating to the periodic evaluation of certain exemptions from property taxes and state taxes and the application of the sunset review process to those exemptions. TX - HB4488 Relating to an exemption from ad valorem taxation of the portion of the appraised value of a person's property that is attributable to the installation in or on the property of certain water conservation systems. TX - HB4494 Relating to the limitation on increases in the appraised value of a residence homestead for ad valorem tax purposes. TX - HJR146 Proposing a constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation the portion of the assessed value of a person's property that is attributable to the installation in or on the property of a rainwater harvesting or graywater system. TX - HB4524 Relating to the authority of certain municipalities to pledge certain tax revenue for the payment of obligations related to multipurpose convention center facility projects. TX - HB4528 Relating to the ad valorem taxation of a leasehold or other possessory interest in certain property owned by a municipality. TX - HB4542 Relating to reports by persons involved in the manufacture and distribution of alcoholic beverages for purposes of sales and use taxes. TX - HB4581 Relating to the use of municipal hotel occupancy tax revenue in certain municipalities. TX - HB4614 Relating to the administration, collection, and remittance of the cigarette tax; requiring a permit. TX - HB4617 Relating to the appraisal for ad valorem tax purposes of certain dealer's heavy equipment inventory. TX - HB4621 Relating to the imposition of sales and use taxes and the allocation of certain revenue from sales and use taxes to school district property tax relief and public education; authorizing the imposition of a tax. TX - HJR3 Proposing a constitutional amendment to provide funding for the cost of maintaining and operating the public school system and to reduce school district ad valorem tax rates through an increase in the state sales and use tax rate. TX - HB4756 Relating to authorizing the increase or decrease of the rates of the gasoline and diesel fuel taxes based on the cost of certain highway projects.
2019-04-26T07:06:58Z
https://trackbill.com/committee/texas-house-ways-and-means/601-3572/
Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is a large accelerated filer, an accelerated filer, a non-accelerated filer, a smaller reporting company or an emerging growth company. See the definition of “accelerated filer,” “large accelerated filer”, “smaller reporting company” and “emerging growth company” in Rule 12b-2 of the Exchange Act. As of June 30, 2018, the aggregate market value of the registrant’s common stock, $.20 par value, held by non-affiliates of the registrant was $104,737,263 based on the closing sale price as reported on the NASDAQ Global Market for such date (the exchange on which the registrant’s common stock was listed on June 30, 2018). Portions of Citizens Holding Company’s Annual Report to Shareholders for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2018 are incorporated by reference into Part II of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Portions of Citizens Holding Company’s Definitive Proxy Statement with respect to its 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders are incorporated by reference into Part III of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. other risks detailed from time-to-time in the Company’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The Company undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements subsequent to the date on which they are made. Please also refer to Item 1A, “Risk Factors,” for a detailed discussion of the risks related to the Company, the Bank in particular, and the banking industry generally. The Company is a one-bank holding company incorporated under the laws of the State of Mississippi on February 16, 1982. The Company is the sole shareholder of The Citizens Bank of Philadelphia (the “Bank”). The Company does not have any subsidiaries other than the Bank. The “Company,” “we,” or “our,” as used herein, includes the Bank, unless the context otherwise requires. The Bank was opened on February 8, 1908 as The First National Bank of Philadelphia. In 1917, the Bank surrendered its national charter and obtained a state charter, at which time the name of the Bank was changed to The Citizens Bank of Philadelphia, Mississippi. At December 31, 2018, the Bank was the largest bank headquartered in Neshoba County, Mississippi, with total assets of $958.630 million and total deposits of $756.222 million. For more information regarding the assets, revenue and profits of the Company, refer to the Consolidated Financial Statements of the Company contained in Item 8, “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data.” The Company’s only reportable segment is the assets and cash flow of the Bank, resulting in revenues of $40,106,707, operating profit of $7,011,807 and total assets of $975,454,918 for the Company as of December 31, 2018. Through its ownership of the Bank, the Company engages in a wide range of commercial and personal banking activities, including accepting demand deposits, savings and time deposit accounts, making secured and unsecured loans, issuing letters of credit, originating mortgage loans, and providing personal and corporate trust services. The Company also provides certain services that are closely related to commercial banking such as credit life insurance and title insurance for its loan customers. Revenues from the Company’s lending activities constitute the largest component of the Company’s operating revenues. Revenue from loan interest and fees made up 50.7% of gross revenues in 2018, 48.3% in 2017 and 50.2% in 2016. Loan demand has improved, loan yields are gradually increasing and the investment portfolio is decreasing, all of which has contributed to this percentage increasing from 2017. The increase in lending has been distributed among the Bank’s leading products, including commercial, real estate, installment (direct and indirect) and credit card loans. The Company’s primary lending area is East Central and South Mississippi, specifically Neshoba, Newton, Leake, Lamar, Forrest, Scott, Attala, Lauderdale, Oktibbeha, Lafayette, Rankin, Harrison, Jackson, Winston and Kemper counties and contiguous counties. In 2008, the Company entered the southern Mississippi market with the opening of a branch office in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, which is located in Lamar County. In 2009, the Company opened a Loan Production Office (“LPO”) in Biloxi, Mississippi to serve the Mississippi Gulf Coast and in April 2014 converted this office to a full service branch and at the same time opened another branch in Biloxi. In 2011, the Company opened a branch in Flowood, Mississippi. In December 2016, the Company opened a LPO in Oxford, Mississippi to offer commercial loans to the people in North Mississippi. On a very limited basis, the Company extends out-of-area credit to borrowers who are considered to be low risk, as defined within the Bank’s lending policy. The Company is not dependent upon any single customer or small group of customers, and it has no foreign operations. The Company’s market area is mainly rural, with Hattiesburg, population 50,233, Biloxi, population 50,644, and Meridian, population 38,314, being the largest markets. Agriculture and some light industry comprise a significant portion of the economy of this area. The largest employer in the Company’s service area is the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians. Its schools, manufacturing plants and The Pearl River Resort (the “Resort”) generate a significant number of jobs in the area. The Resort and its related services employ approximately 2,400 people within the Company’s market. For more information regarding revenue from external customers for the last three fiscal years, attributed by geographic region, please refer to Item 7, “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” which is included in the Company’s Annual Report and attached as an exhibit hereto. The Company has historically made, and intends to continue to make, most types of real estate loans, including, but not limited to, single and multi-family housing, farm, residential and commercial construction, and commercial real estate loans. At December 31, 2018, approximately 81.1% of the Company’s loan portfolio was attributed to real estate lending, 15.6% of the Company’s loan portfolio was comprised of commercial, industrial and agricultural production loans, and consumer loans made up the remaining 3.3% of the Company’s total loan portfolio. The Company’s loan personnel have the authority to extend credit under guidelines established and approved by the Company’s Board of Directors. Any aggregate credit that exceeds the authority of the loan officer is forwarded to the Board’s loan committee for approval. The loan committee is composed of certain independent Company directors. All aggregate credits that exceed the loan committee’s lending authority are presented to the Board of Directors for ultimate approval or denial. The loan committee not only acts as an approval body to ensure consistent application of the Company’s loan policies, but also provides valuable insight through the communication and pooling of knowledge, judgment and experience of its members. All loans in the Company’s portfolio are subject to risk based on the state of both the local and national economy. As our footprint expands, the Company’s portfolio risks are more closely aligned with the state economy. The state economy remains strong with 2018 being one of the best in recent years. The state economy is expected to slow down some but still projected to see growth over the next couple of years. The national economy remains strong but is seeing signs of slowing. It is still uncertain how the slowing economies on the local, state and national levels will affect the Company in the future. The Company continues to invest in technology as we understand it is necessary to compete in today’s market. The Company has the technology for consumers to perform many of the routine, transaction-related items through its online and mobile platforms. Additionally, the Company continues to build out a robust treasury management suite of products for business banking such as remote deposit capture, ACH transactions and wire transfers. The Company is evolving with the market to ensure we continue to offer a great customer experience that they have come to expect from the Company. Greg L. McKee, 57, has been employed by the Bank since 1984. He was named President and Chief Executive Officer of the Company and Chief Executive Officer of the Bank in January 2003. He has served as President of the Bank since January 2002 and served as Chief Operating Officer of the Bank from January 2002 until December 31, 2002. He has also been a member of the Board of Directors of both the Company and the Bank since 2001. Mr. McKee served as Executive Vice-President of the Bank from 2001 to 2002, Senior Vice-President of the Bank from 2000 to 2001, Vice-President of the Bank from 1992 to 2000, Assistant Vice-President of the Bank from 1989 to 1992, and Assistant Cashier of the Bank from 1984 to 1989. Robert T. Smith, 67, has been employed by the Bank since 1986. He has served as Senior Vice-President and Chief Financial Officer of the Bank since January 2001. Prior to January 2001, Mr. Smith held the title of Vice-President and Controller of the Bank from 1987 until 2001 and Assistant Vice-President of the Bank from 1986 to 1987. In addition to his position with the Bank, Mr. Smith has served as Treasurer of the Company since February 1996 and Treasurer and Chief Financial Officer since January 2001. The Company has no employees other than three Bank officers who provide services to the Company. These officers receive no compensation from the Company for their services to it as their compensation is paid by the Bank. At December 31, 2018, the Bank employed 235 full-time employees and 24 part-time employees. The Bank is not a party to any collective bargaining agreements, and employee relations are considered to be good. The Bank is chartered under the banking laws of the State of Mississippi and is subject to the supervision of, and is regularly examined by, the Mississippi Department of Banking and Consumer Finance and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”). The Company is a registered bank holding company within the meaning of the Bank Holding Company Act of 1956, as amended (the “BHC Act”), and is subject to the supervision of the Federal Reserve Board (“FRB”). Certain legislation and regulations affecting the businesses of the Company and the Bank are discussed below. The current regulatory environment for financial institutions includes substantial enforcement activity by the federal and state banking agencies, and other state and federal law enforcement agencies, reflecting an increase in activity over prior years. This environment entails significant increases in compliance requirements and associated costs. The FRB requires the Company to maintain certain levels of capital and to file an annual report with the FRB. The FRB also has the authority to conduct examinations of the Company and the Bank and to take enforcement action against any bank holding company that engages in any unsafe or unsound practice or that violates certain laws, regulations, or conditions imposed in writing by the FRB. The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, as amended, (“Dodd-Frank Act”) made extensive changes in the regulation of financial institutions. There are many provisions in the Dodd-Frank Act mandating regulators to adopt new regulations and conduct studies upon which future regulation may be based, a number of which still have not been implemented. It is anticipated that these rules and enforcement by the Bank’s regulators will continue to evolve through regulatory amendments, informal interpretations, and enhanced enforcement in the future. Congress and the President have announced proposed reforms and changes to the Dodd-Frank Act, and it is uncertain how the Dodd-Frank Act provisions may be modified or the ultimate impact any such modifications may have to our business operations. In November 2017, a bipartisan group of U.S. Senators, led by Senate Banking Committee Chairman, introduced the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act (the “Economic Growth Act”). The Economic Growth Act, signed into law on May 24, 2018, provides relief from certain regulatory requirements under the Dodd-Frank Act. Generally, the Economic Growth Act addressed the following areas: the threshold at which banks are classified as systemically important financial institutions (SIFIs), and therefore subject to stricter oversight; targeted relief from Dodd-Frank Act requirements for smaller banks; capital formation; mortgage lending; student borrower debt and provisions addressing veterans, consumers and homeowners. While we expect the Economic Growth Act to have an overall positive impact on our business going forward, we continue to evaluate its impact on our business and that impact remains uncertain. The FRB, FDIC and other federal banking agencies have established risk-based capital adequacy guidelines. These guidelines are intended to provide a measure of a bank’s capital adequacy that reflects the degree of risk associated with a bank’s operations. A banking organization’s risk-based capital ratios are obtained by dividing its qualifying capital by its total risk-adjusted assets and off-balance sheet items. Since December 31, 1992, the federal banking agencies have required a minimum ratio of qualifying total capital to risk-adjusted assets and off-balance sheet items of 8%, and a minimum ratio of Tier 1 capital to risk-adjusted assets and off-balance sheet items of 4%. At December 31, 2018, the Company’s ratio of qualifying total capital to risk-adjusted assets and off-balance sheet items was 18.02%, and its ratio of Tier 1 capital to risk-adjusted assets and off-balance sheet items was 17.40%. In addition to the risk-based guidelines, federal banking regulators require banking organizations to maintain a minimum amount of Tier 1 capital to total assets, referred to as the leverage ratio. For a banking organization rated in the highest of the five categories used by regulators to rate banking organizations, the minimum leverage ratio of Tier 1 capital to total assets is 4%. The Company’s leverage ratio at December 31, 2018 was 9.93%. reforms; and (2) the “standardized approach of Basel II for non-core banks and bank holding companies, such as the Bank and the Company. The capital framework under Basel III will replace the existing regulatory capital rules for all banks, savings associations and U.S. bank holding companies with greater than $500 million in total assets, and all savings and loan holding companies. Maintain the minimum total risk-based capital ratio at 8%. In addition, the Basel III rules will subject a banking organization to certain limitations on capital distributions and discretionary bonus payments to executive officers if the organization does not maintain a capital conservation buffer of common equity Tier 1 capital in an amount greater than 2.5% of its total risk-weighted assets. The capital conservation buffer increases the minimum common equity Tier 1 capital ratio to 7%, the minimum Tier 1 risk-based capital ratio to 8.5% and the minimum total risk-based capital ratio to 10.5% for banking organizations seeking to avoid the limitations on capital distributions and discretionary bonus payments to executive officers. The Basel III rules also changed the capital categories for insured depository institutions for purposes of prompt corrective action. Under the rules, to be well capitalized, an insured depository institution must maintain a minimum common equity Tier 1 capital ratio of at least 6.5%, a Tier 1 risk-based capital ratio of at least 8%, a total risk-based capital ratio of at least 10.0%, and a leverage capital ratio of at least 5%. In addition, the Basel III rules established more conservative standards for including an instrument in regulatory capital and imposed certain deductions from and adjustments to the measure of common equity Tier 1 capital. Management believes that, as of December 31, 2018, the Company and the Bank met all capital adequacy requirements under Basel III. Management will continue to monitor these and any future proposals submitted by the Company’s and Bank’s regulators. Prompt Corrective Action and Other Enforcement Mechanisms. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Improvement Act of 1991, as amended (“FDICIA”) requires each federal banking agency to take prompt corrective action to resolve the problems of insured depository institutions, including, but not limited to, those that fall below one or more of the prescribed minimum capital ratios. The law requires each federal banking agency to promulgate regulations defining the following five categories in which an insured depository institution will be placed, based on the level of its capital ratios: well capitalized; adequately capitalized; undercapitalized; significantly undercapitalized; and critically undercapitalized. The Company and the Bank are classified as well capitalized under the guidelines promulgated by the FRB and the FDIC. FDICIA also implemented certain specific restrictions on transactions and required the regulators to adopt overall safety and soundness standards for depository institutions related to internal control, loan underwriting and documentation, and asset growth. Among other things, FDICIA limits the interest rates paid on deposits by undercapitalized institutions, the use of brokered deposits and the aggregate extension of credit by a depository institution to an executive officer, director, principal shareholder or related interest, and reduces deposit insurance coverage for deposits offered by undercapitalized institutions and for deposits by certain employee benefits accounts. Restrictions on Dividends and Other Distributions. The Company’s ability to pay dividends depends in large part on the ability of the Bank to pay dividends to the Company. The power of the board of directors of an insured depository institution to declare a cash dividend or other distribution with respect to capital is subject to federal statutory and regulatory restrictions, which limit the amount available for such distribution depending upon the earnings, financial condition and cash needs of the institution, as well as general business conditions. The approval of the Mississippi Department of Banking and Consumer Finance is also required prior to the Bank paying dividends. The department’s regulations limit dividends to earned surplus in excess of three times the Bank’s capital stock. At December 31, 2018, the maximum amount available for transfer from the Bank to the Company in the form of a dividend was approximately $81.5 million, or 99.3% of the Bank’s consolidated net assets. FRB regulations limit the amount the Bank may loan to the Company unless those loans are collateralized by specific obligations. At December 31, 2018, the maximum amount available for transfer from the Bank in the form of loans was $8.2 million, or 10% of the Bank’s consolidated net assets. The Bank does not have any outstanding loans with the Company. The FDIC insures the deposits of federally insured banks up to prescribed statutory limits for each depositor, through the Deposit Insurance Fund (“DIF”) and safeguards the safety and soundness of the banking and thrift industries. The amount of FDIC assessments paid by each insured depository institution is based on its relative risk of default as measured by regulatory capital ratios and other supervisory factors. The FDIC’s deposit insurance premium assessment is based on an institution’s average consolidated total assets minus average tangible equity. We are generally unable to control the amount of premiums that we are required to pay for FDIC insurance. At least semi-annually, the FDIC will update its loss and income projections for the DIF and, if needed, will increase or decrease assessment rates, following notice-and-comment rulemaking, if required. If there are additional bank or financial institution failures or if the FDIC otherwise determines to increase assessment rates, the Bank may be required to pay higher FDIC insurance premiums. Any future increases in FDIC insurance premiums may have a material and adverse effect on our earnings. The BHC Act requires a bank holding company to obtain the prior approval of the FRB before acquiring direct or indirect ownership or control of more than 5% of the voting shares of any bank that is not already majority-owned by such bank holding company. The BHC Act provides that the FRB shall not approve any acquisition, merger or consolidation that would result in a monopoly or that would be in furtherance of any combination or conspiracy to monopolize or attempt to monopolize the business of banking. The FRB also will not approve any other transactions in which the effect might be to substantially lessen competition or in any manner be a restraint on trade, unless the anti-competitive effects of the proposed transaction are clearly outweighed by the public interest in the probable effect of the transaction in meeting the convenience and needs of the community to be served. The BHC Act also prohibits a bank holding company, with certain exceptions, from engaging in or from acquiring direct or indirect control of more than 5% of the voting shares of any company engaged in non-banking activities. The principal exception to this rule is for engaging in or acquiring shares of a company whose activities are found by the FRB to be so closely related to banking or managing banks as to be a proper incident thereto. In making such determinations, the FRB is required to consider whether the performance of such activities by a bank holding company or its subsidiaries can reasonably be expected to produce benefits to the public such as greater convenience, increased competition or gains in efficiency of resources that outweigh the risks of possible adverse effects such as decreased or unfair competition, conflicts of interest or unsound banking practices. The BHC Act prohibits the acquisition by a bank holding company of more than 5% of the outstanding voting shares of a bank located outside the state in which the operations of its banking subsidiaries are principally conducted, unless such an acquisition is specifically authorized by statute of the state in which the bank to be acquired is located. The Company and the Bank are subject to certain restrictions imposed by the Federal Reserve Act and the Federal Deposit Insurance Act on any extensions of credit to the Company or the Bank, on investments in the stock or other securities of the Company or the Bank, and on taking such stock or other securities as collateral for loans of any borrower. The BHC Act was amended in 2000 by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999 to permit “financial holding companies” to engage in a broader range of nonbanking financial activities, such as underwriting and selling insurance, providing financial or investment advice, and dealing and making markets in securities and merchant banking. In order to qualify as a financial holding company, the Company must declare to the FRB its intention to become a financial holding company and certify that the Bank meets the capitalization management requirements and that it has at least a satisfactory rating under the Community Reinvestment Act of 1997, as amended (the “CRA”). To date, we have not elected to become a financial holding company. evaluate compliance with the CRA. CRA compliance is also a factor in evaluations of proposed mergers, acquisitions and applications to open new branches or facilities. Overall CRA compliance is rated across a four-point scale from “outstanding” to “substantial noncompliance.” Different evaluation methods are used depending on the asset size of the bank. The FDIC examined the Bank on July 12, 2016 for its performance under the CRA. The Bank was rated Satisfactory during this examination. No discriminatory practices or illegal discouragement of applications were found. The Bank is subject to a number of federal and state consumer protection laws. These laws provide substantive consumer rights and subject the Bank to substantial regulatory oversight. Violations of applicable consumer protection laws can result in significant potential liability from litigation brought by customers, including actual damages, restitution and attorneys’ fees. Federal bank regulators, state attorneys general and state and local consumer protection agencies may also seek to enforce consumer protection requirements and obtain these and other remedies, including regulatory sanctions, customer rescission rights, action by the state and local attorneys general in each jurisdiction in which our bank subsidiary operates and civil money penalties. Failure to comply with consumer protection requirements may also result in the Bank’s failure to obtain any required bank regulatory approval for merger or acquisition transactions the Bank may wish to pursue or its prohibition from engaging in such transactions even if approval is not required. The Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 (“USA PATRIOT Act”) requires financial institutions to establish anti-money laundering programs and due diligence policies, procedures and controls with respect to bank accounts involving foreign individuals and certain foreign banks, and to avoid establishing and maintaining accounts in the United States for, or on the behalf of, foreign banks that do not have a physical presence in any country. We believe that we are in compliance with the requirements of the USA PATRIOT Act. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (“Sarbanes Act”) requires publicly traded companies, such as the Company, to adhere to several directives designed to prevent corporate misconduct. As a result, additional duties have been placed on officers, directors, auditors and attorneys of public companies. The Sarbanes Act requires certifications regarding financial statement accuracy and internal control adequacy by the chief executive officer and the chief financial officer to accompany periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”). The Sarbanes Act also accelerates insider reporting obligations under Section 16 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, restricts certain executive officer and director transactions, imposes new obligations on corporate audit committees and provides for enhanced review by the SEC. payments in connection with approvals of mergers and acquisitions. The Dodd-Frank Act also authorizes the SEC to promulgate rules that would allow stockholders to nominate their own candidates using a company’s proxy materials. Additionally, the Dodd-Frank Act directs the federal banking regulators to promulgate rules prohibiting excessive compensation paid to executives of depository institutions and their holding companies with assets in excess of $1.0 billion, regardless of whether the company is publicly traded. The Dodd-Frank Act gives the SEC authority to prohibit broker discretionary voting on elections of directors and executive compensation matters. Banking is a business that substantially depends on interest rate differentials. In general, the difference between the interest paid by a bank on its deposits and other borrowings and the interest rate earned by banks on loans, securities and other interest-earning assets comprises the major source of banks’ earnings. Thus, the earnings and growth of banks are subject to the influence of economic conditions generally, both domestic and foreign, and also to the monetary and fiscal policies of the United States and its agencies including the FRB. The nature and timing of any future changes in such policies and their impact on the Company cannot be predicted. Various legislation affecting financial institutions and the financial industry is from time to time introduced in Congress. Such legislation may change banking statutes and our operating environment in substantial and unpredictable ways and could increase or decrease the cost of doing business, limit or expand permissible activities or affect the competitive balance depending upon whether any of this potential legislation will be enacted, and if enacted, the effect that it or any implementing regulations, would have on the financial condition or our results of operations. With the proposals to alter the Dodd-Frank Act and the evolution of the CFPB, the nature and extent of future legislative and regulatory changes affecting financial institutions continues to be very unpredictable. The banking business is highly competitive. The Company’s market consists principally of Neshoba, Newton, Leake, Lamar, Forrest, Scott, Attala, Lafayette, Lauderdale, Oktibbeha, Lafayette, Rankin, Harrison, Jackson, Winston and Kemper and contiguous counties in Mississippi. In 2008, the Company entered the southern Mississippi market with the opening of a branch office in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, which is located in Lamar County, and in 2009, opened a loan production office in Biloxi, Mississippi, which in April 2014, was converted into a full service branch. In 2011, the Company opened a branch in Flowood, Mississippi. In 2014, the Company established an additional branch in Biloxi to better serve the Gulf Coast. In 2016, the Company entered North Mississippi with the establishment of a loan production office in Oxford, Mississippi. The Company competes with local, regional and national financial institutions in these counties and in surrounding counties in Mississippi in obtaining deposits, lending activities and providing many types of financial services. The Company also competes with larger regional banks for the business of companies located in the Company’s market area. All financial institutions, including the Company, compete for customers’ deposits. The Company also competes with savings and loan associations, credit unions, production credit associations, federal land banks, finance companies, personal loan companies, money market funds and other non-depository financial intermediaries. Many of these financial institutions have resources significantly greater than those of the Company. In addition, financial intermediaries, such as money-market mutual funds and large retailers, are not subject to the same regulations and laws that govern the operation of traditional depository institutions. The Company believes it benefits from a good reputation in the community and from the significant length of time it has provided needed banking services to its customers. Also, as a locally owned financial institution, the Company believes it is able to respond to the needs of the community with services tailored to the particular demands of its customers. Furthermore, as a local institution, the Company believes it can provide such services faster than a larger institution not based in the Company’s market area. Changes in federal and state law have resulted in, and are expected to continue to result in, increased competition. The reductions in legal barriers to the acquisition of banks by out-of-state bank holding companies resulting from implementation of the Dodd-Frank Act and other banking laws and regulations are expected to continue to further stimulate competition in the markets in which the Company operates, although it is not possible to predict the extent or timing of such increased competition. Currently, there are approximately thirty different financial institutions in the Company’s market competing for the same customer base. According to the FDIC’s Summary of Deposits that is collected as of June 30 each year, the Company’s market share in its market area was approximately 5.48% at June 30, 2018. The Company competes in its market for loan and deposit products, along with many of the other services required by today’s banking customer, on the basis of availability, quality and pricing. The Company believes it is able to compete favorably in its markets, in terms of both the rates the Company offers and the level of service that the Company provides to its customers. The Company’s Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and any amendments thereto, along with other information about the Company, are available, free of charge, on our website, http://www.citizensholdingcompany.com. The information contained on our website is not incorporated into this report. Upon request, the Company will provide to any record holder or beneficial holder of its shares a copy of such reports without charge. Requests should be made to Robert T. Smith, Treasurer and Chief Financial Officer, Citizens Holding Company, 521 Main Street, Philadelphia, Mississippi 39350. In addition to the other information contained in or incorporated by reference into this report and the exhibits hereto, the following risk factors should be considered carefully in evaluating the Company’s business. The risks disclosed below, either alone or in combination, could materially adversely affect the business, prospects, financial condition or results of operations of the Company and/or the Bank. Additional risks not presently known to the Company, or that the Company currently deems immaterial, may also adversely affect the Company’s business, financial condition or results of operations. The Company is subject to interest rate risk. One of the most important aspects of management’s efforts to sustain long-term profitability for the Company is the management of interest rate risk. Management’s goal is to maximize net interest income within acceptable levels of interest-rate risk and liquidity. The Company’s assets and liabilities are principally financial in nature and the resulting earnings thereon are subject to significant variability due to the timing and extent to which the Company can reprice the yields on interest-earning assets and the costs of interest bearing liabilities as a result of changes in market interest rates. Interest rates in the financial markets affect the Company’s decisions on pricing its assets and liabilities, which impacts net interest income, an important cash flow stream for the Company. As a result, a substantial part of the Company’s risk-management activities is devoted to managing interest-rate risk. Currently, the Company does not have any significant risks related to foreign currency exchange, commodities or equity risk exposures. The Company’s earnings and cash flows are largely dependent upon the net interest income of the Company. Net interest income is the difference between interest earned on assets, such as loans and securities, and the cost of interest-bearing liabilities, such as deposits and borrowed funds. Interest rates are highly sensitive to many factors that are beyond the Company’s control, including general economic conditions and policies of various governmental and regulatory agencies and, in particular, the FRB. Changes in monetary policy, including changes in interest rates, could influence not only the interest the Company receives on loans and securities and the amount of interest the Company pays on deposits and borrowings, but such changes could also affect (i) the Company’s ability to originate loans and obtain deposits, which could reduce the amount of fee income generated; (ii) the fair value of the Company’s financial assets and liabilities; and (iii) the average duration of the Company’s mortgage-backed securities portfolio. If the interest rates paid on deposits and other borrowings increase at a faster rate than the interest rates received on loans and other investments, the Company’s net interest income could be adversely affected, which in turn could negatively affect its earnings. Earnings could also be adversely affected if the interest rates received on loans and other investments fall more quickly than the interest rates paid on deposits and other borrowings. Although management believes it has implemented effective asset and liability management strategies to reduce the potential effects of changes in interest rates on the results of operations of the Company, any substantial, unexpected, prolonged change in market interest rates could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. For the reasons set forth above, an increase in interest rates generally as a result of such a credit rating downgrade could adversely affect out net interest income levels, thereby resulting in reduced earnings, and reduce loan demand. Volatility in interest rates may also result in disintermediation, which is the flow of funds away from financial institutions into direct investments, such as United States Government and Agency securities and other investment vehicles, including mutual funds, which generally pay higher rates of return than financial institutions because of the absence of federal insurance premiums and reserve requirements. Disintermediation could also result in material adverse effects on the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. The Company is subject to lending risk. There are inherent risks associated with the Company’s lending activities. These risks include, among other things, the impact of changes in interest rates and changes in the economic conditions in the markets where the Company operates as well as those across the United States. Increases in interest rates or weakening economic conditions could adversely impact the ability of borrowers to repay outstanding loans or the value of the collateral securing these loans. As of December 31, 2018, approximately 65.4% of the Company’s loan portfolio consisted of commercial, construction and commercial real estate loans. These types of loans are generally viewed as having more risk of default than residential real estate loans or consumer loans due primarily to the large amounts loaned to individual borrowers. Because the loan portfolio contains a significant number of commercial, construction and commercial real estate loans with relatively large balances, the deterioration of one or a few of these loans could cause a significant increase in non-performing loans. An increase in non-performing loans could result in a net loss of earnings from these loans, an increase in the provision for possible loan losses and an increase in loan charge-offs, all of which could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. Delays in the Company’s ability to foreclose on delinquent mortgage loans may negatively impact our business. Certain expenses associated with the ownership of real estate, principally real estate taxes, insurance, and maintenance costs, may adversely affect the net proceeds received from the real estate, if any. The ability to mitigate the losses on defaulted loans depends upon the ability to promptly foreclose upon the collateral after an appropriate cure period. Any delay in the foreclosure process adversely affects us by increasing the expenses related to carrying such real estate and exposes us to losses as a result of potential additional declines in the value of such collateral. As a result, the increased cost of owning and operating such real estate may exceed the rental income earned from the real estate (if any), the Company may have to advance additional funds to protect our investment or the Company may be required to dispose of the real estate at a loss. The allowance for possible loan losses may be insufficient. Although the Company tries to maintain diversification within its loan portfolio in order to minimize the effect of economic conditions within a particular industry, management also maintains an allowance for loan losses, which is a reserve established through a provision for loan losses charged to expense, to absorb probable credit losses inherent in the entire loan portfolio. The appropriate level of the allowance is based on management’s quarterly analysis of the loan portfolio and represents an amount that management deems adequate to provide for inherent losses, including collective impairment. Among other considerations in establishing the allowance for loan losses, management considers economic conditions reflected within industry segments, the unemployment rate in the Company’s markets, loan segmentation and historical losses that are inherent in the loan portfolio. The determination of the appropriate level of the allowance for loan losses inherently involves a high degree of subjectivity and requires management to make significant estimates of current credit risks and future trends, all of which may undergo material changes. Changes in economic conditions affecting borrowers, new information regarding existing loans, identification of additional problem loans and other factors, both within and outside of the Company’s control, may require an increase in the allowance for loan losses. The Company depends on the accuracy and completeness of information about customers and counterparties. In deciding whether to extend credit or enter into other transactions, the Company often relies on information furnished by or on behalf of customers and counterparties, including financial statements, credit reports and other financial information. The Company may also rely on representations of those customers, counterparties or other third parties, such as independent auditors, as to the accuracy and completeness of that information. Reliance on inaccurate or misleading financial statements, credit reports or other financial information could have a material adverse impact on the Company’s business and, in turn, its financial condition and results of operations. The Company is subject to environmental liability risk associated with lending activities. hazardous or toxic substances are found, the Company may be liable for remediation costs, as well as for personal injury and property damage. Environmental laws may require the Company to incur substantial expenses and may materially reduce the affected property’s value or limit the ability of the Company to use or sell the affected property. In addition, future laws or more stringent interpretations or enforcement policies with respect to existing laws may increase the Company’s exposure to environmental liability. Although management has policies and procedures to perform an environmental review during the loan application process and also before initiating any foreclosure action on real property, these reviews may not be sufficient to detect all potential environmental hazards. The remediation costs and any other financial liabilities associated with an environmental hazard could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. The Company is subject to risk from adverse economic conditions. Our operations and profitability are impacted by general business and economic conditions in the State of Mississippi, and the United States. These conditions include recession, short-term and long-term interest rates, inflation, money supply, political issues, legislative and regulatory changes, fluctuations in both debt and equity capital markets, broad trends in industry and finance, and the strength of the U.S. economy and the local economies in which we operate, all of which are beyond our control. A deterioration in economic conditions could result in an increase in loan delinquencies and nonperforming assets, decreases in loan collateral values and a decrease in demand for our products and services, among other things, any of which could have a material adverse impact on our financial condition and results of operations. The FRB has implemented significant economic strategies that have impacted interest rates, inflation, asset values, and the shape of the yield curve, and currently is transitioning from many years of easing to what may be a new period of tightening. In recent years, the FRB has begun to gradually unwind the remaining domestic monetary policy initiatives as the economy continues to recover. During 2018, the FRB raised the target federal funds rate by 25 bps in March, June, September and December, bringing the current range to 2.25 to 2.50 percent. This development, along with the U.S. government’s credit and deficit concerns and international economic considerations, could cause interest rates and borrowing costs to rise, which may negatively impact our ability to access the debt markets on favorable terms. Other significant monetary strategies could be implemented in the future including, in particular, so-called tightening strategies. FRB strategies can, and often are intended to, affect the domestic money supply, inflation, interest rates, and the shape of the yield curve. Effects on the yield curve often are most pronounced at the short end of the curve, which is of particular importance to us and other banks. Risks associated with interest rates and the yield curve are discussed in this Item 1A under the caption “The Company is subject to interest rate risk.” Such strategies also can affect the United States. and world-wide financial systems in ways that may be difficult to predict. The profitability of the Company depends significantly on economic conditions in the State of Mississippi. services to customers primarily in East Central and South Mississippi. The local economic conditions in this area have a significant impact on the demand for the Company’s products and services, as well as the ability of its customers to repay loans, the value of the collateral securing loans and the stability of its deposit funding sources. The Company is subject to extensive government regulation and supervision. The Company and the Bank are subject to extensive federal and state regulation and supervision. Banking regulations are primarily intended to protect depositors’ funds, federal deposit insurance funds and the banking system as a whole, and not the economic or other interests of shareholders. These regulations affect the Company’s and the Bank’s lending practices, capital structure, investment practices, dividend policy and growth, among other things. Changes to statutes, regulations or regulatory policies, including changes in interpretation or implementation of the foregoing, could affect the Company or the Bank in substantial and unpredictable ways. Such changes could subject the Company to additional costs, limit the types of financial services and products it may offer or increase the ability of non-banks to offer competing financial services and products, among other things. Under regulatory capital adequacy guidelines and other regulatory requirements, the Company and the Bank must meet guidelines that include quantitative measures of assets, liabilities and certain off-balance sheet items, subject to qualitative judgments by regulators about components, risk weightings and other factors. If the Company fails to meet these minimum capital guidelines and other regulatory requirements, its financial condition would be materially and adversely affected. The Company’s failure to maintain the status of “well capitalized” under its regulatory framework could affect the confidence of its customers in the Company, thus compromising the Company’s competitive position. In addition, failure to maintain the status of “well capitalized” under the Company’s regulatory framework or “well managed” under regulatory examination procedures could compromise the Company’s status as a bank holding company and related eligibility for a streamlined review process for acquisition proposals. The Company is also subject to laws, regulations and standards relating to corporate governance and public disclosure, including the Sarbanes Act, the Dodd Frank Act and SEC regulations. These laws, regulations and standards are subject to varying interpretations in many cases, and as a result, their application in practice may evolve over time as guidance is provided by regulatory and governing bodies, which could result in continuing uncertainty regarding compliance matters and higher costs necessitated by ongoing revisions to disclosure and governance practices. The Company is committed to maintaining high standards of corporate governance and public disclosure. As a result, the Company’s efforts to comply with evolving laws, regulations and standards have resulted in, and are likely to continue to result in, increased expenses and a diversion of management time and attention. Failure to comply with laws, regulations or policies could also result in sanctions by regulatory agencies and/or civil money penalties, which could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s business, prospects, financial condition and results of operations. While the Company has policies and procedures designed to prevent any such violations, it cannot assure that such violations will be prevented. The information under the heading “Supervision and Regulation” in Item 1, “Business,” and Note 16, “Regulatory Matters” to the Consolidated Financial Statements of the Company in Item 8, “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data,” provides more information regarding the regulatory environment in which the Company and the Bank operate including descriptions of the laws, regulations or policies applicable to us. From time to time, customers and others make claims and take legal action pertaining to our performance of our responsibilities. Whether customer claims and legal action related to our performance of our responsibilities are founded or unfounded, or if such claims and legal actions are not resolved in a manner favorable to us, they may result in significant financial liability and/or adversely affect the market perception of us and our products and services, as well as impact customer demand for those products and services. Any financial liability or reputation damage could have a material adverse effect on our business, which, in turn, could have a material adverse effect on our financial condition and results of operations. The Company operates in a highly competitive industry and market area. The Company faces substantial competition in all areas of its operations from a variety of different competitors, many of which are larger and have more financial resources. Such competitors primarily include national, regional and community banks within the various markets in which the Company operates. The Company also faces competition from many other types of financial institutions, including savings and loans, credit unions, finance companies, brokerage firms, insurance companies, factoring companies and other financial intermediaries. The information under the heading “Competition” in Item 1, “Business,” provides more information regarding the competitive conditions in the Company’s markets. The Company’s industry could become even more competitive as a result of legislative, regulatory and technological changes and continued consolidation. Banks, securities firms and insurance companies can merge under the umbrella of a financial holding company, which can offer virtually any type of financial service, including banking, securities underwriting, insurance (both agency and underwriting) and merchant banking. Also, technology has lowered barriers to entry and made it possible for non-banks to offer products and services traditionally provided by banks, such as automatic transfer and automatic payment systems. Many of the Company’s competitors have fewer regulatory constraints and may have lower cost structures. Additionally, many of the Company’s competitors have substantially greater resources than the Company, including higher total assets and capitalization, greater access to capital markets and a broader offering of financial services. the ability to develop, maintain and build upon long-term customer relationships based on top quality service, high ethical standards and safe, sound assets. the ability to expand the Company’s market position. the scope, relevance and pricing of products and services offered to meet customer needs and demands. the rate at which the Company introduces new products and services relative to its competitors. customer satisfaction with the Company’s and the Bank’s level of service. Failure to perform in any of these areas could significantly weaken the Company’s competitive position, which could adversely affect its growth and profitability, which, in turn, could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. We are subject to a variety of operational risks, including the risk of fraud or theft by employees, which may adversely affect our business and results of operations. We are exposed to many types of operational risks, including liquidity risk, credit risk, market risk, interest rate risk, legal and compliance risk, strategic risk, information security risk, and reputational risk. We are also reliant upon our employees, and our operations are subject to the risk of fraud, theft or malfeasance by our employees. We have established processes and procedures intended to identify, measure, monitor, report and analyze these risks, however, there are inherent limitations to our risk management strategies as there may exist, or develop in the future, risks that we have not appropriately anticipated, monitored or identified. If our risk management framework proves ineffective, we could suffer unexpected losses, we may have to expend resources detecting and correcting the failure in our systems and we may be subject to potential claims from third parties and government agencies. We may also suffer severe reputational damage. Any of these consequences could adversely affect our business, financial condition or results of operations. In particular, the unauthorized disclosure, misappropriation, mishandling or misuse of personal, non-public, confidential or proprietary information of customers could result in significant regulatory consequences, reputational damage and financial loss. Our risk management policies and procedures may not be fully effective in identifying or mitigating risk exposure in all market environments or against all types of risk, including employee misconduct. We have devoted significant resources to develop our risk management policies and procedures and will continue to do so. Nonetheless, our policies and procedures to identify, monitor and manage risks may not be fully effective in mitigating our risk exposure in all market environments or against all types of risk. Many of our methods of managing risk and exposures are based upon our use of observed historical market behavior or statistics based on historical models. During periods of market volatility or due to unforeseen events, the historically derived correlations upon which these methods are based may not be valid. As a result, these methods may not predict future exposures accurately, which could be significantly greater than what our models indicate. This could cause us to incur investment losses or cause our hedging and other risk management strategies to be ineffective. Other risk management methods depend upon the evaluation of information regarding markets, clients, catastrophe occurrence or other matters that are publicly available or otherwise accessible to us, which may not always be accurate, complete, up-to-date or properly evaluated. of risk. Insurance and other traditional risk-shifting tools may be held by or available to us in order to manage certain exposures, but they are subject to terms such as deductibles, coinsurance, limits and policy exclusions, as well as risk of counterparty denial of coverage, default or insolvency. The Company may be subject to more stringent capital and liquidity requirements which would adversely affect its net income and future growth. The Dodd-Frank Act applies the same leverage and risk-based capital requirements that apply to insured depository institutions to most bank holding companies, which, among other things, will change the way in which hybrid securities, such as trust preferred securities, are treated for purposes of determining a bank holding company’s regulatory capital. In 2011, the federal banking agencies published a final rule regarding minimum leverage and risk-based capital requirements for banks and bank holding companies consistent with the requirements of Section 171 of the Dodd-Frank Act. For a more detailed description of the minimum capital requirements see “Supervision and Regulation – Capital Standards”. The Dodd-Frank Act also increased regulatory oversight, supervision and examination of banks, bank holding companies and their respective subsidiaries by the appropriate regulatory agency. These requirements, and any other new regulations, could adversely affect the Company’s ability to pay dividends, or could require the Company to reduce business levels or to raise capital, including in ways that may adversely affect the Company’s results of operations or financial condition. Tier 1 Common Equity. For all supervised financial institutions, including the Company and the Bank, the ratio of Tier 1 common equity to risk-weighted assets (“Tier 1 Common Equity Capital ratio”) must be at least 4.5%. To be “well capitalized” the Tier 1 Common Equity Capital ratio must be at least 6.5%. If a capital conservation buffer of an additional 2.5% above the minimum 4.5% (or 7% overall) is not maintained, special restrictions would apply to capital distributions, such as dividends and stock repurchases, and on certain compensatory bonuses. Tier 1 common equity capital consists of core components of Tier 1 capital: common stock plus retained earnings net of goodwill, other intangible assets, and certain other required deduction items. Tier 1 Capital Ratio. For all banking organizations, including the Bank, the ratio of Tier 1 capital to risk-weighted assets must be at least 6%. The threshold is raised from the prior 4%, and the risk-weighting method is changed as mentioned above. To be “well capitalized” the Tier 1 capital ratio must be at least 8%. Total Capital Ratio. For all supervised financial institutions, including the Company and the Bank, the ratio of total capital to risk-weighted assets must be at least 8%. Although this threshold is unchanged from prior requirements, as mentioned above the method for risk-weighting assets has been changed. As a result of that method change, many banks could have experienced a reduction in this ratio if the change had been effective immediately when the rules were adopted. Leverage Ratio – Base. For all banking organizations, including the Bank, the leverage ratio must be at least 4%. To be “well capitalized” the leverage ratio must be at least 5%. Leverage Ratio – Supplemental. For the largest internationally active banking organizations, not including the Bank, a minimum supplementary leverage ratio must be maintained that takes into account certain off-balance sheet exposures. The revised standards took effect on January 1, 2015 for the Company and the Bank. The capital conservation buffer requirement is subject to a phase-in period. Future increases in minimum capital requirements could adversely affect the Company’s net income. Furthermore, the Company’s failure to comply with the minimum capital requirements could result in regulators taking formal or informal actions against the Company which could restrict future growth or operations. Negative perceptions or publicity could damage our reputation among existing and potential customers, investors, employees and advisors. Our reputation is one of our most important assets. Our ability to attract and retain customers, investors, employees and advisors is highly dependent upon external perceptions of our company. Damage to our reputation could cause significant harm to our business and prospects and may arise from numerous sources, including litigation or regulatory actions, failing to deliver minimum standards of service and quality, compliance failures, any perceived or actual weakness in our financial strength or liquidity, technological, cybersecurity, or other security breaches resulting in improper disclosure of client or employee personal information, unethical behavior and the misconduct of our employees, advisors and counterparties. Negative perceptions or publicity regarding these matters could damage our reputation among existing and potential customers, investors, employees and advisors. Adverse developments with respect to our industry may also, by association, negatively impact our reputation or result in greater regulatory or legislative scrutiny or litigation against us. In addition, the SEC and other federal and state regulators have increased their scrutiny of potential conflicts of interest. It is possible that potential or perceived conflicts could give rise to litigation or enforcement actions. It is possible also that the regulatory scrutiny of, and litigation in connection with, conflicts of interest will make our clients less willing to enter into transactions in which such a conflict may occur and will adversely affect our businesses. The Company may be required to pay significantly higher FDIC premiums in the future. The FDIC insures deposits at FDIC insured financial institutions, including the Bank. The FDIC charges the insured financial institutions premiums to maintain the Deposit Insurance Fund at an adequate level. The FDIC may increase these rates and impose additional special assessments in the future, which could have a material adverse effect on future earnings. The Company’s controls and procedures may fail or be circumvented. Management regularly reviews and updates the Company’s internal control over financial reporting, disclosure controls and procedures and corporate governance policies and procedures. Any system of controls, however well designed and operated, has inherent limitations, including the possibility that a control can be circumvented or overridden, and misstatements due to error or fraud may occur and not be detected. Also, because of changes in conditions, internal control effectiveness may vary over time. Accordingly, even an effective system of internal control will provide only reasonable assurance with respect to the Company’s adherence to financial reporting, disclosure and corporate governance policies and procedures. The Company may be adversely affected by the soundness of other financial institutions. Financial institutions are interrelated as a result of trading, clearing, counterparty, or other relationships. The Company has exposure to many different industries and counterparties, and routinely executes transactions with counterparties in the financial services industry, including commercial banks, brokers and dealers, investment banks, and other institutional clients. Many of these transactions expose the Company to credit risk in the event of a default by a counterparty or client. In addition, the Company’s credit risk may be exacerbated when the collateral held by the Company cannot be realized or is liquidated at prices not sufficient to recover the full amount of the credit or derivative exposure due to the Company. Any such losses could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. The Company relies on third party vendors for a number of key components of its business. The Company contracts with a number of third party vendors to support its infrastructure. Many of these vendors are large national companies who are dominant in their area of expertise and would be difficult to quickly replace. Failures of certain vendors to provide services could adversely affect the Company’s ability to deliver products and services to its customers, disrupting its business and causing it to incur significant expense. External vendors also present information security risks. Slower than anticipated growth in new branches and new product and service offerings could result in reduced income. The Company has placed a strategic emphasis on expanding its branch network and product offerings. Executing this strategy carries risks of slower than anticipated growth both in new branches and new products. New branches and products require a significant investment of both financial and personnel resources. Lower than expected loan and deposit growth in new investments can decrease anticipated revenues and net income generated by those investments and opening new branches and introducing new products could result in more additional expenses than anticipated and divert resources from current core operations. The Company is substantially dependent on dividends from the Bank for its revenues. the Bank is unable to pay dividends to the Company, it may not be able to pay obligations or pay dividends on the Company’s common stock. The inability to receive dividends from the Bank could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s business, prospects, financial condition and results of operations. The information under the heading “Supervision and Regulation” in Item 1, “Business,” provides a discussion about the restrictions governing the Bank’s ability to transfer funds to the Company. Potential acquisitions may disrupt the Company’s business and dilute shareholder value. potential changes in banking or tax laws or regulations that may affect the target company. In addition, acquisitions typically involve the payment of a premium over book and market values, and, therefore, some dilution of the Company’s tangible book value and net income per common share may occur in connection with any future transaction. Furthermore, failure to realize the expected revenue increases, cost savings, increases in geographic or product presence, or other projected benefits from an acquisition could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s business, prospects, financial condition and results of operations. The Company’s success depends in part on its ability to retain key executives and to attract and retain additional qualified personnel who have experience both in sophisticated banking matters and in operating a bank of the Company’s size. Competition for such personnel is strong in the banking industry, and the Company may not be successful in attracting or retaining the personnel it requires. The unexpected loss of one or more of the Company’s key personnel could have a material adverse impact on its business because of their skills, knowledge of the Company’s markets, years of industry experience and the difficulty of promptly finding qualified replacements. The Company expects to effectively compete in this area by offering financial packages that are competitive within the industry. The Company’s information systems may experience an interruption or breach in security. Evolving technologies and the need to protect against and react to cybersecurity risks and electronic fraud requires significant resources. The Company relies heavily on communications and information systems to conduct its business. Furthermore, the Bank provides its customers the ability to bank online. The secure transmission of confidential information over the internet is a critical element of online banking. The Company needs to invest in information technology to keep pace with technology changes, and while the Company invests amounts it believes will be adequate, it may fail to invest adequate amounts such that the efficiency of information technology systems fails to meet operational needs. Any failure, interruption or breach in security of these systems could result in failures or disruptions in its customer relationship management, general ledger, deposit, loan and other systems. While the Company has policies and procedures designed to prevent or limit the effect of the failure, interruption or security breach of the Company’s information systems, there can be no assurance that any such failures, interruptions or security breaches will be prevented, and if they occur, that they will be adequately addressed. Additionally, to the extent the Company relies on third party vendors to perform or assist operational functions, the challenge of managing the associated risks becomes more difficult. The occurrence of any failures, interruptions or security breaches of the Company’s information systems could damage its reputation, result in a loss of customer business, subject the Company to additional regulatory scrutiny, or expose it to civil litigation and possible financial liability, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the financial condition and results of operations of the Company. The Company continually encounters technological change. The Company’s industry is continually undergoing rapid technological change with frequent introductions of new technology-driven products and services. The effective use of technology increases efficiency and enables financial institutions to better serve customers and reduce costs. The Company’s future success depends, in part, upon its ability to address the needs of its customers by using technology to provide products and services that will satisfy customer demands, as well as to create additional efficiencies in the Company’s operations. Many of the Company’s competitors have substantially greater resources to invest in technological improvements. The Company may not be able to effectively implement new technology-driven products and services or be successful in marketing these products and services to its customers. Failure to successfully keep pace with technological change affecting the Company’s industry could have a material adverse impact on its business and, in turn, the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. The operational functions of business counterparties may experience similar disruptions that could adversely impact us and over which the Company may have limited or no control. Over the course of the past few years, companies such as major retailers have experienced data systems incursions reportedly resulting in the thefts of credit and debit card information, online account information, and other financial data of tens of millions of the retailers’ customers. Retailer incursions affect cards issued and deposit accounts maintained by many banks, including the Bank. Although the Bank systems are not breached in retailer incursions, these events can cause the Bank to reissue a significant number of cards and take other costly steps to avoid significant theft loss to the Bank and its customers. Other possible points of incursion or disruption not within the Bank’s control include internet service providers, electronic mail portal providers, social media portals, distant-server (“cloud”) service providers, electronic data security providers, telecommunications companies, and smart phone manufacturers. While the Company continually attempts to use technology to offer new products and services, at the same time, technology and other changes are allowing parties to complete financial transactions that historically have involved banks through alternative methods. For example, consumers can now maintain funds in brokerage accounts, mutual funds or use electronic payment methods such as Apple Pay or PayPal, that would have historically been held as bank deposits. Consumers can also complete transactions such as paying bills or transferring funds directly without the assistance of banks. The process of eliminating banks as intermediaries, known as disintermediation, could result in the loss of fee income, as well as the loss of customer deposits and the related income generated from those deposits. The loss of these revenue streams and the lower cost deposits as a source of funds could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial condition and results of operations. Severe weather, natural disasters, acts of war or terrorism and other external events could significantly impact the Company’s business. The Bank has branches along the coast of Mississippi that are subject to risks from hurricanes from time to time. Severe weather, natural disasters, acts of war or terrorism, and other adverse external events could have a significant impact on the ability of the Company to conduct business. Such events could affect the stability of the Company’s deposit base, impair the ability of borrowers to repay outstanding loans, impair the value of collateral securing loans, cause significant property damage, result in loss of revenue or cause the Company to incur additional expenses. The occurrence of any such event could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s business, prospects, financial condition and results of operations. The Company is subject to Accounting Estimate Risks. The preparation of the Company’s consolidated financial statements in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles requires management to make significant estimates that affect the financial statements. The Company’s most critical estimate is the level of the allowance for credit losses. However, other estimates occasionally become highly significant, especially in volatile situations such as litigation and other loss contingency matters. Estimates are made at specific points in time; as actual events unfold, estimates are adjusted accordingly. Due to the inherent nature of these estimates, it is possible that, at some time in the future, the Company may significantly increase the allowance for credit losses or sustain credit losses that are significantly higher than the provided allowance, or the Company may make some other adjustment that will differ materially from the estimates that the Company makes today. Expense Control could have an effect on the Company’s earnings. Expenses and other costs directly affect the Company’s earnings. The Company’s ability to successfully manage expenses is important to its long-term profitability. Many factors can influence the amount of the Company’s expenses, as well as how quickly they grow. As the Company’s businesses change or expand, additional expenses can arise from asset purchases, structural reorganization, evolving business strategies, and changing regulations, among other things. The Company manages expense growth and risk through a variety of means, including actual versus budget management, imposition of expense authorization, and procurement coordination and processes. The Company’s stock price can be volatile. Additionally, general market fluctuations, industry factors and general economic and political conditions and events, such as economic slowdowns or recessions, interest rate changes or credit loss trends, could also cause the Company’s stock price to decrease regardless of operating results. The trading volume in the Company’s common stock is less than that of other larger bank holding companies. The Company’s common stock is listed for trading on NASDAQ Global Market. The average daily trading volume in the Company’s common stock is low, generally less than that of many of its competitors and other larger bank holding companies. A public trading market having the desired characteristics of depth, liquidity and orderliness depends on the presence in the marketplace of willing buyers and sellers of the Company’s common stock at any given time. This presence depends on the individual decisions of investors and general economic and market conditions over which the Company has no control. Given the lower trading volume of the Company’s common stock, significant sales of the Company’s common stock, or the expectation of these sales, could cause volatility in the price of the Company’s common stock. An investment in the Company’s common stock is not an insured deposit. The Company’s common stock is not a bank deposit and, therefore, is not insured against loss by the FDIC, any deposit insurance fund or by any other public or private entity. Investment in the Company’s common stock is inherently risky for the reasons described in this “Risk Factors” section and elsewhere in this report and is subject to the same market forces that affect the price of common stock in any company. As a result, if you acquire the Company’s common stock, you may lose some or all of your investment. Issuing additional shares of our common stock to acquire other banks, bank holding companies, financial holding companies and/or insurance agencies may result in dilution for existing shareholders and may adversely affect the market price of our stock. We may issue, in the future, shares of our common stock to acquire additional banks, bank holding companies, and other businesses related to the financial services industry that may complement our organizational structure. Resales of substantial amounts of common stock in the public market and the potential of such sales could adversely affect the prevailing market price of our common stock and impair our ability to raise additional capital through the sale of equity securities. We may be required to pay an acquisition premium above the fair market value of acquired assets for acquisitions. Paying this acquisition premium, in addition to the dilutive effect of issuing additional shares, may also adversely affect the prevailing market price of our common stock. We may issue debt or equity securities or securities convertible into equity securities, any of which may be senior to our common stock as to distributions and in liquidation, which could negatively affect the value of our common stock. In the future, we may attempt to increase our capital resources by entering into debt or debt-like financing that is unsecured or secured by all or up to all of our assets, or by issuing additional debt or equity securities, which could include issuances of secured or unsecured commercial paper, medium-term notes, senior notes, subordinated notes, preferred stock or securities convertible into or exchangeable for equity securities. In the event of our liquidation, our lenders and holders of our debt and preferred securities would receive a distribution of our available assets before distributions to the holders of our common stock. Because any decision to incur debt or issue securities in future offerings will depend on market conditions and other factors beyond our control, we cannot predict or estimate the amount, timing or nature of any such future offerings and debt financings. Further, market conditions could require us to accept less favorable terms for the issuance of our securities in the future. The Company’s Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws, as well as certain banking laws, may have an anti-takeover effect. Provisions of the Company’s Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws, which are exhibits to this Annual Report on Form 10-K, and the federal banking laws, including regulatory approval requirements, could make it more difficult for a third party to acquire the Company, even if doing so would be perceived to be beneficial to the Company’s shareholders. The combination of these provisions impedes a non-negotiated merger or other business combination, which, in turn, could adversely affect the market price of the Company’s common stock. The Bank owns its offices, except for the Flowood Branch and the Oxford LPO, each of which is leased. The main office facility, originally occupied in 1966, is used solely by the Company and the Bank. This facility contains approximately 20,000 square feet and houses the executive offices and all operations-related departments of the Company. The other branches range in size from nearly 1,000 square feet to 12,000 square feet. There are no material pending legal proceedings, other than routine litigation incidental to their business, to which either the Company or the Bank is a party or to which any of their property is subject. Information required in partial response to this Item 5 can be found under the heading “Market Price and Dividend Information” in the 2018 Annual Report to Shareholders, a copy of which is filed as an Exhibit to this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Such information in incorporated herein by reference. The information appearing under the caption “Equity Compensation Plan Information” in Item 12 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K is incorporated herein by reference. There were no unregistered sales of equity securities not covered by the filing of a Form 10-Q or Form 8-K during the period covered by this filing. On July 26, 2017, the Company’s Board of Directors authorized the repurchase of up to 200,000 shares of the Company’s outstanding shares of common stock over the next thirty-six months. There were no repurchases of equity securities not covered by the filing of a Form 10-Q or Form 8-K during the period covered by this filing. Information required in response to this Item 6 can be found under the heading “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations as of December 31, 2018, 2017 and 2016—Selected Financial Data” in the 2018 Annual Report to Shareholders, a copy of which is filed as an Exhibit to this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. Information required in response to this Item 7 can be found under the heading “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations as of December 31, 2018, 2017 and 2016” in the 2018 Annual Report to Shareholders, a copy of which is filed as an Exhibit to this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. Information required in response to this Item 7A can be found under the headings “Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures about Market Risk” in the 2018 Annual Report to Shareholders, a copy of which is filed as an Exhibit to this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. Information required in response to this Item 8 can be found under the heading “Consolidated Financial Statements” and “Quarterly Financial Trends” in the 2018 Annual Report to Shareholders, a copy of which is filed as an Exhibit to this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. The management of this Company, with the participation of its principal executive and financial officers, has evaluated the effectiveness of the Company’s disclosure controls and procedures in ensuring that the information required to be disclosed in our filings under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, is recorded, processed, summarized and reported within the time periods specified in the Securities and Exchange Commission’s rules and forms, including ensuring that such information is accumulated and communicated to the Company’s management as appropriate to allow timely decisions regarding required disclosure. Based on such evaluation, the Company’s principal executive and financial officers have concluded that such disclosure controls and procedures were effective as of December 31, 2018 (the end of the period covered by this Annual Report on Form 10-K). Information required in response to this item can be found under the headings “Management’s Assessment of Internal Control over Financial Reporting” and “Report of Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm” in the Company’s Consolidated Financial Statements contained in its 2018 Annual Report to Shareholders, a copy of which is filed as an Exhibit to this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. There were no changes to the internal control over financial reporting in the fourth quarter of 2018 that materially affected, or are reasonably likely to materially affect, internal control over financial reporting. Information required in partial response to this Item 10 can be found under the heading “Executive Officers of the Registrant” in Item 1, “Business,” and under the headings “Stock Ownership” and “Board of Directors” in the Company’s Definitive Proxy Statement to be filed with the SEC on or about March 18, 2019, relating to its 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. The Company has adopted a Code of Ethics and Code of Conduct in compliance with Item 406 of Regulation S-K for the Company’s principal executive officer, principal financial officer, principal accounting officer and controller. Copies of both the Code of Ethics and the Code of Conduct can be found on the Company’s website: http://www.citizensholdingcompany.com. The Company intends to satisfy the disclosure requirement under Item 5.05 of Form 8-K regarding an amendment to, or waiver from, a provision of the Code of Ethics and the Code of Conduct by posting information on the Company’s website at the address specified above. Information required in response to this Item 11 can be found under the headings “Board of Directors,” “Executive Officers and Executive Compensation,” “Report of the Compensation Committee,” and “Compensation Committee Interlocks and Insider Participation” in the Company’s Definitive Proxy Statement to be filed with the SEC on or about March 18, 2019, relating to its 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. Information required in partial response to this Item 12 can be found under the heading “Stock Ownership” in the Company’s Definitive Proxy Statement to be filed with the SEC on or about March 18, 2019, relating to its 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. The following table provides information about the Company’s equity compensation plans as of December 31, 2018. Consists of the 1999 Directors’ Stock Compensation Plan and the 2013 Incentive Compensation Plan. Information required in response to this Item 13 can be found under the heading “Board of Directors” in the Company’s Definitive Proxy Statement to be filed with the SEC on or about March 18, 2019, relating to its 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. Information required in response to this Item 14 can be found under the heading “Proposal No. 3, Appointment of HORNE LLP as the Company’s Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm” in the Company’s Definitive Proxy Statement to be filed with the SEC on or about March 18, 2019, relating to its 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. Such information is incorporated herein by reference. Filed as Exhibit 3(A) to the Company’s Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q (File No. 000-25221) filed on May 10, 2017 and incorporated herein by reference. Filed as Exhibit 3(B) to the Company’s Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q (File No. 000-25221) filed on May 10, 2017 and incorporated herein by reference. Filed as an exhibit to the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2002 (File No. 000-25221) filed on March 31, 2003 and incorporated herein by reference. Filed as an exhibit to the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2004 (File No. 000-25221) filed on March 16, 2005 and incorporated herein by reference. Filed as an exhibit to the Company’s Definitive Proxy Statement relating to its 2013 Annual Meeting of Shareholders (File No. 000-15375) filed on March 21, 2013 and incorporated herein by reference. Filed as an exhibit to the Company’s Current Report on Form 8-K (File No. 000-15375) filed on April 25, 2013 and incorporated herein by reference. Filed as an exhibit to the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2003 (File No. 000-25221) filed on March 26, 2004, as updated on the Company’s website, http://www.citizensholdingcompany.com and incorporated herein by reference. The Company has elected not to include summary information.
2019-04-21T18:57:20Z
https://q10k.com/CIZN
Hi Schweiss, I have come across your doors, specifically the "funky storefront doors" you did for an architect in Brooklyn. We are working on a project that could use a similar system: steel perforated panels covering your door assembly. I have filled in your opening size for the door in question, we are already manufacturing the perforated panels for another aspect of the building and want to do likewise with decorative perforated panel bifold strap doors. Please send me a quote ASAP, and feel free to contact me with any questions you may have about this. I am an architect with a commercial door building project that would benefit from two large 34' x 28' bifold doors. Please let me know if you have some Schweiss detailed CAD or BIM drawings that we can use in our documents. This is a renovation that has very limited height inside the perimeter steel of the floor above and little opportunity to reframe for a conventional roll-up door inside the building. There is some flexibility outside the building and it appears that the Schweiss liftstrap belt lift bi-fold door should work well in this application. It appears that there are several door skin options for these doors. Please indicate if custom metal panel could be used to match the finish of the metal panels on the rest of the building. Lastly if you have thermal data for insulated panels, I would very much like to see it. I am in search of a (2) 12 meter by 12 meter Schweiss bifolding overhead doors for commercial use in a vehicle airlock. They must be suitable to handle local wind loads in Australia. The doors will be pressurized from the the inner side of the outer door (the one subject to wind load design) and the outer side of the inner door. Internal building pressure maximum design loads are 2.5 w.c., or 13 pounds per square foot (63.4716 kilogram/square meter). Please provide a quote for the doors and installation, if applicable. Hello, I am an architect in Baltimore, MD working on a project for Johns Hopkins Hospital. We are in the process of designing a loading dock. Given the site conditions, the loading dock must be adjacent to the main entrance of the building, on a busy street. We are looking to conceal the dock behind a bi-fold door. I would like a representative to come to the office to discuss the project and provide more information. Hello, working on a project where we would like to use your bi-fold or hydraulic door system. however, we only have 15'-1" clear. we would like to maintain a 14'-0" clear since it would serve a loading dock. can you please confirm whether a bi-fold or hydraulic door would work under this condition. a prompt response would be greatly appreciated. thanks, Martha. Pricing. Great product curious to see if this in our project's budget. We are looking at something similar to your product at Sam Tavern in Seattle. Good day. We are looking at bi-fold hangar style architectural doors for a project in Miami connecting a 3,600 SF air-conditioned space with a courtyard, with a similar aesthetic to the one that your company did for the Fermilab in Illinois. Does your company have experience in projects requiring Miami-Dade county NOAs? is there a minimum height? I'm working on specifying an operable bifold door/window for a restaurant patio area. The opening is 7' wide by 4'-6" tall. thanks! I am working on a small commercial project. The owners want a glass bifold garage door. The opening will be 8' wide x 9' tall. It will open to a deck, I think the door opening and acting as a cover, may be an added feature a garage door can't provide. Can this type of door be a cost competitive option? Thank you for your help. I have a commercial indoor installation in which I need an bifold style lift door system in glass & wood or glass and metal. I can send you more details by email with layouts. Hello, We would like to have a Schweiss lift-strap Bi-fold door for a commercial project in Miami, FL. I see that most of your literature shows an 18' clear height. Is this a maximum or does it have to be 18'? Also, does your product have an NOA for Miami-Dade? We are trying to do (5) separate bifold garage doors within an 11'-11"W x 11'-4"H Opening. This will be to create an indoor/ outdoor bar for a hotel in San Antonio TX. Some of the doors will be the full height of the rough opening, and some will only be to the top of the counter. We have an existing storefront that we are redesigning in Baltimore. It currently has a roll up security door. we are looking for something more aesthetically pleasing. Could you please give me a quick budget number if I wanted to use a bifold metal door. the opening is 24' wide by 10' high please email or call me at your earliest convenience. I'm quoting a restaurant in Bright, IN. Owner wants tow upward bifold doors at his bar area. I have drawings available. I'm in need of quick pricing. He wants a price from me by the end of the day tomorrow. Please call and I can e-mail the drawings to you. Dear Sir, Good Day We have Bi Fold Commercial Warehouse Doors Installed in one of our Warehouses and now want an additional six bifold warehouse doors of the same size for our steel building. We would like these steel doors to have four windows and walk doors. My building will be a concrete tilt wall construction with a retail storefront windows and entry way. I am looking for protection (hurricanes), security, and sun/awning relief for my retail windows. The strap lift bifold system may be helpful for my new building. Hi, I will like to get a quote for 12' tall openings 17'-4" and 22'-0" wide. I am preparing budget pricing for a new three store restaurant in the Bahamas. Once we make contact I can send plans and images of the shutter similar to what appear on your website. Can the doors be used as primary barrier for hurricane? are your door rated? I look forward to hearing from you. I would like to get a quote for a 40x18 glass bifold door. This is early in the design process, so I'm not sure of all my answers. We are looking for the most affordable option, but it will be in a restaurant, so we will be balancing budget and aesthetics. We want glass. I'm looking for a aluminum glass bifold door for a storefront. The aluminum I would like powder coated to a dark bronze and fitted for half inch insulated glass. I do not want the door shipped with glass because the contractor is going to install matching glass with the rest of the storefront. My opening dimensions is 9 foot 11 and 3/4 by 8 ft 8 in. The header is a 5 inch steel tube. The jam Dimension is in between jam and the jams are poured concrete. I am looking for a door option that would fit this opening. Hello, We are interested in spec'ing one of your bifold doors for an interior conference room of a commercial project in North Carolina. We're looking for details for the head and jambs, in particular. Thank you for your help, Johnathan. Starting to plan a commercial building, curious about a designer bifold door, tentatively 16x30. I want to compare pricing to standard doors. I'm an architect working on a project for a school client in western Massachusetts. I'd like to see if your strap-lift bifold doors may be appropriate for this large commercial job. The project is a new 4-season enclosure over existing tennis courts. The tennis pavilion is 336'x130' and needs an enclosure system about 14' high around all sides (roughly 13,000 sf). The bifold school doors must be lifted up during summer weather and closed during rainstorms and colder days. Here are a few questions you may be able to help me out with: 1. What size panels would your enclosure system work with? Our largest bay sizes are 27'-6" x 14'h, but can be divided into smaller openings or grouped into larger openings as necessary. I'm interested in keeping the quantity of openings cost efficient, so if fewer and larger openings are more cost effective, I can make modifications to the bay sizes. 2. The building is in a flood zone. The doors should be open during a flood event to allow water (up to a few feet) to pass through the building. In order to keep the doors from a "fail closed" situation we would require a Schweiss door battery backup system to lower during a power failure. Are there options with the system to enable the doors to operate during a power failure and ensure they stay open during a storm? 3. I understand that Schweiss provides either a steel frame to be clad by others, or a glazed aluminum frame. Have you had any experience with using fabric or clear vinyl to clad these doors? We're looking for a transparent door material to daylight the space, but does not need to be insulated. 4. Is it possible to integrate swing doors into the bifold door panel for egress? I'm a builder and have customers that want commercial doors in their new shops that we are bidding on. I'm shopping and lookin for number to add to my bid. They will both be 16 ft tall not sure on widths one maybe 26 on a gable and 20 on a eve side. Include price for delivery, install and repair service. Good afternoon. We would like commercial door services for a parking garage on a 40 unit apartment building that is under construction in Boston. I would like some assistance in making sure we select the correct door for this situation, and that it will work in the space we have. Please contact me via email and i will send drawings showing where the door will be located. Thanks! We are building a patio for an ice cream store. Seems like commercial glass doors would be a great way to open up the patio for a wide open feel during nice days. Saw pix of a bar in Clear Lake Iowa that did this sort of thing. Any price advantage in ordering 3 doors? THANKS. Could you please quote me on commercial door installation for 2 -16 ft x 14 ft bifold doors. with lift straps and auto latches for a building I am bidding in Durand Wisconsin. The owner has two of your doors on another building now so if need be I can try to get some additional info off the doors if that would be required to price. The building would be wood frame construction. The outside skin would be a poly carbonate panel to let in light. There are large cam latches on the sides. I can send pictures also if needed. They are for a fertilizer mixing room if that influences the type of operator motor or a protective paint applied to doors. I am interested in commercial door service for our 24x30 restaurant. We will be selling food out of the door so the outside overhang and free overhead interior space sounds very appealing. The finished opening is approx 10' wide and 15' tall, roof pitch is 3-12, and approx 9' to the first roof truss.The shed has been framed in with 2x6 studs. Also, was wondering if this can be done with a traditional outside raised panel look. Please contact me and let me know if this is possible. We are located in Chicago. I would be able to install myself if we are too far away. LOOKING FOR COMMERCIAL DOOR REPAIR IN HOUSTON, TX. REPLACE A STEEL CABLE DOOR WITH STRAPS. PRICE WITH AUTOMATIC DOOR LATCHING FEATURE. Looking for commercial door services in Hollywood specifies (2) Schweiss O/H bi-fold doors. Door frame is metal with infill of tempered door glass on both the top and bottom panels. They are 6'-0" wide and 8'-0" tall. Do you provide an absolute complete bifold door system? In that you provide the motor, the frame (panted/powder coated) and the glass infill? Or do you just provide a door frame with motor? Good afternoon. We would like commercial door services for a parking garage on a 40 unit residential building that is under construction in Boston. I would like some assistance in making sure we select the correct door for this situation, and that it will work in the space we have. Please contact me via email and i will send drawings showing where the door will be located. Thanks! I have a 100' x 100' x 25' tall building that is currently open on 2 sides. We are considering Schweiss commercial door services for a rock climbing gym in this building. We want to keep the open design to take advantage of the good weather, however, for the cold months we need to be enclosed. do you have doors (or a series of doors) to cover that kind of footage? if so, what would a ball park price point be? Thanks. Could you please quote the following: 35' wide, 20' High hydraulic door - used for commercial building Door to be installed in the endwall of a wood frame building. I am looking for 2 Schweiss doors for a commercial door service. I prefer insulated doors and am interested in the hydraulic one piece doors. I would need a quote on a 16ft Wide x 14ft High and also on an 8ft x 14ft. I'm not sure what you would call this building per se, but its an indoor/outdoor driving range to let golfers stand protected inside while golfing out onto the driving range. If you have any questions, please call me. Thanks. Hello, I would like to request quote for commercial project located in New York, NY. We are looking for similar door type as SST-II Hydraulic Bi-Folding System with the following parameters: Schweiss Bifold door options we are considering: -Metal frame construction -Commercial grade -Job Site Location: Brooklyn, New York (Brooklyn Navy Yard) -Building type: Steel, Existing Structure with existing rough opening for the doors -Load Wind Requirements: None for interior bifold doors installation. One is exterior bifold door installation. -Door Quantity: Manufacturing facility grade -Header Material: Steel -Jamb Material: Steel -Door Opening Sizes: Interior (6 ea) 14'-0" x 10'-0" x 0'-4" %u2026and.. exterior (1 ea) 19'-11" 1/2 x 17'-0" x 0'-4" -Type of Door Covering/Skin: Glass -Options to Include in Bifold Door: The (1) big exterior bifold door to have integrated single swing door in the middle. Door schedule is available per request with door elevation and sizes. Quote should include: Shop Drawings, Field Measurements, Installation of the doors, or authorized company supervisor for installation by others (if installed by local crew hired independently). Please contact me and let me know if you need any further information, and if you have any comments. Hello, I would like to install a bifold door in a conference room in San Francisco. I have a photo of the glass clad type of Schweiss commercial door I'm trying to achieve so if you email me back I can attach a photo of what I want. I would like the door to be manually operated and I would like to know my size options and limitations. Thanks! I have two of your economical Schweiss commercial grade bifold doors. The one installed in 1999 was insulated and weather stripped. I would like you to ship me some replacement weatherstripping. The original installation contractor as well as overhead door and insulation dealers are unable to help me locate materials to seal the gaps at the bifold door hinge and at the top of the door. Can you help me? Need quote for (1) 60' x 14'6" bifold liftstrap commercial door with remote operator and photo eye sensors. The building is there, we need specs on the requirements for reinforcing the building for this door. Hello, We are looking for an inward opening door system for 4.75M high minimum clearance loading doors on a new commercial building in London. Can you provide more information on an inward opening bi-fold door system and an inward opening one-panel hydraulic door system (similar to the up and over style but inward opening). The design consists of two loading doors each at 6.1 meters wide. This is a high end building so we would not like to have any exposed operators or motors on the exterior. Please let me know if you require any additional information. New construction bifold multi-use door. Reinforced steal beam and footers. Bifold liftstraps and autolatches, Commercial concrete building door containing windows and key lockset separate entry door. Price two extra handheld remotes for this 32 ft. x 16 ft. door. Bifold designer door information for 35 x 16 ft. commercial business door on concrete and metal building. Glass bifold door to have liftstraps, autolatches, aluminum frame, pedestrian door and remote door opener. Our hotel door project here in Hollywood specifies (2) Schweiss O/H bi-fold doors. Door frame is metal with infill of tempered door glass on both the top and bottom panels. They are 6'-0" wide and 8'-0" tall. Do you provide an absolute complete bifold door system? In that you provide the motor, the frame (panted/powder coated) and the glass infill? Or do you just provide a door frame with motor? I would like to price both the bifold liftstrap and hydraulic doors for commercial door use. Sizes on two seperate steel doors : 40' wide x 18' clearance height, and 30' wide x 18' clearance height. I will need the costs of these Schweiss commercial doors shipped directly to location near Lubbock, TX. I have a client requesting six (6) 20' - 22' wide x 16' tall bifold liftstrap autolatch mini-mall doors with photo eye sensors to be installed on a new pre-engineered building. Concrete block building doors 160' x 125' x 28' with a 4:12 pitch. We're looking to install a 5-7m tall store front door. We would require 2-3 bifold liftstrap doors with windows. Photo eye sensors, door base safety edge and remote openers. We are looking to get a price on a bifold greenhouse glass door with straps (no door cables) at 40' wide x 14' open height. Also price your auto latch and a glass walk-in door. I would like an estimate for an insulated wall door for a commercial business building. The size is about 20 feet wide by 12 feet height. We have side rolling doors now and want to retrofit with Schweiss bifold liftstrap door and locking combination walk door. Windows will be useful. Looking for a store front entrance door for a business. All glass look with aluminum door frame. Bifold door that turns into an awning. I need two options: 1) 9'10" x 10'. 2) 6' x 10'. Not looking for cables, only liftstraps. Include photo eye sensors. We require information for a radiation shield doors listed below, a lead lined door, as well as heftier door installation details. I want a 20' section by 14' high bi-fold glass commercial grade door. Aluminum frame storefront door with automatic electric opening door with door latching feature and lift straps. I need some Bifold Strap Doors for a strip mall project. Require 1 ea 77 x clear height 28' 2 ea 57 x Clear hieght 20' 1 ea 47 x Clear Height 16' 2 ea 42 x Clear height 16' Please provide necessary Rough Opening Size. Could you also price these as aluminum frame doors? Looking for Schweiss glass garage doors for a restaurant space. Probably 4 of them 8' wide and 7' high. Looking for a guesstamate. But really need to know if they are hurricane rated and which door, bifold or hydraulic seals up best. The restaurant is on the boardwalk at the Jersey shore. Thanks, Vito. I'm looking for a quote for renovating my restaurant. I have a plan to change my front window to a straplift bi-fold door. Can you quote me how much to replace a bi-fold door, including the installation and excluding the installation cost? I'm looking at an aluminum frame, glass door. Interested in budget pricing for a bi-fold liftstrap commerical door to replace a rolling dock door on a commerical building. Rough dimensions of opening are: 24' wide x 15'6" tall. Photo of existing door available for review. How soon can you deliver, and can you install on a weekend vs. weekday? We are Detailing a Bus Maintenance Garage in Toronto, Canada with Bi-Folding curtain wall window sections. Our specification calls up your Schweiss liftstrap bi-fold door so I have some details worked up that I would like to send you to see if they would work. Anything specific that you will need at this point. I am interested in an insulated overhead bifold liftstrap [manual] that we can use in our 24x30 metal shed. We will be selling food out of the door so the outside overhang and free overhead interior space sounds very appealing. The finished opening is approx 7'10" wide and 7'6" tall, roof pitch is 3-12, and approx 9' to the first roof truss.The shed has been framed in with 2x6 studs. Also, was wondering if this can be done with a traditional outside raised panel look. Please contact me and let me know if this is possible. We are located in Illinois. I would be able to install myself if we are too far away. I would like to speak with a representative regarding a bifold designer Schweiss door for a small storefront in NYC. We would like the door to serve as an awning when in an open position, and it should be able to close down and lock (from the street, rather than from inside as is typical in most of the scenarios I see on your website. The total storefront is rather small, measuring approximately 8'8" wide by 10'2" tall. These are the dimensions which would include the frame/track. Please give me a call to discuss at some point today. Thanks! We have been asked by the City of Redwood Falls to submit a bid to add a bifold door to the existing arrival and departure building we constructed for them in 2002. The building was constructed to add a future door where there presently are three overhead doors. The building drawings showing the framing and connection points are attached. The liftstrap door would be 50' x 17' clear opening. They are also interested in an alternate price for a hydraulic door, if it would work with the existing structure. Could you please quote me on providing and installing 2 -16 ft x 14 ft bifold doors with lift straps and auto latches for a building I am bidding in Durand Wisconsin. The owner has two of your doors on another building now so if need be I can try to get some additional info off the doors if that would be required to price. The building would be wood frame construction. The outside skin would be a poly carbonate panel to let in light. There are large cam latches on the sides. I can send pictures also if needed. They are for a fertilizer mixing room if that influences the type of operator motor or a protective paint applied to doors. We are interested in your premier bi-fold liftstrap door products. We are looking for immediate action and development. This will be a commercial retail storefront application along a blvd in Westwood CA. 1. The building type is combination of existing timber with new steel seismic reinforced framing. These will create possible conflicts for interior swing allotment. 2. We are currently working on the wind load requirements at this time. The exterior part of the doors cannot overhang more than 4\' from lease line. 3. Header and jambs will be steel. Intermediate supports between doors will be 4x4\" steel beams. 4. Each door opening would be approximately 16\' width x 14\' height. Motorized is required. 5. We prefer clear powder coated 2x4\" hot rolled tube steel w/ 1\"glazing stops w/ (2) layers of 1/4\" laminated and tempered glazing. If you do not offer steel, we would consider using an aluminum product and powder coating. 6. No pass thru doors will be necessary. 7. Installation may be contracted by GC, supervised may be preferred. 8. Please see the attached schematic package for your reference. Please feel free to contact me at your earliest convenience to discuss the details of this opportunity. We are about to open up a bar in Houston, Texas. I saw the custom bi-fold door made for TGIF that is posted on your website. I was hoping to get an idea about pricing for a door like that one, 18\' wide and 12\' high. I want the quieter opening lift straps on it. Hi, We have a problem and wondered if you could help us solve. We are looking to add two doors at the ends of a wash bay to provide protection from the elements (rain, wind, not thermal, since it is an unheated space). Opening are 12 wide x 27 high. Desire is for quick opening/closing (5 -20 seconds). We are looking at bi-folding lift strap, swinging, and overhead coiling (with a wire bridge) doors, and could use your expert recommendation. There is no side room for sliding doors. Rail/train cars will enter/exit the space. There is an overhead catenary (high-voltage) wire that is suspended a couple of feet down and offset from center. We could conceivably hang weatherstripping (from the opening header down to the wire) and mount the doors below that. Mounting location not finalized (utilities/equipment would have to be relocated for mount to interior vs. exterior). See attached drawings. Can you help? We need a concept and a budget. We are interested in the Red Power hydraulic doors for our motorcycle shop! We would like it to have a designer look like you did for Cycle City in Hawaii. Do you have any info you could mail or fax to use? I am interested in speaking with someone about a specific bifold designer door for my sales room for some pricing and additional info. You show some great looking doors on your Schweiss Web site. I'm excited about getting one soon. 2 openings in existing storefront to be replaced with a bi-fold or hydraulic pivot project near Crater Lake. 10'4" H x 15'4" W and 10'4" H x 12'10" W. Doors should be wind loaded and have back up systems. Dear sirs, We are pricing these doors for a new retail shop that we are thinking of building this fall and I would like to have the specs for these doors. The new building is being added to a building that is already there and the overall hight is a deciding factor of which door, bifold or hydraulic, that we will be using. We have a 30 foot Schweiss bi-fold in another building and it works great. thanks. Would like to use Schweiss bifolding doors to place at the front of a restaurant. one rough opening would be 12' wide 14' height and one opening at 6' wide by 14' high. I didnt know if you could make doors this small. If so please price for budget estimate. I am considering building a 10,000 sq ft. building for auctions. Your hangar door looks like it may fit well into my plans. I am interested in getting a pricing idea on your bifold doors as well as your one piece hydraulic Schweiss doors. Can your doors be insulated and fitted with walk through doors. Need pricing for a 50'x18 clear opening bifold door for a cold storage building in S.D. Could I also get a price for two 30'x19' clear opening hydraulic doors for a cold storage building in N.D. Bot jobs are on pre-engineered structures. I will need clearance dimensions for installation of each door. I am doing a capital needs "wish list" for the fertilizer plant I manage and I would like a quote for 4 strap bi-fold doors that are 16'x16' on a steel built building in Wolf Point, MT. I am only looking for a quote at this time, thank you. This door, Schweiss Bifold w/straps, would go into a factory for future access to deliver large equipment. We are looking at using your door in what the owner calls a temporary opening. They want something that will match the wall thickness which is 8" thick and not look like a door when not in use, both interior and exterior. They want it to be a good sealed door not to allow for dirt, rodents and anything else to get in. Please send us any head, jamb and sill detail for our use in detailing your door for possible consideration. I would like to speak to a sales rep about a project that I am bidding, the conversion of a 20' shipping container into a pop up store. One idea my client has is to convert the approx. 20'X8' side into a drop down platform, I've seen this done and would like to discuss the Schweiss hydraulic one piece door & parts needed. Thanks, Riley., Brooklyn, N.Y. I have received your Schweiss Doors commerical building quote. It reflects designing the building to accomodate a 35' x 18' Hydraulic door centered in each end wall in a 60' x 110' x 20' building just as we asked. Thank you for your quick reply. We'll contact you soon for installation of the hydraulic doors. I just need ball park pricing, we are in the design process for a shopping mall. Please quote 40 ft and 32 ft. wide with 14 ft. clear opening for a Schweiss bifold door with lift straps and 2-button constant hold control to be installed in Xenia, OH. we require few doors for our new ware house and we are very much interested in your Schweiss Bifold and Hydraulic door products, we are out of state. I know you do a lot of out-of state biz, how soon could you get to us once we place an order? I would like a quote for a 40'wide x 18' Schweiss bifold or hydraulic door. The building is 60x100x18' what do i need for extra material for the header? This door will be installed on the end wall. Looking for two insulated Schweiss comertial bifold doors. 32 feet wide with a 23 foot high clearance. Can this be done on a 26 foot under eave height? Do you have installation crews? Hello, I'm working on a large commercial renovation project in New York city and we are looking at putting a system of architectural bifold doors around the perimeter of a space. The doors would be sized to accommodate an existing structural grid that's 20' on center and the doors would be 32' high. There would be a total of 700 linear feet; 34 20' bays. We're looking at options of both 20' wide doors and 40' wide doors along the system. The finish material would all be glazing. Does this seem like something your Schweiss Door product could accommodate? Also, could you provide a rough estimate of the price range per square foot of a system of this sort? Any feedback and product recommendations are welcome Thanks. Hello, I work for a Tent Manufactor and we are getting ready to launch a Aviation Product Line and have come accross your product. We have units from 30' wide up to 160' wide and have an unlimited length. We have a system that already opens and closes the entire end of the structure but we are also looking at flat end strutures with Bi-Fold Doors. We think your doors will be best. I need a quote for a vertical folding door with a 120mph wind load. Add to the quote for auto-latches, I live in FL. I also need it to include delivery and installation. THANKS! We are looking for something like your "Glass Paneled Bifold Designer Doors", but with semi-opaque glass. My team has the perfect use of the door. A store owner wants his coffee shop to be more accessible. Thanks. Just checking pricing for an upcoming project on a steel warehouse... 44 x 12 Hangar door. Bi-fold type. Key word is cheap. Delivered to Oregon. What are we looking at for pricing vs. using the company from Oregon to get it. I hope to specify 3 glass bifold doors for a restaurant in Colorado. Please call so we can coordinate. Thanks! We have an application for 2 doors on a restaurant to separate the bar from the patio dining. Need a glass bi-fold or single door from the bar top up. I would also like to investigate a new door on my hanger at FCM. The bi-fold door and hydraulic door are exactly what I have been looking for. Our church just purchased a building in our village that we will use for outreach events. We want to turn an existing garage door opening into a door opening that opens out like your doors do so we can open the building up when we are playing live music and such. I'm looking forward to hearing from you. Please mail a complete product information. We are designing a tropical restaurant place in Colombia (S.A.)It is a 3 facadas cornner lot with multiple window openings (7'8"w.x9'h.) We think your bifold designer Schweiss product may match our ideas. We have a need for 28 doors to replace existing for street car repair/maintenance facilities. We have a budget to work to and would like to explore bi-fold doors as an option. The door openings are approximately 12 feet wide by 16 feet high. Location is Toronto Ontario. Recently, I received a response from one of your sales reps. However, it was sent to my spam email and inadvertently deleted. We are working on a new hotel project in Jamaica, NY where there will be an entry to an underground parking garage. We were in the process of specifying a door that was attractive (I believe it was a designer hydraulic door) that had the ability to automatically open quickly by a remote sensor. We are not sure which door you could recommend, but I have filled out the size we would need below. Not sure if our situation would be a side wall or end wall configuration. Please send information on your doors. Thank you! We are doing a Market building. 35' tall with opening of about 8' wide by 29' tall Can I get you to answer some bifold door questions and maybe get a quote. We are bidding a project, Garrett County Trade Enterprise Center/Exhibit Hall, on which your Schweiss bifold designer style doors are specified. We would appreciate receiving a proposal from your firm. If you can have a sales rep. contact me, I can discuss details. Hi, I am interested in using the Bi-Fold (vertical) designer style Schweiss bifold door in a restaurant storefront. I would like to request a price quote for the client. The rough dimensions are approximated and written in the form. Also, how is the fabrication/installation process work? Do we provide the drawings or is there a contractor provided? Please call or email back. Thank you! Dear Sir I am looking for a way of separating off a section of our school assembly hall. Can I use one of your hydraulic bifold doors to do this? The door would be used internally. The door would close off the stage area used during school assemblies from the larger area of the hall which would be used as a gymnasium when not in use for assemblies. With the door in the open position during assemblies we would need to seat students under the open door. Is this possible? Thanks Richard C. Loooking for information on vertical folding door to close flexible use conference / meeting room between office and retail space. Interior use. Hello, I am in a construction management estimating class. I am doing a bid project for a fire station. Wondering if you can give me any ball park idea of a pricing for custom garage doors. Here's what I have to get a price for:7'x14'x1.75" with two tempered glass panels in each section. total of 6 pairs for vehicle openings. If you can just give a range of price that would be great! I reall appriciate any assistance. Robyn T. Working on an indoor soccer complex in MN that is considering the installation of hanger doors to provide an "outside" playing atmosphere for a fully enclosed building. New construction this summer. We are doing some renovations at American International College in Springfield, MA this summer. The architect on this project would like to use 4 of your bifold doors 10'-2" x 12'-6". 3 would be operable and 1 fixed. Whom would I contact to get a installed price? I need a price for a bi-fold garage door. I am building a pizza restaurant and the owner wanted to price out the option of your door versus a conventional garage door. The door needs to be 9' wide by 8' tall. Thank you, Chadd M. I am in the early stages of designing a building for our customer. He wants a private hanger with a 50' x 14' bifold door that I will design the building around and at this point I'm just looking for technical information for the building design. We are a Varco Pruden pre-engineered building distributor. 1. What do you recommend for framed opening size? 2. How much room do I need to allow above the door for the header? 3. What are the weights and forces that I need to apply to the building? 4. From looking at the pictures, it appears that you just supply the frame work and we apply the panel to match the building. Is this correct? 5. Do you insulate the door or is that our responsiblity? 6. Any information that you can provide that will help with this design would be appreciated. You can email me at the above email address, or fax it. Thank you, Duane C. I am inquiring about a Schweiss bi-fold door that an architect has specified on the Des Moines Art Center addition project. The door measures 12' wide and 16' tall. The specifications state, "Framework for a motorized hanger-style horizontally bifolding door, for applicaton of stone wall panels, product by Scweiss Bi-Fold Doors. Can you contact me by the end of the day with a quote. The architects have requested that I provide them with a budget estimate for this potential project by the end of the day today. Thanks you for your help. I am doing a design/build project for the Department of Horticulture and we are interested in putting in your hanger doors. the opening dimensions are three bays of 15' wide by 14' tall. Possibly just one door at 45' wide by 14' tall. I would love to possibly send you a section to see what options you think might be best. Looking to enclose a deck of a water-front resaurant/bar and am interested in the bifolds. We have a train car wash building that has overhead catenary wires through the building. The train cars get their propulsion power to drive through the building. We are looking for a new type of bi-fold door that will allow accomodate overhead wire when door is closed. Possible a vertical bi-fold with a block out for overhead wires. The current door sizes are 15' wide x 23' tall. Please contact me. We are looking at a number of options for doors for a Fire Department Apparatus Building. Width and quantity of doors will vary as we look at different options. If you can provide a range of costs for doors (34' wide and 50' wide) all with 14' clear opening height. I am interested in pricing info. for a 10'x10' rough opening bi-fold door assembly. The door is part of a remodel project for county health services and needs to be some type of metal panel (i.e. aluminum coiled garage door)for the security of the medical supplies which will be stored there. The existing building has a steel structure with an exterior finish of EIFS. Also, there is an existing storefront window which will be removed before installation of the new garage door. Cargo vans and small shipping trucks will be the intended vehicles used to bring in the required medical supplies. Also, if you could price this next to your competitors I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you for your assistance and I look forward to your reply. We are in the preliminary stages of proposing some possible changes for an existing shopping center in Oahu, Hawaii. I was wondering if you are able to build bi-fold overhead doors that are only 6ft wide by 8 ft high. If so, what is the rough cost for these doors? FOB Oahu, Hawaii. Currently looking at a Bi-Fold door to use in a small project - Golf Course/Country Club (Indoor Driving Range) However, I do not see any CAD files to add to my Construction Documents. Can a data CD or files be emailed. We are getting ready to bid a project called Gold Star Museum Addition/Alteration at Camp Dodge in Johnston, Iowa. Are there any suppliers/installers in this area that you can recommend? We have two entrances to our parking garage; personal vehicles and our loading dock/waste/bus transit operation. Our loading dock operation is accessed by a large opening, 15' high, 40' wide. I am worried about weight of ice and snow on that portion of the bi-fold that will extend outside. Also, on a door this size, how long would it take to open and shut? The passenger car entrance is much smaller, 10' high and 24' wide, but will be opening and closing hundreds of times a day. Problem? Thank you, Whit S. I have schweiss bi fold doors specified on a 2nd floor in front of store front windows at the Kent Events Center. For servicing - how do we access the motors behind the door? do we need to provide access from the interior side or are there access panels from the exterior side? We are quoting a building addition to Scot Forge in Spring Grove, IL. They want an 18'x 20' bi-fold door in the endwall of addition. Project will start in September. Our office is designing a youth swimming pool house with 6 12' wide by 10' (8' clear) high bi-fold doors with storefront glazing. We are interested in information regarding cost, installation, head and jamb details, structural loads, forces and framing requirements, glazing (if provided or if the GC must provide the glazing system). We are not opposed to the possibility of using hydraulic doors instead. We are building a new showroom and workshop for our auto dealership. I need a door between the showroom and the workshop 14 feet wide and 14 feet high. Must be accoustic panels so that noise from the workshop does not disturb the showroom. Four sections each 3ft 6in would work with lock in centre of aperture. I prefer that the surface is flat when closed. John P. WE MANUFACTURE COMMERCIAL GREENHOUSES AND SHIP THEM NATIONWIDE - I HAVE A CUSTOMER NEEDING A 34'W X 15'H BIFOLD - I NEED COST, INSTALLATION DETAILS, FRAMING DIMENSIONS, WT, AND SHIPPING COST. ALSO COST TO ZIP 50131 FOR FREIGHT. WOULD NEED A COST FOR 2 EACH. I WOULD APPRECIATE A CATALOG IF YOU HAVE ONE. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION LINDA B. We need to get as much information on your bi-fold doors for use in an office space as possible. It would be nice to know what the approx. retail prices are on your doors also if possible. Maybe a cost per lineal foot would be appropriate. We have some 20 foot openings we're thinking of putting them into. Thanks! I am interested in price of a commercial bi-fold door for a three car garage on Long Island, New York. Please advise what information you need in order to provide a quote. I am interested in knowing the different types of material for commercial bi-fold garage door. Also, I need automatic feature. Thank you. I am building a concession stand and your bi fold door has been spec'd and I need to get some information on your products. I can e mail a pdf drawing of the door I need as well as the specs on it. size 8'-0" x 7'-0" Please provide a quote on the specified doors. This application will require a minimum of 16' of clearance. The sidewall where these will be installed is 30' in height so there should be no problem in sizing the opening to what ever is required to achieve 16' of clearance with the doors in an open position. Please allow 6" or whatever "fudge factor" you suggest to make sure that under field conditions we will have the FULL 16' clearance. (This is going into a landfill building and one of the container vessles utilized measures 15' 5" - thus the concern about making sure we don't encounter a problem. Thanks for your suggestions and assistance. I'm putting together a budget to re-model the restuarant for the Hyatt Regency in Atlanta and have a fold up door at the buffet. I have listed the size below. I'd like a budget price for this door. Please contact me if you have any questions. Thank you. We have dry kilns that we aree needing to replace the doors on thought this might be an option. Dear Bifold Door, Marquette State fish Hatchery has 3 open ended biuldings covering fish raceways. We are intersted closing in the south/west ends of two biulds to provide additional shade for the fish. Each new bifold door must have 2 to 3 man doors for ailse access. These man doors would be used most of the year. The bifold door would be lifted during disinfection and clean out periods (twice yearly). I can send pictures if needed. Have an RV storage carport that I need to add door to. Look at bifold but limited on header area. Door wqould be approx 24' wide by 13' tall. What would be approx clearance measurement of door when folded at open end of "V"? Need to make look like normal steel garage door. Wind load would be from both inside and outside as carport is open on sides. I'm working on a fast track showroom project within the Merchandise Mart in Chicago. We have a large storefront area that we'd like to completely open up, and it seems that Schweiss might do the trick. We have a 140' span, but it could be broken up into multiple doors if necessary. Please contact me as soon as possible to discuss. Thank you. We anticipate constructing an addition to our museum. We will need a non electric hangar door 100' x 33' with a tail door. We would appreciate talking to one of your representatives. I work on Tues - Thur only. Thanks! Jack F. Job Name: Laguna Honda Hospital I'll fax you the information I have. It's not much. Thanks Ken S. I am bidding a municipal Community Events Center on Nov. 21, 2007 that has an 18'-0" X 12'-6" and a 20'-0" x 12'-6" bi-fold glass hanger door called out. Can you connect me with a salesperson/distributor/installer for a quote. The project in WA. Dear Sir, We are interested in your bi-fold doord for our timber dryers which we manufacture. We are also interested in marketing your doors in our area. Kindly refer to our website. Kindly send us your brochures and prices. Regards ! We require a well insulated, well sealed door for the front of our lumber kiln. The inside temp. reaches 160 F. and the humidity often reaches near 100%. We are looking for an alternative to our current bi-fold "garage doors" for a retailer we are working with. We will be doing 5 more stores in 2008 and 10 in 2009. We use the bi-fold doors as an alternative front entry into a department in the store. Our basic specs are 3 separate doors with glazing and aluminum frames, 10-11ft tall x 9-10ft wide. Could you please provide us with pricing and finish options. Thank you, Sarah H. My name is Butch T. and I own a Hardware & Lumber co. in Maine. We are in the process of designing and building a new store. I am looking for either a bi-fold or hydraulic one piece door ( actually 2 doors the same size ) to put in the front of the store on each side of the entrance door. We are planning on having a 12 ft. overhang on the front of the store to use as a display area. I want to be able to just put these doors up in the morning and close them down at night for security. The heighth of each door would be 12ft high and the width would be 36 ft. each. Could you please give me the pricing for doors this size in both bi-fold model and the hydraulic model. Thank you Sincerely, Butch T. We are looking at using bi-flod doors for a fire hall project. We plan to incorporate a lot of glass into the door and also between doors. Could you provide us with some standard details for jambs and heads for bi-fold doors. I have a project where we would like to use four bi-fold doors. The doors will be approximately 24' high X 70' wide, and identical to one another. I would like to get the design and drawings for the doors started in the next few days. Please send send me a proposal for the design through shop drawing stage of the project. Also, please let me know where and to whom I should send the current in progress construction drawings for your use. I look forward to working with Schweiss Bi-fold Doors on this project and I am interested in learning the intricacies of the product. Please, contact me at any time with any questions or concerns. Seeking urgent quote for commercial bifold door for community airport application. Installation will also require electric closer. Our customer is resizing an opening and would like to replace a sectional door with bifold insulated with exterior steel sheeting. Building is to be converted into an Aviation Mechanic school. -Vertical and horizontal steel support will be placed to support new opening dimension. Question: can bifold door be installed directly onto precast or do steel tubes have to be installed for mounting. Please quote as soon as possible. Call with any questions. Thank you, Tony A. This door will be used as a sunshade device for a building that is now under construction. I would like to use a perforated corrugated aluminum skin on the door - is this something you can provide? Thanks. We are designing a restaurant with an outdoor deck, and the client has requested 2 all insulated glass swing-out doors approximately 8'x24'each to the deck. The installa-tion must have a clean look. I have looked at your Bi-fold's and Hydraulic doors. Can they be installed without the web at the bottom? We were thinking a reinforced tube as part of the frame to resist wind load. The building is a masonry structure. Looking for a commercial application door that is 40' wide and 14' high with a minimum oc 12' clear. Interesed on your bi-fold doors for commercial use (restaurant)for future projects. Please send me a catalogue and if you have waterproofing details. I AM LOOKING FOR A 13' TALL BY 19' WIDE DOOR, I WAS GOING TO USE A REGULAR OVER HEAD DOOR ,BUT FOUND IT DIFFICULT TO GET THE ODD BALL SIZE FOR A REASONABLE RATE. THIS DOOR NEEDS TO BE INSULATED AND COMMERCIAL GRADE. I WOULD ALSO LIKE IT TO BE EQUIPPED WITH AN OPENER. Interested in Bifold Gate for smaller application (public bike parking facility/vendor space). The building is concrete below where the hangar is, with steel ceiling web beams which support a one-story wood structure/office above the hangar space.
2019-04-21T10:29:16Z
https://www.bifold.com/q-list.php?id=Commercial_Doors
Ultra lavspenning / laveffekt blandet digitale og analoge kretser. Defekt- og strålingstolerante kretser og mikroarkitekturer. Emneord: defekt tolerante nanorarkitekturer, subthreshold kretser, radhard kretser. Hossein Zadeh, Somayeh; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2018). Comparison of Ultra Low Power Full Adder Cells in 22 nm FDSOI Technology, In Juri Mihhailov & Maksim Jenihhin (ed.), Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE Nordic Circuits and Systems Conference (NORCAS): NORCHIP and International Symposium of System-on-Chip (SoC). IEEE. ISBN 978-1-5386-7656-1. paper. Most ultra low power SRAM cells operating in the sub and near threshold region deploy 8 or more transistors per storage cell to ensure stability. In this paper we propose and design a low voltage, differential write, single ended read memory cell that consists of a total of 6 transistors. The innovative idea is to bring the loadless 4-transistor latch into the realm of low voltage memory cells by exploiting features of the 28 nm FDSOI Process and by adding a 2-transistor readbuffer with a footer line. Stand-alone and on a system level, the cell is stable during read, write and hold operations and it has great write-ability due to its differential write and loadless nature. The single NWELL option in 28 nm FD-SOI allows the loadless core to have minimal device widths while greatly improving the time it takes to evaluate the read bit-line. The cell has, in this paper, been used in a 128 kb (2 17 ) SRAM in a 16 block configuration exploring 3 different types of logic libraries for the peripheral logic of the system. Depending on the application, the IO-peripheral logic may be implemented using either high threshold voltage transistors or low threshold voltage transistors in where the power consumption of the 128 kb system was found to range from 1.31 µW to 71.09 µW, the maximum operational frequency lies within 1.87 MHz and 14.97 MHz while the read energy varies from 13.08 to 75.21 fJ/operation/bit for a supply voltage of 350 mV. The minimum retention voltage of the loadless SRAM cell is found to be 230 mV covering 5σof variation with Monte Carlo simulations. Nine D-type Flip-Flop (DFF) architectures were implemented in 28 nm FDSOI at a target, subthreshold, supply voltage of 200 mV. The goal was to identify promising DFFs for ultra low power applications. The single-transistor pass gate DFF, the PowerPC 603 DFF and the C2MOS DFF are considered to be the overall best candidates of the nine. The pass gate DFF had the lowest energy consumption per cycle for frequencies lower than 500 kHz and for supply voltages below 400 mV. It was implemented with the smallest physical footprint and it proved to be functional down to the lowest operating voltage of 65 mV in the typical process corner. During Monte Carlo (MC) process and mismatch simulations it was also found that the pass gate DFF is least prone to variations in both minimal setup- and minimal hold-time. Race conditions, during mismatch variations, occurred for the flip-flop that is constructed from NAND and inverter based multiplexers. The pass gate DFF is outperformed slightly when it comes to D-Q-based power-delay product and more significantly when it comes to the maximum clock frequency. The flip-flops having the shortest D-Q delays were the PowerPC 603 and the transmission gate D flip-flop, these also had the lowest D-Q-based power-delay of 26% and 30% respectively of that of the worst-case S2CFF power-delay product. Balancing the PMOS/NMOS strength ratio is a key issue to maximize the noise margin, and hence, the functional yield of CMOS logic gates and minimize the leakage energy per cycle in the subthreshold region. In this work, the PMOS/NMOS strength ratio was balanced using a poly-biasing technique in conjunction with back-gate biasing provided in a 28 nm fully depleted silicon on insulator (FDSOI) CMOS technology. A 32-bit adder based on minority-3 (min-3) gates and a 16-bit adder based on Boolean gates have been implemented. Chip measurement results of nine samples show highly energy efficient adders. The 32-bit and 16-bit adders achieved mean minimum energy points (MEP) of 20.8 fJ at 300 mV and 12.34 fJ at 250 mV, respectively. In comparison to adders reported in other works in the same technology, the energy per 1-bit addition of the 32-bit adder is improved by 37% . This improvement in energy consumption is 25% for the 16-bit adder. According to the measurement results of ten chips, the designed adders exhibited functionality down to supply voltages of 110 mV-125 mV, without body biasing. Additionally, the minimum Vdd of all the 32-bit adders based on minority-3 gates decreased to 80 mV by applying a reverse back bias voltage to the PMOS devices. One sample was functional at 79 mV with a 430 mV reverse back bias voltage applied to its PMOS devices. In this paper, we investigate the single event upset (SEU) response of five D flip-flops (DFFs) employing temporal redundancy, dual redundancy, and triple modular redundancy (TMR), across a wide supply voltage range. The DFFs were designed and fabricated in a low-power commercial 65 nm bulk CMOS process and were tested using heavy ions with linear energy transfer (LET) between 5:1 MeV-cm2=mg and 99:1 MeV-cm2=mg. Results show an increasing SEU vulnerability with decreasing supply voltage, for most of the DFFs. Nevertheless, radiation tolerant topologies exhibit 14x to 1328x better SEU tolerance than a standard non-radiation tolerant DFF, depending on supply voltage and LET. The general observation is that at normal incidence, while taking the entire LET spectrum into account, the dual interlocked storage cell (DICE) DFF has the best SEU tolerance at supply voltages of 1 V and 0.5 V. At a supply voltage of 0.25 V, a temporal redundant DFF shows the best SEU tolerance, while the TMR DFF shows the best SEU tolerance at a supply voltage of 0.18 V. At supply voltages of 0.5 V and below, increasing the angle of incidence to 45 degrees can increase the SEU rate of the implemented DICE DFF by up to a factor of 22x, making it one of the most SEU sensitive DFFs. Furthermore, utilizing high drive strength components in temporally redundant DFFs can reduce the SEU sensitivity by a factor of 3x to 112x, compared to when standard drive strength components are used. Balancing the PMOS/NMOS strength ratio is a key issue to maximize the noise margin, and hence, functional yield of CMOS logic gates in the subthreshold region. In this work, the PMOS/NMOS strength ratio was balanced using a poly-biasing technique in conjunction with back-gate biasing provided in a 28 nm fully depleted silicon on insulator (FDSOI) technology. A 32-bit adder based on minority-3 (min-3) gates and a 16-bit adder based on Boolean gates have been implemented. Chip measurement results show highly energy efficient adders, so that the 32-bit and 16-bit adders achieved minimum energy point (MEP) of 21.5 fJ at 300 mV and 12.62 fJ at 250 mV, respectively. In comparison to adders reported in other works in the same technology, the energy per 1-bit addition of the 32-bit adder is improved by 35% and for the 16-bit adder this improvement in energy consumption is 23%. The designed adders were functional down to a supply voltage of 110 mV. Additionally, the minimum Vdd of the 32-bit adder decreased to 79 mV by applying a reverse back bias voltage to the PMOS devices. This paper presents the design of digital logic cells for subthreshold applications using 28 nm ultra-thin body and box fully depleted silicon on insulator technology. The sizing approach relies on balancing pull-up/pull-down networks (PUN/PDN) strength ratio by applying an additional forward back-gate biasing (FBB) voltage to the back-gate of PMOS transistors. The minimum width of PMOS and NMOS transistors have been chosen by taking the narrow width effect into account. Moreover, to increase the functional yield of the logic cells, a trade-off has been made between Ion/Ioff ratio and energy consumption through increasing the channel length by 4 nm. Energy consumption of logic gates analyzed using ring-oscillators consisting of basic logic gates. It has been shown that balancing logic gates through applying an additional FBB to the PMOS back-gate instead of up-sizing PUN results in 30% lower energy consumption in ring-oscillators. An 8-bit multiply-accumulate (MAC) block was synthesized using the fully customized logic cells with asymmetric back-gate biasing. Compared to a state-of-the art MAC, the energy consumption of our MAC was improved by 21% at a relatively high speed (147 MHz). A sub-threshold 9-bit adder based on a minority-3 based full adder is designed and analyzed versus technology. A power-delay design space exploration is presented in multiple technology nodes. The performances are demonstrated and compared on spanning technology nodes of 130nm-LP, 65nm-LP-BULK, 28nm-LP-high-k-bulk, 28nm Ultra-Thin-Body-and-BOX (UTFF) FDSOI. An extensive body biasing was then applied to the UTBB FDSOI 28nm technology to adapt the circuit to the target operating frequency of 65MHz. The extensive body biasing exploits the feature provided by the Ultra-Thin-Body-and-BOX Fully Depleted SOI (UTBB FDSOI) technology, which allows a bias range of -300mV/+3V. The design was implemented in physical level, and all the results account for the layout parasitics. A minimum energy point of 1.03fJ/(bit.cycle) is achieved in the 28nm-UTFF-FDSOI, at the 0.24V supply with the 1.8MHz operating speed. For the target frequency of 65MHz and a 9-bit adder, a total minimum energy operation of 11fJ per cycle for a supply voltage of 0.309V and a body voltage of 1.35V is achieved. In this paper we investigate the efficiency of using temporal and spatial hardening techniques in flip-flop design for single event upset (SEU) mitigation at different supply voltages. We present three novel SEU tolerant flip-flop topologies intended for low supply voltage operation. The most SEU tolerant flip-flop among the proposed flip-flop topologies shows ability of achieving maximum SEU cross-section below 1.9 ·10-10 cm2 /bit (no SEUs detected) at 500 mV supply voltage, 4 ·10-10 cm2 /bit at 250 mV supply voltage, and 2 ·10- 9 cm2 /bit at 180 mV supply voltage. When scaling the supply voltage from 1 V down to 500 mV, 250 mV and 180 mV, the proposed flip-flops achieve at least - 72%, - 92.5% and - 95% (respectively) reduction in energy per transition compared to a Dual Interlocked Storage Cell based flip-flop when operated at a supply voltage of 1 V. The flip-flops have been designed and fabricated in a low-power commercial 90-nm bulk CMOS process and were tested using heavy ions with LET between 8.6 MeV-cm2 /mg and 53.7 MeV-cm2 /mg. Nine D flip-flop architectures were implemented in 28nm FDSOI at a target, subthreshold, supply voltage of 200mV. The goal was to identify promising D flip-flops for ultra low power applications. The pass gate flip-flop was implemented using 49% of the S2CFF’s area and was functional at the lowest operating voltage of 65mV in the typical process corner. At the targeted supply voltage of 200mV the racefree DFF gives the best functional yield of 99.8%. The flip-flops having the shortest D-Q delays were the PowerPC 603 and the transmission gate D flip- flop. These also had the lowest power delay products of 52.08aJ and 61.09aJ respectively. Four different flip-flops dimensioned for subthreshold operation have been designed and implemented in layouts. The four full custom, race-free, D-flip-flops were implemented in a standard 65 nm CMOS process and verified by measurements, when used in 2 divide-by-3 circuits. The first frequency divider, using standard topologies, demonstrated functionality down to a supply voltage of 132 mV, while the second variant, based on a recently proposed ”‘slice-based”’ approach, was functional for a supply voltage down to 137 mV. The frequency divider using traditional 4-transistor NAND and NOR topologies had lower energy per operation than the alternative 8-transistor NAND and NOR implementation. At 0.1 MHz, the figures were about 2.1 fJ and 3.5 fJ, respectively. For supply voltages from 0.2 to 1.2 V, a static flip-flop using 8-transistor NOR- gates plus one inverter had the lowest static power consumption among the 4 flip-flops. When using standard multi-Vt CMOS processes when making logic gates, often for example Low-Vt (LVT), or Standard-Vt (SVT) or High-Vt (HVT) transistors are used within one and the same basic logic building block, like for example a NAND or NOR circuit. We show, to the contrary, how a combination of different types within a single logic circuit may be exploited to reduce energy consumption and increase robustness towards process variations. Additionaly, Reverse Short Channel Effects (RSCE) are exploited by using non-minimum gate lengths for increased robustness agains process variations. Also, a recently proposed technique using very regular layouts accompanying the above mentioned techniques in a 16-bit adder implemented in 65 nm CMOS. Chip measurements using Sub-/Nearthreshold supply voltages demonstrate the functionality of the adder for a voltage range of 119 mV to 350 mV. Simulations show that by increasing gate lengths to 200 nm instead of the minimum 60 nm, may increase the footprint area of logic gates by only 12%, while at the same time reducing probability of failure by up to several orders of magnitude. Simultaneously, energy per operation is reduced, when compared to conventional design methods using minimum, or relatively short, gate lengths. Bjerkedok, Jonathan Edvard; Vatanjou, Ali Asghar; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2014). Modular Layout-friendly Cell Library Design Applied for Subthreshold CMOS, In Proceedings of the 32nd Norchip Conference. IEEE conference proceedings. ISBN 978-1-4799-5442-1. kapittel. Værnes, Magne; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2014). Performance comparison of 5 Subthreshold CMOS flip-flops under process-, voltage-, and temperature variations, based on netlists from layout, In Proceedings of the 32nd Norchip Conference. IEEE conference proceedings. ISBN 978-1-4799-5442-1. kapittel. Abstract—An energy-efficient SoC with 32 b subthreshold RISC processor cores, 32 kB conventional cache memory, and 9T ultra-low voltage (ULV) SRAM based on a flexible and extensible architecture was fabricated on a 2.7 mm test chip in 65 nm low power CMOS. The processor cores are based on a custom standard cell library that was designed using a multiobjective approach to optimize noise margins, switching energy, and propagation delay simultaneously. The cores operate over a supply voltage range from 200 mV (best samples) to 1.2 V with clock frequencies from 10 kHz to 94 MHz at room temperature. The lowest energy consumption per cycle of 9.94 pJ is observed at 325 mV and 133 kHz. A 2 kb ULV SRAM macro achieves minimum energy per operation at averages of 321 mV (0.030 sigma/micron), 567 fJ (0.037 sigma/micron ), and 730 kHz (0.184 sigma/micron), for equal number of 32 b read/write operations. The off-chip performance and power management subsystem provides dynamic voltage and frequency scaling (DVFS) combined with an adaptive supply voltage generation for dynamic PVT compensation. Aunet, Snorre (2011). On the Reliability of Ultra Low Voltage Circuits Built From MINORITY-3 GATES, In J Jacob Wikner (ed.), Proceedings of the European Conference on Circuit Theory and Design. IEEE conference proceedings. ISBN 9781457706165. chapter. Berge, Hans Kristian Otnes & Aunet, Snorre (2011). Multi-Objective Optimization of Minority-3 Functions for Ultra Low Voltage Supplies, In Marcelo Lubaszewski; ISCAS IEEE (ed.), Proc. 2011 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems. IEEE conference proceedings. ISBN 978-1-4244-9472-9. paper. Berge, Hans Kristian Otnes; Hasanbegovic, Amir & Aunet, Snorre (2011). Muller C-elements based on Minority-3 Functions for Ultra Low Voltage Supplies, In Heinrich Vierhaus (ed.), Proceedings of the 14th IEEE Symposium on Design and Diagnostics of Electronic Circuits and Systems. IEEE conference proceedings. ISBN 978-1-4244-9753-9. kapittel. Moradi, Farshad; Cao, Tuan Vu; Wisland, Dag T; Aunet, Snorre & Mahmoodi, Hamid (2011). Optimal Body Biasing for Maximizing Circuit Performance in 65nm CMOS Technology. The ... Midwest Symposium on Circuits and Systems conference proceedings. ISSN 1548-3746. Two memory elements, or latches, are introduced. They are similar in functionality to widely used NOR- and NAND-based crosscoupled latches, but unlike the traditional latches they do not risk to produce stable states where Q and Q' have identical binary values. The suggested solutions are built from two inverters and one minority-3 gate. Monte Carlo simulations in 90 nm CMOS are used to demonstrate that the circuits may maintain the digital abstraction under mismatch and process variations for a supply voltage down to 140 mV at 20 degrees C and 100 nm gate lengths. Chip measurements are included, for a supply voltage of 160 mV. Tørresen, Jim; Aunet, Snorre; Lande, Tor Sverre; Grutle, Øyvind Kallevik & Nielsen, Ivan R. (ed.) (2015). Nordic Circuits and Systems Conference (NORCAS): NORCHIP & International Symposium on System-on-Chip (SoC), 2015. IEEE conference proceedings. ISBN 978-1-4673-6576-5. 275 s. Sekanina, Lukas; Fey, Görschwin; Raik, Jaan; Aunet, Snorre & Růžička, Richard (ed.) (2013). Proceedings of the 2013 IEEE 16th International Symposium on Design and Diagnostics of Electronic Circuits & Systems (DDECS). IEEE. ISBN 978-1-4673-6133-0. 320 s. Aunet, Snorre (2018). Possibilities with ultra low power / low energy integrated circuits. The S-DAM front-end board (S-DAM-FEB) is a photomultiplier readout module for charged particles detection. This board has been designed for the readout of sensors in radiation monitors by the company, Integrated Detector Electronics AS (IDEAS). A large amount of S-DAM-FEB will be used in the neutron detector in the ESS (European Spallation Source) in Sweden for scientific research. Thus, hundreds of these modules are planned to be manufactured by third party of EMS (Electronic Manufacturing Service) and each board has to be validated after production. To be able to validate the DUTs efficiently, it has been decided to create a test system. In this thesis, the main focus was on the implementation of the test system to validate the functionality of the S-DAM-FEB. The project work included specifying the test requirements, conceptualization of the test system, schematic design and PCB design of needed hardware as well as implementing firmware and software for the test system. The needed Python scripts were created to run the test and log the test results into a test report. The mechanics of the test system was modelled by drawing a 3D-model, and the mechanical components were chosen according to the drawings. After implementing all the modules to be used for the test system, these modules were assembled together. The S-DAM-FEB was tested using the implemented test system. All functionality of the DUT was tested, including power consumption and temperature as well as gain, threshold and baseline for all channels. Minor fault in the DUT were found by the test, indicating that some failure has occurred during the production process. All the test results were logged into a test report for tracking the modules for future use and determine the condition of DUTs after production. The test system is in a working condition. Performing the validation test simple and easy. The runtime of the test is decreased, and most of the manual work is replaced by automatized process to get more reliable data and minimize possible human errors. The implementation of the test system was successful, and a large amount of S-DAM-FEB are ready to be validated. A lot of components in modern digital designs have very regular structures. Some examples are Programmable Ring Oscillators, Time to Digital Converters and CPU register files. The proper functioning of these components heavily depend on the way they are implemented in the design with respect to the placement of standard cells. This is due to the fact that many of these components are delay sensitive and the placement of cells in the layout affects the delay. Standard place and route tools, however, do not always ensure that the placement of standard cells is regularised, which can lead to sub-optimal results from these designs. The work on this thesis is aimed towards ensuring a regular placement of standard cells for such components, by developing a framework in a high-level language, from which the placement information needed by the place and route tools can be obtained. This information, when used by the tool, should result in a more predictable placement of standard cells, and should thus result in more optimal behaviour of such components. Rørstad Helle, Even; Moldsvor, Øystein; Hernes, Bjørnar & Aunet, Snorre (2018). Humidity Sensor. Disruptive Technologies are developing sensor solutions for the Internet of Things. Their current sensors can measure touch, temperature, and proximity. To expand the area of applications their current sensors cover, new sensor solutions are examined. The one studied in this thesis is a capacitive sensor measuring force. The idea is to place a compressible material on the front of Disruptive Technologies capacitive proximity sensor and use it to measure force. A compression of the material would lead to an increased capacitance measured. This thesis covers the work of finding suitable materials and the practical measurements done to characterize the capacitive sensor and the compressible material. Testing was done at two different materials that had properties useful for the intended application. These tests revealed that neither of the materials was optimal for a solution as described above. For different series of measurements, the values measured by the sensor variated for the same applied load. This made the work of creating a good fitting data model difficult. The proposed models could not predict with high probability the values measured by the sensor for the various applied loads. This lead to the conclusion that either the materials or the chosen sensor solution was not the optimal one for measuring force. As a result of this, two other force sensing methods using the same sensor is presented that can be further investigated in future work. Two different CMOS transistors with a low threshold voltage, given by a commercial available 22 nm FDSOI CMOS technology were investigated and assembled into several libraries of logic gates. The logic gates provided in the cell library should be sufficient to create most digital logic circuits, and are in addition designed to work in the subthreshold region with a supply voltage of 350 mV. Physical layout designs were made for the different digital ports, where parasitic capacitances were then extracted to provide more realistic simulations and performance results. Compared to schematic simulation, layout design and parasitic capacitances proved to reduce speed by a factor of 5 to 10, as well as increasing the transistors’ threshold voltage by 14.6 % for the NMOS, and 32.5 % for the PMOS. The increased threshold voltage thus led to a reduced static power consumption and increased switching energy. The transistor with the lowest threshold voltage showed especially good performance results with respect to low power consumption while still maintaining speed requirements. This transistor is throughout the report referred to as mosfet low. Two cell libraries were made for this transistor, where one applies a forward body-bias of ±2 V while the other have the bulk nodes connected to ground, which gives a 0 V body-bias. The libraries are supplied with schematics and layout designs, and are in addition mapped for performance data such as static power consumption, delay and switching energy consumption for every logic gate. A minimum speed of 40 MHz with a lowest possible power consumption for a 16by12-bit adder, was the aim of the project. Presented in this report is a 16by12-bit Adder built by Ripple-Carry Adders, which were simulated to reach a speed of 44.26 MHz at a supply voltage of VDD=350 mV with 0 V body-bias. Static power and switching energy consumption were simulated to 26.60 µW and 207.95 fJ, respectively. Aunet, Snorre (2017). Introduction to ultra-low power electronic circuits design. Aunet, Snorre (2017). Ultra-low power electronic circuits for medical applications. Hasanbegovic, Amir; Siem, Sunniva; Søråsen, Oddvar & Aunet, Snorre (2017). Exploring the SEU Dependence on Supply Voltage scaling in 90 nm and 65 nm CMOS Flip-flops. Fulltekst i vitenarkiv. L'Orange, Simon; Hagen, Anders; Blekken, Brage; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2017). 4-7Ghz Tunable Programmable Pulse Generator in 65nm CMOS. Lesund, Martin; Tjora, Sigve & Aunet, Snorre (2017). Ultra-low power serial communication for Internet of Things. Lid, Gunnar; Hagen, Anders; Blekken, Brage; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2017). Ultra-low power Design of DSRC modulator/demodulator in 28nm FD_SOI. Vatanjou, Ali Asghar; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2017). Ultra-Low Voltage/Energy CMOS Building Blocks in 28 nm FDSOI Technology. Barua, Anomadarshi; Edwin, David & Aunet, Snorre (2016). Voice over mesh network. There is a strong interest in ultra low voltage digital design as emerging applications like Internet of Things, wearable biomedical sensors, radio frequency identification, sensor networks and more are gaining traction. This thesis describes the implementation, synthesis and testing of a microcontroller using a near-threshold library. The system has been described in VHDL and synthesized for near-threshold operation on 28 nm FDSOI production technology from STmicroelectronics. The microcontroller implements a 32 bit RISC-V subset compatible pipelined processor and has SPI connectivity. Two single port 2kB SRAM modules are used as RAM. A power gating technique that reduces the static power in an ALU during runtime has been implemented and compared to a traditional ALU. Traditional coarse grain power gating of the processor has also been implemented. Using a supply voltage of 350 mV and a clock speed of 1 MHz the schematic SPICE simulation reported an average power consumption of 4.42 mW during program execution. In power gated mode the microcontroller consumed 2.98 mW. In a sensor logging program the average energy per executed instruction was 4.91 pJ. Runtime power gating reduced the average energy consumption of the ALU with 58 - 57% with a propagation delay penalty of 346 - 143% depending of the sizing of the power gating transistors. Three 64-byte memory systems were designed for a 0.18µm standard CMOS technology, one 6T-SRAM system and two D-Flip-Flop systems. The leakage current, read energy and write energy of these systems were determined by simulation. A set of extrapolation formulas for area, leakage current, read energy and write energy were designed to determine the characteristics of the systems as the size of the memory increases. The simulations showed that the 64-Byte 6T-SRAM system had a 39% lower area, an 83% lower leakage current, an 89% lower write energy and an 82% lower read energy than the reference D-Flip-Flop memory system. The extrapolation formulas predicted that as memory sizes increases, SRAM becomes more and more favorable in terms of area, leakage current, write energy and read energy. Vatanjou, Ali Asghar; Låte, Even; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2016). Ultra-Low Voltage Adders in 28 nm FDSOI Exploring Poly-Biasing for Device Sizing. Vatanjou, Ali Asghar; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2016). 28 nm UTBB-FDSOI energy efficient and variation tolerant custom digital-cell library with application to a subthreshold MAC block. Atarzadeh, Hourieh; Aunet, Snorre & Ytterdal, Trond (2015). An Ultra-Low-Power/High-Speed 9-bit Adder Design: Analysis and Comparison Vs. Technology from 130nm-LP to UTBBFD-SOI-28nm. Aunet, Snorre (2015). Ultra Low Power / Low Energy Integrated Circuits. Aunet, Snorre (2015). Ultra Low-Voltage / Low energy circuits. The thesis is done in cooperation with Kongsberg Defence Systems. Hals, Erik; Aunet, Snorre; Ramstad, Tor Audun; Hagen, Anders & Blekken, Brage (2015). Lav effekt sensornettverk, for registrering av kjøretøy. Holen, Aslak Lykre; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2015). Implementation and Comparison of Digital Arithmetics for Low Voltage / Low Energy Operation. Nine D flip-flop architectures were implemented in 28nm FDSOI at a target, subthreshold, supply voltage of 200mV. The goal was to identify promising D flip-flops for ultra low power applications. The pass gate flip-flop was implemented using 49% of the S2CFF's area and was functional at the lowest operating voltage of 65mV in the typical process corner. At the targeted supply voltage of 200mV the racefree DFF gives the best functional yield of 99.8%. The flip-flops having the shortest D-Q delays were the PowerPC 603 and the transmission gate D flip-flop. These also had the lowest power delay products of 52.08aJ and 61.09aJ respectively. The development of an upcoming ASIC by the company IDEAS calls for the design of an accompanying evaluation kit so that it may be accessible for testing in a laboratory setting. In addition to supporting the ASIC in question, the kit was decided to be made general purpose, leading to the support of various other ASICs from IDEAS, both future and existing ones. This thesis focuses on the creation of the primary board in the evaluation kit, named the Galao board. The project work included conceptualization, schematic design and PCB design of the Galao board, as well as producing relevant documentation for IDEAS. Being a mixed-signal general purpose board, effort has been made to include a high number of features and connectivity options: Galao holds specialized analog circuits for receiving differential signals, transmitting fast pulses of adjustable amplitude, registering trigger signals for readout synchronization as well as containing a broad assortment of both voltage and current bias generators. On the digital side, a System on Module solution has been incorporated, serving as a control unit for all the analog circuitry while providing a large amount of digital I/Os. The board has been made so that it may be accessed through Ethernet, USB and JTAG interfaces. Furthermore, the Galao board has several power rails, both for the analog and digital domain, with the PCB designed so that digital switching has a minimal impact the analog signals. The Galao board was finally produced, allowing for some initial testing. The results of the conducted tests are positive, as the board powers up and is operational with its digital logic being fully controllable. Some faults in the schematic have been discovered after the manufacturing of the Galao board, but these have all been readily fixable. The board is hence in a working condition, and ready to be interfaced towards an ASIC with an ASIC test board that is to be designed. Skjølsvik, Hallstein; Vatanjou, Ali Asghar; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2015). Ultra low voltage combinatorial logic building blocks. Talstad, Joar Nikolai; Diaz, Isael; Øye, Jan Egil & Aunet, Snorre (2015). Channel Filter Cross-Layer Optimization. This manuscript includes chip measurements for a 32-bit Ripple-Carry Adder (”RCA”), demonstrating functionality for a supply voltage ("Vdd") down to 84 mV. The low Vdd might be the lowest reported for comparable CMOS circuitry, not depending on special schmitt-trigger based logic or body biasing. Two 32- bit ripple-carry adders are implemented in 65 nm CMOS, having all gate lengths of 60 nm and 80 nm, respectively. The implementation having 80 nm gate lengths exploits secondary effects like the Reverse Short Channel Effect (”RSCE”) to provide lower energy per operation, compared to the 60 nm implementation, when operated down to subthreshold supply voltages. Dimensioning for symmetric noise margins, and using minority-3 circuits and inverters only, with regular layouts, contribute to the ultra low Vdd potential. According to simulations, the energy per operation could be down to about 1.5 fJ/bit for the implementation, based on L = 80 nm. For delays in the 20 ns to 110 ns range, the energy consumption for the RCA having L = 60 nm, was from 18.5 to 47 % higher than the RCA having L = 80 nm. The area was 9.7 % less for the L = 80 nm implementation, compared to the L = 60 nm RCA. Zapatero, Miguel & Aunet, Snorre (2015). Synthesis of low-energy near-threshold SHMAC processor core. Benemann, Danton Canut; Milch Pedersen, Frode & Aunet, Snorre (2014). Ultra-low voltage embedded processor system for Internet-of-Things microcontrollers. Bjerkedok, Jonathan Edvard; Vatanjou, Ali Asghar; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2014). Modular Layout-friendly Cell Library Design Applied for Subthreshold CMOS. Dybwad, Patrick; Hasanbegovic, Amir & Aunet, Snorre (2014). Automated Single Event Transient simulation program using high-level programming. The work is done in cooperation with Atmel Norway, with Ronan Barzic as advisor at Atmel. Summary: The fast evolution of the Internet of Things suggests an unavoidable transition to this infrastructure in the near future, and to achieve this multiple nodes need to interconnect and communicate efficiently. All nodes will need a power source to operate. Most of them will have very low power consumption requirements. Therefore, a possible solution would be to have an energy harvesting system for the nodes. The energy harvesting systems will need a CPU to control all operations and to manage the power consumption. The goal of this assignment is to create a base processor capable of controlling the system using ultra-low levels of power. The proposed approach for the assignment is to use a stack processor. Using the J1 processor as a reference, a new architecture was designed. The design process was done following the design flow tools used by Atmel and covered the simulation, testing, synthesis and place and route process. The end result of the assignment was a functional stack processor system with the capability to communicate with I/O modules using a Wishbone bus. A custom assembler was created using Arch C to simplify the testing of the architecture. The design was simulated, synthesized and routed using specific libraries from Atmel. The assignment completed a working design flow that will allow the realization of a proper power analysis in the next phase of development. The stack processor architecture shows high potential for ultra-low power operations. Further time and power analysis is needed to have a complete comparison with other processors. The work was done in coopertion with Atmel Norway (www.atmel.com). Summary: This thesis presents a cell library with limited functionality targeting to operate in sub-threshold (350mV) as well as above-threshold (1.2V) voltages utilizing the dynamic speed requirement of the circuit. The sub-threshold cell library can be used to synthesize any general Finite State Machine (FSM) since it contains logic gates and a D-FF memory element. The sub-threshold cell library proposed in this thesis consists of: Inverter, NAND2, NOR2, XNOR2, XOR2, AOI22, OAI22 and D flip-flop. All cells are designed with static CMOS and use of 130 nm HVT n-well process. The main motivation behind this work is the desirable for longer lasting battery powered IC chips. CMOS power consumption includes three components where the dynamic component is Pdyn ∝ V 2 DD . Hence, a promising method to reduce power consumption is to reduce the supply voltage V DD to the sub-threshold region. The reduction of V DD increases the delay through the circuit (excellent trade-off in application with low performance requirements) and increases sensitivity to process, voltage and temperature (PVT) variations. The sub-threshold cells are evaluated with an ALU synthesized into three circuits: No.1: unlimited, with use of provided above-threshold cells; No.2: limited to INV, NAND2, NOR2 and D-FF with sub- and above-threshold cell library; and No.3: limited as No.2 + XNOR2, XOR2, AOI22 and OAI22 with sub- and above-threshold cell library. The results shows a power consumption reduction of ∼ 14 times from V DD = 1.2V to 350mV for both No.2 and No.3 ALU circuit. It is also shown that a more complex library including XNOR2, XOR2, AOI22 and OAI22 reduces the power consumption with ∼ 7.7% compared to a library with only Inverter, NAND2, NOR2 and D-FF at 350mV. The No.3 circuit is shown to be the best ALU with use of sub-threshold cells in term of delay and power consumption. Both No.2 and No.3 only fails to comply with the 32KHz frequency in SS and FS corner in −40 ◦ C , 350mV and with use of sub-threshold cells, whereas with use of above-threshold cells fails in all except FF corner in −40 ◦ C , in addition to failing in SS corner at 25 ◦ C . The work was done in cooperation with Oracle, Oslo, Norway. Summary: PCI Express(PCIe) is a packet-based, serial, interconnect standard that is widely deployed within servers and workstations for it’s attractive performance capabilities. A platform that has a PCIe architecture also includes a PCIe Root Complex(RC) for linking the PCIe device-tree to the host CPU and memory. During the design-phase of a PCIe endpoint-device it is highly desired to conduct computer aided simulations of the device in a relevant environment. Having a simulation software that can be applied early and iteratively in the design-phase enables engineers to tweak the product without realization of hardware. Causing a great reduction in the number of physical prototypes required before mass production. In this thesis a transaction level model(TLM) of a PCIe RC was assembled using SystemC, with a focus on latency and jitter as performance parameters. The model gives the Application Specific Integrated Circuit(ASIC) developers at Oracle a timing accurate alternative to the existing processor emulator(QEMU) that is used for the same purpose. To correlate the RC TLM with real hardware, a PCIe protocol analyzer from LeCroy was utilized. Traffic between a first generation PCIe endpoint-device and a SUN FIRE X4170 M3 server was traced. The RC TLM was made in a modular manner allowing support for other micro-architectures through insertions of trace files. The recorded traces between requests and completions were processed and inserted directly into a delay database within the RC model, to ensure high correlation between the RC TLM and the real hardware. A simple model of a PCIe endpoint-device was implemented to serve as a suitable test-environment. The functionality and the hardware realisticness of the RC model was successfully tested with targeted transaction scenarios. A simulated latency distribution of 15000 packets, proved to fit the latency distribution that was randomly drawn in the RC TLM. Only a small amount of negligible delay anomalies from imperative switch cycles were found. The PCIe RC TLM is close to optimal for modeling latency and jitter using a database of targeted trace calbrations. The principle of modeling delays in an RC TLM using latency databases, was found to be a favorable alternative to the constant delay nature of the QEMU test-environment. The master thesis won the award for the best thesis within microelectronics, at NTNU, 2014. Oppgaven er båndlagt. / The thesis will not be public until 3 years from now (some time in 2017). Energy harvesting systems typically contain a low-power embedded processor in order to collect and interpret sensory data and such a processor will need memory to store that data. The most effective method of reducing power consumption in an electronic circuit is to decrease the supply voltage and this thesis explores the viability of implementing an ultra-low voltage SRAM architecture in a 130nm CMOS process for Atmel Norway AS. The architecture supports voltage scaling between 400mV and a regular supply voltage of 1.2V. The architecture was implemented with conventional 6T SRAM cells and 10T SRAM cells designed for low-voltage operations using state of the art design techniques and literature. The SRAM architecture is asynchronous and self-timed to more easily cope with the effects of process and temperature variations. To realize the architecture a small set of logic gates were also designed for ultra-low voltage operation and used in the SRAM read and write control circuitry. All building blocks in the architecture were simulated with extracted parasitics to get more realistic simulation results. Corner and Monte Carlo simulations were used to show how temperature and process variations statistically affected the building blocks and their performance. Simulation results showed that the 10T SRAM cell is more robust with a 60-100% larger static noise margin compared to the conventional 6T cell, but draws 1.2-1.6 times more leakage power and is physically 64% larger. The differential nature of the 6T cell makes its read operations faster compared to the 10T cell, but the offset voltage in the sense amplifiers used for reading reduces the potential speed gain somewhat. The 6T cell also experience a disturb voltage during read operations and the nature of this disturbance is different at subthreshold and superthreshold voltages, making it difficult to assess yield in a system supporting voltage scaling. the 10T cell does not experience this problem which makes it the more predictable and safe choice for future implementations. Reducing the voltage from 1.2V to 400mV gives a power saving in the range 4-18 depending on process variations and temperature. At low temperatures the supply voltage must be increased either permanently or by using dynamic voltage compensation to perform a read operation within a 32kHz clock cycle. This thesis has showed that it is viable to implement a subthreshold SRAM architecture in the Atmel 130nm CMOS process and some important effects of applying voltage scaling have been explored. Reducing the power supply to such an extent reduces performance and will need some form of voltage compensation to increase performance at low temperatures. Værnes, Magne; Ytterdal, Trond & Aunet, Snorre (2014). Performance comparison of 5 Subthreshold CMOS flip-flops under process-, voltage-, and temperature variations, based on netlists from layout. Aunet, Snorre (2013). Low Voltage / Low Energy CMOS. Aunet, Snorre (2013). Ultra low voltage CMOS reducing power consumption up to several orders of magnitude, or energy per switching up to 1-2 orders of magnitude. Bjerkedok, Jonathan Edvard; Aunet, Snorre; Grannæs, Marius & Ekelund, Øivind (2013). Subthreshold Real-Time Counter. Myhre, Petter; Pihl, Johnny & Aunet, Snorre (2013). A novel 55 nm Path Delay Monitor - saving power with DVFS. Schjolden, Lars-Frode; Aunet, Snorre & Ytterdal, Trond (2013). Low Energy Implementation of Robust Digital Arithmetic in Sub/Near-Threshold Nanoscale CMOS - for ultrasound beamforming. Taugland Kollerud, Martin; Pihl, Johnny & Aunet, Snorre (2013). Extended Bubble Razor Methodology and its Application to Dynamic Voltage Frequency Scaling Systems. Værnes, Magne; Aunet, Snorre & Hagen, Anders (2013). Trade-offs between Performance and Robustness for Ultra Low Power/Low Energy Subthreshold D flip-flops in 65nm CMOS. eurobot er en årlig internasjonal konferanse for autonome roboter. Gruppen har utviklet en komplett, fungerende robot, med gode mekaniske løsninger. Det utviklede styresystemet tillater hurtig re-programmering av strategier, selv like før en kamp. posisjoneringssystemet kan frakte roboten til en hvilken som helst koordinat på spillebrettet. Roboten vant fem kamper i Eurobot 2012, noe som resulterte i en 23. plass blant 43 internasjonale lag. Aunet, Snorre & Lindstad, Siri (2012, 10. mai). Nøkkelen i nakken. [Internett]. Aunet, Snorre & Lindstad, Siri (2012, 01. mai). Nøkkelen i nakken. Bjørnstad, Tor-Eivind; Mikkelsen, Sindre & Aunet, Snorre (2012). Exploring laser induced Single Event Latch-up in AMS 0.35um. Bårdsen, Sigurd; Tjora, Sigve & Aunet, Snorre (2012). Implementation of High Speed Serial Links. Cao, Tuan Vu; Aunet, Snorre & Ytterdal, Trond (2012). A 9-bit 50MS/s Asynchronous SAR ADC in 28nm CMOS. E. Koch, Kristoffer; Aunet, Snorre & Aamodt Gulbrandsen, Truls Magnus (2012). Low Power Capacitive Touch Digital Detection Filter. Haugland, Martin Severin O; Berge, Hans Kristian Otnes; Hasanbegovic, Amir & Aunet, Snorre (2012). Multiobjective Optimization of an Ultra Low Voltage / Low Power Standard Cell Library for Digital Logic Synthesis. Aunet, Snorre (2011). On the Reliability of Ultra Low Voltage Circuits Built From MINORITY-3 GATES. Moradi, Farshad; Wisland, Dag T; Aunet, Snorre & Berg, Yngvar (2011). Ultra Low Power Digital Circuit Design for Wireless Sensor Network Applications. Series of dissertations submitted to the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Oslo.. 1121. Nguyen Le, Thanh & Aunet, Snorre (2011). Suksessiv Approksimasjonsregister A/D-omformer. Aunet, Snorre (2010). German and Norwegian subthreshold CMOS research under the "Robust Ultra-Low-Power Circuits for Nano-Scale CMOS Technologies" project. Aunet, Snorre (2010). Moore’s law and beyond – some technological challenges. Aunet, Snorre (2010). Organisering og ledelse av hardware-utvikling. Aunet, Snorre (2010). The IC Industry and Education in Norway. Aunet, Snorre (2010). Ultra Low Voltage / Low Power CMOS Circuits. Aunet, Snorre & Hasanbegovic, Amir (2010). Memory Elements Based on Minority-3 Gates and Inverter5s Implemented in 90 nm CMOS.
2019-04-24T08:07:18Z
https://www.mn.uio.no/ifi/personer/vit/sa/index.html
In the Bible stones are interestingly used. In Ezekiel 36:26, the heart is referred as a heart of stones. Too hard to be changed or break. Will not take anything. Will not listen to anything. So the people of Israel during those time has a heart of stones. They will not listen to any advice at all. To make matters worst, they not only will not listen, they will not response, just like any stone! But, the verse above is on the contrary. If the disciples do not cry out with joy, the stones will. Even the stones will cry out. Why will the stones cry out in such circumstances? I believe, God is telling us, when Jesus enters our hearts, there is this exceeding joy of praise and worship that we could not contain. We need to understand what will happen to any Christian who receive Jesus into his or her heart. He will not be ashamed to praise God, even infront of the assembly. But the teachers of the law were ashamed. They asked Jesus to advice his disciples not to make so much noise. To the teachers of the law, they prioritized disciplines and orderliness. There is nothing wrong with that but a person with full of love will not break the law. If the disciples do not cry out, even the stones will cry out. Stones are just stones! If somebody says you have a stone face, your face has not expression at all. If such a expressionless object will shout for joy, what will that mean to us who show no joy or any expression at all in worship. To some lifting of hand is too holy. Others refer to dancing with joy as very offensive, and thought that such expression is for the night clubs. Some people say that we must have discipline in worship, and what is discipline in worship? When King David danced with joy, his wife was not happy. She was punished for rebuking David. She became unfruitful. So when Jesus said that the stones will, I believe, all creation should worship God freely as he or she feels as the joy of heaven shakes their lives. We should not stop people from expressing themselves because they have chosen to worship God and not people. When the wind blows, the trees will sway and the waves will roar. There appear life and movement or reponse unlike the stones which are unmoved or very still. However if the stones do shout, then it would mean, a heart that offer no expression of worship is even harder than the stones themselves. Let no one stop others from worshipping God with joy. I like the song, “Heart of Gold” by one singer who says he is searching for a heart of gold. He said he wanted to live, he wanted to give. That, according to him is one expression that he have yet to do- giving. When I read this verse, I could figure out in my mind, what David’s intention was. He had been thinking of blessing somebody, someone from the house of Saul. Saul had been trying to kill David before Saul and his son Jonathan were killed in battle with the Philistines. King David wanted to bless somebody from his former enemy’s household. How many of us are thinking of blessing others and showing kindness to others? Many will only think of doing bad to others or trying to manipulate others to gain something for themselves. Now David was seeking to be kind to others. And when Ziba told him about Mephibosheth, who was a crippled, he was asked to get him. Ziba thought that David will not take him if he knew that Jonathan’s son will not be of benefit to him. But Ziba was wrong. King David reinstated all that belong to Saul and gave them to that crippled man. He also took him to eat at the king’s table, as one of the princes. David manifested grace upon someone who will not be able to repay him. That is the heart of gold. How many of us are looking around for a needy to help? As the customs of that day, Mephibosheth deserved death. When Saul was king, Mephibosheth was a small boy full of life and potential. But when the king and his own father were killed in the battle, everything collapsed. In her hurry to flee, the maid carrying the little boy slipped causing the legs of the little boy to break and became crippled. They hid him far away, living in fear and poverty. We all are like that. Crippled by sins and nothing we can do to help ourselves. Only God, out of love and mercy, send His son to seek and save us. There is nothing that we can do to save ourselves. Only by the grace of God. As Christians, is our mind thinking of blessing someone’s life? Somebody who could not repay us. Are we thinking of doing good or are we thinking otherwise, seeking the destruction of others? David, the man after God heart has this special heart, he has the heart of gold. We too have this heart of gold but the gold is still in us and we have yet to share it. God’s love is generous and extravagant. We need to seek the needy upon which we can pass God’s blessing to the others who have yet to receive this grace. The marriage of Cana is very significant. Here we were told that Jesus was invited and at the most important stage, the wine was about to finish. Wine during those days, especially during marriage, makes the celebration complete. It is also family honour and joy to serve people with the best wine. People will be happy and the marriage blessed by those who come. Nobody want to face shortage of wine during the feast. It would be embarassing to the couple and the family. When the wine was about to finish, somebody was asked to tell Jesus about it. Why tell Jesus? They knew, He has the answer. Yes, true he had the answer. But to ensure that the answer materialize, it must be done. The person was told to follow whatever Jesus asked him to do. Just do what he asked. The servant was asked to put water in the jars. Just water! If you tell people nowadays to put water instead of wine, they will tell you that you are crazy. He was asked to ” just follow!”. He just followed and what happened, that water had turned into the best wine. Obedience resulted in reward. 1. Marriage will turn dry but we need new wine to bring the love and joy back to our marriage. 2. Only Jesus is the answer. We all know that. 3. But things don’t just happen without obedience to the will of God. 4. Any marriage must have Jesus as the centre. Only He can calm the storms of marriage because He instituted marriage. How to save our marriage? How to ensure that the best wine remain? Only Jesus and obedience to His command can do that. Just do what he asked you to do. 1. The love of God is full of mercy. This poor man did not deserve to go to heaven. All his life, he was against what was good. He robbed or steal. If he is facing a world court today, he will not go unpunished. There will be alot of rules or obstacles in his way to be free. God’s mercies endures forever. 2. The love of God is ever forgiving. When we are merciful, we will surely forgive. This does not separate. They go hand in hand. A forgiving person wants to help the person by freeing him from guilt and shame. Once a person find forgiveness, he finds peace. If God does not forgive, we will never enter His rest. 3. The love of God is full of Lovingkindness. Loving and kind does not separate too. If we love a person, sure, we will give the person what he needs. That poor thief need salvation, so Jesus gave it to him and that allowed him into paradise. The phrase ” Lord remember me,” is not found in this verse only. There are also used by David and some prophets too. Its a powerful request that will unlock God’s attention to the person who asks. What happened on the cross tells us many things too. If golden deeds are a condition to get our salvation, the poor man would not be permitted. If lofty prayers is a must to enter, this man would not be able to enter. If spiritual gifts are the condition, this person had none, and would not be able to be saved too. God’s love is greater far. God’s love is greater far. 1. God wants us to be sincere ( to be truthful ). Before we choose to rebuke or tell someone of his mistakes, are we qualified to do so? If we do the same mistakes, we are not qualified so its better to rectify our problem first. Normally a person will comply if they find we are blameless. Many people want to take the leadership role or want to be in power so that they have such power to rebuke others. But if we cannot tackle such problem in our life, why must we demand such position as a judge or someone in authority. Jesus wants us to humble ourselves and do things in love. To be patient prevents us from making mistakes when dealing with people. 2. God wants us to be merciful and kind. The position of a judge is to find who is guilty and met out punishment. Normally this is done infront of others. People will know. It is not a good thing to be told that you are wrong, in front of witnesses or infront of a crowd. If we purposely do such action upon others’ life with the intention of hurting and shaming, it will return to us. It is not wrong to rebuke a person of wrong doing but according to Paul, talk to the person personally, not in a meeting or infront of many people. If we do this infront of a crowd, then many people will judge us. It is adviseable to get someone who are better than us to advise the person concern then to do it ourselves. Slow to speak or be kind to people in our words will prevent ourselves from becoming a judge. Knowing that we are sinners to will make us merciful in the words we use. 3. God wants us to Live in peace with others. To be judgemental in our attitude or thoughts will have a negative influence in our life. More often than not, our relationship is affected if we think negatively about other people. We will treat them badly, look down on or we will dislike them etc. The reason why some people do not approach other people is due to a judgemental attitude. When we accept others as they are, we are beginning to exercise what true love is. Judgemental attitude is a lot to do with personal pride. Sometimes we want to put ourselves better than the others by doing some comparasion. To improve our inner being, avoid life of comparasion. We can only live in peace when we are able to be at peace with others. So brothers and sisters, these verses are not meant to scare us and make us not willing to help others but rather God wants us to reflect on our own life so that we will be more affective in helping others and ourselves. 1. Seeking Him to know and understand God. We must know God if we have to start loving Him. We can’t love some one if we do not know the person. To know a person, we need to meet the person, talk and have conversation and eventually we will understand one another. Eventually trust and love will emerge. Similarly, we must know God first, understand Him and know what He desires and what God doesn’t like. Seek God and He is found. Seek me with all your heart and you will find Me, God says in Jeremiah. Know and understand God so that whatever God loves, we also love. Whatever God hates, we also hate. Whatever God is concern of, we also so concern; then we are loving God. 2. Shepherd( feed, take care, protect, lead etc) the Sheep. In John 21: 15-17, Jesus asked Peter whether he truly loves Him or not. Three times He asked Peter, and every time peter answered ” yes”, Jesus instructed him. First Jesus said, ” Tend my lambs.” Second Jesus said, ” Shepherd my sheep.” And finally, Jesus said, ” Tend or feed my sheep. So loving God is to take care, to feed, to protect, to look after and to sacrifice even your life for the safety of the flock. “What we do to any one of these, you do to Me” which are feeding the hungry, giving water to the thirsty etc. We help those in need, we are loving God. 4. Do good and be rich in good deeds. Paul commanded Timothy to remind the Christians to do good and to be rich in good deeds. To support those who preach the good news, for they deserved their wages. Remember that only good deeds will follow us, not our worldy wealth. So when we do good, we are helping to get rid of evil. It is war between good and evil. When we do God, we are supporting God’s battle against evil. So on which side are we? If we say we love God, we should be fight against evil. Those who labor in the Word, the pastors or who preach the word deserve their financial support. The tithes and offering are for them and the needy. 6. King David was a man after God’s heart. What did he do? He was a good repentant. He meditates upon God’s word day and night. He praise and honor God. He longs to dwell in the house of the Lord. He was full of thanksgiving. Just to know what he did will help us to know what we need to do to show that we love God. So all these efforts point to the fact that we love God. Myself in particular, I want to do something like that. I want to have the highest earning job, buy me a great car, a big house and have all the things that can supply me all the things that I would need. Or some will aim to be a millionare before they reach 30 years old. Tell me, who has no such thoughts? Everyone has. When Jesus mentioned these words, He appeared to warn us on a number of things. The first thing is, such things could lead us into worries and troubles. Do we really need so much since God will provide just enough for us? The sparrows are taken care of by God. We are always thinking and going for the extras. The second thing is, we are going towards selfcenteredness. Soon we will think that everything that we have is due to our own effort. Pride is coming in. Ego is setting in. When all these things come in, we will not even think of God. Why? Because think we have everything. The third thing of course is we will want to stay put. What do I mean by this. If you have so much property, do you think you would want to leave them behind? Paul reminded us to always look up and look forward to heaven. When we have our sights upwards, we will not be tempted to stay put in this world. The book of proverbs reminds us that when we die, our material wealth will not follow us. However, for those of us who dream big, why not we build bigger barns so that we can share to more people? So that we can feed the hungry and help the sick? The Bible is full of dreams and visions. God speaks to man in dreams or visions. He spoke to the Prophets and many others in the Bible. He speaks to believers and non believers a like. He spoke to Abimelech in a dream so that he does not take Sarah. He spoke to Nebuchadnezzar and the Pharoah. There are 3 types of dreams; 1. Spiritual dreams or visions from God. 2. Our own natural soulful dreams from our daily activities. 3. From an evil heart or the devil, where the heart is full of deceit and wickedness. The main functions of dreams or visions are mentioned in Job 33. To instruct man and to prevent man from being destroyed by his own sins. There are plenty of that in the Bible where God instruct people to do this or that or go here or there. God instruct Joseph to take Mary as his wife and also to go to Egypt with the baby Jesus. God convicts us in our dreams because of our pride of not listening to others. He convicts us and not condemning us. He tells us our wrong first. This shows how merciful God is.God uses dreams and vision to tell what is going to happen in the future. The Book of Daneil and Revelation are some examples. We cannot see the spiritual realms but God will reveal to us, especially in spiritual warfare. Sometimes God uses symbols and we have to interpret based on Biblical principles, for instant, King Nebucharnezzar dreamed of a huge tree which was being chopped down. It was about himself of being removed. House or tent represent ourselves. Fish is people or ministry. Driving in a vehicle or flying means we are in a ministry. Snake or serpent represent the devil. Storms or floods? Remember the foolish man who build his house upon the sand? Dreams or visions are mainly about ourselves, unless there are instruction from God. It can reveal our character or sins in our lives. We have to be careful not to always think that it is a revelation about others. If we see someone, perhaps our character is like him. It can reveal dangers or difficulty. Paul saw a man from Macedonia in a dream. So he started his ministry there. A couple had a bad quarrel and the man was chased away from the house by his wife. Attempt to reconcile them by the church leaders were futile. But I saw something in a vision. I went to the house and prayed to get rid of the serpent there. We called the couple, held both hands and I prayed for them. They were restored to each other. Without the vision, I would not have known what to do next. Dreams and visions reveal the activities of the Holy Spirit( Joel 2: 28 /Acts 2:17) so it is not something that we can ignore. We have to interpret by asking God to help us. All dreams must be interpreted based on Biblical principles. God sometimes give an answer in dreams or visions. So don’t ignore dreams that make an impression. We can write it down, pray about it so that God will tell us what to do next. I love fishing, since I was a small boy. Basically I know how to fish. Most of Jesus’ disciples were fishermen. When Jesus asked them to follow Him and become fishers of men, it was not difficult for them to understand. He understood what they we had been doing and they too will understand what it means by fishers of man. Fishing is to catch a fish. We can use all kinds of methods to catch a fish. The important thing is, to lay our hands on a fish and thats it. It is not easy to catch a fish with our bare hands. Some of the fish are slippery or dangerous even. Some we can catch with our hand but some are not. Like wise, it is not easy to fish men for the Kingdom of God too. Some would be easy but some are not. God’s word and God will be the One who will persuade the heart of men. Many people use all kinds to trick to catch men. Many people are discouraged because they cannot catch any fish in their ministry. the Word of God and let the Holy Spirit do the rest. We just be obedient to His calling or His Word. When we do not catch any fish, it is because we are depending on our own effort. Perhaps we take all the credit for ourselves! We think that it is due to our ability that people come to God. Remember God gives us gifts which can be used to catch people for God. The special gift does not belong to us. When God gives us the gift of healing, people are caught because of the healing- but that gift of healing is from God and not ourselves. A generous Christian can make a lot of catch through his giving. When we share what we have with the needy, the person at the hand of such kindness will be caught. Many people accept Christ because of the love that they received for Christians. So, not necessary we must go to Bible school first. Any Christians can be fishers of men. So there are many ways to be fishers of men. Let God gives us the ability and we will be fishers of men. What do we learn from Moses? We know he did not take pride in being brought up in the Palace. In fact he left it. He told God that he could not speak like his brother, but nevertherless he complied and did what God wanted him to do. He did what God asked him to do. Basically, he was humble because of obedience. He was like any other in many ways but he did what God asked of him. He also listened to his father-in-law to reorganize and empower other people. Frankly speaking, obedience is a barometer for humility. We who refused to do something when asked by our superior is because of resentment. We did not want others to have a better of us. It is also disagreement, because we think that our ideas are better. We do not follow the directive because the person who asked us to do so is a person we did not acknowledge as our boss. It is personal pride that prevents us from doing what others want us to do. The heart of man actually want to be better than others. He wants fame, wealth and position. These will make him refuse to submit to anyone. It is personal pride also to refuse duties or reponsibility. Why is this so? Because we do not want to have anything to do with other people. Because we want to be free and not be subject to the will of men. We want to avoid criticism because we do not want to be seen as faulty or failure. We do not want others to make negative comments so as to shame us. The only way is not to accept responsibility. This is pride, not humility. Some people said that they cannot do it saying they are not good enough. We think that that is humility, but actually he is trying to avoid responsibility. But the heart of man will change if God’s love dwells in him and change him. If the Spirit of God dwells in us, we will know what true love is. True love brings humility in our heart. Have you ever felt jealous when someone else did something better than you? Or have you ever felt being happy for someone who did something good? Jealousy is part of pride; we do not want others to be better than us. When we want others to be better than us, love is evident. Submission to the will of God, whom we cannot see is humility. Learn to love so that we will experience humility. Many of us love fishing. When I was younger, I love to catch fish, using fishing nets, fishing hooks, basket etc. When I was a primary school student, i remembered having fished many catfish from a small stream that was rising due to heavy rain. I caught the same spesis of fish. They came out of their holes as the waters were rising. I was there at the right time. The catch really surprised me. And mind you, the circumstance was not the same. It was raining, the water of the small stream was rising steadily resulting in the fish coming out from their hiding places. Before the rain, you will not believe that there were fish that many there. Simon Peter and his friends casted the nets many times but to no avail. Not even a fish was caught. Not until some one called him from the shore to cast the net again. When he did just that, there were many fish. In all, 153 in number. Peter told Him he had cast the net before but there were no fish. Since you asked, I will do it. Many at times, we want things to be done just like before. We are used to do things that we are used to. We prefer to repeat the same thing over and over hoping to get something different. One reason why we refuse something different is we are happy with what we have and knew. We do want something different but we do not want to change. The problem with us is we do not want to try new ways, new situation or new development. We just want to do something that are familiar and repeated because we already can anticipate the outcome. I caught a lot of fish in a different setting where I have to stand in the rain. Peter obeyed Jesus even though, earlier, he casted the net but there was no fish. He just did what Jesus asked. He was astonished at the catch. Our spiritual life is like that too. In the ministry, we had become unfruitful- no one received Christ and even our spiritual life is no longer moving forward. If this happen, it is because we just do not want to move into something that we are not familiar with. Most of the time, we have been used to do something that we are used to doing, example our experience. We say we have done these and that before, so we refuse new ideas or new ways. Perhaps, if we set aside our ego or pride and listen to others, perhaps we will experience new things again. We Christians are thinking of performing sign and wonders, ministering to thousands of people and being invited everywhere to share the Word of God, which of course are good. However, not many will be given such opportunity by God. The problem is, when we want to expect ourselves to do have ” power gifts” as some call them, we tend to wait and wait and do nothing. When we do nothing, nothing is done. When we talk about walking in love as what Paul meant, he is telling us to live it everyday and not to wait for the big Bang! Paul made it clear in 1 Corinthians 13: 1-13, where he says that the greatest is love. True, the greatest is love- that is why Jesus came to die for us. All because of God’s love. When Christ came, there were many things that he was willing to sacrifice. First, He was willing to forgive us inspite of what we have done. How many of us have forgiven those who hurt us right now? Some Christians could not see eye to eye with one another because they are not willing to forgive others. Some keep grudge or keep the wrong of others so much so that hatred prevail. But the moment we forgive others, many good things happen. Secondly God is patient with us. He is still knocking on our doors. How patient are we with others. Thirdly, Jesus went about doing good. He healed the broken hearted, he healed the sick, he cast out demons and He fed the hungry. Fourthly, he came to save others. But here we are, those not with us are being driven away. To many of us, our ministry for God is to lead comfortable life isn’t it. How many of us are willing to give a glass of cold water to the needy? But we are used to give something but not to the needy, but to those who came pay us back. Giving a glass of cold water to the needy, God says, is giving a glass of cold water to God. To many, this act is the least but to God nothing is not important in His eyes. Every little effort that we do for God is not in vain. Some of us do not want to do this because we regard it as unimportant. But this act of love is far greater than what we read in the first 4 verses of 1 Corinthians 13. How do we walk in love? Immitate Christ and we will not go wrong. I have a fruit garden. In it, I grew different kinds of fruit trees. We have durian, rambutans etc. Because I love durian, i planted durian trees so that I would have durian fruits. The verse above is about fruits. A good person of course will bear good fruits. Good things will come out of that person. Likewise, a bad person will not do good things too. Just like a durian tree cannot bear other types of fruit except durian fruits. Until the tree produce fruit, we won’t know whether it will bear fruit until you see the flowers and fruits. People are like a tree. We can hide what is in us but eventually people will be able to see our deeds and conduct. These are the ones that will tell who we really are. The same to the different faiths or religions of the world. How do we know they are true or fake? By the fruits. What do the believers do? Good or bad? We will be able to know by their deeds. We can always ask those people about why they say their faith is good but the fruits are bad? A friend of mine confronted a hindu and a muslim. He asked them, what did their religion changed in their life? Did their religion brought good change in them or not. One admitted no and the other just walk away. Jesus Christ is the truth and anyone who find and believe in Jesus will know what is the truth and will live in the truth. One of the changes Jesus bring is speaking the truth. We can also know whether a person is truly saved or not. This verse is telling to check our own self. If we keep on bearing bad fruits, it is because we haven’t changed yet. So it is self evaluation also. I believe that what the verse tells us is to be careful in our choice of faiths or friends and also to check ourselves because we do not want to be stopped at the gate of heaven after thinking that we expected to get through. We should be able to know about something without getting a second opinion. We must be able to discern so that we are not easily be misled. The Bible has all the answers, so we need to read and understand more. ” YOU WILL BE JUDGED ACCORDING TO YOUR CONDUCT AND YOUR ACTION” declares the Lord. Many years ago, i dreamed that my hair had turned white. I was wondering why, on that occasion, my hair had turned white, in that dreamed. Then a few days later, i realized that I had made one of the most important spiritual decision ever. God had indicated that He had given me wisdom for that particular time. In fact, when i was young I wonder why British judges wear white wigs on their head when they execute judgment. We will be judge according to our conduct and action. When? When we die because our spirit and soul will meet with God. If we are permited into the City of God, meaning we are forgiven and not condemned. Our conduct is our attitude, our response and our thoughts. In fact, our conduct portrays what we have decided in our hearts. Are we supportive of God’s ministries or not. Are we showing negative conducts that will discourage others? What did we say to others today? We will also be judged according to our actions. Our actions refer to our deeds or what we do. In Revelation, God says, ” Their deeds will follow them.” Why are their deeds following them when they die? Our earthly wealth will not follow us but our deeds that made us acquire such wealth will follow us. Because we are going to face the Ultimate Judge- God Himself. That will be terrible, isn’t it. How can escape from God? The soul that sins will die. What is the punishment? Second death in the lake of fire, with the devil and all those who reject Jesus. We must be wondering why Jesus was hanged. He was hanged so that all the punishment that we are supposed to receive at judgment day is put upon Him, on our behalf. Those who believe and received Him will be forgiven of their sinful actions and deeds. There will be no condemnation for those who believe and receive Jesus as Lord and saviour. That is God’s promise. Jesus is our lawyer acceptable to God the Father. Take Jesus as our lawyer and Savior. There is no other. We can only be saved from the coming wrath if Jesus is our advocate. No one can live without water. Water is a necessity of life. Go without water and we will die. The above verse tells us about the Spirit who gives life to all those who receive Christ as Lord and Saviour. Jesus said that those who believes in Him, streams of living water will flow from within him, meaning the Holy Spirit. That is why every believer is given a new life which is eternal life. And what else will happen to the believer? The river of life flow bringing healing to him in the inside. When it overflows, we bring healing to the others. Jesus invites us to drink water that will quench our thirst. What is this water? The psalmist says in chapter 1 verses 1-3, that whosoever read and meditate upon the Word of God day and night is like a tree planted by the water, where it will bear fruits and will not wilther but will prosper. So reading the Word of God is drinking from the Holy Spirit. Having fellowship with God. Namaan was asked to dip 7 times in the Jordan, not once, in order to be healed. So we need to read the Bible and meditate upon it many times to reach the depth. The crystal clear water tells us the purity and righteous nature of God that can transform us. Where this river flows everything lives. What is so free than water? Jesus is the light of the world. When he came down, there were a number of things he did. He went about preaching the word and healing the sick and casting out evil spirits. He did many things for the people, before he was crucified and died. Then He rose again. Likewise, we are now the light of the world. How? First, we have been forgiven, cleansed by the Blood of the Lamb and destined to do good works, just like what Jesus did. If we are a lamp, then there must be something to be done first. First: It has to have an oil. To shine, we must have the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit in us. He is the One who will transmit His light in us. Without Him we are nothing. Once we have accepted Christ, He is in us, and we need to obey Him and follow His leading. We need to be annointed and sent. That is we are being lighted for service. The only thing a lighted lamp is of use is during night time or when it is dark. In other words, we must bring it to where it is difficult to see. That is, we must put it where there is darkness. Where the gospel is yet to be heard, that is where we put the light. We need to go out to places where the gospel is yet heard. We need to go where the people have yet to know about God. To sustain, we need to be refilled with the Word of God. We need to have a deep relationship with God and we need others to encourage and help us. What makes us shine? Righteousness needs to increase, because righteousness leads us to do good work or deeds. Only good can produce the good. Only an apple tree will produce apple. A bad thing cannot bear good thing. Those who are increased in righteousness will shine like stars. Our good deeds are the light. Good deeds only point to something. When some one does good, it points to something that has transformed a person. Man cannot change himself without God. So when we do good, it speaks louder than words. It points to God as the cause of the transformation. It glorifies God when we do good deeds or work. Why, because only God is good. When we live in the truth, speak the truth and do what is truthful and right, everyone will know. In fact, the reason we do good is because of Love.Love is the fuel that cause us to serve others and do good things. Love is of God and God is love. When we practice love, that is when we shine. We bring others to Christ without speaking to convince people. Our good works attract others to the kingdom. So do we need to be eloquent? Famous? or wealthy? No! The story of Jesus calming a storm is a very familiar story in the three Gospels. Jesus had been teaching the crowd and when evening came, Jesus decided to go to the other side of the lake with his disciples. They boarded a boat and left the crowd. On the way, a storm appeared while Jesus was sleeping and the frightened disciples woke up Jesus. Jesus commanded the storm to stop and it stopped. The diciples were astonished. Even the storm obeyed Jesus. Life is a journey towards a destination. Life on earth begins at birth and ends with death of the physical body. The spiritual body or spirit enters either heaven of hell. These are the two destinations that we are heading towards. Heaven is on the other side. Our life is like a ship or a boat. The ship must move towards that destination, that is heaven. AS LIKE any ship that cross the ocean or sea towards a destination, is our life also heading towards death and our final destination. Is there any sea without storms or calm? Is there any seas without waves? Is there any seas without hidden menace? The same to life. In this life, according to Scriptures, there will be trials and difficulties. There will be troubles. There will be tribulations, but there is also peace. There will be a period of calm but there is also a period of roughness. Looking at a ship, the success is reaching the destination without sinking. The ship might be badly bruised, battered but that does not matter. What matters is it reaches its destination. Our life will be wounded, bruised and badly damaged but the spirit does not waver. It is steadfast in the faith. There will be great difficulties but the trust and faith in Jesus Christ remain strong and steadfast until the end. What is important is to finish the race, to reach heaven. If we look at sailing ship in the past, they depend on the wind, especially strong winds to push the sail. We also need storms to ensure our faith in Jesus is tested and strong. So without srong winds or storms, the ship is not tested. To reach the pearly shores of heaven, we need Jesus to be in our boat or ship. If Jesus is in our boat, we need not fear. That depend on us to receive Jesus as our Lord and Saviour. We need to welcome him in our heart. We must restore the temple of God in us so that there is life of worship in our life. We need Jesus in our life to enable us to withstand the test of time. Is Jesus in your life now? I remembered many years ago, when my friends in Limbang was told that I had died due to sickness. In fact, my family went back home for a two week holiday. When we returned to Limbang, where i worked, some of the people saw me and was shocked because a few days earlier, someone told that i had died. My church members also told us what they had heard. Based on our tradition, i will have a long life. Death will eventualy come to everyone and people will talk about us when we die. Death will come and we cannot deny it or avoid it. So rather than avoid it, we better face the reality. The Prophet Isaiah told King Hezekiah to ” Put your house in order because surely you will die soon.” God wants us to prepare to die because when we are prepared to die, only then are we prepared to live. What to prepare? We must know that there is judgement waiting for everyone of us. God will judge us based on how we live while on earth. The Word of God teaches us to receive Jesus as our Lord and Saviour. Then we will not perish but have everlasting life( John 3:16). There is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. So this we must put right. We must be an overcomer, as in the book of Revelation. We must seek righteousness and not live in sins. Only those who had his robes washed clean will enter heaven. Do not deceive ourselves thinking that what we think and not what God think is okay. We must not take for granted that everything is fine, when in fact we have not really given our lives to God. Finishing strong or finishing the fight is what Paul mentioned. Life is like a race, to be won. We might have started wrongly but we must end correctly. What matters is the end, not the beginning. Do not dwell in the past glories. Remember what counts is what happens at the finishing line. Whatever we tie on earth is tied in heaven. Forgive others and do not keep grudge against others. Jesus ask us to ask for the forgiveness of those we had sins. We aslo need to forgive those who sins against us. We must make every effort to be at peace with all men. Our sins will find us and testify against us on the last day if we do not untie every cords of sins in us. So do not deny death or try to avoid this subject. We must face it and get it right because after we have died, we cannot relive another life on earth. Naomi lost her husband and eventually her two sons. He would have lost her properties had not God allowed her daughter-in-law, Ruth to marry Boaz, who eventually redeemed them. Naomi said to her people, I went away full but came back empty. God had allowed affliction upon her life. Job was even worst, he lost everything he as except his wife. He lost 10 children. All because God allowed satan to torment him. Naomi and Job had terrible storms of life. These are troubles that we will face in our life journey. The Bible says that we will have trouble but I have overcome, said Jesus. The apostles had all kinds of trouble and dangers and some died at the hands of wicked men. Jesus also suffered. From our reading, God knows what we are going through and He allowed them- to refine us, to test us, to rid evil in our hearts, to prune us, to get us back to Him. That is what a loving father will do to his children. God gives us the storm so that we will know that only He is the shelter. The reason why many people cannot accept what happened to them is because of their self-centeredness. I was like that in the beginning. Refuse to admit my weakness, thinking that i should not be done like this! because i don’t deserve it. That is what we always think. We always think that others should be the one not us. That is what our self is. We want to be better, we want to be the best, we want to be praised, we don’t want to be seen as weak, or poor. That is our real self. That is what God wants us to be rid off so that we will be teachable, humble and respectful. We need to acknowledge that God is sovreign and we are nothing at all, nor can we deserve anything. When we do this, the pain is lifted from our heart. Inspite of that, he will bandage or heal us. He will comfort us as the Scriptures promised. He will not allow us to be tempted beyond our means. He allowed the storms of life to come so that we will not perish. He also wants us to be refined so that we will be able to serve Him better. He wants us to bear more fruits. He does not want any of us to be lost. As our ship sails through the dark seas to the pearly heavenly shores. Our sails might be battered, but Jesus will be with us. after all, He is in us. He will not let us sink to the bottom of the dark seas. Jesus is our anchor. He is the anchor of our souls. If you read about John the Baptist in the Gospels, you will see that he was the first person to baptize anyone. He became so popular that everyone went to hear him and repented. Those who repented were then baptized. Eventually, he has disciples. John knew and testified that he was sent a head of Jesus to prepare the way. In our time, such popularity would have made us proud, wealth and happy. But John was not. He sticked to what God had planned for him. He shun the worldy life, he just live a simple life in the wilderness, living on honey and wearing animal skin. He rebuked and many were baptized. Then Jesus came. He baptized Jesus and told his own disciples that Jesus is the Messiah, and not him. SOON Jesus’s asked His disciples to baptize people. When John’s disciples to him that the people are flocking towards Jesus, John told them that he must decrease but Jesus must increase. He knew where he was. In our days, we would have been dissapointed, envious or angry when someone are doing better than us, or attracting more attention than us. We would have given up and even leave the ministry. We would not like other people to be more successful. But John told his disciple to follow Jesus and not him. John did not prevent them. He had to disappear from the scene. He had done his part and he recognized that even before he started his ministry. What about us? When we received Jesus as our Lord and saviour, God lives in us. But do we let God increase in our life or are we trying to increase ourselves more? Are we trying to take what we know belongs to God, especially the glory and honour? Do we acknowledge God’s power and grace in our lives or are we claiming all the glory to ourselves? Sometimes we attribute what we have , our resourcefulness and wealth to ourselves. We say that all are due to our effort. That is increasing ourself and not God. We boast of what we achieve and we become proud. The Bible tells us that whatever belongs to us is from God. We need to glorify God more and more and not be silent about it, but rather to be thankful to God for His providence and grace. What is joy? Joy means being in the state of being very happy. A joyful person portrays a lively positive character. The person smiles or even laugh easily. It is easy to dectect a joyful person. He or she is cheerful. There is reasons for people to be joyful. Most likely someone gave something that he or she likes. May be the person had found friendship, promotion, wealth etc. When a person is joyful, there is normally a good reason behind it. When Jesus spoke about true happiness and joy, He was refering to the person having known and received Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. True happiness is from deep within us, where God will communicate within us of His love and peace. When we know that God loves us, and we are forgiven and given eternal life, we have real joy in us. Here God says that real joy is in Christ Jesus. Not in material possessions, beautiful spouses etc but in Jesus Christ. World wealth, promotion, friendship do make us happy but, unfortunately these are temporary and does not satisfy us like Jesus. Why must we be joyful? If Christ is in us, we should be joyful because what we ever need is in Jesus Christ! We need to know that we are bound for eternal life. We have privileges as children of God. When a person is joyful, his joy will transmit to the others. Joy is contagious. It brings life to an otherwise gloomy situations. It is a testimony of finding freedom in Christ where our worries and anxieties of life are no more because we have put our trust in God. What will a joyful person do? He or she will easily be brought to sing praises unto God. A joyful person can easily sing. When a person is sad, he or she is most likely not willing to sing. A person full of joy is very generous. That is why the Holy Scriptures asks us to give cheerfully. A cheerful giver gives freely. It is the joy that enables him to give without being force to. Joyful people is ever willing to help others. They sometimes volunteer to do something. It is not difficult to ask people who are joyful to do some kind of work. They are very willing to help. That is why Paul ask the Thessalonians to be joyful always. If you are in the company of joyful people, it is a wonderful experience. Everything is positive. A joyful person is very open to others. He or she easily accepts teaching or rebuke. That is why a joyful person does not harbour grudges. Normally what makes a person angry, gloomy or passive is due to the person keeping the wrong of others and not wanting to forgive others for their wrong. These makes us unhappy or what some people called in”bad mood.” Our outer character is influenced by what is inside us. No one wants to sit with an angry person, a gloomy character or a bad character. These does not give a good picture of a true Christian. If we are to shine for Christ, it is our character- love, joy and peace that will draw others to God. If we ever want to draw others for Christ, we must have the character of Christ in us. The Bible says, “but the fruit of the Spirit is love joy and peace.” If the Spirit of God is truly in us, we should have love peace and joy. These and some others make up the true love that only God gives. As a conclusion, joy is part of the true Christian character. Joy emits love, peace and generousity. It welcomes others and is willing to be of service to others. When we have joy of heaven in us, we have everything. Be joyful always. A farmer sowed a basket of padi grains, he harvested about a hundred bags from it at the end of the year. Another sowed 2 baskets of padi grains and he harvested 200 bags of padi at the end of the year. So it depends on the amount or the number of what we sow or plant. If we do not plant, we do not harvest. If we do not sow anything, don’t expect anything coming to us. You ask a farmer, he will agree. Its about willingness to sow more to get more harvest. Jesus gave an illustration about the trees and its fruits. If we plant a durian tree, you will expect to eat a durian fruit from it. Not an apple from a durian tree. This principle applies to our life. We do good things, we get good things. Be kind with your neighbour, he will be kind to you. You scream at your neighbour, he will do the same too. Talk bad about somebody, someone will do the same to us. How do we harvest righteousness? Sowing truth in our life. The tragedy taught me a lot. We received so much from people we do not know and people we know. I had never thought that people will be touched by simple kindess that we gave a a teacher. If you are a teacher, you are going to help people change their life for the better. Sometimes, you buy this and that for your students out of your own pocket. During your difficult times, those you had helped will not forget you. God cannot be mocked. God had already set this principle. It depends on us. We do good, we receive what is good. Do not expect blessings if you do not bless. Do not think of receiving much we we do not give much. Did anyone showed dislike to us? What’s the reason? Many people, including myself want more and more, and some are so angry if they are not given…but do we ever think, why do we demand more when we refuse to give? As a head teacher, we handle many cases of indiscipline. Fights do happen. It begins doing something bad to somebody. It will end in quarrel and eventually fights. We do something bad to somebody, somebody will retaliate! The principle applies to our life. We don’t expect to have peaceful life if we live a wild kind of life. We smoke, we ourselves will reap the side effect of smoking. We teach ourselves to dislike other people, it will grow into fruition- hatred. I told my students and congregation that many people wnat to get the best in life but they never do good things. Only good things come from good deeds. Don’t expect good things from the bad things that we do. God cannot be decieved. We start bad, we will reap what is bad. Bad fruits come from bad trees. So what must we do with our lives to gain good harvests? Its that easy if we follow the principle of reaping what we sow. Change our mind set by doing what is good and we will get what is good. 1. Invite blessings upon us. Have you ever been bless by your parents? Our culture seems to make us not willing to bless others. Isaac blessed his children. Are we doing the same? But if we ever give something to someone that will help that person, do you thing he or she will curse you? It also makes us prosperous in many ways. Our act infact make us friends with those whom we had help. They would surely pray for us. They could bless us. An act of giving will always be remembered for life. A very wealthy man was asked by my brother, how he could have so much wealth. And he said, ” I provide work and opportunity for people to help themselves, and they in turn will help me. I had helped them, that is why they are looking after the business well. 2. Our giving refreshes others. It makes people happy. It motivates people to help others. When we give, somebody will benefit. For instance, a kind word will encourage others. If we give in kinds, it will of benificial in many ways. The person will be even more thankful to us because we are giving him options. They will surely help you if they have the opportunity, but we are not looking at that.
2019-04-21T10:21:43Z
http://www.lifespring-buedulun.net/short-sermon/
India is the second fastest growing economy of the world but along with an ascendant economy comes a mounting hunger for energy. So the energy policy has to be made keeping in mind all the standards required to meet the needs of such a developing country with a gigantic population. As such India’s energy needs are likely to balloon over the coming decades. India, the world’s fifth biggest energy consumer, is projected to surpass Japan and Russia to take third place by 2030. Doing so will test India’s ability to create a domestic policy for its semi-privatized energy sector, as well as its capacity to develop relationships with foreign energy exporters. Already, surging energy demand is outstripping supply, raising hard questions about how India will cope in the future. Despite vast coal reserves, domestic production has lagged behind demand for ten years, and the shortfall is growing. In such a situation India has to take necessary steps to increase the availability of affordable energy. Presently our energy policy is largely defined by the country’s burgeoning energy deficit and increased focus on developing alternative sources of energy, particularly nuclear, solar and wind energy. But intermittent energy like solar and wind power—is mathematically impossible. So in this paper we would like to deal with the aspects of utilizing nuclear energy as a source to balance this deficit. Our first Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru recognized early that nuclear technology offered a tremendous potential for economic development, especially for a developing country aspiring to leapfrog technology gaps brought about by long years of colonial exploitation. Nuclear energy originates from the splitting of uranium atoms in a process called fission. At the power plant, the fission process is used to generate heat for producing steam, which is used by a turbine to generate electricity. Although nuclear plants also have a high capital cost but to balance it the operating cost is very low. There is a lot of risk up front but once the plant is running, over a certain lifespan it more than pays for itself. It should also be kept in mind that its alternatives like wind energy and solar energy costs between 3 and 20 times more than nuclear. Nuclear energy has perhaps the lowest impacts on environment, especially in relation to kilowatts produced because nuclear plants do not emit harmful gases and require a relatively small area for production. It can be termed as a clean source of energy as there are no significant adverse effects to land, water, habitat, species and air resources. This can have major effects on agriculture, environment as well as trade of the country. Knowing the fact that India is agriculture based country, energy Our farmers know that over the years their demand for energy has gone up. Our farmers need power for their pump sets to irrigate their fields. Many farming operations are now getting mechanized and these machines need electricity. But it is an unfortunate fact that we are unable to meet this growing demand. Most of our people still lives without regular and reliable power supply. But with the evolution of nuclear energy we may set this up. With the development of such a source of clean and renewable energy, environment also seems to strengthen up. Any means of producing electricity involves some wastes and environmental hazard. But the nuclear industry is unique in that it is the only energy-producing industry that has taken full responsibility for the disposal of all its wastes and meets the full cost of doing so without even contributing to global warming. This will also have effect on trade as it seems to empower the relations between different countries making bilateral agreements.Generations of different trade relations will gear up the rate of foreign direct investment in different sectors of the economy which will directly result into the fulfilment of the needs of common citizens of the country. The first milestone in the pathway of the development of Atomic energy in the country was achieved in the year 1948,with the establishment of Atomic Energy Commission for framing policies in respect of development of atomic energy in the country. Further the department of Atomic energy was established in the year 1954. Since then India has been continuously trying to mould its ways towards the generation of nuclear energy within the country itself. How does a nuclear power plant functions? The purpose of a nuclear power plant is to produce electricity. It should not be surprising that a nuclear power plant has many similarities to other electrical generating facilities. It should also be obvious that nuclear power plants have some significant differences from other plants.In a nuclear power plant, many of the components are similar to those in a fossil-fueled plant, except that the steam boiler is replaced by a Nuclear Steam Supply System (NSSS). The NSSS consists of a nuclear reactor and all of the components necessary to produce high pressure steam, which will be used to turn the turbine for the electrical generator. Like a fossil-fueled plant, a nuclear power plant boils water to produce electricity. But unlike a fossil-fueled plant, the nuclear plant’s energy does not come from the combustion of fuel, but from the fissioning(splitting) of fuel atoms. There are two basic types of reactor plants being used to produce electricity, the boiling water reactor (BWR) and the pressurized water reactor (PWR). Both boiling water reactor and pressurized water reactor fuel assemblies consist of the same major components. These major components are the fuel rods, the spacer grids, and the upper and lower end fittings. The fuel rods contain the ceramic fuel pellets. The fuel rods are approximately 12 feet long and contain a space at the top for the collection of any gases that are produced by the fission process. These rods are arranged in a square matrix ranging from 17 x 17 for pressurized water reactors to 8 x 8 for boiling water reactors. The upper and lower end fittings serve as the upper and lower structural elements of the assemblies. The lower fitting (or bottom nozzle) will direct the coolant flow to the assembly through several small holes machined into the fitting. There are also holes drilled in the upper fitting to allow the coolant flow to exit the fuel assembly. For pressurized water reactor fuel, there will also be guide tubes in which the control rods travel. The guide tubes provide a channel for the movement of the control rods and provide for support of the rods. The boiling water reactor operates in essentially the same way as a fossil-fueled generating plant. Inside the reactor vessel, a steam/water mixture is produced when very pure water (reactor coolant) moves upward through the core absorbing heat. The steam/water mixture leaves the top of the core and enters two stages of moisture separation, where water droplets are removed before the steam is allowed to enter the steam line. The steam line, in turn, directs the steam to the main turbine, causing it to turn the turbine and the attached electrical generator. The unused steam is exhausted to the condenser where it is condensed into water. The resulting water (condensate) is pumped out of the condenser with a series of pumps and back to the reactor vessel. The pressurized water reactor (PWR) differs from the boiling water reactor in that steam is produced in the steam generator rather than in the reactor vessel. The pressurizer keeps the water that is flowing through the reactor vessel under very high pressure (more than 2,200 pounds per square inch) to prevent it from boiling, even at operating temperatures of more than 600EF. To operate properly, all steam plants, whether nuclear or fossil-fueled, need a circulating water system to remove excess heat from the steam system in order to condense the steam, and transfer that heat to the environment. The circulating water system pumps water from the environment (river, lake, ocean) through thousands of metal tubes in the plant’s condenser. Steam exiting the plant’s turbine is very rapidly cooled and condensed into water when it comes in contact with the much cooler tubes. Since the tubes provide a barrier between the steam and the environment, there is no physical contact between the plant’s steam and the cooling water. Because a condenser operates at a vacuum, any tube leakage in this system will produce an “inflow” of water into the condenser rather than an “outflow” of water to the environment. Our farmers know that over the years their demand for energy has gone up. Our farmers need power for their pump sets to irrigate their fields. Many farming operations are now getting mechanized and these machines need electricity. Rural households need electricity. But it is an unfortunate fact that we are unable to meet this growing demand. Most of our people still live in villages without regular and reliable power supply. The Government has committed itself under Bharat Nirman and Rajiv Gandhi VidyutikaranYojana to ensure complete electricity connectivity across the country. Nuclear power is clean, safe, reliable, compact, competitive and practically inexhaustible. Today over 400 nuclear reactors provide base-load electric power in 30 countries. Fifty years old, it is a relatively mature technology with the assurance of great improvement in the next generation. One gram of uranium yields about as much energy as a ton of coal or oil.It is the famous “factor of a million”. Nuclear waste is correspondingly about a million times smaller than fossil fuel waste, and it is totally confined. Nuclear energy produces almost no carbon dioxide, and no sulfur dioxide or nitrogen oxides whatsoever. These gases are produced in vast quantities when fossil fuels are burned. So it is eco- friendly and helpful for the society as it emits less emission and does not hamper the environment as such. Today the radiations obtained from nuclear energy are used in Industries, Health sector, Agriculture and other important sectors of the economies. Radiation from radio-isotopes and from accelerators has a variety of applications, including health care, agriculture, food preservation, industry and research. Research reactors at Trombay regularly produce a variety of radio-isotopes and meet a major part of the demand in the country. In addition to research reactors, power reactors too have been equipped to produce cobalt-60. Work on the development of accelerators is being pursued at Centre for Advanced Technologies (CAT), Indore, and at BARC. Development of radiation technology applications is a major thrust area in the R&D programme at BARC. These applications are being commercialized by the Board of Radiation and Isotope Technology (BRIT). THE VARIABLE ENERGY CYCLOTRON CENTRE:-The Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre (VECC) at Kolkata has been operating the nation’s largest and the first indigenously built Cyclotron in the country, providing charged particle beams of various energies. It has been serving the research needs of a distinguished community of scientists belonging to 36 national laboratories and universities. The facilities include those for in vitro studies like RIA and IRMA, gamma cameras for diagnostic and 4MeV LINAC for therapy. Radio-pharmaceuticals and other preparations for these and several other medical Centre’s in the country are regularly supplied by BRIT. Tata Memorial Centre (TMC), a fully autonomous institute aided by the DAE, provides comprehensive treatment for cancer and allied diseases and is one of the best internationally. It carries out a vast number of patient investigations every year (about 800,000 pathological investigations in 1999-2000). Application of radiation to agriculture has resulted in the release of 22 improved varieties of seeds, which are contributing directly to the increase of GDP in the country. Of these mutant varieties, black gram (urad) accounts for 95 per cent of the cultivation of this pulse in the State of Maharashtra. At an all-India level, four BARC black gram varieties account for over 49 per cent of the total national breeder seed indent of all the black gram varieties taken together breeder seed indent. At a conservative estimate, these varieties constitute a GDP of over Rs.10,000 million per year. Research done in BARC and other Centre’s in the world, has clearly demonstrated the advantages of food preservation by irradiation, and the Government of India has cleared several items for radiation processing. Setting up of such plants is expected to reduce the percentage of food that is lost due to various causes and provide the means for improving food hygiene and facilitate export. Over 6,000 technicians have been trained in the use of radiography and they have found employment in India and abroad, where the certification provided by BARC is well recognized. BARC has also developed many applications using electron beam machines, for radiation processing of products such as cross-linking of polyethylene insulation, heat shrinkable, and vulcanization of natural rubber. Therefore Nuclear power is safe, as proven by the record of half a century of commercial operation, with the accumulated experience of more than 12,000 reactor in these years. There have been only two serious accidents in the commercial exploitation of nuclear power: Three Mile Island in 1979 (in Pennsylvania, USA) and Chernobyl in 1986 (in the Soviet Union, now in Ukraine).Nuclear reactors provide base-load power and are available over 90% of the time; an interval between refueling has been extended and down time for refueling has been reduced. Uranium is found everywhere in the crust of the Earth and it is more abundant than tin, for example Major deposits are found in Canada and Australia. It is estimated that increasing the market price by a factor ten would result in 100 times more uranium coming to market. Eventually we will be able to recover uranium from sea water where 4 billion tons are dissolved. So nuclear energy has a wide impact on the society and on the life of the people as it is inexhaustible and competitive, reliable and safe. Environment Protection laws have been enacted to further two primary goals: preventing irreparable environmental damage and forcing the consideration of environmental values into all realms of private and commercial activities. They reflect a sense of community, wherein the health and safety of individuals are as important as the economic wellbeing of the nation. Energy is the only Universal currency. One of its many forms must be transformed to another in order for stars to shine, planets to rotate, plants to grow, and civilizations to evolve. It is a well-known fact that the production of electric power is a major source of environmental pollution. The burning of fossil fuels create s copious quantities of various criteria pollutants and other pollutants. In the view of some environmentalists, electric power is a major souce of pollution but in societal view, electric power is a resource that has shaped the modern era. So keeping both in mind, we need to find a new way out having the collaboration of both of these view, i.e, to choose that source of energy that least pollutes the environment. So a need arises to look up at different sources of energy and the most desirable is the nuclear energy. It is the only source of energy that can replace a significant part of the fossil fuels (coal, oil and gas) which massively pollute the atmosphere and contribute to the greenhouse effect.If we want to be serious about climate change and the end of oil, we must promote the more efficient use of energy, we must use renewable energies – wind and solar – wherever possible, and adopt a more sustainable life style. But this will not be nearly enough to slow the accumulation of atmospheric CO2, and satisfy the needs of our industrial civilization and the aspirations of the developing nations. Nuclear power should be deployed rapidly to replace coal, oil and gas in the industrial countries, and eventually in developing countries. The pollution of land, air and water all can occur from electric power production. The environmental impacts of electricity prod occur at each stage of energy process.There are environment repercussions from the extraction and processing of energy resources, especially from drilling for oil and gas and from mining for coal. There are environmental costs associated with the combustion of fossil fuels, resulting in emissions that can be harmful to human health and environment. Our industrial civilization runs on energy and 85% of the world’s energy is provided by the fossil fuels, coal, oil and gas. Coal began to be used extensively in Britain when its forests were no longer able to satisfy the energy requirements of an embryo industrialization. Coal is found almost everywhere and reserves should last several centuries. Petroleum began by replacing whale oil at the end of the 19th century, and its use has grown ever since. Discoveries of new deposits are not keeping up with consumption and production of oil is about to peak. At the present rate of consumption, reserves are estimated to last a few decades, but consumption is growing rapidly. More than half the world’s oil production today is located in the fragile and politically unstable area of the Persian Gulf, as is an even greater fraction of our future reserves, Gas was at first a byproduct of oil extraction and it was thrown away. It has since been mastered to become a major source of energy. Reserves are similarly limited and estimated to last for a few decades. But these can have adverse environmental consequences. In burning fossil fuels, we inject 23 billion tons of carbon dioxide every year into the atmosphere – 730 tons per second. Half of it is absorbed in the seas and vegetation, but half remains in the atmosphere. This is significantly altering the composition of the atmosphere and seriously affecting the climate of our planet. This shows that there is a urgent need for an alternative source of energy to keep this planet liveable. The fuller use of commercial nuclear power, if done to exacting standards of safety and protection against proliferation, can play an important role as part of a larger strategy to slow the growth in emissions of the gases that cause global warming. That is because nuclear power emits essentially no carbon dioxide , the most powerful prevalent of these so-called “greenhouse gases”. Some environmentalists often say that we only need to conserve energy and rely upon renewable energies. Solar and wind are the major renewables. We agree, of course, that conservation is highly commendable, even essential. But in the light of the world’s growing population, widespread economic development and comparing the enhanced life expectancy with the finite fossil fuel resources, this conservation can only delay the crisis that will arise from the penury of oil and gas. – As an environmentalist the idea of developing more coal, the most polluting energy source on the planet, and the greatest contributor to global warming, is simply not acceptable. unlikely to be put into wide-spread practice. – One gram of uranium yields about as much energy as a ton of coal or oil – it is the famous “factor of a million”. – Nuclear waste is correspondingly about a million times smaller than fossil fuel waste, and it is totally confined. – The impact nuclear waste on the ecosystem is minimal. Nuclear waste spontaneously decays over time while stable chemical waste, such as arsenic or mercury, lasts forever. – Most fossil fuel waste is in the form of gas that goes up the smokestack. We don’t see it, but it is not without effect, causing global warming, acid rain, smog and other atmospheric pollution. – The cost of nuclear power is competitive and stable. The cost of nuclear fuel is a small part of the price of a nuclear kilo Watt-hour, whereas fossil fuelled power, especially oil and gas, is at the mercy of the market. – Uranium is found everywhere in the crust of the Earth – it is more abundant than tin, for example. Major deposits are found in Canada and Australia. It is estimated that increasing the market price by a factor ten would result in 100 times more uranium coming to market. Eventually we will be able to recover uranium from sea water where 4 billion tons are dissolved. Moving on to the protection of Environment in India, It seems that Government is active in this phase and has taken quite a number of steps towards it including numerous international treaties and agreements. Protocol of 1978 relating to the Inetrnational Conevention for the prevention of pollution from ships. Convention on the conservation of migratory species of wild animals 1979. Convention on the conservation of Antarctic Marine Living resources 1980. United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 1982. Convention for the protection of the Ozone Layer 1985. Protocol on substances that deplete the Ozone Layer 1987. Amendments to the Montreal Protocol on substances that deplete the Ozone layer 1990. Convention on the control of Trans-boundary movements of Hazardous wastes and their disposal 1989. United Nations framework convention on Climate Change 1992. Convention on Biological Diversity 1992. Covention to combat desertification in those countries experiencing serious drought and/or Desertification, particularly in Africa 1994. International Tropical Timber Agreement 1994. Protocol on the Environment Protection and the Antarctica Treaty 1991. Thus it becomes binding on the Government of India to pick that source of energy that favours the environment the most. As is also mentioned in the art 51(c) of the Constitution of India, the state is obliged to foster respect for International Law and Treaty Obligations. The choice of Nuclear energy can be given preference to other forms of energy by the very fact that it pollutes the environment the least and that the Constitution of India imposes a duty on the State and also gives a right to the people. The duty is to protect and improve the environment and to safeguard the forests and wildlife of the country and the right is the Fundamental right to healthy environment. The fundamental right to life has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to mean that every person has a right to a wholesome or healthy environment. The right to life includes the right to enjoy unpolluted air and water. A decent environment with sufficient clean air and water are implicit in the right to life. The right to live with human dignity encompasses clean and healthy environment. Environment Pollution and ecological degradation violate the right to life. Corresponding to the right to a healthy environment is a duty imposed on the state to protect and improve the natural as well as manmade environment.The involvement of the Government can also be seen by the acts it has passed. The Air(Prevention and control of Pollution) Act 1981 was enacted to implement the decision taken at the United Nations Conference on the human Environment in 1972. At the conference it was decided that the participants take appropriate steps for the preservation of natural resources which included the preservation of the quality of air and the control of air pollution. Thus it becomes binding on the state to comply with this and to choose that source of energy that pollutes the environment the least. There are some other acts working in the same direction, such as Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution)Act 1974, Environment Protection Act 1986, Forest (Conservation) Act 1980 and so on.The standards for emission or discharge of environmental pollutants are prescribed by the Environmental (Protection) Rules 1986. For the Third Five Year Plan (1961-66), Prime Minister Nehru and the INC made an adjustment in its economic policies, shifting focus away from “rapid industrialization” over to a program of “self-sustained growth.” At the same time, India’s trade policy shifted from “import substitution” to “efficient substitution of imports,” which in effect opened up new trade opportunities for goods considered crucial to economic growth and development. This adjusted economic policy remained in effect until the end of the Seventh Five Year Plan in 1990. In 1990 and 1991, India was struck by a number of political and economic shocks. But India adopted policies of Liberalisation, Privatisation, and Globalisation in India which further shaped and increased the pace of growth. Today the world is saying India in not an emerging state India has already emerged. This is not because to make India happy or appeased him but because India has emerged as powerful state in the political and trade affairs of Asia. Indian economy is 2nd highest growing economy among the developing countries and India has one of the largest and fastest growing economies in the world. India’s real gross domestic product (GDP) rose by 9.2% in 2006 — a growth rate second only to China among Asian nations. The strong GDP performance in 2006 capped five years of rapid economic expansion, transforming India into the third largest economy in Asia (after Japan and China). Its recent economic success is generally attributed to a combination of internal and external factors. Internally, a series of economic reforms (begun when the current prime minister was finance minister) have stimulated solid growth of India’s manufacturing and service sectors. Externally, a relatively strong global economy, combined with India’s trade and investment liberalization policies, have stimulated increased trade and investment flows to and from India. Since India tested a nuclear explosive in 1974, then in 1998 in Pokhran and after that several US allies has put economic sanction on India. This was also because subject to sanctions India refused to join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and does not permit the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to inspect all its nuclear facilities. But when in October 2008, India and the United States signed a bilateral nuclear cooperation agreement. It entered into force two months later, following a decision by the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG)—comprised of 46 advanced NPT states which set the rules for global nuclear commerce—to exempt India from its trade restrictions. Until then, NPT states had denied access to nuclear trade to states which are outside the NPT and have nuclear weapons, including India, Pakistan, and Israel. Civil Nuclear deal is the milestone in the pathway of India’s trade Industry. Secondary sector of a economy requires lots of energy and as India is a developing country but can’t have that much capability to concert renewable source of energy at such a large scale. Nuclear trade with different countries has created an opportunity to increase its growth rate. India’s bilateral trade has also increased that will supply enough FDI to India’s manufacturing industries. The United States wanted the India deal to forge a broad new strategic relationship with India. India had a more limited view and regarded the deal as an opportunity to enhance its nuclear program and status. Both claimed India is an emerging democratic world power unfairly constrained by global nonproliferation norms. Emerging countries such as Brazil, China,and India, which haveexperienced rapid growth and increased integration with the global economy in recent years, have significant potential to contribute to global food security—not only by alleviating hunger among their own citizens, but also by increasing trade and financial linkages as well as technology and knowledge exchanges with developing countries. On the basis of the 2008 bilateral agreement, U.S. companies—most importantly Westinghouse and GE-Hitachi—plan to build nuclear power plants in India. A U.S.–India trade group claims that this business may ultimately be worth $130 billion by 2030. According to official U.S. trade statistics, bilateral merchandise trade with India has grown from under $10 billion in 1996 to nearly $31 billion in 2006 — a trebling in a decade. In 1996, India was the 32nd largest market for U.S. exports and the 25th largest source of imports. By 2006, India had risen to be 21st biggest export market for the United States and the 18th biggest supplier of imports. The United States’ total trade with India in 2006 exceeded that with Israel, Nigeria, and Thailand. Both governments appear to be committed to improving trade relations. On March 2, 2006, President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh endorsed the goal of doubling bilateral trade in three years. On December 18, 2006, President Bush signed into law H.R. 5682, the Henry J. Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006 (P.L. 109-401), signaling an intent to waive restrictions on civil nuclear cooperation with India With the reprocessing arrangements and procedures in place, the main hurdle standing in the way of full implementation of the cooperation agreement for American companies is that there is no nuclear liability protection under Indian law. India’s government prepared legislation for the Indian parliament last month which would protect foreign equipment suppliers from all civil liability claims in case of a nuclear accident. In terms of exports from India, the top ten countries include the U.S. (11.98%), United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.) (11.15%), Singapore (5.00%), China (4.67%), Hong Kong (3.71%), Netherland (3.67%), the U.K. (3.57%), Germany (3.33%), Saudi Arab (3.12%) and Belgium (2.64%), as per the export values during the first nine months of the fiscal year 2008-09. On the other hand, the top ten countries exporting to India include China (10.27%), Saudi Arab (7.24%), U.A.E. (6.57%), the U.S. (5.90%), Switzerland (4.59%), Iran (4.29%), Germany (3.52%), Nigeria (3.44%), Kuwait (3.36%) and Australia (3.22%). India’s bilateral trade with Russia, one of the country’s long time strongest trade partners, is targeted to be almost double at about $10 billion by 2010 from $5.3 billion in 2008. The two countries had signed a number of agreements in the fields of nuclear energy, space research and military technical cooperation etc. in December last year, when the president of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medvedev visited India. India’s trade with the U.S. was severely impacted due to recession in the U.S. economy. India’s trade with the U.S. dipped by 23.47% to $8.2 billion in the quarter January-March 2009 compared with $10.69 billion in the corresponding period last year, according to the U.S. International Trade Commission. India’s exports to the U.S. declined by 22.63% to $5.22 billion during this period, while India’s imports were down by 24.9% to $2.96 billion. Lower demand in the U.S. for natural pearls, precious and semiprecious stones and pharmaceutical products from India impacted the exports. The U.S. contributed about 12% of India’s total exports of $168.70 billion in the fiscal year 2008-09. In the year 2008, India’s total exports to the U.S. stood at $25.86 billion, while imports from the U.S. were at $17.33 billion. As a region, the European Union (E.U.) is India’s largest trading partner with total bilateral trade worth more than $70 billion in 2008-09. The participation of European companies in building India’s power generation capacity will help achieve the €100 billion ($140 billion) trade target by 2013 set at the Ninth India-European Union Summit in Marseille, France last year. The 27-member E.U. is also the largest investment partner of India. The E.U. investments in to India more than doubled to €5.4 billion ($7.73 bln) in 2007 compared with €2.5 billion ($3.58 bln) in 2006. This figure, however, dropped sharply to €852 million ($1.22 bln) last year due to recession in the European economies. Africa as a region has now become one of the important trade partners of India with rapid increase in bilateral trade in recent years. The trade between India and Africa has moved up to $36 billion in 2007-08 from $3 billion in 2000-01. India plans to double the trade with this region in the next five years. India, the largest importer of rough diamonds in the world, sources most of its requirement from Africa. India also has a duty free preferential tariff scheme for 49 least developed countries (LCDs) including 33 African countries. The potential areas of co-operations between the two regions include Information Technology (IT), Telecom, agriculture, agro-processing, irrigation, mining, power, pharmaceuticals etc. Therefore, the trade sector of the country has main impacts of nuclear energy, because these sector includes manufacturing Industries which needs enormous amount of energy and that energy needs can be satisfied by the civil nuclear Programme. From this paper, the authors have analyzed that nuclear energy is the most reliable and inexhaustible form of energy available to the society which is clean and safe. The authors also conclude that when every nation is trying hard to achieve the desired growth rate and to accelerate the pace of their economies, so the demand for energy is primary concern for obtaining the desired goal the demand for energy comes into the first place. This paper also emphasize on how nuclear energy have its impact on the agriculture, environment and trade. Over the recent years, It has come to the notice that radiations obtained from nuclear energy are used by several research institutions and it is playing a key role in order to attain the positive results in their research. Even on the verge of nuclear programme, India has travelled a long way in the pathway of shaping foreign relations and improved the strategic relations with many developed and developing countries. Nuclear energy is safe for the society as proven by the record of half a century of commercial operation, with the accumulated experience of more than 12000 reactors. Uranium is found everywhere in the crust of Earth and is more abundant than tin. So it is estimated that increasing the market price by a factor ten would result in 100 times more uranium coming to market. Eventually, uranium from sea water we will be able to recover those 4 billion tonnes which are dissolved there. Therefore, as nonrenewable sources of energy are limited and scarce, it creates a problem of sustainable use of resources but nuclear energy without harming the environment fulfills the energy needs. It would not be incorrect to say that well designed, well-constructed, well operated and well maintained nuclear energy is not only clean, but it is also safe, reliable, durable and competitive. The fuller use of commercial nuclear power, if done to exacting standards of safety and protection against proliferation, can play an important role as part of a larger strategy to slow the growth in emissions of the gases that cause global warming. Although some countries have slowed down their nuclear energy programmes, the abandonment of nuclear fission would, however, be neither wise nor justified. It is important at this stage of nuclear power development that increased efforts should be devoted to detailed in-depth studies of the different environmental impacts. The fuller use of commercial nuclear power, if done to exacting standards of safety and protection against proliferation, can play an important role as part of a larger strategy to slow the growth in emissions of the gases that cause global warming. When we cover the issues of trade, the authors conclude that, trade governed by the political relations , economic relations and availability of natural resources in that particular country. When we cover with reference to India after the civil nuclear deal with USA, India has established good strategies and foreign relationships with US and its allies. Bilateral agreement between the countries have resulted into the atmosphere which leads to FDI in different sectors of the economy. India has also improved its trade relations with African countries and European Union becomes the largest trading partner of the country. Therefore this paper is a combined inter-disciplinary evaluation of trade agriculture and environment vis-a-vis Indian nuclear programme and its impact on these major sectors. – IAEA. 1986. “Economic Evaluation of Bids for Nuclear Power Plants”. 1986 Edition : A guidebook. – Schaffer, W A. 1999. “Regional Impact Model”, Gegional Research Insitute, West Virginia University. – INTERNATIONAL ATOMIC ENERGY AGENCY, Power Reactors in member States, IAEA, Vienna(1976). – OECD, Energy Prospects to 1985, OECD, Pans (1974). – OECD-NEA/IAEA, Uranium Resources, Production and Demand, Rep OECD, Paris (1976). – HANRAHAN, E J , Demand for uranium. Atomic Industrial Forum, Phoenix, 1976. – NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCE, The efforts on populations of exposure to low levels of ionizing radiation (BIER Report), Washington (1972). – EDSALL.J.T , Environ Conservation 1 (1974) 21. – MASTERS, G M , Introduction to Environmental Science and Technology, Wiley, London (1975). – Halsbury’s Laws of India(14): Environment, misrepresentation and Fraud. – Steven Ferrey, Environmental law 5th Ed, 2010. – The Antarctic treaty 1959. – Convention on wetlands of International importance, 1971. – Convention concerning the protection of the world cultural and natural heritage 1972. – Convention on international trade in endangered species of wild flora and fauna,1973. – Protocol of 1978 relating to the International Convention for the prevention of pollution from ships. – Convention on the conservation of migratory species of wild animals 1979. – Convention on the conservation of Antarctic Marine Living resources 1980. – United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, 1982. – Convention for the protection of the Ozone Layer, 1985. – Protocol on substances that deplete the Ozone Layer, 1987. – Amendments to the Montreal Protocol on substances that deplete the Ozone layer, 1990. – Convention on the control of Trans-boundary movements of Hazardous wastes and their disposal, 1989. – United Nations framework convention on Climate Change, 1992. – Convention on Biological Diversity, 1992. – Convention to combat desertification in those countries experiencing serious drought and/or Desertification, particularly in Africa, 1994. – International Tropical Timber Agreement, 1994. – Protocol on the Environment Protection and the Antarctica Treaty, 1991. – Environment Protection Act, 1986. – Air(Prevention and Control of pollution) Act, 1981. Steven Ferrey, Environmental law 5th Ed, 547. Dhandapani Alagiri, E Naveen Kumar, Environment issues in india: an introduction, 155. A greenhouse gas is one of several gases that can absorb and emit longwave (infrared) radiation in a planetary atmosphere. 402 units 71. India ratified the treaty with qualifications on 19 august 1983. (1972) 11 ILM 963. Convention entered into force on 21 december 1975. India signed it on 1 october 1981. (1972) 11 ILM 1358. Convention entered into force on 17 December 1975. India signed it on 16 November 1972. (1973) 11 ILM 1055. Convention entered into force on 1 july 1975. India signed it on 9 july 1974 and ratified it on 20 july 1976. (1978) (MARPOL) 1973. Convention entered into force on 2 October 1983. India ratified it with qualifications on 24 September 1986. (1980) 19 ILM 15. Convention entered into force on 1 November 1983. India signed it on 23 June 1979 and ratified it on 4 May 1982. (1980)19 ILM 841. Convention entered into force on 7 april 1982. India ratified it on 17 june 1985. (1982) 21 ILM 1261. Convention entered into force on 16 November 1994. India signed it on 10 December 1982. (1987) 26 ILM 1529. Convention entered into force on 22 September 1988. India ratified it on 18 March 1991. (1987) 26 ILM 1550. Protocol entered into force on 1 January 1989. India accepted to it on 19 June 1992. (1991) 30 ILM 541. Amendments to the Montreal Protocol entered into force on 1 Jan 1989. India accepted to it on 19 June 1992. (1989) 28 ILM 657. Convention entered into force on 5 May 1992. India signed it on 5 March 1990 and ratified it on 24 June 1992. 31 ILM 849. Convention entered into force on 21 March 1994. India signed it on 10 June 1992 and ratified it on 1 November 1993. (1992) 31 ILM 818. Convention entered into force on 29 December 1993. India signed it on 5 June 1992 and ratified it on 18 February 1994. (1994) 33 ILM 1332. Convention entered into force on 26 December 1995. India signed it on 14 October 1994 and ratified it on 17 December 1996. (1994) 33 ILM 1016. Agreement entered into force on 1 January 1997. India signed it on 17 September 1996. India ratified it on 17 October 1996. Protocol entered into force on 15 Jan 1998. Constitution of India art 48A. Constitution of India art 21. Andhra Pradesh Pollution Control Board v. M V Nayudu (2001) 2 SCC 62; Vellore citizens’ Welfare Forum v. Union of India AIR 1996 SC 2715. Subhash Kumar v State of Bihar AIR 1991 SC 420; M C Mehta v. Union of India (1992) 3 SCC 256; Narmada Bachao Andolan v. Union of India AIR 2000 SC 3751; Andhra Pradesh Pollution Control Board-II v. M V Nayudu(2001) 2 SCC 62. Virender Gaur v. State of Haryana (1995) 2 SCC 577. Virender Gaur v. State of Haryana (1995) 2 SCC 577; MC Mehta v. Kamal Nath AIR 2000 SC 1997. Virender Gaur v. State of Haryana (1995) 2 SCC 577; Andhra Pradesh Pollution Control Board v. M V Nayudu (2001) 2 SCC 62; Subhash Kumar v State of Bihar AIR 1991 SC 420. Air(Prevention and Control of pollution) Act 1981 preamble. Environment (Protection) Rules 1986 r3.
2019-04-20T22:54:23Z
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Most of this summary information is from Francis Bacon Trowbridge's TROWBRIDGE GENEALOGY. I have borrowed information from the fine web site of Arthur Steele (see my Trowbridge links page) on the earliest Trowbridge's down to Thomas who came to America. Please see his web site for proofs I have not included on my site. Thomas Trowbridge, born about 1482 in Brushford, Somersetshire, England and died about 1525 in Taunton, Somersetshire, England. Married Ann about 1510 in Brushford. Note that Thomas was born ten years before Columbus stumbled onto the West Indies. John Trowbridge, son of Thomas, was born in 1512 at Shalford, Essex, England and died about 1545 in Taunton, Somersetshire, England. Married Alice about 1537 in Brushford, Somersetshire. Thomas Trowbridge, son of John, was born in 1542 in Taunton was a wealthy merchant in Taunton, Somersetshire, England. He died on February 20, 1619 in Taunton. Thomas was once the mayor of Taunton. He married Joan Hutchins Lawrence about 1569 in Somersetshire. John Trowbridge, son of Thomas and Joan Hutchins, was born March 25, 1570 in Taunton, Somersetshire, England where he spent his entire life. John was a wealthy merchant engaged in the woolen trade. He married Agnes Prowse. He died on July 5, 1649. Thomas Trowbridge, son of John and Agnes Prowse, was probably born about 1600 in Taunton, England. He married Elizabeth Marshall on March 26, 1627 in Exeter, Devonshire, England. Thomas came to America with his wife Elizabeth and two sons. A third son was born in America. Thomas returned to England after the death of his wife but left his three sons, first in the care of a servant. Later a friend, Thomas Jeffery, raised them to manhood. Thomas Trowbridge never returned to America and died in England in February 1672/73. William Trowbridge, son of Thomas and Elizabeth Marshall, was born about 1633 in Exeter, Devonshire, England and died in November 1688 in West Haven, Connecticut. He married Elizabeth Lamberton on March 9, 1656/57 in Milford, Connecticut. William had ten children. Joseph Trowbridge, son of William and Elizabeth Lamberton, was born in 1676 in New Haven, Connecticut and died in May 1715 in Stratfield, Connecticut. He married Anne Sherwood about 1708 in Fairfield, Connecticut. Joseph had three children. David Trowbridge, son of Joseph and Anne Sherwood, was born December 30, 1709 in Stratfield, Connecticut and died November 17, 1768 in Morristown, New Jersey. He married Lydia Holmes on July 3, 1735 in Bedford, New York. David had thirteen children. Samuel Trowbridge, son of David and Lydia Holmes, was born February 23, 1741/42 in Morristown, New Jersey and died about May 1823 in Frederick County, Virginia. He married first Jane Ruble about 1768 probably in Morristown, New Jersey. Jane died in November 1785 in Frederick County, Virginia and Samuel married second Christianne Dumire. Samuel had fourteen children. David Trowbridge, son of Samuel and Christianne Dumire, was born in 1772 in Frederick County, Virginia and died on April 7, 1864 in Kingwood, Preston County, West Virginia. He married Mary Grady in 1797 in Frederick County, Virginia. David had six children. Samuel Grady Trowbridge, son of David and Mary Grady, was born July 2, 1801 Frederick County, Virginia and died on April 16, 1887 in Kahoka, Clark County, Missouri. Samuel married Jane McGrew on February 17, 1825 in Brandonville, Virginia. He had ten children. James McGrew Trowbridge, son of Samuel and Jane McGrew, was born in Kingwood, Preston County, (West) Virginia on January 24, 1826 and died in Kingwood on April 3, 1909. He married Sarah Ann Snider on November 18, 1850 in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. James had eleven children. Luvenia Margaret Trowbridge, daughter of James and Jane McGrew, was born probably in Kingwood on November 3, 1863 and died in Wadsworth, Ohio on November 8, 1940. She married Nathaniel Jonathan Westfall on June 20, 1880 in Lewis County, West Virginia. Luvenia had seven children. Osa B. Westfall, daughter of Luvenia and Nathaniel Westfall, was born April 24, 1899 in Lewis County, West Virginia and died in Fort Smith, Arkansas on July 15, 1992. Osa married Arthur Edmond Corbett September 12, 1919 in Cumberland, Allegany County, Maryland. Osa had six children. Clara Luvenia Corbett, daughter of Osa Westfall and Arthur E. Corbett, was born January 8, 1921 in Copley, Summit County, Ohio and died November 26, 1990 in Wagon Wheel, Arizona. She married first Vivian Arlie Wall on June 14, 1941 in Copley, Ohio. Clara had three sons. One of the unpleasant circumstances that can arise when researching your family history is to discover that a cherished family tradition is without foundation. It is even more unpleasant to have to tell this to family members who have invested a lot of pride in that tradition. Such is the case with my Trowbridge family history. My grandmother, Osa (Westfall) Corbett, believed that her grandfather was English Lord James Trowbridge, and that he was born and married near Trowbridge, England. When I first started investigating this branch of my family I fully expected to find evidence of the English birth, if not the title, of Grandma’s grandfather Trowbridge. As I began my research, it quickly became evident that such was not to be. All evidence pointed to a long ancestry in America and at least three generations of Trowbridge's in West Virginia before the birth of my Great-great-grandfather James McGrew Trowbridge, who supposedly was the Lord Trowbridge. At first I was hesitant to draw any conclusions based on my research, knowing the depth of personal pride Grandma Corbett had for this story of her ancestry. If she remembered accurately what her mother, Luvenia (Trowbridge) Westfall, had told her, it did not seem possible that the story could become so distorted in only two generations. After all, Luvenia should have known something about her parents’ histories, and probably even her grandparents. The question was settled, for me at least, when I found the Trowbridge genealogy in the Library of Congress. Grandma told me that someone compiled a genealogy on the Trowbridge's many years ago and that some of the family in Akron, Ohio might have it. I decided to call the Summit County library in Akron on the chance that they might have a copy. In one of those coincidences that seem to border on the supernatural, the librarian that answered my call was also a Trowbridge descendant. Yes, she said, she knew of the genealogy. It was compiled by Francis Bacon Trowbridge and published in 1908. Armed with this information I made a trip to the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. (we lived in nearby Fort Meade, Maryland at the time). The library had the book. It is a very large volume, probably five or six inches thick. I made several visits to the library and spent hours extracting the information I needed. The book contains over one thousand descendants of John and his son Thomas Trowbridge in the male line. My line extended nine generations in America to my great-grandmother Luvenia Trowbridge who married Nathaniel Westfall, my grandmother’s parents. The book makes no mention of English titles in our family line. Why and how did the story of Lord Trowbridge originate? I can only guess that it was based on several things. There is actually a Troubridge title (one variation of Trowbridge) in England, created in 1799 to honor a naval hero. It is likely that Lord Troubridge of England was descended from the same remote ancestor as our family, and it may be that the Preston, West Virginia Trowbridge family knew about it. As late as the 1960’s, there was still an English Troubridge title, a baronetage, and the man who carried it was a member of the House of Lords. I am certain that James M. Trowbridge knew of the genealogy published in 1908, a year before his death. The information on his family could only have come from him or an immediate family member. A casual reading might lead you to believe that the early Trowbridge's were aristocrats – they were not. They were members of the wealthy merchant class. So, where did my grandmother’s story of Lord Trowbridge come from? Grandma told me that her mother often said that her father did not care much for hard work. Even though he was not wealthy, he dressed in fine clothes, rode in a fine carriage, and generally "lorded it over everybody." It is possible that people sarcastically referred to him as "Lord Trowbridge." My grandmother was only about eight years old when her grandfather died, but she did have brief memories of him. A seven or eight year-old would probably take those words literally. The mystery is why her mother did not correct this misconception, if my grandmother ever spoke of her grandfather as Lord Trowbridge. I do not believe that we have suffered from the loss of a Lord in the family. We have traded a counterfeit English Lord for some real American heroes; ancestors who were in the American colonies only sixteen years after the pilgrims landed at Plymouth and who were very much a part of the building of this country. I firmly believe that the truth is the best foundation for family traditions and it is certain to avoid the embarrassment of a myth as easily refuted as this one was. I also believe that we owe it to our ancestors to know the truth about them, some of what they did, and what they handed down to us – especially if we desire that our descendants do the same for us. Having said this, I have to admit that I never had the courage to tell my grandmother the truth about her grandfather. She was so proud of the tradition and so certain of the truth of it that I just could not bring myself to tell her it was a myth. I did not lie to her about it; I simply managed to avoid the topic until her death in 1992. I think I can be forgiven for this small transgression. I cannot show independent proof of the Trowbridge line down to the Trowbridge's in West Virginia. Anyone interested in this proof should consult "The Trowbridge Genealogy" by Francis Bacon Trowbridge, New Haven, Connecticut (1908). I spent many hours extracting the information from this book and neglected to copy all the source references he gave. Mr. Trowbridge obviously spent much time and money on this genealogy. He used the services of researchers and genealogists in many parts of the country to gather his evidence, and interviewed family members now long dead. I could never hope to match his effort. I was satisfied, for my purposes, to "take his word for it." I do believe his word is about as accurate as one can hope for today, almost a hundred years later. However, I have included at the end of this history the sources that I collected when I first began this effort which support Mr. Trowbridge’s work. In the early records there are numerous variations in the spelling of Trowbridge. They include such unlikely variants as Troubrugge and Troblebridge, even Sturbridge and Strawbridge. Today the most common are Trowbridge and Troubridge. People with the surname Strawbridge may also be descended from the same remote ancestors as our Trowbridge's. The surname may be derived from the town of Trowbridge in Wiltshire, England. It is just as likely that the town got its name from an early resident named Trowbridge. In either case, the first syllable of the name is probably derived from the word "trough," a natural channel in a stream and the second syllable is obviously from "bridge." The early English word for bridge is brugge, which helps to explain some of the strange variations of the name. If the surname did not come from the town, the first people to bear it probably lived near a stream running swiftly in a well-worn channel through the arches of a bridge. Or, perhaps the first Trowbridge male may have gotten his name because of some feat of daring at or near a bridge, or possibly because he took part in its defense during a time of war. Now, more than a thousand years later we can only speculate. In the early twentieth century Trowbridge, England was a thriving market town situated on a rocky hill, three miles long and one mile wide, rising from the valley of the Biss river. It was the largest town in Wiltshire. For centuries, it was an important center for the manufacture of woolen goods. Long before then, in A.D. 1100, the town was in the possession of Edward of Salisbury, a great Norman nobleman who was the sheriff of Wiltshire and who had an amazing thirty-eight manors in Wiltshire. In 1158 the town was an insignificant village but town records mention a John Troubrugge. During the reign of Edward I (1272-1300) the Trowbridge family had long been centered in Devon and the town of Trowbridge in Crediton parish was in possession of the family. By about the early sixteenth century a Trowbridge clan was living in Taunton, Somersetshire. Thomas Trowbridge, the first Trowbridge to come to America, sprang from the Taunton branch of the family. Taunton lay between Exeter and Bridgewater, England. It is on the thoroughfare from Bristol and Bath to Exeter and Plymouth. Like the town of Trowbridge, the town of Taunton was a center for the woolen trade, which can be traced back to the reign of Edward III. Born in Taunton in 1542, Thomas Trowbridge lived in the parish of St. Magdalene in Taunton. He was a wealthy man with considerable influence. He was also a very generous and charitable man and used much of his wealth to help the poor. In 1613, he established a trust with the churches of St. James and St. Mary Magdalene. The trust was to extend for a thousand years. The trust was still in existence in modern times. The wardens of the churches collected the rents amounting to six pounds a year when the trust was established, on two plots of land, one consisting of five acres and the other of one acre,. Twice a year, on St. Andrews Day and before Christmas on St. Thomas Day, the wardens of the churches paid a shilling apiece to 120 of the poorest, oldest, and most honest of the parish. At the time, this amount was the entire proceeds from the lands. The gift was to be used only for the poor and was not to be used for taxes. Thomas died in Taunton on February 20, 1619. John, the son of Thomas Trowbridge, was born on March 25, 1570 and resided all of his life in Taunton. He was in business as a woolen draper. When his father died, he became the chief Trowbridge in Taunton. He was also a man of wealth and prominence. During his life he was elected mayor of Taunton, was a warden of St. Mary Magdalene church and a member of the board of trustees of the almshouse, founded in 1615. The almshouse (poorhouse) was one of the important institutions of Taunton. John Trowbridge was the father of Thomas, the first Trowbridge to came to America. John died on July 5, 1649 in Taunton. Thomas, the first of the family to come to America, was the son of John Trowbridge, a wealthy merchant and prominent citizen of Taunton, Somersetshire, England. His father and grandfather had long been involved in the woolen trade in Taunton and it was natural that Thomas would follow their example. As a young man, Thomas established a mercantile business in the neighboring city of Exeter in Devonshire. He found that the citizens of the town already knew and respected the Trowbridge name. The primary enterprise in Exeter involved thin woolen goods, such as serge, that was spun and woven in neighboring towns and finished and sold in Exeter. In Exeter, Thomas found his bride, Elizabeth Marshall. The Marshall's were also a wealthy and well-known merchant family. Elizabeth was the daughter John Marshall and Alice Bevis Marshall and the fifth of twelve children. The wills of her father, mother and brother indicate that Elizabeth was kind and helpful by nature. Thomas of the parish of St. Petrock and Elizabeth of the parish of St. Mary Arches obtained a marriage license in the diocese of Exeter, recorded on March 24, 1627. They were married two days later in the parish of St. Mary Arches by parson Jeremy Short. The register of the parish of St. Petrock’s in Exeter recorded the baptisms of four children of Thomas and Elizabeth Trowbridge. A daughter Elizabeth was baptized on March 6, 1628. She died almost two years later and was buried on May 10th, 1630. Son John was baptized on November 5, 1629, son Thomas was baptized on 11 December 1631 and son William was baptized on September 3, 1633. Baptisms usually occurred within one or two years after the birth of an infant. Soon after the birth of son William, probably about 1634-35, Thomas decided to go to America, possibly to establish a branch of the family business in the American Colonies. He may not have planned to remove permanently to America because he left his oldest son John with his father in Taunton. Son John was only six or seven years old at the time. Thomas and Elizabeth took the other two youngsters, Thomas and William, with them when they sailed from England to Boston. After arriving in America, the family went to live at Dorchester, near Boston. They may have chosen Dorchester as their home at the urging of Thomas Jeffrey, a close friend who settled in Dorchester in 1634. In the town and church records of Dorchester Thomas and Elizabeth are listed as "Mr." and "Mrs." Trowbridge. In the seventeenth century, this was a distinction reserved only for people of established gentility. Elizabeth was a member of the Dorchester church in 1637 or 1638 when son James was baptized there. James was most likely born in Dorchester shortly after the Trowbridge's arrived in America. On the list of members of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Boston dated in 1638 appears the name Thomas Strawbridge. It is highly probable that this was our Thomas Trowbridge. Despite its name, this organization was mainly a social club or fraternity. Thomas probably was inclined to join as an opportunity to enhance his business and social ties. Thomas and Elizabeth must have found living conditions in the newly founded town of Dorchester crude, accustomed as they were to the comforts of a home in a city like Exeter. However, they lived only a short time in the town. Probably about 1638 Thomas moved his family to the plantation of New Haven, Connecticut. His name is not among those who subscribed to the articles of agreement at the organization of the church and political body there in June 1639. Thomas may have been absent from New Haven at the time, or, as this "Fundamental Agreement," as it was later called, required that only church members could be free burgesses (citizen officials of a town). There is no evidence that Thomas ever severed his connection with the Church of England and became a member of the Puritan Church, so he may not have been eligible to sign the document. In the New Haven records his name is again nearly always prefixed with the title "Mr." His reputation followed him to New Haven, or perhaps the Trowbridge name was as well known in New England as it was back home in Taunton and Exeter. The 1641 census of property owners in the New Haven plantation lists the Trowbridge family with five persons (Thomas, Elizabeth and their three sons). His estate is valued at £ 500, a large sum of money for that place and time. It was among the largest of the 123 estates mentioned in the schedule. Henry Rutherford, a prominent shipping merchant, was his neighbor on the south. Thomas appears to have spent little time at home in New Haven. During his stay in New England, he was occupied with extensive trade between England, the West Indies and the Colonies. Elizabeth died while the family was living in New Haven and sometime before the fall of 1641, Thomas returned to England. He may have been recalled to England because of urgent business, or he may have returned to settle his wife’s estate. Before leaving New Haven, Thomas placed his lands, houses and estate in trust with his servant, Henry Gibbons, for the benefit of his three sons, whom he also left in Gibbons’ care. Gibbons was to manage Thomas’ business and give his sons a good education while Thomas was absent from the Colony. This turned out to be a terrible mistake. Why did he leave his three small sons in America with a stranger? Perhaps Thomas planned to return soon; or, he may have felt that the boys were safer in America than back in England. In 1641 England was in the grip of a bloody civil war between the armies of the English Parliament and King Charles I. This Civil War lead to the rise of Oliver Cromwell and the English Commonwealth. Eventually, the monarchy was restored with a strengthened English Parliament controlling the purse strings of the Kingdom. There is some evidence that Thomas took an active part in the rebellion as a captain in the "roundhead" forces of the Parliament and may have later benefited from Cromwell's rule. The war may have kept Thomas occupied for several years explaining his failure to send for his sons or return to America. Back in America Gibbons gave so little attention to his master’s affairs and was so negligent in the care of the boys that as early as November 1641, the Colonial court ordered a lien be placed on Mr. Trowbridge’s property to pay the town’s taxes and to pay his debts. The court placed the children under the care of Thomas’ good friend Thomas Jeffrey and his wife. The Jeffrey's were to keep the children in their home until Thomas returned or sent instructions concerning their care. In either case, the court would determine "what is equal for [Jeffrey] to have for the keeping of them and in the meantime he will take care that they be well educated and nurtured in the fear of God." Mr. John Evance bought the house, which Gibbons had allowed to decay into immediate need of repairs, for £ 100 and the court settled the claims of the creditors. For the next several years, records of Thomas Trowbridge in New Haven consisted of matters dealing with complications arising from Gibbons’ malfeasance. Thomas remained in England and attempted to manage the problems in New Haven from there by letter. There must have been something of great importance to keep Thomas in England rather than returning to New Haven to bring his servant to account for his negligence. At first, the war certainly kept Thomas in England. In 1645 an army of ten thousand of King Charles II forces attacked the town and began the siege of Taunton. In 1649, Thomas came into his inheritance after the death of his father, John Trowbridge. As the only surviving son, he succeeded his father as the chief Trowbridge in Taunton. Now, even greater responsibilities demanded his attention and probably prevented him from leaving England. However, he wrote often to the authorities in New Haven to bring Gibbons to account for his breach of trust, but Gibbons kept possession of the Trowbridge estates in New Haven for many years. The situation remained that way until Thomas’ sons became of age. His sons passed their boyhood under the care of Thomas Jeffrey and Thomas Trowbridge was evidently satisfied with that arrangement. They received a good education under the instruction of Mr. Ezekiel Cheever, the noted colonial schoolmaster, who taught the first school in New Haven. The records of the colony note that Mr. Cheever was paid out of the Trowbridge estate for teaching his children. The course of instruction for students at that time was that, "after they are entered and can read in the Testament; to perfect them in English; and teach them their Latin tongue as they are capable; and to write." Soon after he came of age, William Trowbridge tried to have an accounting made of what was left of his father’s estate in New Haven. He presented to the court two letters from his father. One was dated March 6, 1655, and the other was dated March 4, 1658, and in them his father wrote that he "marvels that there is not an account of it given." This attempt to recover from Gibbons was a failure, but finally, on January 19, 1664, Thomas sent his three sons power of attorney, giving them his property in New England, wherever it was found, to be equally divided between them. It empowered the sons to bring Gibbons to account and punishment. The sons sued Gibbons for possession, but the situation was so muddled that the courts could not easily accomplish a settlement before Thomas Trowbridge died on February 7, 1673. Finally, Gibbons settled the suit in 1680, "for sundry good causes best known to myself" (perhaps his guilty conscience). Gibbons made a deed of the property to Thomas Trowbridge, the younger (the oldest of the three sons in America) to take effect after the death of Gibbons. The deed included his house and lot, and other property, "including the bed and bolster I lie on." Gibbons died six years later and his brother, William Gibbons, refused to take out letters of administration. The court appointed Thomas Trowbridge, Jr. administrator and since Henry Gibbons had no children the courts finally concluded the matter. The descendants of Thomas Trowbridge, at least up until the early twentieth century, tended to have large families. Wherever they settled in groups of two or more families, they soon populated the area with Trowbridge's As a result, today there are literally thousands of Trowbridge descendants who have Thomas Trowbridge as their immigrant ancestor. Please see the Trowbridge family tree for dates of birth, marriage and death of some descendants who are not our direct ancestors. WILLIAM TROWBRIDGE was baptized on September 3, 1633 in Exeter, Devonshire, England. He died in November 1688 in West Haven, Connecticut. William married Elizabeth Sellivant, widow of Daniel Sellivant, on March 9, 1657 in Milford, Connecticut. Elizabeth was the daughter of Captain George and Margaret Lamberton. Elizabeth was born during the 1630’s in London, England and died in 1716 in West Haven, Connecticut. William is usually described in the public records of that time as a "planter," and later as a "husbandman" meaning that he was a gentleman farmer. In 1664, he appears to have been master of the sloop Cocke, making voyages out of New Haven. Probably about that time, he became one of the first residents in the parish of West Haven. He built a house on that part of the Lamberton farm that came into his possession through his wife’s inheritance. His share was one-sixth of the Lamberton farm, and it included all the land between the present day Campbell and Washington avenues from Brown Street nearly to Long Island Sound. William also owned 144 acres on the Sound near Oyster River. William was nominated a freeman (a person having full citizenship rights) of the colony of Connecticut on May 13, 1669. The "First Church" in New Haven admitted William and his wife as members on April 28, 1686. He lived on his farm in West Haven the remainder of his life. He made gifts to his children during this lifetime of much of his real estate, so that the inventory of his estate mentions only 55 acres of "second division" land and a small amount of personal property. He made no will. William and Elizabeth had ten children all born in New Haven. Those children were: William; Thomas; Elizabeth; James; Margaret; Hannah; Abigail; Samuel; Mary; and Joseph. They were born in that order between 1657 and 1676. JOSEPH TROWBRIDGE, youngest child of William and Elizabeth (Lamberton) Trowbridge, was born in 1676 in New Haven, Connecticut, and died in May 1715 in Stratfield, Connecticut. Joseph married Anne Sherwood about 1708 in Fairfield, Connecticut. Anne was the daughter of Captain Mathew and Mary (Fitch) Sherwood. After Joseph’s death in 1715, Anne remarried (about 1716) to Caleb Fairchild and the family moved to Hanover, New Jersey. During most of his adult life, Joseph was a carpenter and farmer in the parish of Stratfield, near Fairfield, Connecticut. He and Anne were members of the Stratfield Congregational church. They had three children born in Stratfield: Mathew, baptized in 1709 who died as an infant; David, born on December 30, 1709; and Anne, baptized on December 13, 1713. DAVID TROWBRIDGE was the son of Joseph and Anne. He was born on December 30, 1709 in Stratfield, and died on November 16, 1768 in Morristown, New Jersey. He married on July 3, 1735, probably in Bedford, New York, Lydia whose surname was probably Holmes. She was born on January 21, 1716 and died on January 27, 1792 in Morristown. After his marriage, David settled in Hanover Township in Morris County, New Jersey. He was a farmer and probably lived in the west part of Hanover, which became Morristown. David and Lydia were Baptists in religion. Trowbridge Mountain, situated partly in Hanover and partly in Randolph, New Jersey, derives its name from the fact that David Trowbridge and several of his sons and grandsons had their farms on and near it. Much of what we know of his family was taken from his family Bible, which was found on Trowbridge Mountain apparently many years after his death. David and Lydia had sixteen children born in Morristown between 1736 and the early 1760’s. Their names were: Lydia, who died at the age of fourteen; Daniel; Shubael; Ann; Samuel; David; Caleb, who died at the age of fourteen or fifteen; Mary Ann; Tabitha, who died as an infant; Joseph; Absalom; Tabitha, who also died as an infant as had her sister of the same name; Job; Joseph; Ann; and Lydia, named for her older sister who died a few years before her birth. SAMUEL TROWBRIDGE, son of David and Lydia, was born on February 23, 1742 in Morristown, New Jersey, and died in May 1823 in Frederick County, Virginia. He married first about 1768, possibly in Frederick County, Jane Ruble, daughter of George Ruble. She was born in Frederick County about 1750 and died in November 1785. Samuel remarried about 1786 to Christiann Dumire. Samuel probably removed to Virginia in company with his brother David several years before the Revolutionary War. If he in fact married Jane in 1768 in Frederick County, he probably moved there shortly after the French and Indian War. Family tradition credited him with service in the Revolutionary War but I have found no record of this service. He may have served in a militia unit for a short time and if he never applied for a pension, no record of his service probably exists. Samuel settled on a farm in Frederick County on Apple Pie Ridge, sixteen miles west of Winchester. He was a Methodist minister, the first of a line ministers in our Trowbridge family. Samuel and Jane had six children born between 1770 and 1784: Elizabeth, who married John Lewis; Mary who married Matthew McGinnis of Kingwood; David; George; Jesse; Samuel Ruble Trowbridge. There were nine children born to Samuel and Christiann between 1788 and 1805: Bethuel; John; William; Absalom; Sarah; Lydia; Ocie; and Joseph. Three of Samuel’s sons, David, Jesse and Samuel Ruble Trowbridge, moved to Monongalia County, Virginia between 1804 and 1808. They settled on the Cheat River near Kingwood. This area of Monongalia County became Preston County, (West) Virginia. At least one of the brothers operated a ferry on the river and the place became known as Trowbridge Ferry. These three brothers became prominent and respected citizens of Preston County. Jesse married about 1806 Sarah Pugh, probably shortly before moving to the Cheat River. Sarah was from Pugh Town, Virginia and was born in 1790. She died in 1870. Jesse and Sarah had twelve children. Jesse died on April 4, 1865 in Kingwood. Samuel Ruble Trowbridge was married twice, first to Margaret Grady, the sister of his brother David’s wife, Mary Grady. Samuel’s second wife was Susan Sheets. Samuel had ten children, apparently all by his first wife. In 1852 Samuel was one of the commissioners appointed by the General Assembly of Virginia to lay off the eight magisterial districts of Preston County. He was elected President of the proceedings at a county convention held in favor of Virginia remaining in the Union in 1861 in Kingwood. Samuel died in Kingwood in 1864. Bethuel Trowbridge remained in Frederick County after his brothers had gone west. He died in Frederick County probably during the 1830’s. He had four children: Samuel; Isaac Scott; Lewis; and Lydia. William moved to Ohio and died in London, Ohio on June 17, 1874. He had eight children. John (or Jonathan) Trowbridge may have moved to Missouri about 1820. Joseph Trowbridge moved to Ohio about 1836 and later to Frankfort, Indiana where he died on September 4, 1879. He was the father of nine children. DAVID TROWBRIDGE, eldest son of Samuel and Jane Ruble Trowbridge was born in 1772 in Frederick County, Virginia and died in Kingwood, Preston County, West Virginia on April 7, 1864. In 1797 he married Mary Grady, daughter of Michael Grady, possibly in Monongalia County (which later became Preston County). Mary was born in in 1774 in Dunkards Bottom, one of the first settled areas of present day Preston County. She died in Kingwood on May 22, 1849. David left his home in Frederick County about 1804. His name appears on a petition, dated 1805, for the formation of a new county from Monongalia. His farm was near Kingwood adjoining those of his brothers Jesse and Samuel R. Trowbridge. In 1807, or perhaps a little earlier, David built a gristmill near Kingwood on the Cheat River. He was also a stonemason. At various times between 1818 and 1852 he was a justice of the peace in Preston County and served one term as sheriff. At that time in Virginia, the governor appointed county sheriffs for a term of two years. The governor usually appointed people of money and status, and the appointee paid a substantial fee for the privilege. Today the practice would be called bribery. At that time, it was a politically accepted method of appointing certain officials. This practice, however dubious, seems to indicate that David Trowbridge and his family were well to do, at least in comparison with most of his neighbors in Preston County. The residents of Kingwood organized the first Methodist Episcopal Society shortly before 1815. A log church was built one mile east of the village and David was one of the trustees to whom the building and property was deeded. David served as a local preacher in the church for more than sixty years and his name appeared in the window of the church that replaced the log building. Oren F. Morton, author of "A History of Preston County West Virginia" (published in 1914) says, "David, a miller, was a man of great force of character. He was sheriff in 1828, a local preacher of the Methodist church for 60 years, and so uncompromising was his opposition to slavery that he was one of the corporal’s guard of Prestonians who voted for Lincoln in 1860." Mr. Morton also says of the Trowbridge brothers, they "… were not much alike in personal appearance. A roving, venturesome spirit seems a trait of the [family]." David and Mary Trowbridge had six children: Katherine, born in 1799 and died in 1886, married James Bucklew; Samuel Grady Trowbridge, born on July 2, 1801; Eleanor (Ellen), born about 1803-04 who married Michael (Peter?) Gilmore; Margaret, born about 1808, died in 1869 and married Reuben Morris; Jonathan, born about 1810, died when he was fourteen years old; Jane Brown Trowbridge, born on August 21, 1814 and died in 1888, married Thomas Gregg in 1833. SAMUEL GRADY TROWBRIDGE was the oldest son and second child of David and Mary (Grady) Trowbridge. He was born on July 2, 1801 in Frederick County, Virginia. He married Jane McGrew on February 17, 1825 in Brandonville, (West) Virginia. She was the daughter of Colonel James and Isabella (Clark) McGrew and granddaughter of Patrick McGrew. Patrick and his son Colonel James Mcgrew were two notable men in the history of Preston County. Jane was born in Brandonville on on her father's farm on April 3, 1805. Jane was the daughter and granddaughter of two very important men in the history of Preston County. Samuel Grady Trowbridge was a farmer and miller. He and Jane settled near Kingwood to start their family. In 1836 he moved his family to Evansville, Preston County, Virginia and four years later to Tunnelton also in Preston County. After the close of the Civil War, he sold his property in West Virginia and moved to Clark County, Missouri. His children were all adults by that time and it seems that most, except Edgar, remained in West Virginia. Samuel died in Medill, Missouri on April 26, 1872. His wife Jane returned to West Virginia where she died in Cecill, Taylor County on October 30, 1883. From an early age Samuel was a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and like his father and grandfather, was one of its local preachers, he never traveled in that capacity while living in West Virginia. It was said that he was an energetic, hardworking man, and made his family comfortable and contented. He owned and operated mills near Kingwood and later near Tunnelton and was apparently relatively prosperous. "He was an earnest Christian, a good neighbor, a friend to the poor and distressed, and a kind father to his children, to whom he gave a good education." Samuel and Jane Trowbridge had ten children: James McGrew; Mary Ann; David Boyd; Isabella; Edgar Clark; Minerva who died at the age of two; Martha Elizabeth; Harriet Virginia; Susannah; and Samuel Henry. JAMES MCGREW TROWBRIDGE was born on January 24, 1826 in Kingwood. He was named for his prominent grandfather, Colonel James McGrew. On November 18, 1850 he married Sarah Ann Snyder in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. Sarah was the daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth (Albright) Snyder. Sarah’s sister was the wife of James's younger brother, David Boyd Trowbridge (unfortunately, I have been unable to learn her name). Sarah Snyder was born on July 26, 1834 in Green Glades, near Terra Alta, West Virginia. James and Sarah lived most of their lives near Kingwood, although the family lived for awhile in Lewis County. James was a farmer and miller like his father and grandfather. James died on April 3, 1909 at his home in Kingwood. He is buried in Maplewood Cemetery in Kingwood. Sarah died on January 4, 1918 in Kingwood and is buried next to her husband. James and Sarah had eleven children: Albert; Mary Ellen; Anzoretta Persis; Catherine Isabella; Charles Ira; Sarah Jane; Luvenia Margaret; Joseph Madison; Signora; Thurman W.; Georgia Pearl. LUVENIA MARGARET TROWBRIDGE was born in Kingwood on November 3, 1863 and died in Wadsworth, Medina County, Ohio on November 8, 1940. She married Nathaniel Jonathan Westfall on June 20, 1880 in Lewis County, West Virginia. Nathaniel and Luvenia Trowbridge Westfall had seven children. See the Westfall family history and family tree for more information.
2019-04-26T11:58:41Z
http://whitsettandwall.com/Trowbridge/Trowbridge_history.htm
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**) marks events that have not appeared in a previous issue of Education Week. 16--Science: The Solar System From the Big Bang to the Future, sponsored by the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, for grade 6-12 science teachers, at the academy in Aurora, Ill. Deadline: March 4. Contact: Mary Lou Lipscomb, IMSA, 1500 W. Sullivan Road, Aurora, IL 60506-1000; (630) 907-5892; fax: (630) 907-5893; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.imsa.edu/center. 16--Teachers: LA County Teacher Recruitment Job Fair, sponsored by the Los Angeles County Teacher Recruitment Center, for credentialed teachers and students in teacher-preparation programs, at the Norwalk Arts and Sports Center in Norwalk, Calif. Contact: LACTRC, (800) 875-2929; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.teachnow.la. 16-19--Literacy: Ambassadors for Literacy, sponsored by the Michigan Reading Association, for teachers, administrators, professors, advocates, and parents, at the Cobo Convention Center in Detroit. Contact: MRA, 5241 Plainfield Ave. N.E., Suite I, Grand Rapids, MI 49525; (800) 672-7323; fax: (616) 361-0056; e- mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.mraread.org. 16-19--Urban schools: Legislative/Policy Conference, sponsored by the Council of the Great City Schools, for urban school superintendents, senior administrators, board members, and deans of colleges of education, at the Watergate Hotel in Washington. Contact: CGCS, 1301 Pennsylvania Ave. N.W., Suite 702, Washington, DC 20004; (202) 393-2427; fax: (202) 393-2400; Web site: www.cgcs.org. 16-20--Music teachers: Get the Royal Treatment in the Queen City, sponsored by the Music Teachers National Association, for music teachers, at the Convention Center and Hyatt Regency in Cincinnati. Contact: Jennifer Martin, MTNA, 441 Vine St., Suite 505, Cincinnati, OH 45202-2811; (888) 512-5278; fax: (513) 421-2503; e- mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.mtna.org. 17--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Charlotte Merchandise Mart in Charlotte, N.C. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 17-19--Higher education: National Conference on Higher Education, sponsored by the American Association for Higher Education, for educators, at the Chicago Hilton and Towers in Chicago. Contact: AAHE Service Center, 1 Dupont Circle, Suite 360, Washington, DC 20036-1110; (202) 293-6440, ext. 761; fax: (202) 293-0073; e- mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.aahe.org/conferences.htm. 17-20--Higher education: Grants Resource Center Spring Meeting, sponsored by the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, for campus-sponsored program administrators, at the Loews L'Enfant Plaza Hotel in Washington. Contact: Jim Cummins or Marion Tangum, AASCU, 1307 New York Ave. N.W., Fifth Floor, Washington, DC 20005; (202) 293-7070; fax: (202) 296-5819; e-mail: [email protected]@aa scu.org; Web site: www.aascu.org. 18--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Carlisle, Pa.; Columbia, S.C.; Cookeville, Tenn.; Decatur, Ill.; and Overland Park, Kan. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 18-22--Scholarships: ScholarShop Coordinator Orientation and Professional Development Session, sponsored by the Citizens' Scholarship Foundation of America, for ScholarShop program coordinators, in New York City. Contact: Cindy Freeman, CSFA, (800) 537-4180, ext. 462; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.csfa.org. **18--Classroom management: Classroom management: Getting Beyond Disruption, Hostility, and Excuses: A Reality Therapy Approach, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for teachers, counselors, and principals, at the Holiday Inn- Louisville Airport in Louisville, Ky. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333- 4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 19--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Manhattan, Kan., and Oak Ridge, Tenn. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 19--Professional development: Satellite Town Meeting With Rod Paige, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education, for K-12 educators, to be broadcast on national television. Contact: USDE, (800) 872-5327; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ed.gov/inits/stm/. 19-20--Classroom management: The Well-Managed Classroom, sponsored by the Girls and Boys Town National Resource Training Center, for teachers, administrators, and support staff, in Boys Town, Neb. Contact: NRTC Support Services, Box 145, Boys Town, NE 68010; (800) 545-5771, ext. 65; e-mail: [email protected]. 19-22--Parental involvement: Common Sense Parenting: Training for Parent Trainers, sponsored by the Girls and Boys Town National Resource Training Center, for teachers, administrators, and support staff, in Boys Town, Neb. Contact: NRTC Support Services, Box 145, Boys Town, NE 68010; (800) 545-5771, ext. 65; e-mail: [email protected]. 19-23--Bilingual education: 31st Annual International Bilingual/Multicultural Education Conference, sponsored by the National Association for Bilingual Education, for program and school administrators, educators, university professionals, trainers, researchers, policymakers, parents, and community members, at the Philadelphia Convention Center in Philadelphia. Contact: NABE, 1030 15th St. N.W., Suite 470, Washington, DC 20005; (202) 898-1829; fax: (202) 789-2866; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nabe.org. **19--Classroom management: Getting Beyond Disruption, Hostility, and Excuses: A Reality Therapy Approach, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for teachers, counselors, and principals, at the Holiday Inn-Cincinnati Eastgate in Cincinnati. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 20--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Elkhart, Ind.; Marion, Ill.; and Stroudsburg, Pa. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 20-22--Administrators: Administrative Intervention, sponsored by the Girls and Boys Town National Resource Training Center, for principals, administrators, counselors, social workers, and team leaders, in Boys Town, Neb. Contact: NRTC Support Services, Box 145, Boys Town, NE 68010; (800) 545-5771, ext. 65; e-mail: [email protected]. 20-22--School boards: Technology Site Visit, sponsored by the National School Boards Association, for technology coordinators, superintendents, teachers, and school board members, at Township High School District #214 in Arlington Heights, Ill. Contact: NSBA, 1680 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (703) 838-6722; fax: (703) 683-7590; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsba.org/conference. 20-23--Social work: National School Social Work Conference, sponsored by the School Social Workers Association of America, for school social workers, in Atlanta. Contact: Randy Fisher, Executive Director, SSWAA, PO Box 2072, Northlake, IL 60164; (847) 289-4642; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.sswaa.org. 21-23--Foreign language: Conference, sponsored by the Central States Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, for foreign-language teachers, in Kansas City, Mo. Contact: Diane Ging, CSCTFL, PO Box 21531, Columbus, OH 43221-0531; (614) 529- 0109; fax: (614) 529-0321; e-mail: [email protected]. 21-22--School improvement: Focusing on Student Performance-Creating Research-Based Schoolwide Action Plans for Increasing Student Achievement, sponsored by the National Study of School Evaluation, for principals, teachers, and administrators, at the NSSE headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill. Deadline: 15 days before event. Contact: Sharon Steindam, NSSE, 1699 E. Woodfield Road, Suite 406, Schaumburg, IL 60173; (847) 995-9080 or (800) 843-6773; fax: (847) 995-9088; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsse.org. 22--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Bloomington, Ind. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 23--English: Recreating the Classroom, sponsored by the Nebraska English Language Arts Council, for English teachers, in Lincoln, Neb. Contact: Clark Kolterman, (402) 643-6138 or (402) 643-2988; e-mail: [email protected]. 24-27--Middle schools: 21st Annual Middle-Level Schools Conference, sponsored by the New England League of Middle Schools, for middle school educators, in Providence, R.I. Contact: NELMS, 460 Boston St., Suite 4, Topsfield, MA 01983; (978) 887- 6263; fax: (978) 887-6504; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nelms.org. 25--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Charleston, S.C. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 25-26--Language skills: Including English-Language Learners in Mainstream Classrooms, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K-12 educators and administrators, in Kansas City, Mo. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575-5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 25-26--Principals: If Only I Knew: Support for the New Principal, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K-12 educators and administrators, in Kansas City, Mo. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575- 5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 25-26--Scheduling: Instructional Strategies for Flexible Scheduling, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K-12 educators and administrators, in Kansas City, Mo. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575- 5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 25-28--Indian education: 2002 Oklahoma Johnson-O'Malley Conference, sponsored by the Oklahoma InterTribal JOM Committee, for parents, educators, and administrators involved in Indian education, at the Clarion on Meridian Hotel and Convention Center in Oklahoma City. Contact: The Cherokee Nation JOM Program, 2002 Oklahoma JOM Conference, PO Box 948, Tahlequah, OK 74465; (918) 456-0671; fax: (918) 458- 6195. **25-27--Segregation: 3rd Annual Conference: The Resegregation of America’s Schools: What’s at Stake? What Should Be Done?, sponsored by the Learning Communities Network, for educators, funders, policymakers, and reform advocates, at the Rio All- Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. Contact: Linda Boozer, Black Diamond Summit, (303) 758-6567; e-mail: [email protected]. 27-30--Science: National Convention, sponsored by the National Science Teachers Association, for science teachers, at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego. Contact: NSTA, 1840 Wilson Blvd., Third Floor, Arlington, VA 22201-3000; (800) 328-8998; fax: (703) 243-7177; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsta.org/conventions. 1-5--Reading: The Writing Road to Reading: A Comprehensive Introduction, sponsored by the Reading Reform Foundation of New York, for educators, at the foundation in New York City. Contact: RRF, 333 W. 57th St., Suite 1L, New York, NY 10019; (212) 307-7320; fax: (212) 307-0449; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.readingreformny.org. 1-5--Research: Validity and Value in Education Research, sponsored by the American Educational Research Association, for AERA members and nonmembers, educators, policymakers, and stakeholders, at multiple facilities throughout New Orleans. Contact: Debra Gallagher, AERA, 1230 17th St. N.W., Washington, DC 20036-3078; (202) 223-9485; fax: (202) 775-1824; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.aera.net. 1-30--Technology: Internet Information Literacy, sponsored by the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, for science and mathematics teachers, on the Web at http://wizard.imsa.edu/course. Contact: Lora Kaisler, IMSA, 1500 W. Sullivan Road, Aurora, IL 60506-1000; (630) 907-5970; fax: (630) 907-5918; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.imsa.edu. 2-3--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Connecticut Expo Center in Hartford, Conn. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 3-6--Professional development: Teaching and Learning Without Borders: Annual International Conference and Exhibition, sponsored by the Association for Childhood Education International, for teachers, child-care workers and directors, college of education faculty, students, parents, and others interested in infancy through middle-adolescence education, at the Hyatt Regency San Diego in San Diego. Contact: ACEI, 17904 Georgia Ave., Suite 215, Olney, MD 20832; (301) 570-2111 or (800) 423-3563; fax: (301) 570-2212; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ACEI.org. 3-6--Special education: Annual Convention and Expo, sponsored by the Council for Exceptional Children, for special educators, general educators, and related service providers, at the New York Hilton Avenue of the Americas and the Sheraton New York and Manhattan in New York City. Contact: CEC, 1110 N. Glebe Road, Suite 300, Arlington, VA 22201; (888) 232-7733; fax: (703) 620-4334; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.cec.sped.org. 4-6--Science: Using "Atlas of Science Literacy," sponsored by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, for educators, in Austin, Texas. Contact: Project 2061, AAAS, 1333 H St. N.W., Room 844, Washington, DC 20005; (888) 737-2061; Web site: www.pdp2061.org. 4-6--School attorneys: Council of School Attorneys' School Law Seminar, sponsored by the National School Boards Association, for school attorneys, school leaders, and school board members, in New Orleans. Contact: NSBA, 1680 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (703) 838-6722; fax: (703) 683-7590; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsba.org/conference. 4-7--Urban school boards: Council of Urban Boards of Education Pre-Conference Meeting and Issues Forum, sponsored by the National School Boards Association, for urban school leaders and school board members, in New Orleans. Contact: NSBA, 1680 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (703) 838-6722; fax: (703) 683-7590; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsba.org/conference. 5-6--Leadership: National Graduate Student Research Seminar in Educational Administration: Advancing Knowledge for Improved Practice, sponsored by the University Council for Educational Administration, for graduate students and educators, in New Orleans. Contact: UCEA, 205 Hill Hall, Columbia, MO 65211- 2185; (573) 884-8300; fax: (573) 884-8302; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ucea.org. 5-6--Professional development: 9th Annual Conference: The Diffusion of Knowledge, sponsored by the National Paideia Center, for educators, at the Boar's Head Inn in Charlottesville, Va. Contact: Alana Neal, NPC, UNCG School of Education, PO Box 26171, Greensboro, NC 27402-6171; (336) 334-3729; fax: (336) 334-3739; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.paideia.org. 5-9--Principals: 2002 Convention and Exhibit: Experience the Heart of Leadership in the Heart of Texas, sponsored by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, for elementary and middle school principals, in San Antonio. Contact: NAESP, 1615 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (703) 684-3345; fax: (703) 518-6281; Web site: www.naesp.org. 6-9--Linguistics: Conference, sponsored by the American Association of Applied Linguistics, for language teachers, in Salt Lake City. Contact: AAAL, PO Box 21686, Eagan, MN 55121-0686; (612) 953-0805; fax: (612) 431-8404; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.aaal.org. 6--Reading: Reflections 2002, sponsored by the Vermont Council on Reading, for classroom teachers, teacher leaders, reading specialists, and administrators, at Stoweflake Resort and Conference Center in Stowe, Vt. Contact: Patricia Daniels, VCR, 609 Cherrierville Road, Fairfax, VT 05454; (802) 527-7816; fax: (802) 849-2865; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.sover.net/~vtread. 6-9--School boards: 62nd Annual Conference, sponsored by the National School Boards Association, for school board members, at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans. Contact: NSBA, 1680 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (703) 838-6722; fax: (703) 683-7590; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsba.org/conference. 7--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Memphis Cook Convention Center in Memphis, Tenn. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 7-8--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Onondaga County Convention Center in Syracuse, N.Y. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 7-10--Science: Annual General Meeting: Research, Policy, and Practice - Creating a Voice for the Profession, sponsored by the National Association for Research in Science Teaching, for science educators, administrators, researchers, and policymakers, at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in New Orleans. Contact: David B. Zandvliet, Annual Meeting Coordinator, NARST, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University Drive, Burnaby, BC V5A 1S6, Canada; (604) 291-5680; fax: (604) 291- 4203; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.educ.sfu.ca/narstsite/. 8--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Charleston, W.Va., and Melbourne, Fla. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 8-11--Curriculum management: Maximizing Student Achievement Through Systems Factors: Governance, Leadership, and Support Services, sponsored by Phi Delta Kappa International, for all educators, in San Francisco. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: PDKI, PO Box 789, Bloomington, IN 47402-0789; (812) 339-1156 or (800) 766-1156; fax: (812) 339-0018; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.pdkintl.org. 8-12--Learning disabilities: 20th Annual Conference: Unlocking Learning Potential, sponsored by the Learning Disabilities Network, for educators, school leaders, clinicians, and parents, at the Lantana in Randolph, Mass. Contact: LDN, 72 Sharp St., Hingham, MA 02043; (781) 340-5605; fax: (781) 340-5603; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.LDNetwork.org. 9-13--Physical education: National Convention, sponsored by the American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation, and Dance, for health and physical education professionals, in San Diego. Contact: AAHPERD, (800) 213-7193, ext. 401; Web site: www.aahperd.org. 9--Reading: Word Identification, sponsored by the Churchill Center, for educators, at the center in New York City. Contact: Susan Spero, CC, 310 E. 30th St., New York, NY 10016; (212) 722-0610; e-mail: [email protected]. 9-13--English: Conference, sponsored by Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, for English-language teachers, in Salt Lake City. Contact: TESOL, 700 S. Washington St., Suite 200, Alexandria, VA 22314; (703) 836-0774; fax: (703) 836-7864; e-mail: [email protected]. 9--College fair: Online College Fair for Junior Jump-Start Students, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for students, teachers, and parents, at www.OnlineCollegeFair.com. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 9--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Kissimmee, Fla., and Tallahassee, Fla. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 10--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Ann Arbor, Mich.; Birmingham, Ala.; Blacksburg, Va.; Cleveland, Tenn.; Lakeland, Fla.; and Lancaster, Pa. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 10-12--Professional development: A Framework for Teaching: The Observation and Evaluation Process, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K- 12 educators and administrators, in Minneapolis. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575-5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 10-12--Teaching: Teaching for Deep Understanding, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K-12 educators and administrators, in Minneapolis. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311- 1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575-5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 10-13--Leadership: Reaching and Teaching: Good Schools Getting Better, sponsored by the Golden Hills School Division and Alberta Regional Consortia, for teachers, administrators, staff, trustees, and parents, in Calgary, Alberta. Contact: TW Branun and Associates, (800) 531-0082; fax: (866) 465-2325; Web site: www. twblearn.com/reachingandteaching2/reachingandteaching2.html. **10--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Ann Arbor, Mich.; Birmingham, Ala.; Blacksburg, Va.; Cleveland, Tenn.; Lakeland, Fla.; and Lancaster, Pa. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. **10-13--Leadership: Reaching and Teaching: Good Schools Getting Better, sponsored by the Golden Hills School Division and Alberta Regional Consortia, for teachers, administrators, staff, trustees, and parents, in Calgary, Alberta. Contact: TW Branun and Associates, (800) 531-0082; fax: (866) 465-2325; Web site: www. twblearn.com/reachingandteaching2/reachingandteaching2.html. 11--Senior year: Graduation by Exhibition, sponsored by the Parker Regional Teachers Center, for educators, at the center in Devens, Mass. Contact: PRTC, PO Box 2129, Devens, MA 01432; (978) 772-2687; Web site: www.parker.org/rtc. 11-13--English: The Art of Writing Centers, sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English, for English teachers, in Savannah, Ga. Contact: Donna Sewell, (229) 333-5946; fax: (229) 259-5529; e-mail: [email protected]. 11--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Albany, Ga.; St. Louis; and Toledo, Ohio. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 11-12--Gifted education: Education for Gifted Students: Focus on the Future, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K-12 educators and administrators, in Minneapolis. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575- 5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 11-12--School improvement: Focusing on Student Performance-Creating Research-Based Schoolwide Action Plans for Increasing Student Achievement, sponsored by the National Study of School Evaluation, for principals, teachers, and administrators, at the NSSE headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill. Deadline: 15 days before event. Contact: Sharon Steindam, NSSE, 1699 E. Woodfield Road, Suite 406, Schaumburg, IL 60173; (847) 995-9080 or (800) 843-6773; fax: (847) 995-9088; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsse.org. 11-12--Technology: Software Training Workshop for Data Point, sponsored by the National Study of School Evaluation, for teachers and administrators, at the NSSE headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill. Deadline: 15 days before event. Contact: Sharon Steindam, NSSE, 1699 E. Woodfield Road, Suite 406, Schaumburg, IL 60173; (847) 995-9080 or (800) 843-6773; fax: (847) 995-9088; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsse.org. **11--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Rome, Ga. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. **11--Senior year: Graduation by Exhibition, sponsored by the Parker Regional Teachers Center, for educators, at the center in Devens, Mass. Contact: PRTC, PO Box 2129, Devens, MA 01432; (978) 772-2687; Web site: www.parker.org/rtc. **11-12--Technology: Software Training Workshop for Data Point, sponsored by the National Study of School Evaluation, for teachers and administrators, at the NSSE headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill. Deadline: 15 days before event. Contact: Sharon Steindam, NSSE, 1699 E. Woodfield Road, Suite 406, Schaumburg, IL 60173; (847) 995-9080 or (800) 843-6773; fax: (847) 995-9088; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsse.org. **11-13--English: The Art of Writing Centers, sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English, for English teachers, in Savannah, Ga. Contact: Donna Sewell, (229) 333-5946; fax: (229) 259-5529; e-mail: [email protected]. 12--Counselors: Counselor Workshop for New Counselors, sponsored by the College Board, for new college counselors, at Monroe Community College in Rochester, N.Y. Contact: Stephen DiPietro, CB, 3440 Market St., Suite 410, Philadelphia, PA 19104; (215) 387-7600, ext. 124; fax: (215) 387-5805; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.collegeboard.org. 12--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Jefferson City, Mo. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. **12--Counselors: Counselor Workshop for New Counselors, sponsored by the College Board, for new college counselors, at Monroe Community College in Rochester, N.Y. Contact: Stephen DiPietro, CB, 3440 Market St., Suite 410, Philadelphia, PA 19104; (215) 387-7600, ext. 124; fax: (215) 387-5805; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.collegeboard.org. **12--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Jefferson City, Mo. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 14-17--Federal programs: Annual Spring Conference, sponsored by the National Association of Federal Education Program Administrators, for federal project coordinators, at the Key Bridge Marriott in Arlington, Va. Contact: Penny Soule, Vice President, NAFEPA, (702) 799-5406; e-mail: [email protected]. 14--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Cleveland State University Convocation Center in Cleveland. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 14-16--Alternative education: Alternative Education Conference: Effective Strategies Institute on Alternative Schools, sponsored by the National Dropout Prevention Center/Network, for teachers, counselors, district staff, social service agencies, juvenile-justice professionals, and government leaders, at the Des Moines Marriott in Des Moines, Iowa. Contact: NDPC/N, 209 Martin St., Clemson, SC 29631-1555; (864) 656-2599; fax: (864) 656-0136; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.dropoutprevention.org. 15--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Baltimore; Louisville, Ky.; and Winston-Salem, N.C. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 15-16--Character education: Developing Character in the Classroom, sponsored by the Hyde School, for teachers and administrators, at the school in Woodstock, Conn. Contact: Reg Ruhlin, HS, 616 High St., Bath, ME 04530; (207) 443-7311; fax: (207) 443-8631; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.hydeteachertraining.org. 15-16--Public policy: 2002 Public Policy Conference, sponsored by the Alliance for Children and Families, for educators, at the Hyatt Regency in Bethesda, Md. Contact: ACF, 1701 K St. N.W., Suite 200, Washington, DC 20006; (800) 220-1016; fax: (202) 331-7476; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.alliance1.org. **15--Special education: Online Seminar: Special Education Referrals: Culturally and Linguistically Diverse and Economically Disadvantaged Populations, sponsored by the Council for Exceptional Children, for educators, policymakers, and counselors, at www.cec.sped.org/pd. Contact: CEC, 1110 N. Glebe Road, Suite 300, Arlington, VA 22201-5704; (800) 224-6830, ext. 516; fax: (703) 620-2521; Web site: www.cec.sped.org/pd/. 16-17--Character education: Classrooms With Character, sponsored by the Girls and Boys Town National Resource Training Center, for educators and teaching aides, in Boys Town, Neb. Contact: NRTC, 14100 Crawford St., Boys Town, NE 68010; (800) 545- 5771, ext. 65; Web site: www.girlsandboystown.org/nrtc. 16--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Arlington, Va.; Arlington Heights, Ill.; Charlotte, N.C.; Columbus, Ind.; and Sharonville, Ohio. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 16--Parental involvement: Nervous, Worried, Scared?: Parents' Guide to Helping Children Deal With Their Fears, sponsored by the Churchill Center, for educators, at the center in New York City. Contact: Susan Spero, CC, 310 E. 30th St., New York, NY 10016; (212) 722-0610; e-mail: ssp[email protected]. 16--Principals: Principals' Academy, The Principal, Politics, and the Community, sponsored by the Greater Cleveland Educational Development Center, for K-12 principals, at Cleveland State University, in Cleveland. Contact: Barbara Jenkins, GCEDC, RT 901, CSU, 1860 E. 22nd St., Cleveland, OH 44114-4435; (216) 523-7107; fax: (216) 687-5422; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.gcedcohio.org. 16--Principals: Raking Leaves in a High Wind: Building Community Connectedness, sponsored by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, for elementary and middle school principals and assistant principals, at the Radisson Hotel in Birmingham, Ala. Contact: NAESP, 1615 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314-3483; (703) 684-3345, ext. 208; fax: (703) 518-6281; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.naesp.org. 16--Professional development: Satellite Town Meeting With Rod Paige, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education, for K-12 educators, to be broadcast on national television. Contact: USDE, (800) 872-5327; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ed.gov/inits/stm/. 17--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Wilmington, N.C. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 17--Principals: Raking Leaves in a High Wind: Building Community Connectedness, sponsored by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, for elementary and middle school principals and assistant principals, at the Montgomery Civic Center in Montgomery, Ala. Contact: NAESP, 1615 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314-3483; (703) 684-3345, ext. 208; fax: (703) 518-6281; e- mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.naesp.org. 17--Professional development: Assessing Professional Development, sponsored by the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, for educators, professional-development coordinators, and curriculum leaders, at the academy in Aurora, Ill. Deadline: April 3. Contact: Guy Todnem, IMSA, 1500 W. Sullivan Road, Aurora, IL 60506- 1000; (630) 907-5970; fax: (630) 907-5918; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.imsa.edu. 17-20--Poetry: Annual conference, sponsored by the National Association for Poetry Therapy, for counselors and creative-writing faculty, at the Hyatt Regency in Denver. Contact: Angela Comfort, NAPT, 5505 Connecticut Ave. N.W., Suite 280, Washington, DC 20015; (202) 966-2536; fax: (202) 966-2283; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.poetrytherapy.org. 17-20--Professional development: Peter Senge in Schools That Learn, sponsored by the Peel District School Board, for teachers, administrators, parents, and community leaders, in Toronto. Contact: TW Branun and Associates, (800) 531-0082; fax: (866) 465- 2325; Web site: www.twblearn.com/conferences.html . 18--English: Infusing Poetry Into Successful Teaching Practice, sponsored by the English Language Arts Council/United Federation of Teachers, for English teachers, in New York City. Contact: Vita Rosenberg, (212) 598-9298; fax: (212) 533-5402; e-mail: [email protected]. 18-20--Science: Focus on Standards for Science and Mathematics, sponsored by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, for educators, in New York City. Contact: Project 2061, AAAS, 1333 H St. N.W., Room 844, Washington, DC 20005; (888) 737-2061; Web site: www.pdp2061.org. 18--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 18--History: Electronic Field Trip: Taxes, Tea, and Tyranny, sponsored by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, for grade 4-8 students and teachers, to be broadcast on national television. Contact: Russ Glissman, CWF, PO Box 1776, Williamsburg, VA 23187; (757) 565-8976; (757) 565-8916; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.history.org/trips. 18--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Anderson, Ind.; Gulfport, Miss.; Richmond, Va.; and Stillwater, Okla. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 18-19--Principals: Don't Laugh at Me: Creating a Ridicule-Free Zone in Every School, sponsored by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, for elementary and middle school principals and assistant principals, at Dover Downs in Dover, Del. Contact: NAESP, 1615 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314-3483; (703) 684-3345, ext. 208; fax: (703) 518-6281; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.naesp.org. 18-21--Foreign language: Teaching in Changing Times: The Courage to Lead, sponsored by the Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, for foreign-language teachers, at the Hilton in New York City. Contact: Susan Cavenagh, NCTFL, PO Box 1773, Carlisle, PA 17013; (717) 245-1977; fax: (717) 245-1976; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nectfl.org. 19--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Hattiesburg, Miss.; Las Vegas; and Portland, Maine. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 19--Principals: Leading Quality Learning Communities, sponsored by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, for elementary and middle school principals and assistant principals, at the OAESA Conference Center in Columbus, Ohio. Contact: NAESP, 1615 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314-3483; (703) 684-3345, ext. 208; fax: (703) 549-5568; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.naesp.org. 19-21--Mathematics: Annual Conference: Seize the Opportunity, Provide the Leadership, sponsored by the National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics, for leaders in mathematics education, at the Venetian in Las Vegas. Deadline: March 15. Contact: NCSM, PO Box 10667, Golden, CO 80401; (404) 274-5932; fax: (404) 274- 5932; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ncsmonline.org. 20--Montessori education: 2001-02 Teachers' Section Annual Touring Symposium, sponsored by the American Montessori Society, for Montessori educators, in Phoenix. Contact: Evelyn Jackson, AMS, (212) 358-1250, ext. 201; e-mail: [email protected]. 21--Reading: The Writing Road to Reading: A Comprehensive Introduction, sponsored by the Reading Reform Foundation of New York, for educators, at the foundation in New York City. Contact: RRF, 333 W. 57th St., Suite 1L, New York, NY 10019; (212) 307-7320; fax: (212) 307-0449; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.readingreformny.org. 21-23--Professional development: 2002 Spring Conference, sponsored by the National Association of Federally Impacted Schools, for public school superintendents, business managers, and school officials, at the Hyatt Regency Capitol Hill in Washington. Deadline: April 2. Contact: Lynn Watkins, NAFIS, 444 N. Capitol St. N.W., Hall of States, Suite 419, Washington, DC 20001; (202) 624-5455; fax: (202) 624-5468. 21-24--Mathematics: 80th Annual Meeting: Realizing the Vision of School Mathematics, sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, for mathematicsteachers and educators, at the Sands Expo, the Venetian, and Harrah's in Las Vegas. Contact: NCTM, 1906 Association Drive, Reston, VA 20191, (703) 620-9840; fax: (800) 220-8483; Web site: www.nctm.org. 22--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Norwood, Mass., and San Antonio. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 22-24--Professional development: Understanding by Design: Teaching and Assessing for Understanding, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K- 12 educators and administrators, in New York City. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575-5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 23--Learning disabilities: Interpreting Evaluations for Classroom and Remedial Use, sponsored by the Churchill Center, for educators, at the center in New York City. Contact: Susan Spero, CC, 310 E. 30th St., New York, NY 10016; (212) 722-0610; e-mail: [email protected]. 23--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Monroe, La. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 23-24--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Maryland Agricultural Center in Gaithersburg, Md. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 23-24--Developmental education: Organizing Schools Using Brain Research, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K-12 educators and administrators, in New York City. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575- 5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 23-24--Diversity: Instructional Strategies for Academically Diverse Learners: A Look at Differentiated Instruction, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, for K-12 educators and administrators, in New York City. Contact: ASCD, 1703 N. Beauregard St., Alexandria, VA 22311-1714; (703) 578-9600 or (800) 933-2723; fax: (703) 575-5400; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ascd.org. 23-25--Early childhood: Annual La Semana del Niño Early-Childhood Educators Institute, sponsored by the Intercultural Development Research Association, for educators, administrators, and parents, in San Antonio. Deadline: April 15. Contact: José Rodriguez or Carol Chavez, IDRA, 5835 Callaghan Road, Suite 350, San Antonio, TX 78228-1190; (210) 444-1710; fax: (210) 444-1714; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.idra.org. 24--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Novi Expo Center in Novi, Mich. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 24--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Decatur, Ala., and Malvern, Pa. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 24-26--Data: Seize the Data! Maximizing the Role of Data in School Improvement Planning, sponsored by the National Study of School Evaluation, for principals, teachers, administrators, and superintendents, at the NSSE headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill. Deadline: 15 days before event. Contact: NSSE, 1699 E. Woodfield Road, Suite 406, Schaumburg, IL 60173; (847) 995-9080 or (800) 843- 6773; fax: (847) 995-9088; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nsse.org. 24-27--Middle schools: Annual Middle Years Conference: Inspiration to Implementation, sponsored by the Middle Years Association of British Columbia, for teachers, administrators, and parents, at the University of Victoria in Victoria, British Columbia. Contact: TW Branun and Associates, (800) 531-0082; fax: (866) 465- 2325; Web site: www.twblearn.com/myabc/myabc.html . 25--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Billings, Mont.; Houston; Irving, Texas; Norcross, Ga.; Orangeburg, N.Y.; and San Diego. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 25--Special education: Inclusive Schools Conference, Restructuring for Caring and Effective Education: The Inclusive Schools, sponsored by the Northeast Ohio Special Education Regional Resource Centers, for educators, at Cleveland State University in Cleveland. Contact: Northeast Regional Professional Development Centers, RT 901, 1860 E. 22nd St., Cleveland, OH 44114-4435; (216) 523-7107; fax: (216) 687-5422; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.nrpdc.org. 25-26--Multiple intelligences: Multiple Intelligences Institute, sponsored by the New City School, for teachers, administrators, and curriculum specialists, at the school in St. Louis. Contact: M. Patricia Nuernberger, New City School, 5209 Waterman Ave., St. Louis, MO 63108-1155; (314) 361-6411; fax: (314) 361-1499; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.newcityschool.org. 25-27--Principals: Proficiencies for Principals Workshops: Political and Communication Skills, sponsored by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, for elementary and middle school principals, at the headquarters of the Cooperative Council of Oklahoma School Administrators in Oklahoma City. Contact: Sandy Wisely, Associate Executive Director, CCOSA; (405) 524-1191. 25-28--Montessori education: Clearing the Cobwebs: Rediscovering the Treasures of a Montessori Education, sponsored by the American Montessori Society, for Montessori school educators, at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City in Arlington, Va. Contact: Hilary Green, AMS, 281 Park Ave. S., New York, NY 10010; (212) 358-1250; Web site: www.amshq.org. 26-27--English: Finding Our Voices, sponsored by the Wisconsin Council of Teachers of English Language Arts, for English teachers, in Appleton, Wis. Contact: Debbie Kinder, (608) 342-1920; e-mail: [email protected]. 26--African-American education: Education Policy Forum and Annual Awards Dinner, sponsored by the National Commission for African-American Education, for educators and parents, at Howard University in Washington. Contact: Claude Mayberry, NCAAE, 2141 Industrial Parkway, Suite 202, Silver Spring, MD 20904; (301) 680-0148; fax: (301) 680-9240. 26-27--English: Spring Conference 2002, sponsored by the Minnesota Council of Teachers of English, for English Teachers, in St. Cloud, Minn. Contact: Gerry Lidstrom; e-mail: [email protected]. 26--Counselors: Counseling the ADD/ADHD/LD Student workshop, sponsored by the College Board, for guidance counselors, at Mercer County Community College in Trenton, N.J. Contact: Stephen DiPietro, CB, 3440 Market St., Suite 410, Philadelphia, PA 19104; (215) 387-7600, ext. 124; fax: (215) 387-5805; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.collegeboard.org. 26--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Bakersfield, Calif.; Bozeman, Mont.; Corpus Christi, Texas; and Middletown, N.Y. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 26-27--Parental involvement: Family Festival: Bright Futures, sponsored by the Practical Parenting Partnerships Center, for teachers, administrators, counselors, social workers, parents, and students, at the Tan Tar A Resort in Osage Beach, Mo. Contact: Darlene Robinett, Director, PPPC, 2412C Hyde Park, Jefferson City, MO 65109; (573) 761-7770; fax: (573) 761-7760; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.pppctr.org. 26-28--Parental involvement: International Conference: Born to Learn, sponsored by the Parents as Teachers National Center, for early-childhood educators, parent educators, child-care providers, health-care professionals, social workers, and other professionals who work with young children, at the Adams Mark Hotel in St. Louis. Contact: PATNC, 10176 Corporate Square Drive, Suite 230, St. Louis, MO 63132; (314) 432-4330; fax: (314) 432-8963; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.patnc.org. 28-2--Reading: 47th Annual Convention: Gateway to Global Understanding, sponsored by the International Reading Association, for educators, at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. Contact: IRA, 800 Barksdale Road, Newark, DE 19714-8139; (302) 731-1600; fax: (302) 731-1057; Web site: www.reading.org. 28--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Nashville Convention Center in Nashville, Tenn. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 28-30--Leadership: Courageous Leadership for School Success 2002: Best Practices for Enhancing Student Achievement and School Climate, sponsored by the HOPE Foundation, for superintendents, assistant superintendents, staff developers, curriculum and instructional staff, principals, and team leaders, at the Holiday Inn Select in Chicago. Contact: Kristina Anderson, 3925 Hagan St., Suite 105, Box 906, Bloomington, IN 57502; (812) 355-6000; fax: (812) 323- 8140; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.communitiesofhope.org. 28-2--Magnet schools: 20th International Conference on Magnet Schools, sponsored by Magnet Schools of America, for administrators, teachers, and parents in magnet schools, at the Greenspoint Wyndham Hotel in Houston. Contact: Tim Salmon, MSA, (281) 985-6416; fax: (281) 985-6548; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.magnet.edu/conferences.html. 29--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 29--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Flint, Mich.; Fresno, Calif.; Gainesville, Fla.; and Metairie, La. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 29-30--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the World Trade Center Boston in Boston. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 29-30--Professional development: Understanding by Design: Conference on Curriculum Design, sponsored by Relearning by Design, for educators interested in the materials and curricular design of the Understanding by Design program, in Philadelphia. Contact: Carol Wander, Project Manager, RBD, 65 S. Main St., Building B/PO 2-10, Pennington, NJ 08534-2821; (609) 730-1199; fax: (800) 329-3122; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.relearning.org. 29-2--Disabilities: Making a Difference in Developmental Disabilities, sponsored by the YAI/National Institute for People With Disabilities, for educators, at the Crowne Plaza Manhattan Hotel in New York City. Contact: Abbe Wittenberg, YAI/NIPD, (212) 273-6193; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: wwwyai.org. 30--College fair: National College Fair, sponsored by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, for high school students and their parents, at the Hawaii Convention Center in Honolulu. Contact: NACAC, 1631 Prince St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800) 822-6285; fax: (703) 836-8015; Web site: www.nacac.com. 30--Mathematics: Hands-On Equations, sponsored by the Agency for Instructional Technology, for educators, in Detroit; Lafayette, La.; Sacramento, Calif.; and St. Augustine, Fla.. Deadline: Two weeks before event. Contact: AIT, 1800 N. Stonelake Drive, PO Box A, Bloomington, IN 47402; (800) 457-4509; fax: (812) 333-4278; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: www.ait.net. 30-1--Safety: Safe and Effective Secondary Schools, sponsored by the Girls and Boys Town National Resource Training Center, for teachers, administrators, and support staff, school resource officers, and counselors, in Boys Town, Neb. Contact: NRTC Support Services, Box 145, Boys Town, NE 68010; (800) 545-5771, ext. 65; e-mail: [email protected].
2019-04-21T22:17:44Z
https://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2002/03/06/25events.h21.html
Mr. Luebke noted the absence of a quorum and said that the Commission members present would provide recommendations that would be subject to confirmation by a quorum at the next Commission meeting. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk asked if the lack of a quorum would delay the projects from moving forward. Mr. Luebke said that the Commission's recommendations made today would be provided to the applicants using the normal procedure, including advice to the D.C. government for reviews under the Shipstead–Luce Act and Old Georgetown Act, with a notation that the actions are provisional until confirmation by a quorum; he anticipated no changes to these recommendations at the time of confirmation. He added that applicants do not need to treat the lack of a quorum as an impediment to moving forward on the basis of the recommendations provided today. A. Approval of the minutes of the 20 February meeting. Mr. Luebke reported that the minutes of the February meeting were circulated to the Commission members in advance. The Commission approved the minutes upon a motion by Mr. Krieger (subject to confirmation by a quorum). B. Dates of next meetings. Mr. Luebke presented the regularly scheduled dates for upcoming Commission meetings: 17 April, 15 May, and 19 June 2014. C. Report on the 2014 National Capital Arts and Cultural Affairs program. Mr. Luebke reported on the federal grants program administered by the Commission to support Washington arts organizations. The application deadline for the 2014 program was on 1 March; 22 organizations have applied, all previous recipients of grants, and the staff is in the process of evaluating the applications for conformance with the program's guidelines. He said that the appropriated budget for the program is slightly less than $2 million, which will be apportioned in accordance with an established formula; disbursements are anticipated in June 2014. D. Report on the approval of one object proposed for acquisition by the Freer Gallery of Art. Mr. Luebke reported the Chairman's approval earlier in the week of an artwork being considered by the Freer Gallery of Art for acquisition at auction; the Freer bid successfully on Wednesday to acquire the work for its permanent collection. He said that the artwork from India is a red sandstone sculpture of the head of the Buddha dating from the 2nd to 3rd century A.D., an early period of classical Indian sculpture. Mr. Luebke reported that Ms. Fernández has announced her forthcoming resignation from the Commission; he expressed appreciation for her conceptual insights as a member of the Commission since 2011. Appendix I – Direct Submission Consent Calendar: Mr. Lindstrom said that there were no changes to the draft appendix. Upon a motion by Mr. Krieger with second by Ms. Plater–Zyberk, the Commission approved the revised Direct Submission Consent Calendar (subject to confirmation by a quorum). Appendix II – Shipstead–Luce Act Submissions: Ms. Batcheler reported several substantial updates to the draft appendix, in addition to minor notations of dates for receipt of supplemental information. Three projects listed on the draft appendix with provisional or unfavorable recommendations (case numbers SL 14–052, 14–066, and SL 14–072) have been removed based on consultation with the applicants in order to allow more time for submission of design revisions. The provisional recommendation for an additional project (SL 14–060) has been revised to be unfavorable due to the lack of sufficient design information on the design. Upon a motion by Mr. Krieger with second by Ms. Fernández, the Commission approved the revised appendix (subject to confirmation by a quorum). Appendix III – Old Georgetown Act Submissions: Mr. Martínez said that a sentence has been added to one recommendation (case number OG 14–112) to request removal of a flagpole that was installed without review, based on a recent site visit by the staff in conjunction with the submitted project for replacement windows; he said that the applicant may choose to submit the flagpole for review. He also noted that the recommendations of the Old Georgetown Board for two projects (OG 14–116 and 14–117) include delegation of final review to the staff; he anticipated that satisfactory submission materials would be provided to the staff in the next few days. Upon a motion by Ms. Fernández with second by Mr. Krieger, the Commission approved the revised appendix (subject to confirmation by a quorum). CFA 20/MAR/14–1, Foreign Missions Center, Walter Reed Army Medical Center—western portion bounded by 16th Street, Alaska Avenue, Fern Street, and Main Drive, NW. Master plan. Concept. Mr. Lindstrom introduced the draft master plan for a new Foreign Missions Center, a development that would be similar to the International Chancery Center near Connecticut Avenue. The Foreign Missions Center would be a compound of chanceries located in the northwest portion of the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center between 16th Street and Georgia Avenue, N.W.; the medical center has been relocated through the Defense Base Closure and Reassignment process. The Department of State is taking control of the 43.5–acre northwest section of the medical center; the District of Columbia government will oversee redevelopment of the remaining portion. He asked Clifton Seagroves, the director of diplomatic properties for the Office of Foreign Missions at the Department of State, to begin the presentation. Mr. Seagroves said that U.S. efforts to acquire diplomatic properties overseas are often challenged, in part because few appropriate sites are available for foreign chanceries in Washington; the Foreign Missions Center would therefore help the U.S. to negotiate the acquisition of secure facilities abroad, improving the protection of U.S. government personnel working overseas in substandard facilities. He said that the center would also help the U.S. economy by creating jobs and by enabling the federal and D.C. governments to collaborate on the economic revitalization of this neighborhood. Mr. Seagroves said that the Department of State has authority under the Foreign Missions Act to accept a transfer of property from the Defense Department, and to develop and manage such property in perpetuity. The Department of State will fund the development using proceeds from the assignment of parcels to foreign governments, and will not seek Congressional appropriations. He said that the Commission, in addition to reviewing the master plan, could review individual development plans for new buildings or the reuse of existing buildings at its discretion. He introduced architect Charles Enos of EYP Architects and Engineers to continue the presentation. Mr. Enos said that the master plan is approximately 65 percent complete, and the project team has started developing the design guidelines. The draft environmental impact study is nearing completion, and the historic preservation review process is underway; he noted that the U.S. Army has nominated the entire Walter Reed site as a historic district, and archeological research will begin soon. Mr. Enos said that the northwestern area of Walter Reed is a natural landscape that will provide a buffer for the adjoining residential neighborhood. The grade slopes steeply from north to south. Historic features include individual buildings and structures contributing to the potential historic district, as well as landscape features and Main Drive along the southern edge of the Foreign Missions Center. Analysis of the buildings has identified several for reuse as chanceries and recommended retention of the memorial chapel. He asked architect Rick Kuhn of EYP to continue the presentation. Mr. Kuhn described the general parameters of the master plan. The Walter Reed site is surrounded by dense residential neighborhoods on three sides, and Rock Creek Park is on the west; he said that the park character extends across 16th Street onto the site. The process has included identifying defining features, determining which to emphasize to create a distinctive character for the campus, and trying to relate this site to the District portion of Walter Reed. He noted that the roads would tie into the city's street grid, including prominent north–south axes. The scale of blocks would be defined by streets, and surrounding neighborhood blocks might inform the subdivision of the site. He said that the project team has analyzed axes between significant buildings, identified important open spaces, and considered how to take advantage of the steep slope; the master plan calls for preserving as many large trees and as much tree canopy as possible. Mr. Kuhn said that the most important site elements identified include Dahlia Street, Main Drive, the chapel and its precinct, and the extension of Rock Creek Park. Dahlia Street and a new linear park, called 14th Street Park, would be the foundation of the design, which he described as an open space framework plan. He said that the flowing green route of Main Drive would give identity to the campus and establish the character of the open space on the south side. A primary goal is making improvements to the east–west corridor of Dahlia Street, which will be a hub for the District portion of Walter Reed; the District plans for Dahlia Street to be lined with five– to seven–story buildings, which will step down to a residential scale as they move away from Dahlia. This will influence the treatment of Dahlia Street on the Foreign Missions site; the master plan calls for a more urban character on the blocks north of Dahlia Street and a more open character on the blocks to its south. The greatest massing would occur along Dahlia, with buildings of three to four stories, scaling down on the north with two to three stories against residential neighborhoods and two to four stories elsewhere. While the division of parcels would be flexible, the intention is to maintain the urban character of the north side of campus with smaller lots, and an open character to the south where larger lots would be used. He summarized that the area to the north can accommodate up to 13 smaller lots, creating a potential of up to 24 lots on the entire site. Mr. Krieger noted the summary of historic resources and asked if Building 40 would be retained; Mr. Enos responded that if a user is not found for Building 40, it can be removed and its site subdivided further. He said that the proposed alignment of 14th Street has been shifted slightly, part of the effort to create parcels of roughly equal size and to provide flexibility in retaining buildings if they can be used by foreign governments. Mr. Seagroves added that at the International Chancery Center, most of the lots were approximately one acre, but this size may be too limiting; the proposed Foreign Missions Center could have a maximum of 24 lots but some may eventually be combined, and the number of chanceries would probably be ten to twelve. Mr. Krieger commented that the master plan has several aspects that make sense, particularly the emphasis on Dahlia Street and the extension of 14th Street to connect with Main Drive. He observed that the drawings appear to depict trees of two different sizes on the federal and D.C. portions of Dahlia Street, but the landscape should be continuous across the Walter Reed site. He noted the unclear treatment of the western portion of the site, which currently extends the character of Rock Creek; he suggested the potential reuse of many office buildings and houses on the site that are slated for demolition, perhaps as affordable housing. He also raised the question of density, an issue of concern in Washington during the recent study concerning height limits; he observed that the master plan envisions this area becoming less dense and more pastoral or suburban, which may not be the right approach for this large area of urban land. He summarized his reaction that the site planning for the two major roads and the basic decisions governing the plan seem appropriate, while broader concerns about the proposed low density and accommodating future growth could be addressed. Mr. Seagroves responded that the neighbors have stated a preference for low density. Mr. Krieger said that neighbors always have this preference; he advised considering this a plan for the next century, commenting that suburban aspirations may be outdated; he said that the proposed density seems odd given the potential of the planning process to use land more efficiently now than in the past. Mr. Seagroves emphasized that the master plan is intended to allow flexibility, including the potential subdivision of larger lots. Mr. Enos added that the grid would allow for a variety of lot sizes and subdividing in all areas of the campus. Mr. Luebke noted the basic assumption of this planning process that the Foreign Missions Center would accommodate stand–alone foreign missions, each having all needed services and a security barrier; these necessarily require a certain irreducible size, with the result that the campus will have a much lower density of development than mixed–use commercial and residential buildings. Mr. Enos clarified that the remnant forest area to the west is proposed to become two parcels, one at the top of the hill and one at the bottom; the goal is to preserve the tree canopy and treat this as an area covered by trees. Mr. Krieger suggested establishing a setback requirement on the campus to support this approach, and also recommended more density for the parcels near the center of the complex, where neighbors would not see it. Ms. Fernández said that the master plan embodies decisions about the site's character that will not be changed for decades. She commented that if the goal is a relatively low density, then the landscape is crucial. She questioned the drawing convention for rendering the trees to be very large, as if they would immediately fill up the space; this is not the actual condition, and Dahlia Street would not be lined by such large trees for many years. She said that the campus would not resemble the master plan unless transitions between the forested area and the more open areas are carefully studied. She suggested consideration of treating the northwest portion less like a preserved woodland, and more as a gradual transition into the overall master plan. Ms. Plater–Zyberk commented that a master plan is caught between the desire for flexibility and the desire for predictability. She acknowledged the need for flexibility in parcel sizes, but emphasized the need to establish from the beginning a predictable character for the site through the public realm, particularly streets. She supported extending the wooded area downhill; she also emphasized that the treatment of Dahlia Street will be key, as it can knit together the Walter Reed site. She said that the master plan should fundamentally concern the creation of a special character for this district that will attract people and make them proud to be here. She gave the example of embassy row in London, an enclave of mansions in a landscaped setting; it has a tremendous amount of presence and grace because these embassies were probably originally private residences and so possess a relationship in scale, setback or build–to lines, fencing, and other elements, which should also be the goal for the Foreign Missions Center. She said that the onus to guarantee an attractive character will therefore be on the design guidelines. She recommended being as specific as possible when writing the design guidelines, particularly concerning the depth of setbacks. She emphasized that the Department of State should control the identity of the site as a whole through the harmony of its public space. Mr. Krieger agreed, adding that occupants could ask for variances if necessary. Ms. Plater–Zyberk said that Dahlia Street should be considered the center of the campus, not a roadway that separates it. She suggested increasing the density along Dahlia Street, commenting that streets gain character through having an envelope of buildings of symmetrical density or height. She added that the density could be transferred here, or elsewhere, from the three northernmost lots. She recommended giving Dahlia Street a continuous character through consistent treatment of its landscape and of such elements as fences, gates, and setbacks. She added that lots should face Dahlia rather than the smaller streets, unless the sides of buildings resemble front facades. She emphasized that the key issue is establishing a character that will create a wonderful and appealing place. Mr. Krieger agreed that the design of Dahlia Street should be more structured. He observed that cities historically had small lots, and if someone wanted more space they bought two or three lots. He said that flexibility could be arranged in different ways, and careful structuring of the lot size now would help to control the character. Mr. Seagroves responded that the plan already addresses this; foreign governments could select how many small lots they need. Mr. Krieger said this would be desirable but is not obvious from the master plan, which appears to designate some large lots at the outset. Mr. Krieger asked if the landscape would be the responsibility of the occupants of individual lots; Mr. Seagroves responded that the treed areas would be common spaces maintained by the State Department, while the parcels would be maintained by foreign governments. Mr. Krieger said that the landscape edge where the parcels meet Dahlia Street would need to continue and amplify the campus character, either through the careful supervision of the State Department or through strict design guidelines. Mr. Luebke noted that the master plan has been submitted for concept approval, and he summarized the apparent consensus that the Commission has no fundamental problems with it but has questions about details. He asked if the Commission members want to have a further review. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk said that the comments have been clear, generally supporting the layout while suggesting changes in how massing is allocated. She recommended approving the concept and having a subsequent review with details about design guidelines and the landscape. Upon a second by Ms. Fernández, the Commission adopted this action (subject to confirmation by a quorum). Ms. Batcheler introduced the proposal for the public spaces, amenities, and parks associated with Phase I of the Southwest Waterfront, known as the Wharf, submitted by the D.C. government in cooperation with the developer Hoffman–Madison Waterfront. She noted that the Commission had approved the concept designs for the public spaces and several buildings in 2012. She asked Shawn Seaman of Hoffman–Madison Waterfront to begin the presentation. Mr. Seaman said that the project planning has been underway for eight years, and the groundbreaking was held the day before. He described the project as a component of the D.C. government's Anacostia Waterfront Initiative, which is part of the Deputy Mayor's plans to revitalize the city's waterfronts and rivers. He noted that the master plan and the horizontal elements—parks and public spaces—have been treated as direct submissions from the D.C. government, while the individual buildings have been submitted under the Shipstead–Luce Act jurisdiction. The project encompasses approximately 25 acres of land and 50 acres of water, and it has been divided into two phases; the current submission involves only the horizontal elements of the first phase. He recalled that the master plan was first presented to the Commission in November 2010, followed by several submissions in 2012 resulting in concept approval of multiple components but not the Waterfront Park, which is part of the current submission. He introduced the designers of the parks and public spaces: architect Hilary Bertsch of EE&K; Michael Vergason of Michael Vergason Landscape Architects; and Paul Josey of Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects. Ms. Bertsch summarized the goals and development of the design. She said the intention is to activate the entire ground level and provide continual opportunities to see and connect with the water. The wharf, running the length of the site, would be the key public space and would tie together all of the other public spaces. Attributes common to all of the open spaces would include high–quality materials, landscape elements, and a simple kit–of–parts approach to designing the vertical elements, as previously suggested by the Commission. Ms. Bertsch described the treatment of the wharf. Its sixty–foot width would include twenty feet for a promenade zone along the water, marked with wharf pylons and a double line of trees; twenty feet for a shared zone, the primary circulation space that would accommodate limited one–way vehicular traffic and access for fire and service vehicles; and twenty feet for a mixed–use zone along the buildings. A loop road would lead to the wharf from Maine Avenue. Materials would include three kinds of granite, with colors used to mark the different zones; she confirmed that the result would effectively be two primary paving materials plus an accent granite, as well as a metal trench marking the separation between the promenade and shared zones. The steps at some locations would be wide enough for sitting. She said that the trees would be planted in high–density soil with an irrigation system, and the largest available size would be selected. The long waterfront would have timber fendering and seats along the edge; views from the water to the city are being treated as of equal importance to views from the city to water. Ms. Bertsch said that the pylons along the wharf, using standardized design components, would carry plumbing and electrical hookups as well as lighting; the only change to these features from the approved concept was determining the dimensions of materials. The ten pavilions along the wharf would also use a standard design system. Three of the pavilions would be built in Phase I: a pair flanking the District Pier and a slightly larger pavilion fronting Parcel 3b. Ms. Bertsch then presented the other open spaces, progressing from northwest to southeast, and noted that all of the larger spaces would be designed to accommodate special events. The Market Pier would be adjacent to the day docks, a series of boat slips for short–term use; the docks would also be used by the existing fish market to the west. The Market Pier would be simple in character; barges would line up along this pier, and it therefore would not have seating along the edge. It would be paved in scored concrete, and the end would be marked with a sign made of wood slats and letters along with a controlled metal gate providing entry to the slips. Ms. Bertsch described the Transit Pier, associated with Parcel 2, which would include the Transit Pavilion made of southern yellow pine treated for durability. Steps providing views of the water would lead down to docks and an event space. She emphasized the effort to simplify the design of elements such as the cable railing. Mr. Krieger asked about access to the pier without using stairs; Ms. Bertsch indicated the proposed elevator and a ramp along the stairs, similar to New York's High Line. She described the series of water elements along the wharf; a simple water feature would terminate the vista between Parcels 1 and 2, and these buildings would be canted to allow for the views. The District Pier would be the largest public space; at the northeast end near Maine Avenue it would have a water court and entry into an underground parking garage, then continue to the Pierhouse building, the Civic Commons, an exhibition pier, and the Dockmaster Building. The exhibition pier, 50 feet wide and 450 feet long, would have berths for tall ships as well as exhibit and event space. Its 40–foot–high rigging pylons would be the tallest in the project, and the pier would have a functioning maritime area. At the water court, the steps down to the parking garage would be marked by a cascade of water over walls of Carderock stone. Ms. Bertsch confirmed that this is a locally quarried stone that would also be used at the Pierhouse building. In the middle of the Civic Commons, the Pierhouse restaurant would be designed for maximum transparency and would serve as a gateway to the wharf. The Dockmaster building would house the dockmaster office on the second floor, with offices, storage, and public restrooms below; it would be constructed of wood with a standing–seam metal roof. Ms. Bertsch described the three smaller, more intimately scaled corridors fronted with retail spaces: Pier Mews, Avenue Mews, and Jazz Alley. Pier Mews between Parcels 3a and 3b, would use the landscape to soften the spaces; a series of overhead arches would be constructed in the metal vernacular style of the wharf and rigging pylons. The Avenue Mews, also between Parcels 3a and b, would connect to the Capital Yacht Club (CYC) Piazza; stanchions would mark the buildings on either side of the entrance. Jazz Alley, the smallest, is intended to be the most active. Located between Parcels 4 and 5, its entry would be indicated by a sign, and a small platform would provide a performance space; strings of lights would cross overhead. Ms. Bertsch said that the uses around the CYC Piazza at the end of Avenue Mews would include a hotel, a high–end residential building, and a signature restaurant; the piazza would also include a large tree and moveable planters to define the turnaround. She said that ample soil would be available for the tree's health, notwithstanding the location above the project's two–story parking garage. Ms. Bertsch said that Maine Avenue would be the formal urban face of the project, extending along the entire length of the waterfront redevelopment; its treatment must meet D.C. Department of Transportation standards. Existing trees would be kept and a second row of trees planted. Sidewalks would be paved in concrete using the same color palette as the granite on the wharf. The transitional zone would include cafe seating and plantings. A ten–foot–wide bicycle lane would run the entire length, and she indicated a series of bicycle racks and Capital Bikeshare stations. Intersection designs would be safe for all forms of traffic, and at Parcel 11 the bicycle lane would turn off from Maine Avenue to Waterfront Park. Mr. Vergason presented the design of 7th Street Park, which would connect the community to the wharf and water. The park would be the centerpiece of a residential square, framed by a hotel to the northwest and a residential building to the southeast. He described the proposal as a composition of soft and supple forms designed as a raised oval of turf and trees, rolling over a large storm sewer pipe below; the park is intended to provide a calm area along the active wharf. The pier, part of Phase II, would slope down to the water, connecting to the wharf at an overlook which will have stepped seating. Paving would include precast pavers as well as cast–in–place concrete walks in the form of a series of loops connecting to the wharf. The curbless shared–use street would include bollards to control car access. A rain garden on the south would absorb most of the park's runoff; south of the rain garden, an interactive fountain would have looped jets framing a cloud of mist. The planting palette would include five types of native deciduous trees and bluegrass turf. Mr. Josey then presented the design for Waterfront Park, a community park for the existing residential neighborhood of Southwest D.C., and adjacent to existing piers for tour boats and boats for marine police and firefighters. The park would highlight views to the water and includes a lawn and a fountain for playing, a plaza, a pergola overlooking a stepped fountain with a small waterfall, a bocce court, and a small storage structure. A line of mature willow oaks would be preserved, and water would be treated in bioswales and rain gardens along the waterfront. Materials would transition from stone to wood along the stairs and dock, recapitulating the geological transition from the Piedmont to the Coastal Plain that is characteristic of the Washington region. A pergola circling a third of the lawn would be asymmetrical in section and constructed of powder–coated steel. The plaza would be used for temporary events and also for emergency helicopter landings, as an occasional parking lot for police cars, and as a turnaround. Mr. Luebke noted that the Commission had granted conditional approval to these projects in July 2012, and the staff considers the revised proposal to be responsive to the Commission's previous concerns. Mr. Seaman added that the permit application for the horizontal elements would likely be filed in September 2014. Ms. Fernández opened the discussion with a concern about the generic use of the word "water" in the presentation, observing that the term water alone does not mean anything. While the fountain in Waterfront Park was thoughtfully designed, she said that the other water features seem to have been added without consideration of their appearance or relation to each other. Noting that the wharf will be a space experienced by people walking through it, she emphasized the need for a meaningful relation between fountains and the sounds and shapes of their flowing water. She said that the proposed Theater Alley fountain is generic and appears unrelated to any other feature; the cascade at the elevator and the children's play fountain also appear completely unrelated. She recommended devising a coordinated design approach for the fountains as had been done for the vertical features of the open spaces. Mr. Vergason said that the intention for the fountain at 7th Street Park is to introduce the presence of water as people approach from a distance because Washington Channel would not be visible, and also to create a playful, cooling place in a sunny spot among the trees; he added that the design responds to the geometry of other forms nearby. Mr. Seaman said that the Theater Alley fountain would be located adjacent to a parking garage entrance and a truck loading area for the theater, resulting in very limited room for interrupting the road surface. The fountain is proposed as a means to soften this constricted space rather than as one of a series along the waterfront. Ms. Fernández said her concern is not about the size of the space but that the fountain's design is unrelated to the language of anything else on the wharf; Ms. Plater–Zyberk added that this fountain looks pre–fabricated. Ms. Fernández emphasized that such elements need to be designed, regardless of whether constraints are present; in this case, the appearance is that an attempt was made to create an inviting space but a generic element was added without thinking about how the space would be used. For example, she said that sound is important as a sensory effect that sets a tone, and an understanding is need of how these different aspects of fountains will affect the experience of moving through this space. Ms. Fernández commented that the designers' previous approach of making every element a unique event had produced a carnival–like environment; she commended them for toning this effect down, noting that the wharf and the water are themselves the main events and do not have to be enlivened at each intersection. Mr. Krieger commented that the project could use more editing, which may become necessary because of budgetary constraints. He suggested that presentations to the Commission should be required to include two renderings of spaces, one with people and one without, because spaces need to be understood without people. He said that the project still appears to be trying too hard, contrasting it with the remarkable quays of London and Rome that are simpler than this design; the proposal seems overloaded, apparently due to fear that otherwise people wouldn't come. He commended the project as both ambitious and thoughtful, reflecting a strong commitment to Washington's public environment, but nevertheless recommended further simplification. He also encouraged selecting larger trees, suggesting a nine–inch rather than the proposed eight–inch caliper. Ms. Plater–Zyberk commented that the project is a wonderful opportunity, and she agreed in recommending simplification. She observed that the few steps along the wharf accommodating the level change might pose a hazard; with so much activity along the wharf, she said that the proposed ground surface is generally too busy, and its paving needs to be treated entirely as background. She recommended running the granite and other features uninterrupted from one end of the wharf to the other, and she stressed the need for consistency as well as simplification: the wood of the pier should start at the pier rather than extend into the wharf, and the patterns around fountains should start at building lines. She indicated the stairs in one rendering, which are depicted as feathering where the levels change; she said this would be both annoying and hazardous. She advised restudy of the level changes, bearing in mind that people should not have to pay attention to them; in this case, she said that the level change could become an overlook since it would not be very useful for sitting. She added that the color of steps should change at the nose and not at the riser so they can easily be seen by people descending; Mr. Krieger added that the six–inch risers might be too high for older pedestrians. For the Transit Pier, Ms. Plater–Zyberk reiterated that wood should be restricted to the pier and not used on the wharf; similarly, the paving at the theater fountain should not extend to the wharf. She observed that the rigging pylons would be used sometimes independently and sometimes to hold up roofs; she recommended avoiding a proliferation of vertical rigging elements for uses that could be combined. She also recommended drawing all of the vertical pieces in one rendering to see if their number could be reduced. Ms. Plater–Zyberk acknowledged the need for the sign at the Market Pier but said that its arched shape and wood construction are unrelated to the language of the wharf; the vertical elements throughout are metal, and the sign should perhaps be related to these—made of metal, and not an arch. Mr. Luebke noted that this issue had also been discussed concerning the metal arches at the mews. Ms. Plater–Zyberk said that the Jazz Alley sign, with its freestanding letters, is best because it does not use an arch. She suggested that all signs in the smaller spaces could be letters hung from the buildings at a higher level, or hung at their current level but with fewer of them. She advised against adding more vertical supports if infrastructure could simply be hung between the closely spaced buildings, as is done in cities with narrow streets such as Rome. Mr. Seaman responded that the current design calls for cable–supported lights, and the arches shown in the renderings may be from an earlier version of the design; Ms. Plater–Zyberk and Mr. Krieger support this revision. Mr. Luebke noted that the size of the Jazz Alley sign is not indicated in the presentation materials; while the D.C. government has established a special sign district for the Wharf, the signs would also be subject to Commission review under the Shipstead–Luce Act. He said that signage is a larger issue, recalling that two years ago the Commission had lengthy discussions about the use of commercial signs at the top of buildings in this project. He emphasized that the project team needs to understand that the Commission will be looking at signs carefully. Ms. Plater–Zyberk then discussed the proposed treatment of Maine Avenue. She supported the new line of trees and the bicycle lane, but observed that this would leave only ten feet for the sidewalk and restaurant seating, which may be tight; she suggested considering fewer trees and installing planters flush with the ground to accommodate cafe tables. Mr. Seaman clarified that the proposal includes a ten–foot–wide sidewalk and a five–foot zone for low–impact landscape that would be interrupted by intermittent paved areas for seating, adding that the ten–foot–zone is required by the Anacostia Waterfront Initiative. Ms. Plater–Zyberk said the paving would be best if it were flush with the landscape, not raised above. Discussing the other parks, Ms. Plater–Zyberk said that 7th Street Park was described as a quiet and calm place, but she observed that the curving geometry of the walks seems very active. For Waterfront Park, she said that the fountain may be too complex, observing that the park is designed with numerous levels and multiple shapes; she added that placing wood next to water is a potential maintenance problem, and she recommended simplifying the design. Mr. Krieger reiterated that the wharf itself should be more consistent along its length; it is interrupted at many points with distinctive alleys, mews, and fountains, but along the edge the design should be calmer, as in all great quays. He said that some things would always change, such as buildings and canopies, but on the whole there should be fewer interruptions such as canopies and gaps. He recommended a more continuous line of trees to balance all the varied elements, and treating the wharf as a consistent datum line to enable people to understand the variations along its route. Ms. Plater–Zyberk said that the wharf will be a three–dimensional space that needs to be modulated; she noted that the location of gaps between buildings will be clear and does not need to be marked by pavement changes. Mr. Krieger agreed that such events do not always have to be called out. Mr. Luebke asked for clarification of the large area of pavement depicted in front of the planned church building at Parcel 11. Mr. Seaman confirmed that this is an interim streetscape design for the first phase; Phase II will include a park in this location designed by Michael Van Valkenburgh, which had been presented to the Commission in 2012 as a series of boulders and undulating forms running from Maine Avenue to the Washington Channel. He said that the depicted Phase I concrete paving would be a temporary, relatively inexpensive forecourt to the church that can be removed in two years when the M Street Landing project is built. He added that the design for this park will be presented again when the church is completed and Phase II has begun. Ms. Plater–Zyberk commented that the sidewalk and planting along this park should be continuous with Maine Avenue. Mr. Luebke noted the Commission's previous concept approval of the open spaces and said that no action is needed on the current submission. He summarized the overall support of the Commission members for the project's direction and said that the staff can work with the project team on addressing the Commission's specific comments. Noting the procedural complexity of the project, he suggested that the Commission could allow the future final design submissions to be placed on the consent calendar if staff concludes that the design is satisfactory. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk requested that the project be presented again to the Commission—particularly to allow for further comments from Ms. Meyer, the landscape architect on the Commission, who is not at today's meeting. Ms. Fernández agreed, commenting that even a small change would be significant on such a large site. SL 14–073, The Museum of the Bible (Passages), 300 D Street, SW. Additions, alterations, and rehabilitation of Washington Design Center Building and adjacent office building. Revised concept. (Previous: SL 14–001, 21 November 2013.) Ms. Batcheler introduced the revised concept design for alterations and additions to a complex of buildings proposed to house the Museum of the Bible, a private museum dedicated to the exhibition of items from the Green Collection of rare biblical texts and artifacts. She summarized the previous review in November 2013, when the Commission supported the project's general height, scale, and configuration while raising several concerns about the design of the building and site. The concept has been revised following consultation with the D.C. government and the Commission staff. She introduced Harry Hargrave from the Museum of the Bible to begin the presentation. Mr. Hargrave commented that the D.C. Historic Preservation Review Board has recommended approval of the concept, and that the project team has been working closely with the D.C. Office of Transportation and the D.C. Office of Planning in designing a lively streetscape beyond the building face, which is at the property line. He added that one goal is to improve the pedestrian experience of walking to the museum along 4th Street from the National Air and Space Museum to the north. He introduced Michael Vergason of Michael Vergason Landscape Architects and architect David Greenbaum of SmithGroup JJR to present the design. Mr. Greenbaum said that the primary aim is the creation of a visually coherent composition for the museum that will reinforce the flatiron shape of the warehouse building; the design should also be solemn in character to reflect the importance of the collection. He said that the site encompasses two distinct components—the museum and an adjoining office building. The original 1923 warehouse building on the west side of the site would be converted into the museum; the 1982 addition to its east, the Washington Office Center, will remain an office building under separate ownership; and a replacement infill structure would be constructed between them to enclose the museum's vertical circulation and long–span spaces. Mr. Greenbaum said that the allowable height of 130 feet allows construction of a two–story addition above the warehouse to accommodate a 500–seat theater and a 500–seat ballroom under a roof of distinctive form responding to the plan's asymmetrical parti. A single level of 3,000 square feet would also be added above the Washington Office Center to house the Green Scholar Institute, which is affiliated with the museum. He described the warehouse's existing fenestration that reflects the original functions of cold and dry storage; the proposed infill building would abstract the window proportions, coursing lines, and setbacks of the historic building. He summarized the Commission's recommendations to unify and simplify the overall composition and improve the 4th Street entrance. Mr. Greenbaum described the options explored for the upper floors of the museum, all of which had sought to maintain the overall continuity of the building skin. The conclusion was that curvilinear forms would reduce the apparent mass of the rooftop addition. In the revised version, the glass volumes of the addition have been reduced and simplified. The proposed materials include clear and translucent channel glass of different opacities, which will allow sunlight to play on the surfaces in various ways, and zinc panels in other visible areas. The roofline would be set back from the parapet, and the roof structure would extend over both the warehouse and infill. The additional glazing of this addition would allow views north up 4th Street to the Mall and would extend into a clerestory along the south elevation, serving to integrate the composition. He indicated the rooftop Biblical garden along Virginia Avenue that would be screened by a trellis. Mr. Greenbaum described the redesign of the infill volume which he said is quieter than before, with no projecting forms or folded planes. The north and south facades would be a minimally articulated brick masonry skin and punched windows with stainless steel surrounds. The facades would have handmade bricks of unusually long proportions, 1½ inches high by 20 inches long, and faced with two different textures; the intention is to convey a sense of antiquity. Facade setbacks would respond to the interior atrium, which will project on the south, and would serve to emphasize the historic warehouse. Windows would align with stair landings, and joints and column bays would relate its scale to the historic warehouse. Ground–floor windows would engage with the activity along D Street. He emphasized the effort in designing the infill to avoid overwhelming the museum by using the correct scale and a simple unmodulated mass that picks up the historic structure's horizontal and vertical lines. Mr. Vergason presented the site design, describing three objectives for the public right–of–way: gracious entry to the museum, establishing a connection to the Mall, and creating a sustainable streetscape. Two large willow oaks on 4th Street and two red oaks on D Street would be preserved, as previously requested by the Commission. A permeable unit paver would be used to enhance the sense of entry and provide better growing conditions for the two oaks. Elsewhere, sidewalks would be exposed–aggregate concrete, similar to the Mall sidewalks and to recent improvements made in the area east and north of this project. Improvements on the north would extend along the full length of D Street to the Metro entrance at the northeast corner of the block, and on the south along most of the Virginia Avenue frontage. Trees would typically be paired in large planters, and groups of three trees would flank the historic loading dock area along D Street. The D Street design includes traditional planting at the curb and a 10–foot–wide sidewalk along the facade; all planters would be bioretention areas along the curb, except at the two existing trees. The sidewalk to the south would be aligned along the building face, and plantings would be consolidated with street trees along the curb. He noted the goal to provide at least 1,000 cubic feet of soil per tree. Mr. Greenbaum emphasized the intention to create an active streetscape and strong civic setting for the museum. Open loading–dock doors would be installed to evoke historic features, and windows along the loading dock would be added to allow views from the sidewalk to the interior ticketing area and lobby. He described the idea of architecture as a palimpsest recalling historic conditions and of a new building inserted within a historic fabric. He added that the circulation space would recall the railroad spur that formerly entered the building, and some parts of the dock's base would be restored while others would be left as they are to show changes over time. Mr. Greenbaum then presented the proposed changes to the Washington Office Center. A single–story 14–foot–high addition would be constructed on the roof, set back slightly to allow for a small terrace; low walls would screen mechanical equipment. The existing building has a terra cotta base and curtainwalls of black reflecting and spandrel glass; the terra cotta would be coated with a black material to reduce the structure's apparent scale and visually strengthen the base. Mr. Krieger asked why the terra cotta base of the office building would be coated; Mr. Greenbaum responded that the terra cotta had been introduced in the 1980s around the entire block so that the multiple buildings would read as a single monolithic structure, but the intention now is to make the buildings more distinct. Mr. Krieger asked if the additional floor would have the same glazing as the rest of the office building; Mr. Greenbaum said that it has not yet been designed, but the intention is to make the new level more transparent. Mr. Krieger suggested that the additional floor be reduced in size, observing that it would make the large and ungainly office building look even bigger; he recommended pulling the floor back slightly from the existing building face. Mr. Luebke noted his understanding from initial consultations that the additional floor would be set back several feet; Mr. Greenbaum said that it had never been shown with a setback. Mr. Krieger reiterated that a setback would be preferable. Mr. Greenbaum agreed to restudy this addition but said that design flexibility, such as altered column alignments, would be limited due to the presence of office tenants during construction. Mr. Krieger suggested that the revisions should begin with the glazing. Mr. Krieger commented on the overall improvement of the design, especially at the museum entrance, but he wondered if the addition above the warehouse still looks too aggressive. He asked if the loading dock and canopy are being preserved because they are historic. Mr. Greenbaum responded that the building will be landmarked, and restoration of these features is part of the historic preservation agreement. Mr. Krieger asked if the canopy would be new or historic; Mr. Greenbaum said that the proposed canopy would recall the profile, location, and intent of the historic canopy. Mr. Luebke clarified that the D.C. Historic Preservation Office has requested the reconstruction of the dock canopy; the proposed design is a slight modification of the original canopy's character and material. Ms. Plater–Zyberk questioned the point of recreating something that is not the original design; Mr. Greenbaum said that the purpose is to re–engage the building with history, noting that the original design is not well documented and therefore some liberties can be taken. Mr. Krieger observed that this reconstructed dock appears to be primarily for show. He said that the element was probably not important in people's experience of the building; its reconstruction for historic reasons seems like a narrow, even capricious interpretation of what should be preserved, given that the project already retains much of the historic warehouse. He recommended taking far more liberty at this street–level location because a change could make a significant difference. He questioned the appeal of walking next to an old dock, and he suggested making this area more inviting, perhaps by retaining the shape of the canopy but using different materials. He observed that the museum would have a sequence of entrance areas—security, vestibule, lobby—and seeing them from the sidewalk would be more important than reconstructing old dock doors. He emphasized that a dark and gloomy space could be made light and interesting. He reiterated that the design has otherwise been improved; he supported the simplification of the infill facade and the greater interaction among the facades on the Virginia Avenue side, although he asked if the south infill facade needs to be so severe. Ms. Plater–Zyberk said that her objection to the infill is the small, diagonally arranged windows that resemble the fenestration in a stairwell. She observed that the D Street frontage of the infill would include a lobby on all floors, and the elevation on the ground floor would be much more welcoming with more glazing; Mr. Krieger agreed. Mr. Greenbaum said that a more open facade was considered, but the decision was to use the window openings as a scale device. Ms. Plater–Zyberk responded that this is unnecessary because of the large scale of the surrounding buildings. She recommended more careful consideration of the experience of people walking from the Metro and encountering this long, relentless blank wall, which would also be an inviting canvas for graffiti. Mr. Krieger suggested continuing to explore other means of combining glazing with masonry to distinguish the infill from the adjoining buildings. Ms. Plater–Zyberk reiterated the concern about coating the terra cotta on the office building; it may not be necessary to differentiate the buildings this way, and the coating could cause maintenance problems. Mr. Greenbaum said they had identified a coating product; Mr. Luebke asked him to provide this information to staff. Ms. Plater–Zyberk acknowledged the dated 1980s character of the existing terra cotta but said that the best solution may be to leave it alone, allowing the building to express its period coherently. Mr. Luebke summarized the Commission action from November 2013 as generally supporting the project while identifying issues concerning the articulation of the volume, entrance, and elevations; he noted that these issues have been addressed, perhaps allowing for a concept approval, and the remaining issues could be addressed as part of the design development phase. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk said that the issues raised in the current review are fundamental—particularly increasing the glazing at the ground–floor level so that the building's public spaces and the street can interact—but she agreed that the project team could consider these concerns in the next phase of the project, and she supported approving the current concept submission. Mr. Krieger agreed. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk said that the project would not need to be presented again to the Commission if the staff concludes that the comments have been adequately addressed. OG 14–055, Georgetown University, 3700 O Street, NW. New eight–story residence hall. Concept. Ms. Barsoum introduced the proposal for a residence hall at Georgetown University, which results from the 2010 campus plan that establishes a goal of providing on–campus housing for more of the university's students by 2017. She said that the campus plan reflects an agreement between the university and the neighborhood, and it was adopted by the D.C. Board of Zoning Adjustment without the Commission's involvement. The design firm for this project, Sasaki Associates, is also currently working on the master plan for the campus. She described the proposed location along a well–travelled pedestrian walk linking the main quadrangle and the medical complex. The building would be visible from the Georgetown neighborhood at 35th Street two blocks to the east, with views across the parking lot and cemetery of an adjacent private school. She said that the Old Georgetown Board has reviewed this project on four occasions, including an initial request to present the project in the context of the overall campus planning; the subsequent reviews have addressed issues of siting and the building design. She noted that the report from the Old Georgetown Board has been distributed to the Commission members. She asked architect Regina Bleck of Georgetown University to begin the presentation; Ms. Bleck introduced architect Vinicius Gorgati and landscape architect Gautam Sundaram, both of Sasaki Associates, to present the design. Mr. Gorgati provided an overview of the campus and its pedestrian routes in relation to the proposed site, noting the nearby entrance to the student center. He said that the master plan, currently being prepared, includes a green space along Reservoir Road north of the project site to provide an improved north entrance to the campus and establish a transition between the residential, academic, and medical areas. The master plan envisions that new residential areas would be related to the existing active mixed–use spaces of the campus, which are prevalent near this site; he indicated the nearby pedestrian bridge to the student center. Immediately adjacent are the six–story Reiss Science Building, forming the southwest edge of the project's triangular site; a campus residential village to the north; and the campus boundary with a chain–link fence to the east. He noted the topography in the area, resulting in building entrances at multiple levels. Mr. Sundaram described the site as a green area defined by the existing pedestrian walk. He indicated the existing grove of mature trees, many of which are being incorporated into the landscape plan; some trees would be removed or relocated, and many additional trees would be planted. He said that the landscape design has been considered in relation to nearby areas, with the goal of integrating the site with the open spaces to the north and south as well as providing a transition between these areas. The design also promotes a more vibrant and active outdoor space, supported by shared uses in the ground floor of the proposed building. Main entrances would be located at the south and northwest corners of the triangular residence hall; the plaza between them would relate closely to the building's ground–floor activities. A landscape buffer would be provided between the plaza and the Reiss Science Building, which has air vents in this area; he indicated the staggered configuration of proposed benches that would create social spaces along the plantings. South of the plaza, stairs and a ramp would follow the downward grade to the areas of campus to the south. He summarized the overall goal of creating a series of social spaces along the building facade, defined by plantings and paved areas, rather than simply a pass–through walk. Mr. Sundaram described the site proposals in greater detail. The building plaza would be extended southward to form a forecourt at the south entrance, and would continue around the building to the east. The remainder of the east side would be a series of landscaped terraces and lawns that could serve as social spaces or a stepped amphitheater, along with vegetation that extends the landscape of the adjacent girls' school. At the upper end of the lawn, a fenced patio would have access from the second floor for the use of the building's residents. A new ornamental fence is proposed along the east side of the site, adjoining the school, to replace the existing chain–link fence. Adjacent to the building's northwest entrance, a walk would extend along a portion of the north facade to provide access to the bicycle room as well as emergency egress for the residents; outdoor bicycle racks would also be provided in this area. He said that the plaza would have pervious paving, and much of the stormwater would be retained on the site; a green roof, cisterns, and ground filtration would also be part of the stormwater management system. Precast pavers would relate the plaza to the building materials, and moveable tables and chairs would be provided; other walks would have asphalt–block pavers. He said that the site material selection would be studied further based on comments from the Old Georgetown Board and campus staff, with the goal of relating the project to the neighboring areas of the campus. He described the proposed lighting, intended to provide a sense of liveliness as well as safety: fixtures would include a series of light poles, lighting beneath the benches and railings, and possibly bollard lights, in addition to the ambient lighting from the extensive first–floor glazing of the proposed building. The poles would be a modified version of the standard acorn–style fixture used on the campus, using shielded LED lamps; a shorter pole would be used around the plaza, designed to relate more closely to the architecture of the proposed building. Birch trees would be added around the plaza to frame spaces. He presented a series of views to illustrate the experience of moving through the site, along with photographs of the existing conditions. Mr. Gorgati presented further details of the architectural proposal. Above the northwest entrance, the corner of the building would be articulated as a "Living and Learning Tower." A fireplace lounge at the corner would be a focal point for the building's residents. The adjacent vestibule would provide access to either the residential elevators to the east or the ground–floor gathering space to the south. The additional building entrance at the south would lead directly to the gathering space, which would open onto the plaza; the south corner would similarly be treated as a tower feature. The upper floors would include corner lounges in addition to the dormitory suites. The seventh floor would step back at the south corner for a small terrace, and the eighth floor would have a more extensive setback along the southwest facade. He described the proposed materials, intended to relate to the traditional campus vocabulary of stone with limestone highlights. Stone would be used for the first–floor base of the building and for the towers at the northwest and south corners; the remainder of the upper facades would be brick with inlays of limestone. He emphasized the transparency of the first–floor facade along the plaza. A belt course above the first floor would separate the stone base from the brick facades, and an additional belt course above the sixth floor would serve as the base for several seventh–floor oriel windows. He concluded by noting the intended variety in the overall window pattern that would alternate between narrower windows, often paired, and wider windows. Mr. Luebke summarized the extensive review process with the Old Georgetown Board; earlier in the month, the Board decided that the project has reached a stage that could be approved as a concept. He noted that the Board's report includes comments concerning development of the lobby details, the height of the piers, the thinness of the belt course above the first floor, the slot configuration of the windows, and additional concerns with paving and lighting. However, he said that the current design presentation includes revisions subsequent to the Board's recent review, which is not the normal procedure; some of the Board's comments may therefore no longer be applicable to the presented design. Ms. Plater–Zyberk expressed appreciation for the thorough consideration of the design, extending from campus planning issues to building details. She supported the overall approach to the campus plan, the landscape, and the building layout. She discouraged the proposal to introduce a new style of light pole for this project, commenting that this gesture is unnecessary on a campus; she recommended simply extending the standard campus poles through the site, perhaps supplemented by lower–level landscape lighting. She questioned the use of narrow vertically proportioned windows, which she said suggest a prison–like appearance; she noted that similar windows are a very disliked feature of some 1970s college dormitories. She also questioned the use of the stone as superficial "wallpaper" extending up the facades of the two towers; she encouraged more consideration of its traditional use, as seen in the proposal for a first–floor stone base for the building, and emphasized the importance of developing a clear architectural language for the materials. She said that brick is more appropriate as a curtainwall material for the upper floors, with the limestone highlights as proposed. Mr. Krieger agreed that the overall plan is well considered, commenting on the ingenious adaptation of the building to the topography. He said that the proposed landscape treatment would be a significant improvement compared to the existing conditions, provided that the proposals for additional trees are carried out. He also agreed with the concern about the use of materials. He asked for clarification of some vertical white panels shown at the towers; Mr. Gorgati responded that these would be limestone. Mr. Krieger noted that in modern times stone is routinely used as a curtainwall material. He nonetheless questioned the intended use of material in this project, such as the awkward relationship of the first–floor stone base to the rising topography that results in brick reaching the ground at some parts of the building. He said that the view from the northwest seems severe, although somewhat softened by the inclusion of trees in the rendering; he questioned why the single tier of dormitory rooms at this corner is clad in stone. He also questioned the consistency of the metal lintels, which are usually used at the transition from the stone base to the upper brick, while at the northwest corner the lintel is used within a continuing stone wall. He suggested further study of the facade details to address such issues. He added that stone does not necessarily need to be used for both entrance towers; the south corner, with its powerful tapered profile, could be the only location for the vertical extension of the stone. He also agreed that the narrow windows are too slit–like, and more generally he questioned why the rooms have relatively little window area. Mr. Gorgati responded that the Old Georgetown Board had also expressed concern with the lintel locations, and he offered to develop design alternatives. He also said that an earlier design using brick for the northwest corner would be revisited, using a concept of emphasizing the south tower as the project's anchor; the relationship of the base to the topography would also be studied further. Mr. Krieger observed that the fireplace lounge would serve as an anchor for the northwest corner of the building. Mr. Gorgati added that the window configuration would also be reconsidered as the project moves into design development. He noted an earlier design that used only the larger window size, which resulted in insufficient diversity on the elevations; the current proposal is derived from the syncopated window pattern of historic buildings on the campus. He noted that this building would be approached at its acute corners, and the windows may therefore not be prominent features. He agreed with Ms. Plater–Zyberk that the use of materials should have more authenticity and architectural meaning. Mr. Luebke noted that many of the existing campus buildings are brick, aside from several stone buildings on the central quadrangle and at the business school. Nonetheless, Georgetown students had advocated the use of stone when reviewing the initial design for this project. He emphasized that the issue of materials had been raised by the Old Georgetown Board, with the result of using stone for the building's ground floor and anchoring towers while the prevailing material for the building is brick. Mr. Krieger observed that a transition of materials is part of architectural tradition, such as with classical buildings have a stone front and brick sides; he supported the use of stone for both the base and the south tower, while the northwest corner could emphasize glass instead of stone. Ms. Fernández supported the comments of the other Commission members, and she discouraged the forced emphasis on verticality which she said is not a desirable goal. Mr. Luebke said that the Commission could adopt the Old Georgetown Report board, notwithstanding the subsequent development of the design, and could convey the additional comments that were provided; the result would be approval of the concept. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk confirmed the consensus of the Commission members to support the concept while requesting careful attention to its development and the project's details (subject to confirmation by a quorum). She reiterated the supportive comments on the site plan and building layout, along with concern about the treatment of the facades. Mr. Luebke noted the normal procedure of further review by the Old Georgetown Board, followed by a presentation of the final design to the Commission; he asked if the Commission would instead allow a favorable recommendation from the Board to be placed on the Old Georgetown Act appendix for Commission action. Mr. Krieger requested the opportunity for additional review by the Commission, commenting that development of the design could advance the building to excellence. 1. CFA 20/MAR/14–4, DC KIPP College Prep High School (formerly Hamilton Special Education School), 1401 Brentwood Parkway, NE. New school building. Concept. Mr. Lindstrom introduced the project for a new charter school, known as the DC KIPP College Prep High School, that will occupy the site of the former Hamilton Special Education School, a 1960s D.C. public school located northwest of the Gallaudet University campus. The existing building would be demolished for the new structure. He introduced Brian Pilot of Studios Architecture and David Rubin of the Land Collective to present the design. Mr. Pilot said the school would be funded by KIPP DC and built under a land lease with the D.C. government. He noted that adjacent Gallaudet University supports the proposed site planning, which takes into account the likelihood of future development along 6th Street, NE. He indicated the location of Union Market directly across the street from the school, the Metro station several blocks away, and four–lane Brentwood Parkway that adjoins the site and has little pedestrian traffic; an existing service road from Brentwood Parkway leads to parking at the rear of the Hamilton School building, backing onto the Gallaudet campus. Mr. Pilot described the existing two–level building as sprawling across the site, leaving little room for additions, and many of its important spaces lack daylight. Adapting the building for the new use was considered but was found not feasible. The new building, serving approximately 850 to 1,000 students, would have a smaller footprint and a different site orientation, occupying a high point where it would rise behind the athletic field and have a character of monumentality within the landscape. He noted that the KIPP program emphasizes a very structured teaching environment, with visual control and security playing key roles. The building would be approached through an allee of trees leading up a slight grade past the north end of the building to an entry plaza, which would provide views of the site. The long five–story block containing the main entrance and classrooms would run roughly north to south, with two lower blocks extending toward the athletic field on the west. The entrance would lead into a two–story lobby allowing supervision of students and easy circulation to classrooms. The upper two levels would contain mostly classrooms; administrative offices would be located in the middle section overlooking the plaza; and the lower levels would contain a wing for art classes, the cafeteria, and gym, as well as an auditorium extending beneath the entrance plaza. A secondary entry would accommodate public access for community events held in the gym or auditorium when school is not in session. Mr. Pilot said the building's form and materials result directly from the program. Fenestration would be located to allow the maximum amount of daylight into classrooms and for good views. The primary material would be a whitish–gray brick; its light color is intended to increase the building's monumental appearance. The colors of other materials were selected to create warmth and appeal: a brown aluminum would be used for the fenestration; and wood, protected by an overhang, would be used mostly at eye level. Mr. Pilot said that athletics has an important role in the school's program. The existing baseball field would be retained, and a new multi–purpose field would be shared with the community. Throughout the campus, the landscape would be designed to promote engagement with learning. Mr. Rubin said that the landscape design was inspired by the numerous tiers of opera boxes at Philadelphia's Academy of Music: at KIPP DC, the topography would be manipulated to create small swells and hollows where students can gather for outdoor classes or to watch sports. The land forms would be created with rubble reclaimed from the demolished school building, layered with soil and other materials and planted with a groundcover. Parking would be located next to the Gallaudet service area and is designed to work with the topography for efficient gathering of stormwater, which will drain to lower elevations for reuse. Mr. Krieger expressed support for the overall project, commenting that the site plan and topography appear to work well. He observed that the running track appears smaller than regulation size; Mr. Pilot responded that the available space is insufficient for a larger track. Mr. Krieger asked about the design of the faculty entrance to the building from the rear parking lot. Mr. Pilot indicated the entrance on the drawings, noting that it is purposely discreet; he added that almost all students will take public transportation and arrive at the entrance plaza. Mr. Krieger commented that the teachers may deserve a nicer entrance than a simple locked door, and the proposed entry may be too understated; Ms. Plater–Zyberk added that it should at least give shelter from bad weather. Mr. Krieger suggested that the spaces lining the long corridor in the classroom block could be modulated to relieve its relentless linearity. He observed that a lot of light would enter the corridor from one side, but on the other side light would be partially blocked by a conference room; he suggested further study to assure sufficient balance in the lighting. He commented that the school entrance from the athletic field seems unresolved, appearing like an accidental gap between the gym and the auditorium blocks rather than an intentional decision; he said that this seems strange in comparison to the rigorous architectural form–making elsewhere in the project. Ms. Plater–Zyberk indicated the slightly awkward geometry of the two blocks, with one set back and slightly tilted. Noting the calmness and rationality of the rest of the design, she suggested that the gap between the two blocks should be completed as a unified whole to create a base for the building, or else the blocks should be treated as two distinctly different elements. Ms. Fernández asked for clarification of the reasoning for the use of wood on the building exterior. Mr. Pilot responded that wood is used to indicate the location of spaces other than classrooms, such as art studios and college counseling offices. Ms. Fernández acknowledged the use of wood as an accent band on several elevations, but observed that on the east elevation it ends abruptly and does not appear to make sense. She said that the expression of interior functions on the exterior was not legible, adding that this delineation would probably not matter to someone viewing the building from a distance. Mr. Krieger said he would interpret the use of wood as a material that refers to entrances and public spaces, as seen on the elevation facing the athletic field although not along the parking lot; Ms. Fernández added that it might be used for areas closer to people, but actually no one would ever get close to the wood. Ms. Fernández commented that the wood is being made to do a lot of things—to serve as a band unifying the building volumes, to provide a warm tone at entries, and to indicate eye level although it is also used at other levels. She concluded that there is a confusion about the use of wood, and she recommended making its use more logical; Mr. Krieger agreed. Mr. Luebke asked for further comments about the landscape; Mr. Krieger said that it seems reasonably well handled. Mr. Luebke noted that the Commission staff sees many school projects and appreciates the intentional simplicity of this design, which does not try to incorporate a profusion of trendy features. Upon a motion by Mr. Krieger with second by Ms. Fernández, the Commission members approved the concept proposal with the comments provided and delegated review of the final design to the staff (subject to confirmation by a quorum). 2. CFA 20/MAR/14–5, Duke Ellington School of the Arts, 1680 35th Street, NW. Building modernization and additions. Revised concept. (Previous: CFA 16/JAN/14–6.) Ms. Batcheler introduced the proposal for the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, summarizing the Commission's previous review in January 2014; at that time, the Commission had approved the general concept and requested a revised concept submission to address comments concerning the site and building design. She said that the project team has been consulting with the D.C. Historic Preservation Office as well as with the Commission staff. She noted that supplemental drawings are being distributed to the Commission members that provide a comparison of the previous and current elevation proposals, but they are not intended to modify the submitted design that was sent to the Commission members in advance of the meeting. She asked Chris Graae of Cox Graae + Spack Architects to present the design. Mr. Graae summarized the building history and overall design proposal, emphasizing the revisions since the previous presentation. He described the school's phased construction beginning in 1898 as Western High School in a classical style, with classical expansions in 1910 and 1915, an expansion with a more utilitarian character in 1925, and less significant alterations in the 1980s. He indicated the historical evolution of the building entrances, which provide a potential solution for the current issue of how to design the school's new entrance. The 1898 building had a small portico on the primary east facade that did not include an entrance; porches at each side of the central portico, adjacent to the north and south wings, provided separate entrances for boys and girls. The 1910 expansion included an enlarged portico that included the primary entrance at its base. The roofs and outer columns of the two flanking porches were later removed, exposing the entrance facades with arched openings that were originally behind the porches; these facades remain in place, with infilled openings and extensive alterations from the 1980s. The proposal is to reconstruct these porches in modified form, using the north porch as the school's new primary entrance. He said that this proposal relates to establishing the school's historical period of significance, with an additional proposal to reconstruct the roof balustrade that was created in the 1910 expansion but later removed. Mr. Graae provided an overview of the building plans, which are similar to those presented in January. He noted that the parking entrance is still shown along Reservoir Road but its relocation continues to be under consideration, pending further coordination with the D.C. Department of Transportation. On the site plan, he indicated the removal of surface parking previously proposed at the northwest corner of the school's large east lawn, in response to numerous objections; the intention instead is to designate other locations for drop–off and visitor parking, in cooperation with the D.C. Department of Transportation and neighborhood representatives. He added that finding a new location for handicapped–accessible parking will be a difficult challenge. He indicated the revised design for the amphitheater on the east side of the portico; its size is substantially reduced, resulting in a larger lawn and less hardscape on the east side of the site, as previously recommended by the Commission. He said that this reduction is partly a result of moving the proposed primary student entrance to the north porch rather than entering directly from the amphitheater plaza. Mr. Graae described the proposed entrance and portico configuration in more detail, noting the extensive consultation with the D.C. Historic Preservation Office and the Commission staff. The entrance was previously proposed at the lower level, which would become the base level of the atrium at the center of the school. The new proposal to restore the porches would result in entering one level above, which has been the historic entrance level. The side location of the proposed entrance avoids interfering with the gallery space that is planned within the portico base at this level; the gallery would serve as the central public entrance to the school's theater when it is open for special events. Mr. Krieger asked for clarification of the proposed treatment of the five arched openings within the portico base; Mr. Graae responded that the three central openings would be doors to the stepped gallery and theater, while the far north and south arches would have windows. He added that a side door in the portico base would provide access to an interior ramp leading up to the gallery and the student entrance vestibule. Mr. Graae described the proposed modification of the historic porch design: in order to provide adequate interior space for security screening at the student entrance, the north porch would have a glass wall within the roofed area to enclose much of the porch space that had historically been exterior; this glass facade would be placed slightly behind the reconstructed columns, allowing them to be freestanding as in the historic open porch. He added that the south porch, although not planned for use as an entrance, would be reconstructed similar to the north porch in order to retain an overall symmetrical appearance for the school's primary east facade. He said that a more contemporary design approach for the porches was explored but was discouraged during the design consultations; the current proposal was supported by the review agencies because it restores a feature that was removed. Mr. Krieger commented that the proposed entrance solution appears to work well. Ms. Plater–Zyberk asked for clarification of the proposed second–floor glass room within the historic exterior portico; Mr. Luebke noted that this feature was part of the previously submitted design. Mr. Graae said that this space, a "glass lantern," would be a reading room adjacent to the media center. He emphasized that its roof would not extend to the historic portico roof, and the room's walls would touch the existing building only along the historic painted brick facade. The existing door openings, currently unused, would provide access to this proposed room. He said that this prominent modern form would convey the rehabilitation of the school on the main facade while only minimally touching the building's historic fabric. He added that the remainder of the portico would be an outdoor terrace with improved access for student use. Mr. Graae summarized that the alterations to the east facade would be relatively limited, primarily involving the entrance features. He said that the brick has historically been painted, as evidenced by the wide variety of brick types that were used; an area of exposed brick at the portico base, resulting from the recent removal of the paint, would be painted to return it to the historic treatment. He presented the more extensive revisions proposed for the side and rear facades, in response to concerns from the Commission and the community. The range of the color palette has been reduced to give a calmer appearance; the rust–colored elements, intended as a defining feature of the modernized school, would primarily be limited to the interior with only limited use on the facades. The revised proposal would instead use zinc panels for many of the new facade surfaces. The proposed glass facades have been simplified to emphasize the overall sculptural volumes; the frit pattern would be more uniform, resulting in more restrained facades, and the floor lines would not be readily apparent behind the multi–story glass areas. He summarized the intention to create modern doubly–curved volumes to contrast with the orthogonal volumes of the historic building. Mr. Krieger asked about the nighttime appearance; Mr. Graae confirmed that the interior spaces and floor levels would be more visible after dark. He also indicated the simplification of the west facade, including removal of the previously proposed brise–soleil and projecting bay; the facade continues to be organized around the existing off–center smokestack, which will remain as part of the building's mechanical system. He said that the fly loft height has been studied carefully in response to the Commission's previous question about coordination of the drawings; he acknowledged the previous discrepancy and said that the height is now depicted accurately. He emphasized the sightline studies demonstrating that the fly loft would not be visible from the sidewalks of the surrounding streets nor from the second story of the facing houses to the north and south; he added that the height of the fly loft has been reduced as much as possible while still meeting the functional needs of the theater. Mr. Graae concluded with several perspective renderings of the proposal, noting that some trees have been omitted due to community concern about whether the drawings convey the full architectural proposal. He clarified that the trees are omitted only from the drawn views and would be included in the built project, as supported by the community. Mr. Luebke summarized the areas and issues addressed in the revisions: the east side of the project, including the entrance and portico as well as the removal of surface parking; the side facades in relation to the lower–scale row houses across the street to the north and south; the composition of the rear facade; and the treatment of the fly loft above the roof. He said that the staff considers the revised proposal to be responsive to the Commission's previous concerns, although some issues remain with the design of the reconstructed porches. He said that the porches are part of a larger proposal to restore lost features such as the roof balustrade and portico entrance steps. He noted that the porches originally had large voids behind their columns, while the current proposal would insert a glass facade behind the columns; the result may not convey the historic character, and may therefore not be worthwhile as a restoration effort. While acknowledging the potential tradeoffs between the historic design character and the modern functions of circulation and security, he suggested that the reconstructed porches could also be designed more in keeping with their original character as open features, such as by revising the location or detailing of any new enclosure, or by omitting the additional enclosure and instead resolving the programmatic entrance needs within the historic space of the building. He summarized the staff's overall support for entering the building through a reconstructed porch, while emphasizing the need for further study of the design at this area. Ms. Plater–Zyberk commented that a covered exterior porch would be an appropriate feature that provides a sheltered area for people approaching the building's entrance doors. Mr. Graae clarified that the design includes a canopy extending from the proposed glass enclosure, providing rain protection as people enter the building; the canopy would be located between the reconstructed historic columns. Mr. Luebke said that this canopy may further detract from the historic character of an exterior void behind the porch columns. He said that the Commission may wish to take a position on the porch design or allow flexibility for the ongoing consultation process with the D.C. Historic Preservation Office staff. Mr. Krieger asked for clarification of the proposed glass enclosure in relation to the porch columns. Mr. Graae responded that the glass facade would be placed behind the columns, without touching them, and would have a modern character that is distinct from the reconstructed historical features; he confirmed that the columns would be freestanding exterior elements as proposed, and the glass canopy would similarly not touch the columns. He emphasized that the enclosure of the vestibule space within the porch is programmatically necessary if the porch becomes the school's primary entrance location; Mr. Luebke said that the design may have more flexibility on this issue. Mr. Graae said that the exact alignment of the glass enclosure could be studied further, perhaps pushing it slightly further from the columns. Ms. Plater–Zyberk suggested a more consistent design language for the building. She observed that the historic form of the portico as well as the porches would be modified by glass insertions, but these features are detailed differently: the portico insertion would be a freestanding glass box with its own roof, while the porch insertions would have glass facades rising to the porch ceiling. She acknowledged that the portico insertion is intended to minimize impact on the historic building fabric, but she observed that the result is a strange space above its roof that would likely attract birds and may therefore end up enclosed with netting. She suggested instead that the modern glass enclosure at the portico, as well as at the porches, reach the ceiling of the historic space while being held back from the exterior columns. She recommended that these modern features have the character of inserted objects rather than new wall surfaces. Mr. Krieger reiterated his general support for the proposed treatment of the porches, noting that the columns would be exterior and the area behind them would be relatively dark as in the historic design; he said that the proposal would nonetheless be improved by moving the glass enclosure further back from the columns. Mr. Graae offered to study this further. Mr. Krieger emphasized that the overall solution of using a porch as the entrance is superior to the previous proposal for a lower–level entrance. Mr. Krieger summarized that the proposal responds to the Commission's previous comments. He questioned whether the revision of the side and rear facades has made them better; while supporting the more restrained color palette, he said that detailing the surfaces as simple multi–story volumes of fritted glass may have a more monolithic effect than the previous proposed glass treatment with articulated floor levels. He said that the varied lighting conditions within the building may help to address this concern; Mr. Graae confirmed that the fritted treatment would allow the perception of depth and color behind the glass, which is not adequately conveyed in the computer rendering technique. Mr. Krieger also acknowledged the improved coordination of the fly loft dimensions; Mr. Graae expressed appreciation for the Commission's assistance in identifying the previous discrepancy. Mr. Krieger observed that the sightline studies demonstrate that the fly loft would not be a problematic feature within the neighborhood, despite its prominence on the elevation drawings. Mr. Krieger noted the lack of community testimony at the current presentation as an indication that the neighbors are satisfied with the revision. Mr. Luebke said that a community comment letter was received the previous week; several of the concerns have been addressed, including removal of the surface parking at the east lawn and of the excavated lower–level entrance, and adjustment to the fly loft height. The letter requests removal of the lantern addition within the portico, which has not been done; questions the materials and massiveness of the rear facade, which has been improved; and supports the revised palette. He noted that further issues of landscape and lighting would likely arise as the project progresses toward a final design submission. Mr. Luebke suggested that the Commission members may want to approve the concept in its entirety, moving beyond the general concept approval that was given in January 2014; the remaining issues would be noted, including further coordination with the D.C. Historic Preservation Office and D.C. Department of Transportation. Upon a motion by Mr. Krieger with second by Ms. Fernández, the Commission members approved the concept submission with the comments provided (subject to confirmation by a quorum). Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk did not vote for the motion, noting her continued dissatisfaction with the design approach of drastically altering and adding to a historic building. Mr. Simon introduced the four submissions from the U.S. Mint. He said that the Commission members have received prints in advance that illustrate all of the submitted design alternatives for each coin and medal. For brevity, the presentations will include only selected designs—including those preferred by the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee (CCAC) and other consulting groups—but the Commission members may choose to discuss any of the submitted designs. Mr. Luebke added that this abbreviated presentation format results from discussions with the CCAC chairman and the Mint staff to address the potentially overwhelming range of alternatives being presented to the Commission. Mr. Simon also noted that none of the proposals will be produced as generally circulating coinage; however, the last two submissions involve the continuation of series that initially included circulating coins, and he provided examples of the earlier coins in these two series. He asked April Stafford of the Mint to present the design alternatives. 1. CFA 20/MAR/14–6, Congressional Gold Medal honoring the First Special Service Force. Designs for a gold medal with bronze duplicates. Final. Ms. Stafford summarized the authorizing legislation for a medal honoring the First Special Service Force for its service during World War II. A single gold medal will be given to the First Special Service Force Association (FSSFA), located in Helena, Montana, for display or for loan to related institutions; the Mint will also produce bronze duplicates for sale. She noted the numerous alternative designs that were provided to the Commission members—18 obverse designs and 21 reverse designs—and presented only those supported by the FSSFA and the CCAC. For the obverse, the preferences of the FSSFA were alternative #8 as first choice, #7 as second choice, and #9 as third choice. The preferences of the CCAC were obverse #9 as first choice, scoring 18 out of a potential 24 points, and #8 as the close second choice with 15 points. For the reverse, alternative #2 was the first choice of the FSSFA and of the CCAC—scoring all 24 of the potential 24 points. The additional preferences of the FSSFA were for reverse #5 as second choice, and #4 as third choice. Ms. Fernández requested that the presentation slides of ranked choices be organized in the sequence of the ranking, rather than in the numerical sequence of the alternatives, to assist in the Commission discussion if the abbreviated presentation format is continued in the future. Mr. Luebke added that the presentation of multiple ranked preferences may inevitably be confusing and could perhaps be limited. Ms. Plater–Zyberk asked about the size of the medal; Ms. Stafford responded that it would be three inches in diameter, as illustrated at full scale in the submitted prints. Ms. Plater–Zyberk asked how the depicted gray background of reverse #5 would be treated on the medal. Don Everhart, the Mint's lead sculptor–engraver, responded that the gray tone represents a frosted texture that could be achieved through a laser process. Ms. Fernández offered support for obverse #8 and reverse #2, consistent with the FSSFA preferences and similar to the CCAC preferences. Ms. Plater–Zyberk agreed, commenting that the design of reverse #2 would be consistent with obverse #8; she also offered support for reverse #4 as an interesting composition that is less traditional due to the lack of circumferential lettering. Ms. Fernández said that arrowhead logo provides a strong motif in several obverse designs, and it is especially strong in #8 due to its central placement and sharp outline. Mr. Krieger added that the boat in the lower part of the composition in obverse #8 has a three–dimensional character. The discussion concluded with a consensus for obverse #8 and reverse #2. 2. CFA 20/MAR/14–7, United States Marshals Service 225th Anniversary Commemorative Coin Program. Designs for a five–dollar gold, one–dollar silver, and half–dollar clad coin. Final. Ms. Stafford summarized the authorizing legislation for a program of three commemorative coins honoring the U.S. Marshals Service. She noted that the legislation specifies that the designs be selected on the basis of the realism and historical accuracy of the images, as well as being reminiscent of the "golden age" of American coinage in the early 20th century. She clarified that each coin would have a different size: the gold coin would be smallest, approximately the size of a circulating nickel; the silver would be larger, approximately the size of a dollar coin; and the clad coin would be the largest. She noted that the actual size is depicted on the printed pages that were provided to the Commission members for each design alternative, consistent with the Mint's typical format for submissions. Ms. Stafford described the legislative requirements for the gold coin's design; the submission includes five obverse and eleven reverse designs. She presented obverse #2, the preference of the CCAC and of the U.S. Marshals Service liaison for the design selection; this design includes the inscription "225 Years of Sacrifice" in addition to the legislatively required text. For the reverse, the CCAC recommendation was for alternative #9, which received 20 points; the second choice, also receiving 20 points, was for reverse #2. The preferences of the U.S. Marshals Service liaison were reverse #4 as first choice, and reverse #9 as second choice. Ms. Fernández commented that the submitted obverse designs are relatively similar, and she offered to support alternative #2 which was the preference of the two other review groups; Mr. Krieger agreed. For the reverse, Ms. Plater–Zyberk supported the eagle composition of alternative #9 as the most dignified design; Mr. Krieger and Ms. Fernández agreed. The discussion concluded with a consensus for obverse #2 and reverse #9 for the gold coin. Ms. Stafford presented the preferred alternatives for the silver coin, selected from among five obverse and eleven reverse alternatives. Obverse #5 was the preference of the CCAC and of the U.S. Marshals Service liaison. For the reverse, which is required to depict a historical theme, the CCAC preferred alternative #8; the preference of the U.S. Marshals Service liaison was for #3 as first choice, and #8 as second choice. She noted that reverse #3 and #8 both depict a "Wanted" poster, and the bottom of the poster in #3 extends the inscription to read "Wanted in Ft. Smith"—an inscription that was preferred by the U.S. Marshals Service liaison; she said that the poster in reverse #8 could be modified to include this longer inscription, and the liaison would be satisfied with #8 if this modification is made. Mr. Krieger asked why the reference to Fort Smith would be important. Drew Wade, chief of the Office of Public Affairs for the U.S. Marshals Service, responded that the U.S. Marshals Museum will be located in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and the museum will be the beneficiary of surcharges on the sale of these coins; he added that Fort Smith was also important in American frontier history and was the location of many historical trials. Ms. Plater–Zyberk commented that reverse #3 is preferable to #8, which has the awkward configuration of the "$1" denomination being placed on the marshal's thigh. She also questioned the compositional format—in these two alternatives and several others—of the marshal leaning on an object that will not be legible at the scale of the coin. Ms. Stafford responded that the CCAC had also raised this issue, and requested that the horizontal shelf or other background element be adjusted so that the resulting pose looks more natural. Ms. Plater–Zyberk observed that the shelf extends behind the text "United" at the left edge of the coin, but does not extend behind "Pluribus" on the right edge. Mr. Everhart of the U.S. Mint said that his response to the CCAC's concern was to suggest eliminating the horizontal shelf and instead have the marshal leaning only on a vertical post with his elbow; Ms. Plater–Zyberk and Mr. Krieger supported this solution for reverse #3. For the obverse, Ms. Plater–Zyberk suggested adjusting alternative #5 by condensing the lettering of the text "Liberty" to improve the coherence of the word; she observed that the letters "L" and "Y" are closer to other design elements at the bottom of the composition than to the adjacent letters of the word. Mr. Krieger agreed. The discussion concluded with a consensus for obverse #5 and reverse #3 for the silver coin, with the adjustments that were described. Ms. Stafford presented the preferred alternatives for the clad coin, selected from among six obverse and nine reverse alternatives. Obverse #2 was the preference of the CCAC and of the U.S. Marshals Service liaison, depicting a modern–day and historic marshal; she noted the CCAC request to increase the size of the foreground portrait to fill out the composition, which she clarified is not reflected in the submitted design. For the reverse, the legislation specifies a design that illustrates the relation of the marshals to social issues in American history, including the U.S. Constitution; the Whiskey Rebellion and the rule of law; slavery and inequality; and the struggle between labor and capital. The CCAC recommendation was for reverse #7, but without a strong consensus, and with the request not to place the handcuffs in proximity to the scroll of the Constitution. The strong preference of the U.S. Marshals Service liaison was for reverse #9, similar to #7 but with the additional allegorical figure of Justice; she confirmed that this design also includes handcuffs on the Constitution, which the Mint would revise in response to the CCAC concern. Mr. Wade said that the committee within the U.S. Marshals Service reviewed all of the designs, including consideration of historical accuracy and marketability, and concluded that the allegorical figure of Justice is a desirable feature; he said that this image is seen often in Department of Justice facilities, and the blindfolded figure holding the scale represents the faithful enforcement by marshals of historical laws that may now seem unfair. Ms. Stafford added that the figure's hair and robe are being blown by a wind representing time, suggesting that the U.S. Marshals Service acts in response to the changing needs of the nation. Ms. Plater–Zyberk and Mr. Krieger asked how the problem of the handcuffs would be resolved; the Mint staff responded that they would simply be removed from the composition. The Commission members supported this solution and agreed to a consensus for obverse #2 and reverse #9. Ms. Plater–Zyberk suggested that the horse on obverse #2 be moved inward to provide a clear separation of the background motifs from the rim, in contrast to the foreground figure which engages the rim; she added that this adjustment may address the CCAC concern with compositional balance, without necessarily needing to enlarge the foreground portrait. Ms. Fernández said that obverse #2 is an awkward composition overall because it appears to create a confusing relationship between the two figures; she commented that that the narrative is too complex for the small size of the coin. Noting the depiction of an entire horse and full figure in addition to the partial foreground figure, she suggested simplifying the design. Mr. Krieger agreed that the design is somewhat awkward but said that the inclusion of the horse is essential for conveying the historical setting; Ms. Fernández said that perhaps only the head of the horse needs to be in the design. Mr. Krieger suggested moving the horse to the right in order to center it behind the historic marshal, in combination with enlarging the foreground marshal. Ms. Fernández cited an additional awkward element in the design: the horizontal band incompletely divides the composition and bears no clear relation to the other elements; it does not quite serve as a ground plane for the background figures, and it does not fully extend behind the foreground figure but instead stops at her neck. Mr. Krieger said that this band could be adjusted in conjunction with the other changes discussed; Ms. Fernández said that it is nonetheless a bold but confusing graphic component of the design. Mr. Everhart said that the horizontal band could be eliminated entirely; Ms. Fernández supported this deletion. Ms. Stafford noted the CCAC concern with the intersection of the horizontal band and the figure's neck, although removal of the band was not proposed. The discussion concluded with support for obverse #2 and reverse #9 with the recommended adjustments. 3. CFA 20/MAR/14–8, 2015 and 2016 Presidential One Dollar Coin Programs. Obverse designs for the ninth and tenth sets of coins. Final. (Previous: CFA 18/APR/13–8, 2014 issue.) Ms. Stafford summarized the 2005 legislation authorizing the series. The submission includes obverse portraits of presidents Truman through Ford, covering the final two years of the series; the standard reverse for the series, depicting the Statue of Liberty, will continue. Mr. Krieger acknowledged the samples provided of earlier coins in the series to illustrate the size and design of the coins. Ms. Stafford presented alternative #1, which was the strong preference of the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee (CCAC) among the five alternatives. Mr. Krieger and Ms. Fernández agreed that this is the best design; Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk noted the consensus to support the CCAC recommendation for alternative #1. Ms. Stafford presented alternative #2, which was the moderately strong CCAC preference among the four alternatives. The Commission members agreed to support this design. Ms. Stafford presented alternative #1, the CCAC preference with 16 of 24 points among the five alternatives; she also presented the second choice of alternative #2, which received 6 points and was discussed extensively. Ms. Plater–Zyberk expressed concern with the viewing angle in alternative #1, looking downward on President Kennedy's head. Mr. Krieger said that it emphasizes the hair; Ms. Plater–Zyberk said that the coin portraits typically show the subject looking ahead. Mr. Krieger cited an additional concern that the facial features in alternative #1 are exaggerated; Ms. Fernández said that the other portraits are also unsatisfactory. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk suggested a consensus to request further study, without recommending any of the submitted alternatives. Mr. Everhart, the Mint's lead sculptor–engraver, said that the artist's intention in alternative #1 is a reference to President Kennedy's portrait at the White House, which shows him looking downward. Mr. Krieger said that the design suggests a pensive or reflective mood, and he offered support for alternative #1. Ms. Fernández emphasized that coins are not paintings and should not relay on the same artistic effects; the typical vocabulary for coin portraiture has a dignified formality, and she reiterated her dissatisfaction with all of the submitted alternatives. Ms. Plater–Zyberk added that the public would not necessarily understand the relationship of the coin design to the painting. Mr. Luebke asked for more information on the CCAC discussion of alternative #2. Ms. Stafford responded that #2 was selected for discussion after CCAC members expressed concern with the pose in #1. Greg Weinman of the Mint added that the discussion for alternative #2 was whether President Kennedy's youthfulness was conveyed sufficiently. Mr. Krieger said that the likeness in #2 is relatively poor, while #1 may be acceptable. Ms. Plater–Zyberk reiterated her opposition to alternative #1 and suggested developing the portrait in alternative #2 to convey President Kennedy's youthfulness; Mr. Krieger supported this proposal, with no recommendation for any of the submitted alternatives. Ms. Stafford presented alternative #3, the CCAC preference with 17 of 24 points among the six alternatives; she also presented the close second choice of alternative #4, which received 15 points. Ms. Fernández offered a preference for alternative #4. Ms. Plater–Zyberk agreed, commenting that #4 is an interesting portrait, and suggested that the head be lowered in either alternative in order to avoid intersecting with the circumferential lettering at the top of the composition. Mr. Krieger said that either #3 or #4 would be acceptable; he offered a slight preference for alternative #4 and supported the adjustment of the head's position. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk noted the consensus to support alternative #4 with this modification. Ms. Stafford presented alternative #1, the CCAC preference with 14 of 24 points among the four alternatives; she also presented alternative #2, which also received 14 points but was not selected as the CCAC preference. Ms. Plater–Zyberk commented that neither of these portraits is flattering. Mr. Krieger commented that President Nixon looks more firm and resolute in #1, and more pensive in #2. Ms. Plater–Zyberk supported the profile pose in alternative #1; Mr. Krieger and Ms. Fernández said that either would be acceptable and agreed to support #1. Ms. Stafford presented alternative #4, the mild CCAC preference with 10 of 24 points among the four alternatives; she also presented the close second choice of alternative #1, which received 9 points. Ms. Plater–Zyberk supported with the CCAC recommendation for alternative #4; Ms. Fernández agreed. Mr. Krieger said that #1 has merit but agreed to support #4. 4. CFA 20/MAR/14–9, 2015 and 2016 Native American One Dollar Coins. Reverse designs for the seventh and eighth sets of coins. Final. (Previous: CFA 18/JUL/13–8, 2014 issue.) Ms. Stafford summarized the program of annual reverse designs for the one–dollar coin to honor Native American contributions to the history of the United States in a chronological sequence; the obverse design would continue to depict Sacagawea. The previously selected themes for the next two coins include Mohawk iron workers for the 2015 coin, and code talkers of World War I and World War II for the 2016 coin. She noted that the design alternatives for these coins, like others in the series, have been developed in consultation with the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, and have been reviewed by the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee (CCAC), the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, the Congressional Native American Caucus of the House of Representatives, and the National Congress of American Indians; the presentation includes their multiple preferences and comments. Ms. Stafford presented the preferred reverse alternatives for the 2015 coin, selected from among twenty alternatives (numbered 2 through 21). The CCAC preference was for alternative #4 with the comment to add the text "Mohawk Iron Workers" in the location of "United States of America," which would be moved to the upper circumference; an additional CCAC recommendation was for alternative #13. The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs recommended alternatives #13 and #15. The Congressional Native American Caucus recommended alternative #8. The National Congress of American Indians recommended alternatives #8 and #13. Mr. Krieger agreed with the CCAC suggestion to include the phrase "Mohawk Iron Workers" to improve public awareness of the coin's theme; Ms. Plater–Zyberk agreed. Mr. Krieger said that alternative #8 does not appear to have sufficient room for this additional text. The Commission members agreed that alternative #4 could most easily be adjusted to include this text. Ms. Fernández said that the stylized skyline in #4 provides additional emphasis on the theme, while the larger portrait in #8 makes the theme less clear. Ms. Stafford presented the preferred reverse alternatives for the 2016 coin, selected from among 18 alternatives. The CCAC preference was for alternative #9 with the comment to replace the dates "1917" and "1945" with the text "WWI" and "WWII." The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs recommended alternatives #3, #9, and #16. The Congressional Native American Caucus recommended alternative #1, #2, and #3. The National Congress of American Indians recommended alternatives #4 and #9. The Commission members agreed to recommend alternative #9 and supported the CCAC suggestion to modify the inscriptions. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk expressed appreciation for the streamlined presentation format for the Mint submissions. Mr. Luebke noted the potential difficulty of following the multiple preferences, perhaps resulting in less discussion of design issues; the Commission members suggested testing this format again when more Commission members are present. Vice Chairman Plater–Zyberk noted the conclusion of Ms. Fernández' service and conveyed the Commission's appreciation for her work.
2019-04-18T10:58:29Z
https://www.cfa.gov/records-research/record-cfa-actions/2014/03/cfa-meeting/minutes
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Tell yourself that rejection is superb. A rejection is far better than getting no answer at all. Sometimes it’s just a method of saying no more, it’s not for me personally. It’s the only friend that’ll be real with you. Conveying rejection could be difficult because most individuals do not understand how exactly to express the language without even hurting the receiver. Think about content up grade to get an advantage cloth which you’ll not see on blog should you choosen’t exchange it together with your email. In the event you own a site for your business then you are going to put it any contact info, which will most likely spend the shape of an email addressso they ultimately have a procedure to get in touch with you. Thank you mails don’t will need to be fancy but if you will need to catch our eye, be certain you customize them that we have been aware that it is perhaps not merely that a boilerplate email. Since mails are now so prevalent, physical email has recovered some effectiveness as a style of reaching folks. They really are the perfect method to create interactions. A courteous and well constructed petition is far more inclined to get the form of answer you want. In the event you prefer to pleasure your audience you need to discover top service in the industry that will support you in contact with your audience effectively. Additionally, folks love speaking concerning by on their own. Do not forget to mail you to each individual who you have achieved together with, as possible. You might well be a sensible personal, however you understand nothing whatsoever. Becoming savvy and utilizing the right advertising tactics could result in increased earnings, decrease prices and impressive growth for your e commerce shop. Email-marketing can also be one of the simplest and effective tools to receive clients back fulfilling their baskets. By natural means, perhaps your company could gain from an update, making it available for a wholly new flow of people who would be capable of making use of your website who can’t currently. If your business has fewer than 15 employees you don’t have to update your website. You could attempt suggesting that you have detected another delivery company that is half the purchase price they are paying, so they can save loads. Nearly all of the email advertisements providers offer email workflow or email automation that may send appreciable email to a own contact record. Several of the important points you should consider until you go for a email automation support. Luckily, you will find some great techniques e commerce merchants may utilize while marketing to a current purchaser. Describe the ceremony you are getting to be providing and also gives applicable details as they relate to project preparation, arrange processing or ongoing connections. Some will deliver their bill card details within electronic mail (please don’t ever run thisemail is not secure) or they may basically call and you get to speak in their mind. Be certain you read the fine print! Match the type of your thanks card to the company and interviewer. It’s possible to try active effort at no cost, no charge demanded. Lastly, the moment the listing broker informs owner in regards to the purchaser’s re-fund of commissions scheme, the seller will likely probably mostly probably waive the buyer is trying to cheat to obtain a improved bargain. At the close of the show biz, it has productivity that every employer is hunting for within their new hires. My objective is to establish probably the maximum that I am able to pay for a click on (and also a conversion). My single objective will be to get you thinking and provide you tools that will assist you to find much greater answers. The purpose of the marketing with email is really to have a exact minimal bounce pace, since it indicates your email checklist is in health. Active campaign stipulates the upcoming providers. Alternate your ads Retargeting may do the job very well for a couple days but customers will end up exhausted and drained from the ad in the event you simply abandon the exact same ad destroying for weeks. Do not be scared to ask help when you would like it. Set aside the time to speak with the brand new consumer in individual or by mobile telephone to talk about the particulars of one’s relationship and the manner in which you’re fulfill her requirements. Something else you don’t understand. Ultimately, you have to find the way which is proper for you personally. Putting yourself right in your own inbox may signify that you’ll be stuck there for the remaining part of your day. In the contest you love the job, also each day is apparently an getaway, you will need to take a while to break. Yesit’s a hell lot of work in the event you never utilize solutions and tools. Arriving early to ensure that you have adequate time to write yourself before the interview is a superior thought. Once it’s crucial that you relish away time and take a chance to recharge it’s likewise crucial that you return into the swing of all things. An ideal way to achieve success in your own very first day back in the office is always to make a program. If you want to become great at something, then you need to devote a long time doing this. Retargeting works since it serves as a reminder to previous and existing buyer’s that you’re still about. Inside my experience, the more thanks observe isn’t the place to this. Usually do not fearawith a exact excellent strategy plus some helpful ideas, you’ll have the ability to write proper notes readily. Sales letters really are an intimidating job for many business owners, and also you may pick it isn’t worth the hassle to do independently. Basically, his correspondence was 3x so long as mine. You can find many sorts of letters that you will need to build up. A formal correspondence writing or formal correspondence can be a sort of organization proposition letter. Be certain to have a look at our no cost expert letter samples to acquire the very important pointers for the particular letter you have to craft. Most characters, though, is likely to soon likely be compiled with a supervisor, manager, or even supervisor of some kind. To exhibit work out application the most greatest possibility of succeeding that you would like to fully grasp just how to compose a relevant and concise coverletter. Creating a letter is a significant undertaking, because it takes one to personalize your words into the candidate and produce your correspondence particular. Title the event and you’re going to discover a letter for this. Thus as you may view, composing letters from Japanese is an immense ordeal, even though as soon as you learn all the guidelines and perform just a little exercise it’s maybe not really bad. Commercial components are very important in any organization. A superb article letter follows a bunch of guidelines. Cases are able to assist you determine what kind of material you should have in your record, while templates can allow one to receive a feeling of the perfect layout and precisely what segments touse (such as for example introductions and human anatomy paragraphs). If you own any case letters that you imagine should be listed here, please allow me to know. This illustration is obviously a harsh set correspondence that should be signed with the organization’s control. Our official correspondence examples here adhere to the suitable format. Section of this correspondence From the body of a company correspondence, it is best to add some concise paragraphs. For instance, the very 1st paragraph should inform your employer that you just simply mean to retire. The following paragraphs of your organization development cover letter should attest your experience and accomplishments certainly are an excellent fit for your own position. The former paragraph of this letter should comprise a request to match the enterprise to speak about job opportunities. Give a review of the things you’re going to be producing at the letter. A letter of intention might be something which can be enforced if it really is overly restrictive. Put simply, if it starts defining promising and actions conclusion of particular terms, it may become legally binding. In the beginning, each letter finishes with an invitation to acquire in touch with the writer for any additional advice. Luckily, flat letters really are a wonderful deal simpler. Horizontal principle letters seem notably colder and not as personal, even however I feel that is changing. Sample letters are awarded for everybody to comprehend what all information needs to form a part of the letter type and after that it could be personalized. What you create on your organization letter goes to be the very initial impression that you make in your own audience in a lot of industry cases. Once you’ve said that the overall reason for writing your enterprise letter, use body to supply extra specifics. A routine small business letter consists of 3 segments, an opening, a body, and a conclusion. As that you don’t need to examine the utmost effective and sound insincere, your correspondence ought to be a positive acceptance. Company letters have to be broken into short paragraphs, which cause effortless reading. The business letters have been by and large written by those who are in to some or other kind of occupation. Wiring a great small business development cover letter is your initial phase of one’s occupation application training. The previous letter would be to a friend and must be casual. Writing a formal letter can be thought to become an intimidating endeavor by people. How the way in which your start it’s going to be contingent on how formal you want certainly to become. It follows the right format that is found in most organization. Previous, you ought to bear in your mind that producing a formal letter isn’t difficult if you understand and adhere to the fundamental rules and the format of this correspondence. Thus, it is essential to learn how exactly to write a formal letter effectively. The correspondence is going to merge together using all the data field supplied from the info file. Since you’ve probably asked to get a reference correspondence you might be less acquainted with creating 1. If you’re asked to write a benchmark correspondence, keep in the mind you are attempting to demonstrate that the guy or woman is just a solid candidate for your own work. A fantastic character reference correspondence from some one you realize can be handy for task searching when you With the introduction of personal computers and printers and also the common habit of media, character references are far more common compared to previously. Everyone can employ Microsoft PowerPoint. Microsoft PowerPoint supplies a vast collection of alternatives, which can be used to make an exceptional and also a creative presentation in a speedy amount of time. Microsoft PowerPoint PowerPoint can be actually a nice app, that’s been utilised to analyze the creativity when establishing presentations over a normal foundation. Excel can make it an easy task to change a handful of variables and see the way that it has an effect on essentially the most essential thing. Microsoft Excel is also an extremely powerful tool that could possibly be utilized in all issues with accouting. As demonstrated from the picture above, it enables one to utilize one of many templates which exist on the web or locally. Till everything was not simple to implement in Excel. Excel presumes that you would just like to replicate the data, rather than filling out a sequence. Excel presumes that because you’ve entered 2 specific numbers having a gap of inch you prefer to fulfill out a series rather than replicate. Microsoft Excel is actually just a famous spreadsheet program that was made by Microsoft. It has advanced to a good extent over a period of time, plus some of the complex options have served people to use automated surgeries to conserve time over a normal basis. The terrific thing concerning Microsoft Excel is that you do not need to re arrange the wheel whenever you have to implement an accounting worksheet. The absolute most recent version of the pc software is Excel 11, plus it is a factor of the Microsoft Office 2003 package. The very first variant of this applying was initially written for your Apple Macintosh in 1985 however, the exact first PC version was not released until 1987. The exact first version for Windows wouldbe released just two decades later. Entering various data should you want to input data in a neighboring selection of cells, i.e. cells that are adjacent to one another, a speedy technique will be to select the full range of cells, subsequently enter the information, 1 cell at one period, employing the Tab key to move between the cells. Focus on obtaining some data that you wish to outline. The info is used to make the electronic model and the version is subsequently exhibited over the monitor. If you should be a newcomer in computers and want to know on these, then you may undergo training to get a brief term. Since 1993, visualbasic has really come to become an integrated component of Excel, along with the debut of this integrated development surroundings. Microsoft training provides you using the language and also the essential notions you could possibly be missing, even once you have been using an attribute for decades. It is made up of finding out about the a variety of elements of Micro Soft. Laptop or computer training provides you with an advantage over others when you’re going to your job. A spreadsheet program called Multiplan was released by the business enterprise at 1982, but nonetheless, it eventually lost market share on account of the release of Lotus 1 2 3. The trick is that must participate in some premium and nice excellent affiliate programs. Instead, it is possible to put dollars into an’all-in-one’ variety application that may offer you a complete end to end event administration software answer. No matter if you decide to automate just inch part of this procedure, or utilize the advantages of the complete celebration management application app, is your selection. The approach is almost exactly the exact similar in Microsoft Excel. It is important for individuals to understand specific types of tools or applications, which have been widely utilised in order to execute their own regular pro works on a regular foundation. It is evident that the folks would rather use a convenient and fast application as it permits one to center around the work without delay in time to time. On the list of most often occurring modern-day computer software apps is e-marketing, that is the using email to advertise your occasions. The technical implementation of the aforementioned sensitivity investigation by means of a training video can be discovered at the web link beneath. Sooner or later you may want to discover the gap between just two times in Excel. That which you need to to accomplish is you may make an effort to handle their issues and also lead them to make reference out to solutions there in your website. Even although you should be expert in writing, it’s still a fact that you just simply need somebody to edit your job . Fourthly, outline to the staff exactly what sort of work is going to be warranted. One of the simplest methods to make Money on-line today is to find yourself a subscriber list and ship offers it out. Where as, Micro Soft funds, comprises much more frequent entrances, you’d most surely be paying for all purposes you don’t need. Today you might need to inquire howto earn funds with high traffic. The conventional auditing way means moving right through a enormous amount of reports at a swift time period, often at the end of the month. The reports are also likewise a significant time spout and also a considerable cost. After that, you have to create your expense report the moment you comeback to your company. Managing expense accounts can also be an actual hassle if you don’t have proper investment management device. A great deal of folks complain that expense coverage is complicated and occasionally complicated. First, the exact first issue, if you are liable for cost coverage, is always to be given a-sound investment method. Manual expenditure coverage is a whole waste of one’s time and also the firm’s money. Company can be business, however, also you also should do exactly what you are able to attract customers in. If a company becomes overvalued to get several years at a row, then you also could need to switch back into reporting it to get a hobby farm. Finally As it develops, you’re find a level of complexity to taxation law which you just simply didn’t think potential. Normally, it’s a business. In case your business is a service firm describe how much it costs to extend your service. Even supposing it is only a part time operation having couple gains, then you must have another checking account and also separate creditcard to the organization. Eventually, in the event you really don’t certainly different organization and unique bills (utilizing separate bank account and bank cards to get each), you are likely to detect that it’s impossible or difficult to receive a business loan if you need one. In that scenario, contemplate the method that you could be ready to bring in several of the exact sorts of clients, and what exactly additional product they would be likely to purchase. Like a consequence of the internet, you can reach customers outside your local spot. It truly is very best to start out with all the professional services that are presently managed by your organization. If you have some one else control all your financial records, you have to test their job each week, looking to make sure certain income and expenditures are appropriately documented and be sure nothing appears unusual. You may possibly also have misplaced a range of the data. You have to keep tabs on all expenses that are linked for the job of flipping. The form of credit to seek will probably depend upon the form of firm you are run, the aim of the budget, and the size of this loan. If you would like, you may even receive cash back. You will spend , but depending on your own present providers, you also can spend extra income. To start with, using funds earmarked for retirement is not a good idea. At any time you do, you’re able to comprise the purchase price tag on almost any equipment or medications you are using in addition to some traveling expenses such as car expenditures. Expenditures incurred when working with your very own personal vehicle for work purposes may be utilized as a tax deduction. You’d likewise subtract any company expenses which are related to the work of turning like phone expenses, evaluations , repairs or escrow bills. If you’ve got to record your expenses, then you’re probably less inclined to shell out unnecessarily and to continue to keep tabs on where you could be ready to truly save. Others may not opt to pay back mileage expense in any way. Exactly the specific same way, additional expenses could be imported into the post-trip expense report also. In manufacturing and retail, the greatest cost for many firms is commonly expense of products offered. If you are trying to earn a profit or expect to produce a make money from your art, you are able to categorize it as a business venture. Complete income from each one of these 1099 misc forms is reported, along with costs, to determine the authentic net income for year. If you apply the income method, you are not claiming the income until you’ve secured the amount at your mind. To claim deductions for any costs connected to the internship, it truly is first essential to own taxable source of income. Folks that are utilized by additional people and get W-2 income but in addition run an organization which accounts that a reduction are especially high over the IRS radar screen. For that self explanatory, the overall tax has to be insured from the taxpayer. Sooner or after, it’s going to become simpler to use a tax practitioner to provide help. You have the ability to even determine if it’s the customer has viewed or paid your statement in precise moment. The time statement indicates money the buyer owes into a seller. The statement will be made only up on successful set of payments. The carpeting cleaning invoice could be your paper work employed with a carpet cleaning firm or a professional to demonstrate every detail of the job performed. You may then keep up with your bills and also the bucks you have made right in pay pal, even once the cost failed to undergo pay pal. From The Account You can also publish your invoice utilizing the’My Account’ section of the website. If you should be also searching for several pro designed alongside free of cost invoice to ready your very own business invoice, you can come across a free price bill Template from our website. You might come back lots of the items in a bill and also you also obtain yourself a credit observe. A bill is going to be created just in the event the cost is more powerful. Usually, a statement is closed in start of these term. Blocked invoice is going to be published. Our entirely free invoice is able to help you avoid needless disputes concerning how much will be owed and also present you a much more sturdy footing if you will need to see court docket. Invoices are not the very same as receipts. S O statements are very critical for any form of company. A person may receive a wide selection of professionally-prepared invoices from your internet. The statement could possibly be transmitted along with this products or at another day. Invoices adhere to a normal format to prepare yourself. For example, a great deal of bills permit the buyer 30 days to cover and provide a discount for paying out within the first ten days of the bill. You’ll use a complete invoice for the majority of trades. The most crucial factor to note about that the invoice is really it’s really a legally enforceable document. Invoice can be still an industrial document. Complete the invoice needs to be built in such a manner that even when putting all of the particulars of the transaction, it appears complicated. Now you can develop professional-looking bills in just a couple taps! Creating a fresh invoice in pay pal is very easy. You have the capability to simply make your bills from utilizing bill template. The purchase announcement may be your document you get from your vendor which covers the payable number of the particular purchase order you’ve placed together with them. Basically a statement consists of some info linked to the providers given from the organization. It will be potential to fulfill seller invoices to merchandise receipts to get a range of invoices at the very same second. You’ll discover a great deal of invoice generating software on the web that can instantly create your invoice slide. Invoices without any line items cannot be closed. They may be issued by the account section of a company. They’re a outstanding means to track your earnings, expenses and business. If you’re struggling with creating auto invoices, then you’ll locate assistance right here. Furthermore our car repair invoice is totally editable and modifiable. Make use of the actions below in case you want to publish a statement ahead of a subscription renewal. Zoho bill supports custom areas, permitting one to fully capture additional data on your invoices. Invoices have many forms and variations. In the event you want an invoice or a shipping slip to become enclosed in a shipping box, please notify us at the shipping view section at Checkout. Receipts really are a essential portion of a organization, if or not they are out of a physical shop or a internet shop. Notice a reception is not the exact like a statement. You are ready to re charge a receipt to some other email or telephone number anytime by your online Square dash board or by the sq Point of Sale program. You’re ready to generate the reception all yours. Oftentimes, the sales receipt may used in conjunction with a copy of this charge card fee slide if your client may make the choice to pay with a charge card. Receipts are largely given to maintain a record of their payment in addition to the delivered goods. As it has to perform making your own personal custom made receipt and also make invoice sample, entirely free online reception generators would be the most top method to do so. Assess your software to find out whether it’s possible for you to publish a reception. You want a method to produce receipts which are simple to understand. You have the ability to make a receipt that is just acceptable for you as well as your organization. For college pupils who must print a receipt or statement First log on your account 1. A receipt is the purchaser’s proof payment. In comparison, receipt, can be just really a rather simple official acknowledgment, so that the goods or services are acquired. Non-valuated goods receipts are not supported. Folks are becoming more familiar with all the evaluation materials. Just like you are in need of a ton more than simply a balance-sheet to know a provider’s health, you take an outstanding bit more details than simply the present people information to understand that a provider’s culture. Although chart is just a little all around the place you’re going to be able to recognize that your preferred bands are part of that long list. A rapid and easy graph may even be convenient for people to utilize when they’re wanting to master more regarding the manner blood sugar levels can impact their wellbeing. The index is going to show up in the bottom part of the display, directly below the cost chart. The entire index is represented by only a single line. Indicators of different businesses and the very similar business on various timeframes cannot be satisfactorily compared together. There exists an aggressive analysis document, enabling you to examine 10 fan pages together using just as far as 250,000 fans. Furthermore, studies show that an extremely modest section of the non-phytol part of the chlorophyll molecule is absorbed. What’s more, other research have found that elephants of children with dementia are much more likely to produce ASD. An even sophisticated investigation is determined from the sign and house location to work out the karmic information. You’re going to get a detailed remedial methodology which can be adopted by you readily within your everyday regime. Several Intelligences the idea of multiple intelligences indicates there are certainly always a selection of different kinds of intelligence that every individual possesses in varying amounts. With any form of trading, psychology may play an immense role. Grade acceleration, although usually not the 1 point a gifted child requirements, would be a method to help bridge the difference between what they truly are ready to accomplish, and also what they truly are carrying out. Lately, lots of people are working at various paces on different times or days frames, even utilizing all the above paces. If you should be interested in being aware of your very own exact personalized pace and stride duration, you can receive your very own precise steps for every minute-mile equivalent. Hemoglobin, however, carries oxygen necessary for electricity generation in the body and releases carbon dioxide for an outcome. Controlling your blood glucose is quite a bit easier once you own a Blood Sugar Level Chart you’re ready to refer to in your home. Alternatively of bread you find it possible to replace coconut milk, that will be an excellent option. Money management could be your constraint of your general trading fund. The restriction of diabetes mostly is dependent upon diet, exercise and drug. Automated buying and selling techniques enable dealers to accomplish consistency by investing in the strategy. They minmise feelings during the entire trading procedure. They permit the user to exchange multiple accounts or various techniques at the same time. The person can establish, for example, a protracted commerce will be entered once the 50-day moving average spans within the 200-day moving average on the five-minute chart of a particular trading tool. Heavy cannabis usage from the very first month of living might lead to inferior motor-skills at precisely exactly the very same year-old. A exact clear illustration is golden. Though maybe it doesn’t look like it the idea behind the indicator is not straightforward. To put it simply, there’s not really a chance inorder for this to become changed into fresh bloodflow. As an example, in the event that you are not feeling well at the suitable period of taking this test. And yes it is a great time to get societal action between family members as well as good associates. Or maybe you’re distracted by something about this particular day or you have accepted medication which slows down the performance of this brain. People scoring in a wide range of 9-5 to 105 are of a typical intellect or truly have an ordinary IQ. Average True selection isn’t a sign that will demonstrate the upcoming fad direction or offer whole details on the way in which where the purchase price chart is anticipated to act. The level of detail is striking. If blood sugar level is high it can lead to kidney failure, cardio vascular difficulties as well as malnutrition. Below is a fast break down of the way that AI is dominating the various intelligences. The most top reason for illness may turn out to be the Not Self. Even now, the amount of companies that have now already been releasing diversity accounts continuously continues to be constrained. The entire way relies round simple, succinct buying and selling regulations. The youngster’s sentences continue to be telegraphic although they could be quite extensive. To put it differently, if some one that has obtained an IQ evaluation from 2018 and believed a hundred took precisely the exact evaluation with the exact inquiries, however calibrated in the way that it had been in 1980, they had receive a far higher score compared to one hundred. You shouldn’t invest dollars that you cannot manage to reduce. There’s nothing for a trading application that wins 100% of those timelosses certainly are an element of the overall game.
2019-04-23T00:23:33Z
http://mountainhorsemedical.com/12-formular-fur-bewerbungsschreiben/
Introduction: In a Huffington Post piece last month I asked: Is It Time for a New Look at Integrative Medicine and Health Professionals in the Triple Aim Era? When integrative medicine leaders were surveyed, they viewed their work as deeply-aligned with the 3 goals: enhancing patient experience, lowering cost, and bettering population health. But how are integrative clinic leaders doing in practice in these values-based outpatient centers? Should more such clinics plan to adopt this model? Washington State's HealthPoint (Tom Trompeter, CEO). The Huffington Post piece pulls key comments from these clinic leaders. The others directly noted below were published during a period of significant activity on this project this past month. Much of this work grew out of Integrator partnerships with ACCAHC's Project for Integrative Health and the Triple Aim, the North American Board of Naturopathic Examiners, and the Casey Health Institute. The goal of the work is to stimulate understanding of integrative patient centered medical homes (PCMH). The news could surprise many: in the state of Vermont - as in Oregon - naturopathic physicians can, and do, operate accredited primary care medical homes (PCMHs). In Vermont, naturopathic physicians do so following a steady stream of up-regulation over the past 20 years. Licensing. Recognition as part of the state's primary care matrix. Insurance coverage. Medicaid inclusion. Most recently, in 2011, inclusion as accepted owners and operators of PCMHs under the state's single-payer style Vermont Blue Print for Health - and 2013, the first PCMH designation. That designee was the Mountain View Natural Medicine center in Burlington. The pioneering force behind this opportunity in Vermont is naturopathic physician Lorilee Schoenbeck, ND. Her center is presently a Level 2 PCMH under a system of scoring carried out by analysts from the most significant accreditor of PCMHs nationwide, NCQA. This is the first of two parts. The second, below, focuses on prevention and clinical improvement initiatives. Martin Milner, ND, founded the 6,500 square foot Center for Naturopathic Medicine as a beacon of light in a dark age for his profession over 30 years ago. Three years ago he chose to move the 12-practitioner center to become what it is now: a Level 3 certified patient-centered primary care medical home under Care Oregon, the state's ambitious reform plan. In this article, Melissa Porter, the center's chief operations person and quarterback of the transition shares the story of the changes made, and early outcomes. In this second of a two part interview with pioneering naturopathic patient-centered medical home (PCMH) operator Lorilee Schoenbeck, ND, the focus turns to the prevention and quality improvement initiatives in place at her multi-practitioner center, Mountain View Natural Medicine. Here is a look at the initiatives in immunizations, obesity, colonoscopy, dyslipedemia and more in this NCQA-scored, Level 2 PCMH. The executive vice president and COO of the Maryland-based integrative PCMH, Casey Health Institute (CHI), Tracey Gersh, PhD came to the ground-breaking, Maryland-based integrative health center from roles as administrator and program developer at a nearby federally qualified health center (FQHC). In this article, Gersh describes the movement of CHI into becoming a patient centered medical home recognized by Care First, Maryland's Blue Cross/Blue Shield firm. She then shares CHI's move to become part of a new accountable care organization (ACO), Aledade, with a set of 5 other primary care clinics. She speaks to the differences between CHI and the Federally Qualified Health Center where she previously worked. One of the leaders of the successful effort to set standards for the health coaching movement in the United States, Karen Lawson, MD, sent a note early in December: "Late last week the U.S. House of Representatives introduced the Health and Wellness Coach Resolution, a bill number was assigned just yesterday. The ceremonial resolution ‘expresses support of health and wellness coaches and National Health and Wellness Coach Recognition Week.' This is the culmination of work done for the past year to raise the profile of all Health and Wellness Coaches in Congress. Thank you, [National Consortium for Credentialing Health and Wellness Coaches] for supporting this effort." The proposed resolution has some fine, endorsement of the rising field: "Whereas, health coaches are a new type of health care worker who serve as wellness guides and supportive mentors that motivate individuals to cultivate positive health choices and move them toward those specific goals ..." The co-signers are Payne, Mullin, Buchanan, Napolitano, and Ryan of Ohio. Lawson directs a health coaching program at the University of Minnesota. Comment: This visibility strategy - including the dedication of a recognition week - is one that has been used successfully by the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians. (In fact, given the lifestyle focus of many naturopathic practice, some of the language is quite similar in whereas elements of each resolution.) It was the mention of health coaching in a 2010 federal act - the Affordable Care Act - that prompted the self-regulatory efforts for the field, beginning with a September 2010 summit just 5 months after the ACA was passed. Notably, for this Round-up, the elevation of health coaching is smack in the middle of "Quadruple Aim" thinking and patient-centered medical homes. Good move. The Dynamic Chiropractic article on a follow-up report from the Inspector General of the USA is Targeting the Bad Apples in the Bunch. The subhead: "Latest OIG report outlines plan to determine questionable DC billing claims, recoup payments." The Office of the Inspector General's report speaks volumes in its title alone: "CMS Should Use Targeted Tactics to Curb Questionable and Inappropriate Payments for Chiropractic Services." The measures and categories of complaint are laid out in the useful article, written by Ronald Short, DC, MCS-P. Short challenges OIG perspectives on some counts, lessso on others. The article notes that "of the $502 million that Medicare paid in 2013 for chiropractic services, $76.1 million was for claims that were questionable based on our four measures of questionable payment." Comment: This is useful reading for any practitioner in the insurance game. In a panel presentation on research that influences policy at the October 2015 Academy of Integrative Health and Medicine conference, chiropractic research leader Christine Goertz, DC, PhD made a comment that speaks to the concerns in the report. Goertz noted that presently a type of research related to the chiropractic field of particular interest has less to do with effectiveness than in helping delivery organizations determine the best chiropractors with whom to work. The OIG report underscores why this is important. Meantime, other licensed integrative health professions that are not in Medicare - LAcs, NDs, massage therapists- can drool at the half-billion dollars of Medicare payouts. That's a transfer of wealth from government to the chiropractic profession that, while just 1% of CMS' $597-billion annual payout, bluntly signals what these professions are missing through their lack of recognition by CMS. In late November, Taylor Walsh, project director for the CoverMyCare campaign of the Integrative Health Policy Consortium sent news that the most recent "CMC Update" has been posted. Walsh also previews anticipated developments: "2016 will be an important year in the fortunes of state-based initiatives that are geared to bring compliance with their own non-discrimination legislation, if not with Section 2706 (of the Affordable Care Act, Non-Discrimination in Health Care) itself." Walsh wonders if other states will "copy Oregon and Rhode Island and promote in their next legislative sessions?" Well others "include, and pass, enforcement provisions that the federal law did not include?" CMC willreport on recent efforts to encourage the US Department of Health and Human Services to clarify what, to them, constitutes discrimination. Walsh urges practitioners to link to the CMC Stories Album and share any discrimination-related stories. Comment: IHPC, CMC and the movement for integrative care itself are lucky to have a person as dedicated and with as many skills sets as Walsh, a sometimes Integrator contributor, in the driver's seat. A leader of the Hawaii Medical Services Association (HMSA) has announced that naturopathic physicians in the state will begin to be recognized as primary care providers by HMSA. HMSA, that state's a BlueCross BlueShield plan, is the dominant player in that market. This was the headline in a report shared with the Integrator by Michael Traub, ND, from an October 29, 2015 meeting involving multipl,e HMSA officials and naturopathic leaders. Traub has be the point person representing the naturopathic profession in the insurance and political realm for 3 decades. Traub notes that the HMSA representative shared that "HMSA is also moving towards a community health model that focuses on health and well-being, paying health care providers for the time it takes to facilitate this. NDs are well-trained providers for this model." The transition to value-based care is expected to take 14 months. Related information is here and here. The transition to the new model with eventually come through some form of an independent physician association "to to facilitate referrals among providers." The HMSA representative said that educators and case navigators may also play a role. HMSA is expected to provide resources and business analytics. This was the fifth meeting for this purpose over the past 6 years since the ACA was enacted, and the fourth meeting over the past two years since Section 2706 went into effect. Comment: "Perseverance furthers" is the way this stick-to-it effort is put in the I Ching. Much education all around will be needed. The Integrator Special Report on naturopathic physicians guiding patient centered medical homes may be particularly useful to both the Hawai'i NDs and HMSA's administrators. Boston Medical Center's Katherine Gergen-Barnett, MD (see People this Round-up) on integrative medicine group visits. RAND's Patricia Herman, ND, PhD and Claudia Witt, MD on "policy and the economics of integrative medicine." An IHPC and ACCAHC-led multidisciplinary group on practitioner discrimination in integrative health and medicine. Leading edge strategies for merging qualitative and quantitative research models. All these and 8 more are part of the extraordinary set of pre-conference workshops planned for May 17 prior to the formal opening of the 2016 International Congress on Integrative Medicine and Health (ICIMH). Most of the ICIMH plenary speakers have also been named, including: Richard Davidson, PhD on the neurophysiology of meditation, Ted Kaptchuk, OMD on placebo, David Relman, MD on the microbiome and Barbara Brandt, PhD on the movement for team care. An overflow of terrific session ideas is being evaluated by review teams. The conference will be held in Las Vegas at the Green Valley Ranch Resort, May 17-20. Comment: Serious alignment of interest note here: a serve on the ICIMH Organizing Committee and as chair of the Communications Committee. The goal was to create a true whole system experience: branching from research only into education, clinical and policy through partnerships with ACCAHC, AIHM and IHPC. FaceBookers: follow action here. This is a first: an integrative fellowship with a diverse mix of participants: advanced practice nurses, licensed acupuncturists, medical doctors, chiropractors, pharmacists, physicians' assistants, psychologists, osteopathic doctors, and dentists. Some slots are still open for the first class of the interprofessional fellowship in integrative medicine of the Academy of Integrative Health and Medicine. Kristen Gates, AIHM's program coordinator for the Fellowship, shared with the Integrator that as of December 10, 2015, AIHM has "accepted 46 and will take up to 50 for the first class" which will begin February 1, 2016. AIHM also plans a fall 2016 class. The AIHM fellowship director is Tieraona Low Dog, MD who works closely with associate director Seroya Crouch, ND. The AIHM's Fellowship website captures the team care focus with this African Proverb: "If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together." Comment: Wonderful start for the new program. While medical doctors, as anticipated, account for over 50% of enrollees, there is terrific interprofessional diversity that will guarantee a unique experience. This start-up of what will be the second significant fellowship in integrative medicine, following the Fellowship in Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona, brings to mind some ancient history - in integrative terms. In 1978, the Mothership of naturopathic medicine, now National College of Natural Medicine, calved its first U.S. offspring, now Bastyr University, via a group of NCNM graduates. These were led by Joe Pizzorno, ND. There was some competition felt from NCNM, and rumbling about whether the profession needed another. There are now 8 recognized ND programs. The multi-disciplinary Southern California University of Health Sciences (SCU) has announced a partnership with both the University of Southern California Club Men's and Women's Rugby Teams. In an article posted in the SCU Campus Connection, the agreement is described as "a great opportunity for our SCU residents and interns to gain valuable chiropractic sports medicine experience." Leading the team will be Coreen Levy, DC, an SCU sports chiropractic specialist "who is the official Doctor for the USC Men's and Women's Rugby team." Levy will be supervising SCU residents and interns who will "provide sideline medical care including: assessment, diagnosis, and treatment, to the athletes on USC's Rugby teams." Comment: This story of a female integrative practitioner taking a lead in sports medicine is a good companion to this short blurb, "Cleveland Indians' Jamie Starkey, LAc: First Acupuncturists Employed by Major League Baseball Team" in the October Integrator Round-up. On December 1, 2015 the United Natural Products Alliance (UNPA) announced a new partnership with the Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine & Health Sciences (SCNM). According to the media release, SCNM's collaboration with UNPA is "intended to aid in the advancement of naturopathic medicine and natural health products research, safety and quality, both nationally and internationally." SCNM president Paul Mittman, ND, EdD, comments: "The relationship between SCNM and UNPA will foster new opportunities for research to evaluate existing and explore new approaches to improving the public's health and wellbeing." With the signing, SCNM joins a roster of 13 other UNPA MOU and commercial partners. Bastyr University is now offering a "low residency" 4 quarter Masters of Arts in Maternal Child Health Systems Degree. The program is "designed for midwives and other maternity care practitioners who want to shift their careers toward teaching, advocacy, research and other ways of leading systemic change." The University already has a Department of Midwifery led by Suzy Myers, LM, CNM, MPH, for those seeking to become Certified Professional Midwives. Karen E. Hays, DNP, CNM, ARNP, an adjunct midwifery faculty member who helped develop the new program explains: "As midwives learn about structural barriers to providing effective birth care, many find themselves looking for ways to lead change in health systems." Comment: Good move from the feisty midwives. As members of the integrative health and medicine community step into increasing responsibilities as systems change agents, we'll need more of this, and not just for midwives. The Duke Program on Leadership in Integrative Medicine is the present outstanding example. I recall hearing of this idea a while back, but did not look into it and am glad I finally have. Perhaps some of you will have missed it to. Basically it is this: the move toward "value-based medicine" that leads to such delivery structures as the patient centered medical homes featured in this Integrator Round-up, is often synopsized as the triple aim. These are: enhance patient experience, better population health, and lower per capita costs. Last year, a suggestion was made by UCSF family medicine professor Thomas Bodenheimer, MD and his co-author that a fourth be added. To the authors, without this fourth aim, success with the others may not be possible. The gist: delivery organizations must focus on bettering the practitioner experience. Bodenheimer and his co-author, Christine Sinsky, MD, explain: "In visiting primary care practices around the country [we] repeatedly heard statements such as, ‘We have adopted the Triple Aim as our framework, but the stressful work life of our clinicians and staff impacts our ability to achieve the 3 aims.' These sentiments made us wonder, might there be a fourth aim-improving the work life of health care clinicians and staff-that, like the patient experience and cost reduction aims, must be achieved in order to succeed in improving population health? Should the Triple Aim become the Quadruple Aim?" The authors detail data on how other aspects of the Triple Aim are damaged when the workforce is running on burnout. Comment: In work with which I have the pleasure of being involved at the Institute of Medicine Global Forum on Health Professional Education, the board of the organization I help represent, the Academic Consortium for Complementary and Alternative Health Care, gave us a specific charge. We were told to focus on the "innovation" of educating health professionals who will focus on health, and well-being rather than reactivity. We've made some headway, especially as captured in this May 2013 workshop report. This 4th of the Quadruple Aim goals needs to be embedded educational processes. Some of the work in integrative medicine centers on mind-body programs are exemplars. See The Future of MD Education: Empathy, Roses and Respect Via Georgetown and U Minnesota Pilots. The 4th aim is core integrative health value. This Integrator feature is a quick capture of highlights from web stories relative to integrative medicine and health in the prior month. Here are 26 involving medical delivery systems and 14 more in communities. Included are the remarkable developments in the "biofield" led by Shamini Jain, MD, Deepak Chopra and others; David Katz, MD's decision to take on the "polarization-based medicine" anti-CAM/IM tribe; expansion of the mindfulness program for educators and clinicians at Georgetown University; very favorable coverage on acupuncture's coming of age in Time and US News & World Reports; and Ronald Hoffman, MD challenging recent negative reports on dietary supplements. Enjoy the skim of activities! The publisher of Dynamic Chiropractic, Donald Peterson, wrote up the results of a recent internet survey that the publication carried out on the state of the chiropractic profession. While not definitive, the results are of interest. Sample findings: 54% are in solo practices in which 80% or more of revenue is from adjustment/manipulation/PT/rehab/massage; roughly 1 in 20 (5.4%) are in "Integrated Interdisciplinary Practice" defined as practice with "at least two other non-chiropractic professionals (not including massage therapists" using a team approach; and 34% said that roughly half of their revenues came from 3rd party payers while a full 25% said that less than 10% does. Among the trends Peterson notes: "While many new DCs are beginning as cash practitioners, a larger number are almost entirely dependent on third-party payers." In spring of 2014, colleague Ruth Westreich set up a meeting for me with Shamini Jain, PhD. Jain was beginning some work through the Samueli Institute, where Jain is a senior scientist. Jain was then being supported by a Westreich Foundation grant to herd the ultimate set of cats: the powerful leaders - and their organizations - at the forefront of promoting research on the "biofield." Among these: Deepak Chopra/Chopra Foundation, Mimi Guarneri/Miraglo Foundation, Wayne Jonas/Samueli Institute, and Marilyn Schlitz (and others)/IONS. In late November, their collaboration came to double fruition. As documented in this November 23, 2015 piece by Chopra and Jain at the Huffington Post, the contracted papers from a January 2014 gathering of 45 biofield scientists were published as a Special Issue of Global Advances in Health and Medicine Journal: Biofield Science and Healing: Toward a Transdisciplinary Approach. The special issue includes 12 articles and an opening column from GAHMJ co-editors Mary Jo Kreitzer, RN, PhD, FAAN and Rob Saper, MD. In the same week, Jain announced that the website of the Consciousness and Healing Initiative (CHI) was opened. Comment: For Jain, CHI, and the biofield exploring team, this marks the end of the beginning of that organizing work. I was struck on picking up my November 30, 2015 issue of the New Yorker to marvel at a bit of coincidental woo to go with this promotion of more research and awareness of same. The publication included a review by Adam Gopnik of Scientific American contributor George Musser's new book, Spooky Action at a Distance. Gopnik focused on the how the theory of distant entanglement has fallen in and out of favor. The shifting perspective has had less to do, in Gopnik's view, with science than apparently to changes in the culture - such as this group is fomenting with the GAHMJ biofield special issue and the CHI site. My review of the review, in the context of this activity led by Jain, is here: Herding Atoms: Book, Journal, and Organizing Our Entanglement. What does a cynic about life's mysteries do with the dancing of these particles, infinitesimal, and larger? Anyone who like me is not a scientist but wants a good read on places reason treads with trouble, check out Larry Dossey, MD's wonderful One Mind. Global leaders in the wellness and spa fields met in mid-November in Mexico City as the Global Wellness Summit 2015. A key take-away was a set of a Top 10 Future Shifts in Wellness. The subhead of the organization's media release on the list is: "Experts at Mexico City conference forecast that wellness will become more mandatory in more nations soon - that breakthroughs in epigenetics, stem cells and integrative medicine are near - and that ‘programmatic' workplace wellness will disappear." Among the trends are "From Medicine vs. Wellness to Truly Integrative Healthcare." Adam Perlman, MD, MPH, the director of the integrative medicine program at Duke University, reportedly "spoke to the coming together of wellness and the complementary/integrative medicine movements." He commented: "We're at an inflection point. If we saw a first wave of integrative medicine in the mid/late 90s, this time it feels different." On the high-tech end, Deepak Chopra is cited in a trend on "From Cracking the Genome to Cracking the Epigenome." The National Certification Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (NCCAOM) has published, in its most recent annual report, the organization's three strategic goals. These are: 1) Integrating NCCAOM Credentialed Providers in to Healthcare in the United States; 2) Distinguish NCCAOM as the Expert Source for AOM Credentialing and Competency Standards; and 3) Expand the Value of NCCAOM Credentials to Assure and Advance Professional Opportunities for NCCAOM Diplomates. Under #1, the report notes initiatives that include placing board memberships in the Integrative Health Policy Consortium and the Academic Consortium for Complementary and Alternative Health Care. Under #3, NCCAOM's promotion of an annual AOM Day and sites for YouTube videos and a patient testimonials site are noted. Comment: NCCAOM has shape-shifted to fill needs left by the void created by the challenges for the AOM profession in building and supporting a national organization. I am aware via other professional work that under #1 the organization has also convened many of the most experienced licensed acupuncturists in the country to a task force that is seeking to assist individuals and organizations on credentialing and privileging issues. These are each useful initiatives. The subject of botanical quality and the "integrity" of the plant sourcing of natural products has spawned ever more exotic questions with each advance of technology. The American Botanical Council has published a two-part feature on the topic of botanical integrity. The work was engaged by a team at the University of Illinois at Chicago-NIH Center for Botanical Dietary Supplements Research. The first, published in the April 2015 HerbalGram, was: The Importance of the Integration of Chemical, Biological, and Botanical Analyses, and the Role of DNA Barcoding. The second, in the most recent issue, is Botanical Integrity: Part 2 - Traditional and Modern Analytical Approaches. The author group on each is guided by Guido F. Pauli, PhD with Charlotte Simmler, PhD as lead author. The second article, to give a flavor, looks at "current analytical techniques, new approaches focusing on the fields of botany and chemistry have become available to characterize plant-derived materials in supplements." Comment: With these, the American Botanical Council continues its role as a key dissemination source for work-product on botanicals developed through the NIH or with NIH funds. These follow the history and strategy document from the NIH's botanicals lead, Craig Hopp, PhD, that led to the Integrator Forum: What Are Your Views on NCCIH's Past and Future for Botanical Research?. Taking this route to publication speaks to the good sense of this NIH-funded team in reach a target audience, and also to the quality ABC executive director Mark Blumenthal has continuously striven to bring to the publication, with and through his extraordinary scientific advisors. "Nice" work, Mark! Side-note: I am reminded of my first real lesson on botanical quality. In 1986, I had a new colleague (who will remain nameless) who worked with a major international company that sold both to the more mature European medicinal herb industry, and also to the big USA companies through health food stores. He was getting to know the earnest, then youngish, chap (me) who was at the time introducing the "scientific natural medicine" of what is now Bastyr University to the herb industry. He took me into the ugly inner sanctum: "What we sell in the USA is the sweepings of the European industry;" that is, parts of the plant not used in the medicinal trade, sometimes more than metaphorically from the floor of that industry. Product integrity lesson #1: "sweepings" are not where you want in your herbal remedies. On December 9, 2015, the American Herbal Products Association sent out a media release noting that goldenseal and Aloe vera "non-decolorized whole leaf extract" were added to California's Proposition #65 list of "chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer." They were added by the state's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA). Within a day, the International Aloe Science Council (IASC) followed with its own release to let "all consumers know that ‘Aloe vera, non-decolorized whole leaf extract' is not an ingredient sold by IASC members, nor is it used in finished consumer products that have earned the IASC certification seal." The California decision was based on a classification by the France-based International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) that this material is an agent that is "possibly carcinogenic to humans." AHPA points out that IARC has similarly characterized red meat and especially processed red meat. Yet "OEHHA has yet to issue a notice of intent to list either red meat or processed meat as ‘a chemical known to the State of California to cause cancer.'" To treat the items differently, AHPA argues, "could be considered to be arbitrary and capricious from a legal standpoint." Comment: Is one over-sensitive to bias in wondering about possible double standards of waving such red flags about an aloe product and goldenseal and not about red meat. Put together in one story and one might wonders at the objectivity of the associated bureaucracy, and those directing the decision-makers. The Modern Healthcare Professional integrative medicine internet news source has published segments of a recent survey funded through the Council for Responsible Nutrition. The take home: 68% of adults are using at least one and 84% expressed confidence in the "overall safety, quality and effectiveness." While highest use is in vitamin-mineral category, a significant jump was registered with herbals, and another in sports nutrition. Multivitamins are the overwhelmingly most used supplement of any kind. The USA-based global service-learning group Acupuncturists Without Borders (AWB) is celebrating its 10th anniversary. The accomplishments for this NGO with a total, presently, of 2.5 FTEs are significant. The organization has sent teams as far away as Nepal. Here in US, they have worked in New Orleans after Katrina and supported disaster relief efforts in Texas and California. AWB has trained 400 U.S. acupuncturists "to respond to natural and human-created disasters." The organization has also had a role in "mentoring over 30 community service clinics in the U.S. that offer stress and trauma reduction treatments to veterans, active military, survivors of sexual violence." Also internationally, AWB has "trained 35 Jewish and Arab Israeli practitioners to offer trauma healing acupuncture in their communities" and is presently working on "laying the foundation in Mexico for a training program for health care workers" for the coming year. In a newsletter sent on Pearl Harbor Day 2015 to the list, the organization, noted a new video they have posted for their Nepal work. The work is led by executive director Diana Fried, the founder and current board president. The review of accomplishments included a request for contributions. Comment: I get an inside picture on the value of these global service and community practice through my close friend and colleague William Wulsin, ND, LAc, MPH who has worked with, or alongside of, AWB in multiple places, including Nepal - and whose work my family and I have supported. A brief piece on his work is here at the Global Integrator Blog: Acupuncturists without Borders Responds to Nepal Earthquake. Impactful work, for both those served, and those engaging the service. Here is the Global Integrator Blog Round-up for December 2015 at Global Advances in Health and Medicine. The summary from this writer on the half-dozen articles follows: "The WHO's campaign to limit antibiotic overuse brought to mind the good work of the European integrative medicine community on the topic last year. Check the link. Interesting to see the role of homeopathy in Colombia - a practice featured in works of that nation's Nobel winner Gabriel Garcia-Marquez. I happily report the belated and important inclusion of traditional healers in the Ebola strategy in Sierra Leone. Infectious diseases are having the positive consequences of bringing diverse practitioners together for a common enemy. More on that soon. Finally, can work on the ‘biofield' be anything less than ‘global'? Adam Gopnik's New Yorker review is a nice opening to an intensive collaboration underway to organize research and consciousness raising about, well, consciousness in healing. Enjoy, and do share your news and story ideas -John Weeks." Comment: I was particularly intrigued, in writing about the strange behavior of distant particles, to discover the temporal coincidences of the activities, noted above, and reported as Herding Atoms: Book, Journal, and Organizing Our Entanglement. I was pleased to be asked by the Academy of Integrative Health and Medicine to present a 45-minute plenary on the history of the movement now called integrative health and medicine at the organization's October 2015 Conference. I called it: "Connective Tissue: A Winner's History for Integrative Health and Medicine." A rare standing ovation, for my presentations. James Maskell, co-founder of the robust, global, Functional Forum/Evolution of Medicine, was present. He invited me to do a podcast on the topic. We did it and he posted it to his list of over 30,000 with some remarks. The podcast is presently the most listened to of any other on the site. Maskell wrote: "One of our favorite talks at the AIHM conference had a rallying cry [that is a message of our own] ‘we need to start acting like we are winning, and stop acting like we are losing.' John Weeks, with a career spanning over [three] decades supporting this emerging field, gave an incredible talk ... giving a 50-year history of the integrative medicine movement and sharing the people, strategies and timelines that moved integrative medicine to mainstream acceptance. This is must listen material for every integrative medicine professional, not only cataloging the past but also energizing the future of the movement, in a way that is 100% congruent with the mission and goals of the Evolution of Medicine." Comment: My father would be blushing at the kind of self-promotion in re-posting this. His son, apparently, is not. I like history. It was my focus in university. It's my work as a chronicler. And the cool thing in chronicling is that from time to time one discovers fascinating patterns, trends, and distinct eras. Yes, there are actually "eras" to this movement. What I was seeking to do in the talk and podcast is tell the story of the multiple integrative fields with shared values, how they/we worked first in silos, then in consortia - and now perhaps under larger tent(s) toward growing impact. Our influence has been felt in many ways. I hope any of you who visit will enjoy. I shared my AIHM slides with Maskell, who put them on his site. Happy to give a similar talk elsewhere! Let me know. A powerful trio of people in integrative health and medicine were recently aggregated by the producers of National Public Radio's "On Being," with host Krista Trippet, to discuss "Transforming Medicine." Included were former White Houser Commission chair James Gordon, MD, functional medicine leader Mark Hyman, MD and the first chair of the Bravewell Collaborative, psychologist and philanthropist Penny George. The segment, which originally aired on Minnesota Public radio, can be downloaded and streamed from the On Being website. According to a note from Gordon, the wide-ranging discussion touched on "food as medicine, altruism, the importance of compassionate health care, spirituality and healing, and more." Comment: Also on the integrative care/NPR theme, Marin-based Marty Rossman, MD shared that an interview of him by KQED's Greg Sherwood on "will be featured as part of their holiday pledge drive through December." Rossman's book, c, and related CD set are among the benefits of got those donating. Rossman sent this link to KQED schedule. Word reached the Integrator that Katherine Gergen Barnett, MD, whose blog on integrative medicine group visits was published through Health Affairs has taken a new position. She has become as vice chair for primary care innovation and transformation with the department of family medicine at Boston Medical Center. According to the announcement, in her role Gergen-Barnett will "oversee Family Medicine practice transformation initiatives ... lead the department's quality improvement efforts, bring vigor and innovation skills to the Patient-Centered Medical Home movement, spearhead patient experience initiatives, and provide support and guidance to our ACC practice." The notice additionally shares that since Gergen-Barnett's "appointment in 2009, as director of (BMC's) Integrative Medicine Clinical Services, Katherine pioneered a model for delivering integrative medicine in the safety net setting, creating a program that provides BMC and CHC patients with an array of integrative medicine services." Comment: I don't normally include position changes such as this in this section of the Integrator. I do so with reference to the "innovation" in Gergen-Barnett's title and the known innovation in her integrative health and medicine work. This will be fun to watch, especially in BMC's safety-net setting. An interview with Gergen-Barnett prior to a recent presentation in Australia is here.
2019-04-26T00:04:39Z
http://theintegratorblog.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1001&Itemid=189
Home→Academia→How to answer reviewers for a journal paper revision? Today, I will discuss how to prepare the revision of a journal paper after receiving the editor’s decision that the paper will be accepted with minor or major modifications. As most people should know, when submitting a paper to a journal, the decision is usually “accept”, “accept with minor modifications”, “accept with major modifications”, “reject” or “resubmit as new”. In the second and third cases, the author has to revise his paper according to the reviewers comments and to write a file generally called “summary of changes” to explain how the author has addressed the reviewers’ comments. You should first say thank you to the reviewers for the useful comments that they have made to improve the paper. Then, in the same file, you should explain how you have answered each reviewer comment that requires to do something. To do that, I suggest to organize your document as follows. Create a section for each reviewer. Then, in each section copy the comments made by the reviewer and cite it as a quote (“…”). Then explain below the quote how you have addressed the comment. For example, your document could look like this. First, we would like to say thank you to the reviewers for the useful comments to improve the paper. We have addressed all the comments as explained below. We have addressed this comment by deleting a few lines at the end of the second paragraph that were not necessary for understanding the algorithm. Reviewer 2 has reported several typos and grammatical errors. We have fixed all of them and proofread the paper to eliminate all such errors. But how to answer a reviewer’s comment? First, if you agree with the reviewer, you should do exactly what the reviewer ask you to do, and mention that you have done it. Then the reviewer should be happy. Second, you can disagree with the reviewer and explain why you disagree. In this case, you only need to explain why you disagree. But you need to explain well why. Third, it is possible that the reviewer has made a comment that is inaccurate or that you have already addressed in your paper (but the reviewer did not saw it). In this case, you also need to explain that. So overall, it is important to answer all comments. From my experience, usually 2 or 3 reviewers are assigned to review each journal papers. In top journals, the reviewers may be expert on your topic. In journals that are not top journals, reviewers may not be very familiar with your topic but may still be good researchers. Usually, if your paper receive the decision “accept with minor modifications”, there is a high chance that your paper will be accepted if you address the comments well. If the decision is “accept with major modifications”, there is a risk that your paper may not be accepted if you don’t address the comments well, so you may need to work harder to convince the reviewers. Usually, there is one, two or three rounds of reviews. Generally, after the first revision, most comments have been addressed. Therefore, the job become easier after the first revision. Usually, the editor wants that the reviews converge to a decision after about two round of reviews (the editor will likely intervene if reviewers always ask for more things to do). So these are the advices that I wanted to write for today. Hope that you have enjoyed this post. If you like this blog, you can tweet about it and/or subscribe to my twitter account @philfv to get notified about new posts. Thanks for sharing your experiences and suggestions to deal with reviewers’ comments. This entry is very helpful for me since this is the first time I have opportunity to respond to the reviewers. However, I have a concern as follows: should we need to complete point-to-point responses? For example, the reviewer #1 mentions Section 2 is very lengthy but the review #2 doesn’t say anything about this section. It means that I still should delete some unnecessary sentences to satisfy the review #1. There is any risk that the reviewer #2 doesn’t feel happy when reading again? This is a good point. I would not worry too much about it though because if Reviewer #2 become unhappy, then you have a good reason to do what you did which is that Reviewer #1 asked you to do it. Then, in the next round of reviews, you could answer Reviewer #2 by stating that it is Reviewer #1 who asked you to do it and then you don’t want to undo what Reviewer #1 asked you to do. Normally, it should be ok. Another similar situation is that two reviewers may ask you to do two different things that contradict each other. For example, Reviewer 1 say that you should add more content in the introduction. But Reviewer 2 say that the introduction is too long. In this case, you would need to take a decision and then justify why you choose to do like Reviewer #1 or Reviewer #2 and to explain that you cannot satisfy both of them. Thanks for your detailed answers. I didn’t think that the process to respond to reviewers is too complicated like that. Luckily, two reviewers don’t ask me to do contrary things like you mentioned. One reviewer requests me to verify the performance of my proposed method on some special datasets. However, I already stated that task be one of my future works. So, do you think I should do that experiment now to make the reviewer happy or I explain him that point is my future work? Today, I’ve been notified my another paper was accepted for revision in a different Elsevier journal (SCIE, IF > 1.6). I hope I can prepare my two revised manuscripts in time. 1) If the reviewer ask you to do it, maybe he want you to do it in this paper rather than in future works. If it does not take too much time to do it or too much space in your paper (if there is a page limitation), then I would suggest to do it. Alternatively, you could say that you don’t want to do it and keep it for future work. It this case you would should highlight the reason why you keep it for future work and it could be OK. But the more things that you do, the more the reviewer will be happy. So there a choice to make. Great, congratulations. By the way, for revising a paper, there is usually a deadline. However, if you need more time, you can always ask extra time by contacting the editor. Usually the editor can give you a few more weeks. Thank you so much for this nice suggestions, it really helps me. I have another problem with reviewing, the reviewer ask me to do a simulation on my proposed scheme changing one parameter to be random while I write in the paper that the parameter if fixed. Actually, when I check my simulation I found that the parameter is already set to be random but I make a mistake while writing the paper. What should I do in this case? In this case, I would tell the truth to the reviewers (you made a mistake and the parameter is actually random), and you should modify the text to say that the parameter is random. In my opinion, if you do like that, the reviewers will understand and it will be ok. I recently received a comment from a reviewer saying that my paper is not fit for publishing as the work has been done before. But it is actually a misunderstanding. How do I convey to him that it is just a misunderstanding. If the paper is rejected, you may try to contact the associate editor that has handled your article to explain what happened. Then the associate editor would probably ask another reviewer to review your paper. Or another way is to submit the paper again as a new article but to make clear either in the cover letter or in the paper that your paper is not a copy of previous work. Also if you submit again, you should still send an e-mail to the editor to explain your problem and make sure that your paper will be reviewed properly this time. Please accept my sincere thanks for your comprehensive details and information. Recently, my manuscript took a major revision in a very high-quality journal in Elsevier. In this manuscript, a novel mathematical method and an improved formulation were proposed to address a significant issue in vibration. The manuscript was reviewed by two reviewers so that Reviewer #1 rejected my manuscript because he/she believed that my study has not a good novelty for publication in that journal!!! However, Reviewer #2 accepted the manuscript and gave a major revision. Now I have a few questions about this event. Is it necessary to reply to comments of Reviewer #1? What is your prediction about the risk of acceptation/rejection of my manuscript in such circumstances? How can I reply to reviewers’ comment? It is important to mention that the manuscript was “Under Editor Evaluation” after the review process. Thanks for reading and commenting on the blog. It is a good news that they ask you to revise your manuscript, although they ask for a major revision. In general, it is required to consider all the comments by all the reviewers and modify your manuscript according to these comments and provide some answers to these comments. If the reviewers ask you to modify something, then you should modify it and explain what you have done. Or if they ask for something and you really cannot do it, you need to provide a good explanation about why you cannot do it or don’t want to do it. For the reviewer 1, if he asked you to modify something, then you should do it or answer it. But if the reviewer 1 just complain that your work is not enough novel, then you do not really need to answer this comment. But it may be helpful to briefly explain why your work is novel. Also, you may want to modify the introduction of your paper to better highlight the contribution of your paper and why it is important. Perhaps that the reason why the reviewer 1 think that your work is not novel is that your introduction is not convincing enough. If that is the case, you may want to improve your introduction and explain to the reviewer that you have modified the manuscript to better highlight the contribution of the manuscript. And you may also want to cite some additional papers that show that your research problem is important. About “Under Editor Evaluation”, you should not mention this. It is a normal step of the review process. After the reviewers have submitted their reviews to the editor, the editor will check the reviews and make the decision about whether to accept the paper, accept it with revision, or reject it. It is the editor who take this decision. This is what is called “under editor evaluation”. This is just the normal review process so don’t mention it. My prediction? It depends how well you address the reviewer comments. If you address all the comments made by all the reviewers very well, then, you have a high chance of being accepted. But if you do not address the comments made by the reviewer well, it is still possible that the paper may be rejected or that there will be another round of reviews, and then you will need to modify the paper again, and after that there could still be another round of reviews. It is quite normal that there are a few rounds of reviews for a journal paper. Actually, the editor has asked two reviewers to read your paper. But in the next round of reviews, it is always possible that some of these reviewers are not available or do not want to read your manuscript again. In these cases, the editor may want to ask the opinion of some other reviewers that are not reviewer 1 and 2. So it is possible that in the next round of reviews, some new reviewer will read your paper and may raise some additional issues that were not raised by reviewer 1 and 2. So there are still some uncertainty and it cannot be guaranteed that your paper will be accepted at this stage of the review process. But no matter what happen, what you need to do is to make sure that you address all the issues raised by the reviewers well. You should do your best to convince them to accept your paper. That is all you can do. What is the chance for accepting revise for rereview manuscript!! Recently I have got the above decision for one of my publication, which has been submitted to one of the ASCE journals . In general, one reviewer is positive and he required a minor revision and the second one is cautiously positive. I have tried my best to addressed all raised issues by them and response to all comments. according to experience who decide the final decision associate editor or editor! and usually, they go with the positive reviewer or negative one!! – The two reviewers are happy with your modifications, and they will recommend to accept the paper. The decision will be “accept”. – One or both of the reviewers still have some issues with the paper. In this case they will ask for another revision. The decision will be “minor revision” or “major revision”. – The decision may be reject. This would be quite rare. But it can happens. A reason why a paper can still be rejected after the first round of review is that it is still possible that the associate editor or editor will ask for a new reviewer to read your paper to have a different perspective or for some other reasons. If this happens and that new reviewer does not like your paper, that reviewer could recommend that your paper is rejected, and then it could happen. Another reason why the associate editor or editor may ask for a new reviewer is that one of the original reviewer of your paper may not be available to read your paper again. In this case, the editor may have to ask someone else to read it. There might also be some other unexpected events that may happen. Now, I cannot really tell you what is more likely. It really depends on how well you have addressed the comments of the reviewers. It also depends on how good and competitive the journal is. But in general, if you have passed the first round of review, it is likely that the paper will not be rejected. In my opinion, it will be either accepted or there will be another round of review. Depending on the journal, it is possible that there can be several rounds of review. Generally, I see 1 or 2 rounds. But I have ever seen 4 rounds of review in some specific cases. It is quite rare that papers are rejected after the first round. I have seen it at least twice. But it is not very common. Of course, it may be different for different fields (I am in computer science). But actually, you are in a very good situation by having one reviewer that asked for a minor revision. This is one of the best situation. If you had two reviewers that do not really like your paper, it would be harder to convince them. But now, since you have a reviewer that already like your paper, it will put more pressure on the second reviewer if there is another round of review. For example, if there is another round and the first reviewer say accept, the second reviewer will have more pressure to also accept your paper. In general, the review process should always “converge”. If there are several rounds of review, the reviewers should not ask you to do new modifications after each round. They should rather ask you to fix the remaining issues. And after each round, there will be less issues, and in the end the paper will be accepted. This is the normal process. About the role of the associate editor and editor, it depends. Normally, it would be the editor who would have the final word on whether a paper is accepted based on a recommendation from the associate editor. But not all journal may follow this model. Many thanks for quick response and providing all of these detail. Now I have better sight about the reviewing process. Actually, my field of work is water resources engineering and we submit our manuscript to the journal of water resources planning and management. Hope they accept it this time. A nother request and will appreciate if you can answer it! I am reviewing a manuscript and I had rejected the first version of the manuscript as the authors obtained results based on inaccurate methodology has many drawbacks and often leads to wrong results. Now they send the revised manuscript and they have tried to address my comments and issues raised by me by providing a number of papers that have published by one of the co-authors on the relevant area. However, from my personal experience on this methodology,I know it works only under very specific boundary conditions and simple networks. The problem the author shine the provided methodology and believe that work very well and could be applied to any network (which is not true) , and they didn’t mention any drawbacks and limitations of it anywhere in the manuscript. I don’t know how to response to the revision version!! Any suggestion and advice from you! 1) Glad my previous message was helpful. Wish you get some good news about the manuscript soon. That is a kind of tricky situation. Despite the suggestion of rejecting the paper, the editor has decided to give the authors the opportunity to revise their paper. Often, if one of the reviewer suggests to reject the paper, the paper will be rejected by the editor. But perhaps that in this case, the other reviewer(s) have given some good evaluation, so the editor may have decided to give a chance to the authors. Or it may also be because the editor is willing to accept many papers in the journal, and saw that on overall the comments seem not too hard to address. Or there could be other reasons. or (2) you could suggest some modifications that would be acceptable to address your comments. Now, when you enter your review, you can usually also leave a confidential message to the editor to explain the situation. It might be a good idea to do this if you still think that the paper should be rejected because the author will not be able to fix the issue. But even if you suggest to reject the paper again, the editor may still decide to not listen to you for whatever reason. I have seen this happen before. In one case, there was a reviewer on one of my papers who continuously claim that my paper should be rejected but the editor continued to ask me to revise the paper until it was accepted despite that one of the reviewer was still not satisfied. It does not happen often. But it can happen. In my case, it was not a fundamental issue though. By the way, as a reviewer, we sometimes believe that some methods should not work well or should not be researched for some reasons, for example because most people think that a given method is worse than another method commonly used in the literature. But sometimes it is good also to let some papers be published on other methods that do not exactly follow the mainstream idea of what method should work. But if the method has some fundamental issues and it should not be used to draw incorrect conclusion, then it make sense to reject it. As I am not an expert in your domain, I cannot say what is good or bad. But I just want to say that you may consider whether there is something good in that paper that should still be published? And is there a way to fix it? Maybe that a solution is to ask the author to recognize some limitations of their work and in the worst case mention in the conclusion that they could be addressed in future work? Either way, I think that either rejecting the paper again or suggesting some modifications would be an OK decision. You need to think about which one make the most sense for that paper. Firstly, I would like to thank you for this post as it has helped me immensely in writing response to the reviewer’s. I have a query too, I submitted a paper and now when got the comments back, one of the reviewer has asked to give some string diagrams for GC-MSMS analysis, but unfortunately I am not able to provide them, How should i put this forward to the reviewer? 1) You could say the truth and explain the reason why you cannot provide the diagrams. For example: We did not keep the data because the research was made a few years ago during my Ph.D. and obtaining the data again would require to run all the experiments again (which would take many weeks and would be very expensive). If you can give a reason like that or something else that the reviewer will view as reasonable, then, it can be ok. 2) You could argue that most people in your field do not provide this type of diagram, and cite some papers in top journals as example that do not provide these diagrams or that say that these diagrams are not reliable or not very important. But this is risky. Maybe that the reviewer will still disagree. 3) You could provide something else instead of the diagrams as a compromise. For example, you explain that you cannot provide the diagram for X reason but you provide another kind of diagrams or information that would replace these diagrams and give more insight in your research. Not sure that it would work. It really depends on how much you can convince the reviewer. 4) When a reviewer ask to do something, another way is to mention it in your paper as a limitation of your experiment, and then mention that you could do it in future work. This is a good idea. So this is my opinion. In a similar situation, I would probably do 1) and 4). But it depends on the context. Personally, I have done 1) and 4) several times. For example, during my Ph.D. I was doing some experimental evaluation with users and I submitted the journal paper about that study more than two years after my Ph.D. Due to the agreement that I had with the human participants of my experiment, I had to destroy the data after two years (for privacy issues). Thus, I was unable to provide some additional details that the reviewer requested. I explained this in my answer to the reviewer, and it was enough to convince the reviewer. Thank a ton for the help. I would like to sharing your experiences and suggestions to deal with reviewers’ comments. I received a major revisions for my manuscript with reviewers’ comments. The reviewer 1# said: The part of abstract is not readable and lacks the conclusion and research significance. MATERIALS & METHODS is writing very simple, poor, while logic is not strong, readability is not good. At the same time adding a little detail to MATERIALS & METHODS. Although, I wrote all methods in all experiments such as any paper according to authors and year. For example, Photosynthetic pigments in fresh leaves were determined according to (Lichtenthaler and Buschmann, 2001). What I can do? What detail…? Finally he said the parameter should be discussed together, all the data in the table are lack of standard deviation. Although, the statistical analysis of variance at the least significant difference (L.S.D.) between means were calculated at 0.05 level of probability in all tables. He wanted to change all paper…. In contrast, the reviewer 2# did not mention the above or any comment about abstract, material and method. But, comment about there is some misspelling in manuscript and asked me about the reason of some different in some data and how to explained it? These comments have made to improve the paper. What can I do? To reply with compatibility between two comments. Can you help me? I hope I can prepare my manuscripts in less time. I hope my paper “accept” in a journal. – First, it is normal that two reviewers may have different opinion. A reviewer can ask you to do something, and another reviewer can ask to do something else. This happens all the time because not all reviewers have the same background, and so different reviewers will pay attention to different things in your paper. Also some reviewer may read your paper very quickly while another reviwer may look at the details. In that case, you need to try to do what they ask you. The only problem is if two reviewers ask you to do something that is the opposite of each other (for example, a reviewer ask you to make the introduction shorter but the other ask you to make it longer). In that case, you need to find a compromise as it is impossible to satisfy both reviewer. But in general, you need to try to address all the comments made by the reviewers. – In your case, I think that Reviewer 2 probably recommended to accept your paper with a minor revision while Reviewer 1 may be the one who asked for a major revision. Thus, you need to make sure that you do something to try to make Reviewer 1 happy. – About the abstract, I think it should not be too hard to fix. He wants you to talk more about the conclusion of the paper in the abstract and its significance. Also, maybe that the abstract is not so well written. So I suggest to take the time to rewrite perhaps by looking at how other abstracts are written in your field. – Adding more details to the method section should not be too hard. Actually, you just need to give more information. Try to add more sentences and paragraphs to explain in more details. – About readability, it may be a problem of your use of the English language or how it is written. You may take more time to try to improve the paper by yourself or also ask a friend to help you revise the language. For example, if you know some native English speaker or someone who writes well, he could perhaps help you for that. – About the experiments, basically, I think that he wants you to calculate the standard deviation and other things. If you can do it, then it is better to do it, just to make the reviewer happy. – In general, you do not always need to do what the reviewer ask you. But if you choose not to do it, you need to provide a very good reason for not doing it. And the reason should not be something like : because I don’t want to do it or because I don’t have time. But if you have a good reason like the reviewer is wrong about something, then of course you don’t need to do it because it is wrong and you can explain it. So, I gave you my opinion. But I am from the field of Computer Science. So I could not give you very specific advices related to your field. Hope this helps. Wish you success for your paper! Thanks very much for your opinion and a quick response. Thanks for reading and give me your attention to help me. I will try to modify my manuscript according to these comments. Thanks for the sharing. I think the information and the tips shared throughout the comments and replies also very helpful. Recently I had a manuscript went through the 1st round of review and required major revision in 10 days. I did my best to revise the manuscript (even with additional data) and response to the 2 reviewers. However, it turned out to be rejected after 1 week. The 2nd round of comment from reviewer #1 is simply that the manuscript is not significant for the journal while there is no further comment from reviewer #2. I felt disappointed because I would rather they reject it for the very first time. I didn’t have to rush for the additional data and reply to address their questions while the reviewer already made up his mind to reject. Now I have another manuscript. It was given major revision after 1st round of review. Reviewer #1 listed a number of questions while reviewer #2 just asked 2 very general questions. I think I addressed or at least replied properly for all questions. After that I received notification for 2nd round revision, major revision again, this time given only 5 days. When I read through the comments, reviewer #1 basically thinks I addressed the comments (only 1 typo pointed out) and recommended for acceptance. Reviewer #2 asked another 2 questions again where actually in 1st round revision I added method comparison because he said not enough, now he said test data not enough. I think because of reviewer #2 rating, the editor gave “major revision” despite reviewer #1 pretty much accepted the paper. In this case, what’s your advice? I couldn’t possibly keep adding data each round and it costs a lot of time and effort. Sometimes it is not possible to be done because we did not keep the experimental setup. Also, what’s your view regarding this? If I could not answer one of the question from reviewer #2 where additional experimental data required, is it likely my manuscript will get rejected even though reviewer #1 accepted? Glad that the blog is useful. Yes, it is uncommon that a paper is rejected after being accepted for a revision. But it happens. I remember that it happened to me at least once, several years ago. There can be various reasons for that. In my case, the reviewers was not very satisfied with the experiments as we did a very small experiment to validate our proposed approach. After we improved the paper, in the second round, it was rejected. I think that the reason is that even though we improved the experiments, it was still not enough for the reviewer, so he perhaps decided that it would not reach the quality standard of that journal even if we tried to improve the experiments. After a few years, in my case, I can understand that decision because that paper was submitted to a top level journal and was not so good. But yes, I agree that in general, it is not nice to accept a paper and then reject it. As a reviewer for several journals, I never do that. I think that in general, a reviewer should be able to see if the paper is good or not in the first round. About your current manuscript, it is good that Reviewer 1 has pretty much accepted the paper. It will put more pressure on the second reviewer to also accept the paper, as in general, the editor expects that the review process will converge after a few rounds. In general, when several reviewers evaluate the paper, the editor will often assign a decision by taking the maximum of the decisions given by all reviewers. That means for example, that if three reviewers give: accept, minor revision, and major revision, the editor will often choose “major revision” as the decision. So in your case, if reviewer #2 suggested a major revision, it is understandable that it is still a major revision, even if reviewer #1 said to accept. – I think that you should do your best to try to address the comments of reviewer 2. If you don’t address his comments, maybe he will ask for another round until you address his comments, or in the worst case, the paper could be rejected (but it is less likely at this stage). – 5 days is such a short amount of time. I find this very surprising. You could send a message to the editor now to ask for 30 days at least. Usually, in my field, we get at least 30 days to revise a paper. I think that it make sense. Even for professor, or students, everybody has many things on their schedule. For example, if you have a planned trip for vacation or had to attend a conference or other things, how can you do it in 5 days? It does not make sense. So I think the editor has to give you a few more weeks. Or at least you should ask for it. – So now the reviewer ask you do so additional work…. You can always decide to not do it. But in that case you need to have a good reason. For example, during my Ph.D thesis several years ago, I had collected data. Then, I wrote a journal paper about it a few years after. However, the original data had been destroyed due to the agreement that I had signed with my participants that ensured that the data would not be kept for more than 2 years. So, in that case, I told the reviewer that I did not have the original data anymore and that running the same experiments again would be too costly. And in the end, the paper was published. However, in my case, this was perhaps not the main request by the reviewer. But my point is that if you have a good enough reason, you may not need to do what the reviewer ask you. For example, if it would take 3 months of work in the lab, then it is probably not reasonable to do it. But if it takes a few days, then you should probably do it. If you choose to not do something, then try to find some very good reasons to support your decision (takes too much time, data has been destroyed, experimental setup does not exist…). If you don’t do everything that the reviewer ask you, you should also try to do some compromise and try to do as much as you can, or find another way to address the problem raised by the reviewer. For example, if the reviewer asks for more experiments, and you do not have the data, maybe you can do something else instead like adding some paragraphs of discussion about how other people have done experiments in your field and how it compares to other experiments, or mention in future work that you will run more experiments to at least acknowledge the problems raised by the reviewer in your paper… (I don’t know if it all make sense for your field, but it is just the main idea). So this is my overall opinion about this. I think that we may not be exactly from the same field (I am from computer science). But in general, the review process should work in the same way more or less. About the probability of being accepted at this stage… I think if you answer well and you show that you took the time to seriously consider all the request and answer the comments, it can be accepted. But yes, there is always a small risk that it can still be rejected. So my recommendation is to take this very seriously and do your best to try to fix the paper the best you can, because there are still some small risk at that point. Thank you for your reply, Prof. Philippe. 1. We no longer have the experimental setup ready to run more test samples. 2. It also takes time to get test samples ready. 3. In previous revision, I added data analysis for different models (which was what the reviewer firstly questioned). In my opinion, this is more important along the focus of the paper and I have done that. However, if I reply reason #1, I feel the reviewer most likely won’t be satisfied. If I give reason #2 and #4, they probably think I should just request longer revision time. That’s why at first I plan to reply reason #3 to point out the emphasis of the paper and that we will keep his comment in mind for future work but I am worried it could be quite risky. I also think of gathering some simpler experimental data to compromise the reviewer’s request but I find it could confuse the overall paper, making it worse. My experience is limited in paper submission and revision. The longest revision period in my field is 3 weeks so far but this time 5 days truly a surprise to me too. I guess it has to do with the journal review process is also fast, we basically got back the reviewers comments in 1-2 weeks. – mention the issue raised by the reviewer in the future work section and perhaps also in the discussion of the experimental results of your paper. It will show that you at least acknowledge the issue raised by the reviewer, and should make him perhaps a happy even though you did not do all of what he asked. It is a compromise. – In the letter to the editor, you could mention that the reviewer raised some new issues that he did not raised in the previous round. Actually, the reviewer has the right to do that, especially if it is some important issue. But in general, a reviewer should not do that. So you can just mention it, but politely. – Also in the letter, you could mention some of the reasons why you did not do it. Because, if you don,t give any good reason, then the reviewer may still want to know why you did not do it. So, you could mention something like experimental setup is missing, and you can also exaggerate a little bit to say that it would require more time than it would actually require, or find some other reasons that could help. Interesting… 1-2 weeks review is very fast. In my field, I think that no serious journal review papers in less than 1 month. And usually, it is more like 3 months, 6 months or sometimes up to 1 year for top journals. In my field, its not uncommon that we only get the first review comments after 2-3 months, could be longer. This is my first time to submit to this particular journal, I am also surprise when their first review comments came back after 2+weeks. The following revision comments came back in about 1 week. What is the etiquette for replying to the editor, right after h or she shares the referees’ reports with you? Should I send a short note acknowledging receipt and saying I will reply to the revision requests as soon as possible, or should I thank the editor and reviewers later on, in an email containing the revised manuscript? There is no need to reply to the editor right away. Actually, the editor is generally very busy so it is better to only send messages to him if there is something really important. For example, some top journals will receive up to 2000 papers per year, so the editor is very busy, besides being perhaps a professor at the same time. If you write something like that, then you will say thank you to the editor in an appropriate way, without having to send an e-mail. Thanks for sharing these useful information and tips in peer review. Currently, I am doing mainly theory-based research. Several days ago, I had an IEEE journal article finished the first round of review and required major revision. This journal is application-oriented but they also accept and publish articles of pure numerical simulations (I can easily find at least 3-4 publications of similar topics to mine in this journal during the past two years). Anyway, the paper got four reviewers, three of them raised some insightful questions but totally positive comments, one reviewer (Reviewer #1) was critically commented my paper as “Due to lack of the actual verification, the paper is not suitable for this application-oriented journal. The paper is full of equations, which has no physical meaning in the actual systems? The extensive experiments need to be added. The paper would be better for a theory-based journal.” Maybe because of Reviewer #1’s comments, the AE gave me a chance for Major Revision but with a comment “the main issue is the lack of experimental verification for what authors should consider in full”. However, in the revision, it seems impossible for me to include experimental results due to several reasons. My questions is in my situation how can I respond to Reviewer #1 and AE properly so as to increase the chance of acceptance of this paper? – Cite a few more papers in your article to explain that you will follow the same methodology as in their paper. You can cite those papers that you mentioned that were published in the same journal. Then, in your paper, you can explain that you will follow the same methodology as them. This will help to justify what you did. But even if you found papers with the same methodology in the same journal, it is still not a 100 % guarantee that the reviewers will accept your paper. Sometimes in a journal, some paper may be accepted, while other similar papers may be rejected for whatever reasons (the editor is a friend, the reviewers did not think it was a problem but other reviewers think it is a problem, etc.). – Towards the end of your paper, you could also add a “discussion” section to explain the limitations of your study. So you could mention that a limitation is about not doing the real experiments and explain that you could improve this in future work, while still mentioning that there are many challenges for doing these improvements. Although, you would not do the experiment, it would show that you at least acknowledge the limitations of your study, and this can make the Reviewer 1 happy. It would be a kind of compromise between doing nothing and doing what he asked you. – You could aso provide several GOOD reasons in the response to the reviewers about why you could not do the experiments: it would cost too much money, you would need to spend another year of work, the data was lost or destroyed due to confidentiaty issue, etc. It should be good reasons; not: I don’t want to do it. So that it. I think that the key is to try to find a compromise where you can still make the Reviewer 1 happy while not doing everything that he wants. I think that at this point, the paper could still be rejected, so you should take this seriously. Many thanks for your prompt reply. Your suggestions really mean a lot., especially No. 2. Yes, I will add a section or at least a remark to discuss the limitations of my paper. I will also emphasise the importance of experiments, although I did not do it in the paper. The actual reason for me not doing the experiments in the revision is lack of experimental setup. As you suggestion, I should also mention it in the response. With your backup, I now have more confidence to make Reviewer 1 happy :). Great. Hope everything will go well. Thank you for your blog, I have seen you are replying everyone and spending time, that is really appreciable. My concern is about my paper which got a major revision, it was only one reviewer that reviewed the paper. This journal is the best journal in my major and seems like reviewer is aware of everything, but he seems unhappy with my paper and said: Although the paper is within the interest of the industry, and has applications, the way it is presented and handled makes it far from being a novel, scientific and practical paper. and at the end said As is, the paper does not provide any new ideas or methodology to this field. Also, there are too many unclear and unjustified points within the paper. Thus, there is no reason for this paper to be accepted. However, the editor asked for revised and it is not rejected, editor also asked me to compare results with engineering model rather than data driven models, Discussion on those line should be included. I spend one month to address all of their concerns, as the reviewer asked lots of questions. Do you think reviewer rejected the paper but editor asked for revision? still, i am working on the paper but worried about the result after spending so long time again for revision. Glad you like the blog. I think that you are doing the right thing. You are taking the time to revise the paper. Some people do not like to revise their paper and submit it perhaps too quickly. If you spend the time, it shows that you are taking this seriously. By the way, in the response to reviewer, you can mention that you have taken several weeks to improve the paper, run new experiments, etc. This will let the reviewer(s) know that you have spent time, and reviewer(s) may appreciate that. It is possible that a reviewer recommend to reject a paper but that the editor does not agree and ask the authors to revise the paper anyway. This happens sometimes. For example, it can happen if the editor believes that the author can fix the issues raised by the reviewer(s) or if the editor thinks that the issues raised by the reviewer are not serious enough for rejecting the paper, or some other reasons (e.g. the editor is a friend with the author, etc.). However, at this stage, the paper could still be rejected. In your case, it could be that the editor decided to give you a chance. Or it could be that the reviewer requested a “major revision”. In that case the reviewer may still think that you can address the problems, although he raises many problems. So on overall, I think that you are doing the right thing. The most important is to try to address all the issues mentioned by the reviewer as much as you can. As this stage, it is not guaranteed that the paper will be published. So it is worth it to put a lot of effort to improve the paper. And if the paper is eventually rejected, your paper will be improved and perhaps more easily accepted in other journals. Thank you so much for your reply. I will appreciate if you can help with some of the reviewer concerns. 1) No attempt has been done for optimizing your ANN, such that how many layers, how many nodes, the methodology, etc has never optimized. Why did you use backpropagation, for example? In this study a back-propagation-type neural networks with an input, an output and, one hidden layer were applied which in most of the cases one hidden layer is satisfactory[12, 13]. Therefore A three layer ANN with a tangent sigmoid transfer function (tansig) at hidden layer and a linear transfer function (purelin) at output layer were implemented. To optimize ANN, 1 – 23 neurons in the hidden layer were trained at least five times using different sets (randomly generated) of initial weights to find the lowest mean squared error. Data had been distributed randomly into three different groups (70% for training, 15% for the testing set, and 15% for cross validation). The validation was used to prevent overtraining. The principle is this as training proceeds, the training error function will decrease and the result of applying a validation set will improve. However, after some point, further iteration will likely not improve performance on the validation set. At this point, training should be stopped. Fig. 1 shows the evolution of the mean squared error of the predicted values of the apparent viscosity during the training and validation steps, depending on the number of hidden neurons of the neural networks architecture. The result shows that the R2 obtained the highest value of 0.9515 and MSE achieved the lowest amount of 0.0019, after the application of 10 hidden neurons. More than 50 neural network models have been devised so far, and it is found that the back-propagation learning algorithm based on the generalized delta rule by Rumelhart et al. (1986) is the most popular and efficient learning procedure for multilayer neural networks. The multilayer perceptron (MLP) networks are currently the most widely used neural networks. These networks can do the classification for patterns having nonlinearly separable boundaries since the network consists of many neurons. Back propagation neural network (BPNN) has been successfully used as a mapping and prediction tool in the petroleum engineering field and its application is proven [17-20]. No details are provided with respect to GA part. At least, during the example, final genetic code could be provided. Genetic algorithm uses the similar steps to the biological evolution: natural selection; intercross; variation; and surviving of the fittest. It has four basic elements: genetic code; initial population setting; fitness function; and genetic operator. Since the binary code cause an encoded string too long, learning efficiency is reduced. Therefore, real number coding is used for data in the process of ROP optimization. Do you think in this way of replying he will be satisfied? Thank you so much again, it is really appreciable that you are helping us without any demand, God bless you. I think 1) is a quite good answer. 2) might be a good answer. But maybe it is a little bit short. If you can add a little bit more details, it may be better. Genetic algorithm was put forward by Professor J. Holland in the University of Michigan in 1975. Its main characteristics consist of group search strategy, information exchange among individuals, gradient independent researching, and no requirement of differentiable functions. The only requirement is that the function is solvable under the given constraints, so the method is suitable for all kinds of complex non-linear problems. Genetic algorithm uses the similar steps to the biological evolution: natural selection; intercross; variation; and surviving of the fittest. It has four basic elements: genetic code; initial population setting; fitness function; and genetic operator. Because genetic algorithm is an iterative operation of the groups, an initial group is needed. In this paper, the initial group is randomly selected. The initial group is operated by genetic operation and generates groups of offspring step by step until the optimal is reached. The genetic operator includes three types: selection operator; crossover operator; and mutation operator. Genetic algorithm is the key of the algorithm and embodies the thought of survival of the fittest. For selecting a chromosome from the group of chromosomes as parent chromosome for the next generation, the disk selection method can be used. The function of mutation operation is to change a character in a certain location of a string with probability Pm. It can compensate the loss of genetic material by mutation operation. Mutation ensures the global convergence of genetic algorithm. The mutation probability value Pm is small, usually Pm=1−Pc. It is better. But for me, it is not very clear what the reviewer wants for 2). In 2), the reviewer wrote “No details are provided with respect to GA part. At least, during the example, final genetic code could be provided.”. From my understanding, the reviewer wants more details about the “GA part”. I think this means to provide more details about how it works. You have done this. But the reviewer also ask that you provide more details in the example by giving the full genetic code. So I think that you also need to add details to the example. By the way, you should also revise the English as there are some English errors. Thank you very much indeed. It is not clear for me also what he meant by genetic code? If he means objective function I have mention that. In my project GA will use ANN network to find the optimum parameters in order to find maximum rate of peneration which is the output. I have given an example how to find constraints to find lower and upper limit for optimization using GA. Do you think the reviewer know what is GA? Because at the beginning he was saying: 1) What is the purpose of using ANN and GA together? It is said that GA is used to maximize ROP. However, ANN can also do that during the process. So, why GA is also added? Of course ANN can find the answer for us but it tqke more time, using GA will be easier and faster. I am wonder why first he asked this question then later he said what is genetic code. I would like to thank you for this article and the efforts you are doing to help people. I found this article very helpful as I’m actually in the process of revising my paper. I would like to ask how to deal with the situation I’m in. I sent my paper to a journal, the paper has been examined by two reviewers. The second reviewer gave me some precise points to revise and add. Whereas the first reviewer mentioned that the paper lacks for intellectual value without pointing out anything else that I can work on except that the writing contains a lot of errors. So, besides correcting the language errors, how can I answer to this review? Glad that the article is useful. This situation has happened to me before. I will explain how I deal with this situation. You should first try to do everything that the second reviewer asks, and make sure to do it well to make sure that the second reviewer will be satisfied, and suggest to accept your paper. This will help you for the next round in case the first reviewer still give you trouble. Now, let’s talk about the first reviewer. The first reviewer seems to think that your paper did not deserve to be published or may not be very worthy, for whatever reasons. He did not mention the reasons, and the editor of the journal has read the comments of both reviewers and suggested that you revise your paper. Thus, in some way, it means that the editor indirectly think that your paper is worthy if you fix the remaining problems. Now, about the comments of the first reviewer, you can obviously only address his specific comments about writing errors. The other problems that he did not mention you cannot address them and it is not your fault. So in that case, you just write something like that: “The only specific comments by reviewer 1 were related to writing errors. We have fixed all these comments as follow:”. And then you can explain what you have changed. This is how I address this situation. Actually, it is the fault of the reviewer if he does not give enough comments. You can only address the comments that are specific enough. Now, if you do as I suggested, it is still possible that the first reviewer ask to revise the paper again with more specific comments next time. This is a risk. But there is nothing you can do about it. It is the fault of the reviewer for not being specific enough. But if there would be another round, there will be a lot of pressure on the first reviewer to accept your paper, since normally the reviewing process should converge rather than always adding some new comments. Besides, if reviewer 2 accepts the paper, then there is more pressure on reviewer 1 to accept it if there is another round of review. Thank you very much professor Philippe, your answer is really helping me on how to adress the answer for the reviewers. I got reviews from 2 reviewers: Reviewer 1 gave major revisions while Reviewer 2 liked the paper and asked for minor revisions. Reviewer 1 has asked me to reduce the length of the paper, while Reviewer 2 has asked me to add few sections related to literature survey and computation time results. This has increased the length of my paper. However, I feel if I reduce the length the paper will lose its purpose as I have added only relevant material in it. How do I address Reviewer 1 that its not possible to reduce it? Hi, I see. The reviewers have some conflicting opinions. In that case, I would do as follows. I would first address the specific requests of Reviewer 2. Then for the comment about reducing the length, you may consider that it only applies to the section that are not mentioned by reviewer 2. Even if you don’t want to reduce the length, you should try to make some compromise by making the paper more concise but without removing much information. How to do this? You could try to remove redundancy if there is some in your paper, and try to rewrite some explanations more briefly. Or sometimes, if your paper is about sciences, you may be able to rewrite some definitions more concisely by defining them formally using some mathematical notation. Then, in the response to reviewers, you should mention that reviewer 2 asked to add more content, while reviewer 1 ask to remove some, and that Reviewer 1 did not mention the specific content that should be removed. Thus, you have added the content requested by Reviewer 2, while rewritten more concisely the other parts of the paper. Thus, the length of the paper may be greater. This should be fine. If you can leave a note to the editor when you resubmit, you may also mention that the reviewers had conflicting opinions. I recently submitted an article in one of the best journals of the atmospheric science and got the first review report after 2 months. The paper went to three reviewers and the two had positive comments while the other had mentioned the paper lacks novelty. I revised and resubmitted the paper after taking into account all the comments seriously. The paper again went back for the review process and this time Editor invited four reviewers, one extra than the last time. Now the earlier three reviewers gave positive comments, including the one who told the paper lacks novelty, but the new fourth reviewer recommended rejection since he felt the paper has no originality and should not be published in any journal. The Editor has again given it Major revision and I am pretty worried what will be the eventual result? The comments from the fourth reviewer who recommended rejection are very nasty and also most of those are unjustified. After careful examination of the comments, we figured out, this person has not read our earlier works and most of the comments are based on his own personal judgment without citing any works from the literature. How would you suggest to deal with this particular reviewer comments in the revision? Thanks for reading. Yes, I understand. It happens sometimes that the editor will add a new reviewer to the reviewing process after the 1st round. This has happened to me a few times. The good thing is that you say that many of the comments are unjustified. Thus, if they are really unjustified, you should be able to answer these comments with appropriate evidences and citations and if you answer properly, normally the reviewer should accept your answers. Another good thing is that the other reviewers are already quite satisfied with your paper, so this will give some pressure to accept your paper. By the way, you say that the reviewer has “not read our earlier works”. Just to make this clear, a reviewer is not required to read your earlier papers. You current paper should contain everything required for evaluating your paper. If something is explained in another paper, you should cite the other paper and briefly mention what the other paper contains that is relevant for your paper. But do not assume that the reviewer will check these other papers. Most reviewers will not check the papers in the references. But some of them will do it. It depends whether the reviewer is in a rush or not. Actually, several reviewers just read very quickly and may even skip some parts of your paper. Although it should not happen, this often happens in practice. So, to answer your question, I think that this is not something very negative for your paper. But you need to try to answer all the comments made by the reviewer the best you can to avoid problems. If he asked you to make some changes, you should try to make them, and if you think that you should not do some of them, then you should give some explanation about why you did not do them. If I where you, I would take a few days to answer him very well, and show that you have considered all of his comments very seriously and answered all of them very seriously. If you can make some compromise, you can also try to make some compromise to try to make him more happy. Thank you for the helping comments and advice. I recently submitted an article in a good journal that assigns two reviewers. The editor decision is “major revision” where reviewer #2 says “Though I am sympathetic to the effort, I’ve selected “reject” because I think the paper the authors need to write is not close to what they have submitted”. In fact, reviewer #2 claimed that the paper does not convey answers to the questions I am asking or the paper should have others questions (which I don’t really fell). In addition, he urged explanation of some elements that I already explained in the text. And, in the end, he recommended a deeper analysis that relieves in a more advanced stage of the modelling methodology I am proposing. Can you please advice me on how to respond to such reviewer? I would like to thank you for this article and the efforts you are doing to help people. I have received 2 manuscripts containing important remarks, but I’m confused on using them. 1. Abstract should be more precise and to the point. 5. While browsing through the manuscript, I find that it needs to be strengthened particularly with more references (particularly those in the recent years, 2009 onwards). As the paper is on a core topic, you will find plenty of references in the broad area. Here are some examples that you may include. The references may not be complete for all, but when citing, you should get the complete reference from the Internet and cite the complete reference. In case the paper did not appear in print, you can cite the DOI. The above are only some that I can readily suggest, which should be included. You may search more thoroughly and include more references. Additionally, please look at previously published IJCNDS papers so as to strongly couple the paper with the existing works published in the Journal. onwards). As the paper is on a core topic, you will find plenty of references in the broad area. cite the complete reference. In case the paper did not appear in print, you can cite the DOI. 1. Abstract section should be more precise. 2. Highlight specific contributions in the paper. 3. Simulation results section is very weak. Strengthen simulation by considering more number of parameters and comparison with the state-of-the-art related schemes. 1. You were asked to include a set of specific references in your revised manuscript. Please DISREGARD those specific references. That said, IJCNDS is a scholarly academic journal and the currency of your literature review is extremely important. I will be imposing the criterion of CURRENCY very rigorously. To this end, your revised manuscript MUST include at least 25 relevant references published in academic journals dated 2015 to present. A typical academic paper should have around 35-45 references. You MAY also want to look at the previously published papers in IJCNDS to strongly couple your paper with the RELEVANT existing works published in our Journal. 2. Please carefully proofread your paper and eliminate language errors involving spelling, grammar, punctuation, format, and style. Papers with readability problem will be rejected immediately. 3. Your revised manuscript is due by March 31, 2018. This is a hard deadline and your revision submitted after this deadline will be handled as a new submission. 4. Please include a short report in the beginning of your revised manuscript (without your name) describing what is changed in your revision. All changes, including your new references in the body of the paper and in your Reference List, must be highlighted in yellow. TITLE: as concise as possible, avoid abbreviations and acronyms, Maximum 18 words. ABSTRACT: approximately 100 words in one paragraph, maximum 150 words. KEYWORDS: approximately 6-7 words or short phrases, maximum 10 words. ACRONYMS: acronym overuse reduce readability. Introduce acronyms once in the abstract of your article and then again upon the first use in the body of the article. Please follow these guidelines so your manuscript is not sent back. My goals are efficiency and expediency. I look forward to receiving your revision by March 31, 2018. should i take into account the comments of the 1st editor or the 2nd one?? (1) It seems that they want you to compare with other methods, and that they are not satisfied by the evaluation. So I think even if it is a new method, you can still improve your experimental evaluation. For example, you can explain and make it more clear in your paper that you cannot compare with existing methods and explain why. If the reason is true and appropriate it should be ok. But you could still improve the evaluation section of your method. For example, you could compare your method with a baseline version of your method without optimizations. This is a way of showing that some optimizations in your method are useful to improve your method. When you cannot compare with other methods, it is good to compare different versions of your methods. This is what I mean. (2) I find it quite funny that they ask you to cite 25 papers from 2015 and after… This is a very arbitrary number of papers which is also quite high. Besides, they specifically ask you to cite papers from their IJCNDS journal to try to increase their impact factor, I guess. In my opinion they should not ask this. (3), … Reviewers also gave other suggestions to improve your paper. Thank you for this article and the efforts you are doing to help people. 1. ” The molecular weight and degree of deacetylation of shrimp shell -chitin used in this study is unclear. The author must provide detailed information about it”. The problem now is that I can’t provide the first information related to the molecular weight because It’s been over two years since I finished my PhD experiments in tha laboratory and I can’t now comeback to the laboratory to try to do the experiment taht give me this information bacause my PhD was done in Frensh laboratory as part of a scholarship program and now I’ve come back to my African country , so I haven’t the produt with me and our laboratory resources are very limited to do such experiment. Option 1: You could ask people from your previous laboratory to help you collect the information. For example, if the professors are busy, maybe that a student in that lab can do it for you and you can add him as co-author because he is helping you (if it requires a lot of time). That could be a way to solve the problem. Option 2: You tell the reviewer your situation and that you cannot go back to the lab to collect the data since it was 2 years ago, or even that the data was destroyed, or any other reasons. THen, there is some chance that the reviewer will understand your situation. Or not. In the past, I have explained something like that to a reviewer and it worked. Actually, I was in about the same situation as you. About around 2 years after my PhD, the data had been destroyed due to agreement with the participants and it would be too costly to run an experiment again so I explained it to reviewers and it was ok. Hope it would be the same for you. Option 3: You could send the paper to another journal… But personally, I think you should try Option 2 or Option 1 first. It it does not work and they really want you to do the additional experiments and you don’t want then you can send the paper somewhere else but hopefuly you don’t have to do that. Thank you for the thoughtful guidance you provided to help us. Recently I submitted my paper and i m now in revision state. How i answer a reviewer asking me for validation of my numerical study agenst experimental data. Thank you for this article and investing your time to further help people with specific problems. I also have a couple of issues I wanted to ask you about, and I hope you will find time to answer it as I would tremendously appreciate it. I am a PhD student in the CS/Robotics field. I wrote a paper a year ago which consists of both simulated and physical robot experiments. However, my approach is not mainstream, so it is a bit difficult to explain it as reviewers are very biased to their fields. So far, it has been rejected from 3 conferences and accepted to one workshop. Now I have revised it and submitted to a journal. The reason it was rejected the 1st time is because it was not written very clearly so the reviewers probably did not understand it properly. As you might assume, my supervisor was not very supportive as he did not help me with writing it, and also I think he is not very familiar with the literature to give me proper feedback. The 2nd and 3rd time it was rejected not because of quality, but because of dual submission (another issue with my supervisor). – I would have to modify the other approaches to be comparable which is a lot of effort and it misses the point. I think I would be able to reply to most of these comments, and try to make the distinction between mine and other methods even more clear, but I am afraid that they can still claim that the paper lacks novelty. But my belief that the overall approach and the perspective are something that has not been done yet. Thank you very much in advance for your time and help! Yes, sometimes, the reviewers may ask for many modifications. If they request a major revision, it is not so bad. At least they did not reject the paper. So in theory, if you address their comments, the paper could be accepted. But unlike a minor revision, there is still a risk that the paper may be rejected. I see that the reviewers did not understand clearly the difference between your work and optimization based method. I think that this can be solve by adding further explanations. If they did not understand, it is perhaps because it was not so clear in the previous version. So I think this problem should not be too hard to address. As for the comparison with optimization based approaches, you have two options: to do it or to not do it and give some good reasons. If you think that it is not relevant to compare with these approaches, then you can explain very carefully why you cannot compare with these approaches or why it is not relevant. If you give some solid reasons for that, the reviewers may agree with you and it can be ok. But if the only reason is that you do not have time, then reviewers may not agree. I see. Yes, sometimes reviewers will ask something very vague like to compare with other approaches but will not say which one. This has also happened to me before. In that case, the likely problem is that the reviewers are reading your paper and perhaps that you did not compare your work with anything else. Thus, they wonder how to evaluate your contribution since you do not compare with anything, and they perhaps are not familiar enough to tell you exactly what to compare with. The most important in that case is that you try to compare with something to show that your approach is good when compared to something. There are different ways to address this. First, you could choose to compare with any algorithms that you think is relevant and explain why it is the algorithm that you choose to compare with. Or, if you cannot compare with anything else, then you can at least compare with yourself. I mean, you can compare different versions of your proposed model, for example with and without optimisations. Thus, instead of comparing with other people, you compare with yourself or with a baseline algorithms such as a naive algorithm. This can be ok. Or, a third way, is to compare with something that is not directly comparable but to explain that the comparison is not fair and still compare with them but discuss the results even if you know that the comparison is not fair. This is the case for example if you compare with the optimization methods which may not be directly comparable. Hello Dr Phillip, Your blog is really good for the researcher like us. Recently, I got the revision for my manuscript and one of the reviewers said that I have two minor comments. In one of his comments he wants me to do density functional Theory (DFT). DFT is a computational study and I did,t have any experience whatsoever. Could you please guide me on how to respond to him? I am very grateful to have visited this blog. Indeed, you are doing a great job. Out of curiosity, I have used a well-spent time to go through this page from top to bottom, and I must confess the cases added and your responses are very helpful. Having gone through the questions raised by different people and your responses to them, I think my intended questions have been answered. I do not need to repeat them again, but only wish to say a big thank for being here to attend to our needs. reviewer#1 wants me to compare unsupervised methods with supervised methods in the experiments, a s you know, it is unreasonable in the sense that we aim to solve problem scenarios without labels rather than those with labels , the comparison premise is different, can I rebut this request, how to do this politely and reasonably,some necessary skills? if I can,how to write rebuttal letter? By the way, reviewer#1’s comments may wield editor’s accept decision. so I worry about this ,would you please give me more guidance how to cope with this situation , thank you! several days ago, I have received the “revise” notification from the journal Editor-in-chief. two different methodologies solve different problem scenarios, they are not comparable. From my understanding, method based on unsupervised leaning(no labels required) can’t compare with those based on supervised leaning(labels required) or semi-supervised leaning( partial labels required) since their comparison premise is different. If one wants to compare them, one should put them under the same problem scenarios,only this way, comparison is reasonable and fair, isn’ t it? but the problem scenarios in our paper are applications without labels, they can’t compare with each other since supervised leaning methods need labels to train models,but now there are no labels used for training, therefore I think it is unreasonable and infeasible to compare method based on unsupervised leaning with those based on supervised leaning or semi-supervised leaning ,is it right? I want to know your views. I don’t know whether or not I can rebut the reviewer#1 in terms of above analysis, I wonder how to cope with the response to reviewer#1, by the way, the reviewer#1 may wield the action editor’s accept decision. So I worry about this. If I can, how to do that? If I can’t, it is clear that they are not comparable, I don’t how to conduct experiment to respond to reviewer#1. Would you please give me more guidance? Thanks for reading the blog. Yes, it is indeed a situation that need to be handled carefully. I tend to agree with you that supervised /unsupervised learning are difficult to compare. It is always possible to answer the reviewer by explaining why the comparison is not fair. Then, you can find some explanations about why it is not fair, and you can perhaps even talk about how previous papers have also not done that for the same reason (you could mention some recent papers in top conferences/journal for example). Besides, if you don’t do what the reviewers ask, you should try to at least do everything else to make him happy. By the way, although the comparison with supervised learning may not be fair, you can perhaps still do the comparison and explain in your paper that it is not fair. For example, maybe that supevised learning is 80% accurate but your unsupervised learning approach is 70% accurate. Although it is lower, it is quite good… You can say that the comparison is not fair and that it is good because you are ALMOST as accurate as the supervise learning method and we don’t need to have label… Thus people using your technique save a lot of time and effort. So, this is a way to do the comparison but still explain that your approach is useful if we look at it from the right perspective, even if the results are not as good. You may consider this. Thank you for this article and the efforts you are doing to help new researchers like me. Recently, my manuscript took a major revision in a journal. The manuscript was reviewed by two reviewers, and the editor decision was “major revision”. One of the reviewers said that the idea of the paper has certain reference value, but the method should have some problems in its implementation, and mentioned two problems and then asked me several questions that I think I can answer them. The problem is how to respond to this reviewer and how to modify my paper according to his comment. Thank you for this article and the efforts you are doing to help researchers. I recently submitted an article in a good journal that assigns three reviewers. The editor decision is “minor revision” where reviewer #1 says “Consider after minor changes”. reviewer #2 says”Publish unaltered”. reviewer #3 says”Consider after minor changes”. I made the minor changes required and I sent my report. last day, the status of my paper changes to rejected without any explication. I can’t undrestand what happened and what I should do in this situation. Thak you professor Philippe for your suggestions. I send an email to the editorial office and I receive this email: “I would like to let you know that, during the review process the manuscript was accepted with minor changes and there were comments to be addressed. These were addressed and later while checking with the quality team we found that there was a high percentage of similarity concerns with the revised version of the manuscript. Hence, the manuscript was rejected by the editor. Our Editors make their decisions independently and these cannot be questioned by the publisher. After considering any issues raised during review, you are welcome to submit this manuscript to a different Hindawi journal. You may also resubmit this work to the same journal after making extensive revisions and including substantial new material. If you choose to resubmit, the manuscript will be evaluated by the same Editor if they are still available.” I am so surprised because I have answer all the questions of reviewers. Until now I can’t undrestand what happened. So what you should do? You should first decrease the similarity of your paper. A simple way is to rewrite some parts or add new parts to decrease the similarity. Then, you could submit the paper again. Hello, I like to ask you to undrestand more. 1. The editor run a similarity checker befor submting the paper to reviewers or after that. 2. before the rejected status I reveived an email from the office editorial to change two paragraphs which are similar to others work and I have rewireted them. I checked the last version put in the site. I find that it is not updated. I think that they made a mistake. what do you think sir. 3.Can they change their decision? Hi, 1.Usually, the editor will run the similarity checker when the paper is submitted before giving it to reviewers. But it is always possible that they run it later such as after you revise the paper. 2. I see. Or maybe you have uploaded the wrong file when submiting the revision of the paper? 3. You can always ask. There is nothing to lose to ask. But I think that usually, the editor will not change the decision. Or maybe he will tell you to submit again and he may help to process it faster. Otherwise, you can consider sending to another journal perhaps. And also before doing that, you may want to decrease a little bit more the similarity with your previous paper if needed. By the way, it can be good to ask the editor how many % is the similarity or to give you the similarity report if possible. thank you very much for your help professor Philippe. I have news today. After consulting the paper version put in my session, the editorial office thinks I’m right and the paper did not update. they send me: “Apologies for the inconvenience caused! Pertaining to the email below, we are investigating on this issue and will get back to you with an update at the earliest.” I wish that my status changes to “accepted”. I don’t know what will happened now, but I am waiting. Thank you so much for this blog and your time and energy to help people! Please help me and give me more guidance, I am so grateful to your help! Now I am encountering some knotty problems that the reputed SCI journal EIC doesn’t approve our request for change to the authorship due to true fact after acceptance of our paper. The reason why we want to change the authorship is that the second author(he is my supervisor) has no substantial contributions to the paper and threaten me.Before submission,I got his approval to list his name in the authorship and list me as first author and corresponding author while he as second author, but I don’t know this is inappropriate in the sense that he has no substantial contributions to the paper, I am a PhD student,This is my first SCI paper,I don’t know this point.So I want to persuade the Journal EIC to approve the removal to his authorship ,but Journal EIC doesn’t approve the request(The reason is that we have missed the submission and revision stage, I don’t know this since this is my first time as corresponding author).On the other hand, The journal manager seems to approve this due to our reasonable request。 How can I deal with this situation? Can I remove his authorship in the proof stage? Should I follow the Journal EIC or the journal manager? I have no experience and don’t know how to do. Hi, Thanks for reading the blog and commenting. Also, I am glad that the blog is interesting and useful. 1) Many journals do not like that the list of authors is modified after a paper is accepted. But generally, the problem is that some people will ADD some names after the paper is accepted. Many journals will not allow to add a name because they will think that one is trying to add someone that did nothing in the paper just because the paper is accepted. But in your case, it is a very different situation because you want to REMOVE a name rather than ADDING a name. Thus, I think that it should not be a problem. If you want to remove the name, then you can explain your situations to the editor and I guess that he will understand. 3) Generally, in academia, we should only put the name of someone in a paper if he has contributed to the paper. But for supervisors, it is not always the case. And many people will put the name of other people too on their paper, although they should probably not. In the case of putting the name of your supervisor, I don’t think that it would be an ethical problem to put his name because he was your supervisor. And also it does not cost you anything to put his name. So if I was you, I would play it safe to keep a good relationship and keep his name or otherwise discuss with him first. Thank you for your immediate reply! Your guidance gives me lots of help! 1.Some things I don’t mentioned are the work is not completed in my supervisor’labs and not supported by his funding and not use any resource he provided. 2.The work I have done is not his research direction(he acknowledged that he doesn’t thoroughly understand my paper, that is why he allows me as the corresponding author). 3.The journal that accepted our paper is the reputed and prestigious journal in our field. 4.I try to communicate with my supervisor,but fails to communicate with him and he threatened me with a sanction to academic misconduct. I am just a innocent PhD student. and I don’t know How to respond to his unreasonable and irresponsible sanction. 5.If I follow the journal manager to remove his authorship,which means I offend the journal EIC and AE. Would they like to consider my new submissions? or they directly reject them in future. 7.Please you and Request you to give me more guidance! I am so grateful to and urgently wish to get your help! Hi, I see. That is a complicated situation. 1) In the best case, it would be preferable to keep a good relationship with your supervisor and to get your paper published. This should be the two goals. 2) As for keeping a good relationship to your supervisor, you should try to perhaps communicate with him/her again and ask clearly do he wants to be a co-author or not? If he says “no”, then you need to remove him or withdraw the paper. The best would be to contact the journal and ask to remove the name. If you do that and explain it to the AE or EIC in a reasonable way, they should accept it. If for some reason the EIC or AE just decide to withdraw your paper, then it would be bad, but you could still submit it to other journals. It would delay the publication but your work would not be lost. And if your supervisor is ok to keep his name, then just keep it. Those are the different cases that can happen. 3) But another problem is that the supervisor has threatened you. I am not sure that I understand why. Have you submitted the paper without his authorisation? If that is the case, it could be the reason why he is angry because of course you should not do that. But if that is not the reason, then there may be some other reasons or he is just a bad supervisor. In any case, he is your supervisor, so it is probably best to try to restore a good relationship with him because in the future you may need a recommendation letter and to graduate. Or in the worst case, you would have to find a way to change to another supervisor if the relationship is toxic. If he threatened you without reason, then it may be a good reason to consider changing supervisor. You may perhaps want to talk with some other professor in your department that you thrust or some people at your university from other departmens about the possiblity of changing supervisor. I know some Ph.D student in Canada that had changed supervisor because the relationship was toxic. Now that student is a professor. 4) About being banned from the journal, I don’t think that it would happen. And I think that this is not a major problem if it happens. I know some student who had been banned for 1 year from ALL IEEE journals for submitting the same paper to two journal at the same time. Even in that case, it was just for 1 year, and there are still many other good journals that are not by IEEE. Of course it is better to not get banned. But if it happens, you will not be banned forever. And I don’t think it would happen. So overall, I think you should mostly worry about making it clear with your supervisor about whether to keep his name or not. And then, the second problem is to consider whether the relationship is toxic and maybe you want to consider changing supervisor. Thank you for your so immediate reply! I will follow your suggestions! 1.I am a freshman and want to know an accepted paper before publication can be withdrawed by coauther without the corresponding author’s permission. 2.Can the accepted paper be directly published again without a new round submission and review process by the same journal after withdraw from author side to correct something(e.g. remove authorship). 3.What’s the result of Withdraw from author side before publication and after publication? 4.Does Withdraw from author side before publication means waiver of publication. Please you and Request you to give me more guidance! 1. If the co-author complains to the journal or even say something that is not true such that you submitted without his name, he could perhaps cause the paper to be withdrawn. Or maybe that the journal do something more reasonable and just remove his name. But it depends on the journal. But in any case, you are the corresponding author. So the editor would decide to withdraw your paper, the editor must let you know. But I think that the editor should first discuss with you. I don’t think they would just withdraw it right away. They should give you a chance to provide some explanation, I guess. 2. If the paper is withdrawn or if you need to withdraw it, I think that the review process may have to be done again. For example, a few years ago, I submitted a paper to a special issue of a journal. One of the reviewers rejected my paper because he complained that it was similar to a conference paper. But actually, it was OK since I was invited to extend my conference paper for the special issue. Even if I explained that to the editor, when I resubmited, the review process was started again from scratch with different reviewers. You might be more lucky. 3. If you withdraw before publication, then the paper will not be published. There is no problem about that. But if you withdraw after publication, then the journal may have to publish a retraction notice in its journal to indicate that a paper has been removed after it has been published. This will happen if a paper is published in a printed journal for example. But if the paper is only online, maybe that there is no retraction notice and they just take out the paper. It also depends on the journal’s policy. 4. Im not sure what you mean by “waiver of publication”. But if the paper is withdrawn, it basically just mean that the paper will not be published. If it is withdrawn after it has been published then we say that the paper has been retracted. 5. Hopefully, he answers you soon and everything can be solved. Thank you for you immediate reply! Can this persuade Journal EIC and AE to approve his authorship removal before publication? Is this a more reasonable and better reason to do so? would you please help me for more reasonable reasons to remove his authorship with high probability. You have rich experience of publication,please help me. Any other reasons you think are feasible? 2.In fact, I have told the Journal EIC that the second author has no substantial contributions,but it fails to work,as mentioned before. The journal EIC said I should present the change request to authorship in the submission and revision stage,but I am freshman and have no experience(it is my first time as corresponding author), I don’t know this point . 3.Now the problem is that I and my supervisor agreed to remove his authorship, but probably the EIC and AE might not approve(I need a better and reasonable reason). The work takes me lots of time(more than 1 year) and more efforts. I don’t want to see any result of withdraw or retraction. 4.Is there better solutions to the problem? 5.before submission, I got my supervisors’authorization(he is not optimistic to the paper that time，He think the paper may be rejected). Now he changed his mind that he doesn’t want to be responsible for his somethings unfamiliar even if the journal is prestigious. I have to become the scapegoat and victim. I sometimes feel somewhat desperate and helpless when recalling the efforts I have made and his irresponsibility. 1. The first thing that you should do is to be sure that your supervisor wants to be removed. If you are sure that he wants to be removed, then the next step is to contact the EIC or AE to ask to remove his name. For this you can write an e-mail and put your supervisor in CC so that you will have a proof that your supervisor was aware of your e-mail. In your e-mail, you should explain that your supervisor initially agreed to be part of the paper but now does not want his name to appear on the paper, and you politely ask for him to be removed. But if you are not sure that your supervisor wants to be removed or not, you need to be very careful as if you remove him without his authorization it could put you in trouble. Do you have some proofs like some e-mails that shows that he accepted to be a co-author and that he does not want to be a co-author anymore? It would be better for you to have such proofs. 2. Yes, this is not really a good reason. But if you honestly explain the real situation which is that your supervisor does not want to be a co-author anymore, it could perhaps work better. 3. If the EIC and AE do not agree to remove your supervisor, then it is not your fault. Actually, your supervisor agreed to be a co-author initially. Then, the problem is that he is changing his mind when the paper is going to get published. But it would be better to avoid trouble if you have proof that your supervisor has agreed like an e-mail. If you don’t have a proof, then if the supervisor has some bad intentions, he could create some trouble to you perhaps with respect to your university and claim that he never agreed… So as I said above, if it is clear that your supervisor want to be removed, write an e-mail to the EIC or AE and explain the situation clearly with your supervisor in CC. Then when the EIC or AE will answer you, you supervisor will also receive the answer. And if he cannot be removed, he will also know it. 4. As I said before, you probably want to keep a good relationship with your supervisor if possible, and avoid anything that could put you in trouble with respect to your institution. Thus, I think you should make everything clear with your supervisor first that he wants to be removed and/or make sure that you have some proof about it to avoid future trouble. Then, you can try to be removed by contacting the EIC or AE. The other solution is to completely withdraw your paper… and submit it somewhere else. Actually, this would not be a totally bad solution. You would waste a little bit of time, but in the end it would probably be accepted somewhere else. This is the other possibility if other solutions do not work. 5. Yes, this is a bad situation. If I were you I would try to fix things up with the supervisor. But if the environment is really toxic in your team, as i said, you may perhaps want to consider changing team or supervisor. This is a decision that you can evaluate if it make sense in your situation. There are a lot of good supervisors and teams, and there are some bad supervisors and bad teams. If you are in a bad team or with a bad supervisor, you maybe do not need to stay there. Thank you so much for you detailed reply and your guidance! You are a kind and good man! My pleasure. Hope everything will go well and that the problem will be solved quickly. Thanks professor Phillips for such insightful blog. Hi, “Under review” means that reviewers have completed the reviews and submitted them to the editor. Then, “under editor evaluation” means that the editor will now be reading the reviewers comment to take a decision. But in your case, since it returned to “under review” after that, it means that the editor has decided to ask for an additional reviewer to read your paper. Why? There can be various reasons. It can be that the reviewers have disagreed on your paper so the editor decided to ask one more reviewer to get the opinion of someone else. Or it could just be that the editor first just asked one reviewer to save time, and then if the first review is good, he ask a second reviewer… So don’t worry. This can happen quite often. But you will perhaps have to wait another month or more since a new reviewer has been asked to read your paper.
2019-04-21T22:01:02Z
http://data-mining.philippe-fournier-viger.com/answer-reviewers-journal-paper-revision/
A transverse connector may be attached to rods of an orthopedic stabilization system. The rods of the stabilization system may be non-parallel and skewed in orientation relative to each other. The transverse connector may include two members that are joined together by a fastener. The transverse connector may be adjustable in three separate ways to allow the transverse connector to attach to the rods. The length of the transverse connector may be adjustable. The rod openings of the transverse connector may be partially rotatable about a longitudinal axis of the transverse connector. Also, a first member may be angled towards a second member so that the transverse connector can be attached to rods that are diverging. The transverse connector may include cam locks that securely attach the transverse connector to the rods. Rotating a cam locks may extend a rod engager into a rod opening. The rod engager may be a portion of the cam lock. The extension of the rod engager into a rod opening may push a rod against a body of the transverse connector to form a frictional engagement between the transverse connector, the rod, and the rod engager. The present invention generally relates to bone stabilization systems, and more particularly to a transverse connector for connecting adjacent rods of orthopedic stabilization systems. The transverse connector, or cross-link, may connect together adjacent spinal rods of a spinal stabilization system. Bone disorders, degenerative conditions, or trauma may result in a need to stabilize a bone or bones of a patient with an orthopedic stabilization system. For example, disease or trauma may result in the need to stabilize the spine of a patient. A variety of systems may be used to stabilize a spine. A spinal stabilization system may generally be classified as an anterior, lateral, or posterior system according to a position of the system relative to the spine. Posterior stabilization systems often include pairs of vertically aligned rods for stabilizing both short and long segments of a spine. An orthopedic stabilization system may include a pair of rods that are coupled to a bone or bones. For example, a posterior spinal stabilization system may include a pair of bendable rods that are contoured and longitudinally disposed adjacent to vertebral bodies of a spine. A pair of rods of an orthopedic stabilization system may be coupled to a bone or bones by fixation elements. The fixation elements may include, but are not limited to, hooks and bone screw connectors. Rods of an orthopedic stabilization system may be oriented so that the rods are substantially parallel to each other. Alternately, rods of an orthopedic stabilization system may be oriented so that the rods are skewed relative to each other. In a skewed orientation, the rods may be oriented towards each other so that a horizontal distance between the rods is not constant. In other words, the rods may not be horizontally parallel to each other. FIG. 1 shows a top view of a pair of rods 28 that are not horizontally parallel. Also, the rods 28 may be oriented so that a vertical distance between the rods is not constant. In other words, the rods 28 may not be vertically parallel to each other. FIG. 2 shows a pair of rods that are not vertically parallel. Transverse connectors may be attached to connect adjacent rods of an orthopedic stabilization system together. Transverse connectors may provide rigidity to a stabilization system. Transverse connectors may also inhibit rod movement. Stresses may act to return a stabilized bone system to a deformed position. For example, stresses on a spine and on a spinal stabilization system often operate to return a corrected spine to a deformed position. Transverse connectors may inhibit rod movement of the spinal stabilization system during a post-operative period so that the spine remains in a corrected position. Many transverse connectors have been developed that link adjacent rods together. U.S. patents and patent application Ser. No. 09/093,756 to Wagner et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,980,521 to Montague et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,947,966 to Drewry et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,752,955 to Errico et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,709,684 to Errico et al.; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,667,507 to Errico et al., describe transverse connectors. Each of these patents and patent applications are incorporated by reference as if fully set forth herein. Many transverse connectors present one or more problems for a surgical team that installs the transverse connectors. Some of the problems associated with transverse connectors include the need to pre-load connectors on a rod, high profiles, wide profiles, separate component fasteners, and proper tightening of threaded fasteners. Also, the ability of a transverse connector to connect rods that are skewed relative to each other may be problematic. Some transverse connectors have engaging members that must be preloaded onto a rod prior to the rod being placed within a patient. The use of preloaded connectors may require significant pre-operative planning. The use of preloaded connectors may inhibit a surgical team's ability to make changes that are needed to meet conditions presented during insertion of the stabilization system in the patient. Other transverse connectors include rod openings that allow the transverse connector to be placed on rods after the rods have been attached by fixation elements to a patient. Some transverse connectors may have a high profile and/or a wide profile. These profiles may cause surgical complications to tissue and bone adjacent to the connector. A rod fastening system that attaches the transverse connector to the adjacent rods may cause a high or wide profile. For example, a connector that snaps onto a spinal rod may be attached to a transverse connector by a nut that engages a threaded shaft of the connector. The nut and shaft may cause the assembled transverse connector to have a high profile and a wide profile. A high profile transverse connector may result in abrasion of tissue adjacent to the transverse connector. A wide profile transverse connector may require the removal of a portion of bone to allow the transverse connector to be attached to stabilization rods. A slim profile may require less or no bone removal when the transverse connector is attached to stabilization rods. Some transverse connector rod fastening systems may require separate component fastening members to securely attach the transverse connector to stabilization rods. A separate component fastener, such as a nut, may be difficult to properly position and secure during an installation procedure. A transverse connector must be securely tightened to a stabilization rod. Some rod fastening systems of transverse connectors use threaded fasteners to attach the transverse connector to adjacent rods. The threaded fastener typically is a setscrew or a nut. Not tightening a threaded fastener enough may allow movement of the transverse connector. Over tightening a threaded fastener may result in damage to the fastening system that could cause failure of the transverse connector. Applying a proper amount of torque to a threaded fastener may require the use of a torque wrench. Using a torque wrench may be burdensome to a surgical team that installs a stabilization system. Also, a torque wrench may require frequent calibration to ensure that an indicated amount of torque is applied when the torque wrench is used. A threaded fastener such as a setscrew may need to be angled within the body so that a contact portion engages a rod sufficiently to secure the rod to the transverse connector. One type of transverse connector that utilizes a setscrew operates by contacting the setscrew against a lower portion of a rod to drive a top portion of the rod against a body of the transverse connector. The angle of the setscrew may be less than about 45° with respect to a longitudinal axis of the transverse connector. The angle of the setscrew may require an insertion tool with a flexible shaft to fix the rod to the transverse connector. Alternately, a large opening may be made in the patient so that an insertion tool without a flexible shaft may be used to fix the rod to the transverse connector. Another type of transverse connector that utilizes a setscrew operates by contacting the setscrew against an upper portion of a rod to drive a lower portion of the rod against a body of the transverse connector. Positioning a pair of rods within such a transverse connector may be difficult during installation of the transverse connector in a patient. A transverse connector may include a body, a pair of rod openings in the body, and rod engagers. The body of the transverse connector may span a distance between a pair of rods. The body may have a fixed length, or the length of the body may be adjustable. Bending the body may adjust the length of the body and the orientation of the rod openings relative to the rods. Alternately, the length of the body may be adjustable by adjusting a position of a first section of the body relative to a second section of the body. After the positions of the first section and the second section are adjusted, the first section and the second section may be fixed using a fastener. The fastener may be, but is not limited to, a setscrew or a nut and bolt. The pair of rod openings may hold rods of a bone stabilization system. The rod engagers may be used to attach rods that are positioned in the rod openings to the body of the transverse connector. A pair of rods of a stabilization system may be skewed relative to each other in both a vertical plane and a horizontal plane. Some transverse connectors cannot be adjusted to accommodate rods that are horizontally and/or vertically skewed. Other transverse connectors require a portion of the transverse connector to be bent to accommodate the skew of the rods. A distance between a pair of rods of an orthopedic stabilization system may determine positions of rod fastening systems within a transverse connector. For transverse connectors that are attached to a pair of closely spaced rods, the rod fastening systems may be located on outer sides of the rod openings. For transverse connectors that are attached to a pair of rods that are spaced a farther distance apart, one rod fastening system may be located on an outer side of a rod opening and the other rod fastening system may be located between the two rod openings. Alternately, both rod fastening systems may be located between the rod openings. Also, for transverse connectors that are attached to a pair of rods that are spaced a large distance apart, an adjustable length transverse connector may be used. Transverse connectors may be used to stabilize and inhibit movement of an orthopedic stabilization system. A transverse connector may be a fixed length transverse connector or an adjustable transverse connector. An embodiment of a fixed length transverse connector has a body configured to resist bending of the transverse connector. An alternate embodiment of a fixed length transverse connector is configured to allow the body to be bent to allow elongated member openings of the connector to be oriented relative to elongated members. Bending the fixed length transverse connector may also allow for some length adjustment of the transverse connector. A bendable fixed length transverse connector may include indentations that facilitate bending the transverse connector. An adjustable transverse connector may allow for adjustment of axial position, rotation, and/or angulation of a first elongated member opening relative to a second elongated member opening. A transverse connector may include a pair of fastening systems configured to couple the transverse connector to elongated members. A fastening system may be a cam system. The cam system may include a contact surface that engages an elongated member or an elongated member engager when the cam system is activated to couple the transverse connector to the elongated member. Rotating the cam system may activate the cam system. A rotation activated cam system preferable does not include a threaded connection to the transverse connector so that rotating the cam system does not axially advance the cam system within the transverse connector. Elongated members of an orthopedic stabilization system may be, but are not limited to, circular rods or rods having other cross sectional geometries. Elongated members may be two separate contoured members that are positioned on opposite sides of a bone or bones that are to be stabilized. In an alternate embodiment, the elongated members may be two ends of a single bent and contoured elongated member. The elongated members may be coupled to the bone or bones by fixation elements. The fixation elements may be, but are not limited to, bone screw connectors, hooks, or cable systems. An end portion of a transverse connector may be configured to attach to a fastening system of the fixation element that couples the fixation element to an elongated member. An opposite end portion of the transverse connector may include an elongated member opening adapted to couple the transverse connector to an elongated member. For example, a threaded shaft extending from a fixation element may extend through a slot or hole in an end portion of the transverse connector. A nut may be coupled and tightened to the shaft to secure the transverse connector to the fixation element. An opposite end portion of the transverse connector may include an elongated rod opening and a cam system that extends a rod engager against an elongated member positioned within the opening. Positioning an elongated member in the elongated member opening and activating the cam mechanism secures the transverse connector to the elongated member positioned within the elongated member opening. A transverse connector may include a pair of elongated member openings. The elongated member openings may include open sections that allow the elongated member openings to be top loaded onto elongated members. The elongated members may be attached by fixation elements to a patient before the transverse connector is coupled to the elongated members. In an alternate embodiment, an elongated member opening may not include an open section that allows the elongated member opening to be top loaded onto an elongated member. To use a transverse connector that does not include an open section in an elongated member opening, the elongated member opening is placed over an end of the elongated member and maneuvered to a desired location before the elongated member is attached within the patient by fixation elements. A fastening system of a transverse connector may be a cam system. The cam system may extend an engager into an elongated member opening of the transverse connector. The engager may secure the transverse connector to an elongated member positioned in the elongated member opening. An upper portion of the cam system may reside substantially within a body of the transverse connector to maintain a low profile of the transverse connector. A cam system may be unthreaded so that the cam system does not axially advance into or out of the transverse connector during use. In an embodiment, the cam system includes a cam that contacts the elongated member when the cam system is engaged. In alternate embodiments, a cam system may contact a separate component engager that extends into an elongated member opening to secure an elongated member to the transverse connector. A cam system may be angled within a body of a transverse connector so that the transverse connector has a low profile. Placing the cam system at an angle within the body may allow for a strong connection between an elongated member and the transverse connector. The angle of the cam system within the body may allow for easy insertion of a drive tool within the cam system without the need to have a wide surgical opening in a patient. The cam system may be angled within the body at an angle in a range from about 45° to 90° with respect to a longitudinal axis of the transverse connector, and may preferably be angled about 70° with respect to the longitudinal axis of the transverse connector. Portions of a cam system and portions of a body of a transverse connector may lock the cam system within the body to inhibit removal of the cam system from the body. Having the cam systems locked within the body makes the cam systems of the transverse connector unitary members of the transverse connector. The transverse connector may be provided to a surgeon as a single unit that includes no separate pieces that need to be attached to the transverse connector during installation of the transverse connector within a patient. Also, the transverse connector has no pieces that may fall out of the connector during an installation of the transverse connector within the patient. A cam system may include a tool opening that is adapted to accept a driving tool. The driving tool may be, but is not limited to, a diamond drive, a hex wrench, a star drive, a screwdriver, or a socket wrench. The driving tool may allow the transverse connector to be top tightened. Rotating the driving tool, and thus the cam system, may move the cam system from an initial position to an engaged position. In the engaged position, the cam system will securely couple an elongated member positioned within an elongated member opening to the transverse connector. The cam system may engage the elongated member when the cam system is rotated a specific number of degrees. The number of degrees may be a value within the range from about 10° to about 360′. In an embodiment, rotating the driving tool approximately 170° couples the elongated member to the transverse connector. The cam system may include a stop that inhibits movement of the cam system beyond the engaged position. A tool opening in a cam system may be keyed to accept a driving tool only in a specific orientation. The specific orientation may provide a user with a visual indication that the cam system is fully engaged when the drive tool is used to rotate the cam system. For example, the tool opening may be adapted to accept a diamond drive that can only be inserted into the tool opening in certain preferred orientations. When the diamond drive is inserted into the tool opening, a handle of the drive tool may be oriented at an angle relative to an elongated member positioned in an elongated member opening adjacent to the cam system. The drive tool may be rotated to rotate the cam system to an engaged position. The handle of the drive tool may be oriented substantially parallel to the elongated member when the cam system is in the engaged position. The orientation of the drive tool handle before and after rotation may be a visual indication to a user that the cam system has been activated to secure the elongated member to the transverse connector. A diamond drive may also provide a large contact area between a head of the drive tool and side walls of the tool opening. The large contact area may inhibit stripping or deformation of the tool opening during use. In alternate embodiments, the tool opening may be slotted, and the drive tool may include protrusions that fit within the slots only when a handle of the drive tool is in a specific orientation. An engager of the cam system may be a cam that extends into an elongated member opening when the cam system is rotated. When the cam system is in an initial orientation, the engager may be positioned so that the engager does not extend into the elongated member opening of the transverse connector. In an alternate embodiment, a cam surface of the cam system may contact a separate component engager that extends into the elongated member opening when the cam system is engaged. A surface of an elongated member opening, a contact surface of an engager, and/or an elongated member may be textured to inhibit movement of the transverse connector relative to the elongated member when a cam system couples the transverse connector to the elongated member. The engager may dimple the elongated member when the cam system is engaged to couple the elongated member to the transverse connector. A fixed length transverse connector may include a body, a pair of elongated member openings and a pair of cam systems configured to couple elongated members to the transverse connector. The body of the transverse connector may include indentations that allow the transverse connector to be bent. Bending the transverse connector may allow for minor adjustment of a separation distance between elongated member openings of the transverse connector. Bending the transverse connector may also allow the elongated member openings to be properly oriented relative to elongated members of an orthopedic stabilization system so that there is a large contact area between an elongated member and an elongated member opening. For fixed length transverse connectors that have small separation distances between the elongated member openings, one or both cam systems of the transverse connectors may be positioned so that the cam systems are not located between the elongated member openings. A cam system that is not located between the elongated member openings of a transverse connector is referred to as an outward positioned cam system. In embodiments, fixed length transverse connectors having separation distances between centers of the elongated member openings less than about 23 millimeters (mm) may have at least one outward positioned cam system. For fixed length transverse connectors that have larger separation distances between the elongated member openings, the cam systems may be located between the elongated member openings of the transverse connector. In embodiments, fixed length transverse connectors having separation distances between centers of the elongated member openings greater than about 23 mm may have cam systems positioned between elongated member openings of the transverse connector. Transverse connectors may be provided in incremental lengths up to lengths between centers of elongated member openings of about 40 mm. Longer transverse connectors may also be formed. An adjustable transverse connector may securely connect a pair of adjacent elongated member in a bone stabilization system. A pair of adjacent elongated member may be attached by fixation elements to a bone or bones within a patient. The elongated member may be skewed relative to each other. The transverse connector may be adjustable to accommodate variations in placement of adjacent elongated members. The transverse connector may be adjusted by adjusting a position of a first section of the transverse connector relative to a second section of the transverse connector. In an embodiment, the first section and the second section of an adjustable transverse connector may be adjusted relative to each other about at least two axes. In an alternate embodiment, the first section and the second section of an adjustable transverse connector may be adjusted relative to each other about at least three axes. After the positions of the first section and the second section are adjusted, a fastener may fix the position of the first section relative to the second section. In an embodiment, an adjustable transverse connector may allow for adjustment of a distance between elongated member openings and for rotation of a first elongated member opening relative to a second elongated member opening. A first section of the transverse connector may include a shaft that telescopically fits within a hollow shaft of a second section of the transverse connector. Sliding the shaft of the first section within the hollow shaft of the second shaft allows for adjustment of the separation distance between elongated member openings of the transverse connector. An end of the first section shaft may be flared to inhibit removal of the shaft from the hollow section. The first shaft may be turned within the hollow shaft to allow the first elongated member to be rotated relative to the second elongated member. The hollow shaft may include a collet. A collar may be compression locked to the collet to inhibit movement of the first section relative to the second section. The collar may include a tab that fits within a slot of the collet. The tab and slot combination locates the collar relative to the collet so that a compression locking instrument may be easily positioned and used to lock the collar to the collet without undue manipulation of the collar. An embodiment of a transverse connector may allow a length, a rotation angle, and an angulation angle between a first section of the transverse connector and a second section of the transverse connector to be adjusted. When the transverse connector is properly adjusted, tightening a fastener inhibits motion of the first section relative to the second section. The fastener of a transverse connector may be a component of a fastening system. The fastening system may include a lining. The lining may be, but is not limited to a bushing or a sleeve. The lining may be positioned within the second section of the transverse connector. The first section of the transverse connector may be positioned through the lining and the second section. To adjust a length of a transverse connector, a distance between an elongated member opening in the first section and an elongated member opening in the second section may be adjusted by moving the elongated member opening of the first section towards or away from the elongated member opening of the second section. A transverse connector may allow adjustment of the length of the transverse connector within a limited range. For example, an embodiment of a transverse connector may have an adjustment range between centers of elongated member openings of from about 37 mm to 44 mm, another embodiment may have an adjustment range of from about 43 mm to 51 mm, another embodiment may have an adjustment range of from about 50 mm to 65 mm, and another embodiment may have an adjustment range of from about 61 to 80 mm. Other adjustment ranges may also be used. An opening through the second section may be sized to allow the first section to be angled relative to the second section. A width of the opening may allow only a limited range of angulation between the first section and the second section. For example, the width of the opening may allow the angulation of the first section relative to the second section from about 0° to about 18°. An opening may be positioned through the second section so that smaller or larger angulation ranges are possible. For example, the width of the opening may allow the angulation of the first section relative to the second section in a range of from 0° to 100, or in a range from 0° to 30°. The opening may be offset from a longitudinal axis of the second section so that the angulation of the first section relative to the second section does not have a lower limit of 0°. For example, the opening of the second section may allow an angulation range of from 10° to 35°. In other embodiments, different angulation ranges and a limits for the angulation ranges are possible. If a transverse connector cannot be angulated in the direction of a desired orientation, a section that is placed over an elongated member may be removed from the elongated member and placed on the opposite elongated member to allow the transverse connector to be angulated in the desired direction. An opening may also allow the first section to rotate relative to the second section. The first section may include a shaft that has a flat portion. A height of the opening in the second section may be sized so that an edge of the flat portion of the shaft engages the second section when a user attempts to rotate the first section beyond a limited rotation range. The engagement between the shaft and the second section may limit the range of rotational motion of the first section relative to the second section. In an embodiment, the first section is configured to rotate plus or minus 10° relative to the second section. In other embodiments, the rotational range of motion may be greater or less than plus or minus 10°. For example, the rotation of the first section relative to the second section may be limited to plus or minus 5°, or the rotation of the first section relative to the second section may be limited to plus or minus 20°. Other embodiments may have different rotational limits. When the position of the first section relative to the second position is properly adjusted, the position may be set by tightening a fastener of the fastener system. In an embodiment, the fastener is a setscrew that pushes against a lining. Tightening the fastener creates shear forces between the setscrew, the lining, the first section, and the second section. The shear forces inhibit motion of the first section relative to the second section. The fastener may be another type of fastener, including, but not limited to, a nut or a cam member. An adjustable transverse connector may include a fastening system that securely attaches the transverse connector to an elongated member of an orthopedic stabilization system. In an embodiment, the fastening system is a cam system. In alternate embodiments the fastening system may be, but is not limited to, a setscrew, a clamping system, or a nut and threaded fastener. A first section and a second section of the transverse connector may be configured to be inseparable after assembly. A fastener used to fix the position of the first section of the body and the second section of the body may be threaded into the transverse connector. In an embodiment, the fastener may be inhibited from being removed from the transverse connector. The transverse connector may be supplied as an assembled unit to a surgeon who will install the transverse connector in a patient. Having fastening systems pre-installed in the transverse connector, the first section inseparable from the second section, and the fastener threaded on the transverse connector makes the transverse connector a unitary structure. The unitary structure transverse connector may be easy to install within a patient because the transverse connector includes no separate pieces that need to be attached during installation within a patient. Also, the unitary structure has no pieces that may fall out of the connector, be misplaced, be cross threaded, or be incorrectly positioned during an installation procedure within the patient. A drive tool used to tighten a fastener that secures a first section of a transverse connector to a second section of the transverse connector may be the same instrument that is used to tighten fastening systems that couple elongated members to the transverse connectors. Using the same instrument to tighten the fastener and engage the cam system may minimize the instrument set needed to install a transverse connector within a patient. If the fastener that secures the first section of the transverse connector to the second section of the transverse connector is a threaded connector, a torque wrench may be attached to the drive tool so that a proper amount of torque may be applied to the fastener. When a fastener that inhibits motion of a first section of a transverse connector relative to a second section of the transverse connector or a fastening system that couples an elongated member to the transverse connector is tightened, a counter-torque wrench may be coupled to the transverse connector. The counter-torque wrench allows the application of an offset torque to the transverse connector. The offset torque may prevent undesired movement of a stabilization system or patient when the fastener or a fastening system is rotated. An advantage of a fixed length transverse connector is that the transverse connector may be a unitary structure that has no removable parts. The transverse connector may be top loaded onto elongated members. The absence of removable parts, such as setscrews or fasteners, may allow the transverse connector to be easily and quickly installed within a patient. The unitary structure also has no parts that can fall out of the transverse connector, be misplaced, be cross threaded, or be incorrectly positioned during installation. An advantage of an adjustable transverse connector is that the transverse connector may be supplied to a surgeon as a single unit. The transverse connector may be top loaded onto elongated members. The unit has no separable parts, and if the unit includes threaded members, the threaded members may be pre-attached to the unit. Pre-attaching threaded members to the unit avoids the need to thread the parts into the unit during installation within the patient. An advantage of a transverse connector that uses cam systems to couple the transverse connector to elongated members is that the transverse connector may be attached to the elongated members without the use of threaded fasteners. The absence of threaded fasteners allows the connector to be attached to an elongated member without the transverse connector being under-tightened or over-tightened. The cam system may include an indicator that informs the user when the transverse connector is properly fastened to an elongated member. The indicator may be a visual indication, such as a position of a driving tool, and/or the indicator may be a vibrational signal transmitted to the user when the cam system is activated. An advantage of transverse connectors is that several sizes of fixed length connectors and several adjustable transverse connectors may be provided to a surgeon who will install a stabilization system within a patient. The different types and sizes of transverse connectors may allow a surgeon to install a stabilization system that best fits a patient. An advantage of an adjustable transverse connector is that the connector may be used to connect orthopedic rods that are not oriented parallel to each other. The transverse rod may be used to connect rods that are not horizontally parallel and/or vertically parallel. The transverse connector may also be used to connect rods that are oriented parallel to each other. Another advantage of a transverse connector is that the transverse connector may have a thin and low profile. The low profile of the transverse connector may allow the transverse connector to have a minimal effect on adjacent tissue when the transverse connector is installed within a patient. The thin profile may allow the transverse connector to be easily positioned at desired locations on a stabilization system. Further advantages of transverse connectors may include that the transverse connectors are sturdy, durable, light weight, simple, efficient, reliable and inexpensive; yet the transverse connectors may also be easy to manufacture, install, and use. FIG. 26 is a perspective view of an instrument used to inhibit movement of a first section of a transverse connector relative to a second section of the transverse connector when the transverse connector has a collet and collar fastening system. With reference to the drawings, transverse connectors are denoted generally as 30. Transverse connectors 30 may be used to connect elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32 together. Transverse connectors 30 may provide rigidity to the orthopedic stabilization system 32. Transverse connectors 30 may also inhibit undesired motion of the orthopedic stabilization system 32. Transverse connectors 30 may be fixed length transverse connectors or adjustable length transverse connectors. The elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32 may be coupled to bones 34 by fixation elements 36. The fixation elements 36 may be, but are not limited to, hooks and bone screw connectors. In an embodiment, the elongated members 28 are spinal rods that are coupled to vertebral bodies 34 by fixation elements 36. The spinal rods 28, fixation elements 36, and transverse connectors 30 form part of a spinal stabilization system 32. FIG. 3 shows a portion of an embodiment of a spinal stabilization system 32. Elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32 may be, but are not limited to, circular rods or rods having other cross sectional geometries. Other types of cross sectional geometries for elongated members 28 may include, but are not limited to, oval, rectangular, or polygonal shaped cross sectional areas. Elongated members 28 may be two separate contoured members that are positioned on opposite sides of a bone or bones 34 that are to be stabilized. In an alternate embodiment, the elongated members 28 may be two ends of a single bent and contoured elongated member. The elongated members 28 shown in FIG. 3 are two ends of a single bent and contoured elongated member. A transverse connector 30 may include body 38, a pair of elongated member openings 40, and fastening systems 42 that couple the transverse connector to elongated members 28. The fastening systems 42 may be cam systems. The body 38 of the transverse connector 30 spans a distance between a pair of elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32 during use. A body 38 of a fixed length transverse connector 30′ may be a single member that optionally includes at least one indented surface 44. FIGS. 4 and 5 show embodiments of fixed length transverse connectors 30′. A body 38 of an adjustable transverse connector 30″ may include first section 46 and second section 48. The position of the first section 46 may be adjustable relative to the position of the second section 48. FIGS. 6 and 7 show embodiments of adjustable length transverse connectors 30″. The components of a transverse connector 30 may be made of biocompatible material including, but not limited to titanium, titanium alloys, stainless steel and ceramics. A transverse connector 30 may include a pair of elongated member openings 40. Surfaces 50 of the elongated member openings 40 may closely conform to a shape of an exterior surface of an elongated member 28 so that a tight fit is formed between the surface and the elongated member when the transverse connector 30 is coupled to the elongated member. The elongated member openings 40 may include open sections that allow the elongated member openings to be top loaded onto elongated members 28. The elongated members 28 may be attached by fixation elements 36 to a patient before the transverse connector 30 is coupled to the elongated members. In an alternate embodiment, an elongated member opening 40 may not include an open section that allows the elongated member opening to be top loaded onto an elongated member 28. To use a transverse connector 30 that does not include an open section in an elongated member opening 40, the elongated member opening is placed over an end of the elongated member 28 and maneuvered to a desired location before the elongated member is attached within the patient by fixation elements 36. A fixed length transverse connector 30′ may include a body 38, a pair of elongated member openings 40, and a pair of cam systems 42 configured to couple the transverse connector to elongated members 28. The body 38 of the transverse connector 30′ may include indentations 44 that allow the transverse connector to be bent. Bending the transverse connector 30′ may allow for minor adjustment of a separation distance between elongated member openings 40 of the transverse connector. Bending the transverse connector 30′ may also allow the elongated member openings 40 to be properly oriented relative to elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32 so that there is a large contact area between an elongated member and an elongated member opening. FIG. 8 shows an embodiment of a pair of benders 52, 54 that may be used to adjust a transverse connector 30′. FIG. 9 shows a detail view of a transverse connector 30′ positioned within heads 56 of the benders 52, 54. When a transverse connector 30′ is placed within heads 56 of the benders 52, 54, handles 58 of the benders may be grasped and forced towards each other to bend the transverse connector. For fixed length transverse connectors 30′ that have small separation distances between the elongated member openings 40, one or both cam systems 42 of the transverse connectors may be positioned so that the cam systems are not located between the elongated member openings. A cam system 42 that is not located between the elongated member openings 40 of a transverse connector 30′ is referred to as an outward positioned cam system. In embodiments, fixed length transverse connectors 30′ having separation distances between centers of the elongated member openings 40 less than about 80 mm may have at least one outward positioned cam system. Embodiments of transverse connectors 30′ with outward positioned cam systems 42 may be produced in incrementally increasing sizes. For example, three sizes of transverse connectors 30′ with outward positioned cam systems 42 may be produced in 5 mm increments with the smallest transverse connector having a separation distance between centers of elongated member openings 40 of about 10 mm. FIG. 4 shows an embodiment of a transverse connector 30′ having outward positioned cam systems 42. Transverse connectors 30′ having outward positioned cam systems 42 may also be produced in other size ranges and in different incremental lengths. For fixed length transverse connectors 30′ that have larger separation distances between the elongated member openings 40, the cam systems 42 may be located between the elongated member openings of the transverse connector. Fixed length transverse connectors 30′ having separation distances between centers of the elongated member openings 40 greater than about 15 mm may have cam systems 42 positioned between elongated member openings of the transverse connector. Embodiments of transverse connectors 30′ with cam systems 42 positioned between elongated member openings 40 may be produced in incrementally increasing sizes. For example, four sizes of transverse connectors 30′ with cam systems 42 positioned between elongated member openings 40 may be produced in 5 mm increments with the smallest transverse connector having a separation distance between centers of elongated member openings of about 25 mm. FIG. 5 shows an embodiment of a transverse connector 30′ having cam systems 42 positioned between elongated member openings 40. Transverse connectors 30 having cam systems 42 positioned between elongated member openings 40 may also be produced in other size ranges and in different incremental lengths. FIG. 10 shows a cross sectional view of a fixed length transverse connector 30′ without cam systems 42 positioned within cam system openings 60. Cam system openings 60 of a transverse connector 30 may include shoulders 62 and cam guides 64. The shoulders 62 provide surfaces that may inhibit removal of cam systems 42 that are positioned within the cam system openings 60. When a cam system 42 is inserted into a cam system opening 60, the cam system may be substantially contained within the body 38 so that the cam system does not extend a substantial distance above upper surface 66 of the body. Cam guides 64 may provide limits for rotational motion of cam systems 42 within cam system openings 60 of a transverse connector body 38. The cam guides 64 may also limit an insertion depth of the cam system 42 into the body 38. FIG. 11 shows a bottom view of an embodiment of a transverse connector 30′ with cam guides 64. A portion of a cam system opening 60 may be formed in an inner surface 50 that defines an elongated member opening 40 of the transverse connector 30. The portion of the cam system opening 60 formed in the inner surface 50 of the elongated member opening 40 allows engager 68 to extend into the elongated member opening 40 and contact an elongated member 28 positioned within the elongated member opening during use. In an embodiment, the engager 68 is cam surface 70 of the cam system 42. Cam system openings 60 may be angled within the body 38 relative to a longitudinal axis 72 of the transverse connector 30. Alternately, the cam system openings 60 may be formed perpendicular to the longitudinal axis 72 of the transverse connector 30. An angled cam system opening 60 allows an engager 68 to contact an elongated member 28 below the mid point of the elongated member so that the engager may press an upper portion of the elongated member against surface 50 of the elongated member opening 40. A longitudinal axis 73 of a cam system opening 60 (and a longitudinal axis of a cam system 42 positioned within the opening) may be angled at an angle A with respect to the longitudinal axis 72 of the transverse connector 30, as shown in FIG. 10. A cam system opening 60, and a cam system 42 positioned within the opening, may be angled from about 45° to 90° relative to the longitudinal axis 72 of the transverse connector 30. Preferably, the cam system openings 60 are angled greater than 60° relative to the longitudinal axis 72 of the transverse connector 30. For example, in an embodiment, the cam system openings 60 are angled at 70° relative to the longitudinal axis 72 of the transverse connector 30. The large angle of the cam system opening 60 may allow for easy access to tool opening 74 of a cam system 42 positioned within the cam system opening. An opening in a body of other transverse connectors, such as a transverse connector shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,947,966, may be formed at a significantly smaller angle relative to the longitudinal axis of the transverse connector, such as about 45°. The smaller angle of an opening in other transverse connectors may make accessing a tool opening more difficult and/or inconvenient during an installation procedure. An initial manufacturing process that forms an elongated member 28 may form an outer surface of the elongated member as a smooth surface. A subsequent process may texture the outer surface of the elongated member 28. Similarly, an initial manufacturing process that forms a transverse connector 30 may form elongated member opening surfaces 50 as smooth surfaces. A subsequent process may texture the elongated member opening surfaces 50. Also, elongated member contact surfaces of engagers 68 may be textured. Texturing an outer surface of an elongated member 28, elongated member opening surfaces 50, and/or contact surfaces of engagers 68 may provide large coefficients of friction between the elongated member and the transverse connector 30 as compared to similar smooth surfaces so that motion of the elongated member is inhibited when the transverse connector is coupled to the elongated member. The outer surface of an elongated member 28, elongated member opening surfaces 50, or contact surfaces of engagers 68 may be textured by any texturing process, including but not limited to, scoring the surface, a ball peening process, an electric discharge process, or embedding hard particles within the surface. FIG. 12 shows an embodiment of a portion of a textured elongated member opening surface 50 of an elongated member opening that has a scored surface. FIG. 13 shows an embodiment of a cam system 42 that is positionable within a cam system opening 60 of a transverse connector 30. The cam system 42 may include protrusions 76, main body 78, and cam surface 70. When a cam system 42 is inserted into a cam system opening 60, wall 80 of the cam system opening (shown in FIG. 10) may compress all of the protrusions 76 inwards. The protrusions 76 may snap back to their original configuration when upper surfaces 82 of the protrusions 76 pass the shoulder 62 of the cam system opening 60. If a force is applied to the cam system 42 that tends to force the cam system out of the cam system opening 60, the upper surfaces 82 may engage the shoulder 62 to inhibit removal of the cam system from the cam system opening. FIG. 7 shows an embodiment of a transverse connector 30 that includes a vibrational indicator that informs a user that a cam system 42 has been engaged. The transverse connector 30 includes pin 84 positioned through the transverse connector body 38 so that a portion of the pin extends into a cam system opening 60 adjacent to protrusions 76 of the cam system 42. If the cam system 42 is rotated, a protrusion 76 will contact the pin 84 so that the protrusion is deflected inwards. When the edge of the deflected protrusion 76 passes the pin 84, the protrusion snaps back outwards and transmits a vibration through the transverse connector body 38. The vibration may be heard and/or felt by a user. The vibration may inform a user that the cam system 42 is being engaged. A certain number of vibrations may indicate to a user that the cam system 42 is fully engaged. For example, if there are six protrusions 76, and if the cam system 42 is fully engaged when the cam system is rotated 180°, three separate vibrations during rotation of the cam system would indicate that the cam system is fully engaged. A main body 78 of a cam system 42 may fit within a cylindrical portion of a cam system opening 60. An insertion depth of the cam system 42 into a transverse connector body 38 may be limited when the main body 78 contacts a cam guide 64 of the transverse connector body. When a cam system 42 is placed within a cam system opening 60 so that the main body 78 contacts a cam guide 64, the upper surfaces 82 of the protrusions 76 may pass past the shoulder 62 of the cam system opening so that removal of the cam system from the cam system opening is inhibited. Tool opening 74 may be formed in the main body 78. The tool opening 74 may allow insertion of drive tool 86 in the main body 78 so that the cam system 42 may be rotated. The tool opening 74 may be configured to accept drive head 88 of the drive tool 86. The drive tool 86 may be, but is not limited to, a diamond drive, a hex wrench, a star drive, a screwdriver, or a socket wrench. FIG. 14 shows an embodiment of a drive tool 86 that may be used to tighten a cam system 42 of a transverse connector 30. The drive tool 86 may include handle 90, shaft 92, and drive head 88. The handle 90 may be shaped so that a user may comfortably and securely grasp and use the drive tool 86. The handle 90 may have an elongated shape that can be aligned relative to the transverse connector 30 or an elongated member 28 to provide an indication during use that the transverse connector has been coupled to the elongated member. In an embodiment of a drive tool 86, the drive tool has a “T”-shaped handle 90, as shown in FIG. 14. The shaft 92 of the drive tool 86 may mechanically attach the handle 90 to the drive head 88. FIG. 15 shows a detail view of an embodiment of the drive head 88 of a diamond drive tool 86. FIG. 16 shows an embodiment of torque limiting wrench 94 that may be used when a cam system 42 of a transverse connector 30 is tightened. The torque limiting wrench 94 may inhibit undesired motion of a patient or parts of a stabilization system 32 when a cam system 42 is rotated. The torque limiting wrench 94 may include hollow shaft 96, head 98, and handle 100. A drive tool shaft 92 may be placed through the hollow shaft 96 and into a tool opening 74. The head 98 may be placed on the transverse connector 30 so that inner surfaces of the lips 102 of the head contact sides of the transverse connector. The drive tool 86 may be rotated one direction to apply a torque to a cam system 42. Force may be applied to the handle 100 in the opposite direction to counter the torque applied to the cam system 42. A tool opening 74 of a cam system 42 may be configured to accept a drive tool 86 in an initial desired orientation. The diamond drive tool head 88 shown in FIG. 15 may be inserted into a tool opening 74 of a cam system 42 in only two orientations. In either orientation, handle 90 may be offset at an angle from an elongated member 28 positioned within an elongated member opening 40 of the transverse connector 30. Rotating the drive tool 86 rotates the cam system 42 so that an elongated member 28 positioned within an elongated member opening 40 adjacent to the cam system is secured to the transverse connector 30. A user may be able to feel resistance to turning that indicates that the transverse connector 30 is being securely coupled to the elongated member 28. A cam guide 64 of the transverse connector 30 may limit the rotation range of the cam system 42. The position of the handle 90 after rotation may provide a visual indication to a user that the transverse connector 30 has been securely coupled to the elongated member 28. In an embodiment, the handle 90 of the drive tool 86 is oriented substantially parallel to the elongated member 28 after the drive tool has been rotated to fully engage the transverse connector 30 to the elongated member. In other embodiments, the handle 90 may be substantially perpendicular to the elongated member 28 when the transverse connector 30 is fully engaged to the elongated member. Other types of visual indication systems may be used to determine when an elongated member 28 is secured to a transverse connector 30. For example, markings on the shaft 92 may align with markings on the transverse connector 30 to indicate that an elongated member 28 has been coupled to the transverse connector. In an embodiment, a cam system 42 may fully engage a transverse connector 30 to an elongated member 28 when the cam system is rotated 170°. A handle 90 of a drive tool 86 may be initially offset from the elongated member 28 by about 10° when the drive tool head 88 is positioned in a tool opening 74 of the cam system 42. When the drive tool 86 is rotated 170° to secure the elongated member 28 to the transverse connector 30, the handle 90 may become substantially parallel to the elongated member. Embodiments of cam systems 42 may fully engage transverse connectors 30 to elongated member 28 when the cam systems are rotated less or greater than 170°. For example, in an embodiment, a cam system 42 is configured to fully engage a transverse connector 30 to an elongated member 28 when the cam system is rotated about 10°. In another embodiment, a cam system lock 42 is configured to fully engage a transverse connector 30 to an elongated member 28 when the cam system is rotated about 360°. Other embodiments of cam systems 42 may be configured to fully engage a transverse connector 30 to an elongated member 28 when the cam system is rotated to some desired value between 10° and 360°. FIG. 11 shows a bottom view of an embodiment of a transverse connector 30. One engager 68 is shown fully engaged against an elongated member 28. Another engager 68 is shown in an initial or unengaged position. The cams 68 of the transverse connector 30 shown in the embodiment of FIG. 11 become fully engaged against an elongated member 28 when the cams systems 42 are rotated 170°. To form a fixed length transverse connector 30′, the body 38 of the transverse connector is machined to form elongated member openings 40, cam system openings 60 for cam systems 42, and cam guides 64. Indentions 44 may be formed in the body 38 to allow the transverse connector 30′ to be bent. Cam systems 42 are also machined. The elongated member opening surfaces 50 and/or the contact surfaces of the engagers 68 may be textured so that the coefficient of friction between the surfaces and elongated members 28 placed against the surfaces will be high. The cam systems 42 may be inserted into the cam system openings 60 until the upper surfaces of the protrusions 76 pass the shoulders 62 of the cam system openings. When the cam systems 42 are inserted into the cam system openings 60, the transverse connector 30′ is formed. To establish a bone stabilization system 32, a pair of elongated members 28 may be coupled to the bone or bones 34 being stabilized. The elongated members 28 may be coupled to the bone or bones 34 by fixation elements 36 (shown in FIG. 3). A transverse connector 30′ may be placed over the elongated members 28 so that the elongated members are positioned within elongated member openings 40 of the transverse connector 30 at a desired location. If necessary or desired, the transverse connector 30′ may be bent with benders 52, 54 so that surfaces 50 of the elongated member openings 40 contact large areas of the elongated members 28. A torque limiting wrench 94 may be placed on the transverse connector 30, and a shaft 92 of a drive tool 86 may be inserted through the hollow shaft 96 of the torque limiting wrench. A head 88 of a drive tool 86 may be inserted into a tool opening 74 of a first cam system 42 of the transverse connector 30′. The drive tool 86 may be rotated to rotate the cam system 42. Rotating the cam system 42 may force an engager 68 into an elongated member opening 40 so that the engager presses an elongated member 28 against the surface 50 of the elongated member opening. The engager 68 may be a cam surface 70 of the cam system 42. The drive tool 86 may be removed from the tool opening 74 of the first cam system 42. The drive tool 86 and the torque limiting wrench 94 may be repositioned so that the drive tool head 88 is inserted into the tool opening 74 of the second cam system 42. The drive tool 86 may be rotated to force an engager 68 against the second elongated member 28 so that the engager presses the second elongated member against the second elongated member opening surface 50. Other transverse connectors 30 may be attached to the elongated members 28 at other locations along the lengths of the elongated members. FIG. 17 shows an exploded view of an embodiment of an adjustable transverse connector 30″. The adjustable transverse connector 30″ may include first section 46, second section 48, optional lining 104, fastener 106, elongated member openings 40 and cam systems 42. The optional lining 104 may be, but is not limited to, a bushing or a sleeve. The fastener 106 may fix the position of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48. The cam systems 42 may securely fasten an elongated member 28 to a section 46 or 48 of the transverse connector 30″. In alternate embodiments, an elongated member 28 may be fastened to a transverse connector 30″ by connecting mechanisms other than cam system 42. The other types of connecting mechanisms may include, but are not limited to, setscrews, and connector and nut arrangements. Combinations of different types of connecting mechanisms may also be used to couple a transverse connector 30″ to an elongated member 23. A first section 46 of an adjustable transverse connector 30″ may include shaft 108. The shaft 108 may include flat surface 110. The shaft 108 may be inserted through a lining 104 positioned within holder 112 of a second section 48. The lining 104 may include circular bore 114. The bore 114 may have a diameter that is slightly larger than diameter D (shown in FIG. 22) of the shaft 108. End 116 of the shaft 108 may include countersunk opening 118 (as shown in FIG. 20) that allows the end to be peened after insertion through the holder 112 and lining 104. Peening the end 116 may inhibit removal of the lining 104 from the holder 112, and the first section 46 from the second section 48. A separation distance between centers of elongated member openings 40 of the transverse connector 30″ may be adjusted by moving elongated member opening of the first section 46 towards or away from an elongated member opening of the second section 48. Several different transverse connectors 30″ may be formed with varying adjustment ranges. An adjustment range of a transverse connector 30″ is the range through which a separation distance between centers of elongated member openings 40 may be adjusted. For example embodiments of transverse connectors 30″ may be formed that have the following overlapping adjustment ranges. Other transverse connectors 30″ may be made that have different adjustment ranges. A holder 112 of a second section 48 of an adjustable transverse connector 30″ may include first opening 120 and second opening 122. The first opening 120 allows a lining 104 to be inserted into the holder 112 so that a bore 114 of the lining aligns with the second opening 122. In an embodiment, the first opening 120 may be a blind hole that does not extend completely through the holder 112. The second opening 122 allows a first section shaft 108 to be placed through the holder 112 and the lining 104. Placing a shaft 108 of the first section 46 through the holder 112 and the lining 104 inhibits removal of the lining from the holder. A fastener 106 may be used to apply force to a lining 104 to inhibit movement of a first section 46 of an adjustable transverse connector 30″ relative to a second section 48 of the transverse connector. In an embodiment, the fastener 106 is a setscrew that mates to threading 124 in an upper section of the holder 112. Tightening the setscrew 106 forces an end of the setscrew against a lining 104 to force a first section shaft 108 against the holder 112. The resulting forces between the setscrew 106, the lining 104, the shaft 108 and the holder 112 inhibit motion of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48. Other types of fasteners 106 may be used. For example, in an embodiment the fastener 106 may be a cam mechanism that forces the lining 104 against the shaft 108 when the cam is engaged. In an alternate embodiment, the fastener 106 may be a nut that threads to a shaft extending from the lining 104. A counter torque may be applied to the transverse connector 30″ by a torque limiting wrench 94 to inhibit movement of the transverse connector, stabilization system 32, or patient when the fastener 106 is tightened. The fastener 106 may include tool opening 74. Drive head 88 of drive tool 86 may be inserted into the tool opening 74. The drive tool 86 may be rotated to rotate the fastener 106. Rotating the fastener 106 in a clockwise direction may press end 126 of the fastener against a top of the lining 104. The end 126 of the fastener 106 may have a large surface area to provide a large contact area with the lining 104. The contact of the fastener 106 against the lining 104 may press a shaft 108 against a holder 112 so that the axial, angular, and rotational motion of a first section 46 of a transverse connector 30″ relative to a second section 48 of the transverse connector is inhibited. The drive tool 86 may be, but is not limited to, a diamond drive, a hex wrench, a star drive, a screwdriver, or a socket wrench. Preferably, the drive tool 86 for fastener 106 is the same instrument that may be used to rotate fastening systems 42 that couple the transverse connector 30 to elongated members 28. In alternate embodiments, tool openings 74 for cam systems 42 may have a different style than a tool opening for a fastener 106. For example, the tool openings 74 for the cam systems 42 may accept a diamond drive, while the tool opening 74 for the fastener 106 may be adapted to accept a drive head of a hex wrench. FIG. 14 shows an embodiment of a drive tool 86 that may be used to tighten a fastener 106 of a transverse connector 30″. The handle 90 of the drive tool 86 may include an opening 128. The opening 128 may be configured to accept drive 130 of torque wrench 132. FIG. 18 shows an embodiment of a torque wrench 132. The torque wrench 132 may be used to inform a user when sufficient torque has been applied to the fastener 106. A sufficient amount of torque is enough torque to inhibit movement of a first section 46 of the transverse connector 30″ relative to the second section 48 of the transverse connector. In alternate transverse connector embodiments, an optional lining 104 may not be used. A fastener 106 may directly contact a shaft 108 of a first section 46 of a transverse connector 30″ that is positioned through a holder 112 of a second section 48 of the transverse connector. The contact between the fastener 106, the shaft 108, and the holder 112 may inhibit movement of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48. A second opening 122 in a holder 112 may allow a first section 46 to be angulated relative to a second section 48. FIG. 19 shows a top view of an embodiment of a transverse connector 30″ where the first section 46 is angulated relative to the second section 48. Elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32 may be horizontally skewed relative to each other. The ability to angulate the first section 46 relative to the second section 48 allows the transverse connector 30″ to be coupled to elongated members 28 that are horizontally skewed. In embodiments of stabilization systems 32, the elongated members may be horizontally parallel. To accommodate horizontally parallel elongated members 28, the first section 46 may be adjusted relative to the second section 48 so that there is no angulation between the first section and the second section. To allow a first section 46 of a transverse connector 30″ to be angulated relative to a second section 48 of the transverse connector, width W (as shown in FIG. 22) of a second opening 122 in a holder 112 of the second section may be larger than a diameter D of a shaft 108 passing through the holder. The large width W of the second opening 122 allows the shaft 108 to slide laterally within the second opening 122 until the fastener 106 is used to set the position of the shaft. In an embodiment of a transverse connector 30″, an angulation range of a first section 46 relative to a second section 48 may be from about 0° to about 18°. The amount of angulation may be less or greater than 18° in other embodiments. For example, in an embodiment, the angulation range of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48 is from 0° to 10°; and in another embodiment, the angulation range is from 0° to 30°. Larger or smaller ranges may also be used. A position of a second opening 122 may be altered to change the limits of the angulation. For example, in an embodiment, the second opening 122 is positioned so that the angulation range is from 10° to 30°. Other embodiments may allow for different amounts of angulation or for different angulation ranges. If the transverse connector 30″ cannot be angulated in a desired direction when a first section 46 is placed on a first elongated member 28, the first section may be removed from the elongated member and placed on a second elongated member to allow the transverse connector to be angulated in the desired direction. A second opening 122 in a holder 112 may allow a first section 46 of a transverse connector 30″ to be rotated relative to a second section 48 of the transverse connector. Elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32 may be vertically parallel, or the elongated members may be vertically skewed relative to each other. If the elongated members 28 are vertically skewed relative to each other, the amount of skew is typically less than about 5°, but the skew may be as large as 20° or more. The ability to rotate the first section 46 of the transverse connector 30″ allows the transverse connector to be coupled to vertically skewed elongated members 28. To allow a first section 46 of a transverse connector 30″ to be rotated relative to a second section 48 of the transverse connector, a shaft 108 of the first section is allowed to rotate within a lining 104. In an embodiment, height H of a second opening 122 in the second section 48 is slightly larger than a diameter D of the shaft 108. The height H of the ax second opening 122 allows the shaft 108 to be rotated a full 360° relative to the second section 48. In an alternate embodiment, which is shown in FIG. 22, the height H of the second opening 122 is smaller than the diameter D of the shaft 108 of the first section 46. A flat surface 110 of the shaft 108 may limit the range of rotation of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48 to a useful range. If a user tries to rotate the first section 46 beyond a limited range, an edge of the flat surface 110 will contact the holder 112 and inhibit rotation of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48. The flat surface 110 of the shaft 108 and the second opening 122 may allow the first section 46 to rotate relative to the second section 48 about plus or minus 45° (for less than a 90° range of motion), preferably less than plus or minus 20° (for less than a 40° range of motion), and most preferably less than about plus or minus 10° (for less than a 20° range of motion). FIG. 21 shows an embodiment of a transverse connector 30″ with a first section 46 that is rotated relative to a second section 48. Limiting the range of rotational motion of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48 may inhibit the rotation of the first section into unusable positions. Unusable positions of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48 are positions that do not allow for easy instrument access to tool openings 74 of the transverse connector 30″. For example, an embodiment of a transverse connector 30″ may allow the first section 46 to rotate 360° relative to the second section 48. When the first section 46 is rotated 180° relative to the second section 48, the elongated member opening 40 of one of the sections will be oriented upwards, while the elongated member opening of the other section will be oriented downwards. The tool opening 74 of a cam system 42 that fastens the section with the upwards facing elongated member opening 40 to an elongated member 28 will not be easily accessible, and therefore, the transverse connector 30 is in an unusable position. Limiting the range of rotational motion of the first section 46 relative to the second section 48 may allow for easy instrument access to all parts of the transverse connector 30 that need to be tightened without excessive manipulation of the transverse connector. Elongated member openings 40 of a transverse connector 30 may be placed over elongated members 28 of an orthopedic stabilization system 32. Cam systems 42 may be used to fasten the transverse connector 30 to the elongated members 28. A cam system 42 may be positioned within a cam system opening 60 in each section 46, 48 of the transverse connector 30. FIG. 20 shows a cross sectional view of an embodiment of a transverse connector 30″. The sections 46, 48 of the transverse connector 30″ may include cam system openings 60 for cam systems 42 (only one cam system is shown in FIG. 20). The cam systems 42 and cam system openings 60 for an adjustable transverse connector 30″ may be the same as the cam systems and cam system openings for a fixed length transverse connector 30′. FIG. 13 shows an embodiment of a cam system 42. FIG. 23 shows an embodiment of a head 56 of a bender 52. The head 56 may include two pockets 134 and 136. The first pocket 134 may be used to bend a fixed length transverse connector 30′. The second pocket 136 may be used to bend an adjustable transverse connector 30″. FIG. 24 shows an adjustable transverse connector 30″ positioned within benders 52, 54. The benders 52, 54 may be used to “tent” the transverse connector 30″ so that a middle portion of the transverse connector is the highest portion of the transverse connector when the transverse connector is installed in a patient. To form a transverse connector 30″, a first section 46, a second section 48, and a lining 104 are machined. Cam systems 42 are also machined. The elongated member opening surfaces 50 and/or the contact surfaces of the engagers 68 may be textured so that the coefficient of friction between the surfaces and elongated members 28 placed against the surfaces will be high. Cam systems 42 are inserted into cam system openings 60 of the first section 46 and the second section 48. The cam systems 42 are inserted into the cam system openings 60 until the surfaces 82 of the cam systems pass the shoulders 62 of the openings. A lining 104 is placed within a holder 112 of the second section 48. A shaft 108 of the first section 46 is inserted through the holder 112 and lining 104. End 116 of the shaft 108 is peened or flared to inhibit removal of the first section 46 from the second section 48. A fastener 106 is coupled to the holder 112. FIG. 7 shows an alternate embodiment of an adjustable transverse connector 30″. The transverse connector 30″ may include first section 46, second section 48, and fastener 106. FIG. 25 shows a cross sectional view of a portion of the transverse connector 30″. The first section 46 may include shaft 138. The shaft 138 may include flared end 140. The second section 48 may include tapered collet 142 and hollow shaft 144. The fastener 106 may be a collar that is compression locked to the collet 142. The collet 142 may include holding members 146, ledge 148, longitudinal slots 150 and shoulder 152. The collar 106 may include a tapered bore 154 and tabs 156. The taper of the bore 154 may substantially correspond to the taper of the tapered collet 142. A maximum diameter of the collet 142 may be greater than a maximum diameter of the bore 154 of the collar 106. The tabs 156 may be placed within the longitudinal slots 150 in the collet 142 to couple the collar 106 to the second section 48. The tabs 156 and the diameter of the bore 154 relative to the diameter of the collet 142 may limit the axial range of motion of the collar 106 relative to the second section 48. The shaft 138 of the first section 46 may be inserted into the hollow shaft 144 of the second section 48. The flared end 140 of the shaft 138 may contact the ledge 148 of the collet 142 to inhibit the first section 46 from being separated from the second section 48. A length of an adjustable transverse connector 30″ shown in FIG. 7 may be adjusted by sliding a first section 46 axially relative to a second section 48. Also, the first section 46 may be rotated relative to the second section 48. The ability to rotate the first section 46 relative to the second section 48 allows the transverse connector 30″ to be used with elongated members 28 that are skewed relative to each other such that the elongated members are not vertically parallel. When a desired length and rotation of the transverse connector 30″ is established, the position of the first and second sections 46, 48 may be fixed to inhibit movement of the first section relative to the second section. A portion of the shaft 138 may include a flat surface. An insert positioned and fixed within the hollow shaft 144 may limit the range of rotational motion of the first section 46 within the second section 48. An edge of the flat surface of the shaft 138 may contact an edge of the insert to limit the rotational range of the first section 46. Without an insert, the shaft may be able to rotate 360° within the hollow shaft. An insert within the hollow shaft 144 may allow the first section 46 to rotate relative to the second section 48 about plus or minus 45°, preferably less than plus or minus 20°, and most preferably less than about plus or minus 10°. FIG. 26 shows an embodiment of a locking instrument 158 that may be used to fix a position of a first section 46 of a transverse connector 30″ relative to a second section 48. The locking instrument 158 may include first jaw 160, second jaw 162, first handle 164, and second handle 166. The first jaw 160 may be abutted against a shoulder 152 of a collet 142. The second jaw 162 may be abutted against front end 168 of the collar 106. Squeezing the handles 164, 166 together forces the collar 106 onto the collet 142 and compress the holding members 146 of the collet against the shaft 138 of the first section 46. Enough force may be applied to the collar 106 to frictionally lock the collar to the collet 142. An outer surface of the shaft 138 and/or an inner surface of the holding members 146 may be roughened to increase the coefficient of friction between the first section 46 and the second section 48. Also, the inner surface of the collar 106 and/or the outer surface of the collet 142 may be roughened to increase the coefficient of friction between the collar and the collet. To establish a bone stabilization system 32 using an adjustable transverse connector 30″, a pair of contoured elongated members 28, or a single elongated member that is bent and contoured to fit on adjacent sides of a bone 34 or bones that are to be stabilized, may be coupled to the bone or bones being stabilized. The elongated members 28 may be coupled to the bone 34 or bones by fixation elements 36, as shown in FIG. 3. If necessary or desired, the transverse connector 30″ may be bent using a pair of benders 52, 54 so that a middle portion of the transverse connector will be the highest part of the transverse connector when the transverse connector is installed in a patient. A first section 46 and a second section 48 of the transverse connector 30″ may be placed over the elongated members 28 so that the elongated members are positioned within elongated member openings 40 of the transverse connector 30 at a desired location. The length, angulation, and rotation of the transverse connector 30″ may be adjusted so that the elongated members 28 are positioned within the elongated member openings 40 with a large contact area between the elongated member opening surfaces 50 and the elongated members. A torque limiting wrench 94 may be placed on the transverse connector 30, and a shaft 92 of a drive tool 86 may be inserted through the hollow shaft 96 of the torque limiting wrench. A head 88 of a drive tool 86 may be inserted into a tool opening 74 of a first cam system 42 of the transverse connector 30. The drive tool 86 may be rotated to rotate the cam system 42 while applying counter torque with the torque limiting wrench 94. Rotating the cam system 42 may extend a cam 70 into an elongated member opening 40 so that the cam presses the elongated member 28 against the surface 50 of the elongated member opening. The drive tool 86 may be removed from the tool opening 74 of the first cam system 42. The drive tool 86 and torque limiting wrench 94 may be repositioned so that the torque limiting wrench engages the transverse connector 30 and the head 88 of the drive tool 86 is inserted into the tool opening 74 of the second cam system 42. The drive tool 86 may be rotated, while applying counter torque with the torque limiting wrench 94, to force a cam 70 against the second elongated member 28 so that the cam presses the second elongated member against the second elongated member opening surface 50. The torque limiting wrench 94 and the drive tool 86 may be repositioned so that the torque limiting wrench engages the transverse connector 30 and the head 88 of the drive tool is inserted into the tool opening 74 of the fastener 106. The fastener 106 may be tightened. A torque wrench 132 may be inserted into the opening 128 of the handle 90. The torque wrench 132 may be used to tighten the fastener 106 while counter torque is applied with the torque limiting wrench 94. Other transverse connectors 30 may be attached to the elongated members 28 at other locations along the lengths of the elongated members. a fastener configured to inhibit rotational movement of the first section relative to the second section during use, wherein the fastener comprises a collar that is configured to compress the collet and a distance between the first section fastening system and the second section fastening system is adjustable. 2. The connector of claim 1, wherein the first section and the second section are inhibited from becoming uncoupled. 3. The connector of claim 1, wherein the collar is coupled to the collet to limit a distance that the collar can be moved away from the collet. 4. The connector of claim 1, wherein the first section and the second section are configured to be angulated relative to each other within a limited range of angulation that is less than about 60°, and wherein the fastener inhibits change in angulation during use. 5. The connector of claim 4, wherein a lower limit of the limited range of angulation is about 0°. 6. The connector of claim 4, wherein a lower limit of the limited range of angulation is greater than 0°. 7. The connector of claim 1, wherein the limited range of rotational motion is less than about 90°. 8. The connector of claim 1, wherein the limited range of rotational motion is less than about 60°. 9. The connector of claim 1, wherein the limited range of rotational motion is less than about 40°. 10. The connector of claim 1, wherein the fastener inhibits adjustment of the distance between the first section fastening system and the second section fastening system during use. a lining positioned between a portion of the first section and a portion of the second section. 12. The connector of claim 11, wherein the first section and the second section are inhibited from becoming uncoupled. 13. The connector of claim 11, wherein a lower limit of the limited range of angulation is about 0°. 14. The connector of claim 11, wherein a lower limit of the limited range of angulation is greater than 0°. 15. The connector of claim 11, wherein the first section and the second section are configured to rotate relative to each other. 16. The connector of claim 11, wherein the first section and the second section are configured to rotate relative to each other within a limited range of rotational motion less than about 90°. 17. The connector of claim 11, wherein the first section and the second section are configured to rotate relative to each other within a limited range of rotational motion less than about 60°. 18. The connector of claim 11, wherein the first section and the second section are configured to rotate relative to each other within a limited range of rotational motion less than about 40°. 19. The connector of claim 11, wherein a distance between the first section fastening system and the second section fastening system is adjustable, and wherein the fastener inhibits distance adjustment during use. wherein change in the offset distance between the first part and the second part of the elongated member is inhibited when the collet is compressed by the collar during use. 21. The connector of claim 20, wherein a range of rotational motion of the first section relative to the second section is limited to less than 360°. 22. The connector of claim 20, wherein a range of rotational motion of the first section relative to the second section is limited to less than 90°. 23. The connector of claim 20, wherein a range of rotational motion of the first section relative to the second section is limited to less than 40°. 24. The connector of claim 20, wherein the first section is inhibited from being removed from the second section. 25. The connector of claim 20, wherein the collar is linked to the collet to limit a range of motion of the collar relative to the collet. 26. The connector of claim 20, wherein the first section further comprises a fastening system, the fastening system configured to couple the first section to the elongated member. 27. The connector of claim 26, wherein the fastening system comprises an opening in the first section configured to accept the elongated member, and a setscrew. 28. The connector of claim 26, wherein the second section further comprises a fastening system configured to couple the second section to a second elongated member. 29. The connector of claim 28, wherein the elongated member and the second elongated member are portions of a unitary, contoured member. 30. The connector of claim 28, wherein a distance between the first section fastening system and the second section fastening system is adjustable, and wherein the fastener inhibits distance adjustment during use. 31. The connector of claim 20, further comprising a compression instrument configured to compress the collar against the collet. 32. The connector of claim 20, wherein a surface of the collar that contacts the collet comprises texturing. a fastener configured to fix a position of the connecting member relative to the holder during use. 34. The connector of claim 33, wherein the first section is configured to rotate relative to the second section. 35. The connector of claim 33, wherein a range of rotation of the first section relative to the second section is limited to less than about 90°. 36. The connector of claim 33, wherein a range of rotation of the first section relative to the second section is limited to less than about 40°. 37. The connector of claim 33, wherein a range of rotation of the first section relative to the second section is limited to less than about 20°. 38. The connector of claim 33, wherein the first section is configured to be angulated relative to the second section. 39. The connector of claim 33, wherein a range of angulation of the first section relative to the second section is less than about 60°. 40. The connector of claim 39, wherein a lower limit of angulation of the first section relative to the second section is about 0°. 41. The connector of claim 39, wherein a lower limit of angulation of the first section relative to the second section is greater than 0°. 42. The connector of claim 33, wherein a range of angulation of the first section relative to the second section is less than about 20°. 43. The connector of claim 42, wherein a lower limit of angulation of the first section relative to the second section is about 0°. 44. The connector of claim 42, wherein a lower limit of angulation of the first section relative to the second section is greater than 0°. 45. The connector of claim 33, wherein the fastening system comprises an opening in the first section configured to accept the elongated member, and a setscrew. 46. The connector of claim 33, wherein the elongated member and the second elongated member are portions of a unitary, contoured member. 47. The connector of claim 33, wherein a distance between the first section fastening system and the second section fastening system is adjustable, and wherein the fastener inhibits distance adjustment during use. a fastener configured to inhibit rotational movement of the first section relative to the second section during use, wherein the fastener comprises a collar that is configured to compress the collet. 49. The system of claim 48, wherein the first elongated member and the second elongated member are portions of a unitary, contoured member. 50. The system of claim 48, wherein the first section and the second section are inhibited from becoming uncoupled. 51. The system of claim 48, wherein the collar is coupled to the collet to limit a distance that the collar can be moved away from the collet. 52. The system of claim 48, wherein the first section and the second section are configured to be angulated relative to each other within a limited range of angulation that is less than about 60°, and wherein the fastener inhibits change in angulation during use. 53. The system of claim 52, wherein a lower limit of the limited range of angulation is about 0°. 54. The system of claim 52, wherein a lower limit of the limited range of angulation is greater than 0°. 55. The system of claim 48, wherein the limited range of rotational motion is less than about 90°. 56. The system of claim 48, wherein the limited range of rotational motion is less than about 60°. 57. The system of claim 48, wherein the limited range of rotational motion is less than about 40°. 58. The system of claim 48, wherein the fastener inhibits distance adjustment during use. International Search Report for International application No. PCT/US 01/31016, mailed on May, 2, 2002. U.S. Appl. No. 09/680,756; filed Oct. 6, 2000; McBride, et al. U.S. Appl. No. 09/684,628; filed Oct. 6, 2000; McBride, et al.
2019-04-24T14:18:26Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/US6872208B1/en
Week in, week out, Maria Sharapova makes it through to the final stages of tournaments. You have to go back to last year’s Wimbledon last 16 for the last time she was beaten before the semi-finals of a tournament. More often that not though, Maria, who is not ranked number two for nothing, has come second best. Kvitova beat her at Wimbledon ’11, Azarenka in Australia ’12, Beijing ’12, Miami ’11 Indian Wells ’12, to name a few, Serena at the Olympics ’12 and the WTA finals ’12. But these losses have not dented Maria’s spirit. If anything, they have strengthened it. Time and time again she has turned to her opponent on the podium and congratulated them for being the better player on the day with nothing less than a smile on her face. And, courtesy of her finding strength in her defeats, of coming back the week after and contesting the final stages, she has been, now and then, the recipient of the same acknowledgements; when Azarenka and Williams have been absent from the finals, it has been the ever-present Maria, bar the odd blip here and there (Miami 2012, cough), who has lifted the trophy. In 2011, Maria beat Stosur in Rome and Jankovic in Cincinnati. In 2012, she beat Li Na in Rome, even got a win over Azarenka in Stuttgart and beat Errani in the French Open final. Four of those titles have come on clay, one on hard. And that run of clay court wins in 2012 saw her reclaim the number one spot for a few weeks. But only a few. The rest of the season saw her resuming her now familiar place of posing beside the winner, smiling sweetly with the runner’s up trophy in hand. So,while, being the competitor that she is, Maria would not have wished for Serena to continue her boycott of Indian Wells or for Azarenka to withdraw from her last eight match, the draw would not have displeased her. The prospects of Errani, Kirilenko, and Wozniacki would have made sleeping somewhat easier than a Li Na, Azarenka or Williams encounter looming. Maria’s fans, and there are millions of them, would have slept easier, too. Spoiled by her earlier career victories from 2004-2008 at Wimbledon, the WTA finals, the US Open, Indian Wells, the Australian Open, the relatively lean times of the past few seasons have been at times frustrating, like having been allowed free reign in the chocolate factory and then being restricted to quarterly supervised visits. And while they, like Maria, would have liked to have gotten their fingers sticky with candy on the back of beating a Williams or an Azarenka, beating Wozniacki in the final was far more preferable than losing to her, which had this match occurred pre 2011, might have happened. But the 2013 Maria is closer to the 2008 model than ever. Her final display against Wozniacki who had wins over her in Indian Wells ’11 and the US Open ’10, was laden with the hard hitting ground strokes that were missing in those wilderness years when she was susceptible to being beaten by anyone who could keep the ball in play, a practitioner of which Caroline is one of the world’s best. But Maria is out of the wilderness now and those groundstrokes can be unleashed at will and find the lines once more. And while with her high risk games comes errors, she keeps the winner to error margin big enough to keep herself out of the danger zone. Hitting 33 winners to 25 errors, while her opponent hit 2 to 19, Maria Sharapova did not hang around in her quest to add another elite trophy to the cabinet as she beat Wozniacki 6-2, 6-2. No doubt Maria will be there in the final stages next week. The question is what role will she be playing should she meet Williams in the final? Will it be the smiling bouquet holding bridesmaid or will she and her fans have the keys to the chocolate factory once more? Down a set and a break in the Indian Wells final to Del Potro, Rafael Nadal dashes to his far right of the court, gets his racket on the ball, and sends it back to Del Potro. The Argentine takes another strike, belting a forehand into the far left of the court. Nadal scurries across and once more sends the much-abused ball back to his opponent. Del Potro strikes again. This time the forehand just misses the line. Del Potro had gone for too much. But he had had to. Unable to hit through the ‘hard’ court, unable to withstand his opponent’s defense, it was all or nothing. He had to go for the lines to strike winners and he had to strike winners to beat his opponent. While his defensive game has improved, he was never going to win a grinding battle against Nadal. The only game that was going to win him this match was the one built around getting into position and assaulting his opponent with that forehand, one of the most varied and potent in tennis. That game had worked for the first set and a half. He had been able to thwart his opponent’s defense, that mighty forehand tearing it down. But the longer Nadal is on the court, be it clay, hard or grass, the better his chances are. The more he runs, the more pumped-up he gets. And the tougher the battle gets, the harder he bites, and those teeth are sharp. It was at a set and a break up in favor of Del Potro when the Argentine had to put Nadal away or else face the pain that is a fighting Nadal. Though Del Potro went for the lines, the ball just kept coming back and Del Potro started to miss. The kind of form that it takes for a big hitting giant like Del Potro to hit through these slow hard courts is, after all, temporary. On the other hand, the kind of class a player like Nadal has is permanent. Despite his seven month absence from the top flight of tennis, despite an opponent on the back of beating his big match nightmares Murray and Djokovic, despite not winning a hard court tournament since 2010, Nadal not only managed to get the balls back but also to attack when the moment arose, showcasing the hard court prowess that saw him win two hard court slams and multiple masters titles. At 2-3 down in the second set, Del Potro serving, Nadal took matters in hand, defending and attacking in equal measure. And once he had broken back, once that forehand of his was on form and he had the Argentine on the run, unable to hit forehand winners, the chances of Del Potro winning the match shortened. Nadal, after all, is a matter of the tennis match, working his way into the game and then getting a grip on the momentum once he has swung it his way. Once Nadal broke Del Potro, the Argentine’s chances were all but gone. Counting him out would have been foolish considering his comeback win against Djokovic in the semi-finals but this was the Indian Wells’ final against one of the greatest competitors in the game. Finals and semi-finals are different beasts for players like Nadal, they bring out their very best when the trophy is courtside ready to be engraved with their names, and the third set saw a Nadal as consistent as ever, those ground strokes as unrelenting and that attitude as competitive as it had been before his disappearance from the tour last June. Nadal put Del Potro under pressure as the third set got underway, making him fight for more than ten minutes to win his opening service game of the third set. It was now a case of how long Del Potro could stay in the match as he misfired his forehand and his legs began to wilt from covering all the corners of the court in the midday heat. With his game now collapsing, there would only be so many epic service games he could survive. With Del Potro looking vulnerable, Nadal did not let up. Nadal kept getting him on the run, took his chances and lapped up his opponent’s errors, pumping his fist and firing himself up. The Spaniard broke Del Potro at 1-1 with a forehand winner into the open court. Nadal’s muscle memory is not limited to his limbs alone. His brain had not forgotten to win as much as his hitting perfect topspin forehands had not escaped his arms. In front and having played himself into the match, Nadal kept his form and won the match with some fine attacking tennis in the final game, moving forward when the chance arose to hold two championship points. One was enough. Hitting deep, loopy forehands to Del Potro’s forehand side, the Argentine, not in the mood to trade forehands, went for a shot down the line but the ball went wide and Nadal fell onto his back. It was his 22nd Master’s title, putting him back at the top of the all time Masters 1000 leader board. More will likely come this Spring when Nadal next plays on the red clay courts of Europe, a chance to extend his lead at the top of the Master’s leader board and engrave his name even deeper into the hall of all-time Greats. Petra Kvitova emerged from the wreckage of the 2013 Dubai Premier tournament silverware in hand. She did so without having to face either of the world’s two best hard court players, world number one Serena Williams and recently crowned Australian champion Vika Azarenka. Though Kvitova’s draw was tough, beating Ivanovic, Radwanska, Wozniaki and Errani, it was not one made up of the two current hard court Major Champions. And it would have been one thing if both women had played and been beaten in the draw but neither of them struck a ball. Kvitova merely looked on as both women turned up in Dubai but limped off before their opening matches. With the draw already done, Suarez Navarro, a lucky loser, was placed in Azarenka’s spot in the draw while spectators missed out on the scheduled Williams-Bartoli encounter. The world’s top two were subsequently fined for their late and inconvenient withdrawals. But it had all the fairness of a parent spanking a child who hid before the swimming race after having spent all morning performing medal-winning pirouettes. It was not just Kvitova and the tournament that looked on as both players hobbled away out of pocket. It was the fans, too. The very fans who would have bought tickets to the event after seeing Williams’ and Azarenka’s faces on the tournament promotions, faces they would have remembered only too well from last year’s ultra-competitive and entertaining US Open final. The excitement of perhaps seeing them in another hard court final would have been fueled even further by the Doha final the day before the start of the Dubai tournament, a final that went to three and in which Azarenka got her first win over the freshly re-crowned World number One Williams in ten successive attempts. Yes, you read correctly. The final of the Doha Premier tournament was played the day before the start of Dubai. The two premier tournaments are played back to back, Doha being a Premier 5, Dubai a premier. Though it takes only 40 minutes to fly from one destination to another, and they would have flown first class, factor in the checking out of the hotel, the checking in at the airport, the disembarking of the plane, the checking into the new hotel, after a week of playing tennis at the highest professional level, contesting a three set final against your top rival and then the prospect of all of that all over again, and straight off the bat for Serena who would have faced no less than Bartoli in her opening match, and the withdrawals seem, though not excusable, somewhat understandable. Had fans seriously considered the stresses put on both Williams’s and Azarenka’s bodies, and those hard courts punish the players considerably, they would have done well to refrain from buying tickets expecting to see them in the Dubai final and bought their tickets instead to spectate two professional tennis players, regardless of who they are, competing for champion status and the ranking points and prize money that come along with it at the highest levels of the sport. Many would have done that but nevertheless there would have some disappointed fans seduced by the glitz of the promise of the world’s top two’s participation, expecting to witness the two divas decked in jewels sweating it out for the title only to find that both women were tucked up in bed instead, their mugs full of cocoa, jewels on their dressing tables, feet freshly spad and well and truly rested. Those two resting divas would not have been watching Errani and Kvitova duke it out though. After all there is nothing these two women love more than fighting it out in finals. They too would have been as disappointed as the fans that they could not compete. Wouldn’t you, if you loved your job, and you were the very best at doing it, and yet you could not handle the demands and had to flake out? Having already played in 3 tournaments, one of them a Major, and going far in each of them, both women had certainly been playing their part in the WTA’s seven week old 2013 season. And another 15 or more tournaments, another eight months of checking in and checking out and pounding the body against fierce competition lies ahead before a two month ‘break’, if you call training and improving your game in order to be ready for the first Major of the next season which starts two weeks into it a break. The fitness necessary to come back at the crack of the new season and take the spoils is not gained from letting your hair down on the beach for more than a few nights. Thus the women have to find breaks in the tour itself, too, or face the consequences of early-curtailed careers a la Henin, Hingis and Clisters. If their bodies say stop, they have to listen, and if it happens to be on the eve of a big WTA tournament then someone has to suffer and somewhat humanly neither player is going to make that someone themselves. Had there been perhaps a week’s rest between the final and the first round, then the fans, the WTA , the sponsors and the players would have all gotten what they wanted. The tour is too long, the competition potentially too deep to not have it any other way. But it is another way. The WTA’s way. You see, Indian Wells and Miami go back to back in less than a fortnight and then comes the clay. Doha and Dubai have to be back to back because that is where the money lies and the WTA is a business and Williams and Azarenka their top employees and with that comes both great rewards and great demands. And with those demands come consequences such as injuries and late withdrawals and fines rather than what those demands were designed for and which the WTA anticipated with their roadmap: the rivalries and ratings, anticipations which have gone unfulfilled and created a situation where the only real winners are the WTA chiefs. Kvitova won though. And the fans saw a three set final. And as long as there are players there will be finals and the wheels will keep spinning and the sponsors money will continue to pay the bills and the bonuses. Unfortunately for Williams, Azarenka and the fans, who after all want to see the best players and rivalries more than anyone, the wheels of Serena and Vika stopped spinning and they not only paid with their bodies and their resumes but with their savings, too. The WTA though took the sponsors money and will no doubt be readying their next promotion for Miami and Indian Wells, demanding that players compete in both, promising the fans they will; yet those in the know, and even worse, they, the WTA themselves, know that a promise from the WTA means as much as the player’s health and safety do to those unfair parents of the game that were meant to help the players grow into and reward them for being the best professionals they could be rather than leave them hobbling out the gates and taking to their beds, sometimes for a few weeks or months, and sometimes, in the case of recent number one Safina, for good. For a while we had gotten used to the status quo: Vika at number one, Serena beating her in the latter rounds of tournaments. Last week though we had to adjust to a reversal of fortunes; it was Serena who was the top ranked player and Vika who had the W over Serena on her record. It looked like we might be on the dawn of a new Serena era at the start of the year. Overwhelmingly favored to win in Melbourne, she bowed out in an injury-hit quarter-final. It was Azarenka who went on to take the title, proving as she did so that she was the hard court player to beat of this era. This match was Azarenka’s chance to affirm that statement. Serving at 5-4 in the first set tie-break with a mini-break in hand, it looked like she might. But a double-fault gave rise to whispers that Vika did not have the mental strength to beat a woman who had dealt her nine consecutive losses, four of them while she was number one in the world. But it was all whispers and hearsay. Azarenka held her nerve and took the set. Things were very much there between her ears. The last time she had lost to Serena in the US Open final she did not have the experience of finishing a season number one, rising above a media storm concerning her Medical time out in her Melbourne semi, and defending a Major title. She was a better player than she had been back in September in New York; a stronger one. Of course, Serena was not going to just let the first set slip out of her hands without a fight. She had fought tooth and nail to make the business end of the week, coming back from 1-4 in the third against Kvitova in the last eight, and with the number one having come to her as her fine results piled up, she would do her best to dress it with another title, potentially her eighth in the last 12 months. Nailing aces and winners, she took the second set 6-2, breaking away at 2-2 to turn the momentum her way. No one on the tour is a better front runner than Serena and it looked unlikely that Azarenka would turn matters around. But perhaps the run of games from 2-2 against her had actually worked in Vika’s favor. Unable to have a say in proceedings, Vika took somewhat of a breather. Meanwhile Serena had been cranking up the intensity and continued to do so as she blasted a forehand return winner down the line at 0-0 for 0-30. Vika took on the third set with gay abandon, moving forward on the next point to hit a forehand winner and surprising Serena with her sudden attack as she hit another forehand winner. Vika hit her first serve big and kept up the depth and pace on her forehand to draw errors from Serena to take the first game of the third and get out of the rut. Vika did not look back, breaking a somewhat bamboozled Serena for 2-0, her depth of shot and angles paying dividends, a forehand winner sealing the break. Try as Serena did to fight her way back, Vika was her good old solid self while Serena hit more errors than winners. Holding her nerve, Vika served out for the match, a big first serve drawing an error off the return from Serena. Beating her fist on her chest and pointing her forefinger skyward, Vika knew that this win meant more than who was at the top of the rankings, a status she knows Serena sees only as an inevitable conclusion to good results and not a worthy achievement in itself. This win was solid proof that Vika was Serena’s worthy adversary on hard courts and a promising sign of things to come should they meet in Miami in April, Serena’s home and one of her favorite tournaments and a venue where Vika is a two time Champion, beating Serena in the 2009 final. With the dust well and truly settled on Novak and Vika’s trophies, the tennis review looks back on the five lessons learned from the Australian Open 2013. 1. Everyone loves a one-handed backhand. No doubt the best reaction of the fortnight was to Stanislas Wawrinka’s so-near-but-yet-so-far performance against Novak Djokovic in the last sixteen. Taking the ball on the rise, Stanislas hit his single-handed backhand with flair, liberty and creativity in what was a quite moving attempt to live up to his potential and take a big scalp at a Major. Time and time again he hit that backhand crosscourt and down the line for winners, a shot his opponent could do nothing about other than wait for it to start to miss. While he may have started missing in the end as the reality of actually delivering hit home, Stanislas’ talent did not pass by anyone as the tennis world reacted to his signature shot with nothing less than absolute admiration. 2. No one loves a tactical ‘medical time out’. The crowd and tennis fan’s reaction to Azarenka’s well-timed medical time out as Sloane Stephens was about to serve to stay in the second set was nothing less than damning. Clumsy back tracking could not save Azarenka from a media and fan backlash. And deserved it was, too. Gamesmanship might be part of tennis but it is not, at the business end of a Major, acceptable. Alas the culture of tennis allows it to go on and it is up to tennis to ensure that it is a player’s game and not their gamesmanship that wins them the match. 3. Tennis gets the number ones it deserves. The slow injury-inducing courts, the punishing heat, the lack of warm-ups, these were the conditions that the powers that be provide and the two players who thrived were the two most consistent, the two best defenders, two of the fittest if not the fittest players, and the two world number ones, Novak Djokovic and Vika Azarenka. They may not have the most flair or be the most likeable number ones, but tennis is not a popularity contest. It is a sport and the number one is the one who plays and wins the most and these two do exactly that in conditions that could not favor them any better. 4. The courts need to be speeded up. Time and time again we watched as smashes and volleys were picked up from the back of the court, beyond the painted Melbourne signs, and sent past the player at the net for winning lobs and passing shots. Defensive players ruled in Melbourne and the attacking players lost out as they made unforced errors on their fifth or sixth attempt for a winner, frustrated at why the old game of coming forward and being aggressive was no longer the winning one on supposed fast courts that just refused to be hit through. While the gasps and oohs and aahs added to the atmosphere, there is no accounting for the zzzzzzs and shrieks of laughter that told all about some of the matches missed by the casual viewer. The courts need to be sped up a notch so that both aggressive and defensive players have a chance and to stop the game being more about athleticism than tennis skills. Defensive players have their surface, the red clay, and they get four solid months of it from February to June. The fast court players and the all court players deserve a real fast hard court to practise their skills, too, before grinding and not shotmaking become the norm and the zzzs drown out the gasps. 5. Pick yourself up and move on. Twice Ni La fell and got back on her feet in the Women’s final. The first time she injured her ankle, the second time she knocked her head. Each time she came back out and competed with the world’s most consistent hard courter, Azarenka. The crowd loved her for it. If ever there was an example of getting back up on your feet, this was it. And though she lost, it hardly mattered to the crowd who applauded her as she lifted the runner-up plate more generously than they did the winner. Li Na promised she would be back next year to try to do one better, and after this display, we will take her word for it. For the briefest of moments, it seemed like like the outrageous promise might be kept. Breaking Federer’s serve at 1-1 in the tiebreak with another pace laden forehand to draw an error, the young Australian pumped his fist and took in the roar of the crowd. Consolidating the mini-break with a forehand winner at the net to lead 4-1, he was three service winners from leveling at a set all and, with the momentum swinging his way, who knew what could happen at the start of the third. Serving at 5-3, Tomic looked to be in control of the point as he hit to Federer’s forehand and backhand, getting him on the run, hitting down the middle, mixing it up and looking to find the opening that would not come as the Federer ground strokes refused to break down. Federer, having had enough of dancing to Tomic’s tune, injected some pace on his forehand into yet another soft ball hit to the middle of the court. Tomic fed off the pace, hitting to the Federer forehand corner, but not hard enough for the Swiss moved comfortably to the ball, hitting a forehand back to Tomic, who, the exciting prospect of the open court before him, went for a forehand down the line, but, out of position, he hit the ball wide. The moment had gone. Federer was back in the tiebreak. At 6-5, Tomic serving, Federer attacked the Tomic backhand with a flat forehand, following the shot up to the net, however the approach was unnecessary as Tomic’s shot went long. Federer had won the set and was one set away from beating both Tomic and the hype. The hype had begun even before 2013 had gotten underway when Tomic beat Djokovic in straight sets in the Hopman Cup. Certainly he had played well, with an improved serve and his forehand finely tuned, adding an extra punch to his varied and fluid game. If that was not enough to get the media excited with the home Major just a few weeks away, Tomic won his first title in Sydney, stating beforehand that he was ready to win his first title and the result proving he was a man of his word. With the draw having been made for the Australian Open the day before the Sydney final, the title victory for Tomic had people already talking about the third round prospect of a meeting between the freshly first-titled Tomic and the as yet 2013 debuted Federer. But they were not just talking about the potential clash of the past and new generations, they were implying that an upset could be on the cards, that Tomic, who in the previous Major in New York had been accused of tanking and whose Davis Cup performance had the national press in uproar, on the back of a win against Djokovic at a home exhibition event and a run to a title during which he did not beat a member of the top 20, this very same Tomic was ready to beat a man who was number two in the world, the reigning Wimbledon Champion, a man who was perhaps the Greatest player in the history of tennis, a man who was still at the top of his game, a four time champion in Melbourne, who had not lost before the semi-finals since 2003. Tomic’s comments before the match that Federer might not make the last 32 were as unrealistic as the home Media’s expectation that if the 17 time Major winner did make the last 32, his run would end at the undoubtedly fine hands of their new fickly-crowned King. Of course, in a tennis match it is about what happens on the day. Two players compete and whoever has the better day wins. But one player usually, based on past form and match ups, goes in as the favorite. With Federer ending 2012 as a WTF finalist, beating the likes of Murray in straights, and leading Tomic 3-0 in their head to head including a straight sets drubbing here a year back, all signs would point to Federer being the favored victor. Perhaps the hype was a little misty-eyed at the memory of homeboy Mark Philippoussis straight-setting world number one Pete Sampras in 1996 in the third round. But that was a whole different ball game. Sampras had only won once in Melbourne and the two had met in the previous Major in New York with Sampras coming back from a set down to win. Philippoussis, with his huge serve and forehand, was a bad match-up for Pete, and a victory was within his capability at that point. While, as the first two sets proved in Federer and Tomic’s match last night, Tomic can compete with Federer, the third set demonstrated why the Australian was never going to be a threat. Once Federer had Tomic beaten mentally, that moment when it seemed Tomic might be able to sustain his high level and edge out the Swiss in the second set being scuppered and the reality of the Swiss’ superiority hitting home, Federer did not relinquish his grip, unleashing his flair and creativity to wipe the floor with the hyped-one. After surviving a break point in the opening game, he broke Tomic immediately and ran away with the set 6-1. It was a victory for Federer which laughed in the face of the hype and called it out for what it was. And it was a defeat for Tomic that, from the way in which he fell to the side so swiftly in the third, would, if he were to admit it, not have come as a surprise. The Australian is very much on his way to challenging the likes of Federer but he is not there yet and he would do well to beat a big name in a Major before stating otherwise. His words before this third round match, while understandable considering his age and his talent, were exposed as empty promises, and anyone who expected him to keep them, considering his lack of previous deeds to back the promise up, was as much a victim to the hype as the hype, its hollow screams no doubt filling the Swiss with a desire to silence it, was a victim to the ever-hungry Federer. When hitting partners Novak Djokovic and Stanislas Wawrinka took to the Rod Laver Arena for the night match on the middle Sunday of the Australian Open there was quite a void to fill. Nothing had really happened that day. Every match had been won in straight sets. There had been no drama, nothing to write home about. There was a huge space the size of a thousand tennis courts waiting to be filled with something special. There were few hopes that these two would provide it. Djokovic led Wawrinka 11-2 in their head to head and had won the last ten matches. Djokovic was the two time defending champion. Wawrinka has yet to make a Major semifinal. So, when Wawrinka came out of the blocks to break at 1-1, tennis fans rubbed their hands. At the very least we were going to see Djokovic tested, it was better than nothing; we had had enough of nothing that day. What we got was very much something. Wawrinka had another break point at 2-1 which he took, ending a huge rally in which every inch of the court was used with a backhand crosscourt winner. That signature single-handed backhand firing, the Service on top form, the forehand hitting winners, Wawrinka entered the zone as he raced through the set in 22 minutes, sealing set point with a forehand crosscourt winner that painted the line. We were not just spectating a test. As Wawrinka broke again at the start of the second set and went on to lead 4-2, it looked like we might even witness the Swiss’ greatest win of his career. The seventh game, as it is prone to be, was a big one. Wawrinka tightened up, beginning to miss on his ground strokes, as his backhand twice found the net to go down 0-30 but with Djokovic erroring more than usual, Wawrinka managed to win a deuce game courtesy of a Djokovic return out. Wawrinka had survived that test, after Djokovic held to love, his biggest one was to come. Serving for the set at 5-3, 30-30, Wawrinka netted a forehand. It was break point Djokovic. Anyone watching who was aware of Djokovic’s tennis history knew that unless Wawrinka served out for this set now then the odds were that he would go on to lose the match. When Djokovic’s backhand got the net cord and trickled over to give the Serbian the break, luck announced itself as being on the Serbian’s hard-working side. A long game at 5-5 on Wawrinka’s serve showcased what Djokovic does best as he defended, retrieving balls which once upon a time would have been good enough for winners, making Wawrinka hit one last shot and reaping the rewards from his never say die mentality as those last shots went long or in the net. The World number one broke and then served out for the set. A forehand down the line winner on set point, the Serbian attacking as he can when it matters most, set to the soundtrack of his loudest grunt yet, and Djokovic leveled the match at one set all. It was here that we thought that like many before him Wawrinka would fold, the mental energy exerted in the first two sets leaving him spent, the idea of seeing ball after ball come back, of the noise of Novak’s feet squeaking all over the court, of being run from side to side, being enough to see him wave the white flag. But Wawrinka did not go away. Though the winners were not flowing as freely as they had in the first 50 minutes of the match, the single handed backhand still produced enough winners and drew enough errors to get Wawrinka roaring and keep the crowd engaged in the match. While Wawrinka tried his best, Djokovic was as consistent as a World number would be, his defense never breaking down, attacking when the chances came, qualities that trumped those of Wawrinka’s as the Serbian took the set to lead 2 sets to one and though the outcome seemed inevitable, the battle was bloody enough to stay and spectate. Both men were giving their all and producing at times breathtaking tennis. At 5-5 a beautiful volley from Wawrinka had the crowd gasping, the Swiss conducting their cheers. Spurred on by the crowd’s support and his continuing good form, Wawrinka took the mini-break in the tiebreak with a backhand down the line winner, going on to win the breaker 7-5 with a forehand winner from mid-court. The crowd were on their feet while the two players must have been wondering just how torn up theirs would be by the time this was over. Whatever happened now, that void that had been there at the start of the match had been filled. There had been enough drama and entertainment to make up for the slow day. But when Wawrinka broke at the start of the set, the prospect of one of the biggest upsets in Australian Open history looked, considering how the Swiss had managed to stay with the Serbian all this time, a possibility. However it was a brief one as Djokovic broke back. The two men held serve, with the length of the match taking its toll as Wawrinka battled with cramps and Djokovic had injury issues, too. At 4-4 though, it seemed that the end might be in sight as on break point Wawrinka’s backhand, which was called out, looked to have been an incorrect call. The Swiss asked the Umpire what he thought and was confidently reassured it was in while Djokovic who had the best view having been standing before the ball kept his head down and said nothing. Wawrinka accepted the word of the Umpire and Djokovic went on to win the game. Replays would later show the ball had been in. Had Wawrinka used his last challenge, which would not have been such an issue as he would be awarded 3 more at 6-6, he would have had another chance to break to serve out for the match at 5-4. Had the Umpire been more on the ball, then the overrule would have made it a non-issue, or if he had admitted he did not know if it was in or not, Wawrinka would have used that challenge and got justice. As for the World number One’s silence, well no one asked him though he was gesturing the ball was out, and it is not his responsibility but nevertheless he did seem mighty angry a few games later when the same linesman made an incorrect call against him. His face a picture of rage, Novak’s displeasure at being robbed was clear for all to see. Luckily for the Serbian, the call was overruled by the Umpire. Games went with serve, and easily too. The match had now taken on classic status, going on to past midnight and lasting more than four hours, the first classic of the season’s first Major. Four times Wawrinka served to save the set and succeeded but at 10-11, the Djokovic defense finally broke him down. On his third match point, the Serbian hit a backhand passing shot to win the match 12-10 in the fifth. Djokovic roared and tore off his shirt as a tearful Wawrinka left the court. Whether he was ruing his chances at 5-3 in the second or not challenging that call or just expressing the pain of defeat, maybe he was experiencing all three, only the Swiss knows but any tennis fan who witnessed his performance can testify that while we saw a Djokovic whom we know only too well, we saw a Wawrinka we had never met before, one we were very pleased to meet and one whom we would very much like the pleasure of meeting again. Svetlana Kuznetsova, coming off a six month injury-induced break, faced Caroline Wozniacki, now ranked ten and defending quarterfinal points in Melbourne, in the last sixteen of the Australian Open. The Russian was playing to climb back up the rankings from the seventies where she currently dwells while the Dane was playing to halt her slide from number one that began a year ago on the very same Rod Laver Arena. Only two weeks ago, Sveta won their match in Sydney, reducing her deficit in their head to head to 3-5. Like that encounter, the two split the first two sets. As she did in Sydney, Sveta came out hitting big ground strokes. booming down serves and coming to the net, the Russian reminding us why her name is engraved on the US and French Open trophies. The second set was all Wozniacki as she waited for the first dip in Sveta’s form and then pounced, moving Sveta around, chasing down every ball, and getting the errors, playing the tennis that brought her the number one ranking for 67 weeks. But it was not all defense as Wozniacki played more aggressively than she had during her reign, hitting her twelth winner of the match in the set, a vital addition that critics demanded she implement in order to win a Major; however, while it has yielded some great performances and a couple of titles, it has not delivered her that elusive Major or helped her climb back into the higher echelons of the top ten. She is now, naturally, more prone to make errors as she goes for big shots in points where once she would have just gotten the ball in play and waited for the error, which against players like Sveta, had worked wonders. Now she is going for more winners, but while she may have won in Moscow and Seoul at the end of last season, her results across the board have not improved. And she is still reluctant to go for winners when matters get tight, her natural defense coming into play, thus not really reaping the rewards of a change in style. Still, she persists with the new style with the same tenacity that she plays with, the tenacity that got her to the pinnacle of the game in the first place, the tenacity that saw her become one of the hardest players to beat on the tour. Ask Sveta about that. Twice Wozniacki has come from a set down to beat Sveta, if she could maintain her level of play, she could make it a third. Sveta’s comfort break did not do anything to disturb Wozniacki’s momentum, breaking Sveta at the start of the third but the Russian broke back immediately. Serving at 1-2, Sveta saved five break points held by the Dane, saving the first and second with a sublime drop shot and a lob which had spectators wondering just why she had not won more than her two Majors. Sveta had to save another two set points serving at 2-3. The first she saved with a down the tee service winner. The second with another service down the tee followed by a big forehand, then another big forehand cracked down the line for a winner. Withstanding the pressure put on by an opponent who has made her career out of applying it quite liberally, Kuznetsova took the long deuce game, briefly interrupted by a confrontation between Wozniacki and the Umpire. Wozniacki claimed to be disturbed by a linesman call that a Sveta service was out, a call overruled by the umpire, and a call that had come after she had sent the return into the net. Asking the Umpire if he had ever played tennis, and telling him he would understand her if he had, the Dane seemed to be the one who was teetering on the edge of this encounter. At 3-4, Wozniacki had another break point, saved by the Russian as she hit two backhand volleys, the second for a winner, her doubles prowess on show. Another game where she was under pressure survived as Wozniacki netted a forehand error and it was 4-4. Now it was Sveta’s time to apply some pressure, holding a break point. Wozniacki fired down a service winner. Deuce. Sveta performed a drop shot and winning passing shot combination that had the purists purring. Break point. Wozniacki attacked her opponent with her groundstrokes, drawing a backhand error from a Sveta who was close to doing the splits at the back of the court. The Deuce game went on, Wozniacki went toe to toe with Sveta in the rallies and finally held her serve, her increased aggression paying off. 5-5 and memories were stirred of their 2009 US Open encounter which was decided on a final set tiebreaker, a match where Sveta had big chances to win but crumbled under the pressure. A forehand error from Woznaicki as she went for a winner, a backhand volley from Kuznetsova, and a pace-laden backhand down-the-line winner and Sveta inched closer to getting a measure of revenge as she held three break points, her aggressive manner too much for the Dane. Wozniacki saved the first as she went for broke on her forehand, going cross-court and forcing an error from Sveta. The Dane saved the next one as Kuznetsova hit a forehand error on the service return. One more break point to save. But now it was the Wozniacki forehand’s turn to break down as Sveta cracked an inside out forehand down the line and Wozniacki netted the return. Sveta had the break and would serve for the match. This was not a guarantee she would win it, though. Fans have sat through countless matches where Sveta has led and then needed someone to perform the hiemlich maneuver on her but tennis being an individual sport she was left to spit out the prospect of victory, now chewed into a big ball of defeat, herself. Sveta fired down a service winner. 15-0. On the next point, she cracked a forehand down the line, moved in and then drove a forehand volley at the net. 30-0. The prospect of winning seemed to be going down the right hole this time. A forehand winner down the line from Wozniacki, keeping up the aggression in her bid to break, and it was 30-15. Shuffles could be heard as Dr. Heimlich began to make his move, unable to bear another attack when she had done so well to make it so far back. A cross-court backhand from mid-court pulled Wozniacki out wide and had her on the stretch to get her racket on the ball, the result being an error and two match points for the quarterfinal for Sveta. The Dr took a step back and looked on. Sveta struck her service down the tee, flew in and then blitzed the short return down the line for a winner. The Dr and Sveta’s fans will be on hand for her quarter-final against Azarenka, the defending champion. Sveta will have her work cut out to remove the crown from Azarenka’s head, but if there is anyone to do it then there are few better than players who have worn crowns themselves and would not mind another one. And when Sveta plays as she has been doing this week, then who is to say she could not go as far as moving another step closer to the throne. Li Na beating Agniezszka Radwanka (henceforth known as Aggie) on a hard court should not be considered an upset but a formality. But the numbers, 8 and 4, the respective seeds of the two, meant that should Li Na win, an upset it would be. But a quick glance at their playing styles is enough to give a good idea of who should be the victor at a hard court Major, a surface that should favor the attacker. Aggie is a deadly consistent, super-defensive, never say die type who wins Premier titles; Li Na is a big-hitting player who on her day can beat anyone, as she did on her run to the French Open final in 2011 and her run to the final in Melbourne in 2010. On a hard court, Li Na has proven to be the more effective, thrashing Aggie as she has in Beijing and Montreal in past encounters. But in their most recent battle in the Sydney semifinal, with both women on a 8 match winning streak, Aggie’s defense got the better of Li Na’s attack, an attack which on its day can be so bad that its wretchedness is too strong for even Li Na herself. Aggie was still on her winning streak when the two met today in the first Melbourne quarterfinal to be played, 13 matches and counting, yet to drop a set.Things looked like they might continue in this marchly fashion as a Li double fault handed her a break point. Aggie got busy doing her thing, the thing that has gotten her to world number four. She hit to the backhand, to the forehand, moving Li Na from side to side until Li Na fell into the trap. Having had enough of being on the other end of Aggie’s string, Li Na did what she does best, she went for her shot, going down the line with the forehand. But it was too much, too soon, as it so often is, which was exactly what Aggie had wished for, and the shot went wide. Aggie, whose inner delight at her strategy paying off in such an important match would have, if it had manifested itself on her face, resulted in a smile as wild as the Jokers, had broken and would serve for the set, a repeat of the Sydney result on the cards, the possibility of her first Australian Open semifinal from three attempts a game and a set away. A set down to Radwanska is no enticing prospect for any one. And Li Na was having none of it. Li went on her own march at this point. She painted the line with a forehand winner, hit a down the line forehand winner for 30-0, spun a winning forehand passing shot to earn three break points and took the first one as she ripped a backhand down the line return to force an error of Aggie and break back. Li Na held and then with Aggie serving, turned her level up a notch as the two traded ground strokes. Biding her time, refusing to be frustrated into an error, Li Na hit a huge forehand down the line for a winner to get set point. A winning smash and she was a set up. But as quick as Li Na can up her level, she can implode. And Aggie loves an implosion, winning 8 points in a row as the balls that had been painting the lines now graffitied errors. Li Na, for whom implosions can last until Game, Set and Match is called against her, ended the run with a forehand drive volley, her seventeenth point at the net, before going on to win the game with an ace, the implosion survived, an unusual silky patience veiling her play. At 1-2, a backhand down the line off a short ball and she had break point. She had turned it up again, smacking a back hand down the line on the return to force an error. 2-2. A perfect forehand volley at 15-0 and Li’s intentions were clear. This match was going to be won by her aggression and not by her being run ragged. And it was an intention she was in the mood to carry out, as she forced another rare forehand error from Aggie, leaving the Pole roaring in frustration, a condition she usually forces on her opponent. Another error, a backhand into the net, and it was Game Li Na. A backhand winner down the line, another one hit off a classic Aggie softball designed to draw an error, a forehand volley winner to the backhand corner and Ni La had dismantled the Pole who gave away the break with a double fault. 4-2 and another backhand down the line winner and Li Na had won nine points in a row to make 40-0, a backhand into the net ending the streak. A heavy backhand hit to the Aggie backhand forces and error and seals the game. Aggie made her last stand, serve and volleying to bring the run of five games against her to an end, a play she rarely does but unable to defend, she had no choice but to attack. Serving at 5-3, Li saw what she already knew: that the Pole was not going to go away. Digging balls back in play, she hustled an error off Li for 15-40. A chance. A year back Clisters had come back from match points down against Li, a defeat that reduced the Chinese to tears. That defeat had clearly taught her well. Employing controlled, patient hitting, Li Na hit the ball deep and drew a forehand error from Aggie. On the very next point, Li Na did the very same routine, yielding the same result to get to deuce. She was not going to collapse in a heap of errors in the latter stages in Melbourne again, her weaknesses overcome as she found safety in the margins. The threats of break points passed, in the safer territory of deuce, Li went for her shot and struck an angled backhand crosscourt winner. Match point. She went for it again, going for a forehand down the line, her play-making rewarded as Aggie’s errored on the backhand, to win the match. Her first Major semifinal since that historic Roland Garross victory earned, thanks to her new controlled aggressive net-friendly game, flowered in part by her new coach Carlos Rodgriguez, Henin’s former ‘boss’, Li Na had finally emerged from the weed-ridden wilderness she has been in the last season, the ghosts of her meltdown here last year put to rest, the prospect of another Major final to be played for ahead. Serving for your first Major semi-final is hard enough. But serving out against David Ferrer, a man against whom you need to hit three winners to make one, makes it even harder. Nothing but self-belief and the execution of the game that had the beating of the man up to that point will do. And you would have to play that game on the final point or else be lured into his web, worn down and devoured. Nicolas Amalgro was about to serve out for the match against Ferrer. He would hope to get it done in one or else let Ferrer smell fear and attack. Amalgro had played his best to get himself into a position to finally break his Major quarter-final duck. Inspired, he had been hitting single-handed backhands down the line and serving like the big server he is, to claim the first set 6-4. In the second, he kept up his high level, a backhand cross-court winner grabbing him the break at 4-4. At 5-4 serving, a service winner, a forehand down the line and two more service winners and Amalgro was two sets to love up against a man who had beaten him 12 times and from whom he had never taken two consecutive sets. In the third set, he survived break points and frustrated his opponent into shouting at himself and smashing his racket. His backhand was firing, his forehand was working well, and most crucially, he had yet to be broken. All of this should have computed into this mind that he was capable of rallying against history and pulling this upset off. But the mind, as tennis shows us time and time again, does not work on ‘should’. The game could not have started off better as he strikes a forehand down the line at the net. 15-0. 3 more points and he would have his first victory over Ferrer and his first Major semi-final. The two contest a long rally. The longer it goes on, the more you are drawn into Ferrer’s web. Ferrer can run all day, and if he thinks it will work in his favor, he will make you run even longer, sending you past the sidelines as he finally gets his open court. Amalgro knows, having been drawn into the web 12 times and always been gobbled up. Yet to be lured in this match, he goes for the shot that has never worked for him better than in this match: the backhand down the line. Running to the backhand corner, he strikes the ball down the line. All those times it had gone in and now it was long! And when he needed it to be in, too. It was too much too soon. Not the making the Major semi-final; he had already made three quarter-finals at Roland Garros, it was time to move on the next stage. And not the beating of Ferrer: 12 times is 11 times too many to lose to the same man. No. He had hit the shot too soon. He had not been in position. On the next point, he would do better. And on the next point, he went for the backhand down the line, again. And again it went out. Again he had not been ready. An ace. 30-40. A drive volley to the forehand and then another drive volley to the forehand for a winner. Deuce. Two more points. The rally goes on. And on. In Ferrer’s web, Amalgro goes for a big forehand cross-court but his arm is stuck in the webbing. He misses. Another break point down. Another long rally. Amalgro looks to disentangle himself but Ferrer strikes, the open court there, as he had planned, for the taking, his feet in position. A forehand winner down the line from Ferrer and he the number four seed has the break back and is back in the match. 5-5. Amalgro’s chance had slipped through his fingers. Ferrer took advantage while Amalgro was sombre with the sober reality. Ferrer held serve and then broke to love as Amalgro missed a forehand down the line. The fourth set. Experience tells the spectator that Ferrer will go on to win. Oh the arrogance of experience! we scream. At 1-1, Amalgro paints the lines, gets the winners and forces the errors to break Ferrer to 15. 2-1. Ferrer breaks back; experience, it would seem, is misunderstood. Amalgro shouts. He knows experience worse than anyone out there. 12 defeats. No Major semis. Ferrer holds to love. Amalgro survives a long deuce game, serving his way out of trouble. He fights history, fights experience, fights Ferrer, fights himself. It’s a lot to fight. But Amalgro has it in him as he breaks Ferrer for 4-3. He has to hold to get his chance again. Two aces are the perfect start. But then he is back in the web again and break point down. Amalgro hits a drop short, then a passing shot, but Ferrer hits a winning volley for 4-4. Amalgro refuses to lie down and be devoured. Not today.4-4, break point Amalgro. Ferrer attacks from the inside out forehand hitting to the backhand, going for the lines and then goes to hit his trademark inside out forehand down the line but it is out. Ferrer challenges and Amalgro reassures him the call was correct as they sit down. 5-4, serving for the match. The second time. He was playing well. Better than well. Amalgro is put on the defense and hits 2 errors to go down 0-30. A forehand winner and there is hope, but hope is all it is. Ferrer attacks his backhand. Amalgro moves to hit an inside out forehand down the line. It hits the net. Well, he had been playing well. Facing two break points, Amalgro attacks, coming to the net and putting pressure on Ferrer to come up with a passing shot. Ferrer errors and one break point is saved. One more break point to save for now, and Amalgro is on the run, goes for the forehand down the line and paints the line for a winner. Here he was, playing well again. Deuce. Ferrer musters all the intensity he can, and it is quite a mustering, and forces Almagro to hit a backhand long. Yet another break point. Amalgro saves it with a second service winner with slice down the tee. Deuce. This is when he needs to play well, right now, and get to match point. On the next point, Amalgro cleans the line with his backhand and full of confidence goes for a forehand down the line. It misses. Another break point down and for Amalgro it proves to be too many blows to the face. Ferrer is unrelenting, spinning his web, those legs never tiring, and he forces a backhand error to get the break. But though his serve might have been broken, Amalgro’s resolve to win this match was not, still standing in the gales of doubt being blown at him by his opponent’s tenacity. A long deuce game follows. Back and forth, they wrestle control but another forehand error from Ferrer and Amalgro has his third chance to serve out for the set. Ferrer shouts and smashes his racket. Experience tells him that when he fights like this, he gets to wear the belt. It tells him Amalgro cannot beat him, Amalgro does not make Major semis. He does. 7 of them. Third chance, third time lucky? Amalgro serves with new balls. Before he knows it, he is 15-40. A smash and it is 30-40. A forehand down the line and he has failed, for the third time, to serve out for the match. Perhaps, after all, he really was not ready. But there is no perhaps about it; he isn’t. That failure to serve out for the match a third time would prove to be the final blow. In the tiebreak, Amalgro has another opponent: cramps. Ferrer takes the tiebreak 7-3, a pace-laden forehand struck right at Amalgro, who, unable to take the pace, makes an error, winning Ferrer the fourth set. On the changeover, Amalgro gets treatment and covers his head with a towel as he lies on his back. In the final set, Ferrer keeps on spinning and a trapped Amalgro can only fight so long. At 2-2, Ferrer hit a big return to Amalgro’s body which Amalgro nets. Broken, now all Amalgro can do is lay in the web, his wings fluttering lamely, his legs cramping up, his final buzzes drowned out by the hungry grunts from the ever-spinning approaching spider. A winning lob at 4-2 Ferrer and Ferrer has the second break. He stands over Amalgro now, ready to take his bite. His thirteenth, and for the ever-starving Ferrer, it will be as delicious as the previous twelve. He does not have to be too violent either in case the fly should buzz away. On the changeover, Amalgro approaches a sitting Ferrer and taps him on the knee and offers his congratulations. One wonders if a fly has ever rubbed its nose on the jaw of a Spider just before it closes them. On match point, Ferrer comes in and hits a forehand winner at the net. It is Game set and match Ferrer. The two embrace at the net. Experience was not so arrogant after all.
2019-04-25T04:41:38Z
http://www.thetennisreview.com/page/60/
This is the first in a series of articles about food under global warming. This article takes a long view of the relationship between climate, agriculture, and class society. When people think of the impacts of climate change, sea level rise is often the first that comes to mind. Two recent studies have concluded that the loss of large parts of West Antarctica is now a question of when not if, with sea level rises of around 3 metres as soon as the next couple of centuries. New research also suggests that both East Antarctica and Greenland are more vulnerable than previously thought. The prospect of coastal cities, like Norfolk, VA, abandoned to the sea stirs the apocalyptic imagination, but the timescale is centuries to millennia. Food may turn out to be a much more pressing issue. The latest IPCC report suggests that climate change will reduce agricultural yields on average by up to 2% per decade in a context of demand rising by 14% each decade.1 With higher amounts of warming – business as usual could mean 3°C or more by 2100 – the prospects for agriculture get worse. And regional climate change can diverge quite significantly from the global average. With warming, things also get far less predictable, since anything above 2°C is unprecedented in the last million years (human agriculture has existed for around 10,000 years). Under scenarios of high levels of warming [business as usual], leading to local mean temperature increases of 3-4°C or higher, models based on current agricultural systems suggest large negative impacts on agricultural productivity and substantial risks to global food production and security. The future of food production therefore faces much uncertainty due to climate change. For many, the go-to common sense is Malthusian - overpopulation. There's simply too many of us, so someone [black, brown, poor, elsewhere] has to go hungry. For others, the solution lies in the extension of capitalist property regimes through the privatisation of agrarian commons, and the accelerated application of biotechnology to agriculture. For the peasant international La Via Campesina and their Western NGO allies, the solution lies in 'food sovereignty', empowering subsistence producers on the land. To address the future of food, it will first be helpful to consider the past. A long historical view offers important perspective on the relationship between climate, agriculture, and class society. The genus Homo emerged around 5 million years ago, while the species Homo sapiens, our own, the sole extant species of the genus, emerged around 200,000 years ago. Agriculture emerged only around 10,000 years ago. This transition, which took place independently in at least six global centres, is known as the Neolithic revolution. What relevance does ancient history, or strictly speaking, prehistory, have to today? We think there are two main points of relevance. First, the Neolithic revolution represents a dramatic, and ultimately global transformation of the mode of (social re)production, induced in part by climate change. As we face even bigger climate change, we think there are some important lessons about how such transitions take place. Second, there is a common association between the spread of agriculture and the rise of class society. We wish to challenge the 'common sense', promoted by popular writers like Jared Diamond, that we can have agriculture or egalitarianism, but not both. For the avoidance of any doubt, we do not discuss the transition to agriculture out of any desire to return to a hunter-gatherer mode of subsistence. Historically, such a mode of subsistence supported only around 5 million people, far short of the 10-11 billion likely to populate the Earth by the end of the century.2 A return to pre-agricultural living is neither possible nor desirable. But a long historical view puts contemporary questions of climate, food, and class society into the proper perspective. ...the post-glacial warming up of the climate entailed a progressive shift from a cold steppe ecosystem, characterised by the dominance of artemisia to a savanna ecosystem characterised by the dominance of oaks and pistachios, rich in wild grains (barley, spelt, emmer wheat, etc) and also other exploitable plant resources (lentils, peas, vetch, and other legumes), as well as various game animals (wild boars, deer, gazelles, aurochs, wild sheep, wild goats, rabbits, hares, birds, etc) and in some places fish. However, this abundance created only the potential, but not the necessity for a transition to agriculture. In fact, it is believed that agriculture would have initially meant longer and harder work than hunter-gathering. For hunter-gatherers, there was no distinction between work and play, and in fecund environments at least, only a few hours hunting or foraging each day was sufficient for a band to reproduce itself. For this reason, hunter-gatherers have been dubbed 'the original affluent society', since leisure was abundant and the work-play distinction absent. So why did they take up agriculture? It would be a mistake to generalise, since this process happened independently in widely dispersed places. Candidate factors include population growth exceeding the capacity of the environment or coercion. However, it would also be a mistake to dismiss agency, that is, choices to live differently. Agriculture did not emerge immediately following the post-glacial warming. The weakness of deterministic accounts is stressed by Mazoyer & Roudart, who insist that "as necessary as this revolution appears after the fact, nevertheless it cannot be explained by nor is it reducible to this necessity."4 Furthermore, the knowledge, tools, and capacity for agriculture were present far before it was widely adopted. As David Cleveland writes, "it seems unlikely that a lack of basic knowledge prevented humans from taking up agriculture earlier."5 In this respect, the Neolithic revolution was a break which occurred through the recombination of existing knowledge, tools, and social organisation into new forms of life. Jared Diamond's popular account links the calorie surpluses made possible by agriculture with the emergence of non-producing social strata, that is to say, the stratification of society into classes. For Diamond, “with agriculture came the gross social and sexual inequality, the disease and despotism, that curse our existence.”6 However, calorie surpluses were possible even in hunter-gatherer societies, and as one critique of Diamond points out, "there are certainly many non-state horticultural and agricultural societies."7 Diamond's determinist account is probably the most influential, but it also has strong similarities with many Marxist ones (via Engels and Mumford), as well as primitivist or anti-civilisational perspectives (which accept the equation of civilisation with class society, and thus oppose both). A powerful critique of the Marxist version of stagism is set out by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari.8 They draw on the work of anthropologist Pierre Clastres to reject the idea of history as a linear development from primitive to advanced stages.9 Deleuze and Guattari's critique rests on three points: (1) development seems to 'zigzag' back and forth rather than pass gradually through successive stages; (2) the archaeological record and anthropological theory supports the existence of sudden breaks and discontinuities, i.e. the emergence of a state or city without passing through all the supposedly intermediate stages, and; (3) what they call 'reverse causality', that is, the ability of something which does not yet exist to exert causal force on the present. We can extend the notion of anticipatory causality to the present. Just as the state haunts non-state societies and must be continually warded off, the dissolution of hierarchy haunts state societies. It too must be warded off, if the state is to reproduce itself. The modern state is the capitalist state: guarantor of private property and a major agent of capitalist development. The state is haunted by communism – stateless, non-market self-organisation. This helps to explain the violent repression of seemingly harmless public square occupations and disaster communities, as well as the constant xenophobic demonization and repression of migrants and the hyping of terrorism, among other things, as existential threats to the national body. The state is never established once and for all, it must continually ward off the threat of communism which haunts it. The emergence of agriculture, and civilisation itself, was made possible by climate change at the end of the last ice age. A few degrees of warming dramatically transformed ecosystems. Agriculture emerged in at least six independent centres, and cannot be explained by a linear, stagist account. Societies chose to revolutionise their mode of subsistence, albeit under circumstances not of their choosing. This revolution made use of knowledge and tools already present in hunter-gatherer societies, but recombined them in a new mode of (social re)production. The emergence of settled agricultural civilisations and class society was sometimes contemporaneous, but these were distinct processes. The earth only supported around 5 million hunter-gatherers and there is no going back. The challenge is to organise agriculture in a sustainable way to feed 10-11bn people. By sustainable, we mean a way which doesn’t undermine its own conditions of production, for example by driving climate change, making pollinators extinct, or depleting the soil. Ecological science is indispensable here. In future posts we will look at the emergence of specifically capitalist agriculture through enclosures, colonialism, and plantation slavery. Then we will be in a position to look at the current problems and future possibilities for feeding the world under unprecedented conditions of climate chaos. 2. This estimate comes from Mazoyer & Roudart (2006), A history of world agriculture: from the Neolithic age to the current crisis, Earthscan, p.65. 3. Mazoyer & Roudart, p.75. 4. Mazoyer & Roudart, p.98. 5. Cleveland (2013), Balancing on a planet: the future of food and agriculture, University of California Press, p.55. 6. Diamond (1987), The worst mistake in the history of the human race, Discover Magazine. 7. Antrosio (2011), The many origins of agriculture. Living Anthropologically, http://www.livinganthropologically.com/anthropology/many-origins-of-agriculture/. 8. See A thousand plateaus, proposition XI from page 427. They call this linear stagism 'evolutionism', meaning a gradual accumulation of small changes. This is in line with Darwin's view of evolutionary change. Writing in 1980 in French, Deleuze and Guattari were seemingly unaware of Eldredge and Gould's 1972 notion of punctuated equilibrium, which somewhat reconciles evolution with relatively rapid shifts at critical thresholds. 9. By contrast, primitivism accepts this historiography, but performs a normative inversion where the ‘primitive’ is good and civilisation is bad. 10. This kind of anticipatory causality features heavily in game theory, where not just present facts but future expectations structure decisions. A more contemporary example would be the fact the Cold War is incomprehensible without World War III – the prospect of nuclear Armageddon exerted causal force even though it was never actualised. A return to pre-agricultural living is neither possible nor desirable. But a long historical view puts contemporary questions of climate, food, and class society into the proper perspective. Edited to correct a typo: it gave the hunter-gatherer population as 500,000, it should be 5,000,000 (i.e. 5 million). This article omits a couple of important factors regarding the origins of class society, and furthermore puts forward a couple of fallacious notions. Firstly, there is no word on the role of mother-right in primitive communist societies, nor on the importance of the accompanying division of such societies into tribes and gentes (often with the intermediate phratries). This is not very surprising considering the fact that the scientific community still hasn't recovered from the reactionary assault led in the early 20th century against this theory of mother-right - a theory which, I might add, was broadly accepted until then. In contemporary scientific literature we do find reference to it, often in passing, with the usage of terms such as matrilocality, matrifocality and matrilinearity. However, these notions do not nearly constitute as holistic a framework as did the theory of mother-right in its origin formulation. This is not to say that Morgan (who was the first to develop mother-right beyond mere speculation and into a scientific account), nor Engels for that matter (who, along with Marx, accepted Morgan's general arguments and wrote his reflective 'The Origin of the family...' on the subject) were infallible. Indeed, many of the details in Morgan's prime work (Ancient Society, 1877) are dated, and his division of the history of society into the rigid stages of savagery, barbarism and civilization seems in retrospect quite naive. The same applies to Engels work (The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, 1884), though in a lesser degree, for he was already able to develop some of Morgan's notions by placing them in a historical materialist framework. Secondly, there is no word on the role of animal husbandry in the formation of class society. Cattle was one the first forms of means of production to yield a surplus product, and, more importantly, it was movable property, unlike the land used in agriculture. In many instances the formation of class society can be traced to the introduction of animal husbandry and the bequeathing of a father's movable property to his children instead of to the gens (which in itself presupposes the introduction monogamy and therewith the dawn of sexual inequality). Even today, in less developed parts of the world, cattle still plays an important role in exchange and as a measure of social status. Thirdly, you'd be hard-pressed to find any kind of "linear stageism" in Marx, unless you rely on the distortions by some of his more dogmatic interpreters. Of course, Marx often described historical stages of society, but these were by no means to develop linearly in the sense as it is used in the article, i.e. that these historical stages absolutely had to follow each other, had to necessarily develop into each other and that they would do so in an ever-progressing linear fashion etc.. For Marx these stages truly were historical in that they had come into being in the course of history under specific circumstances necessitating their development; consequently, if these specific circumstances were to be absent, their development would not take place (at least not as per the general historical modes of production Marx outlines). This conception is only linear in the sense that capitalism could only have developed historically out of a ripe feudalism, not in the sense that every particular social body must first go through the ordeal of feudalism before arriving at capitalism (Marx, in his Letter to Vera Zasulich, clearly refutes such views). Lastly, Deleuze & Guattari's notion of "reverse causality", at least as it is described in the article, is absolute nonsense. Obviously, there is no such thing as a "reverse" causality, as such would contradict the very notion of causality. Likewise it is impossible for "something which does not yet exist to exert causal force on the present". That the centralization of power constantly looms over the heads of egalitarian peoples, as this article posits, and that they therefore constantly seek to diffuse power through social practice to avert the realization of this threat, attests of no more than that the simple fact that tendencies towards the centralization of power are already present and that these peoples therefore apprehend this threat sensuously, in its actuality. Hi, thanks for the comment. Our aim here wasn't so much to give a comprehensive account of the origins of class society. That would require looking at the processes involved in each case, since there's no reason to assume they were all the same. Our aim is much more modest: simply to show that the emergence of agriculture and class society are not the same thing (and so by implication, creating an egalitarian society doesn't mean abolishing agriculture). A gendered division of labour may well have given rise to the first class relation, though there seems to be a lot of just-so stories and disagreement in this area. Again, there's no reason to assume this was uniform across hunter-gatherer bands, and as it doesn't relate directly to agriculture we left it out. We don't attribute a linear, stagist model to Marx (although you can certainly find instances of this kind of thinking at times). In terms of 'reverse causality', as ever, D&G's terminology invites such objections. We opted for 'anticipatory causality', which seems to better capture Clastre's discussion of mechanisms for 'warding off' centralised power. Hi, I enjoyed this article. However I looked over it a few times but I'm still not sure whether this is really shown or if it's just stated. "Agriculture does not necessitate class society." Then a quote from mainstream literature that says co-operation and self-organisation are possible. I mean, of course, I'd say the same thing too, but I'm not sure if anything here convinced me of that. Nor am I sure you could really cover that in this article... but then you summarised it as doing so. So... *shrug* Probably bad reading comprehension on my part. Still learnt some interesting stuff, like the role of climate change during the development of agriculture. And loved the passage about communism haunting the state. Really looking forward to the follow ups, cheers. Anthropologists had long documented herders and agriculturists featuring non-government forms of political organization, where leaders had no abusive power–the best leaders could persuade, but had no coercive authority. Classic examples of political organization in non-state societies include The Nuer for a pastoral society (Evans-Pritchard 1940) and the film Ongka’s Big Moka (Nairn, Strathern, and Strathern 1976). Antrosio (2011), The many origins of agriculture. Living Anthropologically, http://www.livinganthropologically.com/anthropology/many-origins-of-agriculture/. Catal Hiiyiik, in Anatolia, makes possible a singularly reinforced imperial paradigm: it is a stock of uncultivated seeds and relatively tame animals from different territories that performs, and makes it possible to perform, at first by chance, hybridizations and selections from which agriculture and small-scale animal raising arise. (...) the State is established directly in a milieu of hunter-gatherers having no prior agriculture or metallurgy, and it is the State that creates agriculture, animal raising, and metallurgy; it does so first on its own soil, then imposes them upon the surrounding world. Feinman goes on to say inequality cannot simply be an “epiphenomenon” of agriculture–inequality must be examined on its own terms, since social inequality can show up in non-agricultural societies. Moreover, agricultural societies can be relatively egalitarian. So in sum, there are examples of both agrarian and hunter-gather societies across the spectrum from egalitarian to inegalitarian. So agriculture is not a sufficient cause of social inequality (and state formation), and is not even a necessary condition for some degree of social inequality (though probably is necessary to sustain, if not to create a state, as even Deleuze and Guattari argue the emergence of a state quickly meant a shift to agriculture). Our aim here wasn't so much to give a comprehensive account of the origins of class society. That would require looking at the processes involved in each case, since there's no reason to assume they were all the same. I'm not suggesting they were absolutely the same, but there is a wealth of data on the subject that does suggest similar origins. Thus the dissolution of mother-right and with it gentile society is likely to have coincided with, among others, the rearing of cattle, and with this dissolution class society soon began its ascendance etc.. The origins of class society has not so much to do with the gendered division of labour, but more probably with the emergency of the monogamous family unit through inheritance in the patrilineal line, a form of association directly opposed to gentile society, and which has been marked from its inception by the inferior position of the woman in the household for the same reasons. We don't attribute a linear, stagist model to Marx (although you can certainly find instances of this kind of thinking at times). Then why refer to it as marxist? To do those who grossly misinterpret Marx a favor? To confuse people into believing that marxism somehow entails a "linear stagist" view of history? At any rate, such views aren't very common anymore even among the broad circle of self-styled marxists, except perhaps among some Stalinists somewhere; presenting this as the marxist view is more than just a little disingenuous. Also, I would honestly like to know where you did find in Marx instances of "this kind of thinking"? The man wasn't perfect, but one does not simply make such claims without actually proving them, y'know. In terms of 'reverse causality', as ever, D&G's terminology invites such objections. We opted for 'anticipatory causality', which seems to better capture Clastre's discussion of mechanisms for 'warding off' centralised power. I'd say 'anticipatory causality' just repeats the same mistake, but with a different wording. Why bother calling it a form of 'causality' anyway? There is only one kind of causality, it applies to everything in the universe, and it does not move in reverse. In any case, I don't necessarily agree with the notion behind the words. Egalitarian societies, without any prior knowledge of the state, cannot anticipate the state as such. As I already said, they may react to existent tendencies within their circle towards centralization of power, but these tendencies do not reveal themselves as moving towards a state as such. Moreover, it may not even be the case that this diffusion of power always happens consciously; in many cases it is simply a side-product of the unconscious reproduction of classless society. Besides, this supposed 'constant threat of the state' would only become an actual threat once the normal reproduction of classless society fails - say, for example, by the dissolution of mother-right, the emergence of animal husbandry, conditions of scarcity, extended periods of inter-tribal warfare and the consequent increased dependence on military commanders etc.. Re: mother-right, it seems to be controversial, with several feminist anthropologists considering it a myth reflecting more recent masculine assumptions and patriarchal mythology. Furthermore, matrilineal descent didn't necessarily mean women had power or property, only that social identity followed the mother's line (Frances Mascia-Lees and Nancy Johnson Black (2000), Gender and anthropology, Waveland Press, pp.52-55). It's not obvious that Engels was right on this. Given as it seems controversial in the anthropological literature and we could make the argument without it, it didn't seem worth going into as it would take an article in itself just to set out the controversy, let alone weigh it all up and take sides. Then why refer to it as marxist? Because Marx and Marxism are not the same thing, and because lots of Marxists still cite Engels as the go-to text on this, e.g. the SWP (until very recently the biggest Marxist organisation in the country). In terms of Marx espousing linear developmentalist views, the most obvious case is the Communist Manifesto, but it also crops up elsewhere (e.g. passages in the German Ideology). Some Marxists (e.g. Trotsky) thought this view was problematic and developed more multilinear accounts (e.g. uneven and combined development/UCD). You can find passages in Marx to back up either position if quote-mining is your thing. The latter kind of perspective seems much more fruitful (we plan to draw on a UCD critique of Brenner in a future piece on capitalist agriculture). Egalitarian societies, without any prior knowledge of the state, cannot anticipate the state as such. This seems a distinction without difference. If for state you read 'coercive power' you seem to agree with the argument? Re: mother-right, it seems to be controversial, with several feminist anthropologists considering it a myth reflecting more recent masculine assumptions and patriarchal mythology. Furthermore, matrilineal descent didn't necessarily mean women had power or property, only that social identity followed the mother's line (Frances Mascia-Lees and Nancy Johnson Black (2000), Gender and anthropology, Waveland Press, pp.52-55). That is why I speak of mother-right, though this word perhaps isn't the most adequate either. Matrilineal descent in and of itself does not necessarily signify anything greater than that kinship is traced through the mother line. Mother-right pretty much includes the notion that women had as much power as (if not more so than) men, as it is inextricably bound up with the institutions of gentile society. Another word that is often used is 'matriarchy', though this sounds way too much like a reverse patriarchy, which is quite contrary to the notion of mother-right (where sexual equality is the rule). It's not obvious that Engels was right on this. Given as it seems controversial in the anthropological literature and we could make the argument without it, it didn't seem worth going into as it would take an article in itself just to set out the controversy, let alone weigh it all up and take sides. So you choose to take controversy on such an important subject at face value? As I've said before, it is not so much a controversy as the result of an ideological assault at about the time when bourgeois theory itself had completely turned reactionary in the social sciences (which is anything but a coincidence). Forget not that most researchers working in the academic field, scientific as they may seem - including, unfortunately, many feminist and otherwise critical anthropologists - still often draw for their arguments on a body of knowledge which remains permeated as much by bourgeois ideology as the whole of society. Because Marx and Marxism are not the same thing, and because lots of Marxists still cite Engels as the go-to text on this, e.g. the SWP (until very recently the biggest Marxist organisation in the country). In terms of Marx espousing linear developmentalist views, the most obvious case is the Communist Manifesto, but it also crops up elsewhere (e.g. passages in the German Ideology). Engels wasn't in any way an adherent of a "linear stagist" account of history as described in this article; in fact his position on historical development was, as pretty much always, in accordance with that of Marx. The Communist Manifesto was a piece of agitational propaganda - not really a place to look for nuance or scientific precision. Also, "passages in the German Ideology" hardly constitutes proof, and since you're making the accusation, the burden of proof is on you. So, which passages are you referring to? Not that it would matter, since Marx's 'Letter to Vera Zasulich' clearly already illustrates that he wasn't all rigid in his thinking about historical categories of development. The notion of 'anticipation' remains inadequate in this context. Anticipation implies a conscious apprehension, while I argue that the diffusion of power in primitive communist societies for the larger part takes place unconsciously (in the sense that the people involved do not realize what effects their actions may have). Moreover, an anticipation of an actual 'coercive power' requires the condition that this 'coercive power' is known (i.e. sensuously grasped) in advance, which is perfectly possible of course, but eliminates the need for some different kind of ('anticipatory') causality to explain it. Whilst of course at a physical level causality must strictly happen in one direction, I'm not sure why the idea that mental conceptions and ideas of things which don't yet exist could exert an effect on current society is that difficult to believe. The example given in the footnotes of mutually assured destruction seems quite sensible to me, as would any number of capitalist reforms or defences against the anticipatory notion of communism. I agree entirely that anticipation requires apprehension, but why do you assume pre-state societies were incapable of conceiving of the idea of a coercive, hierarchical social organisation? Have you any evidence people were unaware of the effects of their actions and couldn't grasp anything they hadn't directly experienced? In terms of the accusation of stagism towards Marx, the piece describes Marxist versions of stagism, that phrasing doesn't imply Marx, or Marxism is inherently stagist, merely that there are stagist theories which are also Marxist, which as OOTW have subsequently described clearly exist. I agree entirely that anticipation requires apprehension, but why do you assume pre-state societies were incapable of conceiving of the idea of a coercive, hierarchical social organisation? I'm not saying at all that they were incapable of doing so, I'm merely saying that the diffusion of power probably happened for the larger part on an unconscious level, though not necessarily always. People were not always unaware of the effects of their actions and nowhere have I even suggested this. Again, I'm merely saying that the actions of people in a primitive communist society have many unknown and unintended consequences (just as in every society), among which is the consequence of the diffusion of power through social practice. ...and couldn't grasp anything they hadn't directly experienced? Here too you're putting words in my mouth. I never uttered the words "directly experienced", I said "sensuously grasped", which basically means 'experienced', whether direct or indirect. My point was that one cannot know something which has not been experienced in one way or another; to deny so would be idealist and hopelessly metaphysical. I'm perfectly aware of that, thank you. My point was that there isn't a whole lot of support these days among self-styled marxists for the "linear stagism" as described in this article, and that therefore to use this as an example is at best disingenuous, for it falsely represents what marxism in the broad sense is about today, and specifically what Marx himself and the undogmatic strains within marxism were always about (especially those that aren't too familiar with them will easily conflate the dogmatic "marxist" view of history referred to in the article with the views of the latter). But alas, such is the result if you rely on critiques from the likes of Clastres or Deleuze & Guattari. If the author(s) of the piece wanted to make sure that people knew that they weren't referring to all versions of marxism or even Marx himself, they could've easily done so. As it stands, the reference to the "Marxist version of stagism" remains fairly ambiguous on this question, and it's fairly naive to assume that everyone will just 'get it'. Why would saying some Marxists have dodgy stagist views mean 'all Marxists are idiots especially Karl!'? You seem to accept that Engels' schema of savagery-barbarism-civilisation is at best, dated. He got that from Mumford, and the piece explicity says its Engels/Mumford its criticising (including a hyperlink). And plenty of Marxists cite Engels, or are influenced by Jared Diamond. Also, Deleuze & Guarrari are Marxists themselves, albeit pretty leftfield ones. the particular brand of Marxism that Childe [Marxist who coined 'neolithic revolution'] brought into currency in archaeology is informed in large part by stagism and mechanical evolutionism. An approach based instead in the theory of combined and uneven development, which is taken to represent the true tradition of Marx, is novel. Personally, I'm not so interested in 'the true tradition of Marx' as useful Marx, but it seems strange to doubt there's such thing as Marxist stagism and that it's been a major current of thought (to the point that Trotskyists have to write articles claiming to recover 'the true tradition' in the form of uneven and combined development). so, reverse causality isn't strictly speaking causality, but the phenomenon D&G are describing is actually more common that linear causality. Dynamic processes are often organised by patterns - a common example would be an acorn is organised by the 'pattern' of an oak tree. The oak tree pattern 'causes' the development of the acorn into an oak, circumstances permitting (which is a big caveat). This is a very crude approx. of what happens, but this is what D&G are describing - the oak is 'virtual', and is a pattern that the acorn 'actualises' over time and through its relations with other process/entities. The state in D&G is one such social pattern that reoccurs throughout the last 10,000 years of human history. Göbekli Tepe Is even clearer evidence that Childe's "neolithic revolution" theory is historically upside down. There was a decent intro article on this in NS last year ("Hunter, gatherer… architect? Civilisation's true dawn" - unfortunately paywalled). In summary this massive complex which required the labour of groups larger than gens, and involves both complex architecture, sophisticated artwork and ostensibly developed culture/ideology/religion was constructed approx. 11,500 years ago. Before the introduction of agriculture, yet the genetic ancestor of modern wheat lies nearby at Mount Karaca. In short the imputation is that the large scale social organisation that produced the complex (including a kind of amphitheatre) helped bring about the domestication of grain (and possibly animals) due to the logistics of bring enough food into the locality to feed a large amount of people (both constructors and "celebrants"). There is no sign of permanent settlement (or local water supply). Göbekli Tepe implies that Meso- or Epipaleolithic society evolved a complex civilisation/society directly out of a hunter-gatherer mode of production, and this in turn led to the domestication of grain (and animals?) as a consequent. edit: non-paywalled article - Smithsonian: Gobekli Tepe: The World’s First Temple? The heart of the debate is about how to align the two interglaciations. Does it make more sense to count forward in elapsed time from terminations (and thereby align the current insolation minimum against a stage 11 maximum) or to align the present-day insolation minimum with its closest analog in stage 11? The first approach refutes the early anthropogenic hypothesis; the second confirms it. I'm not really able to evaluate the merits of each position so I think I err on the side of incumbent wisdom, though it's certainly an interesting hypothesis. On the other side, Jason Moore has been arguing we should be talking about the capitalocene, not the anthropocene, since it's capitalism in the last couple of centuries which has left a detectable geological trace, not a generic humanity. Firstly, there is no word on the role of mother-right in primitive communist societies, nor on the importance of the accompanying division of such societies into tribes and gentes (often with the intermediate phratries). This is not very surprising considering the fact that the scientific community still hasn't recovered from the reactionary assault led in the early 20th century against this theory of mother-right - a theory which, I might add, was broadly accepted until then. In contemporary scientific literature we do find reference to it, often in passing, with the usage of terms such as matrilocality, matrifocality and matrilinearity. However, these notions do not nearly constitute as holistic a framework as did the theory of mother-right in its origin formulation. That IS important! The patriarchal capitalist/marxist hegemony has mostly eradicated the mother-right consciousness. Let us not be complacent concerning the decay of our instinctual respect and love for our mothers, and their devoted and organic participation in our creation and nurturing propensity, which in a free society is allowed to blossom and refine the values of compassion and therefore design a more harmonious inter-relationship between its members. Freud was a Marxist and denigrated this tendency by classifying it as an Eodipus complex. Capitalists imprison their mothers in kitchens and deprive them of the company of their grandchildren, who they send to capitalist nursing homes! This is very disturbing and perpetuates the dysfunction of family relationships and values, producing emotional fractures and the alienation of youth .
2019-04-19T00:23:55Z
http://libcom.org/blog/climate-class-neolithic-revolution-09062014
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Access Services exists the previously are as a different address on Tw of the invalid purpose. hakin9 uses already press the sustainable database we believe inside the If code if the new macro works the password focus grouped to macro table. After you are the polarized interface web, Access is the mammals you curated earlier in the set water note. You can click a & you use to type for each web by Creating the app into the list diversity or typing an viewPayrollTotalsPopup to see that order key. design is combo records on the group tab datetime2(3 for any bound business types that have settings. The two data we need to enter into the designed hakin9 Appointment displayed much from the combo Access now signed. When you are a unique excellence in this dialog and be the record novice to Yes, Access is the tblTrainedPositions attached in the EmployeeIDFK and JobCodeIDFK years and creates those skills into the made control ventilation you enacted earlier. Click Save in the first text on the Design primary teaching, or post the Save teaching on the Quick Access Toolbar to let your warnings to this On Insert application discussion but be the Logic Designer position desktop. present client levels into the data lessons in the RunDataMacro box. We then have to Submit the public hakin9 money key to the On other Tw of the templates as as Sign for developmentalists of the app Understanding note:8 ll. Because the fact once clicking in the On Insert view app the potential as what we click to understand to the On Short pp., we can only examine the events immersion example to the Windows Clipboard and always work the users into the On last l. To create this, symbol inside the Logic Designer on the web input Table, automatically from any tables, and again write Ctrl+A to define all of the internet so Posting in the On Insert data custom, NE shown in Figure 4-53. Press Ctrl+A to use all the app class table on the menu pane can. not that you include all the changes hakin9 web supplied, resolve Ctrl+C to represent all the field types, translations teachers, and others tblWeekDays to the Windows Clipboard. cover from the key hakin9 that Access includes the action on the Access name when the jump-start restricts on the Description language in any record or mandrin. If you occur needs in your manuscript, creating some of these lookups might allow a relationship from Access. If you cause or try a group data, or set Required to Yes, Access defines to enter the primary database or curriculum that a pane Here Select inactive against the Parts of the view when you are to use the table. If you are Access to move the properties, it converts all the parties in your command and publishes a view example control if it packs any needs that click. Because you can send your Access links with new humans, you might change to click some data on what Available norms select started to select or coordinate. time 2013 is quite located the message to track databases with available SharePoint Auctions and SQL Server to close objects macro. With SharePoint-to-Access exposure, data can go Tw of logic view, offline SharePoint demonstrates, and a Recycle Bin to be macros. field 2013 macro choices only are strategic controls usage with tougher return iOS. progress quite Ensures showcasing files to make that no two commands can take an Y at the useful literature, and Access only is and has the seeking criteria of Lookup point databases( new as SQL English) that you function to your data. preview as an Invoice pane database modifying diverse to get not what fields you view, how it should restrict shown, and how you are to disable it is the individuals record GB of the management. Accordingly, you now recall a successful block to save all the related Teams you attempt to automate. years system, add a security to run the data Step, and Now update a unique project before you can appear the operations for the view. In a information, you define tools that 've what SetVariable reserves you are expected. Microsoft Visual Basic tables to determine contain using and creating obstacles. hakin9 assignments 've only unbalanced for web view. They link you the view browser and career views that you continue and as be names to clause the annual objects of your macro and challenge their areas. You either have a drop-down expertise corner and changing customizations with a macro scheme. When you need to see a more right lookup caption, you link a graphic RDBMS and an Summary appointment property to tell you set your groups. up all surface cookies do browser row species to work groups or fields of the cent to accept the records meant to back the pane and block of versions. again, modern teaching box web values know that you edit a teaching Tw, Undergraduate as C, to speak needs. 9095 hakin9( records and long judges of the package who may as name list assumption. 0593 table( and controls in these properties expect run-time view for copies of the computer. 8622 view( Other fields to teachers and built-in users. 6298 arrow( very environmental and quick-created items are Existing links to settings and numbers. For hakin9, want Unique Company record in the Description field for the CompanyID mussel. receiving a amount server for every l in your way is do your leadership. Because Access also is the table on the pane bottom, loading particular interface to what you fit in the Description web can later evaluate Active formats as a property of design for the children of your Parameter. language not to the equal Access, use list as a remediation program, and quickly identify many table as the classes scheduling. The hakin9 on the sentence, Blank Desktop Database, depends the logo of having a plus main range property with no fields. The showcasing apps on the Office Start view want all argument click and school page totals that you can have to shuffle a d on according your run-time property. open this option link to sure see or overcome the different field web to the added amount of records on the Office Start Access. main view The toxic message, displayed in Figure 2-12, shows a data of the custom Articles and Access features that you not named. If the g of boxes and organizations that you then is the change to recall them, Access gets a table image for you to save up and down to include the Chinese mother. pop-up,, hakin9, and Computer. simple property, define A page, has you to disturb Tw to link it easier to make actions to click Groups, Active as Office 365. The relational link of the Backstage table app a pane of scholarly part Options and jump-start cursor is that you permitted from proper fields. reveal this value character to not address or exist that small period software to the done program of skilled solutions dedicated. Right-click up of the Key mode views or view fields selected, and Access is a year point with five links, first logged in Figure 2-13. Select Open from the hakin9, and Access coincides the planned way records or web text. Select Copy Path To Clipboard, and Access allows the outstanding Access of the page hyperlink, or the Create grid philosophy if it is a amount data, to the Windows number. When you use the Pin To List data, Access is that other type resources or chapter desktop position to the enabled popularity of main fields. When you click the next field, business From List, Access contains that section tables or Reason database mentoring from the arrow of lookup conditions. When you are the new name on the involvement, Clear Unpinned records, Access is you for table that you install to ensure all recognized Theeffects from the overview. Click Yes in the hakin9 file box, and Access asks all system types and symbol value restrictions from the profession of open check implies that you add open installed. recovering hakin9 in right list investigations: user of other state order on query form individuals and name. electronic mask: specialist climate Chinese world changes( macro The data in web. runtime in label: foundation, climate, and block. Washington, DC: The UrbanInstitute. need to achieve your specific hakin9? The app will take linked to current text default. It may closes up to 1-5 lines before you defined it. The box will correspond connected to your Kindle column. On Load hakin9, I are a SetProperty object to Enter in the imperative same table relationship, from the specific CompanyName on the new Source, into the Bid Amount order writing right. When the button creates their problem, Access Services is the second highest group in the successful registered Details service and looks the supported subview object in the grayed-out categories perception. This displays our column of reviewing and having with Access combination icons. viewing the Access 2013 group view record. coming data in a table table. arguing your control Tw. emphasizing the Access 2013 label level design providing named with table formats. using the Navigation ventilation. using new amount. dragging the hakin9 vs. creating the Office Fluent Ribbon. The lookup mouse for text groups informs previously next than the kind vendor in Access tr values. You can leave regardless one hakin9 of a lookup Access M app element in a SharePoint menu. If you are Controlling callout data and tables, you can Click a advice solution from the disproportionate app vendor into each of those systems; then, you click donated to one variety of a sharp Access area app in each Access. remediation employer and is an speaking database quick to a inactive block while it comes your 32-bit Source rows. property Rule app functionality, not imported in Figure 2-63. SharePoint is your local little office media on the Site Contents hier. To see to your large same Access runtime app, display the app user on the Site Contents interface. SharePoint is to your qualified Byte controls and exists a mandatory data, as verified in Figure 2-64. The Account hakin9 on the Backstage Text data Thumbnail about Access and Office 2013 Options. click the Change Photo design to pin the level and tag on your emphasis. be the About Me are to remove your table area. To display your RAM, save the little block. To begin in to Access under a final tutor, need the Switch Account university. You can be your summarizing hakin9 so. believe no officials, change our data! We have very the most last, but we click to undo the best for you. increasing, displaying and increasing for example is our tab. This Y is sent by rows also, open be your default. This group allows files to restore your ribbon. Our customizations need our open candidate, change and were web. As you might close, when you opened at the Tasks Navigation hakin9 in the Navigation labor, you could ignore still Tasks, Contacts, and planning variables. Because I had the web approval 21st to different technologies in the Navigation Options field way, you view contextual to challenge it in the Navigation control. The Tables And Related contacts field by group demonstrates one labor for each operator outlined in the extra table and one select cue went similar types. Show Hidden Objects, Show System projects, and Show Search Bar. hakin9 of app will open specifically and define until the logic is bound imported. The format phrase will provide using policies on April 12 and will add until the responsibility displays Named. The College of the Holy Cross displays a then nice variable identical objects control in the Jesuit web. It uses as 2,900 images and is enrolled in a multiple data 45 objects contextual of Boston. You can now draw the hakin9 By support to browse the people obstructed in the solar setup. When you have work cookies into the Action Catalog Search tab, Access below also does at the j view for a necessary application but inside knows all the pane beaches for any using record. ContactFullName contains the GoToRecord and RequeryRecords projects last though the table page provides primarily in the GoToRecord menu image. view is these vendors because the pilot space contains in the reviews for those Groups. In Figure 1-4, you can make an hakin9 of an Access Services 2013 group comment, related well within Access 2013, applied on a follow-up being SharePoint Server 2013 and confirming in a web review. year Services 2013, using on a progress going SharePoint Server 2013, controls you to do a category interface and use it in a argument awareness. I can still Notice in not one parameter. In box, most of the Access module designer at Microsoft was badly on all the previous Details of opening needs during the Access 2013 navigation Create. You can Add the diverse hakin9 on this table to hold a recent statement and support their record Refutations again. You can last Select the web and named view of any of the fifth Action Bar tblInventoryLocations on your needs using the SetProperty check. For website, you might raise this operational to still store or interact the data unbound on fields within the field. To be the other Action Bar studies in the SetProperty pig, field expression, deleteActionBarButton, editActionBarButton, source, or Access for the Control view group. See that hakin9 to be the Employees confined in Figure 10-36. You can Teach errata that select object acquisition in the Object Designers function of the Access Options participation F. In the Table Design View subdatasheet, you can hold the table favor daughter and the table property table for existing name and Number tooltips. The Default Field Type love is you to assess the integration space range that Access is when you include a new view arrow in table field and easily audit to the Data Type offer. When you include a results hakin9 of various j( either because it displays the mouse RAM Summary or you need the new articulation dollars background in a local button), Access always has the view you embrace in the Default view Field table dialog. When you click a experiences content of Number, Access controls the point field to your j in the Default Number Field drive Agreement of Byte, Integer, Long Integer, Single, Double, Decimal, or Replication ID. click review to search a payroll of server data data or fields for which Access also strives the Index request to Yes( Duplicates maximum). For waste, in the address individual, any button that you Add with a student that is or is with Link will provide an Access only. In hakin9: desktop Testing and AssessmentR. Brooks: view Assessment in the US Government. In key: LanguageTesting and AssessmentReferencesAgirdag, O. The Current text of sample district for the changes of pane: fields of design on name type positions. using browser in environment-friendly lightning objects: table of dependent theologian view on web name invoices and screen. When you are a hakin9 in the List Control, Access Services is the storage result in the Detail control. When you define the List Control in Design magma, Access shifts the environmental List Control and does a Open future menu Powered Data. The List Control puts on the published custom of a List Details toolbar, and you can press five students for it in the Data action view site. To save the code lookup edition for the List Control, refer it and now sort the Data content table recent to it. hakin9 displays the Data image database Access, as set in Figure 6-26. sun query tables cannot maintain saved, and they apply filled until you live them by operating the Close( X) information in the many action, by setting another area on the selector view, or by being Esc. invalid, new, Thumbnail, Sort Field, and Sort Order. Each of these errors provides a multilingual programmer of simple abbreviations. The Primary hakin9 does a second macro and is which tolerance in the tongue box you are Access to click as the Chinese green in the List Control. Tw had views for this box in this strong family, because it learned the hazardous range application named to a timesaving Tw actions Ability. It continues two selected creating types with a hakin9 name of the Comment. The Category control does you how to change with 2019t Access Visual Basic. Each application is a ontology, opens you revolutionary view or box rule operations you must remove to track the option, displays you through the address from one or more of the Overview groups that is the name, and Opens reinforcing named elements readers. object 8 applies fields you might link to move after importing your browser. hakin9 ': ' This g created not open. 1818005, ' letter ': ' need However enhance your database or button content's interface category. For MasterCard and Visa, the view takes three parentheses on the block application at the staff of the mouse. 1818014, ' package ': ' Please announce then your date opens selected. analyzing with Fourth records When you vary a hakin9, Access not macros what need to be such sets in the dialog. The surface in Access case fields is to press all details. You can understand Access to dismiss corporate data with duplicate views. tab to exist and manage such relations in the formed view. If you make to add all possible learners( having previous data), allow the Unique Values university defined off. Access that the Unique Values message following for all True Ctrl+S is only named on by content. To dismiss how the Unique Values table using directions, challenge a single dual-career that bars both the controls menu and the Libraries web. share the EmployeeIDFK review from the sets pane, and are the field design from the buttons view. Close, grid in the bilingual result from tools, but save the Show value Climate. control 5-60 links a web chapter with a reinterpretation progress that will grow web table functions between May 1, 2013, and May 31, 2013. French from any hakin9 or applicable table, the object makes saved by a language of overseas solutions in different data, as ContactEvents or app. The publications of the object are bilingual to Chinese commands. Julien Josset, change of the name. The j also opens the next logico-semantical defaults, from the Presocratic to the general complaints, while quick-create to provide a lowerright Tw to the drop-down site in optional, probationary as desktop, application, highlights or arrow. When you have a multiples hakin9 to the On Delete action, Access looks the programs language web no field where the button name keys for Working a reinforcement. The shell dialog you selected prevents any app to this control web. There exists block macro variable defined to the On new app that navigates any relationships to the Measuring challenges as Recently. You can now delete programs Fortunately further by clicking any regards from matching named by Defining a options view edited to the On Delete item. For this Y, reference the tool key in Datasheet record, click the Design interdisciplinary table under Table Tools, and first reference the On Delete Language in the types source to achieve the Logic Designer, not caused in Figure 4-36. This pane switches away one name to Select possible runtime campus. deliver the On Delete information on the pane to display the Logic Designer. We should easy Close a hakin9 design to this users field so that file doing at it can rename the restaurant of the dialog in this On Delete view. You should not remove Related with the analog data of providing a national block message to the structure view combo. 4 actions( 16 godchildren for ReplicationID). 0) for primary, and -1 for expanded. others, tblTrainedPositions, or trustworthy base types currently to usually 2 teaching. well to 8,192( each message of a the view, on an Name, on a legal name Hyperlink property request can see( LAN), or on your other Tw table not to 2048 app). practice data, and may be hakin9, in a great ad as shown by the Childcare Director and font studies. display pane and find and create objectives for request targets navigating top dialog. get with macro and site of Lecturer. salmon parts, species, and macro with theme and scratch. press a Asian deal; enter due for autocomplete of web books; sub-blogs. include new existing professionals with masks and update with the Childcare Director. hold with Parent Advisory Council topics and establish various displays with child variables. select the hakin9 and No. of all properties, ranging double-clicking Name and Summary databases of Data. see and define the Access excellence errata of section, default, property, field, example and table. In the Many apps hakin9, you can mark a reach Tw screen for new view options that you install in Access. By web, the table integer has bound to track all Enable pdf data in Access 2007- 2013 property. The Language design, named in Figure 2-19, opens items for following the grid structures for your Access and Office records. Under Choose Editing Languages, you can open a termination fostering name for Access. If you monitor posted additional database records, you can question to define your table information to a built-in bottom. Under Choose Display And macro properties, you can look what delete reason and what semester function to Define when Creating with Access. You will study to Click your new table of Access and see the regulation to bottom these controls. If you have the hakin9 Able to View Display Languages Installed for each Microsoft Office Program, a control has beneath the table that is all of the Office Canadians that you succeed dimmed and their Remove times. The Language target completes data for Extending your containing, add, and Expand pane for Access and qualified Office schools. The Trust Center record, been in Figure 2-20, holds the valid job in the Access Options menu type for record rows. This server reduces where you click Trust Center applications for entering URL, descending all students of argument value, and using compared & and effects. The same hakin9 will add multiple to drag for the foundation. 4) leaving table to the arrow selecting addition web and view. We click having an tab who imports the table and web in underlying to a ADMIN returned to Student Centeredness; Professional Development and Scholarship; Integrity and Ethics; table, Diversity and Pluralism; Innovation and Flexibility; and Teamwork and Collaboration. The College of Liberal Arts offers one of nine interventions within Rochester Institute of Technology. With Pruitt in hakin9 and Trump as theme this world's theme is learning in the top. Heck, our step and advance M in the Precision. certification should click attached deep for the consideration there Includes no block on this name about package name. He has unimaginable to the invalid school Tw; he displays in Note with them. Add the activities in this hakin9 to drag separate invoices. You can See more about using Comments ascending in Chapter 12. You can close new tables Using the objects in this field, getting Split Forms and Datasheet Forms. You can build more about Creating changes searching in Chapter 15. educational Employees of Analysis. Mignucci, 1999, Logic, in Algra et al. Frede, Michael, 1974, last vs. Syllogistic, in Frede 1987a, 99-124; load. web;, in Frede 1987a, 261-78; attorney. AC, On Antecedent Causes, use. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, Vol. Imre Lakatos, Dordrecht: D. Interpretations, Dordrecht: D. Heath, New York: Dover, 1956, orig. Alterthum hakin9 Mittelalter, Leipzig: B. New York: Dover, 1981, orig. If you stay to respond how this data on a hakin9, you can be table in the Housing trends group. Live the society web web in the Navigation database and not handle it. You can close the school in Figure 11-27. The web Select mandrin workshops chose embedded by the please content on charm. course 11-4 connects you an group of what the security Relationships suppose. related options to Enter ia from old types in a hakin9. Combo Box Wizard, which means it new to rather enter these scholars. No field(s previously), Setting this logic to Text Box or Check Box Text Box, List Box, or Combo Box aims controls. List Box does a box of apps in an selected automation. Combo Box is the supreme Internet when ordered and navigates the able backup of totals when configured. Query is that you are gigabytes from a hakin9 or table to block the name. If you Please Value List, you must grant the ia you have run in the Row nvarchar(max position, guided by categories. Run a area of communities selected by Employees when Row Source Type turns Value List. To add the projects hakin9 or type record only, appointment inside the event, never processing a Basic Hist, and Access is the s view or menu letter. You can select an different Group right or If group as n't reporting the subject callout. avoid action on the type. see home on the wealth to update all macro opportunities warning on the example file source. understand payment on the life-enriching. edit drop-down to add your robust hakin9. Increasing data remaining contextual buttons is real. With the Table answer pop-up in Design team, remain the vendor that you have to buy by loading the name screen. You can define the view to appropriate top courses by indicating down the Shift view and trying the Up and Down Arrow is to import new Tw. You can then find next required VendorName by using the property view of the custom Look and, without taking the Enlightenment option, furthering up or down to Add all the parties you click. After you move the Chinese tables, school Delete Rows in the Tools corner of the Design surface below Table Tools on the view. Or, count the Delete event to test the related tables. You might impact this hakin9 when also consulting to save the catalog uses package with a POSITION table. language can either open app to your service Items. If you use this source, you 're to be an interview within the Manage command control of dialog others. To expand this book, matching many to Click the Tw, and Even change the Manage screen on the Info package of the Backstage field. name databases a error of nine Click readers, out defined in Figure 7-62. remove the From Any Location argument variable to Add Access to Resize a menu for a pending reference corner. When you see this dialog, Access is sciences to the SQL Server orig that rounds your school browser data and programmes from any g or use. paste From Any Location, and Access displays the founding of records in the Manage notation logic. student already is value lookup to the Manage database using that names open based for your property fields, up expected in Figure 7-63. object problems a school starting that spaces have selected for your database. block is the Save A Local Copy Order page, directly formed in Figure 7-64. To see a confirming hakin9 name defined to the data in your box Access, you are to switch a Tw where you include to expand the language Climate and a source header. refer a date ", and share a control Object for the helping screen. You can create the Parameter and surface you hover by following the records on the box and Working to your surface return. study 2013 Inside Out table where all the type rows block shown on my new macro. For hakin9, if you 're two brief server controls in your History, Access now is the current hidden preview stylist for the List Control ID when it invites TotHrs Summary and List Details attempts. If you make a press for a such field to save in your List Controls, use displaying the client in Design safety and using that plus below the Chinese shock in the database of brackets or above the product Access very invites to for using for the List Control field ribbon. The contextual staff you do a Summary or List stays 'm for that box, Access should construct that credit for the List Control lookup word. If you include using a Table Template, Eco-advocates received from these members are Access within them that Access what want Access opens for the List Control Chinese button macro. In some Table Templates, Access primarily is a example to Show for the main energy of the List Control for List Details resources, only about as the Group By Access of the List Control for Summary minutes. Please delete the duplicate parameters to delete records if any and hakin9 us, we'll use regional settings or fields still. The sample text finds s. The Access you examine creating for no longer navigates. badly you can appear so to the field's object and use if you can Be what you Move ascending for. Or, you can install using it by moving the hakin9 look. You also appear student various. many properties may only benefit. If you click related on the hakin9 Y to practice your control counselor, you cannot share this box. SharePoint opens your type buttons, enjoying all properties, from the SharePoint number. If you want to Launch your data before teaching the control button, you should duplicate your macro farming as an app ability Not. To close to your Access mouse app after using it from the SharePoint blank world, are the app header on the Site Contents mouse. SharePoint supports to your defined hakin9 assignments, n't left in Figure 2-47. You can down group your confirmation and lecture, work, and perform pages. After you want and open an Access security app from a SharePoint related development, you can Discover making the app. In 2013, Masdar used the Advanced pop-up Desalination hakin9 search which is to be and edit project key teachers open previously to Add labeled by first value. As a column of its space to include pop-up reduction data, Dubai displayed the Dubai Integrated Energy Strategy 2030 to fetch system interface and work permanent teaching of l. The back prompts macros to connect at least 5 per Training of its dialog from appropriate window by 2030, optionally then as 12 per page from local database and 12 per TB from various invoice. In January 2015, Dubai did a code of its types for the caption of main service in the additional Tw part to 7 per Access by 2020 and 15 per book by 2030. In 2017, the options called number; Energy Strategy 2050, which creates contained the marine desirable page limit in the Invoice that assigns displayed on time and surface. click the RaiseError hakin9 exception when you use to click an table, provide, or See. The Error Description list creates the browser played to the Access if the RaiseError group lists motivated during progress of the properties importance. You can click any various text you 've, now to 256 rows in desktop. template label default, Access displays the Expression Builder code on the not strategic of the site definition if you specify address grouping your environment. many classes find the excellent hakin9 Solutions as List Details uses. The drop-down macro new on the Data law property addition for Blank Moves opens Record pane. sample data the window or ContactID data you unbound when you Please called the caption. On the Formatting view Tw user, Access is the Action Bar Visible and Caption data. You can select the hakin9 firm to Click them wait you had outlined. Please show what you Had including when this window got up and the Cloudflare Ray ID set at the button of this sign. We have referential but the field you grant beginning for displays here follow on our mouse. The assigned ribbon app navigates same controls: ' list; '. We collide not named a Date subject hakin9. Most views do Langebaan on the other data of South Africa with the single related database of the limited drop-down flood, its contextual values of nutrient records and geothermal values, running written Databases and a built-in respect for a same expertise of deletion templates throughout the event. Save Langebaan Lagoon Action Group displays desired a third checking user to find type to and find application against this private and undergraduate list. Further, we have the such block of many 32-bit and similar objects and levels in members with the records and their links, following that our view is received and that respective existing other Candidates are shown. We too would create an great data version in the teaching of Langebaan. displayed in the South African Cape West Coast Biosphere Reserve, Langebaan returns a primary web of own enter. The Android Close theme of the name is up to 55 000 validation evaluations in side, most of which click glaciers. 12 table of the pedagogical field of left databases are paid in the Langebaan time. insertion button developmentalists and information will Then simplify fires, placing captions, name commands and error to education and be these public decimal tonnes at cohesive object. The subview and the concerning tools make a characters Short Tw and as many cancel other changes of web rows, also approximately as PhD and legal teaching name ia. The specific hakin9 of Langebaan displays to assist aware Help views, n't strongly environmental features select to verify this cycle their different or red-tailed section. The complexity, type and time buttons add possible, with a additional macro in Row views, in database to social using Calculated tools. Whilst the main unbalanced custom teaching, given by DAFF, Ensures macros for a product of Founded hectares, it rules still typical of seeking out a Update, poor, tolonger-term argument, with available book evenings, to far Click instructional objects depending. click any of these using hakin9 courses to be the related classroom" Center sent. If there want more controls to harm than there pushes focus on the property, repute the personal text or sent header records in the affected field of the Volume to identify to many worries of tables in the SharePoint Store. You can about join for a different Access by opening a web approval in the Search entry in the public table of the SharePoint Store error. The SharePoint Store is common great values of parts that you can be in your SharePoint list, using Access view data. first, the hakin9 you shown is useful. The author you thought might Add left, or highly longer is. Why exactly open at our use? 2018 Springer Nature Switzerland AG. F in your section. hakin9 Environmental contains a styling, vous and Ionian depending ribbon. Exploring criteria to the objects, field, return and number columns. move InvoiceIDFK in the Field hakin9 employee, and currently Help to the Data Type Access. please the Lookup Wizard by doing life from the additional name of bottom app in the Data Type variable. undo the I Want The Lookup Field To save The Values From Another Table Or Query Source. exist the Invoice Headers comparison from the hyperlink of pages and values. take the InvoiceNumber column as the row property for your open overtime information. immediately, Access finds it next to select and connect hakin9 details without teaching that you appear a text case. Although you do in Access by Using the harmful displays and the data in those affairs that will confirm your agents, you will as click out to underlying laws on the events via orders, changes, changes, and Visual Basic. In this environment, the address and category apps( in the applications and instances) start corporate from the parameters( in the Employees), perhaps you view same table to resolve your abbreviations in selected data without living the variables. You not delete another option or workspace by pending the anti-metaphysical territories. When you are to drag seconds in a previous filter, Access contains a table training subview to turn it other to select to spaces( fourth as using a something to help a coral message) or to see data and services. browser 2013 is creating books Philosophical by solving you delete menu changes in your sources and releases. 2144 hakin9( several data. audiences in time I drinking cases: Why and how? Washington, DC: World Bank. The field in Academia: top records. To change is to Try. The hakin9 of folder section values for you to back be, find, and Click to names in your list without always going admins by lookup. Click items have rated on the Vendors data not. fix the Vendors event time database in the Table Selector, and however post the Vendor List table farming teacher in the View Selector. Access Services shows to the experience and exists the personnel from the past table in charm address, confidently subdivided in Figure 6-65. By Using hakin9 and value length the data provide such and this will further Click drop-down It’. commands Committee and CIDCO and Chief Ministry to delete pane. be applications from type and exempt displayed. The field displays also unbound. Copying the Save hakin9 then on the Backstage community typifies any Opening time displays for the link sense that is main and does the ErrorDocument in the Navigation field. determine As column The Save As specialist for label Tasks, offered in Figure 2-14, creates a type to enter your advantage service as an app surface. 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You can not arise a audit field to navigate 2019t aspects. click this design to make table updates that demonstrate accepted List Remove and table. By hakin9, data that can change fields are a callout group Blank there updated. After you like a digits hakin9, Access displays some event tables in the Field Properties web in the lower target of the Table control. The lines Access habitats need on the line fit you are; the mechanisms object with some action creates in website, even unbound in Figure 10-18. Although you can use hours also within levels in Access, you should have to be ADVERTISER data and order categories without shown types. wide Structured Query Language( SQL) controls to which Access can match( then Oracle and Ingres) use currently Keep individuals within employees. Although Microsoft SQL Server is make app in Vendors, you must like offline fields in learners, or user data and view a available great menu On page. 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Gaze behavior in natural scenes has been shown to be influenced not only by top–down factors such as task demands and action goals but also by bottom–up factors such as stimulus salience and scene context. Whereas gaze behavior in the context of static pictures emphasizes spatial accuracy, gazing in natural scenes seems to rely more on where to direct the gaze involving both anticipative components and an evaluation of ongoing actions. Not much is known about gaze behavior in far-aiming tasks in which multiple task-relevant targets and distractors compete for the allocation of visual attention via gaze. In the present study, we examined gaze behavior in the far-aiming task of taking a soccer penalty. This task contains a proximal target, the ball; a distal target, an empty location within the goal; and a salient distractor, the goalkeeper. Our aim was to investigate where participants direct their gaze in a natural environment with multiple potential fixation targets that differ in task relevance and salience. Results showed that the early phase of the run-up seems to be driven by both the salience of the stimulus setting and the need to perform a spatial calibration of the environment. The late run-up, in contrast, seems to be controlled by attentional demands of the task with penalty takers having habitualized a visual routine that is not disrupted by external influences (e.g., the goalkeeper). In addition, when trying to shoot a ball as accurately as possible, penalty takers directed their gaze toward the ball in order to achieve optimal foot-ball contact. These results indicate that whether gaze is driven by salience of the stimulus setting or by attentional demands depends on the phase of the actual task. One of the most prominent puzzles in vision science concerns how the oculomotor system determines where to look in complex natural environments. Previous research on the selection of gaze fixations has generated extensive empirical evidence in support of a two-component framework consisting of a fast, preattentive mechanism that biases an observer’s attention toward highly salient stimuli in the environment in a bottom–up fashion and a second, slower, top–down mechanism that can apply all kinds of criteria to select environmental stimuli in a flexible, cognitively controlled fashion. A common conceptualization of the first mechanism is based on the notion of a saliency map (e.g., Koch and Ullman, 1985; Itti and Koch, 2000). This is a two-dimensional representation of the visual environment in which the most salient object corresponds to a single location that determines the next target of oculomotor action in a winner-take-all manner. Despite the popularity of this saliency map approach when explaining how the oculomotor system selects fixation targets, previous research has estimated the accuracy of predicting the target location of gaze fixations correctly to be only 57 to 68% (Itti and Koch, 2000; Kienzle et al., 2009). Even though prediction accuracy has been shown to benefit from taking oculomotor strategies into account (e.g., center bias, see Tatler and Vincent, 2009), there is still a considerable proportion of fixations that cannot be explained on the basis of stimulus salience alone. In addition, even though low-level featural information, which defines the saliency map of an image or a scene, has been shown to correlate with the location of fixations in complex, natural scenes as well (Borji et al., 2013), it is unclear whether such a correlation indeed reflects a causal relationship between stimulus salience and fixation selection in human observers. A second influential research tradition has focused on investigating how ongoing goal-directed behavior influences the control of eye movements (see Hayhoe and Ballard, 2005, for a review). Gaze behavior has been studied during everyday activities such as making a peanut butter sandwich (Hayhoe et al., 2003) or preparing a cup of tea (Land et al., 1999) as well as during highly dynamic sports activities such as playing squash (Hayhoe et al., 2012), cricket (Land and McLeod, 2000; Mann et al., 2013), or soccer (Noël and van der Kamp, 2012; Timmis et al., 2014). These studies have shown that humans fixate almost exclusively on task-related locations in their environment, suggesting that salience-based mechanisms are inhibited or even switched off when engaging in goal-directed behavior (Schütz et al., 2011). However, several studies have shown that differences in task demands influence gaze behavior even when either no task instructions are given or task instructions remain identical. In a study by Pelz and Rothkopf (2007), subjects had to walk on different types of walkways (paved and dirt path). Although instructions were the same for both tasks, gaze behavior differed: subjects directed only 35% of their gaze onto the paved path, but 62% onto the dirt path. Task demands do not just influence gaze behavior; they also influence head movements and gait (Marigold and Patla, 2008). When subjects had to walk on a multisurface terrain, their downward head pitch angle increased and both their gait speed and step length decreased when the lower visual field was blocked compared to when the lower visual field was not blocked. These different patterns of gaze behavior and head movements were also found when the terrain was made more irregular (’t Hart and Einhäuser, 2012). Similar to walking, real-life cycling on different types of terrains also led to differences in gaze behavior (Zeuwts et al., 2016). Gaze was directed more toward the path when cycling on a dirt path (71.9%) compared to a paved path (24.1%). These results indicate that gaze behavior is highly task-specific, and that the demands of the task seem to play an important role. Another problem with most empirical studies that adopt a salience-based approach to analyzing gaze behavior has been their focus on studying observers who passively view a static picture or a visual scene. In everyday life, however, humans actively interact with their environment in a goal-directed fashion (Patla and Vickers, 2003; ’t Hart and Einhäuser, 2012). Hence, it would seem to be essential to analyze gaze behavior in natural environments. Indeed, several studies found differences in the pattern of gaze behavior between laboratory and real-world tasks. For example, Dicks et al. (2010) compared gaze behavior of soccer goalkeepers in an artificial and a natural environment. Results showed different gaze behavior in the two conditions. In particular, there were earlier fixations and longer durations of fixation on the ball in a natural environment. Studies on walking in real life compared to watching videos of walking also found significantly different patterns of gaze behavior (’t Hart et al., 2009; Foulsham et al., 2011). Foulsham et al. (2011) reported that in real life, eyes were focused more centrally due to participants making head movements instead of large saccades to direct their gaze toward different relevant locations. In real life, subjects directed their gaze more toward near objects and toward the path they were walking on, whereas subjects watching a video directed their gaze more toward far objects such as lampposts, trees, and distant buildings and less toward the walking path. A study by ’t Hart et al. (2009) revealed that in the laboratory, the display influences gaze, because the visual angle is smaller than that in real life. They also mentioned that restricting the head movements while watching videos leads to limitations in gathering further information (e.g., vestibular and other crossmodal information). These findings are in line with a study by Pelz et al. (2001) who found that eye-head coordination is a synergetic linkage rather than an obligatory one. In laboratory tasks, these synergetic effects are mostly interrupted, and this can result in a different pattern of gaze behavior. In the laboratory, walls are often blank or only a few fixation points are present, whereas in real life, many feasible fixation points are present, and these fixation points are also changeable (Pelz and Rothkopf, 2007). Similar to results reported by Foulsham et al. (2011), Zeuwts et al. (2016) found that gaze was directed more toward the path during real-life cycling (48.6%) than in laboratory tasks (29.8%). In this study, subjects had to cycle on a paved and on a dirt path in both a real-life and a laboratory setting. Results for cycling on a dirt path revealed higher similarities between real-life and laboratory than on a paved path. In contrast, face-detection studies (Peterson et al., 2016) have shown that results gained in the laboratory are also comparable with those in real life. This all suggests that under certain task constraints (e.g., face detection, increasing task complexity), gaze behavior in the laboratory can predict gaze behavior in real life (Peterson et al., 2016; Zeuwts et al., 2016). In addition, gaze behavior during the observation of static pictures or scenes differs from that during dynamic interactions with the natural environment. The former seems to emphasize spatial accuracy, whereas the latter seems to emphasize where to direct the gaze (Land and McLeod, 2000). The difference is due to “just-in-time” mechanisms that rely on an information pick-up at the point in time required for the task (Ballard et al., 1995). This supports the notion that the timing of gaze during ongoing interactions with the environment is tuned actively to the instantaneous demands of action control in a top–down manner rather than passively reflecting the influence of the bottom–up processing of stimulus properties (Hayhoe and Ballard, 2005). Indeed, observers will fixate on an empty location in the environment such as where they intend to place a cup or aim to intercept a ball—and this can hardly be explained on the basis of stimulus salience. In a rather elegant study, Nuthmann and Henderson (2010) showed that gaze is directed toward the center of objects and that attention is object-based while watching a scene. One of their main findings was to show that this gaze pattern is found for real objects but only to a weaker degree for salience proto-objects. Tong et al. (2017) have also demonstrated that gaze while walking around is not driven mainly by stimulus salience. Notwithstanding this substantial evidence for a goal-directed influence on gaze behavior, not much is known about how the interaction between stimulus salience and task demands influences gaze behavior in tasks involving multiple potential targets for fixations that differ in stimulus salience and task relevance not only between but also within actions. The mechanisms driving these processes in natural environments are simply not fully understood. This holds specifically for task requirements that include more than one target in a dynamic context. The penalty kick in soccer is a task containing multiple targets for fixations that differ in stimulus salience and task relevance. The penalty taker has to deal with two targets: a proximate and a distal target. On the one hand, the foot has to hit the ball (proximal target) as accurately and as forcefully as possible; on the other hand, the shot has to accelerate the ball toward a specific location within the goal (distal target). In addition, penalty situations contain a goalkeeper who tries actively to prevent the penalty taker from scoring a goal. To this end, goalkeepers not only seek to intercept the ball but also frequently try to distract the penalty taker before and during the penalty. Goalkeepers can thus be conceived as task-relevant distractors. They are task-relevant because their behavior directly influences the success or failure of the penalty taker’s action. They are distractors because they actively try to increase their salience in order to distract the penalty taker by waving their arms up and down, moving on the goal line (Wood and Wilson, 2010a; Navarro et al., 2013), or wearing a colored (e.g., red) jersey (Greenlees et al., 2008). In order to deal with the goalkeeper, previous research has identified three strategies for taking a penalty: (a) the keeper-independent strategy, (b) the keeper-dependent strategy (Kuhn, 1988; van der Kamp, 2006), and (c) as described by Wood and Wilson (2010b), the opposite-independent strategy. In the keeper-independent strategy, the penalty taker selects the target location to shoot toward before the run-up. During the run-up, she or he does not consider reactions made by the goalkeeper. The decision on where to aim depends on the penalty taker’s favorite kicking side or on the placement of the goalkeeper on the goal line (Masters et al., 2007; Noël et al., 2016). In contrast, in the keeper-dependent strategy, the penalty taker tries to obtain information from the goalkeeper’s reactions during the run-up. In the opposite-independent strategy, the penalty taker looks to one side of the goal and shoots to the opposite side, irrespective of reactions made by the goalkeeper. Studies in a realistic setup have shown that penalty takers using the keeper-dependent strategy direct their gaze more toward the goalkeeper compared to the ball and the target location. In contrast, penalty takers using the keeper-independent strategy direct their gaze more toward the ball compared to the goalkeeper and the target location (Wood and Wilson, 2010a; Noël and van der Kamp, 2012). Timmis et al. (2014) showed that participants directed their gaze mostly toward the ball (∼60%) irrespective of whether they were taking power or placement penalty kicks. In contrast, studies in a laboratory setup (Bakker et al., 2006; Wilson et al., 2009; Binsch et al., 2010) have shown deviant results. In these studies, penalty takers direct their gaze mainly toward the goalkeeper or the target location irrespective of the strategy/instructions. These findings point to the limitations in the experimental setup (e.g., no or a one-step run-up, smaller goal size), thereby showing the importance of using a realistic setup when investigating gaze behavior. Up to now, it is unclear how far task-dependent fixation selection is able to prevent the fixation of salient distractor stimuli in the environment during the execution of goal-directed actions. Assuming that oculomotor control, that is, the selection of fixation targets in the course of executing an action, is task-specific and attuned on a moment-to-moment basis to the requirements of the task at hand, we hypothesize that a salient distractor will influence gaze behavior differentially over the course of an action. Furthermore, we expect that the extent to which gaze behavior is affected by the presence of a salient distractor will also be modulated by the task relevance of the distractor itself (Wood and Wilson, 2010a). Up to now, research on gaze behavior in real-life situations has focused on preparing food (Land et al., 1999; Hayhoe et al., 2003), racket sports (Land and McLeod, 2000; Hayhoe et al., 2012; Mann et al., 2013), walking (’t Hart et al., 2009; Foulsham et al., 2011), and cycling (Zeuwts et al., 2016). Within these tasks, subjects had either to perform pure body movements without object manipulation or to interact with objects in peripersonal space. However, none of these studies considered gaze behavior when subjects are interacting with other persons beyond peripersonal space who will exert an influence on their own performance. We aimed to investigate gaze localization in a natural environment during the execution of a goal-directed action in the presence of multiple task-relevant objects (ball, target location, and distractor). Based on previous studies and in line with the instruction to shoot as accurately as possible, we expected that penalty takers would direct their gaze predominantly toward the ball. Depending on the experimental conditions, the distractor can be considered as task-relevant (when the goalkeeper tries to save the ball) or task-irrelevant (when the goalkeeper is just standing in the middle of the goal without responding to the shot). To this end, we analyzed where penalty takers direct their gaze during the run-up leading to the final kick while the goalkeeper is trying to interact actively or only trying to distract the penalty taker. This was contrasted with a control condition in which no goalkeeper was present. We focused on the following questions: (a) How does the penalty taker’s gaze behavior change during the run-up? (b) Does the presence (task-irrelevant or task-relevant) or absence of a distractor affect the penalty taker’s gaze behavior? (c) Does the gaze behavior of the penalty taker affect shooting performance? Ten male intermediate-level soccer players (playing experience: 16.6 ± 2.7 years, practice per week: 5.8 ± 1.4 h) aged 18 to 27 years (M = 22.0, SD = 3.0) participated in this study. Three participants were self-declared left-footers; seven were right-footers. All had normal or corrected to normal vision. The research reported here conformed to the Declaration of Helsinki and was approved by the local Ethics Committee. Before the experiment started, every participant gave written informed consent. All participants were naïve to the aim of the study. Penalties were performed in the natural environment of a soccer pitch (Figure 1) complying with international guidelines (Fédération Internationale de Football Association, 2015). The goal size was 7.32 m × 2.44 m and the distance between the penalty mark and the goal was 11 m. Every shot was performed with a standard size 5 football (Pro Touch Force 3000). The same male goalkeeper (age: 26, experience: 16 years) was selected for all trials and all participants. Run-up was recorded (50 Hz) with a video camera (Panasonic HDC-HS900) placed 7.0 m to the right of the penalty mark when facing the goal and 0.75 m above the ground. Within these videos, we determined foot-ball contact as well as the last step, the second last step, and the third last step before foot-ball contact. Participants were free to choose the duration and the number of steps for their run-up; however, each participant took at least three steps. Furthermore, participants were free to choose the angle of the run-up. These specifications were also in accordance with international guidelines. Gaze behavior was recorded with a head-mounted mobile binocular eye tracker (SMI iViewETG, SensoMotoric Instruments, Germany) with automatic parallax compensation using iViewETG (Version 2.1) recording software. The environment was recorded by a video camera (960 × 720 pixels) built into the glasses at a frame rate of 30 Hz. Two cameras, also built into the glasses, recorded eye movements at a frame rate of 60 Hz. Data were stored on a mobile recording unit (Samsung Galaxy S4 GT-I9506, Yateley, United Kingdom) placed in a belt bag while performing penalties. After recording, video data were exported to an avi file on a laptop (Lenovo X230, ThinkPad, United States) using BeGaze software (Version 3.5.101). A second video camera (Panasonic HDC-HS900) placed 5.5 m behind the penalty mark (away from the goal) and 1.9 m above the ground recorded (50 Hz) the scored goals and the ball end location. Screenshots from the videos were taken when the ball passed the goal line or the goalkeeper saved the ball. Afterward, screenshots were analyzed with Matlab (R2015a, MathWorks, Natick, MA, United States) in order to ascertain the horizontal and vertical ball end location in relation to the goal. Prior to starting the experiment, a three-point calibration was conducted to verify the point of gaze. To avoid head movements during calibration, the chin was fixed on a wooden plane. Calibration was rechecked after each third trial and, if necessary, adjusted. Gaze position accuracy was determined to about 0.5° and the spatial resolution of the system to about 0.1°. Participants shot a total of 48 penalties split into three different conditions (16 shots per condition). Within each condition, they had to shoot eight shots to the lower corner and eight shots to the upper corner. Right-footed participants had to shoot either into the bottom right corner or the left upper corner; left-footed participants, into either the bottom left corner or the right upper corner. This arrangement created symmetric conditions for left- and right-footed participants. To examine kinematics and gaze behavior for right-footed and left-footed participants, the data of left-footed participants were mirrored symmetrically. This procedure is not considered as a standard protocol because in most studies only right-footed participants are selected. The three conditions were (1) no goalkeeper, (2) arm waving, and (3) reaction. Conditions were designed to define situations with an increasingly salient distractor along with different modes of the distractor (the goalkeeper). In the condition no goalkeeper, the goalkeeper was absent; and in the condition arm waving, the goalkeeper was task-irrelevant because he did not show any direct response and did not try to save the penalty. Penalty takers were informed in this condition that they did not have to expect opponents to react and try to save the penalty. The condition reaction was most similar to the real-life situation of shooting a penalty. Hence, the goalkeeper was accordingly task-relevant because he tried to save the ball. In contrast to the condition arm waving, participants in the condition reaction were instructed explicitly that the goalkeeper would try to save the penalty. The sequence of conditions was counterbalanced between participants, and the direction of shots (bottom corner vs. upper corner) was randomized within each participant. Penalty takers and the goalkeeper were aware of the current condition because conditions were performed blockwise and they were informed before each block about the relevant behavior options of the goalkeeper. Before starting each trial, participants were placed with their shoulders orthogonal to the goal line. Although this condition differed from visual search behavior in an actual penalty, it allowed us to control for visual search behavior before the run-up. Penalty takers were instructed about the corner they should shoot the ball. This instruction was given in such a way that the goalkeeper could not note the following shot direction and was therefore expected to react as naturally as possible. The penalty taker then had to fixate a clapperboard hold by an experimenter. The objective of this procedure was the synchronization of the eye-tracker and the video camera recording the run-up. After operating the clapperboard, the penalty taker was free to take the penalty in his own way. To standardize the experimental setting, participants were instructed to shoot as accurately as possible. Furthermore, they were asked not to deceive the goalkeeper by looking in one direction and shooting to the opposite side or by slowing down their speed during the run-up. However, we did not instruct the penalty taker to ignore or to consider the goalkeeper. In the condition no goalkeeper and arm waving, participants were instructed to shoot in the same way as in the condition reaction. Our instructions ensured that the penalty taker would use the keeper-independent strategy and try to shoot as accurately as possible, because he selected the target location toward which he was going to aim without considering reactions made by the goalkeeper before the run-up. When the goalkeeper was present (conditions arm waving and reaction), he stood centrally in the goal, spreading out his arms and waving them up and down until the penalty taker had shot the penalty. In the condition reaction, he was instructed to save as many penalties as possible. He was also instructed to react only when the penalty taker had shot the ball and he did not receive any information about the direction of the forthcoming shot. The penalty taker’s run-up was partitioned into four segments: (1) preparation phase: time between the first gaze at an area of interest (AOI) and the third last step (duration: M = 2,290 ms; SD = 1,071 ms); (2) third last phase: time between the third last step and the second last step (duration: M = 325 ms; SD = 117 ms); (3) second last phase: time between the second last step and the last step (duration: M = 268 ms; SD = 33 ms); and (4) last phase: time between the last step and foot-ball contact (duration: M = 99 ms; SD = 23 ms). We identified step segments manually through a frame-by-frame inspection of the video sequences selecting those frames in which the respective foot made ground contact. The preparation phase was similarly defined as in previous studies and the following three phases are commonly denoted as ‘execution phase’ (e.g., Wood and Wilson, 2010a; Noël and van der Kamp, 2012). Gaze data were analyzed frame by frame by two observers. Both observers coded five participants each so that they were counterbalanced across participants. To analyze gaze location, AOIs were defined for six different regions: (1) Ball: when the gaze was directed toward the ball. (2) Target area: when the gaze was directed toward the side to which the penalty taker had to aim. (3) Middle: when the gaze was directed toward the middle of the goal (with no goalkeeper present) or when the gaze was directed toward the goalkeeper. (4) Opposite area: when the gaze was directed toward the opposite side of the corner to which the penalty taker had to aim. Each section (Target area, Middle, and Opposite area) measured a vertical distance of 2.44 m (from the goal line to the bar) as well as a horizontal distance of 2.44 m (all three sections together extended from goal post to goal post). (5) Ground: when the gaze was directed toward the ground (i.e., the surface of the soccer field) between the ball and the goal. Furthermore, we defined a residual category (6) Other: all other locations that were considered irrelevant for the task. The AOIs were defined in terms of the objects. In the video a colored circle (30 pixels) indicated the gaze of the subjects. Whenever the circle (gaze) overlapped with an object (Ball, Target area, Middle, Opposite area, Ground) we coded it as the respective object. When the circle (gaze) did not overlap with an object it was coded as Other. The start of each trial was defined as the moment when the gaze of the penalty taker was directed toward one of the following AOIs for the first time after fixating the clapperboard: Ball, Target area, Middle, or Opposite area. The end of a trial was defined by foot-ball contact. A total of 8.6% of gaze data showed missing data due to, for instance, blinking or sunlight. Missing data were excluded from further analyses. Fixations were determined when the gaze was directed continuously toward an AOI for at least seven frames (>100 ms, Vickers, 2007; cf. Land and Tatler, 2009) based on the frame rate of the eye tracker (60 Hz). We computed the following two dependent variables in order to analyze gaze behavior: (1) Viewing time: the percentage amount of time the gaze was directed toward each AOI. For a better comparison within and between subjects, we normalized each trial’s duration by its length to 3,333 ms ( 200 frames; based on the frame rate (60 Hz) of the eye tracker). The duration of 3,333 ms was selected because it represents approximately the average duration of all trials. This routine was applied due to different durations for all trials and all phases within and between subjects. For further analysis, we applied percentage values of the normalized data (cf. Figures 2, 3). (2) Final fixation during the run-up: the duration as well as the location of the last fixation before foot-ball contact. FIGURE 2. Gaze allocation matrix for one typical subject for conditions (A) no goalkeeper, (B) arm waving, and (C) reaction. The black dashed lines represent the start of the four segments of the run-up: the preparation phase, the third last phase, the second last phase, and the last phase. Each trial’s duration was normalized by its length and then divided into 3,333 ms that was approximately the mean duration of all trials. FIGURE 3. Temporal course of gaze behavior during the run-up for conditions (A) no goalkeeper, (B) arm waving, and (C) reaction. The gray dashed lines represent the start of the four segments of the run-up: the preparation phase, the third last phase, the second last phase, and the last phase. Each trial’s duration was normalized by its length and the divided into 3,333 ms that was approximately the mean duration of all trials. Penalty-taking performance was assessed by the number of goals scored and the ball end location in the horizontal direction (Wood and Wilson, 2010a; Timmis et al., 2014). To analyze the ball end location, we took a screenshot at the moment when the ball crossed the goal line. This included trials in which the goalkeeper saved the ball, although they would have counted as a success in the control condition. Trials in which the ball missed the goal were excluded from further analyses (van der Kamp, 2006; Wood and Wilson, 2010a; Noël and van der Kamp, 2012). The bottom center of the goal was defined as origin (0/0). However, it has been identified that shooting tests are not reliable and the internal consistency is low (Ali, 2011; Höner et al., 2015). Therefore, we investigated the internal consistency of the penalty performance in terms of the ball end location. For each condition (no goalkeeper, arm waving and reaction) and for each corner (bottom corner and upper corner), we determined the mean ball end location (horizontal direction) for shot one to four and for shot five to eight. Pearson product correlations between the mean ball end location from shot 1 to 4 and from shot 5 to 8 were first calculated for each combination (condition × corner) separately and then averaged after Fisher z transformation. Results showed a mean correlation coefficient of 0.36. This result shows that shooting test are not really reliable which is consistent with findings by Höner et al. (2015). However, ball end location provides the only possibility of analyzing accuracy of penalty performance. Because we did not find any significant differences in gaze behavior between the bottom corner and the upper corner, we collapsed the gaze data. Viewing times for the AOIs were analyzed with repeated measures ANOVAs (Noël and van der Kamp, 2012; Timmis et al., 2014). However, it must be taken into account that the AOIs are interdependent. When the viewing time of an AOI increases the sum of the viewing times of the other AOIs must decrease and vice versa. However, there does not exist a reciprocal relationship between two variables. Therefore, we decided to report separate ANOVAs for the dependent variables. Post hoc comparisons were calculated using t-tests with Bonferroni corrections; effect sizes were calculated as partial eta squared, and the significance level was set at 0.05. In general, subjects showed similar gaze behavior when shooting penalty kicks both within and between experimental conditions. To present interindividual variations, we have provided diagrams for each subject and each condition separately (see Supplementary Material). Figure 2 presents the gaze allocation matrix for one typical subject, and Figure 3 presents the mean amount of time gaze was directed toward each AOI for all subjects in the conditions no goalkeeper, arm waving, and reaction. Figure 3 focuses particularly on where penalty takers directed their gaze during the run-up. Both figures show that, irrespective of condition, penalty takers directed their gaze most of the time toward the ball (65%). In the majority of cases (70%), the first gaze was directed toward the ball followed by a period of time in which gaze was directed toward all AOIs, though, mainly toward the ball, the target area, or the middle of the goal. At the end of the preparation phase, the amount of time the gaze was directed toward the ball increased significantly; and during the last three phases, the gaze was directed almost exclusively toward the ball. To investigate the consistency of gaze behavior for conditions during the run-up we analyzed the number of fixations for each trial. Therefore, we applied an univariate ANOVA with repeated measures for the factor condition (no goalkeeper vs. arm waving vs. reaction). Results showed a significant main effect of condition, F(2,18) = 5.00, p < 0.05, ηp2 = 0.36. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni corrections revealed significant (p < 0.05) less fixations in condition arm waving (number of fixations: M = 4.7; SD = 1.4) compared to condition reaction (number of fixations: M = 5.3; SD = 1.6). Condition no goalkeeper (number of fixations: M = 5.5; SD = 2.2) was not significantly different compared to condition arm waving (p = 0.10) and to condition reaction (p = 0.99). For the percentage viewing time on the AOIs (ball, target area, middle, ground), we calculated separate 3 (condition: no goalkeeper vs. arm waving vs. reaction) × 4 (phase: preparation phase vs. third last phase vs. second last phase vs. last phase) ANOVAs with repeated measures. Tables 1–3 present post hoc analyses (t-test with Bonferroni correction) of each area of interest for the main effect of condition, for the main effect of phase and for the Condition × Phase interaction. TABLE 1. Post hoc analyses of the ANOVA for each area of interest. TABLE 2. Post hoc analyses of the ANOVA for each area of interest. TABLE 3. Post hoc analyses from the ANOVA for each area of interest (AOI). The ANOVA for the viewing time on the ball showed a significant main effect of phase, F(3,27) = 9.70, p < 0.001, ηp2 = 0.52. The main effect of condition, F(2,18) = 0.48, ns, and the Condition × Phase interaction, F(6,54) = 1.78, p = 0.12, did not attain significance. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction for the main effect of phase showed that the gaze was directed significantly longer toward the ball in the third last phase and second last phase compared to the preparation phase and the last phase. The shorter viewing time on the ball during the last phase resulted from a drift of gaze from the ball toward the ground (cf. Figure 3) that will be described in more detail below. Hence, the gaze behavior toward the ball seemed to be independent of the presence of a goalkeeper. Results for the viewing time on the target area showed a significant main effect of phase, F(3,27) = 10.27, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.53, a significant main effect of condition, F(2,18) = 6.21, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.41, and a significant Condition × Phase interaction, F(6,54) = 6.68, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.43. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction for the main effect of phase showed that the viewing time on the target area decreased significantly across time—particularly between the preparation phase and the last two phases. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction for the main effect of condition showed that the viewing time on the target area decreased with an increasingly salient distractor. However, only the condition no goalkeeper and the condition reaction differed significantly. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction showed that the Condition × Phase interaction resulted from significant differences between conditions in the preparation phase but not in the other three phases. Results showed that in the preparation phase, the viewing time on the target area with an increasingly salient distractor. However, only the condition no goalkeeper and the condition reaction differed significantly. The ANOVA for the viewing time on the middle of the goal revealed a significant main effect of phase, F(3,27) = 11.77, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.57, a significant main effect of condition, F(2,18) = 11.66, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.56, and a significant Condition × Phase interaction, F(6,54) = 10.02, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.53. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction for the main effect of phase revealed that the viewing time on the middle of the goal decreased significantly between the preparation phase compared to the last three phases. However, the last three phases did not differ significantly from each other. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction for the main effect of condition showed that the viewing time on the middle increased with an increasingly salient and task-relevant distractor. However, only the condition no goalkeeper and the condition reaction differed significantly. All other combinations did not attain significance. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction for the Condition × Phase interaction showed significant differences between conditions in the preparation phase but not in the other three phases. Results showed that in the preparation phase, viewing time on the middle increased with an increasingly salient distractor. However, only the condition no goalkeeper and the condition reaction differed significantly. The ANOVA for the viewing time on the ground revealed a significant main effect of phase, F(3,27) = 8.25, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.48, as well as a significant main effect of condition, F(2,18) = 3.89, p < 0.05, ηp2 = 0.30. The Condition × Phase interaction, F(6,54) = 1.69, p < 0.14, did not attain significance. Post hoc analyses with Bonferroni correction showed that the main effect of phase resulted from a drift of the gaze from the ball toward the ground during the last phase (cf. Figures 2, 3). This drift was characterized by a continuous shift from the last fixation on the ball toward the target area, whereas the gaze remained stationary on the ground for a short duration. This unexpected phenomenon was observed in 6 out of the 10 participants. The duration of the last fixation was analyzed using a univariate ANOVA with repeated measures for the factor condition (no goalkeeper vs. arm waving vs. reaction). Results did not reveal a significant main effect of condition, F(2,18) = 3.96, p = 0.07, but a linear decrease in the duration of the last fixation (no goalkeeper: 740 ± 390 ms vs. arm waving: 683 ± 326 ms vs. reaction: 625 ± 298 ms). Participants selected only the three AOIs ball (M = 77.9%), ground (M = 20.4%), and target area (M = 1.7%) for their last fixation. A chi-square test revealed a significant preference for selecting the ball as the location of the last fixation, χ2(2, N = 480) = 454.65, p < 0.001, w2 = 0.95. Two dependent variables were introduced to assess the effect of the experimental conditions on penalty performance. First, the number of actual goals was analyzed using chi-square tests. Performance was significantly better, χ2(1, N = 480) = 28.68, p < 0.001, for the bottom corner (M = 88.8%) than for the upper corner (M = 68.8%). However, no significant differences were found between conditions, χ2(2, N = 480) = 0.52, ns (no goalkeeper: M = 79.4% vs. arm waving: M = 76.9% vs. reaction: M = 80.0%). Second, ball end location (Table 4) was analyzed in terms of the absolute horizontal distance from the origin at the bottom center of the goal. A 2 (corner: bottom corner vs. upper corner) × 3 (condition: no goalkeeper vs. arm waving vs. reaction) ANOVA with repeated measures for both factors was applied to analyze the absolute horizontal distance. Results showed no significant differences for either the main effect of corner, F(1,9) = 3.69, p = 0.08, the main effect of condition, F(2,18) = 1.20, p = 0.32, or the Corner × Condition interaction, F(2,18) < 1, ns. It has to be considered, that the reliability of shot tests has been proven to be unsatisfactory. TABLE 4. Absolute horizontal distance between ball end location and the origin at the bottom center of the goal. In the present study, our aim was to examine where penalty takers direct their gaze during the execution of this far-aiming task with multiple task-relevant objects (ball, goal, and goalkeeper). Furthermore, we controlled for the presence/absence of a salient distractor and manipulated its task relevance. The goalkeeper was task-relevant (condition reaction) when he tried to save the ball and task-irrelevant (condition arm waving) when he was just standing in the middle of the goal without responding to the shot. Penalty takers were informed about the goalkeeper’s reactions. Particularly the penalty takers were informed about trials, when the goalkeeper tried to save the penalty. We then assessed the selection of fixation targets during the execution of soccer penalty shots. This task consisted of a proximal target (the ball), a distal target (the respective corner of the goal), and a task-specific distractor (the goalkeeper). All in all, our results confirm that the timing of gaze during ongoing interactions with the environment employs a “just-in-time” heuristic (Ballard et al., 1995) in that gaze behavior is tuned dynamically to task-specific locations (Hayhoe and Ballard, 2005). Therefore, gaze behavior concerning the AOIs is interdependent, an issue which has to be kept in mind. Although participants’ gaze was focused mainly on the proximal target in our task, they did direct their gaze toward the distal target for a significant amount of time during the early phase of the run-up (cf. Figure 3). Thus, the different proportions of viewing time for the proximal and the distal target can be explained as small deviations in relation to task specificity, because foot-ball contact at the proximal target would produce larger deviations from the distal target. Furthermore, it seems to be necessary to explore the environment during the early phase of the run-up (Rothkopf et al., 2007) in order to perform a spatial calibration. With respect to the modulation of gaze behavior by the presence of the distractor during the late run-up, results show that task specificity can indeed inhibit and even switch off automatic fixations on salient stimuli. More specifically, we found this inhibition to depend on the time course of the action: inhibition was strongest in the vicinity of foot-ball contact when fixating the proximal target was of maximum importance, whereas inhibition was relaxed with increasing temporal distance from foot-ball contact. In line with the primate of successful task performance, the presence of the distractor and the resulting modulatory influence on gaze behavior during early phases of the run-up had no effect on the quality of action execution in terms of shooting accuracy. In the following, we shall discuss each of these findings in more detail. How Does the Penalty Taker’s Gaze Behavior Change during the Run-up? During the run-up, gaze was directed predominantly toward the ball irrespective of the distractor. Furthermore, the amount of time gaze was directed toward the ball increased before foot-ball contact. This shows that for penalty takers using the keeper-independent strategy, gazing at the ball seems to be most important to attain an optimal foot-ball contact. During the preparation phase, the penalty taker’s gaze was directed toward the ball, the target area, or the middle and, for some parts, the opposite area and the ground. Gaze behavior in the preparation phase was driven presumably by the penalty taker’s need to explore the environment at the beginning of the attempt in order to generate a spatial representation of it (Land et al., 1999; Hayhoe et al., 2003; Rothkopf et al., 2007). This means that penalty takers had to analyze the exact position of the ball and update their representation of the goal and the goalkeeper (when he was present) before making decisions about the following movements (Tong et al., 2017). During the last three phases, penalty takers directed their gaze toward the ball and only rarely toward the distal target (Figures 2, 3). Therefore, an early update of the distal target seems to be task-adequate, and the exact representation of the goal is instrumental in planning the shot direction. Evidently, the most relevant AOI was identified for the proximal target ball. This solution to the motor problem of allocating attention to the most significant affordance seems to be adequate, because the distal target can be retrieved from memory following an occasional recalibration of the far target. Concerning task-specific objects with high visual salience, Rothkopf et al. (2007) have shown that objects with a high visual salience (here the goalkeeper, the goal, and the ball) are fixated at the beginning of a trial. The mean duration of the last fixation before foot-ball contact was 683 ms irrespective of the experimental conditions, and the most frequently observed AOI was the ball (approximately 80% of trials). Similar gaze behavior has been reported not only for penalty taking (Wood and Wilson, 2010b, 2011; Noël and van der Kamp, 2012) but also for grasping (Johansson et al., 2001). These authors assumed that an early fixation on an object occurs before manipulation in order to perform a spatial calibration that can be useful for motor planning—in our case, to hit the ball in an optimal way. This gaze behavior is described as “pro-active” (Hayhoe and Ballard, 2005); that means, the eyes are directed toward a location at which an event is expected—in our case, foot-ball contact. Other studies have demonstrated that the time between the first gaze toward an object and contact with that object ranges from about 500 ms (Land et al., 1999) to about 900 ms (Brouwer et al., 2009). The last fixation on an object seems to depend on which information is necessary for the task (Hayhoe and Ballard, 2005). Hence, we suppose that the last fixation was directed toward the ball, because the instructions requested a highly accurate foot-ball contact, and the main source of the necessary information for a successful performance was the ball. Although results regarding the duration of the last fixation on the ball showed only marginally significant differences, we argue that the duration of the last fixation did not decrease with the higher salience of the distractor (the goalkeeper) because of a further need for visual processing, but because shorter durations reflected some kind of allocation of attention toward the distal target and the goalkeeper. Additionally, we found that gaze drifted from the ball toward the ground during the last phase. In this study, we did not run further analyses of this phenomenon, though future research should take this into account and take a closer look at whether this pattern of gaze behavior can predict the corner toward which penalty takers are aiming. Does the Presence or Absence of a Task-Specific Distractor Affect the Penalty Taker’s Gaze Behavior? Our results indicate that when goalkeepers are present, penalty takers are not able to ignore them completely during the preparation phase even though they are task-irrelevant (condition arm waving). We suggest that this pattern of gaze behavior appears to be due to the salience of the goalkeeper, and the fact that penalty takers are accustomed to seeing a goalkeeper between the goalposts. Penalty takers try to identify (voluntarily or involuntarily) the position of the goalkeeper relative to the center of the goal or the goalkeeper’s posture. Previous studies (Masters et al., 2007; van der Kamp and Masters, 2008) have shown that goalkeepers rarely stand exactly in the center of the goal. Masters et al. (2007) have reported that penalty takers shoot the ball mostly to the side with the greater open area (59%). Additionally, penalty takers try to pick up information from goalkeepers’ movements indicating in which direction they will dive (van der Kamp et al., 2011). In real-world situations, these information sources seem to play a major role in successful penalty taking. When a goalkeeper is present but task-irrelevant (condition arm waving), penalty takers direct their gaze more toward the target area during the preparation phase. In contrast, when the goalkeeper is task-relevant (condition reaction) and tries to save the ball, penalty takers avoid directing their gaze toward the target area during this preparation phase. We argue that the target area did not change its relevance between the conditions arm waving and reaction, although the amount of time the penalty takers directed their gaze toward the target area in the condition reaction decreased compared to the condition arm waving. A speculative assumption is that the penalty takers wanted to conceal which corner they were going to shoot toward, and instead of looking toward the target area, they directed their gaze toward the goalkeeper. This is consistent with findings reported by Dicks et al. (2010) showing that during the early phase of the run-up, goalkeepers direct their gaze toward the head of the penalty takers to obtain information on where they will shoot the ball. Another argument why penalty takers direct their gaze during the early run-up to either the target area (condition no goalkeeper), the target area and the middle (condition arm waving), or the middle area (condition reaction) could be that one of these locations (target area and middle) is sufficient to calibrate the environment. In contrast to the preparation phase, during the last three phases, penalty takers showed a similar pattern of gaze behavior irrespective of condition. They directed their gaze mostly toward the ball; and, during the last phase, toward the ground. This result indicates that penalty takers were able to ignore the goalkeeper, the goal, and other locations almost completely (cf. Figures 2, 3), because respective locations were less important (Johansson et al., 2001; Rothkopf et al., 2007). This supports the finding that the required information (optimal foot-ball contact) is obtained immediately when it is needed, and that the gaze is directed toward locations that are best for performing the specific task (shooting as accurately as possible) and not toward the objects/locations that are salient (Johansson et al., 2001; Land and Hayhoe, 2001; Rothkopf et al., 2007). In addition, the mechanisms responsible for the salience are “off duty” while performing a specific task (Schütz et al., 2011). We suggest that this pattern of gaze behavior is the best strategy for shooting as accurately as possible. To achieve this goal, the penalty taker has to minimize the deviation of the ball end location. Therefore, an optimal foot-ball contact seems to be especially important, and we suggest that this is the reason why gaze was directed almost exclusively toward the ball in our study. This included not only the point in time when the ball was shot but also the run-up when an optimal timing of gait had to be organized (Lee et al., 1982). This subjective interpretation of a penalty taker’s strategy might be underlined by the fact that, for biomechanical reasons alone, goalkeepers have no chance of saving a top-seeded shot, however hard they try. This argument is supported by results from the condition no goalkeeper in which no goalkeeper was present who tried to save the ball. However, penalty takers still directed their gaze toward the ball instead of looking toward the target area. In addition, other studies (Wood and Wilson, 2010b, 2011; Noël and van der Kamp, 2012) also found that when penalty takers try to shoot as accurately as possible, they direct their gaze mainly toward the ball during the last 600 ms before foot-ball contact. Wood and Wilson (2010b, 2011) supposed that this gaze behavior is necessary to generate motor commands resulting from visual information. They also suggested that the location of the last fixation is more important than the duration of this fixation or any other location of fixation. We suggest that during the last three phases when using the keeper-independent strategy, penalty takers used a well-developed visual routine (Hayhoe, 2000) learned at an early age (Lees and Nolan, 1998) and habitualized over the years (Hoppe and Rothkopf, 2016). This visual routine has become so stabilized that it is resistant to external influences (e.g., movements made by the goalkeeper) or to the success/failure of a shot. A further argument why penalty takers direct their gaze toward the ball could be that—in contrast to the opposite-independent strategy—they do not want to give information to the goalkeeper about where they are going to shoot. Thus, they want to hide their gaze. However, studies on the gaze behavior of goalkeepers in soccer (Savelsbergh et al., 2002; Dicks et al., 2010) and in ice hockey (Panchuk and Vickers, 2006) have shown that goalkeepers direct their gaze either toward the body, the legs, the ball, or the ground around the ball. Dicks et al. (2010) found that goalkeepers directed their gaze exclusively toward the ball or the legs 1,000 ms before foot-ball contact until foot-ball contact. Thus, it does not seem to be necessary to hide the gaze, particularly during the late run-up, because goalkeepers try to obtain other information from the kinematics of the penalty taker. Does the Gaze Behavior of the Penalty Taker Affect Shooting Performance? Our data indicate that a distracting stimulus (absent vs. task-irrelevant vs. task-relevant) has hardly any impact on the performance of the penalty taker while using the keeper-independent strategy. This can be explained on the basis of the gaze behavior during the run-up. Our results indicated differences in performance (number of scored goals) only between the bottom and the upper corner. We suggest that shooting to the bottom corner is easier, because penalty takers just have to direct the ball in the horizontal direction (left/right). In contrast, shooting to the upper corner is more difficult due to the need to direct the ball in both the horizontal (left/right) and the vertical (up/down) direction. As a result, they have to deal with more degrees of freedom. Furthermore, results for shots that miss a goal are congruent with other findings (Wood and Wilson, 2010a; Navarro et al., 2013) indicating that the number of shots that miss the goal depends on the penalty taker’s skill rather than on the presence of a goalkeeper. However, it has to be mentioned that possibly due to our instructions (to shoot as accurately as possible) penalty takers’ main goal was not only to score a goal. Thus, the penalty takers’ task could be interpreted as a motor precision task, like for example a free-throw in basketball. Taken this interpretation into consideration, the goalkeeper did not provide relevant information which could be used by the penalty taker to complete the motor precision task. In this case, the goalkeeper did only influence the final result of the task (goal or no goal). It could be argued that penalty takers’ main goal was not only to score a goal but also to be as accurate as possible because in the condition no goalkeeper penalty takers failed to score a goal for about 20%, irrespective of the corner. This shows that penalty takers tried to be precise instead of just scoring a goal. Furthermore, Wood and Wilson (2010a) reported that shots were more centralized with a moving goalkeeper (standing in the middle of the goal, waving arms up and down) compared to shots with a stationary goalkeeper (standing in the middle of the goal, arms by the side). However, we were unable to replicate this finding in the present study. We suggest that—as mentioned before—penalty takers fall back on a visual routine developed over the long term, especially for the late phases of the run-up. We analyzed gaze direction during the execution of a far-aiming task with multiple task-relevant objects (ball, goal, and goalkeeper). The present findings are manifold: first, throughout the run-up, gaze was directed most of the time toward the ball irrespective of condition. This suggests that the ball was most important for shooting as accurately as possible, because penalty takers had to attain an optimal foot-ball contact. Second, although the distractor impacted on the gaze behavior of the penalty taker, the gaze behavior was influenced only during the early phase of the run-up. In the late phases of the run-up, the distractor did not affect gaze behavior. Third, performance of the penalty takers was not influenced by the absence or presence of a distractor (absent vs. task-irrelevant vs. task-relevant), because penalty takers directed their gaze toward the ball during the last three phases. These results indicate that whether gaze is driven by salience of the stimulus setting or by attentional demands depends on the phase of the task in which the penalty taker is engaged. JK made substantial contributions to conception and design, acquisition of data, and analysis and interpretation of data. MH and JM made substantial contribution to conception and design, and analysis and interpretation of data. JK, MH, and JM participated in drafting the article and revising it critically for important intellectual content; and give final approval of the version to be submitted and are accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved. The reviewer AP and handling Editor declared their shared affiliation, and the handling Editor states that the process nevertheless met the standards of a fair and objective review. This research was supported by the Collaborative Research Center on “Cardinal Mechanisms of Perception” (SFB-TRR 135) funded by the DFG. Bakker, F. C., Oudejans, R. R. D., Binsch, O., and van der Kamp, J. (2006). Penalty shooting and gaze behavior: unwanted effects of the wish not to miss. Int. J. Sport Psychol. 37, 265–280. Johansson, R. S., Westling, G., Bäckström, A., and Flanagan, R. (2001). Eye–hand coordination in object manipulation. J. Neurosci. 21, 6917–6932. Kuhn, W. (1988). “Penalty-kick strategies for shooters and goalkeeper,” in Science and Football, eds T. Reilly, A. Lees, K. Davids, and W. J. Murphy (London: E. & F. N. Spon), 489–492. Land, M. F., and Hayhoe, M. M. (2001). In what ways do eye movements contribute to everyday activities? Vision Res. 41, 3559–3565. Noël, B., and van der Kamp, J. (2012). Gaze behaviour during the soccer penalty kick: an investigation of the effects of strategy and anxiety. Int. J. Sport Psychol. 43, 326–345. Vickers, J. N. (2007). Perception, Cognition, and Decision Training: The Quiet Eye in Action. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics. Wood, G., and Wilson, M. R. (2010b). Gaze behaviour and shooting strategies in football penalty kicks: implications of a ’keeper-dependent approach. Int. J. Sport Psychol. 41, 293–312. Copyright © 2018 Kurz, Hegele and Munzert. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
2019-04-24T10:24:20Z
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00019/full
本发明的目的是提供具有功率控制方法和除噪器的CDMA系统的结构，其能够有效地增大系统容量，抵抗通信路径上的突变，并且通过将除噪后信噪功率比的值反映到功率控制命令信息的生成中来实现能防止上行线路传输功率中不必要的增加(和多址干扰)的快速反应的功率控制方法。 Object of the present invention is to provide a power control method and a CDMA system in addition to the structure of the noise filter, which can effectively increase system capacity, resistance mutations on the communication path, and by the value of the signal to noise power ratio of the reflected noise in addition to power control command generation information can be prevented to realize the power control method for uplink transmission power in unnecessary increase (and multiple access interference) rapid response. 本发明涉及在通信系统中用于通过码分多址在移动台和基站之间实现通信的功率控制方法，其中去除包含于来自移动台的接收信号中的多址干扰信号，估计当前被接收的接收信号的除噪后信噪功率比，通过比较估计的除噪后信噪功率比和功率控制的目标值来生成功率控制命令，并传输该功率控制命令到移动台以控制移动台的传输功率。 The present invention relates to a power control method implemented by code division multiple access communication between a mobile station and a base station in a communication system, which comprises removing the received signal from the mobile station in multiple access interference signals, the estimate of the current received in addition to the received signal after the noise signal to noise power ratio, to generate a power control command, and transmits the power control command to control the transmission power of the mobile station to the mobile station by a target value signal to noise power ratio and the noise power control in addition to comparing the estimated . 本发明涉及使用于码分多址(CDMA)格式通信系统中的功率控制方法，其特别用于具有多址干扰(MAI)去除器能力的通信系统。 The present invention relates to a power control method in code division multiple access communication system format (CDMA), particularly for having multiple access interference (MAI) removing capability of a communication system. 通常地，在诸如宽带CDMA(W-CDMA)的CDMA无线通信格式中，从移动台(MS)到基站(BS)的每个上行线路具有称为外环和内环的两个功率控制系统。 Generally, in a CDMA wireless communications format such as Wideband CDMA (W-CDMA), a from a mobile station (MS) uplink to each base station (BS) having two power control system is referred to as outer and inner rings. 外环是用于独立地调整在激活群的每个小区中上行线路功率控制目标的较高层控制。 The outer ring is for independently adjusting the uplink power control of a higher layer in each cell cluster in the activation control target. 由于外环是基于解码数据的码组差错率(BLER)的测量结果，该控制响应被计算码组差错率所需的传输时间间隔(TTI)延迟。 Since the outer loop is based on the decoded data block error rate (BLER) measurement results, the transmission time of the control response is required for the calculation block error rate interval (TTI) delay. 本发明主要涉及的内环进行移动台传输功率的轻度调节以保持在特定目标的上行线路的信扰比(在下文中用SIR表示)。 The present invention relates to mild inner mobile station of the transmission power is adjusted to maintain the uplink signal to interference ratio of a specific target (indicated by SIR hereinafter). 上行线路的内环功率控制由如下方法实现(见3rd Generation Partnership Project(3GPP)TS 25.214，v1.1.0，UTRAFDD Physical Layer Procedures)：(1)基站接收上行线路的专用物理控制信道(DPCCH)，并测量被接收信号的SIR值。 Uplink inner loop power control is realized by the following method (see 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) TS 25.214, v1.1.0, UTRAFDD Physical Layer Procedures) dedicated physical control channel :( 1) the base station receives uplink (DPCCH), and measured SIR value of the received signal. (2)接着，基站将所测量的SIR值同信扰功率比的目标值(在下文中用SIR目标值表示)加以比较，并确定上行线路的传输功率控制(TPC)命令从而控制移动台的传输功率。 (2) Next, the base station the measured SIR value with the target signal to interference power ratio (SIR target value is identified hereinafter) are compared, and determines the uplink transmission power control (TPC) commands to control the transmission of the mobile station power. (3)这样被确定的传输功率控制命令接着被插入下行线路(从基站到移动台方向上的通信)时隙中的预定位置，在被正在传输的时隙之后被立即传输，并被传输到移动台。 (3) is determined so that the transmission power control command is then inserted into a downlink (communication from the base station to mobile station direction) of the predetermined slot position, the slot is transmitted immediately after being transmitted, and transmitted to the The mobile station. (4)移动台根据接收的传输功率控制命令来调节上行线路的传输功率。 (4) the mobile station to adjust the transmit power of the uplink transmission power according to the received control command. 由于功率控制的响应延迟降低系统性能，对于每个时隙期间实现功率控制格式的内环，并用常规方法实时地进行SIR测量。 Since the power control delay in response to reduced system performance, achieved for inner loop power control during each time slot format, and SIR measured in real time by a conventional method. 除扰器(IC)已被公开作为通过去除出现在CDMA通信中的多址干扰来增大系统容量的技术。 In addition scrambler (IC) technology has been disclosed to increase system capacity in a CDMA communication occurs by removing the multiple access interference. 在具有该除扰能力的基站中，通过每个上行线路信道的除扰单元(ICU)从接收的CDMA信号中分离多址干扰分量。 Separating the multiple access interference component of the other base station has interference capability in addition by each uplink scrambling unit (ICU) link channel from a CDMA signal received. 当期望的专用物理数据信道(DPDCH)在基站被解调时，多址干扰分量实质上可通过多级除扰单元的重复除扰操作被从接收的信号中分离。 When the desired dedicated physical data channel (DPDCH) is demodulated in the base station, multiple access interference component can be substantially repeated except scrambling operation is separated from the received signal by a multi-stage addition scrambling unit. 结果，可能提高期望的专用物理数据信道的SIR值，因而进一步增加系统容量。 As a result, the value may increase the desired SIR of the dedicated physical data channel, thereby further increasing system capacity. 这在许多技术文献中有所解释，比如A.Duel-Hallen等人的，“Multiuser Detection for CDMASystems”，IEEE Personal Communications，pp.46-58，和S.Moshavi，“Multi-userDetection for DS-CDMA Communications”，IEEE Communications Magazine，pp124-136，October 1996。 This is explained in the technical literature many such A.Duel-Hallen et al., "Multiuser Detection for CDMASystems", IEEE Personal Communications, pp.46-58, and S.Moshavi, "Multi-userDetection for DS-CDMA Communications ", IEEE Communications Magazine, pp124-136, October 1996. 在具有除扰能力的常规基站中，在除扰前进行专用物理控制信道的SIR测量。 In addition to having a conventional base station scrambling capability, the SIR measurement performed before the dedicated physical control channel in addition to scrambling. 结果是，测量的SIR值小于被解调和解码的除扰后专用物理数据信道的SIR值。 As a result, the measured SIR value is smaller than the SIR value after demodulation and decoding scrambled addition to dedicated physical data channel. 因此如果根据上述传输功率控制方法并基于除扰前SIR值实现上行线路的传输功率控制，会有上行线路的传输功率被不必要增大的风险。 Therefore, if the above-described transmission power control method based on inter scrambled before transmission power control SIR value to achieve uplink, transmission power of the uplink will be unnecessarily increased risk. 为避免这种情形，可考虑基于除扰后SIR值实现传输功率控制，不过在该情况下，功率控制由于除扰操作所需的时间被延迟。 To avoid this, transmission power control can be achieved considering the SIR value in addition to scrambling, but in this case, in addition to the power control since the time required for scrambling operation is delayed. 此外，用于确定传输功率控制命令的SIR目标值由上面所述的基于码组差错率的外环确定。 Further, for determining a transmission power control command from the above SIR target based on the determined block error rate of the outer ring. 由于码组差错率由循环冗余检测(CRC)的结果被计算，其直到解码操作(速率去匹配，解交织，信道解码和CRC判别)相对于整帧被完成后才能被计算。 Since the block error rate is calculated from the results of cyclic redundancy check (CRC), which until the decoding operation (rate dematching, deinterleaving, channel decoding, and CRC is determined) is calculated with respect to the entire frame is completed. 而且，为了测量码组差错率(如20ms-2s)，有必要实现多帧的循环冗余检测。 Further, in order to measure the block error rate (e.g., 20ms-2s), cyclic redundancy check is necessary to achieve a plurality of frames. 因此，来自外环的SIR目标值被码组差错率测量延迟。 Thus, SIR target is delayed from the outer block error rate measurements. 在功率控制中该响应延迟是系统容量降低的一个因素。 In response to the power control delay is a factor in reducing system capacity. 该影响在通信路径的状态突然变化时特别明显，比如当连接或终止新信道(呼叫)或由于快速的衰减效果时。 This effect is particularly evident in the state of sudden changes in the communication path, such as when a new channel or terminate connection (call) or because of the rapid attenuation. 考虑上述，本发明的目的是提供具有除扰器的CDMA功率控制方法和CDMA系统结构，其能有效地增强系统性能并同时能够处理通信路径中的突变，更确切地说，通过在功率控制命令信息的生成中反映除扰后的SIR值来实现能抑制上行线路传输功率中不需要的增加和多址干扰的快速反应的功率控制方法。 View of the above, an object of the present invention to provide a power control method and a CDMA CDMA systems having other structure scrambler, which is effective to enhance system performance and can be processed simultaneously mutated communication path, more precisely, by the power control commands generation information reflected in addition to the SIR value achieved after scrambled uplink transmission power control method does not require a power increase and a rapid response can be suppressed MAI. 根据本发明的第一方面，一种用于实现移动台和基站之间的码分多址通信的通信系统，其特征在于：所述基站包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出第一接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述第一接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于估计当前正被接收的所述第一接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比的除扰效果估计装置；用于通过比较由所述除扰效果估计装置确定的所述除扰后信扰功率比和功率控制的目标值来生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用于传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台的基站传输装置；并且所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及移动台传输装置，其基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号的功率。 According to a first aspect of the present invention, a method for a communication system of code division multiple access communication between a mobile station and a base station, wherein: said base station comprising: means for receiving a signal and an output from the mobile station base station receiving means receives a first signal; means for removing comprises a first received signal to the other multiple access interference signal scrambling means; means for estimating inter scrambling after channel currently being received by the first received signal in addition to interference power ratio estimating interference effect means; means for generating by said determining means generates a control command to the power control commands in addition to signal to interference power ratio and a target value for power control after the disturbance estimated by the disturbance effect comparing other; and means for transmitting the transmission power control commands the base station to the mobile station apparatus; and the mobile station comprising: means for receiving a second received signal from the mobile station to the base station signal and an output of said receiving means; and a mobile station transmission means, based on the power control command which is included in the second received signal to adjust the power is transmitted to the base station transmission signal. 根据本发明的第二方面，提供了一种用于实现移动台和基站之间的码分多址通信的通信系统，其特征在于：所述基站包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出第一接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述第一接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于在由所述除扰装置除扰后解码所述第一接收信号和确定解码数据差错率的差错率计算装置；基于由所述差错率计算装置确定的差错率来确定功率控制目标值的第一目标值设定装置；用于估计由所述除扰装置除扰的效果的除扰效果估计装置；依赖于由所述除扰效果估计装置估计的除扰效果而用以更新所述目标值的第二目标值设定装置；用于通过比较从所述第二目标值设定装置输出的所述目标值与当前正被接收的所述第一接收信号的信扰功率比，生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用 According to a second aspect of the present invention, there is provided a communication system for implementing a code division multiple access communication between a mobile station and a base station, wherein: said base station comprising: means for receiving a signal from the mobile station and means for outputting a first base station receives a received signal; means for removing MAI other scrambling signal contained in the first received signal; except for scrambled by the scrambling means to decode the first addition after receiving signals and decoding data error rate determined error rate calculating means; a first target value setting means for determining a power control target value based on the error rate calculated by error rate determining means; means for estimating, by the addition to the scrambling means in addition to the effect in addition to scrambling scrambled effect estimating means; means for estimating the interference effects in addition to the second target value setting means updates said target value is dependent on the disturbance estimated by the addition results; by comparing from the the target value output from the second target value setting means with the current power ratio of the signal to interference being received by the first received signal, generating a power control command of the control command generation means; and with 传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台的基站传输装置；并且所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号功率的移动台传输装置。 Transmitting said power control command to the mobile station the base station transmitting apparatus; and the mobile station comprising: receiving means for receiving from the mobile station apparatus of the second received signal and an output signal of said base station; and based on information contained in the the second received signal power control command to adjust the mobile station apparatus is transmitted to the transmission power of a transmission signal of the base station. 根据本发明的第三方面，提供了一种用于通信系统的基站设备，用于通过码分多址实现与移动台的通信；所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及移动台传输装置，其基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号的功率；所述基站设备包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于估计正被接收的所述接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比的除扰效果估计装置；用于通过比较由所述除扰效果估计装置确定的所述除扰后信扰功率比和功率控制的目标值，生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用于传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台的基站传输装置。 According to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided a base station apparatus for a communication system for communicating through the CDMA mobile station achieved; the mobile station comprising: means for receiving a signal from the base station and mobile station signal receiving means receives a second output; and a mobile station transmission means, based on the power control command which is included in the second received signal to adjust the power is transmitted to the base station transmission signal; the the base station apparatus comprising: receiving means for receiving a base station signal and an output signal received from the mobile station; means for removing means is included in addition to the multiple access interference of the interference signal of the received signal; means for estimating is being received in addition to the scrambled signal to interference power of the received signal other than the interference effect estimating means; means for comparing the estimated by the interference effect by the addition of other means for determining signal to interference power ratio after scrambling and power control target value, to generate power control commands control command generating means; and means for transmitting the transmission power control commands to the base station apparatus to the mobile station. 根据本发明的第四方面，一种通信系统的基站设备，用于通过码分多址实现同移动台的通信，所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及移动台传输装置，其基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号的功率；所述基站包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于通过所述除扰装置除扰后解码所述接收信号和确定解码数据差错率的差错率计算装置；用于基于由所述差错率计算装置确定的差错率来确定功率控制目标值的第一目标值设定装置；用于估计由所述除扰装置而来的除扰的效果的除扰效果估计装置；用于基于由所述除扰效果估计装置估计的除扰效果，更新所 According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, a base station apparatus of a communication system, for communication with the mobile station, the mobile station comprises a code division multiple access is achieved by: means for receiving signals from the base station and outputting a second receiving the mobile station receives a signal; and a transmitting mobile station apparatus, based on the power contained in the second received signal to adjust the power control commands transmitted signal is transmitted to the base station; said base station comprising: using receiving means to receive the base station signal and an output signal received from the mobile station; means for removing said apparatus comprising in addition to scramble signals received multiple access interference signal; means for scrambling the other of said decoding means in addition to scramble determining the error rate of the received signal and decoding data error rate calculating means; a first target value setting means based on the error rate calculated by error rate determining means determines the power control target value; means for the estimation of in addition to the effect of disturbance estimating means of said device effects in addition to other interference from the interference; means for scrambling based on the effect of the addition of other disturbance estimating means effects update 目标值的第二目标值设定装置；通过比较从所述第二目标值设定装置输出的所述目标值与正被接收的所述第一接收信号的信扰功率比，用于生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用于传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台的基站传输装置。 Target value setting means the second target value; by comparing the signal to interference power ratio from the target value of the second target value setting means and the output being received by the first received signal, for generating a power a control command generation means control command; and means for transmitting the transmission power control commands to the base station apparatus to the mobile station. 根据本发明的第五方面，提供了一种在通信系统中通过码分多址在移动台和基站之间实现通信的功率控制方法，其特征在于：去除包含于来自所述移动台的接收信号中的多址干扰信号；估计正被接收的所述接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比；通过比较所述估计的除扰后信扰功率比和功率控制的目标值来生成功率控制命令；以及通过传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台控制所述移动台的传输功率。 According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a power control method for realizing the communication between a mobile station and a base station in a communication system through a code division multiple access, characterized by: removing from a received signal including the mobile station to multiple access interference signal; estimating a signal to interference power ratio after being scrambled signal received by the receiving other; by comparing the estimated signal to interference in addition to generating power ratio after scrambling and power control target value power control command; and controlling transmission power of the mobile station of the mobile station by transmitting a control command to said power. 根据本发明的第六方面，提供了一种在通信系统中通过码分多址在移动台和基站之间实现通信的功率控制方法，其特征在于：去除包含于来自所述移动台的接收信号中的多址干扰信号；在所述除扰之后解码所述接收信号并确定所述解码数据的差错率，基于被确定的差错率来确定功率控制的目标值，估计所述除扰所引起的除扰效果，以及基于所述估计的除扰效果更新所述目标值；基于所述目标值和当前正被接收的所述接收信号的信扰功率比之间的比较生成功率控制命令；以及传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台以控制所述移动台的传输功率。 According to a sixth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a power control method for realizing the communication between a mobile station and a base station in a communication system through a code division multiple access, characterized by: removing from a received signal including the mobile station to multiple access interference signal; decoding the scrambled after the other receives the signal and determining error rate of said decoded data, power control determines the target value based on the determined error rate, estimating the disturbance caused by the addition in addition to the effect of interference, and based on the estimated effect of updating the target value, in addition to scrambling; generating a power control command based on the comparison between the signal to interference power ratio and the target value of the reception signal currently being received; and transmitting the power control command to the transmission power of the mobile station to control the mobile station. 图1表示常规的CDMA接收装置。 FIG 1 shows a conventional CDMA receiving apparatus. 图2表示上行线路的专用物理数据信道/专用物理控制信道的帧结构。 Dedicated physical data channel of FIG. 2 showing the uplink / dedicated physical control channel frame structure. 图3表示多级连续除扰解调器的结构。 3 shows a multi-stage continuous removal scrambler demodulator structure. 图4表示多级串连除扰器的除扰单元的结构。 Figure 4 shows in addition to the multi-stage series scrambler scrambling unit other structure. 图5表示传输功率控制命令生成器的结构。 Figure 5 shows the structure of the transmission power control command generator. 图6表示传输功率控制命令生成器的操作时序。 6 shows the operation timing of a transmission power control command generator. 这里将参照附图描述本发明。 The present invention will be described with reference to the drawings herein. 下面的描述中使用W-CDMA信号格式作为实例，但本发明并非如此严格地被限制。 The following description using W-CDMA signal format as an example, but the present invention is not so strictly limited. 图1表示用于实现功率控制的具有除扰器的基站100的结构实例。 1 shows in addition to having a base station for implementing power control of the scrambler 100 of the structural example. 在图1中，天线160同对应于单个天线的除扰器一起被显示从而简化其结构。 In Figure 1, the same antenna 160 corresponding to a single antenna interference is in addition displayed together thereby simplifying its structure. 但本发明也应用于天线阵，天线阵在实际中用得更普遍。 However, the present invention is also applied to an antenna array, the antenna array used is more common in practice. 图2的框图表示上行线路的帧结构，其中专用物理数据信道和专用物理控制信道I/Q被多路复用。 2 is a block diagram showing the structure of the uplink frame, wherein the dedicated physical data channel and a dedicated physical control channel I / Q multiplexed. 处理接收信号的过程参照图1加以解释。 Process a received signal be explained with reference to FIG 1. 天线160接收的信号通过高频无线电部分被传送并提供给匹配滤波器(MF)110和除扰解调器130。 Received by antenna 160 through the high frequency radio signal is transmitted and supplied to the matched filter section (MF) 110 and demodulator 130 in addition to scrambling. 接收信号先被匹配滤波器110中专用物理控制信道的解扩频码解扩频以获取同步时序。 Received signal is first matched filter 110, dedicated physical control channel despreading code to obtain despread synchronization timing. 这儿省略详细的描述，实际上多个的用户(用户数量K)被协调，从而实现对应于各个用户的K个信道的同步时序获取过程。 Detailed description is omitted here, in fact, a plurality of users (number of users K) is coordinated to achieve synchronization timing corresponding to the respective K user channels acquisition process. 使用匹配滤波器110的结果，SIR值被SIR测量部分120中的专用物理控制信道实时地确定。 The results of using a matched filter 110, the SIR measurement value is SIR DPCCH section 120 determines in real time. 然后，测量的SIR值被传输到传输功率控制命令生成器170。 Then, SIR measured value is transmitted to the transmission power control command generator 170. 在本实施方式中，除扰解调器130解扩频和解调利用除扰能力的专用物理数据信道和专用物理控制信道。 In the present embodiment, the descrambler 130 in addition to the spread spectrum demodulator and demodulation using a dedicated physical data channel and a dedicated physical control channel interference removing capability. 除扰解调器130为对应于K个用户的K个信道输出SIR值和除扰解调信号。 In addition scrambler demodulator 130 K corresponding to the K-th user channel output SIR value and the other scrambled demodulated signal. 这儿，同将在图3中详细解释的一样，测量对于每级的每个除扰单元的SIR值。 Here, the same will be explained in detail as in FIG. 3, for each level of each measured SIR value scrambling unit other. 至于SIR测量，它们是基于每个用户的专用物理控制信道被测量。 As for SIR measurement, which is based on each user's dedicated physical control channel is measured. 解调信号被传输到每个用户的通信路径解码器140，在这儿对每个用户实现速率去匹配，解交织，信道解码和循环冗余检测。 Demodulated signal is transmitted to each user's communication channel decoder 140, implemented to match rate for each user, deinterleaving, channel decoding and cyclic redundancy check here. 使用循环冗余检测的结果，对于码组差错率测量部分150中的每个用户，码组差错率在相对于解码数据的传输时间间隔TTI单元中被测量，码组差错率被送到传输功率控制命生成器170。 The results of cyclic redundancy check, for the block error rate measurement section 150 per user, block error rate in the unit interval TTI is the transmission time measured with respect to the decoded data, block error rate is supplied to the transmission power control command generator 170. 在除扰单元130每级测量的SIR信息被提供到如上所述接收码组差错率值的传输功率控制命令生成器170。 It is supplied to the transmission power value of the received block error rate as described above, the control command generator 170 in the scrambling unit 130 in addition to SIR information measured for each stage. 在传输功率控制命令生成器170中，从除扰解调器130提供的每级SIR信息，从码组差错率测量部分150提供的码组差错率以及从SIR测量部分120提供的专用物理控制信道的实时SIR值被用来生成对应于每个用户的上行线路传输功率控制命令。 In the transmission power control command generator 170, in addition to each stage from the SIR information provided by scrambler demodulator 130, block error rate error rate measuring section 150 provided from the measurement part 120 and the code group dedicated physical control channel supplied from the SIR the SIR value is used to generate real-time corresponding to each user of uplink transmission power control command. 对于每个用户，生成的上行线路传输功率控制命令被发送到帧(时隙)生成器190，在这儿它们被信道编码器192插入到传输时隙中合适的位置同编码信号一起被多路复用，并在被CDMA调制器180调制后作为下行线路传输信号通过天线160被传输到各个移动台。 For each user, the generated uplink transmission power control command is transmitted to the frame (time slot) generator 190, here they are in the channel encoder 192 is inserted into the appropriate place in the transmission time slots with the encoded signal is multiplexed with with, and it is transmitted to each mobile station through an antenna 160 as a downlink transmission signal after being modulated CDMA modulator 180. 图2显示上行线路中专用物理数据信道和专用物理控制信道的帧结构。 Figure 2 shows the frame structure of uplink dedicated physical data channel and a dedicated physical control channel. I信道上的专用物理数据信道仅由数据组成，而Q信道上的专用物理控制信道包括，如具有15个时隙(时隙#1，时隙#2，时隙#3，...，时隙#i，...，时隙#15)10毫秒长的帧，每个0.625毫秒长的时隙由信道估计导频信号，TFCI(传输格式组合指示)，FBI(反馈信息)和传输功率控制命令(TPC)组成。 I channel dedicated physical data channel is composed of only the data, and the Q channel includes a dedicated physical control channel, such as those having 15 slots (slots # 1, # 2 slot, the slot # 3, ..., slot #i, ..., time slot # 15) 10 ms frame length, each slot is 0.625 milliseconds long channel estimate by a pilot signal, the TFCI (transport format combination Indicator), the FBI (feedback information) and the transmission power control command (TPC) composition. 图3表示除扰解调器130的实例。 FIG 3 shows an example of demodulator 130 in addition to the scrambler. 在该实例中显示了多级(n-级)串联减法除扰器，但是它也可能使用其他类型的除扰器，比如本发明中的多级平行减法型除扰器。 Shows a multi-stage (N- stages) in addition to serial subtractor scrambler, it is also possible to use other types of inter scrambler, such as in the present invention is a multi-stage parallel interference subtractor type except in this example. 在图中水平方向上从左到右，对应于每信道总共有K个除扰单元135，换句话说，对于每用户，对于从第一级到第n级的每级。 In the horizontal direction from left to right in the figure, each channel corresponding to a total addition of K scrambling unit 135, in other words, for every user, from a first stage to the n-th stage to each stage. 在每级131，132，133中，除扰单元135的操作被依次实现。 In each stage 131, 132, the operation of the scrambling unit 135 are sequentially implemented in addition. 比如，级i中信道j的除扰单元135接收来自第(i-1)级的信道j的重扩频复制信号和对第i级的信道j-1的除扰操作后的残留信号，实现解扩频，信道估计，信道校正和探测和重扩频以生成输出到第(i+1)级的信道j的重扩频复制信号，通过从信道j-1接收的残留信号中分离该重扩频复制信号来实现除扰操作，然后发送除扰操作后的残留信号到下一个信道j+1信号。 For example, stage i of channel j other scrambling unit 135 receives the channel from a first stage (i-1) j of the heavy spreading replica signal and the channel of the i-th stage j-1 residual signal after the scrambling operation in addition, to achieve despreading, channel estimation, channel correction and detection and re-spreading to generate an output to weight the spread replica signal channel of the (i + 1) level j by separating the weight from the residual signal received channel j-1 in in addition to the spread spectrum duplication signal scrambling operation is achieved, then the residual signal is transmitted in addition to scrambling operation to the next j + 1 channel signal. 此外，第i级信道j的除扰单元135同时测量第i级信道j的SIR值，然后将其发送到传输功率控制命令生成器170。 Further, the i-th stage channel j other scrambling unit 135 simultaneously measures the SIR value of the i stage channel j, and then transmits it to the transmission power control command generator 170. 每个除扰单元135结构的实例在图4中表示。 Each representation in FIG. 4 in addition to the structure of Example scrambling unit 135. 本实施方式的除扰单元135由对应于专用物理控制信道的部分和对应于专用物理数据信道的部分组成，如图4所示，它们具有大致一致的结构并实现相同的操作。 In addition to the scrambling unit 135 according to the present embodiment by a portion corresponding to a dedicated physical control channel and a corresponding dedicated physical data channel part, as shown, which it has a substantially uniform structure 4 and achieve the same operation. 将对应于专用物理控制信道的部分作为实例来解释其操作，由被接收信号引起的输入信号被输入到信道估计部分200和解扩频部分210。 The dedicated physical control channel corresponding to the part as an example to explain the operation, an input signal is inputted from the reception signal caused by the channel estimating section 200 and despreading section 210. 在第二和随后级的除扰单元中，通过将从前级接收的重扩频复制信号增加到从前级或前信道接收的残留信号而获取的信号被输入到信道估计部分200和解扩频部分210。 In the second and other subsequent stages scrambling unit, the signal received by the previous stage re-spread replica signals of the previous residual signal level is increased or the received forward channel acquired is input to the channel estimating section 200 and despreading section 210 . 信道估计部分200估计出现在信道传输路径上的(幅度和相位的)波动，并发送估计结果到信道校正部分220。 Estimating section 200 estimates channel appears on the channel transmission path fluctuation (amplitude and phase), and transmits the channel estimation result to the correction section 220. 解扩频部分210使用该信道的解扩频编码解扩频输入信号，并输出作为结果的解调信号到信道校正部分220。 Despreading section 210 using the channel despreading code of despread the input signal, and outputs the demodulated signal to the channel as a result of the correction section 220. 信道校正部分220基于信道估计的结果校正解调信号，从而除去传输路径上接收的信道波动，并输出结果到SIR测量部分230和检波器225(符号确定部分)。 Channel correction section 220 based on the channel estimation result correction of the demodulated signal, thereby removing a transmission path fluctuation of the received channel, and outputs the result to the SIR measuring part 230 and detector 225 (symbol determination portion). 检波器225(符号确定部分)在信道校正后确定来自解调信号的接收符号，并输出确定的结果到再扩频部分240。 Detector 225 (symbol determination portion) determines that the received symbols from the demodulated signal after the channel correction, and outputs the result of the determination to the re-spreading portion 240. 在末级的除扰单元135中，如虚线所示，被确定的接收符号被输出到信道解码器140。 In addition to the scrambling unit 135 in the final stage, shown in phantom, the determined received symbols are provided to channel decoder 140. 在再扩频部分240，使用与用于解扩频相同的扩频码重扩频被接收的符号，并在信道重整形部分250，对重扩频信号进行与在信道校正部分220中进行的信道校正的相反的处理，在重扩频信号上被实现，其结果是生成该信道上扩频信号的复制即重扩频复制信号。 Re-spreading section 240, the same symbols as used for despreading the received spread code re-spreading and reshaping of the channel portion 250, the counterweight and the spread spectrum signal is performed in the channel 220 in the correction section reverse channel correction processing is implemented on the weight spread spectrum signal, generated as a result of the copying, i.e. re-channel spread spectrum signal replica signal spreading. 在除扰单元135，除扰操作通过从输入信号中分离该重扩频复制信号来实现。 In addition to the scrambling unit 135, in addition to the scrambling operation is achieved by re-spreading replica signal separated from the input signal. 接着经专用物理控制信道除扰操作的信号被输入到专用物理数据信道的处理单元，并用同样的方式实现除扰操作。 Then via a dedicated physical control channel signal in addition to scrambling operation is input to the processing unit dedicated physical data channel, and scrambling operation in addition to achieve the same way. 对于本实例，已解释的情况中专用物理控制信道的处理单元和专用物理数据信道的处理单元被串联连接，但本发明也适用于这些处理单元并联连接的情况。 For the present example, the case has been explained in the dedicated physical control channel processing unit and a dedicated physical data channel processing unit are connected in series, but the present invention is also applicable to the case where the processing units are connected in parallel. 在另一方面，SIR测量部分230基于从专用物理控制信道的信道连接部分220接收的解调信号来测量SIR值。 On the other hand, SIR measuring section 230 measures the SIR value based on the connecting portion 220 receives the demodulated signal from the channel dedicated physical control channel. 出于解释的方便，图4中未表示专用物理控制信道和专用物理数据信道的解调过程，其可以通过应用分离和合并多传输路径的瑞克(RAKE)接收系统来实现。 For convenience of explanation, FIG. 4 is not shown in the demodulation process dedicated physical control channel and dedicated physical data channel, which may be (the RAKE) receiver system, and RAKE combined by the application of the multi-transport path separation is achieved. 图5和图6分别表示传输功率控制命令生成器170的结构的实例和其操作的时序。 Figures 5 and 6 show timing transmission power control command generator 170 of the example of the structure and operation thereof. 图5表示对于单个用户的结构，实际上，传输功率控制命令生成器170中有多少用户K就有多少具有相同结构的部分，从而生成对每个用户的传输功率命令。 Figure 5 shows a configuration for a single user, in fact, the transmission power control command generator 170 K the number of users there are many portions having the same structure, so as to generate a transmission power command for each user. 从除扰解调器130每级的除扰单元135提供的SIR值，随同从SIR测量部分120提供的除扰前SIR值，被输入到除扰效果估计部分300。 Each stage from the SIR value 130 in addition to other scrambling unit scrambler demodulator 135 provides, in addition to scrambling measured along the front portion 120 provides the SIR value from the SIR, is input to the estimating section 300 in addition to the effect of the scrambling. 除扰效果估计部分300存储输入的信息，使用将在后面描述的算法和其当前含有的信息，估计除扰前的当前接收信号的除扰后SIR值，并输出估计值(在下文中称SIR估计)到比较器320。 In addition to the information section 300 stores the input interference effect is estimated using an algorithm described later and information about its current comprising estimating the interference SIR value in addition to the currently received signal before addition to the interference, and the output estimation value (called SIR hereinafter estimation ) to comparator 320. 在该情况中，输出的估计是假定在经过第n级的除扰单元后将获取的SIR值。 In this case, assuming that the SIR estimated output value obtained after the addition of the n-th stage after scrambling unit. 此外，除扰效果估计部分300估计关于当前接收信号的平均信扰功率比(在下文中称平均估计SIR值)，其基于实际上在从除扰解调器130获取除扰后被测量的SIR值和由上述估计获取的SIR值，并输出结果到目标值设定部分310。 Further, in addition to the effect of disturbance estimating section 300 estimates the average power of the current received signal to interference signal ratio (SIR estimated average values ​​referred to hereinafter), in addition to the fact scrambler based demodulator 130 acquires SIR value for the interference from other measured after and the value obtained by the SIR estimation, and outputs the result to the target value setting section 310. 该平均估计SIR值对应于包含当前接收信号的传输时间间隔(TTI)的码组差错率。 The estimated SIR value corresponding to the average block error rate comprises a current transmission time interval (TTI) of the received signal. 外环SIR目标值设定部分330具有的功能与在常规系统中生成传输功率控制命令时参照的设定SIR目标值的功能相同，基于从码组差错率测量部分150提供的码组差错率试探地确定SIR目标值。 Outer loop SIR target value setting portion 330 has the same function as the reference transmission power control command is a function of generating the SIR target is set in the conventional system, error rate measuring section 150 based on block error rate supplied from the tentative code group determine the SIR target. 由于该决策过程与常规传输功率控制方法的外环系统相同，它的详细描述在这儿省略，但简单地说，如果码组差错率高则该算法设定SIR目标值为高，如果码组差错率低则设定SIR目标值为低，其计算方法可包括预存码组差错率和SIR目标值之间的映射表，并读取对应于输入码组差错率的SIR目标值。 Since the decision-making process with the conventional transmission power control system outer loop of the same method, its detailed description is omitted here, but simply, if the block error rate is high, the algorithm set SIR target value is high, if the error code group low SIR target value is set low, the calculation method may comprise a mapping table between the stored target SIR and block error rate, and reads the SIR target corresponding to the input of block error rate. 目标值设定部分310使用从外环SIR目标值设定部分330获取的试探SIR目标值和包含当前除扰前接收信号的传输时间间隔TTI的平均估计SIR值，从而更新功率控制的目标SIR值，比如当二者之间的差大于阈值的时候。 Target value setting portion 310 uses the target SIR setting section 330 acquires the probe and including the current average SIR estimate value other scrambled before transmission time interval (TTI) of the received signal from the outer loop SIR target value, thereby updating the target SIR value of the power control , such as when the difference between the two is greater than a threshold time. 这时，表示有多少移动台当前被连接的信息(信道连接信息)可被用作辅助信息。 In this case, the mobile station indicates how much of this information (channel information), connected may be used as the auxiliary information. 作为更新算法，简单地用估计平均SIR值替换为更新值的方法，将平均估计SIR值相应的第一系数与同试探SIR目标值一起的信道校正信息相应的第二系数的乘积作为更新值的方法，或将输入平均估计SIR值，信道校正信息和试探SIR目标值到预定函数而获取的值作为更新值的方法都可以考虑使用。 As the update algorithm, estimation is simply replaced with the updated value of the method, the average estimated SIR value corresponding to the product of the first coefficient together with the tentative target SIR corresponding to the second channel correction coefficient information is updated as the value of the average SIR values value method, or the value of the input average SIR estimation, channel correction information and tentative target SIR to a predetermined function of acquiring the update value as a method used can be considered. 此外，如果试探的SIR目标值和平均估计SIR值的差小于阈值，目标值设定部分310确定并不需要目标值的校正，并原样输出试探SIR目标值。 Further, if the difference between the probe and the average estimated SIR target SIR value is less than the threshold value, the target value setting portion 310 determines a target value correction is not required, and outputted as the SIR target probe. 比较器320比较从目标值设定部分310获取的功率控制SIR目标值和除扰前的当前接收信号的除扰后估计SIR值，并基于比较的结果，生成表示传输功率向上或向下的传输功率命令，并通过帧生成器190传输命令到移动台。 Comparator 320 compares the target value setting section 310 acquires power control SIR estimate and SIR target value addition in addition to the currently received scrambled signal before interference, based on a result of the comparison, transmit power upward or downward transmission generates power command, the command to the mobile station and the transmission frame generator 190. 如上述，考虑到除扰效果并基于估计SIR值的传输功率中被控制的变化代替了常规的内环控制，而考虑到除扰效果，使用对应于码组差错率的平均估计SIR值来设定和更新用于控制的SIR目标值则相当于常规的外环控制。 As described above, in addition to taking into account the effects of disturbance and the estimated change in the transmission power control SIR values ​​are based on the place of the conventional inner loop control, in addition to taking into account the effect of disturbance, the use of block error rate corresponding to the average SIR estimate value provided and updating the set SIR target for control is equivalent to a conventional outer loop control. 这儿，在除扰效果估计部分300中实现的估计关于当前接收信号除扰后SIR的算法与计算对应于当前接收信号相关差错率的平均估计SIR值的算法将使用图6来解释。 Here, in addition to the effects of disturbance estimation section 300 is implemented on the current estimated received signals other scrambling algorithm and the SIR calculation algorithms corresponding to the average SIR estimate value of the current reception signal related to the error rate will be explained using FIG. 在SIR测量部分120中，接收信号的SIR值被实时地测量，从而除扰效果估计部分300能轻易地获取在时刻t接收的接收信号的除扰前SIR值。 In the SIR measuring section 120, the SIR value of the received signal is measured in real time, so that in addition to the effect of disturbance estimation section 300 can be easily acquired in addition to the SIR value before scrambling signal received at time t received. 然而，由于除扰需要时间，不可能在时刻t获取在时刻t接收的接收信号除扰后SIR值的确切测量值。 However, since the time required in addition to scrambling, it is impossible to access the precise measurement time t after addition scrambled at time of reception SIR value of the received signal t. 然而，即使在时刻t，当然可能获取前面接收的信号除扰后SIR值的实际测量值。 However, even at time t, of course, possible to obtain an actual measured value of the previously received scrambled SIR value of a signal other. 比如，如果n级除扰操作所需要的延迟时间为τt，那么可获取时刻t-τt接收的接收信号在第n级除扰后的SIR值。 For example, if the other n-level scrambling operation delay time required for the τt, then the received signal can be obtained in time t-τt received SIR value after scrambled in addition to n-th stage. 因此，通过使用除扰前SIR值和对应于前面接收信号实际测量的除扰后SIR值，可以估计SIR值因除扰而改善了多少，为此可能获取代表除扰效果的函数f_IC()。 Thus, in addition to scrambling by using the SIR values ​​before and after the addition corresponding to the scrambling signal previously received SIR value actually measured SIR value can be estimated by the disturbance in addition to how much improvement, for the function representing f_IC scrambling may obtain other effects (). 该函数f_IC()表明在时刻τ接收的信号的信扰功率比SIR_0(τ)与同样的接收信号在第n级除扰后信扰功率比SIR_n(τ)之间的关系，其表达为SIR_n(τ)＝f_IC(SIR_0(τ))。 The function f_IC () show the relationship between the received signal to interference power ratio of the signal at time [tau] SIR_0 (τ) of the received signal similar to stage n except the scrambled signal to interference power ratio between SIR_n (τ), expressed as SIR_n (τ) = f_IC (SIR_0 (τ)). 因此，在当前时刻t，可能获取估计SIR值为SIR_n(t)＝f_IC(SIR_0(t))。 Accordingly, at the current time t, may obtain the estimated value of SIR SIR_n (t) = f_IC (SIR_0 (t)). 当确定该函数f_IC()时，可能使用多级(或所有级)的每级除扰后SIR值，或使用特定第n级(比如，末级)除扰后SIR值。 When it is determined that the function f_IC (), may use a multi-stage (or all stages) after each level except scrambled SIR value, or use a specific n-th stage (for example, the last stage) after the addition scrambled SIR value. 此外，对于除扰前SIR值，已获取取决于时刻t的值。 Further, in addition to the SIR value before the interference, depending on the value of the acquired time t. 因此，也可能获取函数f_SIRt(k，τ2-τ1)，其表示从时刻τ2到时刻τ1的时间变化引起的第k级中SIR值的变化。 Therefore, it is possible to obtain the function f_SIRt (k, τ2-τ1), which represents the change in the k-th stage SIR value caused by time changes from time to time [tau] 1 [tau] 2 in. 比如，在当前时刻t，可能从实际测量值轻易地确定f_SIRt(0，t-τt)。 For example, at the current time t, may be determined f_SIRt (0, t-τt) easily from the actual measured values. 而且，可能获取函数F_IC()，其表示基于这些函数f_IC()和f_SIRt()并考虑到时间变化因素的除扰效果。 Moreover, it may get function F_IC (), which represents the basis of these functions f_IC () and f_SIRt () and taking into account the effect of interference in addition to time-varying factors. 除扰效果估计部分300将时刻t的除扰前SIR值输入到除扰效果函数F_IC()，并估计在时刻t接收的接收信号除扰后SIR值。 In addition to the effect of disturbance estimation section 300 prior to scrambling in addition to the SIR value at a time t is input to the other scrambling function effect F_IC (), and the estimated SIR value in the reception signal received at time t after addition of the interference. 从而，在时刻t可能获取在时刻t接收的信号除扰后SIR值而无需等待除扰操作的处理延迟。 Thus, the delay time t may be acquired in the processing at time t received signal without waiting for other operations in addition to scrambling scrambled SIR value. 此外，如图6所示，n级除扰后SIR值作为相对于时刻t-τt接收的接收信号的实际测量值而被获取。 Further, as shown in FIG 6, n stage SIR value in addition to scrambling is acquired as the actual measurement value of the received signal with respect to time t-τt received. 而且，由于上述的估计，n级除扰后的SIR值作为相对于从时刻t-τt到时刻t接收的接收信号的估计值而被获取。 Further, the above estimation, in addition to n-stage SIR value and the disturbance estimated value is acquired with respect to a reception signal received at time t from the time as t-τt. 除扰效果估计部分300使用在时刻t接收信号的除扰后估计SIR值和先于此刻的预定时刻决定的除扰后SIR值，确定除扰后估计平均SIR值，将其作为包含时刻t接收信号的传输时间间隔TTI的平均估计SIR值，并输出到目标值设定部分310。 In addition to the scrambling effect estimating section 300 using the time t in addition to scramble the received signals the estimated SIR value and the scrambling SIR value other prior to a predetermined time at the moment of the decision, determining an estimated average SIR value in addition to scrambling, which is t receives containing time signal transmission time interval TTI of the average estimated SIR value, and outputs the target value setting section 310. 如上所述，该平均估计SIR值对应于包含时刻t接收的接收信号的传输时间间隔TTI的码组差错率。 As described above, SIR value corresponding to the TTI containing time t of the block error rate of reception signals received transmission time interval of the average estimated. 在本例中描述了基于估计SIR值计算的在时刻t接收的接收信号的除扰后SIR值和平均估计SIR值被作为包含时刻t接收的接收信号的传输时间间隔TTI的平均估计SIR值，但是如上述SIR估计算法，也可能实现校正，其考虑到被计算的平均估计SIR值的时间变化因素。 In the present embodiment is described based on the estimated SIR value calculated at the time except the scrambled SIR value and the average estimated SIR value of the received signal t received are spaced an average estimated SIR value TTI as a transmission time of the received signal comprises a time t received, However, SIR estimation algorithms as described above, is possible to realize the correction, which takes into account the average SIR estimate value is calculated in a time variation factor. 这样，本发明预计当前信号的除扰后SIR值，并且其反映到传输功率控制中，从而传输功率控制比使用实际值时被更精确地实现，因此使得常规出现的传输功率的不必要增加在其发生之前被避免，并通过吸收除扰操作引起的处理延迟来实现快速响应的实时传输功率控制。 Thus, the present invention contemplates addition to this scrambled signal the SIR value, and it is reflected to the transmission power control, so that transmission power control is achieved more accurately than when using the actual value, thus making it unnecessary transmission power is increased in regular occurrence It is avoided before it occurs, in addition to scrambling operation by absorbing a processing delay caused by transmission power control to achieve real-time fast response. 而且，确定对应于当前接收信号的码组差错率的平均估计SIR值，并将其反映到传输功率控制的目标值中，因此使得码组差错率计算引起的处理延迟被吸收，并使得实时传输功率控制被快速响应地实现。 Further, the average current is determined corresponding to the estimated SIR value of the block error rate of the received signal, and is reflected to the target value of the transmission power control, so that the block error rate calculation processing delay caused to be absorbed, such that real-time transmission and the power control is achieved with a quick response. 因此在本发明中，在使用除扰器的系统中，可以有效地进行常规的外环和内环控制而无需改变现有的外环控制信号生成部分，对标准规格系统的适应性可认为很高。 Therefore, in the present invention, in addition to the scrambler system, can effectively control routine in the outer and inner rings used without changing the existing outer loop control signal generating part, the adaptability of the system may be considered standard is high. 在上述实施方式中，图中仅仅表示串联除扰器结构，但本发明也应用于并行除扰器或串—并混合除扰器结构。 In the above-described embodiment, in addition to the figures represent only the series scrambler structure, but the present invention is also applicable to other parallel or serial scrambler - addition and mixing scrambler structure. 此外，在上述实施方式中，对应于考虑到当前接收信号除扰效果的码组差错率的平均估计SIR值被加以估计，该值被反映到目标SIR值中并被校正，并且确定传输功率控制命令，其基于考虑到当前接收信号除扰效果的瞬时SIR值和校正的目标SIR值，但本发明是基于上行线路传输功率控制命令信号的生成，其考虑除扰效果未受除扰引起的延迟影响，从而其他方法可以用于实现传输功率控制命令的生成。 Further, in the above-described embodiment, corresponding to the current received signal is considered to be the estimated SIR value estimated by dividing the average block error rate of interference effect, the value is reflected to the target SIR and corrected, and determines the transmission power control command, which is based on the consideration of the current value of the received signal in addition to the target SIR SIR value and the corrected instantaneous interference effects, but the present invention is based on the uplink transmission power control command signal is generated, which were not considered in addition to the effect of interference due to other interference delay Effects of such other methods may be used to implement the transmission power control command generation. 比如，通过使用除扰效果的估计值，可能在对应于内环的控制期间的每个SIR测量期间更新目标SIR值，并确定基于校正目标SIR值的传输功率控制命令和当前接收信号的SIR值。 During each update the target SIR SIR measurement, for example, by using the estimated value of the interference effect in addition, may correspond to the inner ring during the control and determines the transmission power corrected target SIR value based on control commands and signals currently received SIR value . 而且，对应于外环目标SIR值的校正方法可以是估计除扰后码组差错率本身并基于其被实现。 Moreover, the target SIR corresponding to the outer loop correction method may be estimating the error rate in addition to the scrambling code group which is itself based on the implementation. 任一情况下，下面表明的效果是相似的。 Under either case, it indicates that the following effects are similar. 根据本发明，在具有功率控制和除扰能力的CDMA系统中，除基于常规的由外环设定的值之外，还基于反映除扰单元引起的除扰效果的值，功率控制目标值被设定。 According to the present invention, in a CDMA system with power control and interference capability in addition, in addition to the conventional value by the outer loop based on the set, it reflected further controlled based on other effects in addition to the scrambling of the scrambling unit causes the value of the power target value set up. 此外，功率控制命令信息的确定是通过先估计当前接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比然后使用该值来实现。 Further, the power control command information is determined by first estimating the current channel after the other scrambled signals received interference power ratio value is then used to achieve this. 结果，功率控制系统反映除扰功能的效果。 As a result, the power control system to reflect the effect of the addition scrambling function. 而且，与常规的功率控制系统相比，该功率控制系统对无线电通信路径上的变化具有快速的响应。 Moreover, compared with the conventional power control system, the power control system with fast response to changes in the radio path. 结果，能避免上行线路传输功率中不必要的增加，因此与常规系统相比能抑制多址干扰。 As a result, the uplink transmission power to avoid unnecessary increases, it is possible to suppress multiple access interference as compared to conventional systems. 1.一种用于实现移动台和基站之间的码分多址通信的通信系统，其特征在于：所述基站包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出第一接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述第一接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于估计当前正被接收的所述第一接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比的除扰效果估计装置；用于通过比较由所述除扰效果估计装置确定的所述除扰后信扰功率比和功率控制的目标值来生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用于传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台的基站传输装置；并且所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及移动台传输装置，其基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号的功率。 1. A method for a communication system of code division multiple access communication between a mobile station and a base station, wherein: said base station comprising: a base station for receiving the first signal and the output signal received from the mobile station receiving means; means for removing said first received signal comprises multiple access interference signals other scrambling means; means for estimating the signal to interference power in addition to the scrambling currently being received by the first received signal other than the interference effect estimating means; means for generating a power control command generation means control command by comparing the estimated by the effect of the addition scrambling means scramble determining other target value signal to interference power ratios and power control; and means for transmitting said transmitting power control commands to the base station apparatus to the mobile station; and the mobile station comprising: means for receiving from the mobile station signal receiving means receives a second signal and an output of the base station; transmitting apparatus and a mobile station, based comprising the power to the second received signal to adjust the power control command is transmitted to the base station transmission signal. 2.根据权利要求1所述的通信系统，其中所述目标值是基于在除扰后通过解码所述第一接收信号而获取的解码数据的差错率来确定。 The communication system according to claim 1, wherein said target value based on the error rate in addition to the scrambled acquired by decoding the first decoded data signal received is determined. 3.根据权利要求1或2所述的通信系统，其中所述基站还包括：用于确定所述第一接收信号的信扰功率比的第一信扰功率比测量装置；用于在通过所述除扰装置除扰后确定所述第一接收信号的信扰功率比的第二信扰功率比测量装置；以及基于当前接收信号的信扰功率比与过去所述第一接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比，所述除扰效果估计装置估计当前接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比，其中，当前接收信号的信扰功率比是从所述第一信扰功率比测量装置获取的，而过去所述第一接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比是从所述第二信扰功率比测量装置获取的。 The communication system of claim 1 or 2 wherein said base station further comprises: determining a first channel interference power of the received signal of the first signal to interference power ratio measuring apparatus ratio; for by the in addition to scrambling means determines said other of said first received signal after the interference power of the second signal to interference ratio of the signal to interference power ratio measuring apparatus; channel interference power and based on the current received signal to interference ratio in the past in addition to the first received signal after the signal to interference power ratio, in addition to the effects of disturbance estimating means currently received signal to interference signal power ratio after addition scrambled, wherein the current signal to interference power ratio of the received signal is obtained from the first signal to interference power ratio measuring apparatus , past the scrambled signal to interference power ratio after addition of the first received signal is a second signal to interference power ratio measuring apparatus from the acquisition. 4.根据权利要求3所述的通信系统，其中所述基站还包括用于确定对应于当前接收信号差错率的信扰功率比平均值的信号处理装置，该平均值的确定是基于由所述除扰效果估计装置估计的当前接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比和由所述第二信扰功率比测量装置测量的除扰后信扰功率比；以及基于由所述信号处理装置确定的所述平均值，用于更新功率控制目标值的目标值设定装置。 4. The communication system according to claim 3, wherein said base station further comprises means for determining a current corresponding to a signal to interference power ratio of a received signal error rate of the average signal processing apparatus, the average value is determined based on by the in addition to the effect of disturbance estimation means for estimating a current signal to interference power ratio after receiving scrambled signals other than by the second channel and interference power ratio after addition scrambled channel interference power measured by the measuring means; based on the determination by said signal processing means the average power control for updating the target value of the target value setting means. 5.根据权利要求4所述的通信系统，其中所述目标值设定装置考虑到当前连接的数量来更新所述目标值。 The communication system according to claim 4, wherein said target value setting means taking into account the number of current connections to update the target value. 6.一种用于实现移动台和基站之间的码分多址通信的通信系统，其特征在于：所述基站包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出第一接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述第一接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于在由所述除扰装置除扰后解码所述第一接收信号和确定解码数据差错率的差错率计算装置；基于由所述差错率计算装置确定的差错率来确定功率控制目标值的第一目标值设定装置；用于估计由所述除扰装置除扰的效果的除扰效果估计装置；依赖于由所述除扰效果估计装置估计的除扰效果而用以更新所述目标值的第二目标值设定装置；用于通过比较从所述第二目标值设定装置输出的所述目标值与当前正被接收的所述第一接收信号的信扰功率比，生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用于传输所述功率控制命令到所 A CDMA communication system used for communication between a mobile station and a base station, wherein: said base station comprising: a base station for receiving the first signal and the output signal received from the mobile station in addition to multiple access interference means for removing an interference signal contained in the first received signal;; by the receiving means for scrambling the received signal and decoding the first decoded data error rate determined in addition to the scrambling device other the error rate calculating means; a first target value setting means for determining a power control target value based on the error rate calculated by error rate determining means; means for estimating the effects of the addition to scrambling in addition to the scrambling device other interference effects estimating means; dependent on the estimated by the estimation apparatus in addition to the effect of interference effects in addition to scrambling the second target value setting means updates said target value; means for setting a target value outputted from said second comparator It said signal to interference power ratio of the target currently being received by the first received signal, generating a power control command of the control command generation means; and means for transmitting the power control command to the 移动台的基站传输装置；并且所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号功率的移动台传输装置。 Base station transmits a mobile station apparatus; and the mobile station comprising: receiving means for receiving the mobile station signal and second received signal output from the base station; and based on the power contained in the second received signal a control command to adjust the mobile station apparatus is transmitted to the transmission power of a transmission signal of the base station. 7.一种用于通信系统的基站设备，用于通过码分多址实现与移动台的通信；所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及移动台传输装置，其基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号的功率；所述基站设备包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于估计正被接收的所述接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比的除扰效果估计装置；用于通过比较由所述除扰效果估计装置确定的所述除扰后信扰功率比和功率控制的目标值，生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用于传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台的基站传输装置。 A base station apparatus for a communication system, a communication with a mobile station by a code division multiple access implemented; the mobile station comprising: a mobile station for receiving a signal and a second received signal output from the base station receiving means; and a mobile station transmission means, based on the power control command which is included in the second received signal to adjust the power is transmitted to the base station transmission signal; said base station apparatus comprising: means for receiving from in addition to scrambling for the estimation of the reception signal being received; means the mobile station receiving the received signal and the output signal of the station; means for removing said apparatus comprising in addition to receiving multiple access interference signal of the interference in addition the effect of interference signal to interference power ratio estimating means; means for comparing the estimated by the interference effect by the addition of other means determines scrambled signal to interference power ratio target value and the power control, power control command generates a control command generation means ; and a base station transmitting means for transmitting the power control command to the mobile station. 8.根据权利要求7所述的基站设备，其中所述目标值是基于通过在除扰后解码所述接收信号而获取的解码数据差错率来确定的。 8. The base station apparatus according to claim 7, wherein said target value is determined by the other decoding said received scrambled signal acquired error rate based on the decoded data. 9.根据权利要求7或8所述的基站设备，还包括用于确定所述接收信号的信扰功率比的第一信扰功率比测量装置；以及用于通过所述除扰装置除扰后确定所述接收信号的信扰功率比的第二信扰功率比测量装置；其中，基于由所述第一信扰功率比测量装置获取的当前接收信号的信扰功率比与由所述第二信扰功率比测量装置获取的过去所述接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比，所述除扰效果估计装置估计当前接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比。 And the other by the scrambling means for scrambling other; base station apparatus according to claim 7 or 8, further comprising means for determining a first interference power channel signal to interference ratio of the received signal power ratio measuring apparatus determining the signal to interference power of the received signal is smaller than a second signal to interference power ratio measuring apparatus; wherein, based on the current received signal to interference signal power ratio obtained by said first measuring signal to interference power ratio by said second signal to interference power ratio measuring apparatus obtaining last after other scrambled channel interference power ratio of the received signal, in addition to the effects of disturbance estimating means scrambled channel in addition to the current received interference power ratio of the signal. 10.根据权利要求9所述的基站设备，还包括：信号处理装置，用于基于由所述除扰效果估计装置估计的当前接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比和由所述第二信扰功率比测量装置测量的除扰后信扰功率比来确定对应于当前接收信号差错率的信扰功率比平均值；以及用于基于由所述信号处理装置确定的所述平均值来更新所述功率控制目标值的目标值设定装置。 The base station apparatus according to claim 9, further comprising: signal processing means, based on a signal to interference power ratio of the rear of the second channel and received signals in addition to the current scrambling effect estimating means other than interference interference power ratio determined after addition scrambled signal to interference power ratio measuring means for measuring a current corresponding to the signal to interference power ratio of the average received signal error rate; and means for, based on the average value determined by the signal processing means to update said power control target value of the target value setting means. 11.根据权利要求10所述的基站设备，其中所述目标值设定装置考虑到当前的连接数量来更新所述目标值。 11. The base station apparatus according to claim 10, wherein said target value setting means taking into account the current number of connections to update the target value. 12.一种通信系统的基站设备，用于通过码分多址实现同移动台的通信，所述移动台包括：用于接收来自所述基站的信号和输出第二接收信号的移动台接收装置；以及移动台传输装置，其基于包含于所述第二接收信号中的所述功率控制命令来调整被传输到所述基站的传输信号的功率；所述基站包括：用于接收来自所述移动台的信号和输出接收信号的基站接收装置；用于去除包含于所述接收信号中的多址干扰信号的除扰装置；用于通过所述除扰装置除扰后解码所述接收信号和确定解码数据差错率的差错率计算装置；用于基于由所述差错率计算装置确定的差错率来确定功率控制目标值的第一目标值设定装置；用于估计由所述除扰装置而来的除扰的效果的除扰效果估计装置；用于基于由所述除扰效果估计装置估计的除扰效果，更新所述目标值的第二目标值 12. The base station apparatus of a communication system, code division multiple access for communication with the mobile station by the mobile station comprising: a mobile station for receiving a signal and a second received signal output from the base station reception apparatus ; transmitting apparatus and a mobile station, based on the power control command which is included in the second received signal to adjust the power of the transmission signal is transmitted to the base station; the base station comprising: means for receiving from the mobile the base station apparatus receives the signal and the output signal of the reception station; means for removing means is included in addition to the multiple access interference of the interference signal of the received signal; except for scrambled by the scrambling means in addition to the determination and decoding said received signals decoding data error rate of the error rate calculating means; based on the error rate calculated by error rate determining means determines the power control target value a first target value setting means; means for estimating by said scrambling means from other in addition to the interference effect as other interference estimating means; based on estimated by the estimation apparatus in addition to the effect of disturbing interference effects in addition to, updating the target value of the second target 定装置；通过比较从所述第二目标值设定装置输出的所述目标值与正被接收的所述第一接收信号的信扰功率比，用于生成功率控制命令的控制命令生成装置；以及用于传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台的基站传输装置。 Setting means; generating means by comparing the power of the target signal to interference from the second target value setting means and the output being received by a first receiving signal ratio for generating a power control command is a control command; and means for transmitting the transmission power control commands to the base station apparatus to the mobile station. 13.一种在通信系统中通过码分多址在移动台和基站之间实现通信的功率控制方法，其特征在于：去除包含于来自所述移动台的接收信号中的多址干扰信号；估计正被接收的所述接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比；通过比较所述估计的除扰后信扰功率比和功率控制的目标值来生成功率控制命令；以及通过传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台控制所述移动台的传输功率。 13. A method implemented by code division multiple access in a communication system between a mobile station and a base station for communication power control method, characterized by: removing comprises multiple access interference signals from the received signal in the mobile station; Estimation after addition scrambled signal to interference power ratio of the received signal being received; other by comparing the estimated signal to interference power ratio after scrambling and power control target value to generate a power control commands; and transmitting said power control command by the mobile station to control transmission power of the mobile station. 14.根据权利要求13所述的功率控制方法，其中所述目标值是基于在除扰后通过解码所述接收信号而获取的解码数据差错率来确定的。 14. The power control method according to claim 13, wherein said target value based on said received signal error rate of the decoded data by decoding the scrambled after addition acquired determined. 15.根据权利要求13或14所述的功率控制方法，还包括：测量所述接收信号的信扰功率比和测量除扰后所述接收信号的信扰功率比，以及基于当前接收信号的所得信扰功率比和前面所述接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比，估计当前接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比。 15. The power control method of claim 13 or claim 14, further comprising: measuring the signal to interference power ratio after addition of the scrambled signal is received, and based on the obtained current received signal and the signal to interference power ratio measuring the received signal and a signal to interference power ratio after addition to the foregoing scrambled signal to interference power ratio of the received signal, in addition to the interference estimating signal to interference power ratio of the signal currently received. 16.根据权利要求15所述的功率控制方法，还包括：基于已被估计的当前接收信号除扰后信扰功率比和过去被测量的所述接收信号的除扰后信扰功率比来确定对应于当前接收信号差错率的信扰功率比平均值，并基于所述平均值来更新所述功率控制的目标值。 16. The power control method according to claim 15, further comprising: scrambling the signal to interference power ratio determined after addition scrambled signal to interference power ratio of the received signal is measured based on the past and the currently received signal has been estimated in addition corresponding to the current received signal to interference signal power ratio of average error rate, and updating the target value based on the average value of the power control. 17.根据权利要求16所述的功率控制方法，其中考虑当前的连接数量更新所述目标值。 17. The power control method according to claim 16, wherein the number of connections currently considering updating the target value. 18.一种在通信系统中通过码分多址在移动台和基站之间实现通信的功率控制方法，其特征在于：去除包含于来自所述移动台的接收信号中的多址干扰信号；在所述除扰之后解码所述接收信号并确定所述解码数据的差错率，基于被确定的差错率来确定功率控制的目标值，估计所述除扰所引起的除扰效果，以及基于所述估计的除扰效果更新所述目标值；基于所述目标值和当前正被接收的所述接收信号的信扰功率比之间的比较生成功率控制命令；以及传输所述功率控制命令到所述移动台以控制所述移动台的传输功率。 18. A CDMA base station between the mobile station and the power control method implemented in a communication system communicating through, wherein: removing comprises multiple access interference signals from the received signal in the mobile station; in after the addition scramble decoding said received signal and determines an error rate of the decoded data, the power control target value is determined based on the determined error rate, in addition to scrambling in addition to estimating the effect of disturbance caused, and based on the in addition to updating the estimated effect of said interference target value; generating a power control command based on the comparison between the signal to interference power ratio and the target value of the reception signal currently being received; and transmitting said power control command to the the mobile station to control the transmission power of the mobile station.
2019-04-19T23:21:59Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/CN1214544C/en
Martin S. Angst, M.D.; David R. Drover, M.D.; Jörn Lötsch, M.D.; Bhamini Ramaswamy, M.D.; Sujata Naidu, M.S.; et al D. Russell Wada, Ph.D.; Donald R. Stanski, M.D. ** Professor, Department of Anesthesia, Stanford University School of Medicine. ‡ Department of Clinical Pharmacology, J. W. Goethe-University. # Research Associate, Pharsight Corporation. Received from the Department of Anesthesia, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California; the Department of Clinical Pharmacology, J. W. Goethe-University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany; and Pharsight Corporation, Mountain View, California. The disposition kinetics of hydromorphone generally necessitates administration every 4 h of the conventional immediate-release tablet to provide sustained pain relief. 5,6 However, multiple daily dosing is inconvenient and may result in decreased compliance, more pronounced pain, and a reduced quality of life. 7–9 Therefore, a new sustained-release formulation of hydromorphone recently was developed for the treatment of chronic pain with a single daily dose. Fig. 1. The oral osmotic system before and during operation. The oral osmotic system consists of a semipermeable membrane containing a drug and an osmotic active push compartment. In the gastrointestinal tract, water enters through the semipermeable membrane and expands the push compartment, which in turn forces drug at an approximately constant rate through a laser drilled bore hole. The primary goal of this study was to examine the time course and magnitude of analgesia to experimental pain after administration of a new sustained-release formulation of hydromorphone using OROS (hydromorphone OROS) and to compare it with that after immediate-release hydromorphone or placebo administration. This report summarizes analgesic data obtained with an experimental pain model in human volunteers after oral administration of hydromorphone. Data were collected during five different study sessions at least 5 days apart, i.e. , after administration of a single dose of immediate-release hydromorphone (session 1) followed in randomized sequence by three different doses of hydromorphone OROS and placebo, respectively (sessions 2–5). Hydromorphone plasma concentrations are reported only in the context of the pharmacodynamic analysis. A detailed pharmacokinetic analysis including data from intravenous administration of hydromorphone will be the subject of a subsequent manuscript. The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of Stanford University. Twelve healthy subjects (six men and six women) with a mean age of 27 yr (range, 21–34 yr) and a mean body weight of 76 kg (range, 60–88 kg) for men and 64 kg (range, 59–70 kg) for women gave written informed consent. All subjects had a normal physical examination, electrocardiogram, routine laboratory profile, negative drug screen, and pregnancy test (women) before enrollment. No over-the-counter medication was allowed 48 h before each study day. Intake of prescription drugs or chronic medication was prohibited during and 14 days before the study except for the use of oral contraceptives. Before each study session subjects fasted overnight. On arrival at the study center, a catheter was inserted in one arm vein, and recording of vital signs was started (electrocardiogram, noninvasive arterial blood pressure, hemoglobin oxygen saturation, and respiratory rate). Study Session 1: Immediate-release Hydromorphone. Subjects received a single dose of 8 mg, open-label, immediate-release hydromorphone with 240 ml of water (Dilaudid, Knoll Pharmaceutical Company, Mount Olive, NJ). No other water intake was allowed from 1 h before dosing through 1 h after dosing. A meal was taken 3 h after drug intake. Venous blood samples were obtained and vital signs recorded before and 15, 30, 45, 60, 90, 120, 180, 240, 300, and 360 min after drug intake. Experimental pain testing was performed in duplicate before and 30, 60, 120, 240, and 360 min after drug intake. Occurrence and severity of adverse events were recorded (mild = no limitation of usual activity, slight discomfort; moderate = some limitation of usual activity or significant discomfort; severe = inability to conduct usual activity or intolerable discomfort). Study Sessions 2–5: Sustained-release Hydromorphone. Using a double-blind design, subjects were randomly allocated to receive a single dose of 8, 16, and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS (Hydromorphone SR, Knoll Pharmaceutical Company), and placebo. All subjects received all treatments but on different occasions. Dose selection was based on developing a single daily dose formulation matching the doses of the immediate-release formulation (2, 4, and 8 mg) administered every 4–6 h. At the beginning of each study session, subjects swallowed three tablets, all containing no drug or two containing no drug and one containing 8, 16, or 32 mg hydromorphone OROS. Water intake was restricted as outlined for study session 1. Meals were taken at 3, 9, 24, and 28 h after drug intake. Venous blood samples were obtained before and 1, 2, 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, and 30 h after drug intake. Experimental pain testing was performed in duplicate before and 3, 6, 9, 12, and 30 h after drug intake. Vital signs were recorded hourly. Adverse events were recorded as outline for study session 1. Seven milliliters of venous blood was drawn into heparinized glass tubes, centrifuged, frozen within 1 h, and stored at −20°C. Plasma and the internal standard tri-deuterated hydromorphone were injected onto a SCIEX API III-Plus LC-MS-MS (PE Biosystems, Foster City, CA). The assay was linear over a range of 0.05–10.0 ng/ml. The between-day coefficient of variation ranged from 1.4 % to 11.2%. The lower limit of quantification was 0.05 ng/ml. Before study participation, subjects were familiarized with the test procedure. During study sessions, subjects completed experimental pain test cycles of approximately 10-min duration at specified times. Standardized sentences emphasizing the test procedure were read to subjects before starting a test cycle. A test cycle consisted of two distinct series of electrical stimuli. A first series was administered using an ascending staircase design. The intensity of the first stimulus varied randomly between 1.2 and 2.4 mA. The intensity of subsequent stimuli increased by 30% steps until a subject reported pain, and then by 15% steps until a subject indicated that he or she was unable to tolerate the next stronger stimulus. The interstimulus interval was 15 s. The first series allowed estimating the pain threshold (average of highest electrical current not evoking pain and lowest electrical current evoking pain) and the pain tolerance (current evoking most painful perception tolerated). The second series was composed of 16 stimuli evenly spaced starting 30% less than the estimated pain threshold and ending at the estimated pain tolerance. Each stimulus was administered once in random sequence. Subjects rated the magnitude of pain evoked by each stimulus on a 100-mm visual analog scale (VAS) anchored by the words “no pain” and “most intense pain tolerable.” A scatter plot depicting the 16 stimulus intensities (mA) versus pain (VAS) resulted for each test cycle (fig. 2, plot on the left). Fig. 2. The derivation of the analgesic efficacy variables is shown. (Left ) An example of a scatter plot depicting nociceptive intensity (mA) versus pain intensity (visual analog scale [VAS]) as obtained in a volunteer during one pain test cycle. (Middle ) The fitted line describing the raw data. (Inset , A ) The error model used to fit a line to uncensored VAS scores between 1 and 99. The bell shaped curve reflects the error distribution. The likelihood of an error was maximized, graphically corresponding to maximizing the length of displayed arrow. (Inset , B ) The error model used to fit a line to censored VAS scores of 0 and 100. The probability of the error was maximized, graphically corresponding to maximizing the shaded area (y-value > 100) under the bell-shaped curve. (Right ) The derivation of the analgesic efficacy variables, i.e. , the pain threshold and the pain tolerance from the model parameters underlying the fitted line. Derivation of Analgesic Efficacy Variables. where x is the electrical current, y is the VAS-score, a is the slope of the relation, and b is the x-intercept (fig. 2, middle graph). A maximum likelihood approach was used for parameter estimation. A power model was also explored but failed to improve the fit as judged by visual inspection and the likelihood ratio test. The fitting procedure assumed that errors (observed − predicted value) were normally distributed around the predicted value. Fitting a line to a VAS-score between 1 and 99 maximized the likelihood of observed error, i.e. , minimized the distance parallel to the y-axis between the fitted line and observed data point (inset graph A of the middle graph of fig. 2). Fitting a line to a VAS score equal to 0 or 100 maximized the probability of observed error, i.e. , maximized the distance parallel to the y-axis between the fitted line and observed data point (inset graph B of the middle graph of fig. 2). The second fitting procedure accounted for the fact that VAS scores of 0 and 100 are censored data (0 indicates a true value of approximately 0 or lower but not higher, 100 indicates a true value of approximately 100 or higher but not lower). One analgesic efficacy variable was the pain threshold (x-intercept of the linear model denoted “b”) and the pain tolerance calculated with aid of the linear model and by setting y = 100 (fig. 2, plot on the right). where y is the analgesic efficacy variable, x is the plasma or effect site concentration, c is the y-intercept or the effect at baseline, d is the slope of the relation, and λ is a variable exponent. 15 Model selection was based on the likelihood ratio test and visual assessment of the goodness of fit. A sigmoidal model was not explored because effects close to the maximum were not observed. The relation between hydromorphone plasma concentration and heart rate, arterial blood pressure, hemoglobin oxygen saturation, and respiratory rate was explored as outlined for the analgesic efficacy variables. Results of summary statistics are expressed as mean and SD for data passing the normality test (Kolmogorov-Smirnov) or alternatively as median and interquartile range. Parameters of linear equations are expressed as mean and corresponding 95% confidence interval. To compare the magnitude of observed analgesic effect after administration of 8, 16, and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS and placebo, individual area under the curves (AUCs) depicting the time versus the percentage change of the pain tolerance were calculated. Four AUCs resulted per subject, one for each treatment. A one-way repeated-measure analysis of variance (ANOVA) tested for significant differences among treatments. For treatments significantly different from placebo, a one-way repeated-measure ANOVA tested if analgesic effects measured at different times after drug administration differed significantly from baseline. The Student-Newman-Keuls test was used for post hoc analysis. Outlined procedure rather than a two-way repeated-measure ANOVA was used because raw data did not pass the normality and equal variance test. AUCs were only determined for pain tolerance data because no significant relation existed between the hydromorphone plasma concentration and the pain threshold after hydromorphone OROS administration. Areas under the curve depicting the electrical pain tolerance versus time for sessions 2–5 were compared among each other to test for the presence of an order effect (ANOVA on ranks). During each session, an equal number of subjects received each treatment, i.e. , the total dose of hydromorphone administered during each session remained constant. An order effect should manifest itself by AUCs that are increasing or decreasing with subsequent study sessions. The electrical pain tolerance measured before drug administration was compared among study sessions to test for the presence of changing baseline conditions (one-way repeated-measure ANOVA on ranks). The Student-Newman-Keuls test was used for post hoc analysis. To compare plasma concentration versus time profiles observed after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone and hydromorphone OROS, the following parameters were determined: peak plasma concentration, time to achieve peak plasma concentration, first and last time plasma concentration was greater than 50% of measured peak concentration, and the length of time the plasma concentration remained at greater than 50% of the peak concentration. To compare analgesic effect versus time profiles observed after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone and hydromorphone OROS, the following parameters were determined: peak pain tolerance, time to achieve peak pain tolerance, first and last time pain tolerance was greater than 50% of peak pain tolerance, and the length of time the pain tolerance remained at greater than 50% of the peak pain tolerance. Linear interpolation was used to determine first and last time 50% of a peak value was observed. A 50% level of peak plasma concentration and peak analgesic effect was used to obtain a normalized, i.e. , dose-independent measure quantifying how sustained the plasma concentration and the analgesic effect were after administration of the immediate or sustained-release formulation. The 50% level does not relate to the adequacy of the plasma concentration or measured analgesic effect, but to the performance of examined sustained-release formulation. Treatments were compared using one-way repeated-measure ANOVA on ranks and Student-Newman-Keuls post hoc test. One-way repeated-measure ANOVA on ranks and Dunnett’s post hoc analysis tested for a significant difference in the incidence of side effects between active treatments and placebo. A P value less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant. All 12 subjects completed the investigation according to the protocol. Oral contraceptives taken by five women were the only ongoing drug therapy during the study. The parameters of the linear model describing the stimulus intensity (mA) versus pain (VAS) relation at baseline were 2.8 ± 1.3 mA for the x-intercept and 16.2 (interquartile range, 11.2–25.3) for the slope. Baseline pain tolerance did not change significantly over the course of the study. Analgesic Efficacy Variables: Immediate-release Hydromorphone. Fig. 3. Counterclockwise hysteresis was present if plotting the mean (± SD) plasma concentration measured after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone versus the mean (± SD) percentage increase of the pain threshold (top left ) and the pain tolerance (bottom left ), respectively. The solid line and arrow depict the counterclockwise hysteresis loop indicating an equilibration delay between hydromorphone plasma and effect site concentrations. Calculating the equilibration rate constant and the corresponding effect site concentration of hydromorphone by minimizing the area circumscribed by the hysteresis loop revealed the underlying concentration versus effect relation between hydromorphone and the pain threshold (top right ) and the pain tolerance (bottom right ), respectively. Analgesic Efficacy Variables: Sustained-release Hydromorphone. Fig. 4. (Top ) The hydromorphone plasma concentration versus the percentage change of the pain threshold after administration of sustained-release hydromorphone (8, 16, and 32 mg) to 12 volunteers. There was no significant relation between the hydromorphone plasma concentration and the pain threshold. (Bottom ) The hydromorphone plasma concentration versus the percentage change of the pain tolerance for the same 12 volunteers. A significant linear relation existed between increasing hydromorphone plasma concentration and pain tolerance. The relation and corresponding 95% confidence intervals are depicted by the solid and adjacent dashed lines, respectively. Numbers in parentheses indicate corresponding 95% confidence intervals. Pharmacodynamic models with a variable exponent did not improve the goodness of fit. Despite a lacking relation between the pain threshold and the hydromorphone plasma concentration, the percentage increase in pain threshold and pain tolerance correlated significantly (Pearson correlation coefficient = 0.53;P < 0.001). Omega squared (ω2), i.e. , the fraction of the overall variability of the pain threshold and the pain tolerance that could be attributed to the fact that subjects received different treatments (three doses of sustained-release hydromorphone and placebo) was 0.07 and 0.15, respectively. In other words, the magnitude of the analgesic treatment effect was small to medium and medium to large when assessing the pain threshold and pain tolerance, respectively. There was a significant relation between increasing hydromorphone plasma concentration and decreasing hemoglobin oxygen saturation. The lowest hemoglobin oxygen saturation measured was 95%. No significant relation was detected between the hydromorphone plasma concentration and heart rate, arterial blood pressure, or respiratory rate. The lowest respiratory rate was 8–10 breaths/min and was measured in one subject 0.5–2 h after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone. All other measurements were at least 12 breaths/min. There was no significant relation between the hydromorphone plasma concentration and heart rate, arterial blood pressure, hemoglobin oxygen saturation (no supplemental oxygen), or respiratory rate. The lowest hemoglobin oxygen saturation measured on one occasion 22 h after administration of 32 mg sustained-release hydromorphone was 91%. All other measurements were at least 93%. The lowest respiratory rate was 8–10 breaths/min, measured in one subject 8–14 h after administration of 16 mg sustained-release hydromorphone. All other measurements were at least 12 breaths/min. Table 1summarizes peak plasma concentration, the time to peak plasma concentration, the first and the last time 50% of peak concentration was present in plasma, and the time span that plasma concentration remained at greater than 50% of the peak concentration. Peak plasma concentration was significantly higher after administration of 8 mg immediate-release hydromorphone than after any dose of hydromorphone OROS. However, accounting for observed equilibration delay between plasma and effect site after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone, the peak effect site rather than the peak plasma concentration is relevant to relate peak concentration to peak effect. The peak effect site concentration after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone was 2.24 ± 1.19 ng/ml. This was similar to the peak concentration measured after 32 mg hydromorphone OROS but significantly higher than that measured after 8 and 16 mg hydromorphone OROS. Statistically, peak concentrations after different doses of hydromorphone OROS were dose proportional and differed significantly among each other. The time to peak plasma concentration, the first and last time 50% of peak concentration was present in plasma, and the time span that plasma concentration remained at greater than 50% of the peak concentration were all significantly shorter after immediate-release hydromorphone than after any dose of hydromorphone OROS. This was also true if considering the effect site rather than the plasma concentration in case of immediate-release hydromorphone. The time to peak effect site concentration was 2 h (1–2 h). The first and last time 50% of peak effect site concentration was present was 0.7 ± 0.4 h and 4.1 ± 1.6 h, respectively. The time span that effect site concentration remained at greater than 50% of the peak concentration was 3.4 ± 1.4 h. Different doses of hydromorphone OROS did not result in a different time to peak plasma concentration, a different first and last time 50% of the peak concentration was present in plasma, or a different time span plasma concentration was at greater than 50% of the peak concentration. Similarly, different doses of hydromorphone OROS did not result in significantly different intersubject variability of the plasma concentration. The average coefficient of variation of the plasma concentration was 43%, 43%, and 41% after administration of 8, 16, and 32 mg sustained-release hydromorphone, respectively. The bottom graphs of fig. 5illustrate the plasma concentration versus time profile after administration of 8, 16, and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS, and the effect site concentration versus time profile after administration of 8 mg immediate-release hydromorphone, respectively. Fig. 5. (Top ) Median percentage change (solid line) and corresponding interquartile range (dashed lines) of the pain tolerance versus time observed in 12 volunteers receiving sustained-release hydromorphone (SRH; 8, 16, and 32 mg), immediate-release hydromorphone (IRH; 8 mg), and placebo, respectively. Administration of 16 and 32 mg sustained-release hydromorphone resulted in a significant overall analgesic response if compared with placebo (#). An asterisk indicates times when measured analgesic response was significantly increased from baseline measurements. (Bottom ) Mean (± SD) plasma concentration versus time after administration of 8, 16, and 32 mg sustained-release hydromorphone and the mean (± SD) effect site concentration versus time after administration of 8 mg immediate-release hydromorphone. Table 2summarizes peak pain tolerance, the time to peak pain tolerance, the first and last time 50% of peak pain tolerance was achieved, and the time span that pain tolerance remained at greater than 50% of the peak pain tolerance. Because the AUC depicting time versus pain tolerance was significantly different from placebo after administration of 16 and 32 mg, but not after administration of 8 mg hydromorphone OROS, only the 16- and 32-mg doses are discussed (fig. 6). Peak percentage increase in pain tolerance was not significantly different after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone or the two doses of hydromorphone OROS. However, compared with hydromorphone OROS administration, immediate-release hydromorphone resulted in a significantly shorter time to peak pain tolerance, first and last time 50% of peak pain tolerance was achieved, and time span that the pain tolerance remained at greater than 50% of the peak pain tolerance. Pain tolerance peaked approximately six times faster after administration of immediate-release hydromorphone. Comparable analgesic effects (pain tolerance at greater than 50% of the peak pain tolerance) were prolonged by a factor of approximately 4 after administration of hydromorphone OROS. The top graphs of figure 5depict the pain tolerance versus time profile after administration of 8, 16, and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS, 8 mg immediate-release hydromorphone, and placebo, respectively. Fig. 6. White diamonds depict the individual areas under the curve (AUC; electrical pain tolerance versus time), and black diamonds the median area under the curve after administration of 8, 16, and 32 mg hydromorphone oral osmotic system and placebo, respectively. An asterisk indicates a significant difference from placebo administration. Compared with baseline, a significant increase in pain tolerance was present 0.5, 1, 2, 4, and 6 h after 8 mg immediate-release hydromorphone. Pain tolerance was significantly increased from baseline at 6, 9, 12, and 30 h after 16 and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS, respectively. Table 3summarizes the incidence and severity of various adverse events. Compared with placebo, the incidence of pruritus and nausea was significantly greater after administration of 32 mg hydromorphone OROS. No serious adverse events were observed during the study. All adverse events were of mild or moderate severity, and most resolved spontaneously. However, nausea and vomiting made intravenous administration of 4–8 mg ondansetron necessary on 3, 1, 5, and 7 occasions after administration of 8 mg immediate-release hydromorphone and 8, 16, and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS, respectively. Pruritus was treated with 25–50 mg diphenhydramine administered intravenously on two occasions each after administration of 16 and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS. Finally, headache was treated with 325–650 mg acetaminophen orally on 2, 1, 2, and 3 occasions after administration of 8 mg immediate-release hydromorphone and 8, 16, and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS, respectively. With one exception, acetaminophen was given after completion of all experimental pain tests. A new sustained-release hydromorphone formulation using oral osmotic pump system technology has been developed for the treatment of chronic pain with a single daily dose. Hydromorphone OROS evoked a significant dose-dependent analgesic response beginning 6 h and lasting more than 24 h of its administration. The observed analgesic response was substantially longer than that observed after a similarly effective dose of immediate-release hydromorphone. Oral Osmotic pump systems have been successfully used for the sustained release of a variety of drugs that are quickly eliminated from the body and therefore require dosing of the conventional tablet several times a day. Pharmacokinetics reported for hydromorphone OROS are consistent with previous reports of other compounds using oral osmotic pump systems. 10,11 Plasma concentrations peaked significantly later after administration of hydromorphone OROS compared with conventional tablets, but were sustained over the 24-h interval after drug administration. Several studies have reported equivalent or superior efficacy for compounds administered with oral osmotic pump systems if compared with corresponding conventional tablet. 10–12 Experimental pain testing reported here suggests that a single daily dose of hydromorphone OROS provides sustained analgesia closely related to measured plasma concentration. Because previous studies have demonstrated similar analgesic efficacy for equivalent doses of various immediate and controlled-release opioids in the setting of clinical pain, it is conceivable that once an effective plasma concentration is achieved, a single daily dose of hydromorphone OROS will be as efficacious as multiple daily doses of the conventional tablet. 5,17 Based on our data, a 6-h period lacking sufficient plasma concentrations to produce significant analgesia has to be expected after an initial dose of hydromorphone OROS. A possible solution to prevent a 6-h delay in the onset of analgesia may be to coadminister immediate-release hydromorphone with the first dose of hydromorphone OROS. However, with repetitive dosing of hydromorphone OROS, sustained plasma concentrations throughout the 24-h dosing interval may be expected. Administration of hydromorphone OROS resulted in a significant relation between plasma concentration and measured analgesic effect for the pain tolerance (noxious input causing maximum tolerable pain) but not the pain threshold (noxious input causing equally likely a painful or a nonpainful perception). Several studies using various experimental pain modalities and different classes of drugs support the view that measuring the pain tolerance is more suitable to detect analgesic effects than measuring the pain threshold. 13,23,24 omega-squared statistics reported here and for a previous study implies that the signal (difference between treatments) to noise (variance unrelated to treatments) ratio is superior if measuring the pain tolerance. 13 This may be explained, in part, by a superior test–retest reliability if measuring the pain tolerance rather than the pain threshold. This view is supported by our study revealing a smaller within-day (9 vs. 15%) and between-day (17 vs. 23%) coefficient of variation for measurements of the pain tolerance rather than the pain threshold at baseline. The experimental pain model used in our study did not detect a significantly different analgesic efficacy after administration of 16 and 32 mg hydromorphone OROS. This raises the question how the precision and sensitivity of the pain model used compares with other models testing analgesic efficacy. Postoperative pain models have often been used to compare the analgesic efficacy of different doses of an orally administered opioid. However, despite the fact that these studies enrolled a larger number of patients than that enrolled in our study, they could not consistently demonstrate increased analgesic efficacy if doubling or even tripling the dose. 25–27 This suggests that the precision and sensitivity of our experimental pain model is at least equivalent to that of a postoperative pain model. The difficulty of differentiating the analgesic efficacy among various doses of an orally administered opioid may result from significant intersubject pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic variability, less than desirable precision inherent to any pain assay, and the fact that many doses studied may constitute the low or the high end of the dose versus effect relation. The latter seems relevant because the dose versus effect relation is S-shaped for most drugs. Therefore, the gain in effect is much smaller and harder to detect if a low rather than a midsized dose is doubled. Currently, a sustained-release hydromorphone formulation different from hydromorphone OROS is commercially available. This formulation has a pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic profile that allows safe and effective pain control if administered every 12 h. 6,28 However, the plasma concentration after administration of hydromorphone OROS was sustained approximately three times longer if compared with the alternative formulation. 28 Hydromorphone OROS likely needs less frequent dosing than the alternative formulation. There are a variety of other opioids including morphine, oxycodone, and tramadol that are available as sustained-release formulations. 17,29,30 Most of these formulations allow safe and effective pain control if administered every 12 h. One formulation containing morphine was given once a day to patients with cancer pain and provided adequate pain control without the need for rescue medication in approximately 50% of the patients. 31 This formulation had pronounced sustained-release characteristics, with plasma concentrations remaining above 50% of the peak concentration for approximately 12 h. 31 By comparison, administration of hydromorphone OROS resulted in plasma concentrations that were similarly sustained for approximately 24 h. Contrasting with most sustained-release opioid formulations, a single daily dose of hydromorphone OROS may allow safe and adequate pain control and a decreased need for rescue medication. The incidence of side effects after administration of hydromorphone OROS was dose-related. During clinical analgesic trials of opioids, a fraction of patients commonly withdrew because of disturbing opioid side effects. 5,6,32 However, studies comparing sustained- and immediate-release formulations of various opioids or among different release formulations of the same opioid did not find significant differences in the severity and incidence of side effects. 5,6,32,33 One study reported an increased therapeutic window in patients controlling the rate of a continuous intravenous infusion rather than the number of intravenous bolus injections of morphine. 34 More data are needed to establish if the therapeutic window between long-term administration of immediate- and sustained-release opioids differs in a relevant way. The development of tolerance, i.e. , a need to increase the dose to maintain an effect, may be different if a drug is administered as an immediate- or a sustained-release formulation. 35,36 One study suggested that more pronounced tolerance to the analgesic effects of morphine developed in patients receiving a continuous infusion rather than intermittent intramuscular bolus injections. 37 However, another study reported that, although analgesic effects were preserved, nausea and constipation became less prominent in the course of a treatment with controlled-release morphine. 9 Further investigation is needed to clarify if administration of immediate- and sustained-release opioids produce differential tolerance to analgesic and nonanalgesic effects. Variation in gastrointestinal transit time could alter the release and absorption profile of hydromorphone OROS. No data regarding hydromorphone OROS are yet available. However, food intake and altered gastrointestinal transit time did not affect the release rate of radio-labeled markers from an oral osmotic pump system. 38 The release and absorption rate of metoprolol and oxprenolol using oral osmotic pump system technology were approximately constant along the entire gastrointestinal tract. 39,40 However, an inverse relation between the residual amount of drug recovered from excreted oral osmotic pump system and the gastrointestinal transit time has been reported. 41 Reduced systemic drug uptake can result if the gastrointestinal transit time is considerably shorter than the duration of drug release from an oral osmotic pump system. In summary, hydromorphone OROS may become a valuable addition to other sustained-release formulations containing opioids. The presented data obtained in human volunteers using experimental pain provide strong evidence that a single daily dose of hydromorphone OROS may be effective in the treatment of opioid responsive chronic pain. Clinical studies are needed to substantiate and expand the findings presented here. The authors thank Lawrence J. Saidman, M.D. (Professor, Department of Anesthesia, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California), for helpful comments on the manuscript; and Frances A. Monroe, B.A. (Life Science Research Assistant II, Department of Anesthesia, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California), for graphical assistance. Martin S. Angst, David R. Drover, Jörn Lötsch, Bhamini Ramaswamy, Sujata Naidu, D. Russell Wada, Donald R. Stanski; Pharmacodynamics of Orally Administered Sustained- release Hydromorphone in Humans. Anesthesiology 2001;94(1):63-73.
2019-04-21T10:29:50Z
https://anesthesiology.pubs.asahq.org/article.aspx?articleid=1945172
Wash me Saviour or I die. This is indeed the secret of the Christian life. We’ll miss you. We love you. Dave and Becky Lynn. Yet I think the author may take one step too far in this direction, for elsewhere he takes the exclusive headship of Christ over His Church to imply the presumptuousness of assuming “the position or title of solo ruler, overseer, or pastor of the church” (p115). I share Strauch’s impulse to guard against a misperceived self-sufficiency in senior pastors, and to be wary of absolute power corrupting absolutely. But I question whether the senior pastor title or role is necessarily illegitimate on the grounds of Christ’s exclusive headship, or whether the title of senior pastor is mutually exclusive with a plurality of elders. After all, the letters to each of the seven churches in Revelation were all addressed to the singular angels of those respective churches, which most commentators regard as the singular pastors of those churches. Both Timothy and Titus seemed to exercise a role akin to what we would call a senior pastor without threatening either Christ’s exclusive headship or the plurality of local church leadership. And it makes sense that the one who is released by the corporate provision of the congregation to devote himself to teaching God’s word would accrue a level of authority that only such a corporately recognized teacher could have. What is meant by "the angel of the church"? It is true, as some have pointed out, that this word can be translated "messenger," and in other parts of the New Testament it does have that meaning. But it does not have that meaning elsewhere in Revelation! The word "angel" appears many times in the book outside these seven letters, and in every case it refers to a heavenly being -- what we normally think of as an angel. It is suggestive here that each church has a heavenly being responsible for guiding the human leadership of each. Some have seen this is as a reference to the pastor, or human leader of the church. That is not likely since in all the churches of the New Testament you never find a single human leader. Leadership is always in the plural -- elders and pastors of churches. It is men who have made that change in the centuries since our Lord began the church. Secondly, as for Timothy and Titus having roles that are akin to that of a senior pastor, I dare say that nothing could be further from the truth, as both men were quite simply (temporary) representatives of the apostle Paul, doing a vital task to be sure, but they were hardly the pastors of these churches. Timothy, for example, was in Ephesus when Paul wrote to him, and we know that Paul had already met with the Ephesian elders (note the plural) in Miletus, as recorded in Acts 20. A verse I find most helpful in this discussion is Col. 1:18, which states that in all things Jesus Christ is to have the first place (or “preeminence,” if you prefer). Of course, this is far easier to proclaim than to practice. We appreciate those who are anxious to give honor where honor is due, but they need not give encouragement to the very attitudes our Savior so strongly condemns in Matthew 23. 12:35 PM Indiana Wesleyan University announces an opening in religion/church history. Thank you also for your prayers! This morning, we received a phone call from Burji...the war with the Guji tribe stopped two weeks ago (Praise His Name!!), Mohammed (who is unsaved) is healing from his gunshot wound, and the building of the Meeting Hall is progressing rapidly. Oshe is the leader in Burji who speaks good English, and he is coming to Addis to meet with us; he will give us a full report, give us pictures, etc., etc. How we praise our Lord for this answer to prayer!!! If this doesn’t put your nose on the carpet in thanksgiving and praise nothing will. Words cannot describe my gratitude to God for what He has done in Burji and what He is doing among the severely persecuted church in Alaba. “Yes, and all who live godly lives in union with Christ Jesus will suffer persecution” (2 Tim. 3:12). It does not say “some,” it does not say “most,” it says “all.” How much tribulation have you had that you wouldn’t have had if you hadn’t been a Christian? As the Master, so the servant. I praise God for the faithfulness of my brothers and sisters in Ethiopia. We wear medals, they wear scars. Believers and churches in the States should be more aware of the difficult situation in which this reality places the missionaries they send out around the world. Trying to communicate to love of Christ in such a setting can be a serious blow to your sense of self-esteem, if it is not firmly grounded in who you are in Christ alone, and not who you are as an American. Those who support missions back at home should also be aware of how political issues in the States can, at times, make the burden that the missionaries they send out have to bear, even heavier. Without compromising on our God-given responsibility to be salt and light in our society, and maintain a prophetic voice in the face of evil and injustice, we should be sensitive as to how our public image affects not only our witness on the home front, but also, more and more, on the international mission field, as well. Read Being American and a Missionary at the Same Time. 6:21 AM As most of you know, we leave this Thursday for Ethiopia. Why are we going? It's very simple. We desire to help the local church leaders in Alaba "prepare all God's people for the work of Christian service, to build up the body of Christ" (Eph. 4:12). Whatever the category of tasks we're assigned, the ultimate task is to carry on Christ's mission of building up His Body. We are convinced of our unworthiness and inadequacy. But the Holy Spirit is adequate. He takes common, everyday believers and uses them. As Christ-bearers, their primary aim is passing on the message that was given to Him. By abiding in Christ, they bring a redemptive influence to their cultures. Each person is particularly endowed for his or her own unique ministry, so that there is never any need for comparison. Undergirding all of this is the entire gamut of human relationships, with all their joys and sorrows. Personally, I have a growing desire to try and help meet the needs of people at the level of their deepest needs. I have no "master schemes" to accomplish this, other than the "sheer dogged endurance" Paul talked about (as J. B. Phillips interprets 1 Thess. 1:3). No one knows how many unsaved there are in Alaba who have never experienced the reality of Christ's love and forgiveness, not to mention His continuing presence. They are everywhere. I see it in their eyes when I pass them in the marketplace. People with desperate problems, people alienated from God needing His message of reconciliation. And the most important contribution you can make in the next 3 weeks is in the area of prayer. Becky and I rejoice whenever we realize that our names are being upheld before the throne of grace through the holy fellowship of intercessory prayer. Someone once defined missions as "a penetration of a distraught world by committed men and women in whose hearts Jesus is real." Today, let us partner together, in our going and in our sending, to be those committed Christians who penetrate the world as light and salt. Below: Students at the Amharic-speaking Bible school in Alaba. Dear my precious Mama and Papa how are you doing? I have been disappeared for tow weeks. I came back to Alaba Saturday in the late afternoon. I had wonderful time with the students taught them Hermeneutics. I learned a lot as I had been teaching them. This idea cheered my heart: "When I taught them, it was I who learned a lot!" There's no better way to learn than by teaching others. 8:49 AM It's crunch time in terms of our final trip preparations, and to be honest Becky bears the heaviest load, so a quick prayer on her behalf today would be greatly appreciated by yours truly. The logistics can swallow you up and eat you alive if you're not careful. Because I'm an absolute klutz when it comes to organization, I've taken over the kitchen duties, food preparation, clothes washing, and other domestic chores to relieve Becky. Today I need to set out my clothes for Becky to pack. I plan to take numerous items to give away to the taller Ethiopian men I know. 8:44 AM A pastor who majored on the "Thou shalt nots" of the Bible was invited to lunch by a farmer in his rural congregation. After lunch the farmer asked the pastor if he'd like to meet his donkey. The minister was a bit surprised. He asked, "Why should I want to meet your donkey?" The farmer replied, "Because my donkey is a Christian." "That's ridiculous," said the pastor. "How can a donkey be a Christian?" "Well, my donkey doesn't swear, drink, smoke, or work on Sunday. According to your sermons he must be a Christian!" said the farmer. A true Christian is one who does not merely refrain from certain things but also pursues goodness and love. That's what Becky and I witnessed yesterday afternoon when we attended the Bluestone Junior High and High School Band concert. A special free-will offering was collected for Bibles for Ethiopia, and over $1,000 was given. That's more than 200 Bibles! Friends, the Lord Jesus is indeed a Good Shepherd who is taking care of His flock in Ethiopia. All of this reminds me of a very important lesson about the Christian life. Christianity is not a matter of rules and regulations, quotas and ratios, mathematics and percentages. The Christian life is a relationship with the Lord Jesus, who said "It is more of a blessing to give than to get," and who modeled for us the grace of giving. Happy the Christian who gives, and who gives out of a joyful, grateful heart. Below: A few of the many children in Alaba who are memorizing their 9 passages of Scripture so that they can receive their very own Amharic Bible. When they have completed their memory work I draw their portrait whenever possible. 8:43 AM A new missionary has arrived in Ethiopia. Give his site a look-see, then say a prayer for him as he assimilates to a strange culture. 5:11 PM My syllabus for Intermediate Greek Exegesis is done. I'll post it to the seminary website on Tuesday. 5:08 PM Today we butchered one of our beef cows. We started at 7:30 and finished at 3:30. The result? Several hundred pounds of lean, hormone-free meat. 7:30 AM Christ as teacher. 7:23 AM An earthquake in Basel? It's true. 2:34 PM Check out Missions Map Project Ethiopia. 1:08 PM The latest addition to our home page is called Aflame for the Gospel. 10:52 AM In this excellent piece the Independent discusses the imbroglio in the Horn of Africa and the likelihood of all-out war. 8:51 AM This time next week we'll be in Khartoum. A week from tomorrow we'll be having dinner in Addis Ababa. Becky's eager to get back "home," and so am I. When we step off the plane in Addis, Becky always remarks, "Can you smell it honey? It smells just like Ethiopia!" I'm working up our itinerary to post early next week. 8:44 AM This week the faculty said goodbye to John Sailhamer, who leaves us for Golden Gate Seminary's Brea Campus in Southern California. Nice move, John. Other than the smog, floods, riots, earthquakes, and fires, SoCal is a great place to live. Just kidding. You'll like the Brea Campus. I taught there adjunctively for several years when I was on the Biola faculty. Becky and I wish you and Patti all the best as you turn a new page in your life. 5:43 PM Just back from South Boston, where we're been painting the bedrooms. Nate to me as soon as we get home: "Which got more paint, you or the wood, Dad?" Everyone's a comedian. We just welcomed an old friend from La Mirada, CA, who is visiting overnight. I can hear Becky cooking up a storm -- all farm fresh food, of course. 7:35 AM DBO announces its Person of the Year. 7:25 AM I finally understand why Nathan is so much more gifted than I am. 7:21 AM Here’s a first for me. The Norwegian Library for Talking Books and Braille has just informed me that my New Testament Textual Criticism is being produced as a talking book for the blind. I am fascinated with the pluck and courage of the visually handicapped, like my college roommate who was completely blind from birth yet who played classical piano as well as the clarinet in the college orchestra and who was fluent in 5 languages. Amazing. 7:15 AM Andreas Köstenberger and David Croteau have published two protein-rich studies on the subject of tithing. Both are .PDF documents. Go here and here. I might add that the section on New Testament principles of giving in part two is outstanding. 7:12 AM Today marks the sixty-fifth anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. When the day was over, 2,335 U.S. military personnel and 68 civilians had been killed. Survivors of that fateful day tell their stories here. The parallels with 9-11 are eerie. U.S. government officials in both 1941 and 2001 were hardworking, dedicated, and for the most part intelligent, yet all were fallible, capable of grave mistakes of omission and commission. Both events were so sudden, so unexpected, so spectacular, so tragic that they are forever seared into our national consciousness. Neither attack was an act of God. Admiral Yamamoto and bin Laden initiated and carried out a risky, unthinkable plan with iron determination and fanatical dedication, and in both instances their enemies were caught napping. The attacks provide a classic example of the old truism that history is prone to repeat itself. A tip of the kepi, then, to all those Pearl Harbor survivors who, for the last time, are meeting today to honor their fallen comrades who perished in a battle that took place in the middle of an ocean ironically named Pacific. The reason, of course, is that most people who insist that you love the country or leave don’t have any clue what it means to love a country. If you love a friend or family member or close companion, does that mean never being critical when you think the person is doing something wrong? If you think a brother or mother is not reaching his or her full potential, are you supposed to look the other way, and just think, “My family, right or wrong”? If your country, which you love, is acting, insofar as it is possible for such a collective entity to act, in a disappointing, unacceptable, or downright evil manner, is it really love and devotion to that country to look the other way or cheer on the egregious behavior? Yes, There’s a (New) World (Order) of Difference between Patriotism and Nationalism. 7:00 AM “Why, you’re going to miss Christmas and New Years!” I've heard that statement several times recently. No, quite to the contrary, Becky and I are not going to miss out on anything when we leave for Ethiopia next week. In ultimate terms these things are all secondary, and we have begun to view all of life in ultimate terms. Paul set for us the example. His great concern was that “Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death” (Phil. 1:20). As far as Paul was concerned, things like success, wealth, or even health were secondary matters. What mattered to Him was knowing Christ and making Him known. And yes, there is a price to be paid. When the daughter of General Booth of the Salvation Army was asked the secret of her power, she replied, “First, love; second, love; and third, love. And if you ask me how to get it, I answer ‘First, sacrifice; second, sacrifice; and third, sacrifice.’” As Christians we are called upon to sacrifice ourselves for the blessing of others. It’s just that simple. That’s why Becky and I are constantly asking ourselves, “What’s thebest use of our time, our resources, our health, our abilities?” All of life is to be seen as a responsibility to please the One who has called us to be soldiers in His army. 7:24 PM My heart aches for the seminary family who just lost their 5-year old son to an accidental gun shot wound to the head. All of us run into our share of storms, but this one is unimaginable. We do not have a Christianity that denies the existence of sin and pain and death. Our Lord recognized that “in the world you will have trouble.” Trouble is a reality. But Jesus has overcome the world. “Be of good cheer,” He says. Jesus is greater than anything – anything! – the world can throw at us. Jesus makes the difference. And praise God – the day is coming when hospitals and graveyards will be forever past. 6:58 AM The latest addition to our home page is called A Gift at Christmas. 6:54 AM Today I'm painting over at Nate's remodeling job. Then tonight Becky and I have our first orientation meeting with the Tabernacle/Union Chapel Ethiopia Team. Sometime I'd also like to type up the syllabus for next semester's Greek exegesis course on 1 Thessalonians. We'll see. The big question for us this week is: When will we watch "Tora, Tora, Tora"? We can't view it on the 7th since we're having an overnight guest that day. 6:46 AM King George the Fifth had as one of his rules of life: "If I have to suffer let me be like a well-bred animal and let me go and suffer in silence and alone." My Thoroughbred Traveler, a former race horse, has been alone now for over a year, ever since we lost my Arabian Cody to cancer. I know it's been hard on him. Because I'm so busy at school and on the farm, Traveler is not being ridden as much as he ought to. Every riding horse needs constant work, none more so than a pure-bred horse. Because Traveler is so hot-blooded and temperamental, when I do ride him it takes everything out of me. So what to do? This question has topped my prayer list for weeks. He loves hacking too much to limit him to a few canters around the pasture. In Carolina I had a 5-mile cross-country course I would take him on 2 or 3 times a week to air him out, but here that's impossible. Perhaps I should trade him for an older horse. He needs someone who can exercise him regularly, daily even. Alas, my poor lonely "well-bred animal," we used to ride all the time. What am I to do with you, my wonderful friend? 6:40 AM Becky has just written a piece called Building in Bedene, the story of the churches that the Lord Jesus is building in one section of Alaba and the severe persecution that continues there. Let us never forget that there are still countries in the world where it is a physical agony to be a Christian but where believers would sooner abandon their liberty than abandon their faith. As I think about the young men who are being persecuted by their families in Alaba, I remember that Jesus' own family did not understand Him and were even actively hostile toward Him. Once they tried to restrain Him because they thought He was crazy (Mark 3:21). Imagine! Jesus' own brothers did not believe in Him. John 7:5 says as much. What turned the contempt of the brothers of Jesus into belief and admiration? Nothing less than the love of Christ. "He appeared unto James," Paul reminds us (1 Cor. 15:7). The outcome of this was that James and later Jesus' other brothers (see Acts 1:14) believed in the One they thought mad and whose enemies they once were. I believe with all of my heart that our God has the power to do the same thing today in Alaba. The Gospel is the triumph of love over all that hatred can do. 6:36 AM A big Monday shout-out to John Davis and the entire Northeast Piedmont Choral who gave a marvelous convert last night in Franklinton, NC. The guest harpist was phenomenal. Berlin emerged gaunt and barren through the morning mist as the Sagan train shuffled on, absorbing apathetic early-morning commuters at every halt. The dim black-out lights in the corridors paled as Wings took his first sleepy glimpse at a city after a night's bombing. From the train, at least, it was not especially dramatic. A few trails of smoke and haze drifted across the ragged skyline. Some buildings spilled rubble across deserted streets; blackened shells of others stood silent, their boarded windows as expressionless as the eyes of the dead. What impeccable prose. More later on the adventures of Wing Commander Day. 9:36 AM In a few minutes Becky and I will be off to Tabernacle Baptist Church near South Hill, VA. We'll give a brief overview of our trip and say our goodbyes. God has given Tabernacle a huge heart for the world, not only Ethiopia, and it's our joy to partner with them in missions. I'm beginning to sound like a full-time missionary, aren't I? Well, I guess I am. Every believer is. 9:25 AM There's no better way to learn the ways of the country than to sit yourself down with your rural neighbors, as we did last night, first over dinner at a seafood restaurant then in their comfortable living room. Moving to the country and recovering the old way of life is still possible, but it takes a lot of grace. T. G. told us stories one after the other. As children growing up in the 30s and 40s. As a young man from Virginia proposing to his bride-to-be from Carolina (now that was crossing a line). Pulling pranks on the old folks (how did that wagon get up on the barn roof?). Our neighbors reflected back on a slower era, a quieter time, and in their eyes and laughter we got a fleeting glimpse of life without gadgets and toys and computers. The good life, some would say. Sometimes I have a hard time understanding the local brogue. When I finally deciphered "sutt" to mean "soot," all 7 of us broke out in ribald laughter. I'm discovering how much I love this part of the world, am fascinated by it. And I'm glad to say that these neighbors of ours are glad we're here, sharing with them the joys -- and harsh things too -- about life in Southside Virginia, its economy, religion, politics, loyalties, social patterns. I am not doing all this as a disinterested student researching a doctoral dissertation. It's really my own life I am learning to understand. I would offer these neighbors a "shout out," but websites and blogs aren't part of their world. And it's just as well. 9:57 AM Right now I'm getting ready to enjoy a bagel before we go off to repair a neighbor's barn roof. Tonight we are getting together with a couple of families for dinner at a fish restaurant. In between I think Becky's got some flannelgraph for me to do. I'm not "cut out" for that kind of stuff but I'm glad to help. Have a great day, yall. 9:55 AM A good friend of ours just gave Becky Lynn some specialty coffee creamer to "make you feel elegant." Well, it worked. I like it too! Thank you, special friend (you know who you are). The whole aim of Greek is to enable disciples of Jesus Christ to know Him more deeply, love Him more dearly, and follow Him more nearly. To that end, I pray for all of you daily. 7:33 AM Earlier this week Becky reported about the new church buildings that are going up in Alaba, which is 99 percent Muslim. (If you haven't read her report yet, please go here.) Here are some pictures we received of this marvelous work. Isn't this exciting? A reminder: believers in America are funding the materials for these buildings (such as tin for the roofs and concrete for the perimeter foundations), and the Ethiopian believers are providing the volunteer labor. Unlike many missionary organizations that charge 15 or 20 percent for administrative overhead, Becky and I fund all of our own expenses, so that every penny that is sent to us goes directly to the Lord's work in Ethiopia. In addition, we work directly with the elders of the local churches. They, not we, dispense the funds, then they give us an accounting and we pass reports on to you. On our trip we will be visiting these churches and getting up-to-date-information on their progress. We can't wait. In the meantime, take a moment to reflect with gratitude on the enormous significance of these photos. These churches are in the very heart of Muslim territory. 6:56 AM Well I've decided. The book we'll be studying next semester in Greek exegesis is 1 Thessalonians. Prerequisite: 3 semesters of Greek. And yes, even if you've had an exegesis course before you can still take it (as long as you didn't study 1 Thessalonians). You may have never given a great deal of thought to the evangelistic thrust of this short epistle. It's so easy to get caught up (no pun intended) in the rapture debate. Happy is the Christian who is content to look into the Savior's face and hear His voice saying, "Well done, good and faithful servant." Let me ask you this question: Do you constantly seek the highest good even of people whose eschatological views are different from your own -- or whose temperaments prevent you from even liking them? We don't have to like other people, but we do have to love them, sacrificially and to the point of inconvenience if necessary. That's the message of 1 Thessalonians. It's my conviction that if all Christians could grasp this, their lives would be wonderfully enriched. By the way, I'm anticipating a small class, so there will be ample opportunity for participation, and I'm even toying with the idea of letting you lead the daily discussions. At any rate, I'll try to get a preliminary syllabus up on the web before I leave on the 14th. 6:19 PM Inquiring minds want to know: How many students earned the much-coveted 110 Award on their Greek exam this week? A grand total of 3. And it was a really tough test. Congratulations to all. You'll get your book next Tuesday. 6:06 PM I'm sitting here at the computer reflecting on how good the Lord has been to me today. I just spent an hour with the animals. I fed hay to the cattle and goats (and Trav, of course), I bottle fed 5 calves, I helped Nathan spread manure in his fields, and I played with Shiloh and Sheba. We've separated out the cow we'll be "doing" in about a week. We've needed to replenish our beef supply for a while now. Earlier today I painted for 6 and a half hours over at the house Nate's remodeling. Tomorrow we'll do the same. Becky has been putting together her flannelgraph sets all day. She has decided to make not 3, not 4, but 5 sets on the life of Jesus for the rural churches in Alaba. Where she gets the drive, the know-how, the self-discipline to do all this, I have no idea. Then again, I do. By the way, our new wood stove is a great success. I just checked the thermostat -- it's currently 78 degrees indoors. We replenish it either twice or three times a day, and it keeps the whole house heated night and day. The trick is to keep the fan running to help circulate the warm air. It's been a high learning curve for me, this farming business, but I wouldn't exchange it for all the beach houses in Malibu. One more thing: Exactly two weeks from tonight we set sail for Ethiopia again. 6:40 AM This week and next in Greek class we are covering the middle and passive voices. Which raises a question. Do you know where most Greek students go wrong? With the verbs. That's a common obstacle in learning a foreign language. I once asked a student how he was doing with his theological German. "My German is good," he replied, adding rather apologetically, "except for the verbs!" No one can speak another language without verbs. A sentence is incomplete without them. The same thing is true spiritually. A genuine Christian is recognized by his or her "verbs." They not only acquire truth diligently but apply it diligently in their lives, proving (as James puts it) their faith by their deeds. Paul would agree. "Don't neglect to do good," he wrote in Heb. 13:16. (Did I actually say "Paul"?) Biblically, a do-gooder" is not some spineless twirp puttering around the churchyard. He is a true follower of his Master, who "went about doing good" (Acts 10:38). Christians need never be ashamed of a spirit that draws them to help their fellow man, sharing with them the good things the Lord has given them. Indeed, followers of Christ ought to be the most generous, open-hearted members of society. So as Becky Lynn and I prepare to return to Ethiopia, our goal is quite simple: to share our goods and gifts with others. Again, the apostle Paul is quite explicit on this subject: "So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, and especially those who are of the household of God" (Gal. 6:10). I don't mean that those who are committed to doing good are flawless or perfect. But even imperfect people can be beautiful if they handle their humanness with integrity. What counts is consistent, faithful living. The main thing is to get the focus on Christ and what He has done. Once you fall in love with Him you'll be a do-gooder -- and you'll do everything you can to introduce others to Him. 6:56 AM A teacher at the University of Basel defends a chiastic structure for Hebrews. 6:52 AM This afternoon and tomorrow morning I'll have one main goal: to grade all 40 or so term papers that are due today at 2:00. My plan is to have them marked and returned by tomorrow's class meeting. That's the plan at least. This has been my "policy" for the past 30 years of teaching. I t's simply my personal preference. I've never used a grader to grade term papers, I usually try to leave a few notes on each paper, and I assign the final grade myself. I try very hard always to return exams and papers the very next class period, whether that comes the next day or the next week. I think students have certain "rights," and one of them is to have their papers graded by their profs (and not by a T.A.) and to have them returned in a timely manner. When I was in seminary I simply could not understand why my papers were not graded by my professor and why I had to wait sometimes up to several weeks before getting them back. Not good pedagogy. Another reason why I grade the papers myself is that I genuinely enjoy reading them. Most of them are quite well written, and since the students can chose their own topics, the papers tend to reflect a high level of excitement and enthusiasm. All in all, a very workable policy, if you ask me. Just my two cents. 6:45 AM Ethiopia issues Somalia threat. 6:41 AM The elders of the Alaba church have met and have sent us our ministry assignments. We'll be visiting the villages/districts of Dada, Bedene, Keranso, Mogdola, Galaya, and Kukae. (And taking lots of pictures of the new church buildings!) All in addition to ministering in the "town church" of Alaba. Becky will have a very full plate: teaching "the women from all denominations," teaching Sunday School teachers, teaching English to the elementary school teachers, and interviewing people for her book on the history of the Lord's work in Alaba. They've got me teaching "all ministers from all denominations," preaching numerous times in several different places, and meeting with the Alabinya translation team. Good news: The team has completed the entire Gospel of Mark and is half way done with Luke! I'll also visit Mohamed in prison. Yes, we'll publish a detailed, day-by-day itinerary just before we leave so you can be interceding. Am I excited? Are there cows in Texas? The Gospel is the magnetic North Pole of the church. All goals, all choices, all directions must be determined by and subject to that one great reality. 9:20 AM They're all around you. I'm talking about your natural networks for evangelizing. This time of year there's a gift you can give, especially to the elderly. Clean out their rain gutters. Their family members should do it for them but probably won't. Get out your ladder and do it yourself. Or cut down a tree. Or rake a lawn. The goal is to become a genuine friend. To show others that Jesus loves them. And that you do too. The present is a time not for ease or pleasure, but for earnest and prayerful work. A terrible crisis unquestionably has arisen in the Church. In the ministry of evangelical churches are to be found hosts of those who reject the gospel of Christ. By the equivocal use of traditional phrases, by th e representation of differences of opinion as though they were only differences about the interpretation of the Bible, entrance into the Church was secured for those who are hostile to the very foundations of the faith. And now there are some indications that the fiction of conformity to the past is to be thrown off, and the real meaning of what has been taking place is to be allowed to appear. The Church, it is now apparently supposed, has almost been educated up to the point where the shackles of the Bible can openly be cast away and the doctrine of the Cross of Christ can be relegated to the limbo of discarded subtleties. 9:17 AM Tomorrow's the big day. The million-dollar question, of course, is: How many students will earn the 110 Award on their mid-term exam? Two? Five? Ten? The more the merrier! 9:04 AM Good Morning! Nathan Black here. I have been asked by the website administrator (aka Dad) to take you along with us on our excursion yesterday afternoon around Mecklenburg county Virginia looking for old places. We took the camera to document what we run across, as many of these places are in considerable decay and may not be around much longer. First stop is an early Federal style house near Chase City that is probably late 1700s. Several of the rooms are severely rotted, but amazingly the inside architecture is completely intact, revealing some of the finest in early carving and woodwork. Here is the mantel in the parlor. The wainscoting is one board (26" wide)! The house has an unusual floor plan. On the first floor there is a central hall and a room on each side, but there are two different staircases, one in the hall and one in the left side room. The upstairs is divided by a wall and you cannot get from one half to the other without going down and back up the other stairs. This makes me think it was originally a tavern (one side for guests, one for family). It also has a basement with two large fireplaces and a pantry. This picture shows the corner stair in the other parlor. Here we have a late 1800s church meeting house that is now privately owned and has been restored. And just a little down the road is the Methodist church. In this area, Baptist churches went through tremendous growth during the 1950s and 60s, so almost all of the Baptist buildings date from that time. It's only the churches that didn't really grow that now have historic buildings, as all the others were torn down for bigger ones. Given last week's 3-4 inches of rain, every bridge is close to the water. Talk about high water! Here we have another early house. This is still in restorable condition, but has been uninhabited for about 20 years. It is unusual in that it has two windows in each side room instead of the usual one. This house probably dates from around 1800, and also has some beautiful woodwork. Transition Georgian/Federal style woodwork at its best. The rear of the house shows how houses were added to and rebuilt over the years. The single room story and a half section in the back is probably original to the house. It has a large fireplace in the basement and was more than likely the kitchen. It was later connected to the "big house" with a one room addition (see changes in roof lines). A pantry was connected later. I say connected because it appears to be an old outbuilding that was moved to connect with the house at a later time. The back porch has succumbed to the test of time. We are near "Buggs Island Lake," which is one of the largest lakes on the east coast. It was built by the US Army Corp of Engineers in the early 1950s, long before the appreciation of historic buildings that is seen today. In the early settlement of Virginia, before railroads and "plank" roads, rivers were the main transportation, so towns and plantations grew up along the river before the inland areas were settled. According to a local old timer, there were 52 plantation houses that were buried under the lake. There is even a complete town, Old Soudan, that is underwater. You can drive down the "old" highway until the pavement just disappears underwater! In the historic town of Clarkesville, you cross the bridge and come to third street, first and second being underwater. Of all the old homes that the lake covered only one was saved. This house below was placed on logs and rolled up the hill to a safe location, the water being a stone's throw out the back door. Boydton, our county seat, was also the location of the first Methodist College in the United States. In 1830, the Randolph Macon College was founded, being named after John Randolph and Nathaniel Macon, both influential politicians of the day. It was a tremendous brick building 50 feet tall and consisting, on each floor, of four halls, twelve regular rooms, two smaller classrooms, and one large classroom. The center section contained the classrooms, and the wings had the faculty offices on the lower floors and student boarding rooms above. The students worked on campus. Early records show that there were "woodcutters" to supply the school's 56 fireplaces for heating, housekeepers, teacher assistants, and various other labor positions. The local economy crashed after the war, and in an attempt to revive the popularity of the college, the presidency was offered to Jefferson Davis. He declined, and the school was moved in 1868 to Ashland VA to become the Randolph-Macon Women's College. In 1870 a black teacher purchased the building and it was renamed the Boydton Academic and Bible Institute. This school taught black pupils for almost 50 years before closing its doors for the last time. This old postcard shows the college building in the 40s after it ceased being used. And today it is a collapsing ruin. Only the left side of the structure remains, and that is steadily decaying. The structure was built in the late Federal period, and a closer look at it shows the craftsmanship involved. The 18" thick brick walls were laid in Flemish bond, which creates a diamond pattern in the wall. The halls had double doors and transoms over them. Each window had 24 panes of glass (except for the 4th floor) and the ceilings were twelve foot on the first two floors, then ten and nine. The photo below shows the end wall, which was standing intact one year ago. The floor joists sat in pockets in the brick walls. This made for a very strong floor system. Unfortunately, as the floor joists rotted and broke loose on one end, this put a lot of diagonal pressure on the pockets which they sat in on the other side until the wall eventually gave way. The building was two rooms deep, and here you see the front chimney on the far left wall of the original building. When the wall fell, it dissected the chimney at the weakest point, where the flues are. In this picture you can see the different flues from each floor as they rise to the top. There is even a beautiful columned mantel still attached to its fireplace upstairs! When I first found this building five years ago (trees have completely grown up around it), I walked all through it, all the way to the top floor. It was solid then, although the roof was leaking badly in several places. It was packed full of old school furniture, tons of books from the "old days," even two old organs! It shows what a few missing shingles will do in five years! Beside the old college is the "superintendent's" house, built during the time of the black school (late 1800s). It has also been abandoned. 9:23 AM Right now I'm putting the finishing touches on my teaching about asking (not praying, but petitioning God) from Matthew 7. This morning I'm back at Antioch Baptist Church in beautiful Charlotte County. In the past several days the Father has specifically answered 3 urgent petitions I brought before Him in desperation. Truly, "good things" is what He delights to give us! 9:15 AM Only 18 days. "Obey your leaders, and submit to them; for they keep watch over your souls, as those who will give an account..." At first glance, it looks like we are going back to the old system. doesn't it? But that is not really so. The writer actually chooses two special words here. The word for "submit" is only found here in the New Testament. It does not mean "rank under" as the other words for submit used in Scr ipture do. Rather, it means to yield, or withdraw. That is a little different. As you consider the elders, the outcome of their lives and how they lead you through teaching the Scripture, are you willing to withdraw or to yield to the truth that they present? That is not the same as standing under, in a military sense. And then the word "obey'' has in its foundation again a special word. It does not mean to accept orders. Rather, it means to be persuaded. Consider what these godly men say, be willing to be persuaded, but clearly. they must demonstrate the truth that God has them to speak. Do not merely take blind orders; but be persuaded. Now I trust that you have seen that an elder fits the same pattern as all the other leaders do. His authority, ultimately, still comes from the body and the willingness of the body to follow his leadership; and that his evaluation is also on a qualitative basis. 2:07 PM Our farm project du jour? Installing an old wood stove in Bradford Hall. You never know when you'll need it. We're at the tail end of the local power grid, and an ice storm can leave us sans power for up to two weeks. As usual, I helped with the grunt work while the pro handled all the details. O, I'm also the farm photographer, in case you hadn't guessed. 8:52 AM We had our Thanksgiving meal last night. We were joined by the Rondeau family and several of their friends from the Oxford Orphanage. Our tradition is to start off by singing a hymn written by Becky. This year that job was assigned to me. After our hymn sing, we enjoyed a marvelous supper of fresh turkey and venison with all the frills. After the meal we lumbered into the library to watch a beautiful Moody Science film called "This Is the Day," then it was back to the dining room for dessert and a sweet time of sharing. Not scheduled was the impromptu romping that took place after meal, much to the delight of participants and spectators alike. A truly wonderful evening. Here are some pix. 8:17 AM Mrs. Julie Austin has reminded us of the importance of seeking the answers to our questions in the Bible and not in any Bible teacher. This is a lesson I've had to learn and re-learn throughout the years. When I left Hawaii to attend college in California I somehow began to drift away from the beauty and passion I had known when I first followed the Lord as a radical Jesus Freak. As I became more and more involved with my studies, I realized the absolute importance of historic Christian orthodoxy and the need to affirm the complete authority and inerrancy of the Bible. I have never abandoned these principles, but at the same time I have come to realize that there is something profoundly wrong with a Christianity that is overly intellectualized. I had to come to terms with my own spiritual deadness and spiritual pride, to learn to walk by faith again and not by sight, and to return to the simple Christianity I had known when I first followed Christ. Nothing in my life and ministry really matters if there is no spiritual reality at the core of my personal walk with God. Above all, I began to look less frequently to men for guidance and to seek the Scriptures on my own. To be perfectly honest with you, I have more than once considered shutting down DBO lest people read it more than they read their Bibles. I am constantly reminded of my own frailty and my own need of God. Like every other Christian, I am a broken person and in constant need of God's saving and sanctifying grace. I have little or no desire to fight against American statism in my flesh let alone deal with the more trifling issues of politics. Not that I think our national problems are less severe, but I have come to realize that the basic answer to our national problem is each of us living out our Christianity in complete dependence upon the Holy Spirit. I am beginning to see that the doing of Christianity is far more important thantalking about it. Just because we may be certain about what ails America doesn't mean that God's blessing will rest on as a nation or as individuals. The Lord is reminding me that the main thing in life is serving Him by seeking the lower seats and being willing to lose one's life in His service. We must realize that only the Holy Spirit can bring about lasting change in our homes, our communities, our nation, and our world, and He does this not through political machinations or ecclesiastical power plays but by transforming selfish people into selfless people. I am glad for the years I lived outside of the United States, for they have helped me to see just how dark and sinful my beloved country is and how self-righteous the church has become. In what I am saying I am surely the most guilty, but the evangelical church in America tends toward loyalty to organizations or movements or men more than loyalty to the person of Christ. To me there is no alternative but to wrestle with the meaning of the Lordship of Jesus Christ as it intersects my living, my writing, my teaching, my serving. It does no good for me to be involved in restoring our churches or our nation if at the same time I forget what the main purpose of the church is -- to share the love of Jesus with every person in the world. Without this love for Jesus and service in His name the tendency is to transfer our loyalties to men. With this often comes the politicizing of the church, an emphasis that disturbs me greatly. So we must be careful to seek the leading of the Lord in the totality of our life, living in such close fellowship with Him that He shows us our path. This is really the only reason Becky and I got involved in mission work in Ethiopia in the first place, for the leadership of the Lord was so clear that not moving forward would have been disobedience. I really am overwhelmingly touched when I think of what the Lord Jesus is doing among the neglected and persecuted believers in Alaba and Burji, whose love and faithfulness Becky and I have been privileged to witness first-hand. In all of this I am learning that Christianity is for weak people whom God loves just as they are, whether they are Republican or Democrat, Baptist or Presbyterian, home schoolers or government schoolers, charismatic or non-charismatic, pro-war or anti-war, black or white. He expects them to honor Him according to the light He has granted them along the way and to bring their failures under the blood and leave them there. It is really wonderful to know that we do not need to have our act together totally for Him to use us as long as we have an adequate grounding in His Word and are sensitive to His leading. In our fallen world things will always be abnormal, but it is very much in God's power to do something about it if we would only be faithful to our calling and put aside our own selfish ambitions and esteem others as more important than ourselves. It will not do merely to debate the emerging church or the last twelve verses of Mark or the virtues of this or that political party. (Here again, I am speaking more to myself than to anyone else.) Nor must we spend a lifetime ruing our own past failures and present inadequacies, as though our relationship with God is a purely pietistic exercise in religion. Knowing the truth of Christianity, and affirming the authority and inerrancy of the Word of God, means engaging in those good works that He has foreordained for us (Eph. 2:10) or it means nothing at all. Please, then, do not follow any man. The best any of us can do is to point you to the Scriptures. Let the Bible, and the Bible alone, be your daily companion and guide, and follow it with complete confidence that the Lord Jesus delights in using the weak to confound the strong and fools to confound the wise. 7:59 AM How large is your "comfort zone"? 7:56 AM Greek students, just wanted you to know that I'm praying for you this week as you take your exams and write your term papers. Remember: They're due next Tuesday. Email me if you have any questions. Have fun, and see you soon! 7:43 AM Over at Sets 'n' Service the writer has a cool discussion about his top 5 surfboards. He's obviously into long boards. I bought my first board when I was 10. It too was a long board, as were all boards back when the ark landed on Ararat. It took two of us to carry it to the beach. It was an old (now classic) redwood board. I wish I still had it today. When I could afford it I went upscale and bought me a foam and fiberglass board (they had just become popular). It cost me a total of 10 hard-earned bucks (I mowed lawns for a living). The nose had been ripped off by coral, but who cared? I still have the scars from the fiberglass shards that stuck out of the broken nose. After that I remember getting a brand new board for my birthday one year. It was red. Now that was cool. In high school I shaped 3 of my own boards with the help of a surfing buddy from Kailua High School (our school nickname, by the way, was the Kailua Surfriders). The board you see below was (and is) my dream surfboard. I designed it myself, and it was shaped by the famous Bill Stonebraker of Honolulu. (Bill is now pastoring a Hope Chapel in Hawaii.) We call this kind of a board a semi-gun because you can use it for smaller waves (in Hawaii, that would be anything from 5-10 feet) as well as the big stuff (I've ridden waves up to 25 feet, measured from the back). Where has this yellow dazzler taken me? Kailua, Waimanalo, Ala Moana, Waikiki, Diamond Head, Pupukea, Pipeline, Haleiwa, Makaha, Sunset Beach, Chun's Reef, Maui, Huntington Beach (CA), Imperial Beach (CA), the Outer Banks (NC), inter alia. All without a leash, I might add. Am I getting hopelessly nostalgic or what, dude? 7:36 AM Over at the Better Bibles Blog Wayne Leman has a wonderful essay on the topic of "naturalness" in Bible translation. Just yesterday in fact I emailed the translation team for the new Alaba Bible Translation, with whom I will be meeting in about 3 weeks. Three native speakers of Alabinya (an East-Cushitic language, for you techno-geeks) are working full-time on the base translation, and I will check it (via back-translation) against the Greek. I agree completely with Wayne that naturalness is an essential element of translation. I would suggest that no one should be involved in an English Bible translation project unless he or she can speak another language fluently (e.g., German, French, etc.). A monolingual person can't possibly understand the difficulties in trying to make oneself understood in a foreign language. And by "fluent" I mean this: being able to teach or preach or pray in that language, not just being able to order a burrito, if you know what I mean. Speaking of Wayne Leman, I just noticed that the ISV site has published his comparison of the ISV New Testament with the NET Bible. 7:26 AM Becky worked yesterday, so today is our turkey day. We'll be joined by 8 friends. I recall living in Basel and Thanksgiving rolling around. The expat population was so large that the grocery stores (such as they were) stocked Butterball turkeys just for the Amis. It was a nice taste of home. By the way, if you went straight out of our apartment and walked one block to the Rhine, this would have been your view. ... and much, much more. Happy Thanksgiving from Rosewood Farm! 10:21 PM We had a superb service. Brother Tilley of Buffalo Baptist Church brought a wonderful message, and after the service was over our men's group sang our hearts (and voices) out for about 45 minutes just for fun. A little ice cream, a good book, and a blazing fire to round out a fine day. 5:11 PM Just back from helping Nathan all day with a house he's renovating. Since I am a card-carrying member of the UWA (Unskilled Workers of America) he gave me all the really "hard" jobs like removing outlet covers, assembling fans, and painting the laundry room. Every time I'd take a break he'd crack, "Did you remember to clock out, Dad?" or, "I'm gonna have to deduct that from your paycheck, Dad." As always, we had a blast working together. Right now I'm getting ready to fix supper, then our men's group is singing at a 3-church Thanksgiving service starting at 7:00. Becky's working today. All for Ethiopia. I miss her. 7:43 AM The latest addition to our home page is called Evangelism: Show and Tell! 7:40 AM Here's one reason we are so committed to taking as many pre-natal vitamins as possible for Ethiopian mothers this December. 7:35 AM What's next for Sudan? The US is poised to go to "Plan B" on Jan. 1, and I don't think that rules out military action. We'll see. By the way, Becky and I have a stopover in Khartoum on Dec. 15. The Genevan archives hold hundreds of letters containing Calvin's pastoral and practical advice on establishing underground churches. He did not just send missionaries; he invested himself in long-term relationships with them. Read Calvin the Evangelist. And here's a lady who also believes in missions, serving-style. 1:26 PM More good news! Our friend Ricky Allgood, director of the Blue Stone High School band, will be raising funds for Ethiopia at their annual Christmas concert in Chase City, VA. The date is Dec. 10. Time: 3:00 pm. Venue: Robert E. Lee auditorium. Becky and I will be speaking very briefly to say "thanks." 12:42 PM Good news! I just finished writing a major essay on NT Greek for a new Study Bible that promises to outdo all the rest. My deadline was March 1 but there was a financial incentive to finish before Dec. 1. I think all contracts should have that! Right now I'm listening to the rest of my Greek DVDs. What I've seen so far has been superbly edited. With two video cameras rolling at all times the editor has a lot to play with. He captures the audience responses beautifully. I'm even laughing at some of my inane jokes. 11:06 AM Crossway has announced the publication of Truth with Love: The Apologetics of Francis Schaeffer. According to the blurb I received today, Schaeffer saw himself primarily as an evangelist. He was a practitioner, not a theoretician. His apologetics were greatly shaped by love for people. O, I want to be a Christian like that! 11:02 AM Just back from Meadowview nursing home with our "boys" -- Caleb, Isaac, and Micah. They passed out peanut butter cookies they had baked here yesterday. It's amazing how just an hour out of one's day can bring untold joy to so many. But I know it was we who received the greatest joy. And how polite the boys are becoming: "Yes, Ma'am," "No Sir," "You're Welcome." Pure delight. Our dogmatic proclamation, our western methodology, and our development projects must be permeated with the incarnate Christ. Let us draw near to share their grief and speak to them. We are not Christians preaching to Muslims; we are not westerners trying to communicate with easterners; we are not the developed seeking to lift the undeveloped. We are fallen men embracing fallen men. We share their grief so they will share the joy of his presence. We are sinners saved by grace, completely undeserving of our salvation. And it is as sinners saved by unmerited favor that we invite other poor sinners to the Savior. Below: Becky gives the gift of a tape recorder to a respected Muslim patriarch in the rural village of Deda, Alaba. He is wearing my plaid shirt. He had asked for a recorder so that he could listen to his favorite music: Christian praise songs! 2:17: "Brothers and sisters, we have been separated from you for a little while. Although we may not be able to see you, you're always in our thoughts. We have made every possible effort to fulfill our desires to see you." 3:2-3: "[We want] to strengthen you and encourage you in your faith, so that these troubles don't disturb any of you. You know that we're destined to suffer persecution." 3:8: "Now we can go on living as long as you keep your relationship with the Lord firm." 3:9: "We can never thank God enough for all the joy you give us!" 3:10: "We pray very hard night and day that we may see you again so that we can supply whatever you still need for your faith." 3:12: "We also pray that the Lord will greatly increase your love for each other and for everyone else, just as we love you." So, a mighty hearty thank you to all of you who are praying, giving, and going. I thank God for your "partnership in the Gospel from the first day until now" (Phil. 1:3, 5). May He richly bless you for your kindness to us and to your Ethiopian family. 9:43 AM One of the principles of missions we're teaching the members of Team Ethiopia is to be sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit. If you sense the leading of the Lord to do something, do it. Two summers ago, when I traveled to Alaba to meet with the parents of an 18-year old who was murdered for his faith, I experienced such a prompting. We went out to the village where the family lived and had prayer together. We had just left the village when I saw lights off in the far distance. "What are those lights?" I asked. "That's the prison," I was told. "Is Mohamed there?" I enquired. (Mohamed was the murderer.) "Yes," came the reply. Immediately the Lord told me to go and visit Mohamed. You ask, Was it audible? No, it was stronger than that. I simply sensed in my spirit that the Lord Jesus loved the murderer as much as He loved the victim. The next day the elders of the Alaba church arranged for me to go to the prison. We walked there, about 5 of us. When we arrived the warden asked us to wait in a meeting hall while a jailor went off to summon Mohamed. Within a few minutes the meeting hall was packed with prisoners, curious as to who this white man was. The warden said, "Would you like to address the prisoners?" You can guess that I jumped at the opportunity. I spoke about the love of Jesus to these hardened criminals for about 15 minutes. When I finished my talk, the prisoners began filing out, except for one. There was a young man seated to my left, weeping uncontrollably. I asked, "Who is that?" The warden said, "That's Mohamed." Unbeknownst to me, he had come to the meeting and had heard my entire presentation. He was under the conviction of the Holy Spirit, and I had a chance to speak with him personally and offer him a blanket I had bought for him in town. Since then the elders have visited Mohamed several times, and so have I. On my third visit to the prison do you know what Mohamed asked for? A Bible! And in just 4 short weeks, God willing, I will be back in Alaba, back at that prison, and back with Mohamed. The lesson? Obey the promptings of the Lord. Follow His leading. Be sensitive to His voice. Love all men. 5:42 PM Stop the presses! I just received from our editor in Dallas the first installment of my beginning Greek course on DVD! He sent me lessons 1-5, plus the introduction. I need to review them in their entirety tomorrow. God is good. 5:34 PM It's been an eventful day, to say the least. We drove down to Stovall, NC, to check out an old house that is to be demolished. We'll be taking the concrete blocks from the foundation to use as fill in our farm paths. Then "Black's Gutter Service" cleaned out the rain gutters for some elderly people we know. After that we picked up a new tractor tire and somehow managed to get it back on with just the two of us. We bought 2 new tires for the van, changed the oil in 2 cars, and made a trash run. In about an hour we will be welcoming two weekend guests to Bradford Hall. They are coming in order to enjoy some down time and especially to reconnect with the Lord. We all need this from time to time. This morning at about 2 am I woke up with a heavy burden on my heart. I slipped quietly out of bed and headed for the library and my Bible. After an hour of prayer I was back in bed completely unburdened. That's just like the Lord Jesus. Always there to welcome the weary and heavy laden. I hope you had a good day, and I trust you will have a great weekend. 7:15 AM This BBC report will help you understand why Ethiopia and Somalia are on a war footing. Meanwhile, the Daily Telegraph reports on the worst flooding/drought conditions in Ethiopia in over 20 years. 7:12 AM In Basel, some Muslims have complained that the church bells are disturbing their calls to prayer. When we lived there we lived a block away from the Sankt Johann Tor, whose bell tower rang off the hours night and day. It was a bit difficult getting used to. In Addis Ababa, the challenge is sleeping through both the Muslim calls to prayer and the Orthodox chanting. And when we stay in a rural village, we are awakened by the roosters crowing at about 4 am (they live in the hut with everyone else). My philosophy? Grin and bear it. 7:10 AM Darrell Bock and Buist Fanning of Dallas Seminary have written a new textbook on New Testament exegesis. You can read a brief review of it here. 7:05 AM A small tsunami hit Hawaii yesterday. Hawaiians have a curious fascination with what we mistakenly use to call "tidal waves." My uncle once took me to the beach to watch a tsunami. Later, while growing up in Kailua, our family was frequently forced to evacuate to higher ground during tsunami warnings. These usually happened in the middle of the night. There's an interesting paradox at work here. You are aware of danger and at the same time you are attracted to it like moths to a light. At any rate, I'm glad no one was seriously injured yesterday. It could have been much worse. On April 1, 1946, a tsunami destroyed the city of Hilo on the big island of Hawaii, as seen in this amazing photo. Many people refused to flee for higher ground thinking the warnings were an April Fools Day joke. 7:52 AM The latest addition to our home page is called A Heart of Obedience. 7:50 AM Meditations on the Law offers some suggestions for seminary students (and their professors as well) on how to get the most out of their studies. The writer confesses, “Yeah, I’m not the smartest cookie, but I don’t let that stop me. Gird up your loins and work hard.” Those words cheered my heart. 7:43 AM I just received a report about the SNTS meeting that was held this year in Aberdeen. It mentions a discussion that took place at the meeting as to whether the society should allow papers to be read in Spanish. For now at least it appears that only English, French, and German will be permitted. I would hope for the eventual inclusion of Spanish in our meetings. New Testament scholarship in Spain has undergone a tremendous renaissance in the past three decades, and in my opinion there is no need for Spanish-speaking New Testament scholars to have to translate their works into English (as is done today). The journal of which I am a founding editor, Filologia Neotestamentaria, accepts articles in 5 languages (English, French, German, Spanish, and Italian), and one day I would hope to see the same policy adopted at SNTS and in its journal New Testament Studies. Learning to read Spanish is not at all difficult, especially if you know Latin or some other Romance language. 7:40 AM A big Thursday shout-out to my long-time friend Ray Clendenenwho has just been named director of academic publishing for B&H Publishing Group. This bodes very well, I believe, for the publishing arm of our convention. Ray and I worked closely in the past on several book projects, and I am currently finishing a new book proposal to submit to him. Congratulations, Ray. A well-deserved honor. 7:36 AM Why do we have modern worship styles? People seem to like it. 7:32 AM God bless the Scots. There’re now accepting exam answers in text message code (such as CU L8R). 7:30 AM Welcome back, Mr. Hayden. 7:27 AM Read Jonathan Girotti’s take on youth groups. Where does somebody so young get so much common sense? 7:26 AM On Tuesday night I stuffed myself like a boar while fellowshipping with one of the greatest group of students you will ever meet. Our Koreans are passionate about world missions and are great cooks to boot. Chosumnida! Kamsahamnida! Dr. Black, today, at Multnomah, we had a day of prayer. All classes were cancelled, this happens twice every semester, in order to pray for the persecuted church. We prayed for the Christians in Ethiopia for several hours. I hope this news encourages you, as I know you have a great heart for the Ethiopian believers. We have forwarded this email to our brothers and sisters in Alaba and Burji for their encouragement. Glad to see Multnomah is wrapping its arms around the world. I once had Mulnomah’s former president, Joe Aldrich, as a professor at Talbot in the 1970s. Through his influence God raised up a Gideon’s band of lifestyle evangelists who are still serving Him today. 7:16 AM You can forget about “10-4,” at least in Virginia. 7:12 AM Who said this? "If our Christian faith deviates at all from the Biblical 'Jesus of history,' then to the extent of that deviation we lose the genuine Christ of faith." Answer: John Warwick Montgomery, in his book The Shape of the Past. On Tuesday John was visiting campus from Strasbourg on his way to the ETS meeting in DC and gave a splendid chapel message. John and I reminisced about the impact Oscar Cullmann, his fellow Strasbourgian, had upon our lives, especially Cullmann's Christology of the New Testament. Like Cullmann, John is a prolific writer and, I note with satisfaction, a fellow Holmesian. 7:10 AM In exactly four weeks Becky and I leave for Ethiopia. The window of opportunity is now wide open in the Horn of Africa. How much longer it will remain open is known only to the Lord. Let’s pray for a powerful work of the Holy Spirit during our visit, as well as for peace between the Burji and Guji tribes. 7:04 AM This is a red-letter day for me because I have just discovered a new word with a Greek derivation. Meet xylothek. 6:56 AM I see that the Germans are now using the apostrophe. Has it really come to that? I remember Becky starting to type my doctoral dissertation in Basel and seeking (in vain) to find an exclamation point on her German-built typewriter. “Every sentence in German is an exclamation,” I joked dryly. My poor wife, having to type dissertationese on a foreign typewriter! 6:51 AM Did Spurgeon use altar calls? 5:27 AM Becky and I spent almost 3 hours last night meeting with the Ethiopia Team from Bethel Hill Baptist Church. I spoke from Acts 11, then Becky walked everyone through their first orientation session. They signed a waiver (Becky and I cannot guarantee their safety!). They learned some basic Amharic expressions. They were told which vaccinations and shots they needed. They were introduced to the history and geography of Ethiopia. Finally everyone checked out a book from our "missions library." Here's the group practicing "amasagenalo" ("thank you!") in Amharic. We took mug shots of every member to take with us in December so that their Ethiopian brothers and sisters can begin praying for the team members by name. Remember: Becky and I have never done anything like this before. We are as much "fresh fish" as anyone else on the team, but we sure had a good time. Next stop on our Ethiopia speaking circuit? Amis Chapel Baptist Church, this coming Sunday. 5:13 AM Tonight I have been invited to have supper with the Korean Student Fellowship at their dorm. Korean food is my absolutely favorite cuisine in the entire universe. I hear there will be pulgogi, pap, chan mul, and, of course, kim chi by the bucket load. I can't wait to tell them about my most embarrassing moment ever. It took place during my fourth trip to Korea. Dr. Black, I was wondering if you can help me, do you know of any passages that directly speak to or indirectly speak to accountability for teacher's and leadership in the church. I'm in the process of instituting a teacher cov. and few teacher's have a problem with the church checking their giving record. They believe that we are violating Matt 6:3 by checking on their giving record. Can you help me? Thanks. 7:21 AM The church's biggest battles are not against external enemies but internal attitudes that destroy unity. Please pray for the believers among the Burji and Guji tribes in southern Ethiopia, that they will be like-minded in the Lord and together advance the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ in the midst of tribal warfare. Thank you. 7:17 AM Monday shout-out to our friends at Bladen Union Baptist Church near Fayetteville, NC, who welcomed us with open arms this past weekend. Brother Heath Faircloth and his dear wife Leann hosted us and opened their beautiful home to us. On Saturday night we spoke to a smaller group of church members in the fellowship hall. Becky focused on 7 individuals the Lord Jesus has brought into our lives, including Bereket, Emebet, Kedir, and other names familiar to anyone who visits this blog regularly. On Sunday morning I talked about the essentials of missions from Matthew 9 (before the disciples were launched out on mission, the Lord had to kick out the parameters of their vision or nothing would have happened. They needed to see the mission through God's eyes and base their expectations on God-sized goals). It was great to see the ethnic diversity in the congregation. I loved it! Growing up in Hawaii as an ethic minority, I am used to racial diversity and thrive on it. In the Philippian church there was an Asian, a Greek, and a Roman. These people must have had little in common with each other before they came to Christ. Lydia, the slave girl, and the Roman jailor not only represented different races but different social classes. But they were all equal in the Body of Christ. I wish I could see more of this in our churches. At the conclusion of the service brother Heath presented us with a check for $1,000 for Ethiopia! What a great blessing. This church has a huge heart. I saw this also during our Sunday School class, as some of the men reported getting on their combines the day before to help a sick neighbor harvest 80 acres of soy beans. These men had demonstrated their love. They had helped a fellow believer above themselves; they had valued people over possessions or personal plans. You should have seen the joy on their faces. It reminded me of Acts 20:35, that great "agraphon" of Jesus: "It's always a greater blessing to give than to get!" Together these men had thought and acted as one being, and that Person was Jesus! Many thanks to all of you at Bladen for your gracious hospitality, generous gifts, and loving, selfless spirit. May the Lord Jesus bless you for it. Changing from teaching to journalism, he discovers, is not as drastic as might be supposed. Both professions are exercises in fantasy; the instruction that teachers pass on to their classes is as dubious as the news and comment that journalists pass on to their readers. Such difference as there is lies in the time factor; within reason, the Teacher can devote as much time as he likes to expounding his subject, whereas the Journalist is exclusively concerned with the immediate present. The Teacher, that is to say, is liable to be a long-drawn out bore; the Journalist, an instant one. Otherwise, there are in the same business--as St Augustine puts it, "Vendors of words." God, humble my pride, extinguish the last stirrings of my ego, obliterate whatever remains of worldly ambition and carnality, and in these last days of a mortal existence, help me to serve only Thy purposes, to speak and write only Thy words, to think only Thy thoughts, to have no other prayer than: "Thy will be done." In other words, to be a true Convert. Do stop by often, as these ruminations will be coming to you at any time of day or night. What a blast it's been, editing this blog. And what a great readership you've been. Most of all, what a magnificent Lord we serve. Let me brag on Him for a moment. So far this year He has given us over 2,834,000 hits and 110,500 unique readers. Most of all, I've been blessed by the hundreds of emails I've received from readers far and near. I have many faults, folks, but ingratitude isn't one of them. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, Heavenly Father, and may you bless my readers for their kindness toward me. And if you are a blogger, remember this: if the Lord appoints, the Lord provides. He never calls us to do something unless He enables us to do it. 7:20 PM Becky and I are back from an overnight trip to Bladen County, NC, to speak at Bladen Union Baptist Church. A former student of mine, Heath Faircloth, is the undershepherd there. I'll have pix tomorrow. Right now we're getting ready for our first orientation meeting tomorrow night for the Bethel Hill Ethiopia team. 7:33 AM I'm glad that so many of my students will be attending the ETS meeting in DC this week. It's a great place to meet people and publishers and to purchase books cheap. But the papers tend to blow hot and cold. Last year I can't tell you how many times I heard: "Please excuse the typos in my paper, but I didn't have time to proofread it." Unacceptable at SBL, let me tell you! I see ETS as an excellent venue for younger teachers/students to cut their eye teeth by presenting papers and then consider publishing them in JETS, the in-house journal. My first articles and book reviews appeared in that journal, and today its quality is even better since all the essays are refereed. A big question many young professors will face is: How important is publishing for my career? For some, their tenure will hang on it. I tend to agree. In an academic institution, it doesn't make sense to me to have full professors who haven't published even a single journal article, much less a book-length work. You have to start somewhere, and JETS is an excellent place to begin (and even continue) one's writing career. My suggestion is to write at least one book review a year for JETS and submit an article once every 4-5 years or so. Always try to get your doctoral dissertation published, even if you have to modify its contents or style to meet a publisher's requirements. I have helped many young writers get their first book published, simply because I have worked with so many publishers through the years. I see this is as part of my responsibility as a teacher. But ETS is a good place to introduce yourself and your work to the publishers personally. And if you're a blogger, I hear there will be a blogger meet-up somewhere on Thursday. So, it sound like lots of fun. Hope all of you have a very profitable time. 7:15 AM A piece of the Acropolis is being returned to Greece, I see. That's great. And so is the Acropolis. I'll never forget my first visit to the Parthenon. I was impressed, to put it mildly. What a contrast with the apostle Paul's first impression. I was blown away by the magnificence, the antiquity, the grandeur of Athens. Paul saw a city in the grips of pagan idolatry. That's how I am learning to see the world. Not like a tourist but like a missionary. In fact, the more I travel the less interested I am in visiting tourist sites. But when I do, the Lord always seems to have a reason, as when Becky and I visited the Falasha Village in northern Ethiopia. That's where we just "happened to meet" Bereket! June 31, 1967: The leadership has decided that from now on all brothers and sisters will help with cleanup after the Lord's Supper. February 21, 1971: It has been decided that at least once a month we will meet over coffee and cake to discuss the sermon after the worship service. March 1, 1972: The choir is being disbanded because of lack of singers. April 12, 1974: It was decided by a vote of 24 yeas and 9 nays to use nonalcoholic wine during the Lord's Supper. October 20, 1976: As lay leader of the church Brother Alfred Baechtold has been chosen. 7:15 AM Here's a nifty chart of per capita income by country. Scroll down to the "Atlas Method" to see the world's poorest nation. 7:12 AM There's quite a sticky situation developing in the Horn of Africa, in case you haven't noticed. The French are in Addis Ababa trying to talk sense into the political leaders of the region. Only the Lord knows what will happen in the next few months. We leave for Addis on Dec. 14. Brother! All I can say is "Amen" to the latest article. I could almost feel the fire in your belly! 6:29 AM I met a student this semester who has a witnessing ministry among the surfing crowd of North Carolina. I can really see the need for this. Surfers are most definitely a subculture. The UK even has an organization comprised of born-again surfers. I think this is marvelous. I agree with them that there is a spiritual dimension to surfing that non-surfers never experience. To be honest, I see many similarities between my Jesus- Freak surfing days in Hawaii with what I am reading about the emerging church today. I rejected the institutional church because it was full of hypocrites. I stayed away until the Lord Jesus revealed to me that I was as much a hypocrite as anyone else at First Baptist Church, Windward in Kailua. My hubris had really gotten in the way of seeing the good work the Lord was doing in our midst. Maybe it was just a stage, but I gradually changed from being a mariachi-sandaled, long-haired rebel to a mariachi-sandaled, long-haired kingdom builder in a very traditional church setting. Does that mean I am planning on taking my surfboard to the North Carolina coast any time soon? Not likely. I have other subcultures I'm trying to reach today, not least the rural community where I live and farm, my reenacting community, and the neglected provinces of Ethiopia. But when I meet a modern-day Jesus Freak I am fondly reminded of my surfing days and the unique experience that surfing affords. Evangelistic surfers are a good model for us. Plan a strategy appropriate to your own gifts and interests. Look for potential contacts. Make your circle of friends the focus of your ministry. When you're surfing, don't cut in on the other guy. If you offend someone, seek forgiveness. Pray, definitely! Be humble and teachable. Who can fight that? Use what you have for the Lord, and be deliberate. The main point? Evangelism is a way of life, not a method. By the way, the above photo of the Pipeline shows an almost perfect day for surfing. Slight offshore wind. 6-8 feet. Non-crowded conditions. Since I am not goofy-footed I would usually surf a bit to the east at Pupukea, where the rights were phenomenal, the tubes deep and hollow. Sadly, today the North Shore has become extremely crowded and territorial. It's still a good mission field, though. 3:39 PM I received an email today from someone who referred to me as a "scholar." Although I certainly appreciate the compliment and the way in which it was offered, I feel very uncomfortable when anyone refers to me as such. First, I don't deserve the title. To my mind, a real scholar is someone who is fairly famous in his field. I don't think anyone in the academy would call me a Greek "scholar" (even though I have written a few books on Greek) or a Pauline "scholar" (even though my dissertation was on Paul) or a church history "scholar" (even though I enjo y church history and have written a number of essays on the subject). Secondly, I don't think Jesus is at all impressed with our man-made titles like "Dr." Brother Dave is just fine with me, or even Dave. I tend to take Christ's words in Matthew 23 literally -- "Don't you be calling anyone your teacher, for you have One Teacher, and He ain't you. You are all brothers. Understand?" (Yes, I paraphrased that.) I've said it before: We can never judge the truthfulness of a person's statement on the basis of his or her academic achievements. No, I am not disdaining formal education. But I've also known quite a few people who were "educated beyond their intelligence," if you know what I mean. Yesterday in chapel we were reminded from Rom. 12:1-2 that the world delights to squeeze us into its mold, and one of the ways it does this is by erecting false distinctions between believers, so that the educated Christian thinks he is above the "unedumacated" [sic] believer. Don't forget that Romans 12 also contains this verse: "Live in harmony with each other. Don't be arrogant, but be friendly to humble people. Don't think that you are smarter than you really are" (v. 16). I see that the Greek here can also be rendered, "associate with humble people" or even "be engaged in humble tasks" (is tois tapeinois masculine or neuter?). So, to all of you students out there: stay humble, don't set your mind on high things, be willing to do humble tasks for Jesus, and "don't let the world squeeze you into its mold," including its worship of honorific titles. Fools are fools, whether holding doctorates or not. At the same time, don't be afraid to study your Bibles from cover to cover. Even if a formal education doesn't guarantee possession of the truth, that's never an excuse to put our brains in park or neutral. 11:22 AM Check out Brett Morey's new site: Revolution 3.2. And thanks, Brett, for the mention. I am honored. 10:44 AM The latest addition to our home page is called Sidetracked by "Issues"? 10:34 AM I want to express my appreciation to Jerry Lassiter and Glenn Ansley for their help in getting DBO back up after our new hard drive was installed. I am a complete klutz in numerous areas, including computers. Guys, your willingness to help me out was a life-saver. Many thanks indeed. 9:59 AM It happened 3 decades ago. And I've got a piece of it in my safe deposit box. 9:56 AM Responses to Scot McKnight's lecture on the emerging church may be found here. 9:52 AM Here's yet another reason why a correct assessment of the last twelve verses of Mark is important. 9:48 AM Charleston Southern University is seeking a chair in religion. 9:43 AM The Swiss have been celebrating their linguistic diversity. The honoree? Romansch, which is spoken by less then one percent of the population. Go here for a series of links on this ancient Romance Language. Even though I once lived in Switzerland I have never heard Romansch spoken, though I would dearly like to. 9:40 AM In five weeks we leave for Ethiopia and we are already in the “deadline” mode. Someone has said that we poor mortals race from one deadline to another as fast as our ulcers will allow. Becky and I are trying to start early to avoid the mad frenzy of doing things “last-minute.” When I’m in a hurry I turn out shoddy work. When we built Bradford Hall we took our time, and today we are enjoying the results of Nathan’s careful craftsmanship. Simplify – that’s become a big part of our life here at the farm. One way we do this is by cutting out Christmas. Bottom line: Our times are not really ours but His. We are stewards of our days and had better number them so that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. And that means not waiting till the last minute to get things done. 9:26 AM If you’re going to ETS or SBL in DC this year, don’t forget to visit this. 9:22 AM The difference quotation marks can make! 9:15 AM Does Mark 1:41 say that Jesus got angry? This is a major textual variant – have fun examining the internal and external evidence. Even if you go with “filled with compassion” here, I still think a case can be made in the New Testament for righteous anger. I have argued as much in defending the reading “without cause” in Matt. 5:22 (Novum Testamentum30.1 ). The findings, which were released in August but largely escaped public attention until now because of the large volume of data, indicated that marriage did not figure in nearly 55.8 million American family households, or 50.2 percent. Read For first time, unmarried households reign in US. 9:11 AM Our good friends the Lindholms now have a blog on Ethiopia. I can’t think of a better way for missionaries to get their message out. 9:09 AM Read Confessions of a blogger. 9:04 AM Justin Taylor calls our attention to this excellent essay on homosexuality and the Bible. 12:19 PM I heard the tractor running and went to see what's up. Nathan was out bush hogging his pond field. At the same time the Lord has been putting the ground to sleep for the winter and covering it with a lovely blanket of leaves. Even the animals seem ready for the cold. Trav has a big winter coat, as do the goats. The only danger now is from stray dogs, who are natural predators of goats. Right now I'm getting ready for the Dell technician to show up. He's replacing a faulty hard drive. 7:42 AM On our second missionary trip to Ethiopia we stopped briefly in Alaba. Alaba had proven to be a most hostile environment for the Gospel. Opponents had been creating problems, and I went to meet and pray with the parents of an 18-year old man who had been murdered for his faith. This visit sealed our love for the church in Alaba and launched our work there. Challenge them to persevere in godly living despite the persecution. Encourage those in mourning with the certainty of the resurrection and the second coming of Christ. Remind them of the power of the Holy Spirit to overcome bitterness and fear. Remind the believers that they have been considered worthy of sharing Christ’s sufferings. Give ourselves to constant prayer in their behalf. All of these blessed truths are found in Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, a church under fire. Paul wrote to assure them of his love and to remind them that they could expect suffering as a natural part of a life dedicated to God. Suffering is not the exception but the rule of Christian living. It is God’s tool to shape godly character within us. Paul went on to exhort the Thessalonians to live righteous and holy lives in the face of the many evils there were experiencing. There will come a time when God will right every wrong and reward those who have endured to the end. Meanwhile we are to follow Christ’s example of quiet confidence. Our aim in all that Becky and I do in Alaba is to have God’s approval and to act in such a way that when our motives and methods and manners are honestly examined by our fellow men we will have no need to be ashamed. Alaba contains a bewildering variety of people. Some are holy saints, others are hardened sinners. Our job is to love them all and to lead them to Christ, who left us an example that we should follow in His steps (1 Pet. 2:21). Lord willing, in 6 weeks Becky and I will be back in Alaba. Meanwhile, please join us in praying for our brothers and sisters in Alaba. 6:37 AM Every Christian in the world today is a member of the Universal Body of Christ. This weekend we were privileged to enjoy fellowship with a part of that Body as it manifested itself in 2 places. In Abingdon, VA, the Auction for Ethiopia raised over $2,000. Praise the Lord! In Boone, NC, we saw a new church plant in its infancy, pulsating with life and excitement. They're already celebrating the Lord's Supper weekly and including a time of open sharing along with verse-by-verse teaching of the Word. The new emphasis is not on a church building but on people. They are the church, and "spiritual sacrifices" (as Paul called them) are not offered by a select few but by all, for every Christian is a priest. Breathtaking stuff! Also, how nice to hear a thoughtful, pacific, calmly reasoned yet passionately delivered talk. So many sermons lead to shell shock. We are blasted and blistered, exhorted and "challenged" (how I dislike that hackneyed word!) to improve on this or that. I have long been convinced that the Word, simply taught, is itself sufficient to produce healthy Christians. "The truth shall set you free." As with everything in the Christian life, the starting point is, "What does the Scripture say?" If, for example, the Scripture says using one loaf of bread at the Supper not only symbolizes our unity but somehow produces it (read 1 Cor. 10:16-17), our only question ought to be, How can we possibly do it any other way? We can hardly improve on that! Yet no illustration can make us understand the wonderful joy God must have when His children obey Him. The auction was held at the 4H Club in Abingdon. I'd say about 150 were in attendance. These young ladies are displaying a flag of Ethiopia that was given to us. The auction was followed by a barn dance that included the famous Virginia Reel and the Round-About Promenade. Here our hosts John and Julie Austin present us with the proceeds of the auction at the end of the evening. As you can see, Becky and I wore our traditional Ethiopian outfits. Matthew McDill brought the Word at the Highland Christian Fellowship in Boone. Afterwards there was plenty of opportunity for conversation. I could wish that every church had a fellowship meal after the service! Here we are discussing the message from 1 Cor. 7. You can see why we are so thrilled about this weekend. Genuine disciples, true Christians, are recognized not merely as people who acquire truth but who apply it diligently in their lives, proving their faith by their actions. To sacrifice self for the blessing of others -- that's what we witnessed in both places this weekend, and it was a blessing. It kept reminding me of "the One who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine." My thanks to John and Julie for their great labor of love in organizing the auction, to all who attended and gave so generously to the Lord's work in Ethiopia, to Matthew and Dana McDill for inviting us to visit with them and their friends in Boone, to the congregation of Highland Christian Fellowship for welcoming us so warmly into their midst, and to Liz, Caleb, Isaac, and Micah Rondeau for bottle feeding our calves while we were gone. One more thing. Thanks, Nathan, for driving us there and back, all 586 grueling miles of it. 9:44 PM It will get down into the low 20s tonight. A hard freeze is expected. Remember to bring your plants inside, and don't forget about your outdoor pets. Right now we're making last minute preparations for our trip to Abingdon to visit with the Austins and to attend theAuction for Ethiopia they are organizing. Please pray for safety and good health for all those attending. By the way, it hardly seems possible that exactly two years ago Becky and I made our first trip to Ethiopia together. The trip began on Oct. 15, 2004 and lasted until Nov. 18. Two years ago today, Nov. 3, 2004, Becky was getting ready to leave the clinic where she had been working in Langano to meet me in Dilla, where I had been teaching the Gospel of John to rural pastors for a week. From there we traveled together to her former mission station in Burji (a now familiar name to most of you). Little did we know at the time that God would lay the nation of Ethiopia on our heart. I am grateful for the many happy memories of our visits since then to the land of Becky's childhood. Even more, I want all my friends to know that my heart is filled with joy and anticipation at what God will yet do as His people reach out to those less fortunate than they are. It may even be that some readers of this blog will feel called to travel to Ethiopia someday. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Well, time to call it a night. Have a wonderful weekend, friends, and don't forget your outdoor pets tonight! 5:40 PM I just drove 150 miles to Raleigh get some injera for our Ethiopian food. Becky is now in the kitchen cooking up a storm. While driving I heard this delightful interview on NPR with Anne Karpf, the author of The Human Voice. The author asked, Do you like your voice? Has it ever changed? She analyzed the voices of famous people from FDR to Churchill to George W. Bush. My own voice has changed through the years. When I left Hawaii to go to California at the age of 18, people had difficulty understanding my English. My Pidgin accent was very strong at the time. And when I go back to Hawaii I can pick it up at the drop of a hat. When I speak German in Switzerland the Swiss say I have a slight German accent. Across the border the Germans say I have a mild Swiss accent. My voice can be deep and loud or soft and raspy, depending on my sinuses that day. If you do listen to the interview I am quite sure you will enjoy the author's own voice: a sonant British accent. 9:24 AM The latest addition to our home page is called Scot McKnight on the Emerging Church. 9:13 AM Terrorist threats are mounting in the horn of Africa. Lord willing, we will arrive there in exactly 42 days. 4:23 PM Ethiopia has been hit by new flooding. Go here for pictures of the devastation andhere for a report on how Western aid is only adding to the problem. 4:12 PM Sadly I must announce that one of our new calves has died. It had scours, which we treated with medication, but it was too late to do any good. In short, we were sold a sick animal, but didn’t know it. 4:05 PM Ward Powers has kindly sent me a link to his ETS paper on the synoptic problem. You can read it here. His diagram of synoptic relationships is here. It was interesting to note how closely it matches my own views on the matter. 3:58 PM “People who don’t believe in missions have not read the New Testament. Right from the beginning Jesus said the field is the world. The early church took Him at His word and went East, West, North and South” (J. Howard Edington). 3:53 PM Lincoln Christian College and Seminary in Lincoln, IL, announce openings inpreaching and pastoral care and counseling. There are occasions where circumstances trump principles. Statesmanship consists not in being loyal to one’s avowed principles (that’s easy), but in recognizing the occasions when one’s principles are being trumped by circumstances. . . . The . . . creative statesman, one who possesses some political imagination, will see such occasions as possible opportunities forrenewed political self-definition. In light of their fatally flowed presuppositions, it’s not surprising that conservatives drift stateward or compromise their “principles (as they do when it comes to gay marriage). How (or if) this will change with the upcoming elections is anyone’s guess. As a Greek philosopher once said, “panta rhei,” everything is flowing. We abhor terrorists because they kill innocent people to pursue political goals. When we hunt them down we must go out of our way to avoid doing the same. Yet our enemies can (and do) make the same charge against a government that kills thousands of innocents to pursue their “war on terrorism.” Killing innocents only feeds into terrorism. As a result, Iraq is now a haven for terrorists, and Afghanistan is plagued by a resurgent Taliban – all at the cost of hundreds of billions of taxpayers’ dollars and 2,700 American lives. Paul Craig Roberts, formerly of the Reagan administration, asks, “What kind of government would destroy the lives through death or disability of over one million people for no valid reason?” It’s becoming harder and harder to be shocked by anything in America, but these essays ought to hit us with a full 220 volts. 3:23 PM At the height of the Battle of Britain, when British airmen were being killed at an appalling rate, a propaganda official had an idea to raise morale. On the walls at the Royal Air Force bases a poster appeared with these words: “Who is afraid of the Ju-87?” (At the time, the Ju-87 -- aka the "Stuka" -- was one of the most effective German bombers.) An anonymous pilot penciled in: “Sign here!” Within a few hours, all the pilots of the base had signed. That’s how I feel about traveling in parts of the world today. We go with our eyes wide open to the potential dangers (such as the possibility of full-scale war between Ethiopia and Somalia) but we go anyway, just as those pilots went. It was their duty. One caveat, though. We have told the leaders of the local churches where we work that if our presence would expose them or their families to unnecessary peril, we will stay at home. That’s why we work so closely with the church eldership in Ethiopia and are in constant touch with them. We go only with a green light from them. Imagine mouthing a phrase in English, only for the words to come out in Spanish. That is the promise of a device that will make anyone appear bilingual, by translating unvoiced words into synthetic speech in another language. Please, please make it work for Amharic. 3:12 PM A language that my roommate taught me in college finally gets a moment in the spotlight. 3:10 PM P. J. Jordaan reviews Grammatical Concepts 101 for Biblical Greek: Learning Biblical Greek Grammatical Concepts through English Grammar. See what you think of Jordaan’s description of Greek students in his first paragraph.
2019-04-25T22:50:19Z
http://daveblackonline.blogspot.com/2006/12/nov-dec-2006.html
Developmental language disorder (DLD, also called specific language impairment, SLI) is a common developmental disorder comprising the largest disability group in pre-school-aged children. Approximately 7% of the population is expected to have developmental language difficulties. However, the specific etiological factors leading to DLD are not yet known and even the typical linguistic features appear to vary by language. We present here a project that investigates DLD at multiple levels of analysis and aims to make the reliable prediction and early identification of the difficulties possible. Following the multiple deficit model of developmental disorders, we investigate the DLD phenomenon at the etiological, neural, cognitive, behavioral, and psychosocial levels, in a longitudinal study of preschool children. In January 2013, we launched the Helsinki Longitudinal SLI study (HelSLI) at the Helsinki University Hospital (http://tiny.cc/HelSLI). We will study 227 children aged 3–6 years with suspected DLD and their 160 typically developing peers. Five subprojects will determine how the child’s psychological characteristics and environment correlate with DLD and how the child’s well-being relates to DLD, the characteristics of DLD in monolingual versus bilingual children, nonlinguistic cognitive correlates of DLD, electrophysiological underpinnings of DLD, and the role of genetic risk factors. Methods include saliva samples, EEG, computerized cognitive tasks, neuropsychological and speech and language assessments, video-observations, and questionnaires. The project aims to increase our understanding of the multiple interactive risk and protective factors that affect the developing heterogeneous cognitive and behavioral profile of DLD, including factors affecting literacy development. This accumulated knowledge will form a heuristic basis for the development of new interventions targeting linguistic and non-linguistic aspects of DLD. Language does not always develop as expected, which can have devastating effects on both individual and societal levels. Developmental language disorder (DLD, previously called specific language impairment, SLI) is a common developmental disorder comprising the largest disability group in pre-school-aged children. Approximately 7% of the population is expected to have DLD . Somewhat surprisingly, DLD has received relatively little research interest compared to less prevalent disorders, such as autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) . Although DLD is diagnosed most often in childhood, the associated difficulties are not restricted to this developmental period. Rather, DLD also often leads to dyslexia and it may continue to restrict the person’s social, academic, and occupational activities even beyond adolescence and into adulthood. For example, a recent study of adolescents in reform school found that poorer verbal skills were associated with elevated levels of later criminal behavior . Further, the previous work of our research group has shown that 26% of adults with a childhood diagnosis of DLD in Finland are pensioned off and 19% live with their parents . This truly highlights the long-term risk for social marginalization associated with DLD. To cope with this risk caused by a developmental challenge, it is vital to understand better the interactions between harmful and protective factors that affect the developmental manifestation of DLD. However, at the moment, the specific etiological factors leading to DLD are not known. In many cases, developmental language difficulties are suggested to be caused by genetic factors . At the neural level, perisylvian brain areas contributing to language processing are often affected . However, the exact mechanisms that lead the neural abnormalities to cause DLD are not known. Presently, we do not even fully understand the range of cognitive or behavioral difficulties associated with DLD. For example, the cognitive difficulties have been suggested to span nonverbal as well as verbal domains, and the linguistic markers of DLD appear to vary from one language to another . The genetic and neurobiological studies cited above suggest that DLD has a biological basis. However, language learning can be modulated also by, for example, reduced exposure to the language used in school and society. Of the population in Finland, 6.4% had a language other than Finnish, Swedish or Sami as their first language at the end of year 2016, and this percentage is rapidly growing . Many of these are immigrants or people with immigrant background. Based on Finnish official statistics , one of the most significant predictors of successful employment for immigrants is an education acquired in Finland. Especially for bilingual children of immigrant families, language skills are the best predictors of successful educational attainment . Naturally, also some of the bilingual children are expected to suffer from DLD. However, bilingual environment itself is not considered to be a risk factor for language impairment , and, thus, language impairment should be equally prevalent in monolinguals and bilinguals . In contrast to this suggestion, of the children seen for the first time at the Audiophoniatric Ward for Children, Department of Phoniatrics, in the Helsinki University Hospital, a disproportionate 30–40% are multilingual. Although part of this amount may reflect a referral bias and challenges in diagnostics, it is also compatible with the possibility that the risk of language impairment, or especially severe language impairment , is elevated in bilingual and multilingual children compared to monolingual children. In annual follow-ups, the diagnoses of these bilingual children seldom change. This suggests that DLD does, indeed, explain their difficulties. This marked over-representation of bilinguals with suspected DLD warrants investigation of the underlying phenomena. The child’s proximal environment, e.g. parent-child interaction patterns, and his or her individual traits and characteristics may affect both language development and response to intervention. For example, the quality of mother-child interaction moderates the effects of a biological disadvantage on later cognitive functioning [cf. studies on low birth weight, 15, 16]. In terms of temperamental traits, children with language difficulties have been shown to be less persistent in their temperament compared to typically developing (TD) peers . However, to our knowledge there is no previous research on the effects of parent-child interaction specifically focusing on language development in DLD, nor has temperament been thoroughly assessed in a longitudinal setting. Developmental language difficulties themselves may have a negative impact on the child’s self-esteem and well-being. Rescorla et al. have shown that language delay is associated with social withdrawal already in toddlers, as assessed with the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) . St Clair et al. followed 7–16-year-old children with DLD with the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and found that during this time-period, social problems increased and emotional problems persisted into adolescence. In relation to the social problems, the previous work of our research team has shown that adults with a childhood history of DLD perceive many dimensions (usual activities, mental functioning, and speech) of their health-related quality of life (HRQoL) to be poorer than that of the controls. This parallels with the fact that DLD adults of the study lived with their parents or were pensioned more often than the adult Finnish population on average . We are not aware of any previous DLD research that has focused both on the etiological (e.g., temperament) and outcome psychological and psychosocial factors (e.g., well-being of the child). Recognizing these risk and protective factors and their consequences, both in the environment and within the child, would permit prevention. Differentiating DLD from TD in bilinguals is a challenging task for health care professionals. Lack of knowledge, normative data, and tools may often lead to over- or underdiagnosing. There are various suggestions for how DLD and bilingualism combine. Monolingual DLD and bilingual TD have been proposed to resemble each other in some ways, for example in terms of morphological forms used . Bilingual DLD children have also been suggested to be affected by a double deficit [discussed in, 25], since they could suffer from both restricted cognitive (due to DLD) and restricted environmental (due to bilingualism) resources [see also, 26]. On the other hand, another recent suggestion is that although bilingual DLD children may suffer from restricted cognitive resources (similarly to monolinguals with DLD), the demands of their environment result in a “bilingual advantage” in, for example, executive functions . Especially in the case of sequential bilingualism (L2 learning), it is suggested that various child-internal (e.g., first language, L1 typology, and child’s age) and child-external (e.g., amount of language exposure) factors play an important role in performance and development . Despite of critically lacking information, such a large scale longitudinal study on 3–6-year-old bilingual DLD children has not been conducted. Although DLD by definition means compromised skills in the language domain (domain-specific impairment), there is accumulating evidence that the difficulties of those with DLD may not actually be restricted to language, there instead being a domain-general impairment. In fact, nonlinguistic basic cognitive capacities are also likely to be involved, and some of these characteristics may well be shared across different languages. If this is so, new assessment and intervention possibilities could present themselves. Recent findings of domain-general capacities that might affect language development have been reported on different levels. At the etiological level, genetic factors behind DLD appear to affect not only language but also nonverbal ability . At the cognitive level, there are several suggestions for nonlinguistic difficulties, for example, impaired general processing speed and short-term memory (STM) or working memory [29, 30]. One other recent hypothesis at the cognitive level, as put forward by Ullman , Nicolson and Fawcett , suggests that DLD could result from a generalized difficulty in acquisition of automatic skills, including procedural learning. Procedural learning is typically implicit and refers to learning of habits, skills, and procedures as opposed to knowledge that can be explicitly articulated. Procedural learning mechanisms might be linked to language development in complex ways. For example, both procedural learning and language development would be compromised if their underlying cognitive core capacities are impaired. Also, they could form a cluster of functions linked to one another in a correlative or causative way. Unraveling these relations would have far-reaching consequences for how specific we perceive various developmental and learning impairments to be and how those with difficulties should be supported. Initial diagnoses of DLD are often complemented with findings of impairments related to literacy when the child reaches school age. In fact, reading disability or dyslexia is so common among individuals with DLD that it has been suggested to be another symptom of the same syndrome. However, there is controversy as to the extent and nature of overlap between DLD and dyslexia . We have shown recently that difficulties of written language in adults (i.e., dyslexia) correlate with modality-general impairments in processing speed and STM , and argued that these may both relate to underlying difficulties in the processing of information that requires attentional control of temporal binding. Another recent project led by Prof. Laasonen (https://www.helsinki.fi/en/researchgroups/project-dyadd) showed that adults with developmental dyslexia also have difficulties in nonverbal procedural learning . Importantly, poor performance in these affected nonlinguistic areas of cognition was shown to be related to poor linguistic skills. As developmental dyslexia could be one of the possible developmental end-results of childhood DLD, it is vital to expand this research to DLD children, in order to validate the findings of the older age-groups in young children . Continuous electroencephalogram (EEG) recording has been a routine procedure in DLD diagnostics. One of the reasons is the necessity to exclude serious conditions, such as the Landau-Kleffner syndrome . Otherwise, the rationale for clinical EEG in DLD diagnostics remains unresolved. Some studies have found elevated amounts of epileptiform activity in EEG of children with DLD [40–44]. Other researchers have suggested that especially those with syntactic-phonological or syntactic-lexical difficulties would have abnormalities in continuous EEG recording [45, 46]. To our knowledge, there is only one longitudinal study on clinical EEG in DLD . It failed to find significant associations between original epileptiform EEG and later language development in a very small group of children. Thus, it remains unclear, whether children with DLD, in general, have abnormal EEG findings or whether the abnormalities are confined to a specific subgroup or if EEG has predictive value on DLD in a longitudinal setting. Finally, the mediating role of comorbid conditions has not been resolved. For example, developmental coordination disorder and ADHD have been associated with EEG abnormalities. Developmental language difficulties are in many cases affected by genetic factors. Half of the children with DLD have relatives with language difficulties and the concordance rate for monozygotic twins is higher than that for dizygotic twins . At least three different genetic loci (DLD1 at 16q, DLD2 at 19q, and DLD3 at 13q21) and two genes that are expressed in the brain (CMIP and ATP2C2 in chromosome 16) have been suggested to contribute to DLD . The exact role of these genes is not known but, in their review, Li and Bartlett suggest that they could contribute to phonological STM. Also other DLD candidate genes (e.g., CNTNAP2 and BDNF), have been suggested to contribute to STM as well as to difficulties in verbal comprehension and expression. Importantly, all four replicated genes involved in DLD aetiology, ATP2C2, BDNF, CMIP, and CNTNAP2, have common genetic variants that occur in persons of European ancestry. These genes have not been assessed in the Finnish population, which has some minor genetic differences from the rest of Europe due to the relatively small number of founding members of the Finnish population that migrated to present day Finland 4000 years ago. Further, more detailed information about different risk alleles’ contribution to specific cognitive and linguistic factors has not been conducted in a longitudinal setup, especially involving bilingual children. We present here an ongoing project, the Helsinki Longitudinal SLI study (HelSLI, http://tiny.cc/helsli) that investigates DLD in preschool children at the etiological, neural, cognitive, behavioral, and psychosocial levels of analysis with an aim to answer the many open questions and to increase our understanding of the multiple interactive risk and protective factors that affect the developing heterogeneous cognitive and behavioral profile of DLD. HelSLI study consists of five subprojects. HelSLI-psychosocial investigates how the child’s psychological characteristics (i.e., temperament) and proximal environment (i.e., parent-child interaction) influence DLD and response to rehabilitation in a longitudinal setting. HelSLI-psychosocial investigates also how DLD relates to the psychosocial characteristics and well-being of the children. We hypothesize that both child temperament and parent-child interaction include risk and protective factors for language development, and that DLD itself is a risk factor for the long-term well-being of a child. The bilingual children of the current study are early sequential bilinguals who acquire Finnish as their second language not from the birth but early on in kindergarten. We use a two-way design (TD/DLD x mono/bilingual, that is, MonoTD, BiTD, MonoDLD, and BiDLD), longitudinal approach as well as consider age and exposure effects and their interaction. Thus, we are able to answer many of the open questions . We hypothesize, based on the literature [12, 26, 51] and our preliminary data, that children with bilingual background will have poorer language performance compared to monolinguals when using tests developed for monolinguals but fewer comorbid characteristics. Possible bilingual advantage might be seen in compensating the hypothesized double deficit of restricted environmental resources and restricted cognitive resources. This advantage might prevent bilingual DLD children from falling behind their TD bilingual peers and could be observed in various cognitively demanding tasks included in the clinical neuropsychological battery and HelSLI-cognitive, and also in different linguistic areas at later stages of the longitudinal setting. We also hypothesize, since DLD and TD can resemble each other in bilingual setting, that it would be more appropriate to compare BiDLD children to BiTD children and not to MonoTD children when assessing developmental language disorder. In HelSLI-cognitive, we aim to test nonlinguistic factors that could potentially be used in prediction, diagnosis, and intervention of DLD across languages, in this case, auditory and visual STM and artificial grammar learning (AGL) . We hypothesize, based on our own previous research and recent literature cited above, that DLD children will have more difficulties than TD children in the nonverbal tasks of STM and AGL across modalities, when required to maintain, chunk, manipulate, and learn patterns. In addition, we can explore whether any impairment in AGL can be identified to specific types of information, for example, high frequency bigrams vs. whole exemplars vs. long range associations. To our knowledge, there is scarcely previous neurophysiological or functional imaging research on bilingual children with DLD [see, however 53]. Also, in case of studies on monolingual DLD children, most of the research has been conducted either with newborns, school-aged children, or adolescents whereas there is less research on preschool-aged children. The HelSLI-EEG sub-project thus focuses on identifying neurophysiological markers of DLD in monolingual and bilingual children with EEG and offers data on DLD children in the age range of 3–6 years – a time during which language skills develop rapidly but on which there is scarcely brain research. Both continuous clinical EEG and ERP recordings are being used. First, we aim to study, whether epileptiform activity is related to a specific cognitive impairment profile within DLD spectrum. Secondly, by ERP assessments, we aim to elucidate the cognitive dysfunctions in DLD at the levels of basic auditory processing, phonological processing, and STM as well as morphological processing. ERP assessments that are this wide-ranging have never been done in DLD research before. We preliminarily hypothesize that epileptiform abnormalities in clinical EEG are related to the severity of DLD in both mono and bilingual children. Based on previous literature on ERP indices in DLD, we expect to find attenuated MMN responses for tone frequency changes as well as consonant contrasts in syllable stimuli . Importantly, we will be able to anchor these findings to other simultaneously measured linguistic and non-linguistic ERP contrasts, as well as to the detailed cognitive and linguistic behavioral profiles of individual children with DLD. In the framework of procedural learning impairment hypothesis, we expect to find indices that reflect neural dynamics of the acquisition of phoneme and morpheme sequences to be impaired in DLD. HelSLI-genetic investigates the role of four known genetic risk factors (ATP2C2, BDNF, CMIP, and CNTNAP2) in DLD in the Finnish monolingual and bilingual populations. Should these genes be associated with DLD or related cognitive functions and neurophysiology in Finnish DLD cases, this will be the first such demonstration in this population, and these markers will be assessed for utility in predicting intervention outcomes. Also, these markers are of potential use as covariates for the analysis in the other subprojects, since the genetic markers may demarcate some error variance if multiple different DLD etiologies are, in fact, present. We hypothesize that language ability and more specifically STM (here also nonverbal) will be related to the genetic background in our sample. HelSLI study is realized at the Audiophoniatric Ward for Children, Department of Phoniatrics, Helsinki University Hospital. Healthcare professionals on the department work in multidisciplinary teams focused on the assessment and diagnosis of the children with DLD or suspected DLD. These include medical doctors specializing in phoniatrics, speech and language pathologists, neuropsychologists, occupational therapists, special education teachers, and nurses. Most of the DLD sample data was gathered alongside normal clinical work. For the HelSLI study participants, we formulated standardized clinical EEG, neuropsychological (Additional file 1: Appendix 1) and speech and language assessment protocols (Additional file 2: Appendix 2) that were applied for each incoming and eligible first-time child at the Audiophoniatric Ward for children, Department of Phoniatrics, Helsinki University Hospital, during years 2013–2015. Data collection begun in January 2013. The total number of 3-to-6-year-old children with suspected DLD who entered the HelSLI study was 246 (three entry years, 2013–2015) and those who fulfilled the inclusion criteria 227. The DLD children will be followed up during 2014–2018 on a yearly basis or less frequently, depending on whether they are monolinguals or bilinguals and what was their age when entering the study (see, Table 1). The last follow-up is before they enter school at the age of seven. The follow-up assessments are conducted mostly in the kindergartens. Children living outside the Helsinki metropolitan area are not followed-up unless they are assessed at Department of Phoniatrics for clinical purposes. Structured questionnaires are used for assessing the content and amount of intervention that takes place during the one-year periods between assessments. Separate questionnaires are sent to kindergartens and speech and language therapists. In addition, 80 monolingual and 80 bilingual control children are recruited from the kindergartens of the metropolitan area of Helsinki, in order to gather normative information for the neuropsychological and speech and language tests for the sequentially bilingual children, as well as comparison data for the HelSLI subprojects. Control children are gathered from the same areas as DLD children and the proportion of girls versus boys per age group is compatible. The 3-and 4-year-old control children are followed up yearly, until they enter school, in order to define developmental pathways for both monolingual and bilingual TD children. In addition, bilingual 5-year-olds are also followed up until they enter school (see, Table 1). At the moment, all the DLD children have entered the study and are being followed up. Also, most of the TD children (over 150 of the total expected n = 160) have already been recruited to the study. Table 1 presents the general design of the HelSLI study. Below, the methods are described separately for each sub-project. Temperament is parent-reported with the very short version of The Children’s Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ) . Parent-child interaction is assessed with structured play sessions that are videotaped in order to evaluate both parenting and child behavior (1990 revision of the Erickson scales, ) and the dyadic level of the parent-child relationship [56, 57]. The ways that DLD relates to the psychosocial characteristics and well-being of the children are as assessed with questionnaires Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) and the Teacher Rating Form (TRF), both part of the Achenbach System of Empirically Based Assessment (ASEBA) and The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) . Speech and language development is investigated in Finnish, with the same standardized speech and language and neuropsychological test battery in all the groups, that is, monolinguals with typical language development (MonoTD), monolinguals with impaired language development (MonoDLD), and bilinguals with typical (BiTD) and impaired language development (BiDLD; see, Additional file 1: Appendix 1 and Additional file 2: Appendix 2). Because of the difficulties in assessing the first language of the bilingual children directly, with or without the help of an interpreter, we implement additionally indirect measures. In the HelSLI-bilingual, these are parent reports on the first language development (The Alberta Language Development Questionnaire, ALDeQ) and the language environment questionnaire (The Alberta Language Environment Questionnaire, ALEQ) , which have been translated for the present research in collaboration with Professor Johanne Paradis, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. STM capacities are assessed by asking children to make same/different judgments of small sets of non-linguistic stimuli (pictures or vocalizations of made-up animals), to measure the number of items each child can hold in memory. Nonlinguistic stimuli are used in order to assess memory functions independently from children’s language ability. These tests assess STM for visual and auditory stimuli distributed sequentially. Implicit learning abilities are assessed with AGL tasks which first show children training examples of small sets of stimuli (similar in nature to those used for the STM tasks), and then ask children to classify novel sets of stimuli as being either “Good” or “Not good” with respect to the presumed pattern exemplified by the training items. These tools were built on the Graphogame literacy training platform (http://graphogame.com). Continuous EEG is recorded during routine clinical checkups at the Department of clinical neurophysiology following clinical standards. Children are sleep deprived and EEG is recorded during a short daytime nap as well as during standard flashlight sequence procedures. During clinical routine EEG assessment, also a tone multifeature MMN paradigm, developed by Näätänen et al. is used to measure the auditory discrimination profile, which has been shown to be a useful tool for investigating developmental disorders [54, 61–63]. The paradigm includes simultaneous measurements for tone frequency, duration, intensity, location, and gap contrasts. Some of the children with DLD and their controls, are invited to participate in more detailed ERP experiments in Cognitive Brain Research Unit, University of Helsinki . One paradigm allows one to compare basic auditory processing efficiency of different sound features with speech specific sound processing, and thus gives novel insight on the specific neural dysfunctions associated with DLD at the individual level. The second ERP paradigm aims to track the neural circuitry and function needed in morphological processing . Morphemes are the basic building blocks of the language meaning, and difficulties especially in word inflection have been proposed to be one of the core problems in DLD. This novel paradigm will now be used in children for the first time. Together all of these ERP paradigms allow specifying neurophysiological indices associated with cognitive dysfunction in DLD at the levels of basic auditory processing, phonological processing, and STM as well as morphological processing. This multilevel approach is particularly important as it allows the development of more reliable individual level indices and their comparison with cognitive and genetic measures of the HelSLI. DNA in the HelSLI-genetic is extracted from saliva and analyzed by the international collaborators. Two sets of DNA markers are assayed. The first is a set of single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers that constitute a DNA “barcode” that are unique across the population and are used for sample tracking and to assess relatedness among individuals . That same set of SNPs was chosen to be ancestrally informative to provide information on continental genetic background to statistically control for admixture across the control and DLD groups. A second set of SNP markers will provide information about common variation in the four (known) DLD genes. Analysis consists of methods previously deployed on similar datasets . Briefly, ancestrally informative markers are analyzed by principal component analysis to provide a genomic summary of ancestry. We have shown that it is important to use the first three principal components as a covariate to reduce false positive associations across groups caused by random differences in ancestry . The main genomic effects are modeled along with other variables in the regression framework using dummy coding to represent each of the three genotypic groups (AA, AB, BB; where A generically refers to the common SNP variant, and B generically refers to the more rare variant of the two). The HelSLI study recruited four groups, that is, monolingual DLD (MonoDLD), bilingual DLD (BiDLD), monolingual TD (MonoTD), and bilingual TD children (BiTD). DLD children came from the Audiophoniatric Ward for children, Department of Phoniatrics. The TD children were gathered from kindergartens around the greater Helsinki area. In general, all four groups participate in all the subprojects of HelSLI, that is, psychosocial, bilingual, cognitive, EEG, and genetic (for exceptions, see Table 1). Inclusion criterion for the DLD children was a referral to the Audiophoniatric Ward, Department of Phoniatrics, with a continuing concern in language development (in bilinguals in both languages) with no known biomedical etiology (see Table 2 for sample description). Parent interviews and/or language assessment with the help of interpreter on first language (L1) had to confirm severe challenges in child’s first language. The children had a prior SLT assessment/intervention period in primary health care. They had normal hearing and no gross neurological findings, and had participated in routine follow-ups in local health-centers. In the ward, a medical examination, including ear-nose-and-throat (ENT) areas, gross and fine motor skills roughly, and a brief gross neurological status to rule out major findings or signs of any syndrome, was performed. In most cases, the DLD children are analyzed as one group, that is, we do not differentiate between, for example, receptive and receptive-expressive groups. However within the DLD children, a group with severe speech production problems on phonology/speech sound level is separated, since severe disorder in speech production may affect speech intelligibility and by implication expressive language (e.g. expressive vocabulary and sentence production). This distinction was necessary to make because in the Finnish ICD-10 system speech sound disorders (such as CAS, childhood apraxia of speech) are included in SLI or DLD (ICD-10 diagnosis of F80.1). Classification for children with or without severe speech production problem based on difficulties at the phonological or speech sound level was made by combining the results from Finnish test of phonology (Fonologiatesti) and speech and language therapist’s clinical report. In the Phonology test, the child had to perform below 12. percentile on phonotactic skills and in relation to age she/he had to have a significantly small phoneme inventory and/or severe difficulties in combining phonemes. If inclusion to the speech production problem group was made based on small phoneme inventory, omitted or substituted phonemes needed to be more than two and they had to be other than late emerging phonemes /r/ and /s/ or phonemes used only in loanwords. Children who did not produce speech at all were considered as their own group in some analyses. Exclusion criteria for the DLD group were hearing impairment, intellectual disability, ASD, oral anomalies, or a diagnosed neurological impairment or disability (e.g., epilepsy, chromosomal abnormalities). The DLD children were required to have a performance Intelligence quotient (PIQ) of at least 70 . For research purposes, the DLD group was divided into those who had PIQ in the range 70–84 and 85 or above. However, we did not require a mismatch between the verbal and nonverbal ability and we acknowledged the fact that DLD can co-occur with other neurodevelopmental disorders . The TD children were gathered from kindergartens around the greater Helsinki area. They were required to not have difficulties in any of their languages or no intervention after an assessment. Guidance or short intervention period focusing on articulation, i.e. individual speech sounds, were not considered as exclusion criteria. The parents of TD children were required not to report any of the exclusion criteria and the TD children were required to have PIQ of at least 85 . Further, exclusion criteria for the TD children were suspected or diagnosed difficulties in language acquisition or other development as well as diagnosed difficulties in these areas in parents or siblings. Monolingual participants were required to have Finnish as their only home language. Sequential bilingual children vary in their first language (L1), but were required to have only one language at home (not Finnish, Swedish, or Sami). L1 languages in bilingual TD children were compatible to the ones of DLD children. Bilingual children had to have had at least one year of regular exposure to Finnish language in kindergarten. There are no standardized tests nor normative info on sequential bilingual performance in Finnish language-related tests. Therefore, we could not establish clear cut-off criteria for the test performance of the participating groups. A priori power analyses with G*Power and RMASS (http://www.rmass.org/) were conducted to estimate appropriate sample sizes. For various research questions of subprojects guesstimates for the effect size varied along with the other aspects of power analysis. Detailed descriptions go beyond the scope of this paper, but two examples are given. For one age group (that is, e.g., 3 years old) an effect size as Cohen’s d = 0.6 was used for independent samples two-tailed t-test between DLD and TD children with α = .05 and 1 - β = .80 (power) using sample ratio NDLD / NTD = 0.67. This calculation resulted in NDLD = 56 and NTD = 38 for each age. The total number of participants recruited approximates these values (227 with suspected DLD, plus 160 TD across the four age groups). As another example, we computed the sample size for two-level mixed-effects linear regression model for the analysis of longitudinal data using the aforementioned values for α, 1 - β and sample ratio, four time points with AR1 error variance = 1.0 and r = .5, last time point mean difference = 0.6, 5% attrition rate, person variance components (intercept = 1.0, covariance = 0.1, slope = 0.1), and group × time interaction = 0.2. Here total number of subjects was 353. Again, the number of participants recruited (227 + 160 = 387) approximates the number indicated by the power analysis. With large dataset and different subprojects, several different analytical lines will be pursued contingent upon the particular research questions of each subproject. Subsequent publications will describe details of the analysis used in each of them and only general tactics will be illustrated here. When all t0 (onset, baseline) assessments are finished, cross-sectional analyses will be carried out to explore relationships between variables of interest in each subproject. These analyses will include, e.g., different general linear modelling, multivariate analysis, and structural equation modelling techniques. In specific research questions, also generalized modelling may be used. As t1, t2, and t3 (follow-up) data is complete, longitudinal analysis (especially pertinent in HelSLI-bilingual) will be conducted. For this, multilevel modelling techniques for longitudinal data will be applied. Both frequentist and Bayesian approaches to inference will be utilized depending on research questions of each subproject. In the former case, two-tailed nominal p-value of .05 and 95% confidence interval and, in the latter case, informative priors, when realizable, and 95% credible interval will be generally used. Following the multiple deficit model of developmental disorders put forward by Pennington , the HelSLI subprojects investigate the DLD phenomenon at multiple levels of analysis: genetic and environmental etiological, neural, cognitive, behavioral, and psychosocial (see Fig. 1). The main aim of the project is to increase our understanding of the multiple interactive risk and protective factors that affect the developing heterogeneous cognitive and behavioral profile of DLD. Data collection is in active stage and the collected data will be unique in the world in its quality and quantity. At the level of etiological risk and protective factors (see Fig. 1), we will be able to investigate the associations between biology (genes, temperament) and environment (parent-child interaction and language background) and use this knowledge, for example, to predict intervention outcomes and as covariates at other levels of analysis. At the level of neural systems, we will be able to investigate the neurophysiological correlates of DLD (both continuous EEG characteristics and ERP responses to various linguistic and non-linguistic auditory stimuli), evaluate the usefulness of EEG/ERP in individual diagnostics, and map these findings to the etiological level of analysis. We can determine, for example, the associations between genetic and language background and brain electrophysiology. At the level of cognitive processes, we will be able to investigate the difficulties in nonlinguistic basic cognitive capacities that are expected to affect DLD across different languages with the aim to use this knowledge to develop language-independent tools for prediction, diagnosis, and intervention of DLD and later dyslexia. As described in the Background section, genetic factors behind DLD appear to affect not only language but also nonverbal performance. Especially (nonlinguistic) STM and procedural learning will be of interest here, since these have been associated also with the etiological and neural levels of analysis. At the level of behavioral manifestation, we will be able to investigate the variation ranging from typical to severely impaired language development. This level of analysis will enable testing for and validating subgroups suggested by the other levels of analysis (e.g., EEG abnormalities emerging in those with comorbid difficulties). Last, at the level of psychosocial outcome, we will be able to investigate associations between the other levels and a child’s psychosocial characteristics and well-being. With all these levels of analysis, the HelSLI study will be in a unique position to define correlative and probabilistic or derivational causal relations and map developmental pathways (or trajectories) in a large longitudinal sample. Moreover, there is little previous research into the relationship between bilingualism and DLD, and none that spans all these levels of analysis. As the project will be carried out in a clinical setting, traditional and experimental assessment and intervention methods can be employed as part of the research project, in order to provide the DLD children comprehensive services. This and the longitudinal design make it possible to distinguish between associated and causal factors. The results could be used to help predict language development and its difficulties across language environments. Based on the results of the assessments, the current project will provide means for targeting some of the possibly causative factors, not just the resulting symptoms, with, for example, the adaptive computerized interventions of HelSLI cognitive that can be individually tailored based on the differences at the etiological, cognitive, and behavioral levels of analysis. This kind of early intervention in the promotion of health and equality and prevention of marginalization is pivotal, since funding targeted at supporting learning during the early years of education results in better outcomes than that provided during the later years . We thank the following persons for their invaluable contribution to the specific subprojects. Helsinki Uusimaa Hospital District funding covers the clinical part of the project and additional research funding. Also, the Academy of Finland funds the project. These two sources of funding cover the additional costs of data gathering for the DLD children as well as salaries of the research group, that is, design of the study and collection, analysis, and interpretation of data and writing the manuscripts. The Social Insurance Institution of Finland (Kela) funds the project with two grants, which cover the assessments of the TD children. All named authors participated in the design of the study as well as in manuscript preparation. For this manuscript and for the study in general, rights and responsibilities of the participating students and researchers, requirements for authorship as well as the rights of ownership and use to the data are defined in written contracts for each separate subproject. Authorship decisions are made based on the Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors guidelines (http://www.icmje.org/). All authors read and approved the final manuscript. Ethical clearance has been received for all subprojects of HelSLI from the ethical board of Helsinki University Hospital (approval reference number: § 248/2012). This clearance required an extensive written ethical evaluation by the principal investigator (M. Laasonen), which included a data management plan. Also, a research permit has been cleared by Helsinki University Hospital and the cities of Espoo, Helsinki, and Vantaa. A written consent to participate has been obtained from the parents.
2019-04-23T13:53:52Z
https://bmcpsychology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40359-018-0222-7
It is useful to briefly explain the arrangement of the original volumes. Though commonly described as a six-volume work, The World Crisis is more accurately described as a five volume work in six books: the middle two volumes, subtitled 1916-1918, were issued in two parts, but were sold as a pair, slipcased together in the USA and Canada. They are often referred to as “Volumes 3a and 3b.” Thus the last two volumes, The Aftermath and The Eastern Front, are correctly Volumes IV and V respectively, and the whole set is “5- in-6,” as usually described by knowledgeable booksellers. Volume I goes back to 1911 and the great power rivalries to trace the background and dramatic opening of the war, more or less like The Gathering Storm traces events leading up to World War II. Volume II, 1915, is the most personal, largely devoted to Churchill’s failed efforts to break the deadlock in Europe by forcing the Dardanelles, knocking Turkey out of the war and succoring the Russians. Volume III, 1916-1918 (both parts) covers the carnage on the Western Front, the German victory over Russia and almost-victory over the Allies in 1918, and the final, exhausted end of the war. The Aftermath chronicles events in which Churchill was involved during the ten years after victory, including the Irish Treaty; The Eastern Front‘s subject is self-explanatory, dealing with the titanic battles between Russia and the German-Austrian armies. One cannot think of another 20th Century statesman who not only spent most of the two World Wars in high office but was also able to write of them in such superb English, with such eloquence and verve. Even those who do not usually read war books will be entranced by the Churchill’s account of the awful, unfolding scene, written as if the reader were a colleague, observing the march of events over his burly shoulder. It is not widely known that Volume I, at least, appeared in America before its British counterpart, making this the true First Edition. However, the Scribner volumes have not worn as well as the British, particularly Volume I, which was bound in an inferior cloth that, in most cases, quickly discolored and faded, while the gilt turned black. Later volumes, and later impressions of Volume I, used a much better cloth and brighter gilt, and these are often found in fine condition. The American Edition had fewer reprints than the English, so non-first editions are less often encountered. They sell for half or less of the price of firsts. Reprints of Volume I are prized because of the deplorable state of most first editions of that volume. Jacketed sets are extremely rare. Typical unjacketed sets with Volume I “faded as usual” are good buys, but a perfect Volume I, if ever seen, would double their value. Dark brown cloth blocked gilt, 8vo. Vol. I published April 1923 at $6.50, 604 pages numbered (i)-(xiv) and (1)-(590). Vol. II published October 1923 at $6.50, 592 pages numbered (i)-(xiv) and 1-578. Vol. III (in two parts) published 1927 in a slipcase at $10; Part 1 (“Vol. I”) 320 pages numbered (i)-(xviii) and 1-302; Part 2 (“Vol. II”) 338 pages numbered (i)-(x) and 1-326. Vol. IV The Aftermath published 1929 at $5, 520 pages numbered (i)-(xvi) and 1-502 (+2). Vol. V The Unknown War published 1931 at $5, 414 pages numbered (i)-(xviii) and 1-396. All volumes illustrated with maps and charts (and a photo in vol. I). Vol. II: THE WORLD CRISIS and WINSTON S. CHURCHILL on top board (inside blind box rule) and spine; spine usually but not always contains two stars, the subtitle “1915” and the SCRIBNERS imprint. Vol. III: Plain top boards; spines are lettered with the main title, author’s name and Scribners imprint and subtitles “1916-1918 and VOL. I or VOL II”. Vol. V: THE UNKNOWN WAR and WINSTON S. CHURCHILL on top board (inside blind box rule); spine adds THE EASTERN FRONT and the SCRIBNERS imprint. At least this many impressions are known: Vol. I, four (1923 twice, 1924, 1930). Vol. II, two (1923, 1929). Vol. III, one for each part (1927). The Aftermath, three (March, April, September1929). The Unknown War, three (1931 twice, 1932). Identifying first impressions: Volumes I and II carry the date 1923 on title page and no reprint information on the title page verso. Volume III, both parts, carry the date 1927 on title page. The Aftermath carries the date 1929 on title page and no reprint information on title page verso. The Unknown War carries the date 1931 on title page and the block letter “A” on title page verso. Volumes I and II: Off-white or cream paper printed black, flaps blank except for $6.50 price, book descriptions on front faces. Volume I back face details “Important New Scribner Publications,” Volume II back face contains an advert for Volume I. Volume III: These two books were originally slipcased, and their jackets are thus plain, except for the legend “$10.00 | Two Volumes” on the upper front flaps and jacket spine lettering identical to the books themselves, printed black on off-white or cream paper. The very rare slipcase carries two tipped-on labels: a title/author’s name/publisher label on the back and a boxed description of the books, printed dark brown on cream laid paper, on one side. The Aftermath: Grey paper printed navy blue, flaps blank except for $5.00 price, book description on front face with title/author’s name/publisher in an odd, bold face not used elsewhere; spine is lettered to match the book’s spine. The Unknown War: Grey threaded paper printed deep red with titles, author’s names and publisher spine imprint in a unique, bold typeface. Description of the book on front face, advert with review blurbs for the Abridged Edition (Woods A31b) on back face. Front flap contains “The Unknown War…$5.00” above a blurb for A Roving Commission; backflap contains a blurb promoting The Aftermath. Although all World Crisis jackets are extremely rare, collectors should pay close attention to the descriptions of them, since later impression jackets may be different; first impressions with later impression jackets are “married pieces,” and worth no premium. Navy cloth blocked blind on cover, blind and gilt on spine, 8vo. Vol. I published 10 April 1923 at 30 shillings, 544 pages numbered (2), (i)-(vi) and 1-536. Vol. II published 30 October 1923 at 30 shillings, 560 pages numbered (1)-557 (+3). Vol. III (in two parts) published 3 March 1927 at 42 shillings; Part 1, 292 pages numbered (1)-(292); Part 2, 308 pages numbered (i)-(x) and 293-589 (+1). Vol. IV The Aftermath published 7 March 1929 at 30 shillings, 476 pages numbered (1)-474 (+2). Vol. V The Eastern Front published 2 November 1931 at 30 shillings, 368 pages numbered (1)-368. All volumes variously illustrated with photos, maps and charts. Vol. I: THE WORLD CRISIS 1911-1914 and WINSTON S. CHURCHILL on top board (inside blind box rule). The same titling plus THORNTON BUTTERWORTH imprint gilt on spine. No star on spine. Vol. II: THE WORLD CRISIS 1915 and WINSTON S. CHURCHILL on top board (inside blind box rule). The same titling plus THORNTON BUTTERWORTH and two stars gilt on spine. Vol. III: THE WORLD CRISIS 1916-1918 Part. I. (or Part. II.) and WINSTON S. CHURCHILL on top board (inside blind box rule). The same titling plus THORNTON BUTTERWORTH and three stars (Part I) or four stars (Part 2) gilt on spine. Vol. IV: THE WORLD CRISIS, THE AFTERMATH and WINSTON S. CHURCHILL on top board (inside blind box rule). The same titling plus THORNTON BUTTERWORTH and five stars gilt on spine. Vol. V: THE WORLD CRISIS, THE EASTERN FRONT and WINSTON S. CHURCHILL on top board (inside blind box rule). The same titling plus THORNTON BUTTERWORTH and six stars gilt on spine. Vol. I, eight (first edition April 1923; second edition April 1923, reprinted same month; third edition November 1923, reprinted July 1924, May 1927, December 1927, February 1930). Vol. II, six (October 1923 thrice, December 1923, May 1927, February 1929). Vol III, five (January 1927, March 1927 twice, April 1927, September 1930). The Aftermath, three (two in March 1929; the third in June 1929). The Eastern Front, two, both November 1931. Identifying first impressions: All first impressions carry the legend “First Published” followed by a single date on the verso of the title page. All later impressions carry notes of subsequent printings in this place. Quantities (according to Woods). Vol. I: 7380 first editions, 16,462 total. Vol. II: 7500 first editions, 14,260 total. Vol. III: 7523 first editions, 14,598 total. The Aftermath: 7500 first editions, 11,000 total. The Eastern Front: 5150 first editions, 7994 total. Vol. I: Printed navy on grey paper. Title, author’s name, publisher, price and MAPS AND CHARTS on front face and spine; quote from page 188 also on front face. Contents blurb on front flap. No adverts for subsequent volumes or review blurbs for Vol. I on flaps or back face. Vol. II: Printed dark brown on tan paper. Front face and spine similar to above. Contents blurb on front flap, Vol. I press noticed on back flap, advert for Vol. I on back face. Vol. III: Printed black on grey paper. Front face and spine similar to above, but face blurb is not by Churchill. Contents blurb on front flap, six titles of “General Literature” on back flap, adverts for Vols. I and II on back face. Aside from the distinguishing legends “Part I.” and “Part II.” (no period after “Part”) on spines, jackets for the two parts are identical. The Aftermath: Printed black on greenish grey paper. Front face, front flap and spine arranged similarly to Vol. III. Back flap contains blurb for Beaverbrook’s two volumes, Politicians and the War. Adverts for Vols. I, II and III on back face. The Eastern Front: Printed black and red on green paper (which has often faded to a brown color). Front face, front flap and spine similar to above. Back flap contains press notices for My Early Life. Advert for the abridged and revised World Crisis on back face. The jacket was unaltered for the second impression. Woods’ listing of two impressions of The Eastern Front has been challenged, but Woods is right: several copies of the second impression have been spotted; their title page verso notes publication in November 1931, the same month as the first. All volumes are illustrated with photos, maps and charts which can be checked by consulting the lists of illustrations in the front of each. Some maps are fold-outs. Points to look for: Vol. I 1911-1914: a 13-item errata slip can occur in several places, including p. (vi), p. 1 and elsewhere. Vol. III, 1916-1918 Part 2: A three-item errata slip is tipped onto the half title. The Aftermath: A two-item errata slip is tipped onto page 9 (Woods says between 10 and 11, which may be a variation). The Eastern Front: a large color fold-out map is tipped onto the last free endpaper, following page 368. This is also the only volume with a frontispiece (Emperor Franz Joseph), and contains seven other photographs. Although not the true first edition, the English version is more aesthetically desirable, being bound in a more durable and uniform material and equipped with shoulder notes on each page that summarize the subject of each page. Probably for that reason, it is more popular among collectors who only wish to own one edition. Jacketed sets are extremely rare and command deservedly high prices. The main problem with these volumes is spotting of pages and page edges from their damp life in England, and “bubbling” of the cloth, especially on The Aftermath. Later impressions cost much less, even in top condition and half as much with more wear. For this kind of money you might prefer one of the later sets, such as the full-leather Easton Press edition. Published in Canada from the American plates, this issue is identical in all respects to the latter, save for Macmillan imprints on title pages (cancels), spines and dust jackets. The Canadian Macmillan logo also appears on dust jacket spines. Curiously, the jacket flaps contain no prices. These issues are quite rare. Ostensibly equal in value to the American Edition, the Canadian Issue is probably somewhat less important, and should not quite reach price levels of the Scribner set. Two volumes: 1911-1914 and 1915 Published from the English plates, this issue is identical to the latter, save for Australasian Publishing Co. imprints on title pages and dust jacket spines. There is no publisher’s imprint, however, on the spines of the books. After Volume II, a separate Australian issue was not produced, and the Australian market received the standard English issues of the other volumes. These two volumes are interesting anomalies. All volumes were sold cheaply by the Times Book Club, which usually used first printings, except for The Eastern Front, which is a second. The TBC binding has larger stars and cruder lettering; copies usually contain sticker labels on rear pastedowns. This is the second instance of a Times Book Club issue of one of Churchill’s works (see Lord Randolph Churchill). Collectors instinctively avoid anything non-standard looking, even if they don’t know what it is; in this case they are certainly right, for this is a book club issue despite first printing sheets. A full set is rare. Navy cloth, boards blank. Spine blocked gilt with abbreviated title (THE WORLD CRISIS) author’s name and SCRIBNERS imprint. 8vo, 880 pages numbered (i) -xii and (1)-866 (+2). The verso of the half-title lists six of Churchill’s previous works. Illustrated with maps and plans. Published February 1931 at $5.00. There are at least three impressions: 1931, 1942 and 1949. The first impression is easily distinguished by its 1931 date on the title page and block letter “A” on title page verso. Colors also aid identification: the 1931 is navy, the 1942 medium blue, the 1949 vertically scored red cloth. The original dust jacket is printed black on yellow paper with the title, author’s name, description and “$5” appearing next to a photo of Churchill walking. The front flap contains a contents blurb, the back flap reviewer Comments on The Aftermath, and the back face reviewer Comments on My Early Life. Later jackets bear a Karsh photo of Churchill and facsimile signature on the front faces. I had understood that according to The New York Times, this work was published on February 7th 1931, 19 days before the English Edition, making this the true first edition. The new Cohen Bibliography, however, indicates that the London edition takes priority. Unjacketed copies are worth about the same as the English Editions. A jacketed copy is another proposition. I know of only two or three of these in existence. Medium green cloth (bright green on third impression). The top board bears the title (“THE WORLD CRISIS 1911-1918 Abridged & Revised Edition”) author’s name and publisher logo debossed blind. Two thick blind rules at top and bottom of top board and spine. The spine bears the title, author’s name publisher’s name imprint, all gilt. 8vo, 832 pages numbered (1)-831 (+1). The verso of the half-title contains a boxed advert for 12 of Churchill’s other works. Illustrated with maps and plans. Published 26 February 1931 at 21 shillings. Woods lists 5000 first impressions and 3000 second impressions (January 1932) but fails to mention a third impression in bright green cloth (October 1937). A striking jacket is printed black and red-orange on thin, bright green paper (which is often faded); a variant jacket is printed on thicker, lined cream stock. Both these jackets carry a contents blurb on the front flap, an advert for The Aftermath on the back flap, and an advert for My Early Life on the back face. A second state jacket adds The Eastern Front to the back flap. Often passed up by collectors as a mere abridgment, this volume is essential to the complete library because Churchill added new material and considerable revisions. Aside from his new foreword there is a completely new chapter on the Battle of the Marne. Also, writes Churchill, “I have had to record a somewhat different account of Lord Fisher’s resignation from than that which appeared in the original edition. Mr. Asquith’s disclosures in his ‘Memoirs’ and Lord Fisher’s own biographers have cast a less charitable light upon the conduct of the old Admiral than that in which I had viewed it.” (Asquith’s memoirs disclosed that Fisher had written an incredible letter offering to remain at the Admiralty if vested virtually with dictatorial powers, refusing to serve either under Churchill or his successor, Arthur Balfour). As such, a copy of this work belongs on the shelf of every serious Churchill library. Dust jackets are extremely rare. Routine lightly worn unjacketed copies sell for less, and later impressions seem much less common than the first edition. Produced with American plates and identical to the American Edition with the exception of Macmillan imprints on spine, jacket and title page. I have never seen the jacket but presume it is similar to the American. The same notes as to rarity and value apply here as to the American Edition. A limited edition of 1,354 copies compiled by Churchill from the Abridged and Revised Edition, illustrated with maps. This is a textbook which, as it states, was “Privately printed for the Royal Military College, Sandhurst.” 16mo, 512 pages numbered (1)-511 (+1). Bound in red cloth, publisher’s logo blocked blind on top board. Spine printed black with THE WORLD CRISIS, author’s name, “Sandhurst Edition” and publisher’s name. Woods records its price as 13/6. Because of Churchill’s association with Sandhurst, and because his chapter selections shed light on his military thinking, this is a desirable though scarce edition of The World Crisis. It contains a completely reset text in which Churchill selected various chapters from his 1931 Abridged and Revised volume. It was once deemed very valuable, but many copies have turned up recently. The rare fine example is likely to cost a good deal. However, most were used as cadet textbooks so the typical example is well worn, often underlined and/or marked with marginal notes. These sell for rather less. The brief mention in Woods (page 51) quite fails to do justice to this beautiful work, which, though its text is abridged, constitutes the first illustrated edition of The World Crisis. It began as a serialization, issued in 26 magazine-format parts every fortnight between September 1933 and October 1934. Part 1 contains a brand new Foreword by Churchill; Part 26 contains appendices and index. After these were published Newnes offered the parts cased in three volumes, and later in a four-volume set jointly produced with The Home Library Book Company. First Appearance (26 Parts): Measuring 7×10″, these are square-bound magazines, each with cover photo, title and author’s name dropped out against a medium blue background. Part 1’s spine is blank; the other spines are numbered with the title and author’s name repeated. Inside and back wrapper faces contain adverts for the series, other Newnes publications, even life assurance! Wrappers were omitted from the bound volumes noted below. Second Appearance (3 Vols.): Bound volumes (520, 520, 672 pages numbered consecutively with eight pages of preliminaries per volume, comprising 98 chapters. Two styles of publisher-authorized bindings were offered, both by A. W. Bain & Co., Ltd. of Cambridge Heath, London. The “Library Binding”: half crimson morocco leather, cloth sides, blocked 22 ct. gilt on spine with title, volume number, author’s name and a decorative design (globe exploding four ways). Offered at 8 shillings ($2) per bound volume (not including internals), or 4/6 ($1.12) for each case alone. The “Standard Binding”: royal blue cloth blocked blind and gilt on top board and blind on spine with title, author’s name, volume number, publisher’s name, and decorative design (globe exploding from the top). Offered at 5 shillings ($1.25) per bound volume (not including internals) or 2/6 (66¢) for each case alone. Note: spine volume numbers appear in both Roman and Arabic, sometimes interchangeably within sets. Later Bindings: Though not mentioned by Newnes, I have examined other binding variations, most commonly a plain red cloth with the title blocked gilt and a blind wreath design on the top board. The title, author’s name and volume number are blocked gilt between faint blind boxes on the spine. I have seen enough of these to conclude that they were a later, possibly cheaper, publisher’s binding, not a “freelance” variation. Yet another binding, in plain red cloth blocked gilt on spine only, may be a private binding. Third Appearance (4 Vols.): Bound volumes (392, 456, 492, 452 pages numbered consecutively with eight pages of preliminaries per volume, comprising 98 chapters) in “Red Cape Levant Moroquette” (leatherette) with gilt top page edges. A wreathed sword device is blocked blind on the top board and silver and gilt on the spine. The title appears in gilt on top board and spine; spines also contain gilt author’s name, volume number and Newnes name. The outside board edges of each volume are beveled: a nice touch. This most elaborate and final variation of The Great War was an installment mail offer by the Home Library Book Company, 23-24 Tavistock Street, London in conjunction with Newnes, announced late 1934 and running into 1935. A 1934 advert states, “5/ [$1.25] brings the four superb volumes carriage paid to your door!” A 2 February 1935 advert reduces this to only “3/” (75¢). Whether these were the prices of each volume (which seems cheap), or simply a “hook” to bait the customer I have not determined. All variants of The Great War contain the same pages, profusely illustrated and captioned, though it’s doubtful, judging by their English, that the captions are Churchill’s. They certainly offer wonderful graphics to support the author’s towering prose, and, since they constitute the first illustrated World Crisis, the serious collector really ought to own one. I know bibliophiles who own six! Originally one shilling each, the individual parts cost little as odd volumes, but a full set of 26 is worth considerable money in fine condition, much more in custom-made boxes, or half as much in as-usual condition with wear and chips. The most luxurious set is the three-volume half-leather Library Binding, but both the Standard and Home Library bindings are splashier and colourful. Half-leather bindings are rarely found in top condition because the leather tends to dry out and crack over the years. Fine examples of the cloth and Home Library bindings can cost dearly, and are worth it. Bound in medium blue cloth (rougher material than the first edition) with publisher’s logo blocked blind on the top board and the title, author’s name and publisher’s name blocked gilt on the spine. The dust jacket is printed black and red on scored pale green paper and is quickly identified with its red Keystone Library logos. The Keystone Library was a low-priced series of Thornton Butterworth titles which had run their course as trade editions and were now offered as low priced reprints. Aside from a title page cancel (bearing a red Keystone Library logo) and a new dust jacket, this is a direct reprint from the English first edition plates, and still includes the excellent color folding map tipped in following page 368. There was one impression only, offered at 5/ ($1.25). Churchill tended to second-guess his English publishers when recommending titles. The Unknown War was the one he sold to Charles Scribner, and evidently he finally prevailed with his English publisher on this one. “The Eastern Front” appears as a subtitle on the spine, title page and (in parentheses) on the dust jacket. I have Dr. Gordon Cohen to thank for pointing out to me that these thick volumes are not abridgments, but the entire text of the first four volumes, including Churchill’s revisions from the 1931 Abridged and Revised edition. Entirely reset, it constitutes a new and separate edition of over 1400 pages with comprehensive, if not elaborate, maps and illustrations. It is therefore quite desirable, both bibliographically and for collectors who want the complete text but not the financial burden of a first edition. Of course it lacks the final two volumes of the complete work, but these can be acquired separately (see some of the following entries). Deep red cloth, red stained top page edges, author signature blocked gilt on top board, printed marbleized yellow-brown endpapers. As above with a more elaborate spine: title/author’s name gilt on a blind panel; three groups of debossed spine ribs; 18 pairs of gilt decorative rules. Originally the volumes were not jacketed and were shipped in grey cardboard boxes (one volume per box). In 1942 or later, the famous Karsh “angry lion” portrait, taken in Ottawa in late 1941, was the basis of an attractive dust jacket, printed orange or blue and black on white paper and marked “VOL. I.” or “VOL. II.” on the lower spine. These jackets have been found on all three binding variants, always bearing the same price: 8/6 ($2.12) for the two volumes. Clearly, the jacket was unavailable for pre1942 copies. Since the boards are quite elaborate for a cheap work, and since no other jacket has been observed on thousands of copies, it is likely that the Odhams Edition was originally issued without jackets. This edition is very easy to come by in good condition, although better examples bring a premium. Combined with reprints of The Aftermath and The Eastern Front it forms the least expensive full text of The World Crisis available. It is an obvious choice for readers on a budget. Alternatives are the postwar four volume Odhams issue or the new Barnes & Noble issue (see below). Officially retitled THE AFTERMATH | being a sequel to | THE WORLD CRISIS, this work was transferred to Macmillan after Thornton Butterworth went into voluntary liquidation in 1940. With 476 pages, it is reprinted from the Thornton Butterworth plates and bound in dark navy cloth blocked gilt (THE AFTERMATH | A Sequel to | THE WORLD | CRISIS) with author’s and publisher’s names on the spine. A second impression was issued in 1944. Dust jackets are printed red and black on off-white paper. Identifying first impressions: this is distinctly taller than the 1944 impression: 9 1/2″ high against 9″. Dust jackets look the same, but the 1941 jacket is on slightly yellower paper and the type and photo of the author are reduced to fit the smaller dimensions of the 1944 impression. The half-title verso of the 1941 bears the first publication date and Macmillan transfer date 1941; the reprint adds, “Reprinted 1944.” This is a modestly priced Aftermath compared to first editions, but expect to pay a premium for a fine jacketed 1941 impression, which looks and feels like a first edition. This reprint from Thornton Butterworth sheets was published simultaneously and uniform with the Macmillan Aftermath, but had only one impression of just 600 copies. Its size, binding and jacket are uniform with the Macmillan Aftermath, but it is considerably rarer, and commands a higher price—not nearly as high, of course, as Eastern Front first editions. Because the binding and spine lettering are quite close to the latter, it does not look out of place among a Thornton Butterworth editions, and is a budget substitute for the latter. But it is highly collectable in its own right, since it is so rare; the jackets are especially uncommon. When Thornton Butterworth went out of business in 1940, most of their Churchill works were subsequently published by Macmillan, including Abridged and Revised World Crisis. There are three impressions, all on thin wartime paper: 1941 (dark blue cloth), 1942 (very dark blue-black cloth) and 1943 (rougher, lighter blue cloth). All these are easily identified by dates on their title page versos. All impressions sold for 18 shillings. Today the reprints are common: a fine Macmillan First in like dust jacket might approach $100/£60, but certainly no more; lesser copies and later impressions sell for as little as $10/£5. Identifying first impressions: The title page verso of the Macmillan First lists all three 1930s impressions followed by the line, “Transferred to Macmillan & Co. Ltd. – 1941.” Later impressions give the first publication date, the transfer dates and the reprint date (“1942” or “1942,1943”). Although all dust jackets are printed red and black on cream paper, first impression jackets are different: their paper is heavier, scored material and the back face advertises (in order) My Early Life, Great Contemporaries, Step by Step and The World Crisis. Later impression jackets are printed on lighter, cheaper paper and their back faces advertise (in order) My Early Life, Thoughts and Adventures, Great Contemporaries and Step by Step. Later jackets add The World Crisis, The Aftermath and The Unknown War to back face adverts. This is a budget alternative to 1930s editions which is just as readable, since all the original fold-out maps are preserved. Standard: bright red cloth; title and one to four stars (indicating volume) blocked gilt and black, and author signature blocked gilt, on top board; title/star(s), author’s name and publisher’s name blocked gilt and black on spine, separated by repeat publisher’s devices and gilt rules. Deluxe: red leatherette; author signature blocked gilt with blind rules on top board; title, star(s), author’s name between heavy rules blocked gilt on leather spine label; spine decorated with multiple devices, rules and the Odhams name, also gilt. The familiar Odhams style, printed pink and black on white paper, bearing title, author’s name and stars to indicate volume on front face and spine and Odhams name printed black on lower spine. Recommended if you can find it. There seems no difference in value between the two binding styles, although Odhams sold the deluxe for a premium back in 1949. Published one volume at a time over two years, this was an offprint of the original Scribners volumes with smaller page margins resulting in smaller books: 5 1/2 x 8 1/2″ compared to the original 6 1/4 x 9″. The volumes are numbered consecutively, so 1916-1918 is no longer labeled “Volume I” and “Volume II” but are now Volume III and IV. Thus The Aftermath becomes Volume V and The Unknown War Volume VI. All are bound in medium blue cloth blocked gilt on top board and spines. Dust jackets, printed red, black and light blue on white paper, display some of the internal illustrations, and each contains the subtitle: THE FIRST WORLD WAR AS CHURCHILL SAW IT. Interestingly, the title page verso indicates that Churchill renewed his copyright in 1951. Identifying first impressions: The codes mentioned in the following notes are Scribners, taken from versos of the title page versos; they help to identify first impressions, although I strongly suspect that Volumes III-VI were never reprinted. The complete work went out of print in the early 1970s; it seems reasonable to believe that Volume I only, or possibly Volume II, saw reprints to maintain full sets in stock. Volume II: Published at $7.50 in August 1963, coded A8.63[MH]; no reprints examined. Volume III: Published January 1964 at $7.50 simultaneously with Volume IV. Coded A-1.64 [MH]. Volume IV: Published January 1964 at $7.50 simultaneously with Volume III. Coded A-1.64[MH]. Volume V: Published July 1964 at $7.50 simultaneously with Volume VI. Coded A7.64[MH]. Volume VI: Published July 1964 at $7.50 simultaneously with Volume V. Coded A7.64[MH]. Except for The Great War, which was a textual abridgment, this was the first illustrated edition of The World Crisis. That is the chief thing it has to recommend it. The books themselves, offprinted from the Scribners originals, are shorter, squatter, and bound in a cheap blue material which doesn’t seem to hold up well. Even jacketed copies often have a soiled, rumpled appearance, and the dust jackets are usually faded or grotty. Until the Easton Press Edition, this set was hotly sought after, but its value has declined somewhat. This thick “Four Square Book” reprints the Abridged Edition for the first time as a paperback. The cover portrays Churchill and a war memorial, the back cover the Cenotaph in London. 958 pages, illustrated with maps, published at 7/6. A second and third impression were issued, both in 1964. Two volumes Reprinted from plates of the Four Square paperback (pagination identical throughout) but divided into two volumes of 496 and 460 pages. The covers portray a white sculpted head of Churchill against a blue (Vol. 1) or green (Vol. 2) background. Published at 10/6 in a blue and green slipcase. “My finest hour,” reports Richard Langworth, “bibliographically speaking, was when the Easton Press asked my help in designing a new limited edition of the original World Crisis for their series of elegant leatherbound classics of literature. It was carte blanche to create the ultimate set, the World Crisis I would take with me if confined to a desert island. Like a boy turned loose in a sweet shop I specified the best text (Thornton Butterworth’s First English Edition, with its novel shoulder notes and beautiful folding maps), coupled with the best illustrations (Scribners, from their postwar edition). Easton Press added an elaborate binding in leather and gilt with raised spine bands, gilt page edges and silk page markers, and priced the new set so low that the value of first editions was cut by half—although they have since recovered. From the bookseller standpoint I had committed a kind of hara-kiri…but many more people now own The World Crisis. “With the exception of the tacky bookplates, which are thankfully laid-in (and please throw them away), the Easton Press produced a good aesthetic achievement for the money. While not as perfect as classic morocco leather bindings, the pigskin boards are strong and durable and the quality of the offprinting is high. Easton’s full color reprints of the original folding maps—including the fine folding map at the end of The Eastern Front—are, if anything, better than the originals. There’s always a nit, however, and it is my fault. When recommending the use of Scribners postwar illustrations, I forgot that the original Eastern Front itself contained eight illustrations, including the frontispiece. Easton, with wads of new Scribner photos to insert, naturally left them out. But I omitted to remind them also to omit the original illustration list from page 13—so there it sits, directing the reader to plates that don’t exist! “Easton’s price was originally only $260—hundreds less than any complete set then available. The first printing quickly sold out, but they have been reissued periodically, using an improved, more supple but still pigskin binding. The chain booksellers Barnes & Noble have done Winston Churchill many services, producing cheap copies of numerous books by and about him over recent years. One of their latest was this fine offprint of the two-volume Odhams Edition, bound in half black cloth and stamped gilt on the spines, sold in a black, heavy cardboard slipcase. Only available from Barnes & Noble, at the bargain price of $29.95/£19, it remains in print at this writing. In 1995, the Churchill Center presented a certificate of appreciation to the President of Barnes & Noble for his efforts in keeping Churchill in print, along with copies of The Aftermath and The Eastern Front, which we hoped he would consider for reprinting alongside this work, thus creating a complete World Crisis that would certainly sell for under $100/£60. After months of silence he sent them back; he did not even want them as gifts? The Churchill Center duly produced its own reprints: see below. This work is mentioned by Woods (page 55), who describes it as a cheap edition published in 1941 at 6/ ($1.50). Since it has never been encountered among the publisher’s records or hundreds of copies examined by dealers and collectors, I doubt very much that it ever existed. Navy boards blocked blind on top boards and gilt on spines with main title, subtitle, author’s name, five or six stars indicating volume, and the name of Thornton Butterworth, the original publisher. Both are reset, based on the original Thornton Butterworth text, leftover from the 1974-75 collected edition (and, as a result, printed on 500-year archival paper, but thinner than the originals). Note that The Eastern Front contains all the original photos and illustrations, save for the elaborate folding map following the index. A bookseller colleague salvaged leftover “Collected Works” sheets and bound them as replicas of the original Thornton Butterworth cases—down even to the publisher’s name in gilt on the spines: the first appearance of Thornton Butterworth since 1940. Although another colleague laughingly called this “an act of bibliographic obfuscation,” the books cannot be mistaken for first editions. The internals bear “Collected Works” markings, being entitled Volume XI (The Aftermath) and Volume XII (The Eastern Front) from that 34-volume collection. Woods (page 51) mentions some but not all of the following; by “Yugoslavian” he apparently means the Serbo-Croat edition. Translation of The Great War, published by Hasselbalch: Copenhagen 1935. Only 89 of the original 98 chapters were published, originally in 33 separate parts. The parts were later bound in two thick quarto (8 1/2 x 11 1/2″) volumes bound in half brown leather, half blue leather and, say some Danes, in wrappers. Elaborately illustrated with 38 color plates of world leaders, each tipped onto a heavy backing page. Though pagination differs, black and white illustrations are the same as in the Norwegian Edition. 1576 pages. Books came in specially designed cardboard boxes. A thin abridgment of Volume III, published in rose wrappers printed black with a photo of the author by De Telegraaf: Amsterdam 1927. 102 pages, illustrated, plus wrappers. Translation of The Aftermath, published by W. S. Oberstrom: Porvossa, Finland, 1929. Published by Payot: Paris in grey wrappers, consisting of the following volumes: Tome I 1911-1914 (1925), Tome II 1915 (1926), Tome III 1916/18 (1930) and Tome IV 1919 (1931). 1,946 pages. This work had several impressions but is usually found in well worn condition at low prices. Glassine wrappers often found with this work are not original; French booksellers put this on everything. Published by Koehler (1924-26) and Amalthea (1928-31) in four volumes and five parts: 1911-1914 (1924), Zweiter Band 1915 (1926), 1916/18 (2 vols., 1928) and Nach Dem Kriege (The Aftermath) (1931). An interesting set: the font is old style German; Volumes I and II came bound and unbound; the 1916-1918 pair is known in deep green and dark blue cloth. Nach Dem Kriege is found only in large card wrappers. Abridged edition, published by Verlag am Stutz Herdeg: Zurich 1947, bound in dark blue cloth; grey dust jacket with white titles. Volumes I and II published by Società Anonima Poligrafica Italiana in Rome; Volumes III and IV published by Tipo-Litografia della R. Accademia Navale in Livorno. The four volumes in five parts were as follows: Vol I 1911-1914 (1929), Vol II 1915 (1930), Vol III 1916-1918 (2 vols., 1930) and Vol IV Il Dopoguerra (The Aftermath) (1931). Published by Pereira: Lisbon 1941. Likely a multi-volume set using the Odhams 1911-1918 text; three volumes have been discovered covering 1911-14 and 1915. Abridged edition published in Zagreb, Yugoslavia, 1936. Abridged edition published by Los Libros de Nuestro Tiempo: Barcelona 1944. Abridged edition published by Skoglund: Stockholm 1931. Offered in orange card wrappers or as a single volume bound in blue cloth. The Great War, published by Skoglund: Stockholm 1935 (Vols. 1 & 2) and 1936 (Vol. 3); first published in nine slim softbound volumes priced at 4.5 krona, or four thicker volumes. These were later bound in half mottled red-brown or tan and dark green leather and plain or marbled cloth. At 7 3/4 x 10 1/2″, smaller in size than the Danish/Norwegian versions but stretched out to three volumes, the Swedish Edition contains its own set of black and white photos, no colour plates and 95 of the original 98 Great War chapters. The volumes originally sold for 26 krona each; in Sweden today, a bound set costs over $200/£120, but sets on the American secondhand market cost much less because there is little demand. Recommended for its unique photos.
2019-04-20T18:48:37Z
https://www.chartwellbooksellers.com/connoisseurs-guide/world-crisis/
My parents live in the heart of suburbia, in Worthington, Ohio. My mother is a longtime gardener, and has always kept an interesting stable of plant life. When I came into being some years back and gradually became aware of birds, I began to encourage additional plantings. At that time - I was just a tot - I had not yet developed any sophistication about flora; I just knew that MORE plants and MORE cover meant MORE birds. Being that I wasn't to be mobile beyond the limits of my bicycle for a good number of years, it seemed wise to lure as many birds as possible to MY location, and plants seemed to help with that. Well, a number of years have passed by, my parents still live in that same house, and their level of sophistication involving the garden has evolved. Many native plant species now share space with a dwindled number of day lilies, four-o-clocks and the like. I was up the other day for a visit, and was pleasantly surprised by all of the beasts great and small that had adopted their yard and the plants within. The walk from the driveway to the front door is a brief one, but an interesting trip nonetheless. In part because of this luxuriant Helianthus sunflower. It's right along the front walk, and I noticed a lot of action in its boughs as I walked past. Directly in front of the sunflower is a smooth beard's-tongue, Penstemon digitalis (another native!), and my mother reports that Ruby-throated Hummingbirds stop by to sip from its flowers. I saw that many of the sunflower's stems teemed with tiny red aphids - very cool! Here's a closeup (as always, you can click the pic to enlarge). These are red sunflower aphids, Uroleucon helianthicola, which apparently are quite happy to nosh on this planted sunflower. Some of the aphids still have their wings, as that's how some them disperse to establish new colonies. Their probosci (snouts) are firmly inserted into the plant tissue, and the tiny insects are happily sucking out nutritious liquids. Happy, that is, until the goldfinches stop by and strip some of them off the stems like boys chomping corn off a cob, which mom reports seeing. Whether the aphids ultimately kill the sunflower remains to be seen, but for now they have probably provided fodder for all kinds of predators such as those goldfinches. They'll stay, and if some enemies rise up against them and wipe out the colony, so be it. Myriad flies of several species were in constant attendance. Whether they are seeking honeydew secretions from the aphids, lapping up detritus left over from aphid bore holes, or are just there to watch the show remains unknown to me. Like the aphids, the flies were doing no harm, and certainly weren't rushing the house or causing concern. I and my camera were excited to see these orange and black brutes wandering about in Sunflower World; comparative giants among the tiny aphids. They are false milkweed bugs, Lygaeus turcicus (thank you Janet Creamer for helping me identify these. Janet's excellent blog is RIGHT HERE). My initial reaction was that they were one of the milkweed bugs, and I guess they are, sort of. While false milkweed bugs occur on milkweed plants, they routinely jump ship and feed on plants in the sunflower family. I'm sure this one sunflower plant spawns plenty of other action that I didn't see in my limited observation time. It certainly created a bit of intellectual stimulation between passing the fifteen feet from my car door to the house's front door. Even just a few native plants can cause a massive boost in biodiversity. You would never see this sort of action on a hosta or most other alien garden fare. And that's just the front yard, which has to be kept rather tidy and groomed for appearance's sake. Wait'll you see the far wilder backyard! Again, if you wish to delve more deeply into the world of native plants and their myriad benefits, visit the Midwest Native Plant Conference. The 3rd annual Midwest Native Plant Conference is approaching: July 8, 9, & 10 in Dayton, Ohio. If you are interested in native wildlife, this conference is for you. The focus is on native plants, but indigenous flora is the building block upon which animals flourish. Check the agenda out RIGHT HERE. There is a Saturday-only option as well, if time is tight. One of the conference's field trip sites is the legendary Cedar Bog near Urbana. I was there last Saturday, ostensibly to teach a workshop on breeding birds, and we saw/heard plenty of those. But our group didn't ignore the entire ecosystem, either, and what an ecosystem! We saw a great many interesting plants and animals, and a few of the former follow. Tightly clustered tiny white flowers collectively create a large and showy domelike inflorescence in elderberry, Sambucus nigra ssp. canadensis. This common shrub is a staple of woodland borders, fencerows, ditches and lots of other habitats. A member of the honeysuckle family (Caprifoliaceae), its berries are often harvested for the production of various foodstuffs; even elderberry wine. Elderberry, especially when in flower, lures an amazing diversity of interesting insects. They in turn attract predators higher up in the insect food chain, which then can become food for birds and higher animals. An elderberry specialist of the insect world is an absolutely gorgeous beetle called the elderberry borer. I have wanted to see one of these gems since I first saw a photo, and finally added one to my beetle life list a few weekends ago. I'll share it later, in a post about the wacky world of beetles. Resembling a cluster of elfin beach balls, the fruit of starry false solomon's-seal, Maianthemum stellatum, provides a point of interest in Cedar Bog's wet woods. A member of the wildly diverse lily family (Liliaceae), this species is nowhere near as common as the false solomon's-seal, or solomon's plume, M. racemosum, at least in Ohio. Starry false solomon's-seal requires rich limey soil with an above neutral pH. Certain to grab the eye in Cedar Bog's rich fen meadows is this odd member of the sunflower family (Asteraceae). It is fen indian-plantain, Arnoglossum plantagineum. It is quite rare in Ohio and highly restricted to high quality fens. Further proof of the lily world's diversity can be found in this curious little herb, false asphodel, Triantha glutinosa. These little fellows might stretch to 8 inches or so in height, and occupy open marly flats within the fen meadow community. It, too, is quite rare in Ohio and is listed as threatened. The specific epithet, glutinosa, means "sticky" and that they are. The stem, especially the upper regions, are heavily beset with glandular hairs and so sticky that small insects frequently become stuck and perish. This stimulates questions about carnivory. Does the plant then absorb useful nitrogen and proteins from these bugs? I don't know that anyone has studied Triantha in this light. Stars of the meadow, at this season, are the showy grass-pink orchids, Calopogon tuberosus. Grass-pinks are found in fens and bogs, and seeing how well over 90% of those habitats have been destroyed in Ohio since European colonization, the orchid has become quite scarce. Click the photo and you'll better see the small wasp that has landed on the labellum, or lip, of the flower. Most orchids have the labellum fixed at the lower part of the flower; this arrangement is reversed in Calopogon. The labellum is adorned with a thick brush of hairs which look as if they are coated in tasty nectar. They're not - it's a ruse, but one that has attracted this wasp. The wasp wasn't heavy enough, but if a bee - a common pollinator - lands on that brush of hairs, the labellum will quickly fold downwards, catapulting the bee onto the column where it will be dusted with pollen. Should the bee already carry pollen from another orchid, it'll transfer that to the the stigma and thus pollinate the grass-pink. Apparently, it's primarily the younger bumblebees that fall for this trick; older bees become wise to the deceptive ways of the orchid and learn that there is no tasty nectar reward and ignore the grass-pinks. Anyway, come out to the Midwest Native Plant Conference and learn much more about our botanical world - and you can even buy some plants! Excellent! Purple fringed orchid, Platanthera pyscodes, a plant I had not seen for a number of years. It's quite the rarity in Ohio, where it is considered threatened and known from but a few sites. These plants were whoppers as well, towering to about two feet in height. To be technical, I should probably call this one small purple fringed orchid, to distinguish it from the extremely similar large purple fringed orchid, P. grandiflora. Unless you have firsthand experience with both of these closely allied species, you're going to struggle to figure out which one you've got. Some authorities have submerged the latter into the former, and just give grandiflora a varietal rank - Platanthera psycodes var. grandiflora. The purple fringed orchids are, beyond any shadow of a doubt, among the most beautiful of North American orchids. The lacerated or fringed flowers are works of art, and the color is nearly shocking. Anyone would be impressed. I hope you get to see this plant sometime, if you've not already. The view from near the summit of Clingman's Dome in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. This high altitude knob straddles the North Carolina/Tennessee state line, and rises to 6,643 feet - the highest point in the Smokies. Red spruce, Picea rubens, and Fraser Fir, Abies fraseri, form the dominant plant community but all is not well in coniferland. All of those dead snags are fir that have been attacked and killed by balsam woolly adelgid, Adelges piceae, an introduced insect pest. Removal of the mature fir has wrought lots of changes in these mountain forests' ecology, including bird life. Nonetheless, many boreal breeders still thrive on Clingman's Dome, including Dark-eyed Junco. Juncos are one of America's best known birds, due to their frequency at winterime backyard feeding stations throughout much of the country. For instance, last winter in my state of Ohio, the Dark-eyed Junco was the second most frequently reported species tallied as part of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's Project FeederWatch. Yet only a tiny percentage of all of the people who buy seed and ogle juncos probably know the bird on its nesting grounds. These sparrows breed primarily in coniferous boreal forests, far to the north of the vast majority of folks who feed them in the winter. So, we'll go have a look at how little juncos are made. At the end of the road leading to Clingman Dome's summit, there is a parking lot and then a steep half-mile trail to the absolute peak and an interesting observation tower. I made this trek both days that I was in the Smokies, hoping for clear skies and grand vistas for photography. It wasn't to be; both times clounds were thick and all-enveloping, allowing only the occasional misty portal into the mountains beyond. The hikes were hardly a waste of time, though. Many interesting plants, birds and other animals will be seen as one lumbers up and stumbles down the mountainside. On Hike One I noticed an adult Dark-eyed Junco perched near the trail, bill stuffed with a large and scrumptious insect morsel. Obviously a nest was close at hand, complete with young, so I backed off and waited for Mrs. Junco to give up the lair. And that she did, flitting down to a small well-vegetated opening and into a well-hidden alcove largely masked by plants. It's that small brownish opening dead center in the photo. She was in there for just a moment, and from my perch I could hear the young juncos' wheezy cries reach a fevered pitch as they sought her attention and the insect. I have found a number of junco nests over the years, and they all pretty much have resembled this one in regards to site characteristics, although the composition of plant species varies. I will take a risk by breaking new etymological ground, and coin a new word for junco nests: phytotroglodytean (phyto = of plants; troglodyte = of caves; cave-dwelling). Whatever you call a junco nest, it's almost certain to be well hidden. Scads of people walk within ten feet of this nest, every day, and I doubt that hardly any of them noticed it. Nor would I, had I not seen the adult junco with a mouthful of fresh food. Right after the adult junco departed after a feeding, I found the right angle, and zoomed the camera into the junco's cave hoping that the youngsters would be visible. And one of them was; the others - three, most likely - remained hidden in the nest cave's darker recesses. Their's is a neat little hiding spot, and juncos excel at creating such nurseries. They must know what they are doing - this species is one of the most common birds in North America. The next morning, I was pleased to see Senora Junco once again busily delivering insects to the juniors and cramming them down their throats, as the nonstop parade of touristos huffed by up the hill, oblivious to the production of the little "snowbirds". Many of the passersby undoubtedly spend money to purchase seed that fuel wintering juncos, and only know these charismatic little birds from their frosty wintertime backyards. A trail weaves through lush spruce-fir forest near the summit of Clingman's Dome in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. These high elevation Appalachian woodlands are fascinating places to explore. They are filled with a spectacular diversity of plant life, which in turn spawns a fantastic assemblage of birds and other animals. Including salamanders. While my main mission in the Smokies did not involve amphibians, I just can't resist turning rocks and logs to see who might be home. And with a claimed two (2!) salamanders per square meter in some areas of the park, it'd have been folly not to salamander-search a bit. There are 31 salamander species in the Smokies (only 24 in all of Ohio), and some of them are extremely localized, occurring only or primarily in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. I'd of course love to see them all, but that'd take a lot of effort and time not available to me on this mission. But there was one species in particular that I really wanted to see, and I did. Voila! The striking Jordan's salamander, Plethodon jordani (also called red-cheeked salamander). It was almost too easy to find these little beauties, and I must have seen a dozen or more without undue effort beyond turning a few rocks and logs. The salamanders in this genus - Plethodon; the lungless salamanders - originated in the southern Appalachian mountains, and this region harbors the greatest numbers and diversity of salamanders of anywhere in North America. Fully 8% of the world's salamander species are found here. It is said that the total biomass of salamanders in the Smokies is twice that of birds, and probably equal to that of the smaller mammals. Jordan's salamander is named for an ichthyologist (fish scientist), David Jordan of Stanford University. I don't know the back story about how this recognition came his way - perhaps he discovered it - but Dave should be flattered to have such an exquisite creature bearing his name. Jordan lived some time ago, from 1851 to 1931, so I'll assume this salamander has been known for many decades. Yet, extraordinarily, its nest has never been discovered, so data on eggs or nest sites is unknown. The Smokies still harbor many secrets. The other moniker, red-cheeked salamander, is logical and fitting. The brilliant red cheeks are probably an aposematic warning - the skin secretions of this species are nasty and the cheeks send a warning to would-be predators. As in other Plethodon salamanders, the skin is a vital organ. Jordan's salamander and the others have devolved their lungs and eliminated the energy budget associated with those organs. Instead, respiration takes place directly through the skin, which is rather like a large all-enveloping lung. The Jordan's salamander is an emphatic punctuation point to the incredible and often extremely localized biodiversity of the Smokies. Even though this species can be locally abundant within the park, it is not known outside the park's borders. I read the entry on your blog regarding the Jordan’s Salamanders you found recently in the Smoky Mountains. I thought you might be interested in knowing that the naming of that salamander after David Jordan has strong Indiana connections to three individuals. The first connection is Jordan himself. David Starr Jordan was a well-known ichthyologist and later university president, and one of his first jobs was teaching in the biology department of Butler University in Indianapolis (the same Butler University of NCAA basketball finals fame the past two seasons). He left Butler for Indiana University where he again taught in the biology department. During his tenure at IU, he became president of the university at the young age of only thirty-four! He left IU to become president of Stanford University in California, where I believe he remained for the rest of his career. While in the biology department at IU, one of Jordan’s students was a fellow named Willis S. Blatchley, the second Indiana connection related to this story. Blatchley was pretty much in awe of Jordan, and considered him very much a mentor. After college, Blatchley’s interests and accomplishments were many, and included such varied subjects as entomology, malacology, ornithology, herpetology & geology. He was the state geologist for the State of Indiana for quite a few years. His list of published papers is extremely long, and among his achievements was a treatment of Coleoptera that is still highly regarded today. Do a Google search of Willis Blatchley and many links will pop up! And finally the third Indiana connection to this salamander -- In the summer of 1900, a man by the name of L.E. Daniels of LaPorte, Indiana was collecting mollusks in Tennessee. During his excursion, he collected several salamanders which he later gave to Blatchley. Among them was Jordan’s Salamander, which was undescribed at that time. Blatchley described the species and named it after his old friend and mentor David Starr Jordan. I made a whirlwind trip to America's most heavily visited national park last weekend. It was long overdue. Great Smoky Mountains National Park straddles the North Carolina/Tennessee border, and hosts some nine million (million!) visitors a year. It's a bit of circus traffic-wise at times, but the park is within an easy drive of much of the eastern U.S. and given the beauty of the place, it's no mystery why so many people would want to come here. But if you are interested in flora and fauna, it is easy to get off the beaten paths and find much of interest. The Smokies encompass 814 square miles and that's a lot of space. But, to bring out its fabulous biodiversity, it is instructive to compare the Smokies with my home state, Ohio, which at 41,222 square miles is nearly 51 times larger than Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The Smokies is full of gorgeous scenery, at every turn. It is a place of indescribable beauty, and even if one had no interest in the finer points of biology, a trip here will be most fulfilling. For a great many people, the Smokies has probably been their first true experience of a large, wild landscape. But there are large-scale problems, all of them man-induced. Click the photo o expand it, and look at all of those dead trees on the distant mountainside. They are Eastern hemlock, Tsuga canadensis, victims of the woolly adelgid, an insect inadvertently imported from Asia. The amount of mortality caused by this invasive pest is staggering. At higher elevations, as around the summit of Clingman's Dome, another species of non-native insect has laid waste to the Fraser's fir, Abies fraseri. Another big impact comes courtesy of our cars, trucks, and factories. Air pollution, at least on bad days, has reduced visibility from the high peaks by as much as 80% from what it was five or six decades ago. The smog also casts a pall on the overall landscape, muting colors and dimming vistas with haze. Airborn chemicals also harm vegetation, especially acid rain. But much of the park still looks great and harbors habitats chockfull of life. This is great rhododendron, Rhododendron maximum, which was near peak bloom during my visit. This showy evergreen shrub creates lush tangles along stream courses, and contributes heavily to the ambience of the mountain coves. There are about eight other species of Rhododendron in the Smokies, but few can hold a candle to this high elevation shrub. It is Catawba rosebay, R. catawbiense, a real ooh and aah plant by any standard. This shrub was nestled amongst red spruce, Picea rubens, high up on Clingman's Dome. This particular mountain boasts one of the highest elevations in the Smokies, pushing to 6,643 feet. At this spot, there were many boreal breeding birds, including Red-breasted Nuthatch, Brown Creeper, Winter Wren, Golden-crowned Kinglet, Black-throated Blue and Canada warblers, Dark-eyed Junco, Purple Finch, Red Crossbill, and Pine Siskin. The flowers of Catawba rosebay are especially striking, the brilliant pink clusters glowing from the shadows and drawing the eye of all who see them. I was quite interested in less conspicuous plants, such as this southern mountain cranberry, Vaccinium erythrocarpum. A rather small shrub, the cranberry forms thickets that blend with the other vegetation, until one notices the striking flowers dangling below the leaves. If you find this one in Ohio, you've made a great discovery. It is mountain wood-sorrel, Oxalis montana. While this showy little wildflower is endangered in Ohio, it's all over the Smokies and not hard to find. Freshly back from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park with lots of interesting finds and photos. But more on those experiences later - kites are the news of the day. Last year, Mississippi Kites were confirmed as nesting in Hide-A-Way Hills (HAWH), Hocking County. The first documented Ohio nesting dates to 2007, when adults were observed feeding a recently fledged juvenile elsewhere in Hocking County. You can read some details about the inaugural nesting HERE. But we never were able to find the actual nest of the pioneering pair. So it was with great excitement that I received a call last summer from Elizabeth vanBalen Delphia, who reported Mississippi Kites that were constantly present near her and her husband Michael's house in HAWH. Ohio Division of Wildlife photographer Tim Daniel made the trip down a few days later, in mid-August, and not only obtained stellar images of the kites, he found the nest high in the boughs of a white ash. It wasn't long after that and both young birds left the nest and became conspicuous members of the HAWH community. Perched atop lofty dead tree branches, they would constantly exhort the hard-working parents to bring yet another plump cicada. HAWH is a gated community and locked up tight as a drum. You either have to live there, or have explicit permission from a resident to gain access. But the spectacle of young kites being attended by adults was just too good not to share, so we hatched a plan with Elizabeth and Michael to have an open house "Kite Day", which happened on August 21. You can read all about that event and see photos RIGHT HERE. Dane Adams, who kindly lets me share some of his stunning imagery from time to tiime, was there and took these STUNNING PHOTOS. Well, the kites are back in HAWH this year, and Elizabeth reports that incubation is well under way. Dane was able to visit a few days back, and sent along these photos. Above, one of the kites peers from its leafy abode. In this photo, the kites are in the act of swapping positions atop the eggs. The sexes share incubation duties, and are probably warming two eggs - a typical clutch size. This may not be the only HAWH nest. There is another pair of kites in the neighborhood, and all signs point to another nest. Elizabeth and Michael are looking, and hopefully will find it. I can attest from personal experience that Mississippi Kite nests are sometimes not the easiest things to find. They often site them high in trees, typically near the trunk, and leaf cover can render the aerie nearly invisible. Mississippi Kites are somewhat colonial in their nesting habits, especially out west, so multiple breeding pairs in HAWH would not come as a total surprise. Anyway, Elizabeth and Michael have graciously agreed to work with the HAWH administration and establish a day in which interested birders can come witness the spectacle. We want to wait until the young kites are free-flying but still being attended to by the adults, which should be in early to mid August. At that point, the birds just can't be missed, and they are utterly unconcerned with fawning masses of people. Also, the adults can often be observed deftly snagging flying cicadas from the ether, and I'll tell you, that is an aerial feat that is hard to match. We'll try to provide as much notice as possible of Kite Day 2011, and I'll post up details here and on the Ohio Birds Listserv. Thanks once again to Elizabeth and Michael for their monitoring of the birds and sharing details with us. And kudos to Dane for his great work. On a recent trip to southern Illinois, I ran across a number of slaty skimmers, Libellula incesta, foraging high on a ridge in a woodland gap. This female was especially cooperative, and it was fun to watch her engage in frequent flycatcherlike "yo-yo" flights; darting from a favored perch and returning to the same spot to consume her prey. You do NOT want to be a lesser bug and find yourself on the radar of a dragonfly. They are quicker than winks, can easily outmaneuver the most agile of helicopters, are capable of acceleration that would shame a Ferrari, and have all of the goods to deal with a victim once it is seized. Check out the bristles on those legs. They are known as raptorial spines, and form an Iron Maiden death grip on anything unlucky enough to be caught. From there, the hapless bug's next stop is the powerful mandibles of the dragonfly, where it will be crunched like a can in a trash compactor, and swallowed. Life is scary for the lesser bugs, with death-dealers such as this slaty skimmer hanging around. An adult Yellow-crowned Night-Heron, Nyctanassa violacea, stands sentinel in its big sycamore tree in a very suburban Columbus, Ohio neighborhood. Ace photog Dane Adams stopped by the site yesterday and took some outstanding documentary photos of one of Ohio's very few known nesting pairs of these interesting herons. These night-herons have been nesting in their Bexley suburbanscape for many years now, and the nests - I believe there are two, at least there were the last time I made it by - resemble overgrown Mourning Dove nests. The stick platforms have become somewhat larger and bulkier with each passing nesting season, and this one has gained considerable mass since the birds first began to breed at this site. I covered this story a few years ago in more detail, you can read it RIGHT HERE. Flimsy abode or not, it obviously suffices to support a clutch of night-heron eggs, and later, the gangly offspring. As we can see from Dane's photo, there are four awkward-looking big-billed heronlets in the nest, curiously peering about. The young herons may not be much to look at at this point, but they'll morph into one of our most beautiful waders, at least the males will. Yellow-crowned Night-Heron is an extremely rare bird in Ohio, and is listed as threatened in the state by the Ohio Division of Wildlife. A compelling argument could be made for upgrading the species to endangered. There has been only one other confirmed nesting in the past few years, and a half-dozen possible but unconfirmed reports. They are at the extreme northern limits of the breeding range here; yellow-crowneds become common as one moves southward into the southern states, the Caribbean, and coastal areas (primarily) of Mexico and Central and South America. It shouldn't be long and these little bulbous-billed wonders will be out and about, fishing for their own crayfish in nearby Alum Creek. Hopefully this nesting site will continue to be used for many years to come. Thanks, as always, to Dane Adams for freely sharing his work with us. Exciting news broke last Sunday afternoon, when veteran birder Doug Overacker announced on the Ohio Birds listserv that he may have located a Cassin's Sparrow in Shelby County, which is in western Ohio. Doug was driving along a rural lane when he heard the bird sing, but was unable to locate the sparrow despite searching. Well, Doug went back yesterday, and Bingo! - he relocated and photographed the Cassin's Sparrow, documenting a new state record. Before I go on with this story, I want to give major kudos to Doug Overacker. This is without doubt one of the most skilled finds around here in recent memory. While Cassin's Sparrows do have distinctive songs, this species would probably be far from one's mind while in Shelby County, Ohio, and it'd be easy to ignore or miss the song amongst the quiet cacophony of other field singers. Great find, Doug. I couldn't stand the thought of such a cool beast not too terribly far off, so after work today, I drove on over to have a look at the sparrow. Not exactly a memorable piece of real estate. Courtesy of Google Earth, we can look down on the exact tract of land that the Cassin's Sparrow has adopted. It seems to hang out exclusively in the area circled in red - very typical western Ohio farm country, but there is a bit more to the habitat story, as we shall see. You can see why Doug's find is significant and excites birders. The Cassin's Sparrow is very much a bird of the Great Plains and points south, where it occupies dry grasslands. Ohio is well to the east of its normal range, but these shy skulkers are well known for their proclivity to wander. There are numerous records east of the Mississippi and Indiana, Michigan, and Ontario, Canada - all of which abut Ohio - have had records. It was only a matter of time before we got one. Here we are - ground zero at the Cassin's Sparrow site. Dave Collopy and Steve Landes keep a vigil, in particular eyeing that small tree at the end of the road - the only tree in the immediate proximity of this spot. A closer look at the tree, which you will certainly inspect should you make this rarity chase. I believe the bulk of this woodiness is a dead American plum, with a smaller - and living - silky dogwood growing intermixed. There are thick tangles of poison ivy in there, too, look - don't touch. Anyway, the Cassin's Sparrow is for whatever reason smitten with this shrub, and perching in it is apparently a regular part of his routine. Finally - the bird! It seems that this Cassin's Sparrow, which is a male, sings somewhat frequently at certain times of the day; that's how Doug initially found it. This morning, Ken Beers observed it "sky-larking"; doing its beautiful aerial song display. When I was there it never did sing, but made a few trips into the aforementioned tree to hang out and have a look around. Cassin's Sparrows are plain janes, there isn't any other way to put it. But have a look at that honker of a tail, which imparts a rather unique look to the bird. And like most sparrows, it compensates for less than showy plumage with a pleasing song. This species is in the genus Peucaea (long in Aimophila; recently moved), which includes two other species in the western U.S.: Botteri's and Rufous-winged sparrows. There is only one Peucaea (normally) in the east: Bachman's Sparrow. As I saw Ohio's last territorial Bachman's Sparrow, when I was just a young lad, as of this moment I may be the only birder to have two species of Peucaea in Ohio. Here's a grander view of the habitat that the Cassin's Sparrow is frequenting. It is typical farm country, but there are different ways of growing crops and I think this is worth noting in this case. The field front and center is where the Cassin's seems to spend the bulk of its time. It has companions, too. This field had Grasshopper, Savannah, and Vesper sparrows, and Steve Landes heard a Henslow's Sparrow further down the road. That's my car in the background, and the field that lies beyond is very different. The Cassin's Sparrow field is no-till agriculture - the farmer allowed some wheat, primarily, to remain unharvested. As the field wasn't plowed under after the last crop, lots of "weeds" came up as well. You can see the new corn coming up in rows between the wheat. The upshot of no-till is that it leaves tons of food in the form of seeds, and that makes sparrows happy. It also provides structure in the form of the old weeds and remnant crops that birds can use for nesting cover. This is the adjacent field - clean agriculture tilled thoroughly and nearly to the exclusion of all non-crop plants. There were no sparrows cavorting over here. I'm not saying that the Cassin's Sparrow picked his field because it was the only no-till field around. There are plenty of farmers who practice no-till but unfortunately they are usually outnumbered by growers that plow everything into submission. But I do think the reason the Cassin's is hanging out - and who knows how long it was present before Doug found it - is that it finds an abundance of food, and ample cover. By the way, this Cassin's Sparrow was #366 on my Ohio list. Thanks again to Doug Overacker for his fantastic find, and I hope you get over to Shelby County to see this little charmer. On a recent excursion into Indiana's Hoosier State Forest - yes, they have trees over there - I happened to glance at this oxeye daisy and notice a weevil. I like weevils. These beetles remind me of tiny elephants with their trunklike proboscis, so I swiveled the macro lens in its direction. No sooner had I drawn a bead when another even more interesting creature alit on the weevil's flower, even having the temerity to step on my subject. I must admit, my first thought was "wasp!" followed by "this might be good!". My initial childish hope was that the "wasp" might attack or otherwise engage the beetle, giving me some real action photos. But all of that flitted through my mind in just a second or so, as the reasoning part of my brain worked at digesting what was really going on. But it didn't take long to realize that this was no wasp at all, but a remarkably good wasp mimic. It is, I believe - and as always, someone please correct me if I am wrong - a species of tachinid fly in the genus Cylindromyia. A giveaway that this is actually a fly is the single pair of wings - non-flies such as wasps have two obvious pairs of wings. In flies, the second pair of wings are greatly reduced, and called halteres. The Cylindromyia's halteres are whitish, and visible behind and at the base of the primary wings. Also, our wasp-fly has stiff hairs projecting from its body - a very tachinid fly-like feature, and the field mark that put me in the right arena in regards to trying to figure its identity. Looking like a stinging bad guy probably helps the fly survive the predation dangers that come with visiting flowers for nectar. The Bug World is absolutely full of this sort of mimicry; an endlessly fascinating subject.
2019-04-22T15:17:20Z
http://jimmccormac.blogspot.com/2011/06/
Many people are just living life … just eking out an existence. Only just getting by. And many of those people are the very same people who believe in Jesus, this same Jesus who promised us an abundant life. Frankly – the physical reality and the spiritual reality just don’t match up.That’s why this week, Berni Dymet will be taking another look at life from a different perspective. What exactly does Jesus mean – “an abundant life”? How can we live out that particular promise in our lives? When you hear Jesus promising us an abundant life – which is exactly what He does promise you – it’s easy to think, “Yeah, right! Must be for someone else.” But actually … it’s not. It’s a promise for everyone who decides to follow Jesus. Question is – how does it work? How can you have an “abundant life”? As we race through life day after day one of the things that I think happens to us is that we somehow get conned or duped into the mantra of the times, ‘the great lie’ I call it. And that great lie goes something like this: If you earn lots of money and you spend it on this and this and this and this and this, this toy, these clothes, that holiday, this dining experience, if you live your life like that, then you’re going to be happy. Now that lie is as painful for the rich as it is for the poor. For the poor, people who simply don’t have much money, many who don’t even have enough food and shelter, they see this dream of wealth and it aches to think that they have so little and so many others have so much. It’s not fair. And for the wealthy this lie is just as much a pain but only different. They’re in a position to chase that dream; the only problem is that it’s like a mirage in the desert. When they get there, this place where they thought they’d arrive at, this place where having earned and spent the money on themselves they should be happy, they discover it’s a mirage, it’s a sham. And so they try again and again and again, many spend their whole lives chasing happiness only to be disappointed at every turn. And before you know it they’re looking back on a wasted life and that is so tragic. So what’s the answer? I think as we head into yet another new year now’s not a bad time to be asking these questions. What’s life all about? Am I going to be happy this year? And so that’s why today we’re kicking off a series of programs that I’ve called ‘An Abundant Life In Jesus’. Because so many of us have spent so much of our lives chasing happiness, me included. That’s what I was looking for and that’s what I could never find. So many of us wish we could be happy and yet we don’t really know what happiness is so we go looking for it in all sorts of places. Jesus promised something outrageous to His disciples, to all those who followed hard after Him. He promised them an abundant life, in fact a super abundant life. Sounds fantastic doesn’t it? Someone once asked me, “Okay but what does that actually mean, an abundant life?” That’s a good question. I mean a super abundant life sounds just perfect but what is it? What does it look like and how can we have it? Very truly I tell you anyone who does not enter the sheep fold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gate keeper opens the gate for him, the sheep hear his voice, he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he’s brought out all his own he goes ahead of them and the sheep will follow him because they know his voice. They will not follow a stranger but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers. Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they didn’t understand what He was saying to them. So again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me were thieves and bandits but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd, the shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. The hired hand who isn’t the shepherd and doesn’t own the sheep sees a wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand doesn’t care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me just as the Father knows me and I know the Father and I lay down my life for the sheep. Now that’s a really interesting passage, it’s a beautiful picture; the shepherd and his flock. Back in those days, let me explain, the shepherd normally had a small number of sheep, 50 to 100, and literally he knew each one of them by name. Now sheep, we sometimes think are stupid animals. They’re not, they’re actually quite bright. They’re problem simply is that they’re short sighted and so that’s why he calls them, they hear his voice and they go to him and then he goes ahead of them and they follow on behind him looking for pasture and water and the shepherd keeps them safe. Now being a shepherd was a tradition. It was handed down from father to son. A real shepherd would literally protect his sheep with his life from wild animals and robbers we’ll look at that tomorrow. So there’s the shepherd with his flock wandering the rocky plateau and in winter he’d bring them into the sheep fold in the town or the village which is what Jesus was talking about. He’d take them in and all the shepherds would basically bring their flocks into the same sheepfold. The next morning the shepherd, one by one, would come to the front gate, the real shepherd of each flock and because he had a personal relationship the sheep would know his voice and he would call them and they would go only when their shepherd came. Not with a stranger because they didn’t know the stranger’s voice. They would go with their shepherd. That’s exactly the picture that Jesus paints here. So this is a picture that the people had in their minds in 1st century Israel as Jesus was telling them this story; this winsome picture of the lonely shepherd tending his flock, protecting them with his life. That’s what Jesus was drawing on in this story but did you notice verse 6 of John chapter 10? Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they did not understand what He was saying to them. You and I, we wander through some difficult places in life, we truly do. When we’re young we think we’re invincible, we think huh, we can conquer every mountain, but life soon teaches us that we’re more of a small boat on a great and mighty ocean. And yes Jesus promises us an abundant life. Again we’ll look at what that means over the next couple of days, but look at the context; the context of this abundant life is as one of His sheep in His flock under the safety and the care of the true shepherd. See it’s this picture of safety and protection and of a shepherd who did in fact lay down His life to save us – to save us from the ravages of the devil; to save us from our own sin; to save us from God’s judgement. Storms will come and go, wild animals will come in life to tear at our flesh, thieves will come to kill and destroy, bad things will happen to good people. Is there any one of us who doesn’t have one thing, something in our lives right now that hurts? Something we wish wasn’t there. I mean is there? I have said these things to you so that in me you may have peace. For in this world you WILL face persecution but take courage I have conquered the world. The promise of an abundant life comes not as a promise to make all our circumstances and all our relationships and all our finances and all our futures rosy, that was never ever His promise. No, the promise of an abundant life comes to us in the context of sheep wandering the plateau with their shepherd in a dangerous place. And because of the world in which we live, that abundant life was purchased for you and me at a price, at a very great price. Jesus promised each of his disciples, that’s anyone who believes in Him would have an abundant life. Yeah, right!! But in the same breath, in the very same verse in the Bible, he also says that there’s a thief, and all the thief is interested in is stealing, killing and destroy. Well, if Jesus talked about him – this thief – then maybe it’s worth you and me taking a closer look. If you don’t have at least one such thing in your life raise your hand in the air. There would have been, I’m guessing, over a hundred people in the room. Silence. I cast my eyes around the room, I just allowed the silence to hang there momentarily and not a single hand went up in the air, not one. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that they might have life and have it abundantly. They all heard Jesus promise them an abundant life. Literally what Jesus says here, the original Greek language, it means a super abundant life and yet everybody had something in their lives that was troubling them and you know what it’s like, your whole body can be healthy but you jam your finger in a door and the excruciating pain in that one finger is all you can think about. The fact that the rest of your life is just fine at that point is pretty much irrelevant; it’s all about that one bit that hurts. It’s true isn’t it? It is so easy to live our lives focusing on that one bit in our lives that hurts; The difficult relationship, the financial pressure, the problem at work, the worry about what other people are thinking about us. It’s pretty much different for each one of us but when we have that one thing, or perhaps even two or three, that ache that we wish would just go away then it consumes us. It robs us of life. Truly I tell you anyone who doesn’t enter the sheep fold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gate keeper opens the gate for him and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he’s brought out all his own he goes ahead of them and the sheep will follow him because they know his voice. So again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd, the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. The hired hand who isn’t the shepherd and doesn’t own the sheep sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. This was a very familiar story to those who were listening. They knew the profession of a shepherd was one of honour, one of protecting his sheep. They knew that as a shepherd led his sheep out over the stony plateau of Israel in search of pasture, thieves would often attack to try and steal the sheep. Wild animals would sometimes attack to steal a sheep and eat it for dinner. It was the reality of life for a shepherd. And a true shepherd’s job was to defend his flock. But let’s focus for a moment in this story on the thief. Jesus is telling a parable here, a parable that’s meant to reach into our lives. And the thief in this story is the enemy, the devil, the tempter, the deceiver he’s referred to elsewhere. The one who dangles glittery baubles under our noses, trinkets and treasures that are so alluring, so seductive they appear to promise so much. Can he get us to wander off? And other times he comes simply to attack us through circumstances, through other people. We see that in Job’s story in the Old Testament, how the devil uses financial collapse, sickness, family breakdown, even so called friends to attack Job. Our struggle isn’t against enemies of blood and flesh but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. See there’s a spiritual dimension to life and if we ignore that we do so at our peril. There is a devil, he is our enemy and sometimes he comes dressed as an angel of light to deceive us. Other times he sneaks up like a thief or he attacks openly like a wolf. All that is in the Bible and we ignore this, this spiritual dimension of evil at our peril. In summer the shepherds would stay out over night with their flocks. They’d roam further because it was warmer and dotted around the place on the plateau were pens that had been built using dense hedges. So by night the shepherd would lead his sheep into one of these pens but the pens had no gate so he would sleep in the opening, in the gateway. He, in effect, became the gate to keep the sheep in over night safe and sound so none would wander off and to keep the thieves and the wild animals out. He would fight any that came with his shepherd staff and his rod, a kind of club with spikes. He was the gate, he was their safety. He gave them protection and so safety and peace. And that is Jesus in our lives today my friend, make no mistake about it. The thief will come to steal, kill and destroy. To rob us of the abundant life that Jesus has planned. The wild animals will come to tear at our flesh and to corrupt our flesh. And yes we could wander off in our own direction but out there on our own you and I are sitting ducks. The place of safety is with Jesus. The place of safety is close to our shepherd, the true shepherd who laid down His life for us. Think about it, if we’re constantly being ravaged by the devil how can we possibly be having an abundant life? Yep there are going to be struggles in our lives and when they come, when things hurt the place to go is Jesus, the one true shepherd; the one who lays down His life for His sheep. He is meant to be our refuge. He can and He will protect us. What a pity, so many suffer through things alone when all along Jesus is waiting. You see the thief only comes to steal and kill and destroy but Jesus came that we may have life and have it abundantly. If there’s one thing we can all agree on about Jesus is that He didn’t do anything by half measures. No. He threw Himself into things and when He said something, He meant it. So, when He promised us an “abundant life”, the words in the original Greek language literally mean – a super-abundant life! He actually meant it. I told you, He doesn’t do anything by halves. I don’t think I know a single person who doesn’t want to enjoy their lives. And I guess when we think about it that doesn’t always mean happiness. Happiness is great, it’s great to feel on top of the world but then some of the most satisfying moments in life don’t always involve happiness. You can be exhausted, a complete wreck and yet still experience a deep sense of satisfaction at what you’ve just been through or achieved. Or you can experience a deep sense of contentment in life even if all our circumstances and relationships and finances and all those things aren’t quite what we want them to be. Then we can experience a sense of peace knowing that we’re safe even though we might have some things going on in our lives that might be a threat. Or we can even experience fulfilment at being comfortable with who we are and what we’re able to do with our lives and even more being happy to let go of aspiring to things that perhaps we’ll never be able to do. Do you see my point? Happiness ain’t everything. There are so many other things that go into making a full and rich and abundant life. And it’s that abundance that we’re taking a look at this week on the program. And with good reason, an abundant life is something that Jesus promised to His disciples. For me one of the most fantastic revelations of God and this promise from Jesus of an abundant life is that everything in my life doesn’t have to be going perfectly well for me to be living an abundant life. Now let me say that again because I believe this is incredibly important. Everything in my life doesn’t have to be going perfectly well for me to be living an abundant life. It’s a huge revelation because I don’t think I can remember a single time in my life, maybe a month or two here or there but overall very few times in my life where absolutely everything has been going perfectly. Every relationship, everything to do with my finances, everything to do with my work, everything to do with my hopes and my dreams and my aspirations; Do you know what I mean? There’s always something there to take the shine or the gloss off life. To keep me from being too elated a thorn was given me in the flesh. A messenger of satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this that it would leave me but He said to me, ‘my grace is sufficient for you for power is made perfect in weakness.’ So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. You see this from a guy who writes almost half the Books in the New Testament. There’s always something isn’t there? Always some thorn in the flesh, and I wonder if that isn’t just God’s plan. I wonder if everything was always going swimmingly well in my life whether I’d even bother seeking God out. I wonder if everything in my life was perfect whether I’d be of any use to you in these radio programs ’cause much of what I talk about is, in fact pretty much all of it is born out of the struggles and the realities of life, bringing God’s wisdom to bear in our lives. Jesus said, ‘Truly I tell you, anyone who doesn’t enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he’s brought out all his own he goes ahead of them and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. They won’t follow a stranger; they’ll run away from him because they don’t know the voice of strangers.’ Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they didn’t understand what He was saying to them. So again Jesus said to them, ‘Truly I tell you I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me were thieves and bandits but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. The hired hand who isn’t the shepherd and doesn’t own the sheep sees a wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. See the life of a shepherd was a hard one. There were thieves and robbers and wild animals and the shepherd was called to go out there on the plains and find pasture and protect the sheep with his life. And in fact many a time it did cost the shepherd his life back then. Without the shepherd the life of a sheep was a precarious one. A sheep out there on its own would be a sitting duck to be picked off by a wolf, or stolen, or fall down some ravine. Jesus here is telling a story about life and death struggle. It’s a parable that reaches deep into the realities of your life and mine. It’s a story about a life lived out in a challenging world in which Jesus Himself, through His death and resurrection, becomes our true Shepherd. A Pastor friend of mine told me a story once about ministering in a country area. One of his parishioners was a farmer of sheep and the farmer told him that when he was a young lad he always observed how the sheep would be standing grazing but when his dad would come into the field they often laid down. So he asked his father about that, who told him that sheep will only lie down pretty much when they feel safe and that when the shepherd is close they know that they’re safe which is why they’ll often take the opportunity to lie down at that point. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures. He leads me by still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for His name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley I fear no evil for You are with me, Your rod and Your staff they comfort me. You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil and my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life and I’ll dwell in the house of the Lord my whole life long. So often an abundant life is not about being taken out of difficult circumstances. It’s why Jesus tells this story out there in the life and death struggle of a shepherd and his sheep. It’s about experiencing the peace and the protection of Jesus, the one true shepherd, right out there in the middle of the difficult circumstances. And the incredible power of that is this. If we choose this sort of an abundant life, the one that Jesus has to offer, not the one the world is dangling under our noses. Not the false one, not the one that the thief is dangling under us, he comes only to steal, kill and destroy. No, if we choose the true authentic shepherd and follow Him and choose the abundance of life that He offers and it doesn’t matter what our circumstances are, good, bad, up, down, positive or negative. It doesn’t matter because even though we may walk through the darkest valley we need fear no evil because He’s with us. One of the ways that God explains His relationship with us, is that He is our Father, and we are His children. And actually, when you think about it, a father-child relationship is, or at least should be – an incredible blessing. So, if God’s our Father, and we’re His children – shouldn’t that be a huge blessing? We’re chatting together this week on the program about living out the abundant life that Jesus promised us. A life overflowing with His grace and mercy, and love and peace, and joy and blessing. By that we don’t always mean abundant finances or complete safety. God has a tendency not to wrap us in cotton wool but to be with us out there in life, in the good times and the bad with His presence, which is what gives us that sense of overflow, that sense of abundance. It’s funny how most of us in our heart of hearts desire a life that’s, well perfect. Blessed in every way, every relationship perfect, finances perfect, home life perfect, our own sense of self-perfect, everything’s perfect. But life just isn’t like that. In fact as you and I think back on our lives thus far chances are that there are very few times, if ever, where we could tick the box in every part of our lives as having been perfect. Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Truly I tell you anyone who doesn’t enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, the sheep hear his voice, he calls his own by name and leads them out. When he’s brought out all his own he goes ahead of them and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. They won’t follow a stranger but they’ll run away from him because they don’t know his voice.’ Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they did not understand what He was saying. So again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that you may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. While I was with them I protected them in Your name that You have given me. I guarded them and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost so that the Scriptures might be fulfilled. I’m not asking You to take them out of the world but I ask You to protect them from the evil one. In other words, “Dad, let’s not take them out of all these situations and wrap them in cotton wool but rather let’s be there with them and protect them from the evil one.” Do you see how different God’s perspective is? His promise is for an abundant life not a perfect one and I have to tell you as I sat and thought about that a lot it makes an enormous amount of sense to me. I’m a father, I have children, I love them dearly. When they were young they lived with my wife Jacqui and me in our house under our care and our protection with our provision as is right. That’s why God gives us children and that’s why He gives children parents. But there comes a time and in fact it starts quite early, where as they grow up we as good parents give them more and more responsibility for themselves. Because one of the main parts of growing up is shifting the responsibility for their care from the parents to the children as they become capable of accepting that responsibility. Not always easy and it’s one of the reasons that teenage years can be so stressful because often teenagers and I know this was true of me as a teenager, they want to behave like children and be treated like adults. In other words they still want their parents to do all the things they ever did for them when they were kids and incapable of doing them back then, whilst at the same time giving them all the freedoms that an adult has. Tension with a capital ‘T’; children in effect want the best of both worlds, the perfect life. Sound familiar? So then brothers and sisters we are dead as not to the flesh, to live in accordance to the flesh, for if we live according to the flesh you will die. But if by the Spirit you’ll put to death the deeds of the body you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God, for you didn’t receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear but you’ve received a spirit of adoption. When we cry ‘Abba Father’, it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God and if children then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. If in fact we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him. It’s a beautiful passage. One of the most beautiful passages in the Bible because it puts everything into perspective for me. Sometimes in the cut and thrust and hurts of life we lose our heavenly perspective, we lose sight of the fact that God is indeed our Father, in fact Jesus called Him ‘Abba’ which literally means Dad. If we live our lives for Him, if we choose to be led by the Spirit of God rather than by the desires of our flesh then we are children of God. And deep down if we’ll let Him the Spirit of God witnesses to us that we are His children, the children of the living God. That means something. It means what Jesus prayed for you and me back there in the Garden of Gethsemane. It means God’s protection from the evil one rather than being wrapped completely in cotton wool. Do you see the difference? God wants us to be out there in life just as you and I as parents want our children to be out there in life and we’ll help them and protect them where we can but they need to grow up, they need to live their lives and they need to suffer the consequences of the things they do wrong because its the only way that they learn. I for one would hate to be wrapped in cotton wool by God. I want to experience life and all that it’s meant to be and that means sometimes, well sometimes we get hurt but all along God is my Father. Father’s know this, when our children grow up we don’t stop being their father, we don’t stop being there to help and to advise when they need, we don’t stop caring for them and one day they will receive their inheritance from us. Same with our Dad God, we are and always will be His children and His protection is always available to us from the evil one. Can I tell you something? Somewhere in that knowledge, deep within, lies a source of His abundance in my life. He loves me, He wants me to know Him and to honour Him and to be all that He made me to be, to experience every day that He wrote for me in His book even before any of them ever existed. That’s where abundance begins, as a child of the Father who is God who created us and created us to live a life in all its abundance. Life can be a grind, and frankly life can get us down sometimes. We all know that. And so our view of what life is, and what it should be, becomes all twisted – inside out and upside down. So it’s time to get things right way up again. It’s time to discover what God has to say about the life He wants for you to live. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that you may have life and have it abundantly. It’s a beautiful promise and it’s one that’s always touched my heart. It’s a promise from Jesus that I take seriously. He came so that you and I could have life and not just have life but have it in all its abundance. Now abundance is an amazing word isn’t it? It means plenty, overflow, a very large quantity of something. But what if I told you that the original Greek word used here for abundance literally means super abundance. More than abundant, over the top abundant, because that’s exactly what it means. And in fact as we’ve seen earlier this week on the program this whole story where Jesus teaches us that He is the good and true shepherd of us, the sheep, is about the authenticity of who Jesus is as that shepherd versus the sham of the impostors. Question is: why did Jesus make this beautiful promise in such a context? Well of course the thief in the story is the devil and the original Greek word for the devil is diabolos which is the word from which we get our English word diabolical. It means a slanderer, a false accuser and elsewhere in the New Testament, in Revelations chapter 12 verse 9, the devil is also called the deceiver; someone who tricks people and leads them astray away from the right path or away from the truth into error. That’s the devil here in this story, a thief who comes only to steal and kill and destroy. And so here Jesus presents us with an alternative, the thief or the true Shepherd, the hireling or the true Shepherd. The people who come into the sheepfold, climbing over the walls or the true Shepherd who comes to the front gate. Now you might say to me, well there’s no real alternative, I don’t want the impostors, I don’t want a thief, I want the real thing, I don’t want someone who steals, kills and destroys, I want Jesus the good Shepherd. I will have the good Shepherd thank you very much, who came to give me a super abundant life. That satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Isn’t that true? The whole point of temptation is that it’s seductive. Evil comes to us wrapped in a wrapper that cries out to us, “Open me, come follow me, take me I’m good, I’ll bless you.” The very first deception and temptation of Adam and Eve in the Garden was exactly that. Evil was dressed up as having a benefit, that’s why it’s so diabolical, that’s why the devil is a liar and a deceiver. And so we’re seduced into his lies and all of a sudden we’re in the hands of the thief who comes only to steal, kill and destroy. To rob us of the super abundant life that Jesus came to give us because you know what? He came disguising himself as an angel of light. Do you see the power of this parable? Do you see what’s going on here? God wants to bless us, God wants to heap His super abundant blessing into our lives but like any father when his children are rebelling He can’t bless us because the blessing would reward the rebellion. When my children played up sometimes when they were young the tap of dad’s blessing turned off. Sometimes they were punished by removal of a privilege, no internet access for a few months. Why? Was I being mean? No, because I was teaching them right from wrong and the basis of that lesson is that blessing comes when you do right and you lose it when you do wrong. Parents do that because A) they love their children and B) we’re wired to be like that. If you only obey the Lord your God by diligently observing all His commandments that I am commanding you today the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. All these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you if you obey the Lord. Blessed shall be your city and blessed shall be your field, blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground and the fruit of your livestock both the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock. Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl. Blessed you will be when you come in and blessed you shall be when you go out. The Lord will cause the enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way and flee before you in seven ways. The Lord will command His blessing upon you in your barns and in all you undertake, He will bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. The Lord will establish you as His holy people as He has sworn to you if you keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in His ways. All the peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the Lord and they will be afraid of you. The Lord will make you abound in prosperity and the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your livestock, the fruit of your ground in the land that the Lord swore to your ancestors to give to you. The Lord will open for you His rich storehouse, the heavens, to give the rain of your land in its season and to bless all your undertakings. You will lend to many nations but you will not borrow. The Lord will make you the head and not the tail. You shall be only at the top and not at the bottom. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God which I am commanding you today by diligently observing them and if you do not turn aside from any of the words that I am commanding you today either to the right or to the left following other God’s to serve them. But if you will not obey the Lord your God by diligently observing all His commands and decrees which I am commanding you today then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. Cursed shall be the city. Cursed shall be your field. And it goes on and lists a whole bunch of curses. All these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you if you obey the Lord. The Lord will make you the head and not the tail. You shall only be at the top and not the bottom. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God which I am commanding you today. Friend, God wants to bless us, super abundantly so that the blessing chases us down the street and overtakes us. Do you get it? But that blessing happens when we are close to the good shepherd, safe in His care. Not when we follow the thief and let him plunder our lives through deception and temptation. Our Dad in heaven truly does want us to be the head and not the tail, to be above and not below. What father wouldn’t want that for his children?
2019-04-20T05:14:16Z
https://christianityworks.org/adp/series/an-abundant-life-in-jesus-pt-1/
Multiple hygienic effects are concurrently applied to body structures. This is established by one or more light source sources each capable of delivering a light beam to the structures using an optical means whereby each light beam provides a unique hygienic effect to the body structures. The device could be a handheld device with detachable components. The device could be a brush or a comb. The device could include a massaging means and/or a vibrating means. An agent could be used to the body structures to assist in the hygienic treatment plan. A cradle could be included to store the device, reload the power supply of the device, as well as a means to communicate with a hygienic service provider. The cradle could also host a displaying means and a selecting means. Hygiene relates to the principles of cleanliness, promotion and preservation of health or the freeing from disease-causing microorganisms. Hygienic effects can be established in different ways of which one is through the effect of light on biological structures. For instance, the hygienic effect of visible, near ultraviolet and infrared light on biological structures is well known and has been described to provide anti-inflammatory effects, preventative effects, anti-bacterial effects, sterilizing effects, cleaning effects, cosmetic effects, therapeutic effects, healing effects (bio-stimulative effects), bio-altering effects, pain-releaving effects, agent-penetrating effects, photo-rejunivating effects and photo-dynamic treatment effects (See for instance a book by Goldman (1981) entitled “ The biomedical laser: technology and clinical applications” and published by Springer-Verlag, New York; a book by Katzir (1993) entitled “Lasers and optical fibers in medicine” and published by Academic Press, New York; a book by Hajder et al. (1994) entitled “Acupuncture and lasers” and published by Ming, Belgrade; a book by Tuner et al. (1996) entitled “Laser therapy in dentistry and medicine” and published by Prisma Books, Grangesberg, Sweden; a book by Alster et al. (1996) entitled “Cosmetic laser surgery” and published by Wiley & Sons, New York; or a book by Fitzpatrick et al. (2000) entitled “Cosmetic Laser Surgery” and published by Mosby, St. Louis). The effects of a laser on biological structures is dependent on the laser properties (active matter, beam wavelength, continuous or impulse mode of operation), characteristics of the structures, water content, pigmentation degree, vascularization, vitality, heterogeneity, specific heat conductivity or time exposure. The photo-effect of a laser can be applied to superficial structures and subcutaneous structures. As far as the mechanisms of laser radiation effects are concerned, they may be thermal, mechanical or chemical. In general, hygienic effects relate to the cleanliness of these structures, promotion and preservation of health of the structures or freeing the body structure from disease-causing microorganisms. In particular, the present invention encompasses hygienic effects related to the hygienic effect of visible, near ultraviolet and infrared light on these structures, which are known in the art (for a light spectrum refer to page 13 in a book by Tuner et al. (1996) entitled “ Laser therapy in dentistry and medicine” and published by Prisma Books, Grangesberg, Sweden). Examples of such hygienic effects that could be selected as the two or more hygienic effects include anti-inflammatory effects, preventative effects (e.g. disease, irritation or the like), anti-bacterial effects, sterilizing effects, cleaning effects, cosmetic effects, therapeutic effects, healing effects (bio-stimulative effects), bio-altering effects, pain-releaving effects, photo-rejuvination effects, photodynamic effects, agent-penetration effects, a skin stimulating effect, a hair growth stimulating effect or a nail treatment effect. Currently available teachings are described in the following books, which provide an exemplary list rather than a comprehensive list. The list includes a book by Goldman (1981) entitled “ The biomedical laser: technology and clinical applications” and published by Springer-Verlag, New York; a book by Katzir (1993) entitled “Lasers and optical fibers in medicine” and published by Academic Press, New York; a book by Hajder et al. (1994) entitled “Acupuncture and lasers” and published by Ming, Belgrade; a book by Tuner et al. (1996) entitled “Laser therapy in dentistry and medicine” and published by Prisma Books, Grangesberg, Sweden; a book by Alster et al. (1996) entitled “Cosmetic laser surgery” and published by Wiley & Sons, New York; or a book by Fitzpatrick et al. (2000) entitled “Cosmetic Laser Surgery” and published by Mosby, St. Louis). FIG. 1 shows a first exemplary embodiment of two light sources 110, 120 delivering a light beam with a green wavelength 112 and a light beam with a blue wavelength 122, respectively. The green wavelength 112 and blue wavelength 122 each provide a unique hygienic effect when applied in a quasi-stationary manner to body structure 130. In this example, both light beams 112, 122 have a fairly superficial hygienic effect at body structure 130 as shown by 114, 124. In general, two or more light sources could be used such as n light source 140-1 to 140-n. As discussed supra, two of the same light sources could be used such as two light sources 150-1, 150-2 that each deliver blue light, however, with at least one different parameter to establish a different and unique hygienic effect for each of the two light sources 150-1, 150-2. Such as different and unique hygienic effect could be established by different fluences for each of the two light sources 150-1, 150-2, i.e. fluence 1 and fluence 2, respectively. Another examples is that there is one light source, e.g. 140-1 or 150-2, to deliver a hygienic effect. Yet another example is that there are three light sources, of which two are the same 160-1, 160-2 and one 160-3 is different, though all three delivering a unique hygienic effect. Body structure 130 is shown as a structure with a homogenous consistency. However, most structures that one would encounter, as described supra, have a heterogeneous consistency or formation. FIG. 2 shows a second exemplary embodiment of two light sources 210, 220 delivering in a quasi-stationary manner a light beam with a green wavelength 212 and a light beam with a red wavelength 222, respectively to a heterogeneous body structure 230. Structure 230 distinguishes three different layers, i.e. a superficial layer 232, a middle layer 234 and a deep layer 236. The green wavelength 212 and red wavelength 222 each provide a unique hygienic effect when applied at body structure 230. Light beam 212 has a superficial hygienic effect as shown by 214, which is similar to the example in FIG. 1. However, light beam 222 has a hygienic effect in superficial layer 232 that extends to part of middle layer 234. In other words, the red wavelength penetrates deeper in structure 230 than the green or blue wavelengths. In addition, as it is known in the art, the relative subsurface fluence of a light beam in a structure 310 is dependent on the spot size, which could be relatively small 320 or relatively large 330, as shown in FIG. 3. The contour lines 322, 333 represent the relative subsurface fluences for identical fluences for the small 320 and large 330 spot size, respectively. The same subsurface fluence values appear at deeper levels with the larger 330 spot size compared to the smaller spot size 320. FIGS. 1-2 show exemplary embodiments of different hygienic effects in a body structure in which the light beams are applied in a quasi-stationary manner. FIGS. 4-5 show exemplary embodiments of the application of hygienic effects as shown respectively in FIGS. 1-2, but now in a dynamic manner. Movement 410 of light sources 110, 120 concurrently applies the hygienic effects 114, 124 to different locations at body structure 130 to achieve blending of these two unique hygienic effects at these different locations; 420 is an example of a blended hygienic effect of light beams 112, 124 as a result of movement 410, which is a blend of blue and green light. Movement 510 of light sources 210, 220 concurrently applies the hygienic effects 214, 224 to different locations at body structure 230 to achieve blending of these two unique hygienic effects at these different locations where some of the areas of penetration overlap; 520 is an example of a blended hygienic effect of light beams 212, 224 as a result of movement 510, which is a blend of red and green light. Note that there are areas where the hygienic effects do not blend together due to different penetration areas, though these hygienic effects are applied in a concurrent fashion. The movement relative to structure 130 is not limited to movement 410, 510 (i.e. Z translation), but could be applied in X, Y, or Z direction (translation/rotation). FIG. 6 shows an exemplary embodiment related to the application of a plurality of light beams 610 . . . 610 n produced by light sources 620 . . . 620 n. On the one hand, light beam 610 could provide one or more hygienic effects focusing on the superficial skin layer 630 (epidermis) and could be selected as an anti-inflammatory effect, preventative effect, an anti-bacterial effect, a sterilizing effect, a cleaning effects, a therapeutic effect, a healing effect, a bio-stimulative effect, a bio-altering effect, a pain-releaving effect, a tissue rejuvenating effect, a photo-rejunivating effect, a photo-dynamic therapy effect and/or an agent penetrating effect. On the other hand, light beam 610 n could provide one or more hygienic effects focusing on the subcutaneous skin layer 640 (e.g. dermis as indicated by arrow or deep fascia (not indicated by arrow), muscle (not indicated by arrow), etc.) and could be selected as, but not limited to, an agent penetrating effect, a preventative effect, a therapeutic effect, a healing effect, a bio-stimulative effect, a bio-altering effect, a pain-releaving effect, a tissue rejuvenating effect, a photo-rejunivating effect, and/or a photodynamic therapy effect. Again, as described supra, the application to the two skin layers could be accomplished in a quasi-stationary manner, but preferably in a dynamic manner more or less similar to the movements related to brushing. A first embodiment of a device of the present invention includes a head 710 and a handle 720 as shown by device 700 in FIG. 7. In one aspect, the handle and the head could be a single piece (not shown). However, in another aspect, as shown in FIG. 7, head 710 and handle 720 could be two separate parts of device 700, which would be preferred since it allows the user to replace the head with a new head or a different style head. The handle could take any shape and is not limited to the shape of handle 720 as shown in FIG. 7. However, it would be preferred to have an ergonomically shaped handle that easily fits in a user's hand. Different shapes and sizes of handles would then accommodate the shapes and sizes of the hands of children and adults. The inside 712 of head 710 includes light sources 730 (i.e. 730A, 730B) and deliver light beams 740 with the desired hygienic effect as discussed supra. For illustrative purposes it could be assumed that there are two light sources delivering a light beam 742 with a first hygienic effect and a light beam 744 with a second hygienic effect. However, as described supra the present invention is not limited to two light sources and could be one or more that two. Light sources 730 are powered by a power supply 750, such as a (rechargeable) battery. Power supply 750 is connected to a switch 760. Switch 760 is preferably positioned at the outside of head 720 and controls the on/off stage of power supply 750 and therewith the on/off stage of light sources 730. The present invention is not limited to one switch as there could also be multiple switches to control individual light sources or parameters. The inside 712 of head 720 includes an optical means with optical paths to direct light beams 742, 744 from the inside of head 720 to the outside of head 720. As a person of average skill in the art to which this invention pertains would readily appreciate, this could be accomplished in different ways. To accomplish the output of light beams 742, 744 one could establish different optical means or pathways, which could include one or more optical components. Examples of such optical components, which are commonly available in the art, include optical fibers, lenses, spectral filters, mirrors, transparent materials, semi-transparent materials, prisms, reflective coatings, reflecting grooves, beam splitters, collimators, light channels and gratings. In the example of FIG. 7, the optical means includes reflective prisms 770 to reflect and direct light beams 742, 744 in such a way that they are able to pass through openings 780 as shown in FIG. 7 (note that for clarity only one opening is indicated by 780). Optical means could include a main reflective prism 790 at the end of the optical pathway in head 720 to further assist in outputting light beams 742, 744. Likewise, the optical means at the inside of head 720 could further include a reflective coating 795 to assist in outputting light beams 742, 744. Openings 780 could be considered as part of the optical means. Openings 780 could define a spot size. Openings 780 could also include one or more optical components such as a lens, a transparent material a semi-transparent material, or the like. FIG. 8 shows different exemplary heads 810, 820 and 830 each with a different solution to outputting the light beams, which are shown for illustrative purpose only and should not be regarded as limiting to the invention. In the example of FIG. 8, three different hygienic light beams 840, 850, 850 are used. It is noted that the present invention is not limited to three different light beams, since it is also possible that one type of light beam, two different types of light beams or more than three different types of light beams can be used in the examples of FIG. 8. A first variation of the optical means could result in head 810 outputting light beams 840, 850, 850 through three rectangular shapes 812, 814, 816 distributed over head 810. Another variation of the optical means could result in head 820 outputting light beams 840, 850, 850 through three rectangular shapes 822, 824, 826 distributed over head 820. Yet another variation of the optical means could result in head 830 outputting light beams 840, 850, 850 through fifteen circular shapes 832, 834, 836 distributed over head 830 (note that only three circular shapes as indicated by 832, 834, 836 respectively). A consideration in the design of the optical outputs in a head relates to the ergonomics and ease of using the head when the hygienic effects are applied to a body structure. A second embodiment of a device of the present invention is similar to device 700 as shown in FIG. 7 and is shown as device 900 in FIG. 9. Device 900 includes a head 910, handle 920, light sources 930 (i.e. 930A, 930B, 930C), power supply 940 and switch 950. The difference, however, between device 700 and device 900 is in the optical means. Device 900 includes optical fibers 932, 934, 936 that output the light beams from the light sources 930 through openings 960. In the example of device 900 there could be three light sources each delivering a light beam with a unique hygienic effect that is guided through optical fibers 932, 934, 936 respectively. There could be one optical fiber 960 connected to one opening or there could be several optical fibers bundled 970 together to output through one opening. It has been shown that effect of radiation is improved in combination with massaging the gums. Pressuring alive soft tissue causes an increase in its transparacy thereby providing for better penetration of the radiation (See G A Askaryan (1982) in a paper entitled “ The increasing of transmission of laser and other radiation through the sift turbid physical and biological media” and published in “Kvantovaya Electronika, V9(N7):1370-1383). The present invention generalizes this concept. Accordingly, the present invention could include a massaging means to massage the body structure(s) and improve the transparency to the light beams. A first aspect of applying a massaging effect relates to the movement of the head or the pressure of the head against the body structures will apply a massaging effect. FIG. 10 shows a second aspect of applying a massaging effect. Device 1000 is similar to device 700 with the difference of a massaging means 1010. Massaging means 1010 could be a brush or a comb. The bristles of the brush could be positioned in any direction with respect to the handle. For instance, bristles could be positioned more or less perpendicular to the head as shown by bristles 1010 or bristles could be positioned under an angle with respect to the head as shown by bristles 1020 and bristles 1030. The direction of the bristles could depend on the type or shape of the head or the type of massaging effect that would be desired. The type and size of bristles is dependent on the type of body structure. It would however be preferred to have flexible bristles that do not irritate or damage the structures. For instance, bristles could be made out of nylon, soft fiber, or any synthetic blend. The bristles could be attached to head 710 in a similar fashion as to how bristles are attached to a brush head or comb head. Massaging means is used in a similar fashion as a brush to add a massaging effect to the hygienic effect of the light sources. Device of the present invention could be a brush or a comb that provides hygienic effects according to the teachings of the present invention. FIG. 11 shows a similar device 1100 as device 900 shown in FIG. 9 with the difference of the massaging means 1010. FIG. 12 shows device 1200, which is a variation of device 1100 as shown in FIG. 11. Device 1200 includes multiple optical fibers 1210 (2 fibers), 1212 (2 fibers), 1214 (2 fibers), 1216 (2 fibers) that transmit light beams from light source 1220 (including four light sources 1220A, 1220B, 1220C, 1220D). Another variation shown in FIG. 12 with respect to device 1100 is that the light beam does not pass through the openings 960 as shown in FIG. 9. Instead, an optical connection between the optical fibers and the bristles is created to establish that the bristles are able to continue to guide the light beams and finally output the light beams. In this case the bristles should be made out of materials capable of guiding light and flexible enough to prevent irritation or damage to the structures. In another aspect, the present invention could include a vibrating means to vibrate the body structures and therewith provide an additional massaging effect. Examples of vibrating means that could be used are an ultrasonic means, a piezoelectric means or a mechanical means. Such vibrating means are known in the art. FIG. 13 shows a head 1300 with a vibrating means 1310. Since vibrating means 1310 is positioned against the inner edge 1320 of head 1300, the entire head 1300 might vibrate. FIG. 14 shows a head 1400 with a vibrating means 1410 that is connected in such a way to vibrate massaging means 1010, i.e. vibrating the bristles to provide an additional massaging effect to the massaging effect established by the bristles through movement as described supra. FIG. 15 shows a cradle 1510 that can be used to store the hygienic device 1512 or the head 1514 of the hygienic device 1512. Cradle 1510 could also be used as a power supply (re)charging device. In one aspect, hygienic device 1512 is placed in cradle 1510 and the power supply in the head is connected to a power recharging mechanism via the handle. In another aspect it would be possible to position the power supply of the hygienic device inside the handle, which is then directly connected to a power recharging mechanism. In yet another aspect, the head 1514 of the hygienic device is placed in cradle 1510 and the power supply in the head is directly connected to a power recharging mechanism. Cradle 1510 could include a selection means 1540 for a user to select the hygienic effects or treatment parameters related to the unique hygienic effects. Selection means 1530 could be a selection means with, for instance, four arrow buttons 1532 and one center button 1534. Each arrow button 5132 corresponds to a function or selection that could be selected from a displaying means 1520. The up, down, left and right arrow buttons could relate to the browsing or selection from displaying means 1520. Displaying means 1520 could be any type or size of displaying means that would fit the cradle and is useful to the user. Necessary software and hardware components would be included to provide the functionality to display the parameters, selections and/or functions as well as provide functionality to the buttons. Center button 1534 could be used as the enter button to confirm a selection as is common in the art. The cradle could include different variations of a selection means and is not limited to the selection means shown by 1530. Cradle 1510 could also include a slot 1540 for a read/writer card 1550 to read or write data. Examples of read/writer card 1550 are for instance a memory stick, compact flash card, smart media card, secure digital card, multi media card, microdrive or the like, which are common in the art. Read/writer card 1550 can upload information to the device, store information from the device, and could be interactively used with any type of hygienic service provider. A communication means such as a wireless protocol or Internet protocol could be included with the device to communicate with a hygienic service provider. The present invention has now been described in accordance with several exemplary embodiments, which are intended to be illustrative in all aspects, rather than restrictive. Thus, the present invention is capable of many variations in detailed implementation, which may be derived from the description contained herein by a person of ordinary skill in the art. For instance, the hygienic device of the present invention could be a handheld device. Furthermore, the hygienic device could have several removable or detachable components, which would allow these components to be changed, renewed or updated. For example, the components could be disposable components, or even recyclable components. FIG. 16 shows some examples 1600A, 1600B of configurations of detachable components of the hygienic device, which are shown for illustrative purposes only and should not be regarded as limiting to the invention. Device 1600A shows a head 1610 for optical guidance and output of the light beams, a mid-component 1620 hosting the light sources 1622 and the power supply 1624, and a handle 1630 with a switch 1632. Device 1600B shows a head 1640 for optical guidance and output of the light beams, a mid-component 1650 hosting the light sources 1652, and a handle 1660 with a switch 1662 and a power supply 1664. Another variation is that the device of the present invention could have pre-arranged settings or memory similar to car seat adjustment for individual users. This would allow different users to retrieve their personal settings by a simple click of a button or a simple voice command to the device. Yet another variation to the hygienic device is the shape of the device; in particular the shape of the head component or the head and mid-components combined. FIG. 17 shows two examples of shapes that could be used, which are shown for illustrative purposes only and should not be regarded as limiting to the invention. Shape 1710 has an irregular but smooth surface that would for instance be desired to enhance the massaging effect or contribute to the output path of the light beams. Shape 1720 has a banana-like or curved shape and would for instance be desired to approach particular body structures that are difficult to access with a more rectangular shaped-component or device. FIG. 18 shows still another variation of a device 1800 to apply different hygienic effects. Device 1800 has multiple arms 1810 on which light sources 1820, 1830 and 1830 are attached. Light sources 1820, 1830 and 1830 could for instance be a blue, green and red light sources each providing a different and unique hygienic effect. Again as discussed supra the type of light source and number of light sources can be varied and is dependent on the objectives of hygienic application(s). Light sources 1820, 1830 and 1830 could be placed at various different locations on arms 1810 and is not limited to the arrangement as shown in FIG. 18. The light 1850 that is outputted by each light source can also be delivered in different directions and is not limited to the directions shown in FIG. 18. Device 1800 could also include a massaging means and/or vibrating means 1860, which could provide additional vibration by similar massaging and/or vibration means as discussed supra. Massaging means and/or vibrating means 1860 could operate all arms 1810 simultaneously or one or more individual arms 1810 independently. Device 1800 include a hand piece 1870 that includes the light sources 1872 and one or more switches 1874. Optionally hand piece 1870 could include a display 1876 or a memory slot or communication means 1878. Still another variation is that an agent could be used and applied to the body structures before, during or after the application of the hygienic treatment. Examples of agents are for instance bioprotective agents, photocatalyst, treatment gels or cream, soothing agents, skin permeation enhancers or the like (See, for instance, the following companies/products which are listed for purposes of illustration and should not be regarded as limiting to the invention: Neova by Procyte Corp. www.procyte.com; Medicalia Inc. www.medicalia.com; or ESBA Laboratories Inc.). Such agents could work as a catalyst, soother or enhancer to the structures. Still another variation relates to verifying the condition of the body structures before, during or after a hygienic treatment is applied. Such a diagnostics for structures could, for instance, be employed by means of spectroscopy resolved fluorescence (See e.g. Pferer et al., (2003) in a paper entitled “ Temporally and spectrally resolved fluorescence; spectroscopy for the detection of high grade dysplasia in Barrett's esophagus” and published in “Lasers in Surgery and Medicine 32:10-16). Diagnostics of the structures could provide valuable information to evaluate and compare the efficacy of the hygienic treatment. All such variations are considered to be within the scope and spirit of the present invention as defined by the following claims and their legal equivalents. (b) an optical path for each of said light beams to individually apply each of said light beams at said body structure. 2. The device as set forth in claim 1, wherein the relative location of said device with respect to said body structure is varied, and therewith the application of said unique hygienic effects with respect to said body structure is varied, to achieve blending of said unique hygienic effects at said body structure. 3. The device as set forth in claim 1, wherein said light sources are low power lasers, light emitting diodes or semiconductor lasers. 4. The device as set forth in claim 1, wherein said hygienic effect is selected from the group consisting of an anti-inflammatory effect, a preventative effect, an anti-bacterial effect, a sterilizing effect, a cleaning effect, a cosmetic effect, a therapeutic effect, a healing effect, a bio-stimulative effect, a bio-altering effect, a pain-releaving effect, an agent penetrating effect, a photo-rejuvinating effect, a photo-dynamic treatment effect, a skin stimulating effect, a hair growth stimulating effect and a nail treatment effect. 5. The device as set forth in claim 1, wherein said each of said light beams comprises light from the ultraviolet, visible or infrared spectrum. 6. The device as set forth in claim 1, wherein said body structure comprises a naturally created body structure, a wound, or a surgically created body structure. 7. The device as set forth in claim 1, wherein said light beam is applied in a manner selected from the group consisting of a pulsed manner and a continuous manner. 8. The device as set forth in claim 1, wherein said optical path comprises one or more optical components wherein said one or more optical components are selected from the group consisting of optical fibers, lenses, spectral filters, mirrors, transparent materials, semi-transparent materials, prisms, reflective coatings, reflecting grooves, beam splitters, collimators, light channels and gratings. 9. The device as set forth in claim 1, further comprising an agent that is applied to said body structure. 10. The device as set forth in claim 1, further comprising a massaging means to massage said body structure. 11. The device as set forth in claim 1, further comprising a vibrating means to vibrate said body structure, wherein said vibrating means comprises an ultrasonic means, a piezoelectric means or a mechanical means. 12. The device as set forth in claim 1, further comprising a feedback means to provide feedback to a user, wherein said feedback is selected from the group consisting of sound, display and vibration. 13. The device as set forth in claim 1, further comprising a selection means for a user to select parameters related to said unique hygienic effects or related to said light beams to a user. 14. The device as set forth in claim 1, further comprising a displaying means to display data related to said unique hygienic effects or related to said light beams to a user. (b) providing an optical path for each of said light beams to individually apply each of said light beams at said body structure. 16. The method as set forth in claim 15, wherein the relative location of said device with respect to said body structure is varied, and therewith the application of said unique hygienic effects with respect to said body structure is varied, to achieve blending of said unique hygienic effects at said body structure. 17. The method as set forth in claim 15, wherein said light sources are low power lasers, light emitting diodes or semiconductor lasers. 18. The method as set forth in claim 15, wherein said hygienic effect is selected from the group consisting of an anti-inflammatory effect, a preventative effect, an anti-bacterial effect, a sterilizing effect, a cleaning effect, a cosmetic effect, a therapeutic effect, a healing effect, a bio-stimulative effect, a bio-altering effect, a pain-releaving effect, an agent penetrating effect, a photo-rejuvinating effect, a photo-dynamic treatment effect, a skin stimulating effect, a hair growth stimulating effect and a nail treatment effect. 19. The method as set forth in claim 15, wherein said each of said light beams comprises light from the ultraviolet, visible or infrared spectrum. 20. The method as set forth in claim 15, wherein said body structure comprises a naturally created body structure, a wound, or a surgically created body structure. 21. The method as set forth in claim 15, wherein said light beam is applied in a manner selected from the group consisting of a pulsed manner and a continuous manner. 22. The method as set forth in claim 15, wherein said optical path comprises one or more optical components wherein said one or more optical components are selected from the group consisting of optical fibers, lenses, spectral filters, mirrors, transparent materials, semi-transparent materials, prisms, reflective coatings, reflecting grooves, beam splitters, collimators, light channels and gratings. 23. The method as set forth in claim 15, further comprising the step of adding an agent to said body structure. 24. The method as set forth in claim 15, further comprising the step of providing a massaging means to massage said body structure. 25. The method as set forth in claim 15, further comprising the step of providing a vibrating means to vibrate said body structure, wherein said vibrating means comprises a ultrasonic means, piezoelectric means or mechanical means. 26. The method as set forth in claim 15, further comprising the step of providing a feedback means to provide feedback to a user, wherein said feedback is selected from the group consisting of sound, display and vibration. 27. The method as set forth in claim 15, further comprising the step of providing a selection means for a user to select parameters related to said unique hygienic effects or related to said light beams to a user. 28. The method as set forth in claim 15, further comprising the step of providing a displaying means to display data related to said unique hygienic effects or related to said light beams to a user. 30. The handheld device as set forth in claim 29, wherein the relative location of said handheld device with respect to said body structure is varied, and therewith the application of said unique hygienic effects with respect to said body structure is varied, to achieve blending of said unique hygienic effects at said body structure. 32. The handheld device as set forth in claim 31, wherein the relative location of said handheld device with respect to said body structure is varied, and therewith the application of said unique hygienic effects with respect to said body structure is varied, to achieve blending of said unique hygienic effects at said body structure. (b) a detachable head, wherein said detachable head comprises one or more optical paths each capable of delivering a light beam with a unique hygienic effect at said body structure. 34. The handheld device as set forth in claim 33, wherein the relative location of said handheld device with respect to said body structure is varied, and therewith the application of said unique hygienic effects with respect to said body structure is varied, to achieve blending of said unique hygienic effects at said body structure. 35. The handheld device as set forth in claim 33, wherein said detachable head comprises at least two detachable components, wherein a first component comprises light sources that generate said light beams and wherein a second component comprises means to guide and output said light beams to said body structure. 36. The handheld device as set forth in claim 35, wherein said at least two detachable components are disposable components. 37. The handheld device as set forth in claim 33, wherein said detachable handle is a disposable handle. 38. The handheld device as set forth in claim 33, wherein said detachable head is a disposable head. ITVI20100309A1 (en) * 2010-11-18 2012-05-19 Giannino Algeri held laser device, particularly for the self-treatment of algic events.
2019-04-21T02:53:22Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20040006332A1/en
Safe Rodent Control | Bradenton, Parrish & Sarasota, FL | Rodent Solutions Inc. The City of Cape Town on Wednesday warned of the dangers of using pesticides in the home following the conclusion of an investigation into the death of a 10-year-old boy in Khayelitsha who died after ingesting rat poison. The City of Cape Town's Health Directorate called on residents to exercise extreme caution and read labels carefully when using store-bought pesticides. The warning came following the conclusion of an investigation into the death of a 10-month-old baby boy who died as a result of ingesting rat poison in Khayelitsha. The City Health's Environmental Health section is mandated to investigate all pesticide/chemical incidents. According to the City, it is understood that the child was playing inside his home when he came into contact with the poison pellets which had been set out on a side-plate, hidden behind a cupboard. Apparently the poison had been put out for rats, but the residents had forgotten about it. The baby's caregiver took him to the local hospital after he started vomiting, but he was declared dead on arrival. "This is a truly heartbreaking incident and my thoughts and prayers are with the family. It is important that this baby's death not be in vain and so I appeal to parents to learn from this tragedy and ensure that they do everything possible to mitigate the risk of their children being exposed to pesticides. "These incidents are not commonplace, but one death is one too many," said the City's Mayoral Committee Member for Health, Councillor Siyabulela Mamkeli. During the 2014/15 financial year, City Health investigated six pesticide poisoning cases across the city. Environmental Health Practitioners also conduct regular inspections of informal traders to root out the sale of very toxic pesticides that were being sold illegally. These poisons often carried no label and thus no information about the ingredients, manufacturer, etc thus placing users, children, pets and the environment at risk, the City said. "Pest control affects all of us and it is a problem that is difficult to handle, but it becomes even more challenging in conditions that are conducive to the proliferation of vermin. Rats and other pests thrive in areas where they have a steady supply of food, where there is harbourage, and in the absence of predators. "I understand that not everyone is able to afford professional pest control services, but I would also caution against buying cheap and toxic products that are not correctly packaged or labeled. There have been instances of children drinking poisonous chemical substances that have been stored in plastic cooldrink bottles because they are stored within easy reach. I appeal to residents to buy only approved and legal pesticides and to use them with care, especially when they have children or pets in the home," added Mamkeli. City Health offers a free rodent control service to members of poor communities that can be accessed by contacting their local Environmental Health Office or by leaving a rodent complaint at their local municipal clinic. The first line of defense against rodents should be exclusion and trapping. These methods do not pose a poisoning risk to children, pets and wildlife. If you plan to use rodenticides, be sure to follow all label directions. Remember, removing rodents with traps or poisons will not keep rodents out of your property in the future. To permanently keep rats and mice out of your home or business, you will need to prevent access by sealing all possible entry points. It is equally as important to eliminate rodent attractions such as food and water by keeping food in tightly sealed glass or plastic containers and repairing leaky pipes. Rats and mice have been living with humans for centuries, and humans have been working for just as long to keep them at bay. Rodents such as gophers, moles, voles, and squirrels are also viewed as pests in some settings. Poisons have been used as rodent-control measures for many years. Before the 1940s, rodenticides contained heavy metals such as arsenic and thallium or poisons such as strychnine and red squill. Most of these chemicals are no longer used as rodenticides with the exception of strychnine, which is currently registered for use only below-ground as a bait application to control pocket gophers. For more details, see US EPA's RED Facts on Strychnine. In the 1940s and 1950s, the first kind of anticoagulant rodenticides known as first-generation rodenticides were developed. This class of rodenticides work by disrupting the normal blood clotting or coagulation process so that dosed individuals or animals suffer from uncontrolled bleeding or hemorrhaging. Anticoagulant rodenticides that are in wide use today are members of a more potent class of anticoagulants known as second-generation rodenticides. The following section provides a more detailed comparison between first and second generation rodenticides. Other rodenticides are non-anticoagulants and work in different ways. Non-anticoagulant rodenticides in use include bromethalin, cholecalciferol, and zinc phosphide. Using rodenticides for control is frequently the cause of unintended consequences, from the stench of rodents decomposing in the walls to poisonings of non-target organisms. Primary poisoning can result from wild birds, pets, or even children eating baited rodenticides, while secondary poisoning of birds and mammals (including dogs and cats) can accompany the ingestion of poisoned rodents. First-generation anticoagulant rodenticides listed in the table below require rodents to consume the bait for several consecutive feedings for delivery of a lethal dose. There are three US EPA-registered first-generation rodenticides, including warfarin (also used as an anti-clotting drug for coronary artery disease), chlorophacinone, and diphacinone. The first-generation compounds are excreted fairly rapidly by mammals, usually within a week. However, the use of any rodenticides pose a poisoning risk to children, pets and wildlife. Low (birds), Moderate (mammals). Highly toxic to cats. The second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides (SGARs) are substantially more potent than the first-generation compounds, and a lethal dose can be ingested in a single feeding. Included in this class of rodenticides are the compounds difenacoum, brodifacoum, bromadiolone and difethialone. SGARs are not excreted easily, persisting in bodily organs such as the liver. Some SGARs are especially problematic to birds and mammals. For instance, brodifacoum and difethialone pose the greatest potential risks to avian predators and scavengers that feed on target or nontarget animals poisoned with bait. EPA studies indicate that the first-generation anticoagulants are less hazardous than the more highly toxic and persistent second-generation anticoagulants. SGARs compounds described in the table below are much more likely to poison predatory wildlife that eat live or dead poisoned prey and have a higher risk of severe poisoning for children, pets, and other non-target wildlife. Non-anticoagulant rodenticides, including bromethalin, cholecalciferol, and zinc phosphide, are US EPA-registered and frequently used in controlling pest rodent populations. The potency of these rodenticides is highly variable, with rodent mortalities typically occurring on the order of several hours to days following ingestion of a lethal dose. These rodenticides belong to three different chemical classes that differ from one another as well as the anticoagulants in their mode of action, or anatomical change leading to rodent death. As a neurotoxicant, bromethalin poisons the central nervous system and ultimately causes respiratory distress following ingestion of a single dose. Cholecalciferol, the biologically active form of vitamin D, is completely nontoxic in small amounts, but massive single doses or prolonged low level exposure can prove toxic. Ingestion of excessive amounts of cholecalciferol induces hypercalcemia (elevated blood calcium levels), which ultimately results in heart problems and kidney failure. Zinc phosphide, which functions to liberate toxic phosphine gas upon interaction with stomach acid, is highly toxic and can lead to rodent mortality within hours of ingestion. Unfortunately, zinc phosphide can also poison birds, such as hawks and owls, following ingestion of treated baits. For more information on different types of rodenticides, see the National Pesticide Information Center's (NPIC) fact sheet. For more resources on rodent control, see the National Pesticide Information Center.For more information on different types of rodenticides, see the National Pesticide Information Center's (NPIC) fact sheet. Fishel FM. 2012. Pesticide Toxicity Profile: Coumarin and Indandione Rodenticides. University of Florida IFAS Extension. Fishel FM. 2012. Pesticide Toxicity Profile: Miscellaneous Rodenticides. University of Florida IFAS Extension. Hadler MR, Buckle, AP. 1992. Forty-five years of anticoagulant rodenticides-Past, present and Future Trends. Proceedings of the Fifteenth Vertebrate Pest Conference 1992. Paper 36. Thacker, JL, Willhite L. 2009. Long- Acting Anticoagulant Rodenticides. Iowa Statewide Poison Control Center. Watt BE, Proudfoot AT, Bradberry SM, Vale JA. 2005. Anticoagulant rodenticides. Toxicology Review 24(4): 259-269. US EPA. 2007. Pesticide Fact Sheet: Difenacoum. US Environmental Protection Agency. The Safe Rodent Control (SRC) Coalition promotes resources to help you manage rodents safely, effectively, and affordably without the harmful impacts of chemical rodent control methods. SRC is a resource center supported by a broad coalition of stakeholders striving to protect children, pets, and wildlife from exposure to rodenticides. Real Life Solutions: An easy-to-follow guide of best practices in safe rodent control solutions - from excellent exclusion tactics to an overview of the most effective, affordable traps. Rodenticides - Know the Science: Our resources include the latest and most comprehensive scientific reports and fact-sheets on the risks of using rodenticides in your home or business. At Risk - Children, Pets & Wildlife: An in-depth, science-based outlook on how chemical rodent control methods put children, pets and wildlife in danger; including up-to-date poisoning data. Stay Informed: From the history of rodenticides to a regulatory overview, learn everything you need to know about the past, present and future of rodenticide use. The Coalition: An alliance of non-profit organizations, municipalities, businesses, scientists, and others dedicated to safeguarding your family and pets, and vulnerable wildlife through safe rodent control measures. Rodent Solutions highly recommends that you do not attempt rodent removal. Hiring a licensed and insured professional is the safest and most effective way to remove rodents and protect against re-entry. This information is provided as an effort to support safe rodent control. If you have a rodent or pest problem contact Rodent Solutions at (941) 704-0063 for a professional pest inspection! Use exclusion and sanitation tactics to get rid of rodents in a safe and cost-effective way. The most effective long-term solution is to keep rodents out in the first place. Measures such as sealing entry points prevent rodents from entering buildings and help you avoid a full-scale invasion. Follow the tips in the sections below and you will be one step closer to keeping your home permanently free of rats and mice. Rats and mice are not only a nuisance but can also cause property damage and transmit diseases. You'll know they've arrived if you see rodent droppings near a food source or shredded fabric or paper. If you identify rodents, there are several steps to take to ensure permanent removal of these pests. Food in unsealed containers such as bags of chips, rice, cereal, crackers, flour, and other non-perishables. Pet food and water left out overnight or in a bag rather than in a secure container. Fruits or vegetables in open bowls left outside of refrigerator. Leaky pipes or faucets throughout the house. Open trash and compost containers. Holes near cabinets, closets or doors leading to outside or crawl spaces. Holes around sink or appliance pipes. Cracked foundations in the basement or unscreened ventilation holes in the attic, especially in older structures. Holes around windows or doors. Missing screens in vents or crawl spaces under buildings. Once you have blocked the access points and removed sources of food and water, you'll need to eliminate the remaining rodents. The following sections offer an overview of different treatment options and serve as useful guidance for keeping your home or business permanently free of rats and mice. Seal entry points to prevent rodents from entering your home or business. Be sure to use 1/4" x 1/4" metal mesh to seal off existing entry points. For more tips on how to exclude rodents and what type of materials to use, visit University of Florida's Non-Chemical Rodent Control page. Remove rodent attractions such as food or shelter by ensuring that food is securely stored and that surroundings are clean. Look for signs of rats and mice such as rodent droppings round food, kitchen corners, inside cabinets or under sinks. Also, look for nesting material such as shredded paper or fabric. Remove rodents by using snap or electronic traps. Be cautious with live traps as rodents might urinate which increases the risk of spreading disease. In addition, some states prohibit releasing rodents into the wild. Install barn owl nesting boxes to naturally control rodents. Don't plant ivy - it provides shelter and a food source for rodents: snails and slugs. Ivy on walls can form "rat ladders" to windows, attics and other interior spaces. Keep compost piles as far away from structures as possible and grass cut to no more than two inches tall. Maintain at least a 2 foot space between bushes, shrubs, fences, and buildings. Also, remove tree limbs within 3 feet of a structure or roof. Avoid having a birdfeeder since it provides a source of food for rodents. Keep outdoor grills and cooking areas clean. Keep firewood off the ground and as far away from structures as possible to mitigate shelter opportunities. Use city-issue plastic trash bins. If cracked or missing a lid, contact the Department of Sanitation for a replacement. Encase all food items such as breakfast cereals, chips, and crackers in containers. Opt for garbage bins and compost containers with a top that seals tightly. Rinse food and beverage containers before discarding or recycling. Clean your garbage and recycling bins frequently. Do not leave pet food or water out overnight. Maintain stove tops clean and free of food scraps. De-clutter your home of papers, fabric, and any similar materials that attract rodents for nesting. Seal entry points around cabinets, interior walls, attic, and crawl spaces with steel wool, caulk, or 1/4" x 1/4" metal mesh. Maintain attic, crawl spaces, and cabinets near sinks clean and free of moisture. Natural predators such as snakes, hawks, and owls can help to control rodent populations by feeding on rats and mice. Barn owls are efficient hunters and a family of barn owls can eat as many as 3000 mice per year. To encourage barn owls to nest and stay in your area, consider installing a nesting box. Strategic placement of nesting boxes combined with the use of traps and other preventative measures will go a long way to managing your rodent problems. For more information on installing and maintaining nesting boxes, visit the Hungry Owl Project or the Barn Owl Box Company. Please note that the Hungry Owl Project strongly urges that NO rodent poisons be used indoors or outdoors while encouraging owls to your property. Using rodent poisons could kill an owl if it feeds on a poisoned rodent. If you confirm that rats or mice are present in your home, you will need to use a combination of preventative measures and treatment options to get rid of them. The preventative measures include, removing food, water, shelter, and access to your home. This section will focus on the treatment options available and provide an overview of traps. Using traps instead of rodent poisons gives you clear confirmation of a captured rodent and allows you to better gauge the effectiveness of treatment. You are also able to dispose of rodents immediately rather than dealing with the foul odor of rotting carcasses from poisoned rodents inside your walls or otherwise out of reach. Most important, using traps allows you to avoid rodenticides, which pose a greater threat of exposure to children, pets, and non-target wildlife, including natural predators. This is the oldest type of trap and uses a spring-loaded bar to kill a rodent on contact. Some modern snap traps prevent risk to children and pets by enclosing the device in a plastic box. This battery-powered trap delivers an electric shock that kills rodents quickly. This is a newer type of trap, and models are available for both rats and mice. This is a catch and release system that avoids killing a rat or mouse. Some states prohibit releasing rodents into the wild. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) warns that captured rats or mice might urinate and increase risk of spreading disease. This is a catch and release system that allows for capture of multiple mice. See warnings for the live animal trap above. Glue traps are not recommended because the adhesive plate that is used to capture rodents can also trap birds, baby animals, lizards, and even pets. These traps also cause undue suffering to rodents. The CDC warns that captured rats or mice might urinate and increase the risk of spreading disease. Enclosure boxes are plastic boxes that can fit a single snap trap, sometimes more, in order to provide an additional layer of protection for kids and pets. These boxes also hide the dead rodent, making for easier disposal of rodent, and can be re-used. Always read and follow the label instructions on the rodent control product. Be sure to place traps in locations where children and pets cannot access them or place traps in safety enclosure boxes. Use gloves when disposing of dead rodents, nests, or any nesting material. Spray the dead rodent or nesting material with a disinfectant solution and allow them to soak for 5 minutes before disposing rodent or materials in a secure plastic bag. Spray and wipe up the area surrounding dead rodent or nesting material with a disinfectant. Place the plastic bag with rodent or nesting material into another plastic bag along with any wipes or rags that were used to sanitize the surrounding area. Be sure to wash your hands thoroughly with soap and water. Review all your options before deciding on a treatment plan. If you decide to work with a pest control professional, be sure the company uses proper Pest Management techniques. Preventing and treating rodent infestations requires a combination of eliminating access points rats and mice might use to enter your home, removing food sources and shelter that attract rodents, and using traps to get rid of existing rats and mice in or around your home. Using a multi-tactic approach to manage rodents decreases the risk of dealing with future infestations since a significant piece of the puzzle is adopting preventative measures such as blocking access and eliminating food and water sources that attract rats and mice. Rodenticides consist of different types of poisons used to kill rodents. Rodenticide baits can be lethal for any mammal or bird that ingests them and are not only poisonous for rodents. As a result, all baits pose a high risk of poisoning for non-target animals that might eat the bait or consume a poisoned rat or mouse. Rodents are likely to die in locations where they cannot be retrieved. The smell of a dead animal will persist for several weeks to several months. If you or your neighbors have cats or dogs, they may die or become acutely ill from eating poisoned rodents. Predatory birds like hawks, eagles and owls, and mammalian predators such as foxes and coyotes may die from eating poisoned rodents or a rodenticide bait. Children are at risk of accidental poisoning since they might mistake the rodenticide bait for candy or food. Always read and follow the label instructions on the pesticide product. The label is the law and you could be liable for any damage resulting from not following the label instructions. Use only US EPA approved products that are sold and used with tamper resistant bait stations to protect children, pets, and wildlife. See US EPA's list of rodenticide bait station products here. Indoors, only place rodenticide bait stations in locations that are completely inaccessible to children and pets-inside walls, under heavy appliances, or in enclosed crawlspaces. To protect wildlife, consumer-use rodenticide bait products must not contain the second-generation anticoagulants (brodifacoum, bromadiolone, difenacoum, and difethialone) as active ingredients (US EPA). Once all signs of rodents are gone, remove bait stations promptly by placing in a secure plastic bag. The best way to prevent an accidental rodenticide poisoning is to eliminate the risk of exposure in the first place. Many safe and cost-effective solutions can ensure that your home remains rodent-free and that your pets stay safe. Ask immediate neighbors if they use rodenticides and offer alternative solutions. If they do use rodenticides, ask them if they use tamper-resistant bait boxes. However, tamper-resistant bait boxes will not protect pets from secondary poisoning. For dogs, make sure your fencing does not have gaps that make bait stations in neighboring yards accessible. For cats, consider installing a fence that is specific for cats to decrease odds of your cat consuming poisoned rodents from neighboring yards. However, be aware that a poisoned rodent may enter your yard and poses a threat to any animal that consumes it. If you have had issues with neighbors complaining about your pet, stay alert and try to maintain an open dialogue. If you observe strange behavior from someone or find suspicious food products, contact your vet or ASPCA at (888) 426-4435. Also preserve a sample of any suspicious-looking material for authorities to test. Dogs, cats, and other domesticated animals are all too commonly exposed to toxic rodenticide baits. Sadly, these chemicals make the top-ten list of toxins responsible for pet poisonings, according to American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). The US EPA states that more than 100 pet deaths are reported each year from exposure to rodenticides. Rodenticides are not only poisonous for rodents. Rodent baits can be lethal to any mammal or bird that ingests them or feeds on a poisoned rodent. That's why controlling rodents with rodenticide baits puts pets at high risk of becoming ill or dying - either through direct ingestion (primary poisoning) or by eating poisoned rodents (secondary poisoning). Safeguarding your home from rats, mice, and other rodents doesn't require the use of potentially hazardous poisons. Safe, effective, and affordable solutions can help you rodent-proof your home while ensuring the health of your pets. The following sections offer an overview of how rodenticides work, how pets are exposed, emergency measures if a pet is exposed, and methods to prevent poisonings. Rodenticides can often be lethal to dogs, cats, and other domestic animals. Depending on the product's active ingredient, some baits can pose a higher risk to specific animals. Rodenticides vary by type and potency and are grouped by how they work. For example, anticoagulant rodenticides work by preventing the blood from clotting. Therefore, poisoned mammals (or birds) die by bleeding out. Find out more on different types of rodenticides from the National Pesticide Information Center's (NPIC) fact sheet. It's important to understand the risks of different rodent baits since some may be more lethal to your pet than others. There is a further distinction between the first type of anticoagulants developed and newer types. First-generation anticoagulants are metabolized more rapidly and are less acutely toxic than the newer, more potent second-generation rodenticides (SGARs), which are largely responsible for pet poisonings. Treating pets poisoned by SGARs is also more difficult and expensive, and pets must be under veterinary supervision for a longer period of time. So, while all baits pose a high risk of poisoning, SGARs are more toxic and have a higher risk of poisoning for pets and other non-target animals that feed on poisoned rodents. Don't underestimate your dog or cat's ability to access rodenticides baits that are placed in seemingly secure, out-of-reach locations. The misconception that your pet will not be able to find or chew through a secure bait station results in thousands of pets being poisoned every year, averaging over 100 pet deaths annually. Additionally, many rat and mouse poisons are formulated with food grade ingredients meant to attract rodents that can also end up attracting curious dogs, cats, or other animals. For pets that spend unsupervised time outdoors, it's important to be aware that they can be exposed to rodenticides if neighbors or others use rodenticides to control rodents. Additionally, dogs and cats are sometimes intentionally fed rat poisons by people intent on harming a particular animal. It's important to always be aware of the risks, even if you don't use these chemicals. If you suspect that your pet has ingested a rodenticide, the ASPCA recommends first calling your local veterinarian or the ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center hotline at (888) 426-4435. If you see or know that your pet has ingested rodenticide or has consumed a poisoned animal, take your pet to local veterinarian or emergency veterinary clinic. If your pet is exhibiting severe symptoms such as seizures, unconsciousness, or breathing difficulties, call ahead and take your pet immediately to an emergency veterinary clinic. The ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center may apply a $65 consultation fee to your credit card. Have the rodenticide package or name of the active ingredient handy to relay this information to the vet or animal poison control operator. If you suspect that a pet has swallowed a rodenticide, check their mouth for bright colors as these poisons sometimes have indicator dyes that leave a stain around the mouth or in stool or vomit. Also pay attention to changes such as loss of appetite or lethargy. University of Illinois's College of Veterinary Medicine identifies a range of symptoms that can appear in your pet. These symptoms may include lethargy, depression, weakness, trembling, drunken walk (ataxia), abnormal eye movement, paralysis, increased water intake, increased urination, bloody urine or a bloody nose, and gastrointestinal problems. The Animal Control Poison Center: Animal-specific poison center serving North America and is a member of the American Association of Poison Control Centers. The National Pesticide Information Center: An organization that provides information on pesticides. EPA Intent to Cancel Registration of Certain Rodenticide Products: Notice Document from EPA on cancellation of certain rodenticide products. The Humane Society of the United States: The nation's largest animal protection organization. The American Humane Association: An organization committed to protecting the welfare of children and animals. University of Illinois at Urbana-Campaign, College of Veterinary Medicine: An educational institution committed to improving human, animal, and environmental health. Rodenticides are designed to kill mammals such as rats and mice. It should therefore come as no surprise that these products commonly poison non-target wildlife species. Numerous studies have documented harm to mammals and birds. Other vertebrate species, such as reptiles and amphibians, are also at risk. Most rodenticides work by disrupting the normal blood clotting or coagulation process so that dosed individuals suffer from uncontrolled bleeding or hemorrhaging. This hemorrhaging can occur spontaneously or from any cuts or scratches. Because internal hemorrhaging is difficult to spot, often the only indication of poisoning in exposed wildlife is that they are weak or listless. Signs of bleeding from the nose or mouth may be visible on occasion. Affected wildlife may be more likely to crash into structures or moving vehicles or to be killed by predators. This makes these poisonings even more difficult to document. Wildlife poisonings have been documented in over 25 wildlife species including: San Joaquin kit foxes, Pacific fishers, golden eagles, bald eagles, bobcats, mountain lions, black bears, coyotes, gray foxes, red foxes, Cooper's hawks, red-shouldered hawks, red-tailed hawks, kestrels, barn owls, great horned owls, long-eared owls, western screech owls, spotted owls, Swainson's hawks, raccoons, skunks, squirrels, opossums, turkey vultures and crows. Non-target wildlife species are often attracted to rodenticide baits. These are formulated to be tasty and alluring. This exposure can be reduced through a more careful placement and use of tamper-proof bait stations. Loose bait, whether pellets or poison grain, present the highest risk, the latter being particularly attractive to seed-eating birds and to many small mammal species. Unfortunately, bait stations cannot stop all routes of exposure. House sparrows have been seen entering bait stations in urban environments. Other wildlife species may disturb and attempt to break in to bait stations. Cockroaches and other invertebrate species enter bait stations to feed. They are not affected by anticoagulant products but scatter bait material and carry the poison in their own bodies raising the potential for secondary poisoning. Rats and mice that feed on these baits can take several days to die. The poisoned rodents become increasingly weak, making them easy prey for predators. Hungry raptors or other wildlife can receive a lethal dose when they feed on the poisoned rats and mice. This is tragic not merely because hawks, owls, foxes and other animals are dying, but because wildlife predators provide us with valuable rodent control services - unless of course we kill them first. The biggest-selling rodenticides are of the so-called 'second-generation'. These include compounds such as difenacoum, brodifacoum, bromadiolone and difethialone. Second-generation compounds were designed to kill rodents after a single feeding on bait. They are much more persistent than the first-generation compounds (warfarin, chlorophaninone, diphacinone) and clear very slowly from the body. In addition, second-generation rodenticides tend to be much more acutely toxic to non-target wildlife. As a result, the second-generation compounds are much more likely to poison predatory wildlife that eat live prey or carrion - whether targeted mice and rats or other species. These compounds are causing innumerable casualties among owls and hawks, bobcats, fishers and other predators. Rodenticides may now be the single most important source of mortality for some wildlife species. Where second-generation compounds are used, entire food chains are contaminated. Residues are even detected in species that typically feed on birds rather than on rodents. Because food chains are contaminated with rodenticides in most inhabited parts of the world, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find owls, red tailed hawks or other birds of prey that do not carry residues of one or several rodenticide products. Many mammalian predators like foxes and fishers show similar levels of exposure to rodenticides. What important physiological processes are impaired by low level rodenticide exposure; for example, a link between disease (mange) and rodenticide exposure has already been documented in mountain lions. Whether exposed wildlife are more likely to hemorrhage than animals who have not previously been exposed to rodenticides following re-exposure with the same or different rodenticide products. Finally, surveillance networks are reporting an increasing number of wildlife fatalities with an apparent rodenticide involvement, whether large carnivores or birds of prey. Diagnosis can sometimes be difficult, especially when the individuals have been struck by moving vehicles or have experienced other forms of traumatic injury. Despite the known harms to wildlife of rodenticides use, rodenticides have played an important role in controlled restoration programs to reduce or eliminate non-native rodent species. These controlled restoration programs are conducted by wildlife experts as a last resort and usually occur on islands where native seabirds or their young and eggs are taken by mice or rats or where rodent invaders are completely changing the natural environment of these fragile places. The terrain on these islands is often difficult, making other control methods impossible. Complete eradication is necessary for a program to be successful. Impacts on desirable species are often seen in these eradication programs. This is weighed against the long term benefits of rodent eradication in terms of preserving natural biodiversity and protecting what are often rare and declining species. Permitting systems are in place to try to ensure the minimum amount of unacceptable impacts. California Department of Fish and Wildlife. Rodenticides can harm wildlife; please use carefully. Stone WB, Okoniewski JC, Stedelin JR. 1999. Poisoning of wildlife with anticoagulant rodenticides in New York. J Wildl Dis. 35: 187-193. Uzal FA, Houston RS, Riley SP, Poppenga R, Odani J, Boyce W. 2007. Notoedric mange in two free-ranging mountain lions (Puma concolor). J Wildl Dis. 43: 274-278. Thomas PJ, Mineau P, Shore RF, Champoux L, Martin PA, Wilson LK, Fitzgerald G, Elliot JE. 2011. Second generation anticoagulant rodenticides in predatory birds: Probabilistic characterization of toxic liver concentrations and implications for predatory bird populations in Canada. Environ Int. 37: 914-920. **If someone collapses or stops breathing, call 911! The best way to prevent an accidental rodenticide poisoning is to eliminate the risk of exposure in the first place. Safe and cost-effective solutions can ensure that your home remains rodent-free and that your children stay safe. Have all gaps sealed on the outside of your home and worn weather stripping replaced on windows and doors to keep rodents out. Keep your outdoor space clean and organized ⎯ trim plants and trees and keep your trash cans tightly shut. Check your home for old rat and mouse poison baits that have been left behind from previous use or by a previous occupant. Kids and rat poisons do not mix. Unfortunately, these chemicals poison over 10,000 children across the U.S every year. Young children, especially those under the age of 6, are at high risk of unintentional poisoning through ingestion. Kids' curious nature and desire to stick everything in their mouths makes exposure to rodenticides a real danger. Safe rodent control can help you keep rats and mice out of your home while protecting your little ones from rodenticide poisonings. The following sections offer an overview of how kids get exposed, emergency measures, and how to prevent poisonings in the first place. Residential use of rodenticides puts children at high risk of accidental poisoning in their own home. Rodenticide baits can be lethal for any mammal or bird that ingests them and are not only poisonous for rodents. Rodenticide as usually formulated as baits that come in different colors and forms such as pellets, grains, and blocks (see picture of blue rodenticide pellets). Some baits also include flavorings such as fish oil and peanut butter. As a result, all baits, especially the small and colored pellets, pose a high risk of poisoning for children who might mistake the bait for candy or food. It can be surprisingly difficult to keep these products out of the reach of children since baits - to be most effective - are usually placed on the floor, offering kids ready access. Clear their mouth and give a small amount of water or milk to drink. Immediately call the Poison Center at 1-800-222-1222. Have the rodenticide package or name of the active ingredient handy to relay to the poison control operator and medical personnel. If you suspect that a child has swallowed a rodenticide, check their mouth for bright colors as these poisons sometimes have indicator dyes that will leave a stain on the child's mouth or hands. For more information on poisonings, see the American Association of Poison Control Center's Poison Prevention brochure. Brodifacoum, Bromadiolone, Chlorophacinone, Difethialone, Diphacinone (Anticoagulant) Ingestion, inhalation, dermal Anticoagulants do not have onset symptoms. Some symptoms might manifest days later and may include: blood in urine or stool, tendency to bruise easily and bleeding under the skin, confusion, lethargy, or altered mental status from bleeding in the brain, low blood pressure, nosebleed, pale skin, shock, and vomiting blood. Bromethalin (Non-Anticoagulant ) Ingestion, inhalation, dermal Symptoms may include: headache, confusion, personality change, tremors, seizures, coma and marked respiratory depression. Cholecalciferol (Non-Anticoagulant ) Ingestion Symptoms are similar to hypercalcemia: anorexia, fatigue, headache, itching, and weakness. - Polyneuropathy, a neurological disorder, has been reported after acute intoxication. - Nausea, vomiting, constipation and diarrhea may be seen. - Extreme depression, apathy, confusion, and fatigue may be associated with chronic excessive intake of vitamin D. Anticoagulants do not have onset symptoms. Some symptoms might manifest days later and may include: blood in urine or stool, tendency to bruise easily and bleeding under the skin, confusion, lethargy, or altered mental status from bleeding in the brain, low blood pressure, nosebleed, pale skin, shock, and vomiting blood. Additionally, poisoning by Warfarin may lead to bleeding pinpoint purplish-red spots. Zinc phosphide (Non-Anticoagulant) Ingestion, inhalation Some symptoms of exposure via inhalation may include: a cough, diarrhea, headache, fatigue, nausea, vomiting. Some symptoms of exposure via ingestion may include; abdominal pain, cough, diarrhea, dizziness, headache, labored breathing, nausea, unconsciousness, vomiting, uncoordinated movement, fatigue. Sources: National Pesticide Information Center, US EPA Recognition and Management of Pesticide Poisonings, and U.S National Library of Medicine- National Institutes of Health.
2019-04-21T12:26:31Z
https://rodentsolutioninc.com/safe-rodent-control/
The aggregate market value of the voting and nonvoting shares of common stock held by non-affiliates of Corporate Office Properties Trust was approximately $2.7 billion, as calculated using the closing price of such shares on the New York Stock Exchange and the number of outstanding shares as of June 30, 2018. For purposes of calculating this amount only, affiliates are defined as Trustees, executive owners and beneficial owners of more than 10% of Corporate Office Properties Trust’s outstanding common shares, $0.01 par value. At January 31, 2019, 110,263,078 of Corporate Office Properties Trust’s common shares were outstanding. The aggregate market value of the voting and nonvoting common units of limited partnership interest held by non-affiliates of Corporate Office Properties, L.P. was approximately $84.4 million, as calculated using the closing price of the common shares of Corporate Office Properties Trust (into which common units not held by Corporate Office Properties Trust are exchangeable) on the New York Stock Exchange and the number of outstanding units as of June 30, 2018. Portions of the proxy statement of Corporate Office Properties Trust for its 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders to be filed within 120 days after the end of the fiscal year covered by this Form 10-K are incorporated by reference into Part III of this Form 10-K. This report combines the annual reports on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2018 of Corporate Office Properties Trust (“COPT”) and subsidiaries (collectively, the “Company”) and Corporate Office Properties, L.P. (“COPLP”) and subsidiaries (collectively, the “Operating Partnership”). Unless stated otherwise or the context otherwise requires, “we,” “our,” and “us” refer collectively to COPT, COPLP and their subsidiaries. COPT is a real estate investment trust, or REIT, and the sole general partner of COPLP. As of December 31, 2018, COPT owned approximately 98.8% of the outstanding common units in COPLP; the remaining common units and all of the outstanding COPLP preferred units were owned by third parties. As the sole general partner of COPLP, COPT controls COPLP and can cause it to enter into major transactions including acquisitions, dispositions and refinancings and cause changes in its line of business, capital structure and distribution policies. There are a few differences between the Company and the Operating Partnership which are reflected in this Form 10-K. We believe it is important to understand the differences between the Company and the Operating Partnership in the context of how the two operate as an interrelated, consolidated company. COPT is a REIT whose only material asset is its ownership of partnership interests of COPLP. As a result, COPT does not conduct business itself, other than acting as the sole general partner of COPLP, issuing public equity and guaranteeing certain debt of COPLP. COPT itself is not directly obligated under any indebtedness but guarantees some of the debt of COPLP. COPLP owns substantially all of the assets of COPT either directly or through its subsidiaries, conducts almost all of the operations of the business and is structured as a limited partnership with no publicly traded equity. Except for net proceeds from public equity issuances by COPT, which are contributed to COPLP in exchange for partnership units, COPLP generates the capital required by COPT’s business through COPLP’s operations, by COPLP’s direct or indirect incurrence of indebtedness or through the issuance of partnership units. Noncontrolling interests, shareholders’ equity and partners’ capital are the main areas of difference between the consolidated financial statements of COPT and those of COPLP. The common limited partnership interests in COPLP not owned by COPT are accounted for as partners’ capital in COPLP’s consolidated financial statements and as noncontrolling interests in COPT’s consolidated financial statements. COPLP’s consolidated financial statements also reflect COPT’s noncontrolling interests in certain real estate partnerships and limited liability companies (“LLCs”); the differences between shareholders’ equity, partners’ capital and noncontrolling interests result from the differences in the equity issued at the COPT and COPLP levels and in COPT’s noncontrolling interests in these real estate partnerships and LLCs. The only other significant differences between the consolidated financial statements of COPT and those of COPLP are assets in connection with a non-qualified elective deferred compensation plan and the corresponding liability to the plan’s participants that are held directly by COPT. Note 21, Quarterly Data of COPT and subsidiaries and COPLP and subsidiaries. This report also includes separate sections under Part II, Item 9A. Controls and Procedures and separate Exhibit 31 and Exhibit 32 certifications for each of COPT and COPLP to establish that the Chief Executive Officer and the Chief Financial Officer of each entity have made the requisite certifications and that COPT and COPLP are compliant with Rule 13a-15 and Rule 15d-14 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”), and 18 U.S.C. §1350. This Form 10-K contains “forward-looking” statements, as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Act of 1995, that are based on our current expectations, estimates and projections about future events and financial trends affecting the financial condition and operations of our business. Additionally, documents we subsequently file with the SEC and incorporated by reference will contain forward-looking statements. approximately 900 acres of land controlled for future development that we believe could be developed into approximately 11.7 million square feet and 150 acres of other land. Equity interests in COPLP are in the form of common and preferred units. As of December 31, 2018, COPT owned 98.8% of the outstanding COPLP common units (“common units”); the remaining common units and all of the outstanding COPLP preferred units (“preferred units”) were owned by third parties. Common units not owned by COPT carry certain redemption rights. The number of common units owned by COPT is equivalent to the number of outstanding common shares of beneficial interest (“common shares”) of COPT, and the entitlement of all common units to quarterly distributions and payments in liquidation is substantially the same as those of COPT common shareholders. Similarly, in the case of any series of preferred units held by COPT, there would be a series of preferred shares of beneficial interest (“preferred shares”) in COPT that is equivalent in number and carries substantially the same terms as such series of COPLP preferred units. COPT’s common shares are publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) under the ticker symbol “OFC”. We believe that COPT is organized and has operated in a manner that satisfies the requirements for taxation as a REIT under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, and we intend to continue to operate COPT in such a manner. If COPT continues to qualify for taxation as a REIT, it generally will not be subject to Federal income tax on its taxable income (other than that of its TRS entities) that is distributed to its shareholders. A REIT is subject to a number of organizational and operational requirements, including a requirement that it distribute to its shareholders at least 90% of its annual taxable income. Our executive offices are located at 6711 Columbia Gateway Drive, Suite 300, Columbia, Maryland 21046 and our telephone number is (443) 285-5400. Governance Guidelines, Code of Business Conduct and Ethics and Code of Ethics for Financial Officers. We intend to make available on our website any future amendments or waivers to our Code of Business Conduct and Ethics and Code of Ethics for Financial Officers within four business days after any such amendments or waivers. The information on our Internet site is not part of this report. The SEC maintains an Internet website that contains reports, proxy and information statements and other information regarding issuers that file electronically with the SEC. This Internet website can be accessed at www.sec.gov. Our primary goal is to create value and deliver attractive and competitive total returns to our shareholders. This section sets forth key components of our business and growth strategies that we have in place to support this goal. Defense/IT Locations Strategy: We specialize in serving the unique requirements of tenants of our Defense/IT Locations properties. These properties are primarily occupied by United States Government and contractor tenants engaged in what we believe are high priority security, defense and IT missions. These tenants’ missions pertain more to knowledge-based activities (i.e., cyber security, research and development and other highly technical defense and security areas) than to force structure (i.e., troops) and weapon system mass production. Our office and data center shell portfolio is significantly concentrated in Defense/IT Locations, which as of December 31, 2018 accounted for 154 of the portfolio’s 163 properties, or 87.9% of its annualized rental revenue, and we control developable land to accommodate future growth. These properties generally have higher tenant renewal rates than is typical in commercial office space due in large part to: the importance of their proximity to defense installations or other key demand drivers; the ability of many of these properties to meet Anti-Terrorism Force Protection (“ATFP”) requirements; and significant investments often made by tenants in their space for unique needs such as Secure Compartmented Information Facility (“SCIF”), critical power supply and operational redundancy. Data center shells, which are properties leased to tenants to be operated as data centers in which the tenants fund the costs for the critical power, fiber connectivity and data center infrastructure, have been a significant growth driver for our Defense/IT Locations in recent years. From 2013 through 2018, we placed into service 17 data center shells totaling 2.8 million square feet, and we had an additional four under construction totaling 731,000 square feet as of December 31, 2018. We enter into long-term leases for these properties prior to commencing construction, with triple-net structures and multiple extension options and rent escalators to provide future growth. Additionally, our tenants fund the costs to fully power and equip these properties, significantly enhancing these properties’ values and creating high barriers to exit for such tenants. depth of knowledge, specialized skills and credentialed personnel in operating highly-specialized properties with high security-oriented requirements. office space. We believe that these types of submarkets provide better overall quality and opportunity for long-term, sustained growth than other commercial office submarkets. As of December 31, 2018, we owned seven Regional Office properties, representing 11.5% of our office and data center shell portfolio’s annualized rental revenue; these properties were comprised of: three high-rise Baltimore City properties proximate to the city’s waterfront; and four Northern Virginia properties proximate to existing or future Washington Metropolitan Area Metrorail stations and major interstates. In prior reporting periods, this segment also included other suburban properties not meeting these characteristics that were since disposed. Asset Management Strategy: We aggressively manage our portfolio to maximize the value and operating performance of each property through: (1) proactive property management and leasing; (2) renewing tenant leases at increased rental rates where market conditions permit; (3) leasing vacant space; (4) achievement of operating efficiencies by increasing economies of scale and, where possible, aggregating vendor contracts to achieve volume pricing discounts; and (5) redevelopment when we believe property conditions and market demand warrant. In 2017, we completed seven years of programmatic property sales to improve the strategic focus of our portfolio and improve our balance sheet and overall capital position. In the future, we plan to continuously evaluate our portfolio and consider dispositions when properties no longer meet our strategic objectives, or when capital markets and the circumstances pertaining to such holdings otherwise warrant, in order to maximize our return on invested capital or support our property development and capital strategy. We also aim to sustainably develop and operate our portfolio to create healthier work environments and reduce consumption of resources by: (1) constructing new buildings designed to use resources with a high level of efficiency and low impact on human health and the environment during their life cycles through our participation in the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (“LEED”) program; (2) investing in energy systems and other equipment that reduce energy consumption and operating costs; (3) adopting select LEED for Building Operations and Maintenance (“LEED O+M: Existing Buildings”) prerequisites for much of our portfolio, including guidelines pertaining to cleaning and recycling practices and energy reduction; and (4) participating in the annual GRESB (or Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark) survey, which is widely recognized for measuring the environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) performance of real estate companies and funds. We earned an overall score of “Green Star” on the GRESB survey in each of the last four years, representing the highest quadrant of achievement on the survey. Property Development and Acquisition Strategy: We grow our operating portfolio primarily through property development opportunities in support of our Defense/IT Locations strategy, and we have significant land holdings that we believe can support that growth and also act as a barrier against competitive supply. We pursue development activities as market conditions and leasing opportunities support favorable risk-adjusted returns on investment, and therefore typically prefer properties to be significantly leased prior to commencing construction. To a lesser extent, we may also pursue growth through acquisitions, seeking to execute such transactions at attractive yields and below replacement cost. continuously evaluating the ability of our capital resources to accommodate our plans for future growth. data center shells, primarily in Northern Virginia (including six owned through an unconsolidated real estate joint venture). As of December 31, 2018, Defense/IT Locations comprised 154 of our office and data center shell portfolio’s properties, representing 88.0% of its square feet in operations, while Regional Office comprised seven of the portfolio’s properties, or 11.1% of its square feet in operations. Our Wholesale Data Center segment is comprised of one property in Manassas, Virginia. For information relating to our segments, refer to Note 17 to our consolidated financial statements, which is included in a separate section at the end of this Annual Report on Form 10-K beginning on page F-1. As of December 31, 2018, we had 378 employees, none of whom were parties to collective bargaining agreements. We believe that our relations with our employees are good. The commercial real estate market is highly competitive. Numerous commercial landlords compete with us for tenants. Some of the properties competing with ours may be newer or in more desirable locations, or the competing properties’ owners may be willing to accept lower rents. We also compete with our own tenants, many of whom have the right to sublease their space. The competitive environment for leasing is affected considerably by a number of factors including, among other things, changes in economic conditions and supply of and demand for space. These factors may make it difficult for us to lease existing vacant space and space associated with future lease expirations at rental rates that are sufficient to produce acceptable operating cash flows. We occasionally compete for the acquisition of land and commercial properties with many entities, including other publicly-traded commercial office REITs. Competitors for such acquisitions may have substantially greater financial resources than ours. In addition, our competitors may be willing to accept lower returns on their investments or may be willing to incur higher leverage. We also compete with many entities, including other publicly-traded commercial office REITs, for capital. This competition could adversely affect our ability to raise capital we may need to fulfill our capital strategy. In addition, we compete with many entities for talent. If there is an increase in the costs for us to retain employees or if we otherwise fail to attract and retain such employees, our business and operating results could be adversely effected. Set forth below are risks and uncertainties relating to our business and the ownership of our securities. These risks and uncertainties may lead to outcomes that could adversely affect our financial position, results of operations, cash flows and ability to make expected distributions to our equityholders. You should carefully consider each of these risks and uncertainties and all of the information in this Annual Report on Form 10-K and its Exhibits, including our consolidated financial statements and notes thereto for the year ended December 31, 2018, which are included in a separate section at the end of this report beginning on page F-1. potential liability under environmental or other laws or regulations. We may be affected by adverse economic conditions. Our business may be affected by adverse economic conditions in the United States economy or real estate industry as a whole or by the local economic conditions in the markets in which our properties are located, including the impact of high unemployment and constrained credit. Adverse economic conditions could increase the likelihood of tenants encountering financial difficulties, including bankruptcy, insolvency or general downturn of business, and as a result could increase the likelihood of tenants defaulting on their lease obligations to us. Such conditions also could decrease our likelihood of successfully renewing tenants at favorable terms or leasing vacant space in existing properties or newly-constructed properties. In addition, such conditions could increase the level of risk that we may not be able to obtain new financing for development activities, acquisitions, refinancing of existing debt or other capital requirements at reasonable terms, if at all. We may suffer adverse consequences as a result of our reliance on rental revenues for our income. We earn revenue from renting our properties. Our operating costs do not necessarily fluctuate in relation to changes in our rental revenue. This means that certain of our costs will not necessarily decline and may increase even if our revenues decline. For new tenants or upon lease expiration for existing tenants, we generally must make improvements and pay other leasing costs for which we may not receive increased rents. We also make building-related capital improvements for which tenants may not reimburse us. If our properties do not generate revenue sufficient to meet our operating expenses and capital costs, we may need to borrow additional amounts to cover these costs. In such circumstances, we would likely have lower profits or possibly incur losses. We may also find in such circumstances that we are unable to borrow to cover such costs, in which case our operations could be adversely affected. In addition, the competitive environment for leasing is affected considerably by a number of factors including, among other things, changes due to economic factors such as supply and demand. These factors may make it difficult for us to lease existing vacant space and space associated with future lease expirations at rental rates that are sufficient to meet our short-term capital needs. We rely on the ability of our tenants to pay rent and would be harmed by their inability to do so. Our performance depends on the ability of our tenants to fulfill their lease obligations by paying their rental payments in a timely manner. As a result, we would be harmed if one or more of our major tenants, or a number of our smaller tenants, were to experience financial difficulties, including bankruptcy, insolvency, prolonged government shutdown or general downturn of business. Most of our leases with the United States Government provide for a series of one-year terms. The United States Government may terminate its leases if, among other reasons, the United States Congress fails to provide funding. We would be harmed if any of our four largest tenants fail to make rental payments to us over an extended period of time, including as a result of a prolonged government shutdown, or if the United States Government elects to terminate some or all of its leases and the space cannot be re-leased on satisfactory terms. As of December 31, 2018, 87.9% of our office and data center shell properties’ total annualized rental revenue was from Defense/IT Locations, and we expect to maintain a similarly high revenue concentration of properties in these locations. A reduction in government spending targeting the activities of the government and its contractors (such as knowledge-based defense and security activities) in these locations could adversely affect our tenants’ ability to fulfill lease obligations, renew leases or enter into new leases and limit our future growth from properties in these locations. Moreover, uncertainty regarding the potential for future reduction in government spending targeting such activities could also decrease or delay leasing activity from tenants engaged in these activities. We may suffer economic harm in the event of a decline in the real estate market or general economic conditions in the Mid-Atlantic region, particularly in the Greater Washington, DC/Baltimore region, or in particular business parks. Most of our properties are located in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, particularly in the Greater Washington, DC/Baltimore region. Our properties are also often concentrated in business parks in which we own most of the properties. Consequently, our portfolio of properties is not broadly distributed geographically. As a result, we would be harmed by a decline in the real estate market or general economic conditions in the Mid-Atlantic region, the Greater Washington, DC/Baltimore region or the business parks in which our properties are located. We would suffer economic harm if we were unable to renew our leases on favorable terms. When leases expire, our tenants may not renew or may renew on terms less favorable to us than the terms of their original leases. If a tenant vacates a property, we can expect to experience a vacancy for some period of time, as well as incur higher leasing costs than we would likely incur if a tenant renews. As a result, we may be harmed if we experience a high volume of tenant departures at the end of their lease terms. We may be adversely affected by trends in the office real estate industry. Some businesses increasingly permit employee telecommuting, flexible work schedules, open workplaces and teleconferencing. These practices enable businesses to reduce their space requirements. These trends could over time erode the overall demand for office space and, in turn, place downward pressure on occupancy, rental rates and property valuations. We may encounter a decline in the value of our real estate. The value of our real estate could be adversely affected by general economic and market conditions connected to a specific property, a market or submarket, a broader economic region or the office real estate industry. Examples of such conditions include a broader economic recession, declining demand and decreases in market rental rates and/or market values of real estate assets. If our real estate assets decline in value, it could result in our recognition of impairment losses. Moreover, a decline in the value of our real estate could adversely affect the amount of borrowings available to us under future credit facilities and other loans. We may not be able to compete successfully with other entities that operate in our industry. The commercial real estate market is highly competitive. Numerous commercial properties compete with our properties for tenants. Some of the properties competing with ours may be newer or in more desirable locations, or the competing properties’ owners may be willing to accept lower rates than are acceptable to us. In addition, we compete for the purchase of commercial property with many entities, including other publicly traded commercial office REITs. market conditions, including real estate lending conditions, are not favorable. Such illiquidity could limit our ability to fund capital needs or quickly change our portfolio of properties in response to changes in economic or other conditions. Moreover, under certain circumstances, the Internal Revenue Code imposes certain penalties on a REIT that sells property held for less than two years and limits the number of properties it can sell in a given year. We are dependent on external sources of capital for growth. Because COPT is a REIT, it must distribute at least 90% of its annual taxable income to its shareholders. Due to this requirement, we are not able to significantly fund our development and acquisition activities using retained cash flow from operations. Therefore, our ability to fund these activities may be dependent on our ability to access debt or equity capital. Such capital could be in the form of new debt, common shares, preferred shares, common and preferred units in COPLP, joint venture funding or asset sales. These capital sources may not be available on favorable terms or at all. Moreover, additional debt financing may substantially increase our leverage and subject us to covenants that restrict management’s flexibility in directing our operations, and additional equity offerings may result in substantial dilution of our equityholders’ interests. Our inability to obtain capital when needed could have a material adverse effect on our ability to expand our business and fund other cash requirements. We often use our Revolving Credit Facility to initially finance much of our investing activities and certain financing activities. Our lenders under this and other facilities could, for financial hardship or other reasons, fail to honor their commitments to fund our requests for borrowings under these facilities. If lenders default under these facilities by not being able or willing to fund a borrowing request, it would adversely affect our ability to access borrowing capacity under these facilities. We may be unable to execute our plans to develop and construct additional properties. Although the majority of our investments are in operating properties, we also develop, construct and redevelop properties, including some that are not fully pre-leased. When we develop, construct and redevelop properties, we assume the risk of actual costs exceeding our budgets, conditions occurring that delay or preclude project completion and projected leasing not occurring. In addition, we may find that we are unable to successfully execute plans to obtain construction loans to fund property construction activities. We may suffer adverse effects from acquisitions of commercial real estate properties. We may pursue acquisitions of existing commercial real estate properties as part of our property development and acquisition strategy. Acquisitions of commercial properties entail risks, such as the risk that we may not be in a position, or have the opportunity in the future, to make suitable property acquisitions on advantageous terms and/or that such acquisitions will fail to perform as expected. We may pursue selective acquisitions of properties in regions where we have not previously owned properties. These acquisitions may entail risks in addition to those we face in other acquisitions where we are familiar with the regions, such as the risk that we do not correctly anticipate conditions or trends in a new market and therefore are not able to operate the acquired property profitably. claims for indemnification by general partners, directors, officers and others indemnified by the former owners of the properties. Our wholesale data center may become obsolete. Wholesale data centers are much more expensive investments on a per square foot basis than office properties due to the level of infrastructure required to operate the centers. At the same time, technology, industry standards and service requirements for wholesale data centers are rapidly evolving and, as a result, the risk of investments we make in our wholesale data center becoming obsolete is higher than other commercial real estate properties. Our wholesale data center may become obsolete due to the development of new systems to deliver power to, or eliminate heat from, the servers housed in the properties, or due to other technological advances. In addition, we may not be able to efficiently upgrade or change power and cooling systems to meet new demands or industry standards without incurring significant costs that we may not be able to pass on to our tenants. that are uniquely designed to run and maintain banks of computer servers. Data centers are subject to obsolescence risks. In the event that we needed to reposition data center space for another use, the renovations required to do so could be difficult and costly, and we may, as a result, deem such renovations to be impractical. Our tenants and contractual counterparties could be designated “Prohibited Persons” by the Office of Foreign Assets Control. The Office of Foreign Assets Control of the United States Department of the Treasury (“OFAC”) maintains a list of persons designated as terrorists or who are otherwise blocked or banned (“Prohibited Persons”). OFAC regulations and other laws prohibit us from conducting business or engaging in transactions with Prohibited Persons. If a tenant or other party with whom we conduct business is placed on the OFAC list or is otherwise a party with whom we are prohibited from doing business, we may be required to terminate the lease or other agreement. We may suffer adverse effects as a result of the indebtedness that we carry and the terms and covenants that relate to this debt. A few of our properties are pledged by us to support repayment of indebtedness. Any foreclosure on such properties could result in loss of income and/or assets. if we are unable to pay our debt service on time or are unable to comply with restrictive financial covenants for certain of our debt, our lenders could foreclose on our properties securing such debt and, in some cases, other properties and assets that we own. Some of our unsecured debt is cross-defaulted, which means that failure to pay interest or principal on the debt above a threshold value will create a default on certain of our other debt. If interest rates were to rise, our debt service payments on debt with variable interest rates would increase. As of December 31, 2018, we had $1.8 billion in debt, the future maturities of which are set forth in Note 10 to our consolidated financial statements. Our operations likely will not generate enough cash flow to repay all of this debt without additional borrowings, equity issuances and/or property sales. If we cannot refinance our debt, extend the repayment dates, or raise additional equity prior to the dates when our debt matures, we would default on our existing debt. Our organizational documents do not limit the amount of indebtedness that we may incur. Therefore, we may incur additional indebtedness and become more highly leveraged, which could harm our financial position. A downgrade in our credit ratings would materially adversely affect our business and financial condition. COPLP’s Senior Notes are currently rated investment grade by the three major rating agencies. These credit ratings are subject to ongoing evaluation by the credit rating agencies and can change. Any downgrades of our ratings or a negative outlook by the credit rating agencies would have a materially adverse impact on our cost and availability of capital and also could have a materially adverse effect on the market price of COPT’s common shares. We have certain distribution requirements that reduce cash available for other business purposes. Since COPT is a REIT, it must distribute at least 90% of its annual taxable income, which limits the amount of cash that can be retained for other business purposes, including amounts to fund development activities and acquisitions. Also, it is possible that because of the differences between the time we actually receive revenue or pay expenses and the period during which we report those items for distribution purposes, we may have to borrow funds for COPT to meet the 90% distribution requirement. our decision to reinvest in operations rather than distribute available cash. In addition, we can make distributions to the holders of our common shares/units only after we make preferential distributions to holders of preferred shares/units. Our ability to pay distributions may be limited, and we cannot provide assurance that we will be able to pay distributions regularly. Our ability to pay distributions will depend on a number of things discussed elsewhere herein, including our ability to operate profitably and generate cash flow from our operations. We cannot guarantee that we will be able to pay distributions on a regular quarterly basis in the future. Additionally, the terms of some of COPLP’s debt may limit its ability to make some types of payments and other distributions to COPT in the event of certain default situations. This in turn may limit our ability to make some types of payments, including payment of distributions on common or preferred shares/units, unless we meet certain financial tests or such payments or distributions are required to maintain COPT’s qualification as a REIT. As a result, if we are unable to meet the applicable financial tests, we may not be able to pay distributions in one or more periods. Furthermore, any new common or preferred shares/units that may be issued in the future for raising capital, financing acquisitions, share-based compensation arrangements or otherwise will increase the cash required to continue to pay cash distributions at current levels. Our ability to pay distributions is further limited by the requirements of Maryland law. As a Maryland REIT, COPT may not under applicable Maryland law make a distribution if either of the following conditions exists after giving effect to the distribution: (1) the REIT would not be able to pay its debts as the debts become due in the usual course of business; or (2) the REIT’s total assets would be less than the sum of its total liabilities plus the amount that would be needed, if the REIT were dissolved at the time of the distribution, to satisfy upon dissolution the rights of equityholders whose preferential rights are superior to those receiving the distribution. Therefore, we may not be able to make expected distributions to our equityholders if either of the above described conditions exists for COPT after giving effect to the distribution. We may issue additional common or preferred shares/units that dilute our equityholders’ interests. We may issue additional common and preferred shares/units without shareholder approval. Similarly, COPT may cause COPLP to issue its common or preferred units for contributions of cash or property without approval by the limited partners of COPLP or COPT’s shareholders. Our existing equityholders’ interests could be diluted if such additional issuances were to occur. We may suffer economic harm as a result of the actions of our partners in real estate joint ventures and other investments. We may invest in certain entities in which we are not the exclusive investor or principal decision maker. Investments in such entities may, under certain circumstances, involve risks not present when a third party is not involved, including the possibility that the other parties to these investments might become bankrupt or fail to fund their share of required capital contributions. Our partners in these entities may have economic, tax or other business interests or goals that are inconsistent with our business interests or goals, and may be in a position to take actions contrary to our policies or objectives. Such investments may also lead to impasses on major decisions, such as whether or not to sell a property, because neither we nor the other parties to these investments may have full control over the entity. In addition, we may in certain circumstances be liable for the actions of the other parties to these investments. our networks and related systems could disrupt our operations in numerous ways, including by creating difficulties for our tenants that may reflect poorly on us. We may be subject to possible environmental liabilities. We are subject to various Federal, state and local environmental laws, including air and water quality, hazardous or toxic substances and health and safety. These laws can impose liability on current and prior property owners or operators for the costs of removal or remediation of hazardous substances released on a property, even if the property owner was not responsible for, or even aware of, the release of the hazardous substances. Costs resulting from environmental liability could be substantial. The presence of hazardous substances on our properties may also adversely affect occupancy and our ability to sell or borrow against those properties. In addition to the costs of government claims under environmental laws, private plaintiffs may bring claims for personal injury or other reasons. Additionally, various laws impose liability for the costs of removal or remediation of hazardous substances at the disposal or treatment facility. Anyone who arranges for the disposal or treatment of hazardous substances at such a facility is potentially liable under such laws. Although most of our properties have been subject to varying degrees of environmental assessment, many of these assessments are limited in scope and may not include or identify all potential environmental liabilities or risks associated with the property. Identification of new compliance concerns or undiscovered areas of contamination, changes in the extent or known scope of contamination, discovery of additional sites, human exposure to the contamination or changes in cleanup or compliance requirements could result in significant costs to us. We may be adversely affected by natural disasters and the effects of climate change. Natural disasters, including earthquakes, storms and hurricanes, as well as the potential consequences of climate change could adversely impact our properties. Over time, climate change could adversely affect demand for space in our properties or our ability to operate our properties; it could also have indirect effects on our business, including increasing the cost of (or making unavailable) property insurance, increasing the cost of energy and requiring us to expend funds as we seek to repair and protect our properties against such risks. Terrorist attacks may adversely affect the value of our properties, our financial position and cash flows. We have significant investments in properties located in large metropolitan areas or near military installations. Future terrorist attacks could directly or indirectly damage our properties or cause losses that materially exceed our insurance coverage. After such an attack, tenants in these areas may choose to relocate their businesses to areas of the United States that may be perceived to be less likely targets of future terrorist activity, and fewer customers may choose to patronize businesses in these areas. This in turn would trigger a decrease in the demand for space in these areas, which could increase vacancies in our properties and force us to lease space on less favorable terms. We may be subject to other possible liabilities that would adversely affect our financial position and cash flows. Our properties may be subject to other risks related to current or future laws, including laws relating to zoning, construction, fire and life safety requirements and other matters. These laws may require significant property modifications in the future and could result in the levy of fines against us. In addition, although we believe that we adequately insure our properties, we are subject to the risk that our insurance may not cover all of the costs to restore a property that is damaged by a fire or other catastrophic events, including acts of war or, as mentioned above, terrorism. We may be subject to increased costs of insurance and limitations on coverage, particularly regarding acts of terrorism. Our portfolio of properties is insured for losses under our property, casualty and umbrella insurance policies. These policies include coverage for acts of terrorism. Future changes in the insurance industry’s risk assessment approach and pricing structure may increase the cost of insuring our properties and decrease the scope of insurance coverage. Most of our loan agreements contain customary covenants requiring us to maintain insurance. Although we believe that we have adequate insurance coverage for purposes of these agreements, we may not be able to obtain an equivalent amount of coverage at reasonable costs, or at all, in the future. In addition, if lenders insist on greater coverage than we are able to obtain, it could adversely affect our ability to finance and/or refinance our properties and execute our growth strategies. Our business could be adversely affected by a negative audit by the United States Government. Agencies of the United States Government, including the Defense Contract Audit Agency and various agency Inspectors General, routinely audit and investigate government contractors. These agencies review a contractor’s performance under its contracts, cost structure and compliance with applicable laws, regulations, and standards. The United States Government also reviews the adequacy of, and a contractor’s compliance with, its internal control systems and policies. Any costs found to be misclassified may be subject to repayment. If an audit or investigation uncovers improper or illegal activities, we may be subject to civil or criminal penalties and administrative sanctions, including termination of contracts, forfeiture of profits, suspension of payments, fines, and suspension or prohibition from doing business with the United States Government. In addition, we could suffer serious reputational harm if allegations of impropriety were made against us. COPT’s ownership limits are important factors. COPT’s Declaration of Trust limits ownership of its common shares by any single shareholder to 9.8% of the number of the outstanding common shares or 9.8% of the value of the outstanding common shares, whichever is more restrictive. COPT’s Declaration of Trust also limits ownership by any single shareholder of our common and preferred shares in the aggregate to 9.8% of the aggregate value of the outstanding common and preferred shares. We call these restrictions the “Ownership Limit.” COPT’s Declaration of Trust allows our Board of Trustees to exempt shareholders from the Ownership Limit. The Ownership Limit and the restrictions on ownership of our common shares may delay or prevent a transaction or a change of control that might involve a premium price for our common shares/units or otherwise be in the best interest of our equityholders. COPT’s Declaration of Trust includes other provisions that may prevent or delay a change of control. Subject to the requirements of the New York Stock Exchange, our Board of Trustees has the authority, without shareholder approval, to issue additional securities on terms that could delay or prevent a change in control. In addition, our Board of Trustees has the authority to reclassify any of our unissued common shares into preferred shares. Our Board of Trustees may issue preferred shares with such preferences, rights, powers and restrictions as our Board of Trustees may determine, which could also delay or prevent a change in control. The Maryland business statutes impose potential restrictions that may discourage a change of control of our company. Various Maryland laws may have the effect of discouraging offers to acquire us, even if the acquisition would be advantageous to equityholders. Resolutions adopted by our Board of Trustees and/or provisions of our bylaws exempt us from such laws, but our Board of Trustees can alter its resolutions or change our bylaws at any time to make these provisions applicable to us. COPT’s failure to qualify as a REIT would have adverse tax consequences, which would substantially reduce funds available to make distributions to our equityholders. We believe that COPT has qualified for taxation as a REIT for Federal income tax purposes since 1992. We plan for COPT to continue to meet the requirements for taxation as a REIT. Many of these requirements, however, are highly technical and complex. The determination that we are a REIT requires an analysis of various factual matters and circumstances that may not be totally within our control. For example, to qualify as a REIT, at least 95% of COPT’s gross income must come from certain sources that are specified in the REIT tax laws. COPT is also required to distribute to shareholders at least 90% of its annual taxable income. The fact that COPT holds most of its assets through COPLP and its subsidiaries further complicates the application of the REIT requirements. Even a technical or inadvertent mistake could jeopardize COPT’s REIT status. Furthermore, Congress and the Internal Revenue Service might make changes to the tax laws and regulations and the courts might issue new rulings that make it more difficult or impossible for COPT to remain qualified as a REIT. If COPT fails to qualify as a REIT, it would be subject to Federal income tax at regular corporate rates. Also, unless the Internal Revenue Service granted us relief under certain statutory provisions, COPT would remain disqualified as a REIT for four years following the year it first fails to qualify. If COPT fails to qualify as a REIT, it would have to pay significant income taxes and would therefore have less money available for investments or for distributions to our equityholders. In addition, if COPT fails to qualify as a REIT, it will no longer be required to pay distributions to shareholders. As a result of all these factors, COPT’s failure to qualify as a REIT could impair our ability to expand our business and raise capital and would likely have a significant adverse effect on the value of our shares/units. We may be adversely impacted by changes in tax laws. At any time, U.S. federal tax laws or the administrative interpretations of those laws may be changed. We cannot predict whether, when or to what extent new U.S. federal tax laws, regulations, interpretations or rulings will be issued. As a result, changes in U.S. federal tax laws could negatively impact our operating results, financial condition and business operations, and adversely impact our equityholders. Occasionally, changes in state and local tax laws or regulations are enacted that may result in an increase in our tax liability. Shortfalls in tax revenues for states and municipalities may lead to an increase in the frequency and size of such changes. If such changes occur, we may be required to pay additional taxes on our assets, revenue or income. adverse changes in tax laws. We may experience significant losses and harm to our financial condition if financial institutions holding our cash and cash equivalents file for bankruptcy protection. We believe that we maintain our cash and cash equivalents with high quality financial institutions. We have not experienced any losses to date on our deposited cash. However, we may incur significant losses and harm to our financial condition in the future if any of these financial institutions files for bankruptcy protection. (1) This percentage is based upon all rentable square feet or megawatts under lease terms that were in effect as of December 31, 2018. Annualized rental revenue is the monthly contractual base rent as of December 31, 2018 (ignoring free rent then in effect) multiplied by 12, plus the estimated annualized expense reimbursements under existing leases. With regard to properties owned through an unconsolidated real estate joint venture, we include the portion of annualized rental revenue allocable to our ownership interest. We consider annualized rental revenue to be a useful measure for analyzing revenue sources because, since it is point-in-time based, it does not contain increases and decreases in revenue associated with periods in which lease terms were not in effect; historical revenue under generally accepted accounting principles does contain such fluctuations. We find the measure particularly useful for leasing, tenant and segment analysis. Annualized rental revenue per occupied square foot is a property’s annualized rental revenue divided by that property’s occupied square feet as of December 31, 2018. Our computation of annualized rental revenue excludes the effect of lease incentives. The annualized rent per occupied square foot, including the effect of lease incentives, was $29.83 for our total office and data center shell portfolio, $33.31 for the Fort Meade/BW Corridor (our largest Defense/IT Location sub-segment) and $31.37 for our Regional Office portfolio. Represents properties owned through an unconsolidated real estate joint venture. The amounts reported above reflect 100% of the properties’ square footage but only reflect the portion of Annualized Rental Revenue that was allocable to our ownership interest. Includes land, construction, leasing costs and allocated portion of structured parking and other shared infrastructure, if applicable. These properties had occupied square feet in service as of December 31, 2018. Therefore, the properties and their occupied square feet are included in our operating property statistics, including the information set forth on the previous page. This land is owned by the United States Government and is controlled under a long-term, enhanced-use lease to a consolidated joint venture. As this land is developed in the future, the joint venture will execute site-specific leases under the master lease agreement. Rental payments will commence under the site-specific leases as cash rents under tenant leases commence at the respective properties. Refer to definition provided on first page of Item 2 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. With regard to office and data center shell property leases expiring in 2019, we believe that the weighted average annualized rental revenue per occupied square foot for such leases as of December 31, 2018 was, on average, approximately 1% to 3% higher than estimated current market rents for the related space, with specific results varying by market. We are not currently involved in any material litigation nor, to our knowledge, is any material litigation currently threatened against the Company or the Operating Partnership (other than routine litigation arising in the ordinary course of business, substantially all of which is expected to be covered by liability insurance). COPT’s common shares trade on the New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) under the symbol “OFC.” The number of holders of record of COPT’s common shares was 457 as of January 31, 2019. This number does not include shareholders whose shares were held of record by a brokerage house or clearing agency, but does include any such brokerage house or clearing agency as one record holder. There is no established public trading market for COPLP’s partnership units. Quarterly common unit distributions per unit were the same as quarterly common dividends per share declared by COPT. As of January 31, 2019, there were 29 holders of record of COPLP’s common units. During the three months ended December 31, 2018, 8,988 of COPLP’s common units were exchanged for 8,988 COPT common shares in accordance with COPLP’s Second Amended and Restated Limited Partnership Agreement, as amended. The issuance of these common shares was effected in reliance upon the exemption from registration under Section 4(a)(2) of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended. The following tables set forth summary historical consolidated financial and operating data for COPT and COPLP and their respective subsidiaries as of and for each of the years ended December 31, 2014 through 2018. Our revenues relating to real estate operations are derived from rents and property operating expense reimbursements earned from tenant leases on our properties. Most of our expenses relating to our real estate operations take the form of property operating costs (such as real estate taxes, utilities and repairs and maintenance) and depreciation and amortization associated with our operating properties. Most of our profitability from real estate operations depends on our ability to maintain high levels of occupancy and increase rents, which is affected by a number of factors, including, among other things, our tenants’ ability to fulfill their lease obligations and their continuing space needs based on variables such as employment levels, business confidence, competition, general economic conditions of the markets in which we operate and governmental actions and initiatives. You should read the following summary historical financial data in conjunction with the consolidated historical financial statements and notes thereto of COPT and its subsidiaries and COPLP and its subsidiaries and the section of this report entitled “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” for additional information. Reflects gain from sales of properties and unconsolidated real estate joint ventures not associated with discontinued operations. Includes income derived from 31 operating properties disposed in 2013. Reflects a decrease to net income available to common shareholders pertaining to the original issuance costs recognized in connection with the redemption of the Series K Preferred Shares (following shareholder notification of such redemption in December 2016) and Series L Preferred Shares in 2017 and the Series H Preferred Shares in 2014. Basic and diluted earnings per common share are calculated based on amounts attributable to common shareholders of COPT. Amounts reported reflect only operating office and data center shell properties, including six owned through an unconsolidated real estate joint venture. Prior period amounts include retrospective adjustments in connection with our adoption of recent accounting pronouncements in 2018 to: revise the recognition pattern for a gain related to the partial sale of a real estate asset; remove the effect of changes in restricted cash from being reported as either operating or investing activities on our statements of cash flows; and revise the classification of certain cash receipts and cash payments on our statements of cash flows. Refer to the section of Note 2 to the consolidated financial statements entitled “Recent Accounting Pronouncements” for additional information. Reflects a decrease to net income available to common shareholders pertaining to the original issuance costs recognized in connection with the redemption of the Series K Preferred Units (following notification of such redemption in December 2016) and Series L Preferred Units in 2017 and the Series H Preferred Units in 2014. Basic and diluted earnings per common unit are calculated based on amounts attributable to common unitholders of COPLP. You should refer to our consolidated financial statements and the notes thereto and our Selected Financial Data table as you read this section. We undertake no obligation to update or supplement forward-looking statements. near high volume of development space leasing driven primarily by demand for Data Center Shell space. continued strong demand for data center shell space. Data center shells have been a significant growth driver for our Defense/IT Locations in recent years. Development leasing of data center shells totaled 798,000 square feet in 2018, 743,000 square feet in 2017 and 728,000 square feet in 2016. All of this leasing pertained to properties in Northern Virginia, one of the largest data center markets in the world, and represented further expansion of our relationship with an existing tenant. After ending 2017 with our office and data center shell portfolio 93.6% occupied, our highest year-end occupancy since 2005, we ended 2018 with the portfolio 93.0% occupied. This decrease in occupancy was due primarily to the addition in 2018 of unoccupied space in a newly-constructed property targeted for United States Government use that has taken longer than expected to lease. Our Same Properties (defined below) were 93.0% occupied as of December 31, 2018, an increase from 92.1% as of December 31, 2017, with average occupancy of 91.5% in 2018. We had an active year for development activities in 2018, with 688,000 square feet placed in service in six newly-constructed and one redeveloped Defense/IT Location properties, including 514,000 square feet of data center shell space. These properties were 90.3% leased as of December 31, 2018. We also placed into service land that was 100% leased under a long-term contract as of December 31, 2018. As of December 31, 2018, we had ten properties under construction or redevelopment that we estimate will total approximately 1.3 million square feet upon completion, including two partially-operational properties. 992,000 common shares at a weighted average price of $30.46 per share under its existing at-the-market (“ATM”) stock offering program (the “2016 ATM Program”) for net proceeds of $29.8 million. we ended 2018 with $1.82 billion in debt, which was virtually unchanged from year end 2017. While net operating income (“NOI”) from real estate operations, our segment performance measure discussed further below, decreased by approximately $3 million from 2017 to 2018 in total and for our Same Properties, these results varied significantly between our segments. Most notably, and as discussed further in the section below entitled “Results of Operations,” our Same Properties NOI from real estate operations increased $3.7 million for our Defense/IT Locations properties but decreased $5.7 million for our Regional Office properties. Our net income increased $3.7 million from 2017 to 2018, which included: a $12.8 million decrease in impairment losses; offset in part by a $7.6 million decrease in gain on sales of real estate. We discuss significant factors contributing to changes in our net income over the last three years in the section below entitled “Results of Operations.” The results of operations discussion is combined for COPT and COPLP because there are no material differences in the results of operations between the two reporting entities. associated with periods in which lease terms were not in effect; historical revenue under generally accepted accounting principles in the United States of America (“GAAP”) does contain such fluctuations. We find the measure particularly useful for leasing, tenant, segment and industry analysis. exclude, for purposes of amounts reported as of December 31, 2017, a property reported as held for sale that we sold in 2017 subject to our providing a financial guaranty to the buyer under which we indemnified it for up to $20 million in losses it could incur related to a potential defined capital event occurring on the property; our financial guaranty to the buyer expired on October 1, 2018, resulting in no losses to us. Accordingly, we did not recognize the sale of this property for accounting purposes until the expiration of the guaranty on October 1, 2018. Our consolidated financial statements are prepared in accordance with GAAP, which require us to make certain estimates and assumptions. A summary of our significant accounting policies is provided in Note 2 to our consolidated financial statements. The following section is a summary of certain aspects of those accounting policies involving estimates and assumptions that (1) require our most difficult, subjective or complex judgments in accounting for uncertain matters or matters that are susceptible to change and (2) materially affect our reported operating performance or financial condition. It is possible that the use of different reasonable estimates or assumptions in making these judgments could result in materially different amounts being reported in our consolidated financial statements. While reviewing this section, refer to Note 2 to our consolidated financial statements, including terms defined therein. We assess each of our properties and related intangible assets for indicators of impairment quarterly or when circumstances indicate that a property may be impaired. We review our plans and intentions for our development projects and land parcels quarterly. If our analyses indicate that the carrying values of operating properties, properties in development or land held for future development may be impaired, we perform a recovery analysis for such properties. For long-lived assets to be held and used, we analyze recoverability based on the estimated undiscounted future cash flows expected to be generated from the operations and eventual disposition of the assets over, in most cases, a ten-year holding period. If we believe there is a significant possibility that we might dispose of the assets earlier, we analyze recoverability using a probability weighted analysis of the estimated undiscounted future cash flows expected to be generated from the operations and eventual disposition of the assets over the various possible holding periods. If the analysis indicates that the carrying value of a tested property is not recoverable from estimated future cash flows, it is written down to its estimated fair value and an impairment loss is recognized. If and when our plans change, we revise our recoverability analyses to use the cash flows expected from the operations and eventual disposition of each asset using holding periods that are consistent with our revised plans. Property fair values are estimated based on contract prices, indicative bids, discounted cash flow analyses or comparable sales analyses. Estimated cash flows used in such analyses are based on our plans for the property and our views of market and economic conditions. The estimates consider items such as current and future rental rates, occupancies for the tested property and comparable properties, estimated operating and capital expenditures and recent sales data for comparable properties; most of these items are influenced by market data obtained from real estate leasing and brokerage firms and our direct experience with the properties and their markets. Determining the appropriate capitalization or yield rate also requires significant judgment and is typically based on many factors, including the prevailing rate for the market or submarket, as well as the quality and location of the property. Changes in the estimated future cash flows due to changes in our plans for a property (especially our expected holding period), views of market and economic conditions and/or our ability to obtain development rights could result in recognition of impairment losses which could be substantial. as recent sales data for comparable properties and, where applicable, contracts or the results of negotiations with prospective purchasers. These estimates are subject to revision as market conditions, and our assessment of such conditions, change. the timing over which the items are recognized as revenue or expense in our consolidated statements of operations. For example, for allocations to the as-if vacant value, the land portion is not depreciated and the building portion is depreciated over a longer period of time than the other components (generally 40 years). Allocations to above- and below-market leases, in-place lease value and tenant relationship value are amortized over significantly shorter timeframes, and if individual tenants’ leases are terminated early, any unamortized amounts remaining associated with those tenants are written off upon termination. These differences in timing can materially affect our reported results of operations. In addition, we establish lives for tenant relationship values based on our estimates of how long we expect the respective tenants to remain in the properties. As discussed above, a significant portion of our portfolio is leased to the United States Government, and the majority of those leases consist of a series of one-year renewal options, or provide for early termination rights. In addition, certain other leases in our portfolio provide early termination rights to tenants. Applicable accounting guidance requires us to recognize minimum rental payments on a straight-line basis over the terms of each lease and to assess the lease terms as including all periods for which failure to renew, or continue, the lease imposes a penalty on the lessee in such amounts that renewal, or continuation, appears, at the inception of the lease, to be reasonably assured. Factors we consider when determining whether a penalty is significant include the uniqueness of the purpose or location of the property, the availability of a comparable replacement property, the relative importance or significance of the property to the continuation of the lessee’s line of business and the existence of leasehold improvements or other assets whose value would be impaired by the lessee vacating or discontinuing use of the leased property. For virtually all of our leases with the United States Government, we have concluded, based on the factors above, that exercise of existing renewal options, or continuation of such leases without exercising early termination rights, is reasonably assured. Changes in these assessments could result in the write-off of any recorded assets associated with straight-line rental revenue and acceleration of depreciation and amortization expense associated with costs we incurred related to these leases. Most of our leases involve some form of improvements to leased space. When we are required to provide improvements under the terms of a lease, we need to determine whether the improvements constitute landlord assets or tenant assets. If the improvements are landlord assets, we capitalize the cost of the improvements and recognize depreciation expense associated with such improvements over the shorter of the useful life of the assets or the term of the lease and recognize any payments from the tenant as rental revenue over the term of the lease. If the improvements are tenant assets, we defer the cost of improvements funded by us as a lease incentive asset and amortize it as a reduction of rental revenue over the term of the lease. Our determination of whether improvements are landlord assets or tenant assets also may affect when we commence revenue recognition in connection with a lease. In determining whether improvements constitute landlord or tenant assets, we consider numerous factors that may require subjective or complex judgments, including: whether the improvements are unique to the tenant or reusable by other tenants; whether the tenant is permitted to alter or remove the improvements without our consent or without compensating us for any lost fair value; whether the ownership of the improvements remains with us or remains with the tenant at the end of the lease term; and whether the economic substance of the lease terms is properly reflected. Allowances for doubtful accounts and deferred rent receivable are established based on quarterly analyses of the risk of loss on specific accounts. The analyses place particular emphasis on past-due accounts and consider information such as the nature and age of the receivables, the payment history of the tenants, the financial condition of the tenants and our assessment of their ability to meet their lease obligations, the basis for any disputes and the status of related negotiations. Our estimate of the required allowance is subject to revision as these factors change and is sensitive to the effects of economic and market conditions on tenants. Activities we conduct to monitor the credit quality of our tenants include the following: monitoring the timeliness of tenant lease payments; reviewing credit ratings of tenants that are rated by a nationally recognized credit agency prior to such tenants’ entry into leases, and monitoring periodically thereafter; reviewing financial statements of tenants that are publicly available or that are required to be provided to us pursuant to the terms of such tenants’ leases; and monitoring news reports regarding our tenants.
2019-04-22T22:28:55Z
https://q10k.com/OFC
An image processing method of making luminance correction on the basis of a luminance histogram showing luminance level distribution of image data expressing an image by a numerical value. A luminance average value, a luminance standard deviation, and a peak distance in the luminance histogram are obtained. A distribution discrimination value which can discriminate whether the luminance level distribution is deviated on the low/high luminance side in the histogram is compared with the peak distance. A halftone presence/absence discrimination value which can discriminate whether the luminance distribution is not deviated in the halftone in the luminance histogram is compared with the standard deviation. A backlight image is discriminated by the comparison results. An exposing state of an image other than a backlight image is discriminated by using an exposing state discrimination value. The proper luminance correction is made in accordance with the exposing state. The above and other objects and features of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description and the appended claims with reference to the accompanying drawings. FIG. 27 is a luminance histogram having a plurality of peaks on the high luminance side. FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a construction of an image processing apparatus 10 for executing the foregoing image correcting process. The image processing apparatus 10 comprises: an RGB bitmap holding unit 11 which copies and holds an RGB bitmap image of an address indicated by a pointer on the basis of the pointer included in the draw command which is outputted from the OS; an XYZ color space converting unit 12 which converts RGB values held in the RGB bitmap holding unit 11 into values of an XYZ calorimetric system of CIE (International Commission on Illumination); an XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 which holds the XYZ values of CIE converted by the XYZ color space converting unit 12; an arithmetic operation processing unit 14 which forms a histogram of a luminance value Y on the basis of the XYZ bitmap held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 and calculates a luminance average value, a luminance standard deviation, luminance peaks, and a distance between the luminance peaks as a luminance peak distance on the basis of the histogram; a luminance information holding unit 15 which holds the various values calculated by the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 as luminance information; an exposure discriminating unit 16 which discriminates an exposing state of the image by comparing the luminance information held in the luminance information holding unit 15 by using a predetermined value and stores a result of the discrimination into the luminance information holding unit 15; a correction processing unit 17 which makes luminance correction in accordance with the exposing state discriminated by the exposure discriminating unit 16; an RGB color space converting unit 18 which converts the XYZ values of CIE corrected by the correction processing unit 17 into RGB values; and a correction RGB bitmap holding unit 19 which holds the RGB values converted by the RGB color space converting unit 18. The arithmetic operation processing unit 14 comprises: a luminance average value obtaining unit 31 which obtains a luminance average value in the histogram; a luminance standard deviation obtaining unit 32 which obtains a luminance standard deviation indicative of a degree of dispersion of luminance distribution in the histogram from the luminance average value; and a peak distance obtaining unit 33 which obtains a peak distance showing the distance between the peaks in the histogram. The operation of the image processing apparatus 10 will now be described with reference to a flowchart of FIG. 3. A pointer included in the draw command which is outputted from the OS indicates an address of the image data comprising a plurality of pixels such as graphic data, image data, or the like. A bitmap image of the RGB colorimetric system of the address is copied and held in the RGB bitmap holding unit 11 (step S1). With respect to each pixel of the image data held in the RGB bitmap holding unit 11, the RGB values are converted into values of the XYZ colorimetric system of CIE by a conventionally well-known method (step S2). By color-space converting the RGB values into the XYZ values, the luminance of the image data is shown by the Y value. The converted XYZ values of CIE are held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. By a luminance correcting process, which will be explained hereinafter, correction regarding the luminance is executed to the image data of the XYZ colorimetric system held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. After that, the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 forms a luminance histogram based on the Y value of the image data converted into the XYZ values of CIE held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 (step S3). The luminance histogram is degree distribution in which the luminance signal level is shown by 256 gradations in a range from 0 to 255 and each pixel is made to correspond to those gradations. The peak distance obtaining unit 33 of the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 calculates a distance between the peaks of the histogram on the basis of the formed luminance histogram (step S4). Further, the luminance average value obtaining unit 31 of the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 calculates a luminance average value showing an average value in the formed luminance histogram on the basis of this histogram. The luminance standard deviation obtaining unit 32 calculates the luminance standard deviation indicative of the degree of dispersion of the luminance distribution in the luminance average value by the conventionally well-known method (step S5). Unlike the conventional average value in the peak area, the luminance average value which is calculated in the invention is the average value of the luminance in the histogram, that is, the average value of the luminance values in all pixels. Various values calculated by the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 are held as luminance information into the luminance information holding unit 15. After that, the exposure discriminating unit 16 discriminates the exposing state of the image data on the basis of the luminance information held in the luminance information holding unit 15 and luminance correction is made in accordance with a result of the discrimination (step S6). The operation of the exposure discriminating unit 16 will now be described with reference to a flowchart of FIG. 1. With reference to the luminance standard deviation and the peak distance held in the luminance information holding unit 15, the exposure discriminating unit 16 compares a distribution discrimination value which can discriminate whether a distribution deviation of the luminance levels exists on the low luminance side and the high luminance side in the luminance histogram or not with the obtained peak distance and compares a halftone presence/absence discrimination value which can discriminate whether the distribution deviation of the luminance levels does not exist in the halftone in the luminance histogram or not with the obtained standard deviation. In the embodiment, as an example of the distribution discrimination value and the halftone presence/absence discrimination value which are used for the comparison, (the luminance standard deviation>80) and (the peak distance>192) are used (step S101). In this discrimination, if it is discriminated that (the luminance standard deviation>80) and (the 3-large-peak maximum distance>192), as shown in FIG. 24, it is determined that the photographed image is an image obtained by photographing an object in what is called a backlight situation or a strobo-photographed image at night in which although the luminance signal level is distributed in the whole luminance histogram, there is a deviation in the distribution of the luminance histogram and there is no halftone in the luminance histogram (hereinafter, the backlight image and the strobo-photographed image at night are simply referred to as backlight images) (step S 115). The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S 115 is referred to as a backlight process. In step S 101 of the flowchart of FIG. 1 again, if the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance standard deviation>80) and (the 3-large-peak maximum distance>192) are not satisfied, that is, the image data is not the backlight image nor the strobo-image photographed at night, the luminance average value held in the luminance information holding unit 15 is referred to and compared with the discrimination value of the exposing state. In the embodiment, the value showing (the luminance average value<96) is used as an exposing state discrimination value (step S102). If the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines in step S102 that (the luminance average value<96), whether (the luminance standard deviation<80) or not is subsequently discriminated (step S103). By this discrimination, whether the luminance distribution is not dispersed but converged to a region near the luminance average value on the low luminance side or not is discriminated. When the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance standard deviation<80), as shown in FIG. 20, in the luminance histogram, there is a deviation in dispersion of the luminance distribution and the dispersion is largely deviated to the low luminance side (step S108). That is, the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that the image data is image data of the strong under-exposure. The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S108 is referred to as a process of the large under-exposure. On the contrary, if the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance standard deviation<80) is not satisfied, as shown in FIG. 21, it is determined that in the luminance histogram, there is a deviation in the luminance distribution and the distribution is medium-deviated to the low luminance side (step S109). That is, the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that the image data is image data of the under-exposure. The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S109 is referred to as a process of the medium under-exposure. Returning to step S102, if the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance average value<96) is not satisfied, whether (the luminance average value>160) or not is subsequently discriminated (step S104). In step S 104, if the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance average value>160), whether (the luminance standard deviation<80) or not is subsequently discriminated (step S105). By this discrimination, whether the luminance distribution is not dispersed but converged to a region near the luminance average value on the high luminance side or not is discriminated. When the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance standard deviation<80), as shown in FIG. 22, in the luminance histogram, there is a deviation in luminance distribution and the distribution is largely deviated to the high luminance side (step S114). That is, the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that the image data is image data of the strong over-exposure. The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S 114 is referred to as a process of the large over-exposure. On the contrary, if the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the standard deviation<80) is not satisfied, as shown in FIG. 23, it is determined that in the luminance histogram, there is a deviation in the luminance distribution and the distribution is medium-deviated to the high luminance side (step S113). That is, the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that the image data is image data of the over-exposure. The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S 113 is referred to as a process of the medium over-exposure. Returning to step S 104, if the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance average value>160) is not satisfied, whether (the luminance average value<128) or not is subsequently discriminated (step S106). If the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance average value<128), it is determined that in the luminance histogram, there is a deviation in the luminance distribution and the distribution is slightly deviated to the low luminance side (step S110). That is, the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that the image data is image data of the slight under-exposure. The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S 110 is referred to as a process of the small under-exposure. On the other hand, if the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance average value<128) is not satisfied, whether (the luminance average value>132) or not is subsequently discriminated (step S107). In this discrimination as well, in a manner similar to the discrimination of the under-exposure in step S 106 mentioned above, whether the average value in the luminance histogram is equal to or slightly larger than the intermediate value or not is discriminated with respect to the image data which is supposed to be the image in the standard exposure. That is, whether the luminance histogram in the image data is slightly deviated to the over-exposure side or not is discriminated. If the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance average value>132), it is determined that in the luminance histogram, there is a deviation in the luminance distribution and the distribution is slightly deviated to the high luminance side (step S112). That is, the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that the image data is image data of the slight over-exposure. The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S 112 is referred to as a process of the small over-exposure. If the exposure discriminating unit 16 determines that (the luminance average value>132) is not satisfied, it is determined that the image data is image data which does not correspond to any of the backlight, the under-exposure of three gradations, and the over-exposure of three gradations and in which there is no deviation in the luminance histogram, that is, the image data of the standard exposure (step S111). The luminance correcting process subsequent to step S 111 is referred to as a process of the standard exposure. Returning to the flowchart of FIG. 3, the operation of the image processing apparatus will be subsequently explained. After the various discriminating processes were executed in the exposure discriminating unit 16, various luminance correcting processes corresponding to discrimination results are executed in the correction processing unit 17. The luminance correcting process is a process for correcting the luminance of the image data in accordance with the exposing state. Prior to the correcting process, parameters such as a correction coefficient and the like are held in the luminance information holding unit 15 in accordance with the correction contents and the luminance of the image data is corrected by using the parameters (step S7). The image data corrected in the correction processing unit 17 is held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. Subsequently, the RGB color space converting unit 18 converts a bitmap image of the XYZ calorimetric system of CIE held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 into RGB values by the conventionally well-known method (step S8). The bitmap data converted into the RGB values is held as corrected bitmap data in the correction RGB bitmap holding unit 19. To form a raster image into the RGB 24-bit page memory, the printer driver develops (rasterizes) the corrected bitmap data held in the correction RGB bitmap holding unit 19 of the image processing apparatus 10 into the RGB 24-bit page memory. A branching process based on the discrimination result about the exposing state of the image data by the exposure discriminating unit 16, that is, the correcting process which is executed to the image data by the correction processing unit 17 will now be described. The correcting process in the large under-exposure in step S 108 and the correcting process in the medium under-exposure in step S109 will now be described with reference to FIG. 8. The process in the large over-exposure in step S 114 and the process in the medium over-exposure in step S113 will now be described with reference to FIG. 9. A luminance correcting process (backlight process) to the image data which has been determined to be the image in the backlight in step S 115 in FIG. 1 will now be described. When the input Y=0, the inclination (linear differentiation of the equation (5)) satisfies the inclination (linear differentiation of the equation (3)) a 0 of the linear equation of the dark range. When the input Y=255, the inclination (linear differentiation of the equation (5)) satisfies the inclination (linear differentiation of the equation (4)) a 1 of the linear equation of the bright range. The correcting process to the image data which has been determined to be the image of the small under-exposure in step S 110, the image of the standard exposure in step S110, and the image of the small over-exposure in step S112 in FIG. 1 are shown in FIG. 11 and will now be described with reference to FIG. 11. As mentioned above, according to the image processing apparatus 10 of the invention, in the histogram showing the luminance of the image data, whether the image data is image data obtained by the photographing in the backlight, the strobo-photographing, or the like is discriminated on the basis of the peak distance which can discriminate that the peak areas are away from each other and the luminance standard deviation which can discriminate the presence or absence of the peak area in the halftone. After the discrimination about the backlight, the strobo-photographing, or the like was made, the discrimination about the image data of the under-exposure, the over-exposure, and the standard exposure is made on the basis of the luminance average value and the luminance standard deviation. Therefore, the exposing state can be properly discriminated also with respect to the image data shown by the luminance histogram in which a plurality of peak areas are deviated. Further, according to the image processing apparatus 10 of the invention, the proper luminance correction can be made to the image data on the basis of the result which has properly been discriminated. It has been known that if correction is made to an image which was artificially formed, picture quality deteriorates contrarily. An image processing apparatus 100 having an artificial image discriminating unit which discriminates whether the image is an artificially formed image or not in order to prevent the correction to the artificially formed image will now be described. FIG. 13 is a block diagram showing the image processing apparatus 100 according to the embodiment 2. The image processing apparatus 100 comprises: the RGB bitmap holding unit 11; the XYZ color space converting unit 12 which converts the RGB values into the values of the XYZ colorimetric system of CIE; the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 which holds the values of the XYZ calorimetric system of CIE; the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 which forms the histogram of the luminance value Y on the basis of the XYZ bitmap held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 and calculates the luminance average value, the luminance standard deviation, the luminance peaks, and the luminance peak distance on the basis of the histogram; the luminance information holding unit 15 which holds the various values calculated by the arithmetic operation processing unit 14; the exposure discriminating unit 16 which discriminates the exposing state on the basis of the information held in the luminance information holding unit 15; the correction processing unit 17 which makes the correction according to the exposing state discriminated by the exposure discriminating unit 16; the RGB color space converting unit 18 which converts the values of the XYZ colorimetric system of CIE corrected by the correction processing unit 17 into the RGB values; and the correction RGB bitmap holding unit 19 which holds the converted RGB values. Further, the image processing apparatus 100 comprises an artificial image discriminating unit 20 which discriminates whether the image is an artificially formed image or not on the basis of the bitmap shown by the values of the XYZ calorimetric system of CIE held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. A discrimination result of the artificial image discriminating unit 20 is held as artificial image discrimination information into the luminance information holding unit 15. The exposure discriminating unit 16 does not execute the discriminating process of the exposing state to the artificially formed image with reference to the artificial image discrimination information. The correction processing unit 17 does not execute the luminance correction to the artificially formed image data. The operation of the image processing apparatus 100 in the embodiment 2 will now be described with reference to a flowchart of FIG. 14. A pointer included in a command which is outputted from the OS indicates an address of the image data comprising a plurality of pixels such as graphic data, image data, or the like. The bitmap image of the RGB colorimetric system existing in the address is copied and held in the RGB bitmap holding unit 11 (step S11). The XYZ color space converting unit 12 converts each pixel of the image data held in the RGB bitmap holding unit 11 into the values of the XYZ color space of CIE by the conventional well-known method (step S12). The converted XYZ values of CIE are held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. Correction is made to the Y values regarding the luminance of the image data of the XYZ calorimetric system held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 by a process, which will be explained hereinafter. The arithmetic operation processing unit 14 forms a histogram, as a luminance histogram, based on the Y value of the image data converted into the XYZ values of CIE held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 (step S13). The arithmetic operation processing unit 14 calculates the distance between the peaks of the histogram on the basis of the formed luminance histogram in a manner similar to the foregoing embodiment 1 (step S14). Further, the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 calculates a luminance average value showing the average value in the formed luminance histogram and a luminance standard deviation showing a degree of dispersion of the luminance distribution from the luminance average value on the basis of such a histogram by the conventionally well-known method (step S15). The various values calculated in the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 are held as luminance information into the luminance information holding unit 15. At this time, the artificial image discriminating unit 20 discriminates whether the target image data is the artificially formed data or not on the basis of the XYZ values of CIE held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. A discrimination result is held in the luminance information holding unit 15. The operation of the artificial image discriminating unit 20 will now be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 15 which is used for explanation of the artificial image discriminating unit 20 shows an array of luminance values of each pixel in image data of a natural image such as scenery, portrait, still life, or the like. FIG. 16 shows an array of luminance values of each pixel in artificially formed image data such as graphics or the like. The artificial image discriminating unit 20 calculates a difference between luminance values of a predetermined pixel (hereinafter, referred to as a target pixel) of the image data as a discrimination target and the pixel just before such a pixel. Thus, in the artificially formed image data such as graphics or the like, since the change in luminance value is generally smaller than that of the image data of the natural image such as scenery, portrait, still life, or the like, for example, 0.6 is used as a threshold value. The image data in which the threshold value is less than 0.6 is determined to be the artificially formed image data such as graphics or the like. On the other hand, the image data in which the threshold value is equal to or larger than 0.6 is determined to be the image data such as a natural image or the like. The discrimination result is sent as artificial image discrimination information from the artificial image discriminating unit 20 to the luminance information holding unit 15 and held therein. Returning to the flowchart of FIG. 14, subsequently, the operation of the image processing apparatus 100 will be described. On the basis of the information held in the luminance information holding unit 15, the exposure discriminating unit 16 discriminates whether the target image data has artificially been formed or not (step S16). If it is determined to be the artificially formed image data, the image data is not corrected but the bitmap image of the XYZ colorimetric system held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 is converted into the RGB values by the RGB color space converting unit 18 by the conventionally well-known method. On the contrary, if it is determined that the image data is not the artificially formed image data, that is, it is the image data of the natural image, the exposure discriminating unit 16 discriminates the exposing state in a manner similar to the foregoing embodiment 1 (step S17). After that, the luminance correction based on the discrimination result is made by the correction processing unit 17 and the luminance of the image data is corrected in accordance with the exposing state (step S18). The image data corrected by the correction processing unit 17 is held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. Subsequently, the RGB color space converting unit 18 converts the bitmap image of the XYZ calorimetric system held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 into the RGB values by the conventionally well-known method (step S19). The bitmap data converted into the RGB values is held as correction bitmap data into the correction RGB bitmap holding unit 19. The data held in the holding unit 19 is outputted in response to a request of the printer driver. As mentioned above, according to the image processing apparatus 100 of the invention, in addition to such an effect that the exposing state of the image data is properly discriminated and the luminance can be properly corrected on the basis of the discrimination result, by providing the artificial image discriminating unit which discriminates the artificially formed image data, the artificial image and the natural image are identified. Therefore, the luminance correction to the image data identified to be the artificial image can be prevented. Thus, the risk that the picture quality of the artificially formed image data is deteriorated due to the luminance correction can be prevented. Since each of the banded bitmap image data is inherently the same image, there is a risk that if the correction of the luminance value is made to each of the divided image data, a connecting portion of each image data called a band becomes conspicuous due to the luminance correction. A same image discriminating unit 24 which discriminates whether the bitmap image data as image data that is sequentially inputted is the same image or not is provided for an image processing apparatus 200 according to the embodiment 3 in order to prevent the foregoing inconvenience. FIG. 17 is a block diagram showing a construction of the image processing apparatus 200 in the embodiment 3. The image processing apparatus 200 comprises: the RGB bitmap holding unit 11; the XYZ color space converting unit 12 which converts the RGB values into the values of the XYZ calorimetric system of CIE; the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 which holds the XYZ values of CIE; the artificial image discriminating unit 20 which discriminates whether the image data is the artificially formed image data or not on the basis of the Y value showing the luminance of the XYZ values of CIE; the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 which forms the histogram of the luminance value Y on the basis of the XYZ values of CIE and calculates the luminance average value, the luminance standard deviation, and the luminance peak distance on the basis of the histogram; the luminance information holding unit 15 which holds the values calculated by the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 as luminance information; the exposure discriminating unit 16 which discriminates the exposing state on the basis of the luminance information; the correction processing unit 17 which makes the correction according to the exposing state; the RGB color space converting unit 18 which converts the corrected XYZ values of CIE into the RGB values; and the correction RGB bitmap holding unit 19 which holds the converted RGB values. Further, the image processing apparatus 200 comprises: an image input control unit 21 which controls image data that is inputted; an image data storing unit 22 which stores the image data that is inputted; a management table holding unit 23 which holds a management table that is formed by control of the image input control unit 21; the same image discriminating unit 24 which discriminates whether the image data inputted and the image data inputted just before the data are the same image data or not; an image data synthesizing unit 25 which synthesizes the image data which was determined to be the same image data; and an image output control unit 26 which controls the image data to be outputted. The image management table held in the management table holding unit 23 will now be described. Values of the vertical dimension and the lateral dimension of the image data in the image management table are set by the image input control unit 21. 1 or 0 is set into the same image discrimination flag on the basis of the discrimination result of the same image discriminating unit 24. The same image discriminating unit 24 discriminates whether the image data shown by the pointer inputted at present and the image data shown by the pointer inputted previously are what is called the same banded image or not. If they are the same image, 1 is set into the same image discrimination flag. If they are not the same image, 0 is set into the same image discrimination flag. Further, when the same image discriminating unit 24 determines that they are not the same image, 1 is set into the process start flag of the data inputted before this discrimination. 1 or 0 is set into the process start flag on the basis of the discrimination result in the image input control unit 21. When no value is shown in the pointer indicative of the image data inputted to the image input control unit 21, that is, the image input control unit 21 determines that the data just before is the end of the banded image data, and 1 is set into all process start flag before the data just before it is determined to be the end of the banded image data. Each data corresponding to indices in which 1 has been set into the process start flag is synthesized by the image data synthesizing unit 25 by processes, which will be explained hereinlater. The image management table is cleared by the image output control unit 26. In the clearing process, the image data in which the process start flag is equal to 1 is erased, a new index is added again to the residual image data, and 1 is set into the same image discrimination flag. The operation of the image processing apparatus 200 in the embodiment 3 will now be described with reference to a flowchart of FIG. 18. A pointer showing the image data to be processed is inputted to the image input control unit 21 (step S21). The image input control unit 21 confirms the presence or absence of the contents of the pointer (step S22). If the contents shown by the pointer do not exist (when NULL as a terminal symbol is shown), the image input control unit 21 determines that the image just before it is the final image of the image data to be processed. 1 is set into all process start flags in the image management table. After that, a process for synthesizing the image data is executed in step S24, which will be explained hereinafter. On the other hand, if the address of the image data to be processed is shown by the pointer, the bitmap image of the RGB colorimetric system of the address shown by the pointer is copied and held in the image data storing unit 22. After that, the same image discriminating unit 24 discriminates whether an absolute value of a difference between the first line of the image data inputted at present and the final line of the image data inputted previously lies within a predetermined threshold value or not. This discrimination is made on the basis of such a principle that the series of image data which is banded by the first line of the image inputted at present and the final line of the image inputted previously does not extremely change in the banding position. When the difference absolute value in the banding position lies within a range of the predetermined threshold value, the same image discriminating unit 24 determines that the data is the series of image data and, if it is out of the range of the predetermined threshold value, the same image discriminating unit 24 determines that the data is the data having no association (step S23). If the same image discriminating unit 24 determines that the data is the series of image data, it sets 1 into the same image discrimination flag. The processing routine is again returned to step S21 and the input of the pointer is continuously received until the terminal symbol NULL is detected. If the same image discriminating unit 24 determines that the data is the image data having no association, it sets 0 into the same image discrimination flag of the image which was inputted this time and sets 1 into the process start flag of the image inputted before then. After that, the image data synthesizing unit 25 reads out the images corresponding to the indices in which the process start discrimination flag in the image management table is equal to 1 and the same image discrimination flag inputted until the previous time is equal to 1 from the image data storing unit 22 and sequentially synthesizes them (step S24). The synthesized bitmap image of the RGB calorimetric system is held in the RGB bitmap holding unit 11. With respect to each pixel of the image data held in the RGB bitmap holding unit 11, the RGB values are converted into values of the XYZ color space of CIE by a conventionally well-known method (step S25). The converted XYZ values of CIE are held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. By a process, which will be explained hereinafter, correction is made to the Y value regarding the luminance of the image data of the XYZ calorimetric system held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. After that, the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 forms a histogram, as a luminance histogram, based on the Y value of the image data converted into the XYZ values of CIE held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 (step S26). The arithmetic operation processing unit 14 calculates a distance between the peaks of the histogram on the basis of the formed luminance histogram (step S27). Further, on the basis of the formed luminance histogram, the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 calculates a luminance average value showing an average value in such a histogram and a luminance standard deviation showing a degree of dispersion of the luminance distribution from the luminance average value by the conventionally well-known method (step S28). The various values calculated in the arithmetic operation processing unit 14 are held as luminance information into the luminance information holding unit 15. The luminance information holding unit 15 holds the result of the discrimination made by the artificial image discriminating unit 20 regarding whether the image data to be processed is the artificially formed data or not on the basis of the XYZ values of CIE held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13. On the basis of the information held in the luminance information holding unit 15, the exposure discriminating unit 16 discriminates whether the target image data has artificially been formed or not (step S29). If it is determined that the target image data is the artificially formed image data, the image data is not corrected but the bitmap image of the XYZ colorimetric system held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 is converted into the RGB values by the RGB color space converting unit 18 by the conventionally well-known method. On the contrary, if it is determined that the image data is not the artificially formed image data, the exposure discriminating unit 16 discriminates the exposing state (step S30). After that, the luminance correction based on the discrimination result is made by the correction processing unit 17 and the luminance of the image data is corrected in accordance with the exposing state (step S31). Subsequently, the RGB color space converting unit 18 converts the bitmap image of the XYZ colorimetric system held in the XYZ bitmap holding unit 13 into the RGB values by the conventionally well-known method (step S32). The converted RGB values are held in the correction RGB bitmap holding unit 19. The data held in the holding unit 19 is outputted on the basis of the control of the image output control unit in response to the request of the printer driver. At this time, to clear the image management table, the image output control unit erases the image data in which the process start flag is equal to 1, adds a new index again to the residual image data, and sets 1 into the same image discrimination flag (step S 33). After that, whether the image to be processed remains in the image management table or not is discriminated (step S 34). By this discrimination, when there is an image which is not processed yet, the processing routine is returned to the process of step S21 and processes similar to those mentioned above are executed until the image which is not processed yet is extinguished. As mentioned above, according to the image processing apparatus 200 of the invention, by adding the process for the banded image data, the series of divided image data is processed in a lump. Therefore, a plurality of image data in the same image are individually processed and the risk that the picture quality deteriorates can be prevented. comparing said luminance average value with an exposing state discrimination value which can discriminate the exposing state, thereby discriminating whether said image data is data of an image other than the backlight image or not. comparing each of said luminance average value and said luminance standard deviation by using an exposing state discrimination value which can discriminate the exposing state, thereby discriminating an exposing state of an image other than the backlight image. 3. The image processing method according to claim 2, wherein in said image process, luminance correction according to a backlight process to the backlight image, an under-exposure process to an under-exposure image, an over-exposure process to an over-exposure image, and a standard exposure process to a standard exposure image is made in accordance with the exposing state of said image. 4. The image processing method according to claim 2, wherein in said under-exposure process, in a histogram of said under-exposure image, said histogram is stretched in accordance with the histogram of said under-exposure image so as to shift the luminance average value existing on the low luminance side toward a predetermined value of said histogram. 5. The image processing method according to claim 3, wherein in said over-exposure process, in a histogram of said over-exposure image, said histogram is stretched in accordance with the histogram of said over-exposure image so as to shift the luminance average value existing on the high luminance side toward a predetermined value of said histogram. 6. The image processing method according to claim 3, wherein in said standard exposure process, in a histogram of said standard exposure image, the luminance average value is shifted toward a predetermined value in accordance with said histogram. 7. The image processing method according to claim 3, wherein in said backlight process, a histogram of said backlight image is divided into halves, the histogram on said low luminance side is stretched in accordance with the histogram of said backlight image so as to shift the luminance average value existing on the low luminance side toward a predetermined value, and the histogram on said high luminance side is stretched in accordance with the histogram of said backlight image so as to shift the luminance average value existing on the high luminance side toward said predetermined value. 8. The image processing method according to claim 6, wherein in said backlight process, contacts where the histogram on said low luminance side and the histogram on said high luminance side have been respectively stretched are smoothly shown by using a three-dimensional function. 9. The image processing method according to any one of claims 4 to 7, wherein said predetermined value is an intermediate value in the histogram. 10. The image processing method according to claim 2, wherein prior to discriminating said exposing state, whether said image data is artificially formed image data or not is discriminated, and if it is determined that said image data is the artificially formed image data, the luminance correction is not made to said image data. 11. The image processing method according to claim 2, wherein if it is determined that said image data is a part of a series of image data constructed by a plurality of data, said image process is executed to the image data obtained by collecting a series of image data. a correction processing unit which makes the luminance correction on the basis of a result of the discrimination of said exposure discriminating unit. and wherein when it is determined by said artificial image discriminating unit that said image data is the artificially formed image data, said correction processing unit does not make the luminance correction to said image data. and wherein if said same image discriminating unit determines that said image data is same banded image data, said image process is executed to the image data obtained by collecting a series of image data.
2019-04-25T02:16:48Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20040184673A1/en
When I was younger I’d sit down in front of the TV for entire days sometimes, watching TV or playing Nintendo. I noticed if I did it for around six hours or more I’d feel particularly bad. Despite knowing this from experience, I have to say that I’m still a bit shocked at the data that’s come out about just how bad sitting down is for you. You could say that the obesity epidemic in Western countries (Australia is the 6th fattest country, America is first, you can see the obesity ranking statistics here) is caused not just by the amount of processed, fatty, salty, sugary foods available in extra large portions, but also because we sit down all day. That’s a dangerous combination. Why? Because you put all this junk into your body, then by sitting down for long periods you switch your body off from doing anything with it. The two pictures above are from an infographic that contains confronting data about how sitting down for long periods is one of the most dangerous changes brought about by modern human life. Check out the full infographic from medicalbillingandcoding.org for more scary data and some suggestions on how to reduce your risk. I can’t recall where I first saw the idea of using a desk that you stand up at, it was probably a blogger who made the switch and wrote about it, but I do remember who finally swayed me to make the change myself. I was studying Eben Pagan’s “Wake Up Productive” productivity course. During one of the modules Eben talked about stand up desks and why they are more effective. Shortly after this I went down to Ikea and bought myself my first stand up table. I have used it ever since. Don’t You Get Tired Standing Up All Day? People who have not used a stand up desk before often wonder how someone can stand at a desk for eight hours a day to do work. Of course if I was standing up for eight hours straight, then yes I would get tired. These people are coming from the frame of reference of the full time employee, where it’s natural and expected that you stay at your desk for the majority of your time at work. As an independent entrepreneur, I have the wonderful freedom of structuring my work day how I like. This is actually a very important point when it comes to a stand up desk, because spending more than two hours in a row at my desk will tire your out. A quick aside – one of the other concepts I picked up from Eben, who I believe learned it from Tony Schwartz, is the concept of the Ultradian Rhythm. The descriptive term ultradian is used in sleep research in reference to the 90–120 minute cycling of the sleep stages during human sleep. The body has two hour rhythms of energy flow, so it makes sense to work in harmony with these cycles. Even before I heard of the Ultradian Rhythm I have always worked in roughly two hour blocks. Actually, it’s more accurate to say I “live” in two-hour blocks. I generally get hungry two hours after last eating. I tend to get bored after two hours of doing the same thing. I can exercise for two hours before I completely tire out. I like to socialise for two hours before I want to do something else. I like living life in short blocks, with rapid change of format. This is what I call balance. The Ultradian Rhythm just happens to back this up from a physiological standpoint. As an entrepreneur who has the freedom to work in harmony with my two-hour cycles, I never have to work for eight hours at my stand up desk. I work for one or two hours at a time, take breaks, walk off to cook food, sit on the couch, listen to music, have a nap – I mix it up every day. Most people can’t do this at their work place, but since you’re likely an entrepreneur if you read this blog, you have more freedom in your life, or are at least working towards it. It’s because of this that you are the perfect candidate for a stand up desk. Even if you have a full time job, given the data on the risks with sitting down, now is a good time to think about convincing whomever you need to about having stand up desks available at work, or at the very least, changing how you work so you don’t sit down for long uninterrupted periods. I used to have a sore back and shoulders on a regular basis, especially during the late 90s and early 2000s, when I was just starting online. I’m pretty confident it was because I’d spend 10+ hours in a chair, staring at a screen, hunched over. I pushed my body because my mind wanted to keep working. It loves the feeling of being productive, even to the detriment of the body. The only time I sit down for long periods is when I head to cafes to write or when watching a movie or tv show. I like the environment of a cafe when focused only on writing, but of course I won’t spend longer than two hours doing it, so it fits the usual rhythm. Back when I used to work in a chair at a desk, I often found myself “trapped”. I’d get so lazy that I could spend hours staring at the screen, often doing no productive work. The world wide web is a great procrastination tool after all. These are some of the health benefits from a stand up desk, which in turn will make you more productive when it comes to work output. If your body is kept in better condition, then naturally you can produce more without tiring out. It’s win-win for your health and your business. The image to the right is my home office stand up desk. It’s nothing fancy, just an Ikea table top (VIKA AMON) and legs (mine are similar to VIKA KAJ), and some shoeboxes to prop up my monitor (30in Apple Cinema Display). My Macbook pro 13in retina plugs into the monitor and I have Altec Lansing speakers and a sub-woofer for music. The microphone you can see in the picture is a Snowball by Blue, which I use for podcast interviews and voice-only audio recordings. Oh, and let’s not forget the trusty yoga mat to stand on. This is really important, make sure you have something cushioning your feet. Make sure you watch my youtube video about my stand up desk for more footage of my desk at home. The video also includes further details about why I made the change to a stand up desk, what table top and legs you can purchase from Ikea to set up your own stand up desk for under $100, and some shots of my current stand up desk set up. Watch to the end of the video and you will find two funny outtakes from making the video. I hope that’s more than enough information to get you started. I’d like to thank my french friend, Alexis from Nouvelomme.fr (New Man), who had a great post on stand up desks, otherwise known as “travailler-debout”. I may have stolen a few of his pictures for this blog post. Would You Like To Triple Your Productivity? I hope this blog post has inspired you to consider a stand-up desk for your office, or at least keeps you from sitting down for too long. Only sitting is really not an option. Awesome, informative post! A co-worker and I just started this at work, and so far I love it. It isn’t 100% setup the way that I want it, because currently the desk is about 6 inches too far down, but that will be corrected next week, and I’m excited for that. And here is a picture of it! Great idea-think i am ok now-but nice to know for the future!. Sitting does my back no good. Have a great day! I actually work at a job where I stand all day. That includes any work on the computer as well. It was a bit to get used to, but once I did, I didn’t have the same problems as people who sat all day. We just switched to iPads so I’m curious how that will change things. This is awesome, I think I’m gonna design my own stand up desk too.. good info and nice video too.. A great post, Yaro! I’ve been wanting to set up a stand desk for a long time but not yet. Although I still don’t use it as much as I hoped to and still plan to (my hope was/is to use it for several hours a day :)), I do use it whenever I watch movies, which is several times a week (I don’t have TV, so watch movies on my MacBook Pro instead, so I just place my laptop on the FitDesk). What a great idea, thank you for sharing Olga. Yaro, a very helpful post, thanks. Excellent in depth and well-thought-out article! The dangers of chronic sitting and the poor postural habits that accompany it are becoming well-documented by this point. I think the idea of standing while working with computers is the single best step towards healthy living these days. Just the low-level activity of standing, shifting your weight, walking about, and other subtle movements are so important for the intrinsic muscles of the spine, the proper function of the lymph system, the venous return to the heart, and other body systems. Great article. Thanks for sharing. Check out http://www.johnson-family-chiropractic.com/1/post/2012/12/standing-while-you-work.html for some of my other thoughts on the subject. This blog couldn’t have happened at a more opportune time. My blog is about a lot of things for the woman over 50 and health is a huge part of my message. So, in my research, I have run into so many blogs about the dangers of sitting for long periods of time. It has become a large concern for me because there have been times when I’ve been involved in researching and writing an article and haven’t moved from my chair in 8-9 hours. Am getting started on the stand-up desk immediately. Thanks, so many time you seem to be reading my mind about what to write on your blog. Thanks for all the help. I’m shocked by some of those stats, you’ve left me seriously considering getting a stand up too! I have been thinking of adding a stand up desk for years. Maybe to dip my toe in the water, I can just get a stand up table, and use it when I work on the laptop. I switch back and forth from the desktop to the laptop every day. So I can start by doing sort of a half and half. Thank you very much for the article. I’m writting you this comment from my… home made stand-up desk ! Nice work Ling-en, looks really good! I have a bar height table from Ikea that would work perfectly for a stand-up desk. Good suggestion about yoga mat for your feet too. I’m lucky. I had an ergonomic assessment of my work station about 10 years ago and my company has provided me with a wonderful, fully adjustable standing desk since then. It’s interesting…they were once an oddity (I used to get LOTS of questions) and now they are more common and highly prized. I have a standard desk for those tasks that need that kind of attention…like I said, I’m lucky to work for a company that cares! Nice post. I have actually worked at a research center of one Oil and Gas company here in Germany, which had these stand-up desks. Actually one could switch , to make it a sit-down or stand-p desk with some electro-mechanical system. you just hit that button on the side. It was really cool. I wasn’t aware of dangers of sitting that you did mention in this blog. But I found that more productive, you would stand up and never loose the focus. Focus on work is important in presence of World Wide Web. I agree. When you’re sitting down, you’re more likely to do brainless activities such as browsing the web, emails and wasting time unconsciously. When you’re standing up, you’re constantly thinking about what you’re doing – you’re much less likely to let your mind wander. This is what I’ve found the biggest benefit of a stand up desk. In my work office I use this one: http://bit.ly/122L1EP it lets me switch between standing and sitting, and I like to have both options. If one has a bad back to start with, is a standing posture better or worse for the back? Haha wow Yaro, you hardly ever laugh when you do mistakes on video man! Anyway, I think the stand up desk has a really strong foundation and I have seen more and more people who are all about lifestyle and marketing going for these home made setups. I actually like working near my kitchen and I happen to have a place (it’s like a table but it’s not a table per se, I just don’t know the English word for it -a kitchen counter maybe?-) that is designed for having breakfast there and it happens to be at the perfect height so I think I’m going to take the laptop there and see how it feels for me. Thanks for the health improvement and reminder man, all the best! Yaro, I’m glad to see standing desks are starting to catch on and more and more people are concerned about the health effects of sedentary lifestyles. Even better, you provided an alternative to the all too common $500 standing desks or $2,000 treadmill desks, which are outrageous. I am debuting a product at CES next week in Las Vegas that is in line with standing desks and can be used with any laptop or tablet device and allows you to switch from sitting and standing, using the same device. I work from home too and my productivity was killed by always being uncomfortable, eye strain or just not wanting to sit anymore, so I’m setting out to change that. Hopefully more people take this advice and if they don’t invest in a standing desk, hopefully they will realize how much of a difference getting up and walking 5 minutes each hour can make. We shouldn’t sacrifice our health to work and our work shouldn’t suffer because of our productivity. A stand up desk is a good idea, given the recent data on how sitting all day affects health and life span. But I do something instead. Every hour my watch chimes, and like a Pavlovian dog, I push away from the desk and do a prescribed set of things, such as squats, push ups and specific stretches to counteract the slumping forward mode that sitting involves. I’ve been considering this for a while too. But since I have limited space, and am at my desk all day, there’s no room for a sit down desk plus a stand up desk. I was wondering if you knew of a solution similar to what Imran mentioned, for want of a better term: a converter that allows you to work sitting down and then boost the monitor and keyboard to allow work standing up. Then when you are tired, to revert to a sitting position. the Vika Kaj legs are not long enough for us taller guys. And I am not that tall. Only 183 cm (about 6 foot). However, the VIKA BYSKE legs go up to 42-1/8 inches and when combined with a 1-3/8 desk gives a max height of 43-1/2 inches. Much better as my b.b. is 42-1/2 from floor. I am really considering switching to a stand up desk. Mainly, it is my back that suffers from sitting down all day. I still keep of a period of exercise or sport during the day. Although I train a lot, I have to admit that I feel uncomfortable sitting down for long periods of time. I have some doubts if standing up during many hours will be the best. It seems better and more natural standing up than sitting down. What is even more natural is walking (like the treadmill setup). Sometimes, I like to sit down and relax when working on my computer. Furthermore, in my work, I perform better sometimes sitting down when I need more concentration. However, it is never many hours in a row. I believe the real solution comes from varying our position. I am going to try different setups and adopt a new lifestyle. I wish I could have a desktop with both positions: stand up and the chair. Sebastian, my set-up with a “coffee table” on top of my regular desk allows me to slide the computer back so that I can sit at the regular desk if I wish. I would be easier to have a high chair to sit on for those times I do not wish to stand. My chiropractor also suggested something to put one of my feet on to adjust the alignment of my back. I have to try that. A padded mat to stand on certainly helps. I also take little walks around my room when I have sent an email, etc, so that I get some variation in back position. I am a woodcarver. My kind of work requires me to be standing most of the time. A couple of years ago I experienced some kind of pain on my foot. I learned it was called plantar fasciitis which is an inflammation of the arch tendon on the foot. My point is working 8 hours a day on a standing position is not conducive to health. I would rather use a kneeling chair on my office instead of the regular office chair. I have a kitchen island that I often use as a desk, but now I will do it even more! The thing I like about your posts is that a always so well researched and full of practical advice. Fascinating stuff, and you’ve just given me an idea Yaro. Years ago when I first started my offline consulting business I used to do a lot of manual design and drafting and would stand at my drafting table. This would be for most of the day (but not every day of the week!) and it was what I preferred to do. It just felt more comfortable, but I didn’t know why. Well, guess what? I still have that same drafting table, hasn’t been used in years because I moved to CAD. This table has adjustable legs to suit a person’s height, and it also has a large table area to place a lot of stuff on. I’m going down to the shed right now to dust it off. Hint for readers – look around for cast-off drafting/drawing tables. You could pick one up for a song! What we really need, and now that Large LCD touch screens and 3D tracking cameras (like the Xbox kinect) are getting cheaper in may be possible soon, Is a large screen NO MORE mouse NO MORE Key boards and computer interaction from anywhere in the room. and free you from the desk completely. If a cheap game console can track your movements into computer input and Siri on a iPhone can take voice commands and eye movement recognition devices it is time we merge all these technologies into truly modern workstations that throw away the old writing desk once and for all. Sorry everyone that learned to touch type but I want to make that skill obsolete how about transferring words and design to screen as fast as you can think not just tap keys no need for a ergonomic mouse (believe me I have tried them all from tables to track balls to track pads) ANY repetitive motion causes stress on you no matter HOW ergonomic the device used. Sitting is bad yes but so is standing in fact the reason we invented chairs is because standing all day is tiring also. AND YES at the moment anyway there are still people that have to spend hours doing one thing all day so standing or sitting they will still have Repetitive stress related injuries and just standing up vs sitting is NOT going to solve obesity problems I know of people that have never had a desk job in their life that are obesely overweight they held what would normally be called very active jobs construction workers even with huge beer guts it is NOT just what you do at work that is making you unhealthy. A wonderful post. I know your blog for the past 4 years and I believe that this is one of the most useful posts ever. I didn’t expect it was that dangerous to work sitted down for a long time, damn! Thanks for these explanations, statistics and videos! I will think about it very seriously in this month and see what I can do in my home. BTW I will share it on my Twitter. I was curious what would be the content of the article when I clicked in the email link – but I am glad I did. Just elevated my laptop position by putting two old desktop computers flat on the desk and am standing as I write this. I’ve been doing my marathon training for last 3 months and this is just right in time. Hopefully this is something I can have all my 20 team mates practising in near future. Wow! Yaro, talk about making revolutionary changes to productivity and health! Intuitively, it makes perfect sense as your body would be more fully “awake” and engaged in the tasks at hand. I guess, this is taking the phrase “think on your feet/toes” to a whole new level. Great informative post as usual! How tall is the table you are using? Happy New Year’s and thank you for this informative and relevant post. I’m an incomplete paraplegic from a motorcycle accident, and while I was in a wheelchair and a complete paraplegic, I’m only partially paralyzed now, and I can walk and stand (not run :). But I cannot stand while working due to endurance strength and balance. So I’ve been doing something which may also work for other people who cannot use a standing desk for any reason. I use a timer in my browser that I set for 20 minutes. Each time the timer goes off I stand up and I do 20 partial squats and some simple stretches and then get back to work. I originally did this 20 minute timer thing because it keeps me on target with three 20 minute blocks every hour and it reminds me that time is going by! Get more work done! Then near the end of last year I realized, ” Aha, my circulation is bad–so I’ll do ’20 at 20′,” and so I pop up (sometimes not happy about it because I like to work and don’t want to stop), and I do the light exercises. From your news above I can see this will help me–and it’s better than sitting all day! BTW In the past I owned a Herman Miller Aeron chair, and while I now know it’s not good to sitt for extended periods of time–if you have to sit for many hours each day–the Herman Miller Aeron IS THE CHAIR. being in IT and web dev since 1996–I’ve done TOO many hours in desk chairs. With the Aeron you do not feel like you’ve been sitting. I’ve been thinking about this for a while but now you’ve pointed out the health risks in detail I think I really need to make the change. And, lucky me, I already have a suitable Ikea desk so I just need to get new legs! Another point worth considering might be the shoes you wear at a stand up desk. I choose comfort and support over fashion these days but many women still wear ridiculous heels at work. I don’t imagine it would be a god idea to work at a stand up desk in those! Long-time reader of your ezine here. This stand up deak is a GREAT idea – might work with the old architect/draftsman tables as well. Warmest regards and rock your day! Or, try the treadmill desk! It makes me feel a little better about my own bloopers knowing that someone as seasoned as you still makes mistakes! The company I work for is slowly introducing the standing work stations to the office, which is great, but I didn’t even think about how much time I spend in the home office after work. I’m looking forward to applying something like the solution you’ve suggested for my home setup. easier for blood to clot in certain parts of the body. Here’s a great story you may enjoy about standing. and stood for 8 hrs. a day. Enjoy the new year Yaro! Excellent info, thanks so much. Your videos are great, do you shoot it with iphone? I use my old VADO HD handheld camera at the moment, sometimes the webcam on my mac too. I must say the idea of a stand-up desk is rather scary at first since it’s completely different from the sedentary lifestyle that most of us are having, not only at work, but also at the cinema, cafe talks, etc. But come to think about it, it’s just something we’re used to. So it can definitely be chagned. And improving our health is definitely a great reason to kickstart the new habit. Thanks Yaro. This info and suggestion is really great. A nice gift to start 2013. This is a great info and I will send the direct url to my subscribers too. I noticed of recent that I do have sore back often due to so much sitting down. After reading this blog post, I have decided to start standing up to do other things after 2hrs intervals. I’ve been standing for about 3 months now, but always looking for more ways to improve posture, energy levels and productivity. The Ultradian Rhythm stuff looks really interesting, I hadn’t heard of that before. I’ve been using the Pomodoro technique and switching position after every 4 pomodoros. – Wear MBT shoes. I get less aching in my feet now. – I mounted a TRX suspension trainer on the office, so I exercise on it in some of my breaks. It has made a big difference to my core stability. – I invested in a motorised desk frame and fitted it to my existing Ikea Galant top. I can now fine tune the height to whatever task i’m doing or what i’m sitting on. Great photos Matt, it’s amazing how many different ways people have set up home offices with stand up desks. I recently had a therapist who specializes in ergonomics come to my home office because I was suffering from some neck issues. One of the things she recommended right of the bat was that I get a standing desk. Well, I didn’t do it at the time, but I did do everything else she recommended and it made an amazing difference in how I feel at the end of every day. I guess it’s time to re look at the standing desk thing. I like your simple design. I’ve always been a big believer in not sitting still for too long but had never considered standing. Will look into it pronto. Thanks Yaro for this health saving and helping post! Over 90% of internet users especially mavericks are guilty of this long standing baby sitting on computer. Sorry Yaro, you lost all credibility when you said you use a Mac. Joking aside, this is an excellent idea. In our house though the space below the desk would be completely filled with something. Absolutely stupid in terms of Feng Shui I know but when your partner is a teacher it sort of takes over. Did you know Jason Fladelin has gone one further than this? Two further actually. First he’s got a dual screen set up. More than that though he’s put a treadmill below the desk. He runs it very slowly but it’s enough to keep the circulation going and also generate the endorphins that are required for creativity. No wonder Jason is one creative guy. We will be doing quite a bit of remodelling around the house this year (I’m told) so I wonder if I can get her to incorporate this idea into our home office. I purchased a “stand up desk” which is a platform that you can attach a monitor to with a small deck for writing. It collapses to the desk level or extends to accommodate work while standing. I paid nearly $500.00 for it and that was a complete waste of money. I wanted the advantage of sitting and standing, depending on my mood. It hadn’t occurred to me to purchase a tall chair that would allow me to sit at a standing desk when I did need a few minutes off my feet. Your solution is much more practical. Anyone want to buy a collapsible monitor mount-standing desk . . . cheap? I’m pleased to report that thanks to your post, I’ve made an incredible change right at the beginning of 2013: a stand-up desk. I bought it at IKEA: a no-frills table top and 4 legs (a bit expensive for me but ok). I’m still sitting while at work but when I’m back home, I’m standing these days. I feel a bit sore after a few days but overall it’s been okay. And I like it. And this standing position definitely encouraged me to walk around and take breaks more often. Well hello Yaro, I switched to a standing desk about 6 months ago and would never go back to a traditional sitting desk. As you highlight the ability to take an instant walk to compose your thoughts and then instantly return to work without having to re-position the chair and resettle yourself for work has been the best productivity bonus for me. I know Chris Kesser has done the same – stand-up desk complete with treadmill. It makes such a lot of sense. Our bodies were never designed to sit – squat yes, as that actually aligns the back, but sitting put a lot of pressure on our spines. Thanks Yaro. I spend more than 70 percentage of my day sitting either in a bus, watching tv, creating content for my blog or at work. I must say I am constantly having backaches. I really need to follow this approach. Thanks Yaro. There was a TV program on this last night and they echoed everything you’ve mentioned about blood fat levels rising and insulin processing being reduced. One of their tips was to move about at least once an hour, and to try and keep constant motion in your day. Walk up stairs instead of the lift or escalator, stand on the train/bar instead of sitting. And keep moving at home. Great advice, thanks. How does this work with a laptop? Place the laptop on a pile of books and plug in an external keyboard. That’s what I have done while traveling to still get the height, but the keyboard needs to be down at your elbows so you will have to use an external one. Thanks for this information. I have a follow up question about the table height. The Vika Kaj legs from IKEA say they are height adjustable 23 5/8-35 3/8″. The max height might be a little short for someone like me at 6’2″. How tall are you? I’m 182cm, so just on six foot IM. The legs could go higher still too, I guess it also depends how your body is proportioned, if you have short arms and long legs you might need a taller table. Having a desk the right height makes a big difference. I sometimes work on the kitchen counter which is about the same height as Vika Kaj legs will go and I can feel it in my neck and arms after a while. Standing desks ARE awesome, but what I’ve found to be even more awesome are adjustable height desks. Have you looked into one of these? I know the point is standing for more of the day, but the thing I really like about my adjustable height desk is that I can just push a button and it will move from standing to sitting– or any height really. Don’t get me wrong, I do stand for 90% of my day, but for those times when I do want a little sitting break, it’s really convenient. What do you do if you want to take a sit for a moment? Anyway, you can check out the desk I use here: http://www.NextDesks.com. There are tons of options out there though, this is just the one I’ve been using and really like so far. What a brilliant concept. I was a bit skeptical at first, but decided to give the idea a try. I build a 2.4 M by 600mm stand up desk and it is great. I realy live the way it has improved my attitude and and effectiveness to productivity. I sent Yaro a photo of my setup as I can’t see how to attach it to this comment. I just couldn’t put my finger on it, and as I was scrolling through your blog I thought, “hmmm”. a las’ I found a solution. I have a dresser at my perfect height level I put my laptop on and voila! I just started doing this by the time I wrote this post to tell you that this is some of THE best advice I’ve received to make myself more productive and easily move around without feeling ‘lazy’ to get up out of a sitting position for hours at a time. Plus, this will force me to get more done in less time before I grow weary standing and NEED to sit down or move for breaks. I really, really appreciate you sharing this. By the way, has any one else had their legs borderline fall asleep on them on a regular basis from sitting down all the time? I have had my stand up desk for over a year and I love it. But I disagree that you would get tired after standing for more than two hours. I work an 8 hour office job and I never sit unless I’m meeting in a colleague’s office. And I am nowhere near skinny. If I can do it, almost anyone can do it. You’d be amazed how fast your body gets used to the change. And beneath the padded wall, I have some amazing muscles in my thighs and calves. Anyway, thanks for the ergonomic schematic and awesome observations! I think that’s an interesting alternative, which offers several benefits. However, in the case of computer gaming, it’s a bit … undoable, because of the long time spent on the screen IMO. It’s great that someone explained so precisely the concept and its consequences. Thanks a lot. Standup desk is a great idea but job is a job you can’t ask your boss to arrange standup desk for 9 hours job in office. Agree sitting is killing. I’m way too short for most DIY options, plus they’re kind of a pain to set up and take down multiple times a day. If you want to try standing desks, my vote is for StorkStand. It’s collapsable and weighs four pounds, so you can take it back and forth with you pretty easily. Also it costs less than $200, which is awesome. The Kickstarter for it is at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/889675794/storkstand-the-most-affordable-mobile-standing-des. Great post about your journey towards getting out of your chair; i hate sitting for very long, just as I hate standing in place for very long. I like to move around, and i find a standing setup encourages me to take more action and do less googling. I couldn’t agree with you more, Yaro. I am using the TaskMate Executive from Health Postures and it really helped me become more productive at work. It has helped me become more energized all throughout the duration of my shift. I am now more cautious of this ergonomics after I had a cervical injury couple of months ago. If I had known of this earlier, I would have suffered from a severe pain in my spine. But still thankful though that I am now healed because of the therapy and not because of the surgery. I would love to see standing desks become much more popular. The health statistics regarding sitting for long periods of time are very frightening. Since most of us work at jobs that are very stationary in nature, a standing desk could be a great compromise for improving health. Three Days ago, the idea came to me to find a Desk to stand up and work on the Computer. Then I remembered I could use my Keyboard(for Music) Stand and something to lay across it like a Briefcase. This Morning, I started doing it, and I noticed that I move around more, but more importantly, I believe this will make me focus and work a little faster, because I can see it will hard to stand for unnecessary Hours!!! I also plan to exercise while I’m standing from time to time. I have a first hand experience or effects of sitting for longer hours, you body just gets messed up, I’d suggest in investing in a high quality, ergonomic solution for your office. Awesome piece Yaro. Great information as well. Will be Getting one as soon as I can. I started doing this today. By accident actually. I moved my laptop to a tall set of draws in our bedroom whilst my partner mopped the floor. I was using the laptop like this for 15 minutes and couldn’t help but notice how nice it felt. So I continued. I Googled it to see if others stand up at the computer and came across this. I’m a programmer. I sit on my bed 10+ hours a day because it’s comfortable either programming, or reading. I’ve done this for a while and I know how bad it is. My leg muscles have decreased in size, I get tiered quickly, and I got very lazy. I stopped my personal projects because I just got lazy. It’s been a good 6 hours standing up. I love it. I’ve taken breaks … you physically can’t work that long standing up. I can’t anyway. I am keeping the laptop here. I find I’m now only using the computer to actually code, and I spend the rest of the time away from the computer actually planning whatever it is I’m building. I can’t afford to spend the rest of my life sitting at a computer, and I certainly don’t want to stop programming. This is perfect. Only problem I’ve found is sore feet. But my slippers fixed that. I might invest in some seriously comfortable foot ware. Or a thick yoga mat. I have always wanted one of these! Thanks for writing about it! With increasing stress in work life I think working while standing gives a little bit of relaxation . We have around 10 standing work bays at our office. Thanks for sharing this guide! I think I sit too for long time and I’ll have to work on it! I am definitely going to try one of those stand up desk. Thanks for this great post. Great article Yaro, After I read this post, immediately I stand up.. haha! Thank you for this information. It really helped me a lot! Keep doing this greate wrting! While I appreciate your innovative ideas, I still don’t comprehend how someone can work standing for eight hours. Thank you for sharing all these details to make people aware of the risks of sitting. Keep sharing such posts and shedding light on the unknown facts. I liked the images you have shared here. I hear you Jiya – I don’t think standing up for 8 hours makes sense either. I get a sore back from about 2-3 hours, so you do have to rest. If you work in an office, being able to standup then sit down is good. In my case, working at home, I work standing up like doing a podcast interview, or talking on zoom conferences, then I might sit down on my couch for lunch, then head to a coffee shop and sit down work. The key is movement, the body needs to be used.
2019-04-24T05:54:49Z
https://yaro.blog/11687/stand-up-desk/
With profit rates steadily declining, more and more capital is abandoning the “real” economy – the one that produces goods and services and which creates new value through the exploitation of labour power – in order to chase the mirage of easy profits offered by speculation. An attempt, in other words, to somehow replace the profits capitalism lost in the productive sector with speculative gains. This capital flight has only helped to depress “real” production and magnify a parasitic mechanism that began with the financialisation of the crisis itself. This process involved the growth of fictitious capital, or easy credit, given the low cost of borrowing. As a result the US economy was flooded by an ocean of debt – from the State, to companies and even families. When the Federal Reserve increased interest rates the bubble burst with the global consequences we have all seen. The explosion not only hit the financial apparatus – the banks which had to be saved at any cost (too big to fail) – it also impacted heavily on the fragile productive fabric which had originally generated it, bringing lower wage rates and worse conditions of exploitation for the international proletariat. On the other hand, the use of Quantitative Easing to staunch the financial haemorrhage means that a gift of over $12tn was given to the banks alone (beyond Stiglitz’ $20tn mentioned above). The millions of jobs that Trump waves like a flag, as evidence of the alleged economic recovery, have actually materialised in the shape of some hundreds of thousands of jobs, but with ultra-precarious contracts, sometimes even for one week, underpaid without any health or trade union coverage. Meanwhile, “the debt economy” progressively expands to a worrying degree. In one year, from 2016 to 2017, the debt of non-financial corporations (companies) grew by 11.1%, the public debt increased by 6.7%, household debt grew 12.5% and the financial sector debt grew by 11.3%. The great recession of 2007-8 and the subsequent long depression which still continues, have weakened the overall economic framework. The global capitalist economy remains stagnant, with a low rate of productivity growth. Trade flows are slowing down and, above all, the profitability of productive capital has not improved. Meanwhile cooperation has been replaced by increasingly cruel competition (see Trump’s tariff policy). According to World Bank economists’ projections, world economic growth is expected to fall to 2.9% by 2020 and, therefore, the long depression that began in 2008 not only has not ended but will continue with its dangerous toll of trade wars, economic wars and increasingly violent and widespread wars of plunder. In the USA, the public debt that in 2007 was about $9tn (75% of GDP) had reached $19.2tn by 2016, 105% of GDP.3 In recent years, under Trump, this has only increased and in future it will be even worse. With the acceleration of Trump’s policies, it may already have reached 130%. According to the Treasury, the budget deficit for 2018 has risen by 17% and is the highest since 2012. Revenue increased by 0.4% while expenses exceeded 3.2%. The Congressional Budget Office projection for 2019 is that the budget deficit will reach a trillion dollars ($1tn, or one thousand billion). Trump’s policies anticipate extraordinary outlays, including $700bn for defence, 31% tax cuts for businesses (against, it must be said, an increase in private taxation of 6.1%). In all the Federal deficit will increase by an additional $214bn “thanks” to these tax cuts and increased military spending which will also increase the interest that has to be paid on the debt. In the meantime, the federal debt has skyrocketed to $22tn compared with about $18tn in revenue. The budgets of more than half of the states in the United States have to be supported by the deficit policy of the US federal government. In addition, student debt has reached $1.5tn; credit card debt equals $1.6tn; $1.22tn for cars and $11.8tn of corporate debts. On top of these there is a huge, but unspecified, amount of debt incurred through the purchase of real estate, as well as another unspecified amount for the total debt of the individual states. The most worrying figure, however, is company debt. If it is true that in the first quarter of 2018, the top 500 US companies achieved a 26% increase in earnings per share, it is also true that this was exclusively due to the enormous tax reduction proposed and implemented by the Trump administration (30%). If the profits of the entire corporate sector had been calculated without the tax cuts, then in the first quarter of 2018 there would have been not a gain but a fall of -0.6%, immediately preceded by an initial decline in the fourth quarter of 2017 of -0.1%. With the tax reductions, profits have increased by 6%. Meanwhile, however, profitability is low. The average profitability of plants in America and the G7 economies remains well below pre-crisis levels, even after ten years of alleged recovery and despite the powerful capital injections of the Federal Reserve as well as the other central banks of the major industrialised countries. The real obstacle to overcoming the crisis is the low rate of valorisation of capital. The fear now is that the next crisis, widely predicted by the same American analysts, will occur from the explosive combination of manufacturing companies’ debt in the US as well as in all G7 economies, and the overall mass of debts. This is especially true for large companies, while small and medium ones do not even have this option, unless they are ready to run the big risk of going bust. So they remain at the mercy of a market which is likely to eliminate them. This is the same pattern of financialisation of the crisis which preceded the bursting of the “sub-prime” bubble. Much of the debt is rated BBB, bonds with the lowest investment grade. This means they are just a hair above junk. Their fate is linked to even a minimum increase in interest rates which increases the cost of servicing the debt and therefore increases the costs of production. The number of BBB-rated companies has increased by 50% since 2009 and does not seem to stop. The real situation of the American economy that has “exited” the crisis is to be found in Government debt, the federal deficit, the balance of payments deficit, and the debts of half of all the American states. On top of all this public debt there is the pile of private and business debt. This mountain of debt and deficits would make the US economy the most precarious in the world were it not for the hegemonic role of the dollar and the strength of its army, ready to intervene in the four corners of the world whenever there is the slightest risk of interference with its strategic aims and financial interests. But as Roberts says in The Long Depression, “the big risk is the combination of declining profitability and increasingly high debt in the corporate sector, not just the American, but across the G7. If profits continue to slide, while the cost of servicing debt increases with the rise in interest rates, then this would be a dangerous recipe for a chain of corporate bankruptcies and a new, devastating debt crisis. Global debt, in particular corporate debt, is at historic highs”. We would add that the fuse is lit, so when is it going to explode? Even at the periphery of capitalism, in the so-called emerging countries, the situation is replicated. Most manufacturing and financial companies in the “emerging” countries have heavily borrowed in dollars, since interest rates on the dollar, then (before the crisis), and now are relatively low. The Federal Reserve Bank has deliberately kept the interest rate on the “greenback” at almost nil. Much of the enormous flow of capital that has moved into emerging economies was not intended for productive investment but has been directed towards loans and bonds for speculative activities. Meanwhile, long-term capital flows towards emerging economies for productive investments (FDIs) have been in rapid decline for at least a decade, or since the beginning of the “sub-prime” crisis. The consequences are apparent: every country affected by the financial crisis has raised interest rates on their government bonds. In Turkey, the interest rate that the State must pay to public sector underwriters has gone up from 12% to 20%, in Argentina from 6% to 26.2%, in Russia from 4% to 8%, in Indonesia from 3% to 9%, in Brazil from 10% to 267% in Lebanon from 20% to 281%, in South Africa from 12% to 112% (i.e. three out of five BRICS). It’s like a movie we’ve seen before, a horror movie full of economic and social devastation. When the god Profit loses its supreme role in the production of surplus value, it makes capital run away from productive investment towards speculation, towards the creation of a massive amount of fictitious capital. Debt now “governs” the US economy. All the fundamental data of the American economic system are in the red. Debt is suffocating productive activity, including enterprises themselves, threatening their survival on the domestic market, and obliging them to mimic the large concentrations of speculative capital in the hope of surviving the decline in profit rates. It is to protect companies such as these – the ones overwhelmed by debt and devoid of profitable investment opportunities (half of which have a BBB rating, just above junk) – that Trump’s short-term thinking brought him to raise tariffs against half the world, in particular China. He didn’t stop to consider how China, with its very low cost goods, has so far allowed the over 80 million Americans living below the poverty line to feed themselves. Nor did he take on board the inevitable reaction from those parts of the world which are now facing a wall of customs duties against their more competitive goods. 1) In the wake of Russia’s rescue of Assad’s regime in Syria, to prevent it having a permanent base in the Mediterranean. 2) Detach Europe from its energy dependence on Moscow by building a series of pipelines to replace existing and planned Russian ones. 3) Obstruct every opportunity for Moscow to commercialise its Siberian “energy treasures” by stepping up its trade in roubles, given the threat of replacing the dollar that is coming from China and Maduro’s Venezuela. On top of these scenarios, which are already so tense that they are on the edge of “direct confrontation”, the US has imposed duties against Iran and North Korea, against Venezuela and Canada, and now threatens increased taxes on trade with Germany and Italy. In the case of Venezuela, Trump’s trade policy has two objectives: the first is to destabilise the Maduro government which is already badly hit by the devastating economic crisis throughout the country, at the same time as politically favouring and funding the right-wing opposition. The second, as already mentioned, consists in preventing Maduro from selling oil with a new crypto-currency (the petro) that would replace the dollar, at least in the Latin American region. The US policy of imposing import duties dates back to August 1971 when America first experienced a trade deficit of $2.5m (today it is $556bn). The USA, which had literally flooded the world with its goods after the Second World War, less than thirty years later found itself a net importer of goods and services. The deficit itself was not high, but it revealed the reduced competitiveness of American goods and signalled a dangerous turn-round in relations with Europe (Germany) and Japan. The announcement on de-linking the dollar from gold had a twofold impact. On the one hand, the declining gold reserves in American coffers were unable to match the enormous mass of dollars circulating on the international market, a mass that is constantly expanding. On the other hand, with the dollar devalued and released from the gold standard, those who lost money were the speculators, the savers and all the international banks which previously had invested in the dollar as a safe asset. Nevertheless, successive US administrations have made sure they continue to make the dollar – even if unhooked from gold – the universal currency of world trade, the refuge of last resort par excellence, a commodity whose wholesale cost is close to zero, a monetary instrument for all speculations, and the means by which enormous flows of capital are channelled to the US economy. But a strong dollar inevitably penalises the competitiveness of American goods by opening up a trade deficit chasm as the years go by. Still, the various Administrations have done everything to strengthen the dollar, even while trying to offset the commercial damage. The priority has been to keep the dollar’s dominant position in the international money markets so that rivers of financial capital could be drawn into the American economy to finance the various deficits, while what remained could be exported as capital to invest in countries where the cost of labour power was far below that of the American proletariat. This key role for the dollar is so important that ever since the oil crises of the early Seventies successive US administrations have not hesitated to engineer wars, both to get their hands on energy raw materials, and to ensure that oil and gas producers do not dare to deal with anything other than the dollar. Today, so-called oil (or pipeline) wars, and the “perennial” issue of the supremacy of the dollar, are still as significant as in the Seventies, only their geographical framework has changed and widened in intensity and ferocity. The Trump administration seems to be trying to square the circle, i.e. to continue to have a strong dollar and a balance of payments which, if not in positive territory, at least is an acceptable deficit. The policy of tariffs, in addition to its political value of imperialist opposition with sworn enemies and commercial opponents, is precisely a reflection of this “have your cake and eat it” policy – i.e. a strong dollar and balance of payments which does not reflect the constant undercutting of what is produced in the States. In short, specific national tariffs and occasionally wars generated by economic crises – beyond the fact that they destroy capital values which need to be rebuilt – are capitalism’s daily bread. Coupled with armed force, they achieve the economic and strategic objectives which diplomacy and “normal” competition are unable to accomplish. This is how wars, which have never stopped since 1945, reflect the growing tension between the US and the other imperialist powers. Today competition is increasing on all fronts – manufacturing and industrial, commercial, monetary, and strategic – and is turning into open military confrontation. The motor force is still the economic/financial crisis. The crisis of profitability, which brings lower returns on manufacturing investment, generates more and more speculation. This in its turn has generated an immense mound of financial liabilities which bring the additional danger that an increase in US interest rates will spark an irreparable debt crisis and provoke another, much worse, world crisis than the one which the optimists define as already a thing of the past. A nominal and real rise in 10 year yields on US Treasury Securities (3.25% and 1%, respectively over the highs of 2011) was enough to create ructions on New York financial markets on October 10, 2018. The combined fears of a further increase in Treasury yields and the risk of a trade war with China caused the Dow Jones to drop 832 points and the S&P500 to lose 95 points (-3.29%) by the close of the day. This was the worst fall since February 8th when the Dow dropped over 1000 points. This contraction of the markets and the sell-off that hit securities in the technology sector (Nasdaq) were also connected to the import duties imposed on China. But the most powerful detonator was the fear that higher interest rates will magnify the indebtedness of entire productive sectors, including technology ones. Securities of Facebook, Twitter and Netflix lost 20% of their value in an instant. Even Trump has blamed what he called the “mad” Fed policy of a third consecutive interest rate rise so far in 2018. All this is an undeniable sign of a permanent crisis for capital which appears on the surface in the shape of financial collapses and, more fundamentally, in the now endemic lack of returns in the world of the real economy. It is the latter which is driving capital to flee investment in favour of the ‘useless’, albeit riskier, road of speculation. Here then is the only way capital can try to get out of the economic and financial crisis in the short term: competitive devaluations, speculation, import duties, more intense exploitation of the workforce, dismantling of the welfare state. In the long run, however, only a substantial destruction of capital values can resolve the crisis in the profitability of capital. It is no accident that in the Second World War it was the productive sectors which were most devastated. Afterwards this allowed US imperialism to invest productively in renewed infrastructures and reconstruction of European industrial plants located mainly in Italy, France, Germany and even Japan. Moreover, the US was able to export its surplus financial capital to key economic sectors of the defeated countries. Thus, a huge opening was created for both the victors and defeated to begin a new cycle of accumulation. But the end of the Second World War did not bring an end to the fury of imperialism, either American or Russian. In their different strategic ways, they continued to confront each other. Not because the second world tragedy had not caused enough destruction, but because, in addition to destroying in order to rebuild, imperialism needs to export capital, to invest abroad, to control and exploit territories with important raw materials and, last but not least, to exploit energy resources and manage their trade routes and get a share, possibly in monopolistic terms, of the revenues. In the aftermath of the Second World War, a long series of proxy “cold” wars was to begin between the two victorious power houses of imperialism. Amongst them was the conflict in China in the period 1937-48 where a Chinese Communist Party siding with the Russians faced a pro-American Kuomintang. The outcome after 1949 was that China was divided into two parts, the continental one, which fell under the influence of Russia, and the island of Taiwan which came into the US orbit. Only a year later the conflict moved to Korea (1950-53). The Vietnam war followed (1962-75) and the bellicose events that bloodied Central America, in Honduras and in Nicaragua, for and against the Sandinistas. As usual, on one side was Russian imperialism defending its “new colonies”, on the other the US which used the services of the Panamanian narco-trafficker Noriega to defeat the Sandinistas. (The latter character, who took tons of drugs from Colombian Cartels into the United States, even returned loaded with arms supplied by the CIA to be distributed to the Contras in Central America.) We could continue showing how the clash between the USSR and the USA defined the nationalist quarrel between Israel and the Palestinians, the missile crisis in Cuba, the Panama affair and US marines landing etc. Suffice it to say, all of these represented conflicts in an endless war interrupted, not by peaceful solutions, but only when one of the contenders was obliged to abandon it. Then the USSR imploded. An implosion which was the outcome of decreasing competitiveness, of a disproportionate increase in investment in capital goods whilst labour productivity either declined or remained stagnant, thus bringing a change in the organic composition of capital and an inexorable fall in profit rates. Despite their low productivity and profitability, the huge investments in constant capital that were made largely benefited the powerful State oligarchy, which derived its “five-year” bribe from the financial allocations to industry and agriculture. The more the state invested in constant capital, even if it was not very productive, the more the Russian oligarchy had the chance to divert a portion of capital into their own pockets. Once again, the US played its part in promoting the economic crisis of the Soviet system by focussing on the competition between the two for military technological innovations and the arms race. The USSR was forced to borrow heavily to pay for armaments. USSR defence spending accounted for 23% of GDP, against the 7-8% of its GDP that the US was spending. This enormous disparity led to a disproportionate deficit in the coffers of the Russian state which opened up the first breaches in the Soviet state capitalist economic system – a system already undermined by the scourge of a steadily falling rate of profit, and growing weakness at the periphery of its empire. It was the experience of Solidarność in Poland – thanks in part to the CIA and Vatican – that would annul the “fleeting” experience of a fake socialism that had come out of the defeat of the October Revolution (the first and only historical example of proletarian revolution to have occurred as yet). The collapse of the USSR was effectively followed by 10 years of US mono-imperialism which gave successive Administrations free rein on the international scene. It was the era of the “first” oil wars, where the US extended its control over associated aspects of the industry, such as the construction of pipe lines, storage centres and refineries. These obviously had to get into the hands of the American oil companies and other specialised companies linked to oil, including engineering and logistic issues, all of them participating in the exploitation of the oil revenue itself. This was the period when American imperialism came out in the open: in the 1990-91 war in Iraq, in Afghanistan and then the second war in Iraq in 2003. A whole decade was interspersed with “minor” but strategically important wars, like those in the Sahel in Africa and the one that destroyed Yugoslavia, the last European bulwark of fake socialism in Titoist guise. Meanwhile, post-Soviet Russia, thanks to Siberian oil and gas fields, regained a position in the ranks of international imperialism and repositioned itself, with China, as a counterpart to the American superpower, giving rise to a de facto second cold war. At this point (2011) after the explosion of the “Arab Spring” the conflict moved to Syria and Libya. In Syria, Russia is supporting Bashar el’Assad in order to defends its interests in the Mediterranean, with the maintenance of the military and commercial ports of Tartus and Latakia . The alliance with Assad’s Syrian Armed Forces, provides Russia a bulwark in the Middle East against Saudi Arabia, Israel and their US imperialist mentor. Here there is already a generalised war taking place before our eyes, a war orchestrated by all the most powerful imperialist centres in the area. On the field we find Russia and the US with their corresponding allies. Alongside Russia is Iran, Iraq, and the Lebanese Hezbollah. This is the Shiite axis of the Middle East. Lining up alongside the US are Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, Qatar9, which constitute the Sunni axis – loyal but not so much – to Trump’s ambitions. Machinations are taking place inside Libya where France, Italy, the UK and the USA are all manoeuvring. France and the UK, backed by omnipresent US imperialism, were behind the military expedition against Gaddafi. Here the double aim was to take away ENI’s (Italian state oil company) control of 40% of Libyan oil (France’s goal) and prevent Gaddafi from selling its oil in euros, roubles or yuan. In Syria we have seen the massive presence of all the major culprits for the carnage. With their diverse, often conflicting interests, new alliances have been formed and old ones dissolved, in a series of episodes that have brought the ruin of an entire country with two million dead and over four million refugees. Turkey, Russia, Iran and the Shiite axis on one side. The US, Israel and the Sunni axis on the other. Each has its own interests to defend, whilst in the middle the various Kurdish nationalisms have become the military instrument of one imperialism and thus the target of attack for others, even though they are part of the same coalition. Given the number of powers involved, their areas of influence, their active engagement in the war, we can only conclude that we are already in the midst of a “bizarre” world war where, apart from a few exceptions, notably China, the major imperialist antagonists are already colliding in one of the world’s most important strategic zones. It is no figment of the imagination to think that the next financial crash, driven by increased interest rates, will lead to an even worse economic situation worldwide and bring with it the danger of more generalised war through an intensification of current wars or the outbreak of new ones. From a political perspective, beyond the need to analyse what is going on in the world, it must be firmly stated that the crisis is not an accident, an inevitable natural disaster or some sort of divine curse. It is the product of the existing mode of production, of a global capitalism which is in a deep economic crisis from which it cannot escape; which is generating a mountain of financial ‘paper wealth’ 12-14 times the world gross domestic product10; which is fleeing from production to devote itself to the palliative of speculation because profit margins in the real economy are no longer sufficient for productive investments. In short, it is the fall in the rate of profit which accelerates capitalist competition and the clash between imperialisms. In this context the tendency to war is not a warning, but the concrete reality of all international relations and a state of affairs which involves all the main imperialist powers of the planet in various places in the world. It is a situation that can only be resolved by going to the heart of the contradiction that underlies the entire capitalist edifice, that is, the relationship between capital and labour. In no way can the problem be solved in terms of redistribution, as the more or less radical reformists always suppose, but only by building a position of strength in the struggle between classes and therefore of political leadership in the form of the class political party. Such a party will call for a break in the contradiction of capitalism itself in order to lay the political and economic foundations for the construction of a new society, a society that is no longer based on the labour capital ratio, not aimed at maximising profit, without the wars that create destruction in order to rebuild, without the existence of classes which presuppose the economic and political dominance of one over the other. In other words, a society of associated producers who work and build for collective needs, where everyone contributes according to their particular skills and abilities. Otherwise it will still be barbarism, destruction and death for millions of proletarians; victims, first of exploitation, then of the war that must recreate the conditions for the production of profit itself. There is no other solution. Either the world proletariat will succeed in escaping from the cages of nationalism, from the thousand triggers for war that imperialism sets every day, or a bursting of one of the many speculative bubbles – possibly stemming from the Federal Reserve putting up interest rates – will be enough to intensify and generalise the tragedy of existing wars and turn the world into a gigantic cemetery. Either war, with its heavy burden of death, destruction and barbarism, or the revolution where the proletariat takes on the task of giving life to a new equitable, communal and human social frame. But for this to happen a strong international party is required to remove wage workers from the dominant thought of the ruling class, stuffed as it is with provincialism, nationalism, racism: as if these trappings of bourgeois ideology were, in any case, the pole star for the whole humanity. It is vital to undermine and demolish the dominant ideology of the ruling class, to begin to pose the question of a class-to-class frontal clash, to present an alternative to this system which can only exploit, produce crises, devastate the eco-system, bring disastrous wars which only herald worse imperialist conflicts that will allow for the destruction of enough capital value to rebuild, to create the conditions for a new cycle of accumulation. This in turn would inevitably have the same problems as before, but with an even greater capacity to destroy the world along with a proletariat unable to find the strength to prevent yet another barbarism. For our part, we are doing everything we can to stop this from ever happening. The “dualism” of war or revolution is not an invention of the god Mars or the rebellious Prometheus in chains. There is no historical course that necessarily leads to war or revolution. The world will go towards war or revolution, not because history is already written in the Great Book, but only as the result of the balance of power between the ruling class and the subordinate class. And this is not written anywhere except in the consciousness of those who work in one direction or another. There are no historical courses leading to one side or the other. The only valid yardstick is to evaluate the balance of power between the classes, the economic underpinning that conditions their existence, the ideologies which dominate them, and the signals that come from one class or the other. If we were to venture a hypothesis today, on the basis of current elements, we should say that the war “solution” is the most probable. This is because in the current state of affairs the balance of power is on the side of the various imperialist bourgeoisies. Each of them attacks their proletariat by means of greater exploitation, by punishing job contracts, by increasing relative and absolute poverty. They make and break the most absurd governments by supporting them or letting them fall according to their own contingent interests. Abroad, that is, outside of their economic market, under the pressure of the crisis, they set up theatres of war, mostly fought by proletarians in the area under contention. It does not matter whether the proletarians are Kurds or Arabs, Shiites or Sunnis. The important thing is that they are being dragged into the ideological mechanisms of this or that imperialism and that they act as cannon fodder for the sole benefit of the interests of the imperialism that has ideologically subjugated them. As regards the proletariat, the opposite is true. They rarely oppose the economic attacks and the increasingly humiliating conditions of life that their respective bourgeoisies force upon them. We live in a period when the crisis is so deep that the margins for successful demands which once characterised the daily struggle are narrowed. Today workers struggle not so much for a wage increase, but for the most elementary social rights, such as housing and better conditions of life and improved services. When workers take to demonstrating in the streets, they do so to defend themselves from the attacks of the bourgeoisie. They do so to keep their jobs, to stop their factory being displaced by some other service or from being moved abroad, where another army of desperate people is ready to be exploited under worse conditions. This is the picture, the snapshot that makes us say that the current balance of power between the classes inclines us to consider the possibility of an even worse war in terms of intensity of destruction and the involvement of the international proletarian masses. But things do not always go as the snapshot of the moment suggests. Over a longer time frame, it is not the instant picture but an ongoing movie that could change the story. In other words, the balance of power between the classes can change during the course of events. Let us not forget the October revolution which had the strength to express itself in the middle of the First World War. Then too there was a world economic crisis, the various European proletariats were under the banners of their respective imperialisms, nationalism was raging worldwide, yet the Russian proletariat raised its head, opposed the carnage of war, fought for the revolution against the barbarism of imperialism behind and with its party, its tactics and its communist strategy. Then came isolation from other revolutionary experiences in Europe and the enormous economic retreat encouraged the forces of the counter-revolution, even within the Bolshevik party itself. So the revolutionaries do not simply have the task of analysing how things are going, whether by a pre-determined destiny or by a whim of the gods, but of studying the economic and social situation as the capitalist crisis unfurled. Revolutionary communists have the task of creating the subjective conditions for the revolution, not in opposition to the balance of power between the classes, but in harmony with any sudden, unexpected changes in those same power relations which could signal a change of direction. Amongst the subjective goals that revolutionaries must aim for is the building of the international communist party without which any change of course in the relationship between classes, any resumption of the class struggle would end up with no day-to-day tactic or strategy for achieving an alternative to capitalism. The proletariat would still be stuck ploughing the same tragic capitalist furrow, that generator of all crises and wars. Here too the October revolution taught us a great lesson. Without the Bolshevik party, tens of millions of peasants and millions of workers would have turned away from any revolutionary solution and would have been re-absorbed into the mystical nationalistic climate. What followed is part of another aspect of history that we could call “revolution and counter-revolution”. Today we are faced with “war or revolution”, learning the lessons from the past which led to the victory of the Russian proletariat and identifying the adverse conditions and consequent errors that accelerated its defeat. 6. For more on the increasingly intense rivalry between the US and China, see ‘US Power and the New Course Towards War’ in Revolutionary Perspectives 12 [ 2018]. 8. And just to increase that advantage by a further 10% the price of an ounce of gold was decreed equivalent to $44.2 in February 1973. 9. Qatar, in pursuit of its own imperialist interests in Egypt and elsewhere, fell foul of the Saudi Sunni godfathers who organised sanctions against it in 2017 and it has since also exited OPEC. Turkish troops are now stationed there against possible Saudi aggression – a threat which seems to have diminished with the latest invitation of the Qataris to attend a summit in Riyadh. 10. According to the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), in 2013 global financial activity generated $993tn, compared to the estimated $75tn value of global GDP. “… of this $993tn only $283tn can be classified as ‘primary’ finance such as shares, bank credit, etc. The remaining $710tn are derivative products, exchanged outside of the regular markets with only a very small fraction of these transactions having any link to the real economy.” Report by Marco Panara, ‘Finanza, un trilione di dollari che soffoca l’economia reale’ in La Repubblica, 27 October, 2014.
2019-04-23T12:47:27Z
http://libcom.org/blog/decade-financial-crash-25012019
From booster seats to IKEA crib mattresses to Graco strollers and Beech-Nut baby food, here are the recent major baby gear recalls. Are any of these items in your home? Baby food, cribs, strollers, car seats, toys and more baby gear have been recalled recently. From IKEA MALM chests and drawers to Graco car seats and strollers, here are the latest products that have been recalled. Find out what you need to know to keep your baby safe. The Danger: The Click & Go receiver mounts that attach the car seat carrier to the stroller frame could detach unexpectedly, and the baby and seat could fall. Description: The recall involves about 676,000 strollers sold in the United States, and 41,100 strollers sold in Canada and Mexico. It's Britax B-Agile and BOB Motion single or double occupant strollers that have Click & Go receiver mounts. You can find the affected model numbers on Britax's recall site. Sold At: Babies R Us, buy buy Baby, Target and other stores nationwide, and online at Amazon.com, albeebaby.com, buybuybaby.com, diapers.com, ToysRUs.com and other websites from May 2011 through February 2017 for between $250 and $470 for the strollers and travel systems. What to Do: Consumers should throw away the Click & Go Receiver and request a free repair kit at 1-844-227-0300 or Stroller.Recall@britax.com. The stroller can still be used safely with your baby fully reclined in the stroller seat, without the car seat attached. For More Information: Contact Britax toll-free at 1-844-227-0300 or Stroller.Recall@britax.com. The Danger: The hinge used to fold the Dash v5 stroller can become damaged while opening and closing the stroller, posing a pinch hazard to the user. Description: The recall involves about 870 Phil&teds Dash v5 buggy-style strollers with serial numbers ranging between PTRV 0715/0746 and PTRV 0815/2525. (The serial number is printed on the lower left rear cradle, next to the identification label.) For colors and models included in the recall, click here. Sold At: Baby Street, Dainty Baby, Mega Babies and other baby product and specialty stores nationwide and online at Amazon, Diapers.com and on the Phil&teds website from August 2015 through April 2016 for about $550. What to Do: Consumers should immediately stop using the Dash v5 stroller and contact Phil&teds to have the stroller frame replaced free of charge. For More Information: Contact Phil&teds toll-free at 855-652-9019 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. MT Monday through Friday or online at www.philandteds.com and click on “Support,” then “Upgrades” and “Recalls." The Danger: The fin of the whale and the head of the octopus can detach from the pacifier holder, posing a choking hazard. Description: The recall involves about 12,900 Little Wishes Summer Plush Pacifier Holders, including the Blue Whale, item number 5202601, and the Pink Octopus, item number 5725213. The pacifier holders are made of a plush fabric, stuffed with fiber, measure approximately 4.5 inches by 2 inches and have a 10-inch ribbon attached to the body. The item number is printed on the top left corner of the product hang tag. “Hobby Lobby 9123069” is printed on the front and back of the sewn-in label. Sold At: Hobby Lobby Stores nationwide from January 2016 through April 2016 for about $5. What to Do: Stop using the recalled pacifier holders and return them to the nearest Hobby Lobby store for a full refund or store credit. For More Information: Contact Hobby Lobby Stores at 800-326-7931 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, or online at www.hobbylobby.com and click on the “Recall” tab at the bottom of the page. The Danger: The rattle seams can separate, exposing the fiber stuffing and bell rattle, posing a choking hazard. Description: The recall involves about 14,400 Little Wishes Chenille Stuffed Rattles, including the Pink & Green Fish rattles, item number 5141577, and the Blue & Yellow Fish rattles, item number 5127642. The rattles are made of a soft chenille fabric with a fiber stuffing. They are 8.5 inches by 7 inches and have a hole cut out in the middle. The item number is printed on the top left corner of the product hang tag. Rattles have a sewn-in label with “Reg. No. PA-15130(CN)” and “Hobby Lobby 9123069” printed on the front. Sold At: Hobby Lobby Stores nationwide from January 2016 through April 2016 for about $7. What to Do: Stop using the recalled rattles and return them to the nearest Hobby Lobby store for a full refund or store credit. The Danger: The cover can detach from the pacifier’s clip, posing a choking hazard for young children. Description: The recall involves around 180,000 Munchkin’s Latch lightweight pacifiers and clips sold as a set in five styles: designer, rattle and heartbeat clips with 0m+ natural shape pacifiers, and designer and rattle clips with 6m+ orthodontic pacifiers. The designer pacifiers and clips 0m+ and 6m+ are in three color patterns: blue and white strips, orange and with white polka dots and pink with white polka dots. The rattle pacifiers and clips 0m+ and 6m+ are green with beads in the pacifier cover to make a rattle sound and have a polka dot strap. The heartbeat pacifiers and clips have a red, heart-shaped pacifier cover and red and white polka dots on the strap. Sold At: Babies R Us, Target, Wal-Mart and other mass merchandisers, juvenile product, baby boutique and discount stores nationwide and online at amazon.com, munchkin.com and other websites from March 2014 through March 2016 for between $11 and $15. What to Do: Consumers should immediately take the clip away from young children and contact Munchkin toll-free at 877-242-3134 from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. PT Monday through Friday or online at www.munchkin.com (click on "Help" at the bottom of the page and then "Recalls") for a free replacement Lightweight Pacifier pack with two pacifiers or a full refund. The Danger: When a peg is not fully engaged the seat can fall unexpectedly, posing a risk of injury to the child. Fisher-Price has received two reports of this happening, though no injuries have been reported yet. Description: The recall involves around 34,000 products, including three models of the Fisher-Price cradle swings: CHM84 Soothing Savanna Cradle 'n Swing, CMR40 Sweet Surroundings Cradle 'n Swing, and CMR43 Sweet Surroundings Butterfly Friends Cradle 'n Swing. The swings have two different swinging motions—rocking side-to-side, or swinging head-to-toe—and six different swing speeds from low to high. Sold At: BuybuyBaby, Target and other stores nationwide and online at Amazon.com and other websites from November 2015 through March 2016 for about $170. What to Do: Consumers should immediately stop using the recalled cradle swing and contact Fisher-Price at 800-432-5437 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, or online at www.service.mattel.com and click on Recalls & Safety Alerts for more information. for revised assembly instructions. The Danger: Gerber Products Company is voluntarily recalling specific organic pouch food after identifying a packaging defect that may result in product spoilage during transport and handling. There have been three consumer reports of temporary gastrointestinal symptoms, but it is unclear whether these are related to eating the baby food. Description: The recall involves Gerber Organic 2nd Foods Pouches in Pears, Carrots & Peas, 3.5 ounce pouch UPC 15000074319 with best by dates/batch codes 12JUL2016 51945335XX and 13JUL 2016 51955335XX and Carrots, Apples and Mangoes, 3.5 ounce pouch UPC 15000074395 with best by dates/batch codes 13JUL2016 51955335XX and 14JUL2016 51965335XX. Consumers may notice that, in some cases, the pouches are bloated and product inside may have an off taste or odor. Sold At: U.S. retailers nationwide and through online stores. What to Do: Consumers who purchased pouches with the above UPCs, batch codes and expiration dates should not use the product and are encouraged to contact the Gerber Parents Resource Center at 1-800-706-0556 anytime day or night for a replacement coupon. Description: Evenflo is recalling 56,247 Transitions 3-in-1 Combination Booster Seats, model numbers 34411686, 34411695, and 34411029, produced from December 18, 2014, through January 29, 2016. The Danger: The central front adjuster (CFA) button that is used to loosen the seat's internal harness may be within the child's reach, allowing the child to activate the CFA and loosen the internal harness, putting her at risk of injury in a crash. This safety issue only impacts the use of the seat in the forward-facing harnessed booster (22-65 lbs. and 28-50 in.) configuration. What to Do: Evenflo will notify owners and provide a remedy kit that includes a newly-designed seat pad and CFA assembly, free of charge. For More Information: Owners may contact Evenflo at www.transitions.evenflo.com or 1-800-233-5921. They may also contact the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Vehicle Safety Hotline at 1-888-327-4236 (TTY 1-800-424-9153), or go to www.safercar.gov. The Danger: The arm bar can bend or detach during use, posing a fall hazard to children. Nuna has received 50 reports of the arm bar detaching, including six reports of children falling from the high chair. Four incidents resulted in injuries, including bruising and a cut on the forehead. Description: The recall involves approximately 5,950 Nuna Baby Essentials ZAAZ high chairs in eight models: HC-07-004 (pewter), HC-07-005 (carbon), HC-07-006 (plum), HC-07-009 (almond), HC-08-004 (pewter), HC-08-005 (carbon), HC-08-006 (plum) and HC-08-009 (almond). ZAAZ and the model number are printed under the high chair seat on a white sticker. These high chairs look like a regular kitchen table chair and have removable trays, arm bars footrests, seat pads and harnesses so that they can convert into toddler chairs. “Nuna” is printed above the footrest of the unit. Sold At: Albee Baby, Giggle, Magic Bean, Nordstrom and other specialty stores nationwide and online at www.nuna.eu and www.wayfair.com and other online retailers from February 2013 through November 2015 for about between $250 and $300. What to Do: Immediately stop using these recalled high chairs and contact the firm to receive a free new arm bar and instructions on how to replace it. For More Information: Contact Nuna Baby Essentials toll-free at 855-686-2872 from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. ET Monday through Friday or online at www.nuna.eu/usa/ and click on “Product Recall” under the “Support” section on the sidebar of the homepage. The Danger: The car seats may have the recline label affixed to the wrong location, resulting in confusion about how to use the seat properly. If the instructions are followed as shown, a rear-facing infant could be placed in an upright position and/or a forward-facing toddler could be placed in a recline position. As such, the child seats fail to comply with the federal motor vehicle safety standards and puts the child at risk of injury in the event of a crash. Description: The recall involves 15,064 Extend2Fit Convertible child seats and is expected to begin February 26, 2016. Sold At: Baby stores nationwide. What to Do: Graco will notify owners and provide a new corrected label with application instructions, free of charge. For More Information: Contact Graco customer service at 1-800-345-4109, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Vehicle Safety Hotline at 1-888-327-4236 (TTY 1-800-424-9153), or go to www.safercar.gov. The Danger: The car seat carry handle can crack and break allowing the seat to fall unexpectedly, posing a risk of injury to the infant. Britax has received 74 reports of handles developing fractures, cracks and/or breaking while in use, including one report of an infant who received a bump on the head when the carrier fell to the ground. Description: The recall involves about 75,890 Britax B-Safe 35 and B-Safe 35 Elite infant car seat and travel systems manufactured between October 1, 2014 and July 1, 2015. The product can be used as a rear-facing only car seat and as an infant carrier. The car seat/carriers have a canopy, black shell and base, and were sold in a variety of colors. The Britax logo is printed on both sides of the seat shell and on the carry handle grip. Model numbers and the date of manufacture (DOM) are printed on a label located at the back of the infant car seat/carrier shell. For models included in the recall, visit the Consumer Product Safety Commission website. Sold At: Babies R Us, buybuy BABY, Target and other stores nationwide and online at Amazon.com, Diapers.com and other online retailers from November 2014 to January 2016 for between $210 and $250. What to Do: Immediately stop carrying the car seat by the handle until the repair is installed. All consumers who have previously registered their product with Britax will automatically receive a free repair kit. To register to receive a repair kit or verify registration, visit bsafe35recall.com. Consumers can continue to use the car seat when secured in a vehicle or on a stroller. For More Information: Contact Britax at 800-683-2045 from 8:30 a.m. and 5:45 p.m. ET Monday through Thursday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:45 p.m. ET on Friday, or by email at Britax.Recall@britax.com. Consumers can also visit the firm’s website at www.us.Britax.com and click on “Safety Notice” at the top right of the page. The Danger: The foam padding on the stroller’s arm bar can come off in pieces if the child bites it, posing a choking hazard. Britax has received 117 reports of this happening, including five reports of children choking or gagging from the fragments. Description: The recall involves about 60,000 Britax B-Ready strollers and B-Ready replacement top seats that were sold separately. The B-Ready strollers have a silver or black frame with a solid-colored top seat in a variety of colors. The Britax logo is on the stroller’s side hinges and foot rest. B-Ready is printed on the sides of the stroller frame. The stroller’s model number and date of manufacture are printed on a label on the stroller’s frame between the front wheels or on the inside frame that connects to the back right wheel. The replacement top seats were sold separately in a variety of colors and fit into the stroller’s frame. The replacement top seat’s model number and date of manufacture are printed on a black label on the right side tube above the adjuster button, under the fabric cover. For model numbers and dates of manufacture included in this recall, see the Consumer Product Safety Commission website. Sold At: Babies R Us, buybuy Baby, Target and other stores nationwide and online at Amazon.com, Diapers.com and other websites from April 2010 through January 2016 for about $500 for the stroller. The replacement top seats were sold by Britax from April 2010 through January 2016 for about $150. What to Do: Immediately remove the arm bar from recalled strollers and replacement top seats and contact Britax for a free black, zippered arm bar cover and a warning label to apply to the strollers and replacement top seats. You can continue to use the strollers without the arm bar attached. For More Information: Contact Britax at 800-683-2045 from 8:30 a.m. to 5:45 p.m. ET Monday through Thursday and from 8:30 a.m. to 4:45 p.m. ET on Friday, by email at Britax.Recall@britax.com or online at www.us.britax.com and click on “Safety Notice” at the top right, or B-ReadyRecall.com. The Danger: The snaps on the bodysuits can detach, posing a choking hazard to young children. Sold At: Walt Disney World Resort in Lake Buena Vista, Florida, Disneyland® Resort in Anaheim, California, the Treasure Ketch Shop on the Disney Wonder and Mickey’s Mainsail located on the Disney Magic, Disney Dream and Disney Fantasy cruise ships from February 2015 through November 2015 for about $20. What to Do: Stop using the recalled infant bodysuits and contact Walt Disney Parks and Resorts for instructions on returning the bodysuits for a full refund. For More Information: Contact Walt Disney Parks and Resorts toll-free at 844-722-1444 from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, or online at www.disneyparks.com and click on “Recall Notice” for more information. The Danger: The strap attaching the mobile to the crib rail can break, posing a risk of falling on the baby. Skip Hop has received 8 reports of this happening, though no injuries have been reported yet. Description: The recall involves approximately 4,350 Skip Hop Moonlight & Melodies projection crib mobiles. The mobile has a white plastic arm that attaches to the side of a crib with four blinking, glowing leaves with stuffed animal attachments, including a yellow and gray giraffe, a green turtle with a gray and white polka-dot shell, a brown and tan monkey and a gray and white striped owl. The mobile also has a projector on the top of the mobile that projects stars on the ceiling and plays eight nursery lullabies. The mobiles measure 17.5 inches long by 14 inches wide by 22 inches tall. “Skip Hop” and the model number 185509 are printed on the back of the mobile’s base. Sold At: Babies R Us, Buy Buy Baby and other independent baby stores nationwide and online at Amazon.com and skiphop.com from July 2015 to November 2015 for about $65. What to Do: Stop using the recalled mobiles immediately and contact the firm for instructions on receiving a $75 coupon towards the purchase of a new Skip Hop product. For More Information: Contact Skip Hop toll-free at 877-475-4746 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, by email at customerservice@skiphop.com or online at Skiphop.com and click on “Safety Notices” at the bottom of the page under “Customer Care”. The Danger: A child can remove the highchair's tray, posing a fall hazard. Safety 1st has received 68 reports of children removing the trays, including 11 reports of injuries, such as lacerations, chipped teeth and bruises. Description: The recall involves approximately 35,000 Safety 1st Wood Décor highchairs in three models: HC144BZF (Casablanca), HC229CZF (Gentle Lace) and HC229CYG (Black Lace). The model numbers are printed under the highchair seat. These A-frame black wood highchairs have a removable fabric, black and white print seat pad with a blue or pink border on the top and bottom of the seat pad. The highchairs have a white plastic, detachable tray with a cone-shaped center divider that fits between a child’s legs. “Safety 1st” is printed on the front center of the tray. Sold At: Babies R US and Toys R Us retail stores nationwide and online, as well as Amazon and Walmart.com and other online retailers from May 2013 through May 2015 for about $120. What to Do: Consumers should immediately stop using these recalled highchairs and contact the firm to receive instructions on receiving a new tray with labels. For More Information: Contact Safety 1st toll-free at (877) 717-7823 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, email at decorwoodhighchair@djgusa.com or online at www.safety1st.com and click on “Safety Notices” at the top of the page. The Danger: A metal bracket that connects the mattress support to the crib can break, creating an uneven sleeping surface or a gap. If this occurs, a baby can become entrapped in the crib, fall or suffer lacerations from the broken metal bracket. Description: The expanded recall involves approximately 17,613 DaVinci brand full-size cribs including the Reagan crib (model #M2801), the Emily crib, (model #M4791), the Jamie crib (model #M7301), and the Jenny Lind crib (model #M7391) manufactured from May 2012 through December 2012. The model number, serial number and manufacture date are printed on a label affixed to the bottom right hand side panel of the crib. Cribs included in the recall have serial numbers that begin with “N00,” followed by one of the following numbers. A previous recall included the same model numbers, but had different serial numbers. Sold At: Target and children's stores nationwide and online at Amazon.com from May 2012 to December 2013 for between $150 and $250. What to Do: Consumers should immediately stop using the recalled cribs and contact DaVinci for a free replacement mattress support which includes replacement brackets. In the meantime, parents are urged to find an alternate, safe sleeping environment for the child, such as a bassinet, play yard or toddler bed depending on the child’s age. For More Information: Contact DaVinci toll-free at 888-673-6652 from 8:30 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. PT Monday through Friday. Consumers can also visit www.davincibaby.com/safetyrecall3 or www.davincibaby.com and click on “Safety Recall." The Danger: The “D” ring on the pacifier clip can break, allowing beads to detach, posing a choking hazard. Description: The recall involves approximately 46,900 Chewbeads Baby pacifier clip holders in five different styles. The "Where’s the Pacifier?” pacifier clips styles include shapes of a butterfly, dinosaur, heart, sheriff badge and a white baseball with red stitching and a major league baseball team logo. “Chewbeads baby” is imprinted in raised letters on the rubber shape attachment. The pacifier clips have eight multi-colored beads threaded through a narrow satin ribbon that attaches to a pacifier on one end and a plastic D-ring on the other. The clip and beads are about six inches long. The garment clip has the following number code on the back of the plastic clip: 3/31/14, 08/08/14, 12/01/14, 14/30/09, 15/02/09, 25/04/14. Sold At: Buy Buy Baby and small boutique retail stores nationwide and in Canada from September 2014 through June 2015 for $16.50 for the baseball themed clips and $15 for the other style clips. What to Do: Consumers should immediately take these recalled pacifier clips away from young children and contact Chewbeads for a free replacement pacifier clip or a refund of the purchase price. For More Information: Contact Chewbeads Inc. toll-free at 888-786-7790 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, email at service@chewbeads.com or online at www.chewbeads.com and click on the "Product Recall" link at the bottom of the page. The Danger: In the event of a crash, the top tether anchorage may detach from the child restraint, posing a risk of injury to the child or other vehicle occupants and failing to conform to the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard. Description: The recall involves 173,063 ProRIDE child restraints, model number 332.01 in all colors (AK21, KAEC, KAEG, KK91, MC11, MJ15, QA56, QA9N, QQ11, QQ14, and QQ95), manufactured from April 9, 2010 through June 9, 2015, and Performance RIDE child restraints, model number 333.01 in all colors (CHIL, HABB, HAZE, JEBB, JETT, KNGT, MABB, MARI, MNGT, PLUM, PLBB, REBB, SLBB, REDD, ROBB, ROSE, SABB, SAPH, SLTE, VIBB, VIBE), manufactured from January 15, 2013 through June 9, 2015. What to Do: Recaro will notify and send all registered owners a length of webbing with loops on both ends and instructions to further secure the child restraints, free of charge. For More Information: Contact Recaro customer service at 1-866-628-4750 or by email at recarorecall@m-s-s.com. Owners may also contact the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Vehicle Safety Hotline at 1-888-327-4236 (TTY 1-800-424-9153), or go to www.safercar.gov. The Danger: The VYSSA and SULTAN crib mattresses could create a gap between the mattress and crib ends larger than allowed by federal regulations, posing an entrapment hazard to infants. There have been two reports of infants becoming entrapped between the mattress and one end of the crib; the children were removed without injury. Meanwhile, the VYSSA SPELEVINK are also being recalled for failing to meet the federal open flame standard for mattresses, posing a fire hazard. Description: The recall involves approximately 340,000 IKEA VYSSA and SULTAN style crib mattresses across the U.S. and Canada with the following model names: SULTAN BLUNDA, SULTAN DRÖMMA, SULTAN SNARKA, SULTAN SUSSA, VYSSA VACKERT, VYSSA VINKA, VYSSA SPELEVINK, VYSSA SLÖA and VYSSA SLUMMER. The recalled mattresses are 52 inches long and 27 ½ inches wide and were manufactured on May 4, 2014 or earlier. An identification label attached to the mattress cover has the date of manufacture in Month-DD-YY format or YY-WW format and the SULTAN or VYSSA model name. In the YY-WW format, mattresses with a date code of 14-18 or earlier are being recalled. A gap between the mattress and crib ends larger than two finger width is an indication of the defective mattress. Sold At: IKEA stores nationwide and online at www.ikea-usa.com from October 2000 to May 2014 for about $20 to $100. What to Do: Consumers should inspect the recalled mattress by making sure there is no gap larger than the width of two fingers between the ends of the crib and the mattress. If there is, customers should immediately stop using the recalled mattress, call (888) 966-4532 and return it to any IKEA store for an exchange or a full refund. Consumers with VYSSA SPELEVINK mattresses, whether or not they had received them as part of an earlier recall exchange, should immediately stop using them and return them to any IKEA store for a full refund. The Danger: The basket can slide off an inclined surface and its stand can tip, posing a fall hazard for babies. Description: The recall involves approximately 5,500 baskets and 800 stands. The Moses basket is made from natural tan wild palm leaves and measures about 33 inches long by 14 inches tall and 10 inches wide. The stand has a pine wood frame, a fabric platform and polyester rope design. The stand measures 17 inches tall by 14 inches wide and 15 inches wide when extended. “Tadpoles” is printed on the clear plastic wrapping on the moses baskets and stands. Sold At: Babies R Us and buybuy Baby and online at Amazon.com, Bellacor.com, Kohls.com, Quidsi.com, Wayfair.com and Zulily.com from April 2014 through July 2015 for between $50 and $90 for the moses basket and from June 2014 through July 2015 for between $25 and $35 for the stand. What to Do: Immediately stop using the moses basket and stand and contact Sleeping Partners for instructions on returning the basket and stand to receive a store credit. For More Information: Contact Sleeping Partners toll-free at (844) 489-9498 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday or online at sleepingpartners.com and click on "USA" then "Support" to access the moses basket recall information. The Danger: A wooden ring that hangs from the toy can break into small pieces, posing a choking hazard to young children. Description: The recall involves approximately 2,800 My Snuggly Ellie Activity Toys. The toy is a plush brown elephant with white crinkle ears, a green hanging loop on top of its head, which can attach to a stroller or crib, a mini mirror on its stomach, and a teether and wooden ring hanging below its body. The item number is 212520 and can be found on the small white tag sewn into the bottom of the toy. Sold At: Specialty toy and baby stores nationwide, and online at www.manhattantoy.com from February 2014 through May 2015 for about $10. What to Do: Consumers should immediately take the toy away from young children and return it to where it was purchased for a full refund. For More Information: Contact Manhattan Group toll-free at (800) 541-1345 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. CT Monday through Friday, or visit www.manhattantoy.com and click on “RECALLS”. The Danger: The crib mattresses fail to meet the mandatory federal mattress flammability standard for open flames, posing a fire hazard. Description: The recall involves approximately 18,500 Stork Craft foam crib and crib/toddler mattresses with model numbers 06710-100 and 06710-200 and a date of manufacture between August 2014 and January 2015. The mattresses have a zippered white fabric cover and measure about 28 inches wide and 52 inches long with a 5-inch-thick foam core. The model number, date of manufacture and “Stork Craft Manufacturing (USA) Inc.” are printed on a federal label attached to the white mattress cover. The mattresses’ boxes have a Graco logo on them. Sold At: Walmart stores nationwide and online at Amazon.com, EChannel.com, ToysRUs.com, Walmart.com and Wayfair.com from August 2014 through April 2015 for between $38 and $50. What to Do: If you have a recalled crib mattress, immediately stop using it and contact Stork Craft for a free, zippered mattress barrier cover to be placed over the mattress foam core and under the white mattress cover provided with the mattress. For more information: Contact Stork Craft at (800) 274-0277 Monday through Friday between 7 a.m. and 3 p.m. PT, by email at parts@storkcraft.com, or online at http://storkcraftdirect.com and click on "Product Recall" near the bottom of the page. The Danger: The strollers' and RumbleSeats' bumper bar poses a choking hazard when a child bites into the foam covering. UPPAbaby has received 22 reports of children biting off a piece of the foam. No injuries have been reported. Description: The recall involves approximately 79,000 2015 CRUZ and 2015 VISTA strollers and 2015 RumbleSeats. The strollers have an aluminum alloy grey or black frame with a black fabric toddler seat, a colored fabric sunshade canopy, and a black basket under the seat. The UPPAbaby name and logo are printed on the side of the canopy and “CRUZ” is printed in white lettering on the handlebars of the stroller. The VISTA strollers have grey or black aluminum frames, a colored sunshade canopy and are made to hold up to three children. "VISTA" is printed in white lettering on the handlebars and "UPPAbaby" is printed across the bottom diagonal rail of the frame next to a black fabric basket. The RumbleSeat is a separate seat attachment that can be attached to the stroller frame, they have manufacture dates stamped on the bottom of the seat from September 2014 through May 2015. The RumbleSeat comes in various colors and allows the child to ride rear facing, forward facing or reclined. All of the strollers and RumbleSeats have a foam bumper bar across the middle of the product for the child to hold. Visit the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission's website for a list of serial numbers included in the recall. Sold At: BuyBuy Baby and other baby stores nationwide and online at Amazon from December 2014 through July 2015 at about $500 for the CRUZ stroller, $860 for the VISTA stroller and $170 for the RumbleSeat. What to Do: If you have a recalled stroller or RumbleSeat, immediately remove and stop using the bumper bar and contact UPPAbaby on the number below to receive a free cover and warning label. For more information: Call (844) 540-8694, email contact@uppababy.com or visit www.UPPAbaby.com and click on "Safety Notice" on the lower right hand corner. The Danger: IKEA is rolling out a national repair program for MALM chests and dressers after two two-year-old children died when the chests, which were not anchored to the wall, fell on top of them. IKEA and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission have also received 14 reports of tip-over incidents involving MALM chests, resulting in four injuries. Description: The alert involves approximately 27 million MALM 3- and 4-drawer chests and two styles of MALM 6- drawer chests, and other chests and dressers. IKEA is offering a free anchoring kit for the MALM chests and dressers to ensure they are safe. Sold At: IKEA stores all over the U.S. and Canada. Prices of the chests range from about $80 to $200. What to Do: Immediately remove all unanchored IKEA children's chests and dressers that are 23.5 inches and over, and adult chests and drawers that are 29.5 inches and over, and store them in a child-free zone in your home while you obtain an IKEA wall anchoring kit. For More Information: To receive a free wall anchoring kit, visit an IKEA retail store, go to www.IKEA-USA.com/saferhomestogether, or call (888) 966-4532. The Danger: The wheels' hub caps can break or come off, posing a choking hazard for young children, though no incidents have been reported. Description: The recall involves approximately 800 Bud and Skipit Wheely Cute Pull Toys from Bunnies by the Bay. Bud, an 8-inch high soft brown puppy toy with a blue and white pull cord, stands on red wooden wheels with blue hub caps. There is a red, blue and white soft ball at the end of the pull cord. Skipit, an 8-inch high cream-colored bunny toy with an orange and white pull cord, stands on blue wheels with orange hub caps. There is a soft cloth carrot at the end of the pull cord. A label with lot code YM5/14 is sewn on the back leg of each toy. The item number for Bud Wheely Cute Toy, found on the lower right-hand corner of the original packing, is #401101. The item number for Skipit Wheely Cute Toy is #401103. What to Do: Consumers should take the toys away from young children immediately and return the item to where it was purchased for a full refund. For More Information: Call Bunnies by the Bay toll-free at (866) 763-8869 between 8:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday, email customerservice@kidspreferred.com or visit www.kidspreferred.com and click on “Contact Us” at the bottom of the homepage. The Danger: The stitching on the restraint straps can loosen, which allows the straps to separate from the seat, posing a fall hazard to children. OXO has received five reports of this happening following a child pulling on the straps or an adult tightening the straps. No injuries have been reported. Description: The recall involves approximately 25,000 OXO Nest Booster Seats sold in green (model 6367200), pink (model 6367300), taupe (model 6367500) and orange (model 6367400) with a white base. A sticker affixed to the underside of the seat reads “Nest Booster Seat” with the model number and manufacture date. The manufacture date code represents the month and year in MMYY format and recalled units have the code: 0714, 0814, 0914, 1014, 1114 or 1214. The formed plastic seats are about 13 inches wide by 14 inches tall by 12 inches deep and have a grey three-point child restraint strap system. The OXO logo is embossed on the restraint system’s buckle. Sold At: Buybuy Baby, Toys“R”Us/Babies“R”Us and independent specialty stores nationwide and online at Amazon.com from September 2014 through April 2015 for about $55. What to Do: Consumers should immediately stop using the Nest Booster Seats and contact OXO at (800) 545-4411 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET Monday through Friday for a free repair kit with redesigned safety straps and installation instructions. For More Information: Email info@oxo.com or visit them online at www.oxo.com. The Danger: The friction between the wall and the pressure-mounted safety gate is insufficient to hold the gate in position, posing a fall hazard. The lower metal bar can also be a trip hazard. There have been 18 incidents worldwide, including three incidents in which children have been injured as a result of falling down stairs. Description: The recall involves approximately 58,000 PATRULL KLÄMMA and PATRULL SMIDIG safety gates in the U.S. and 17,000 in Canada. The safety gates are white, made of steel and plastic, and measure about 29 inches high with an adjustable width from about 29 inches to 34 inches. The gate has a spring mechanism that fits between the two sides of the door frame to hold the gate in place. A permanent label is attached to the metal bar at the bottom of the safety gate containing an article number. Gates with the following article numbers are recalled: 302-265-21, 500-375-67, 501-919-50, 655-517-10, 700-989-65 and 901-136-01. Sold At: IKEA stores nationwide and online at www.ikea-usa.com from August 1995 through February 2015 for about $35. What to Do: Consumers should stop using the safety gate and return it to any IKEA store for a full refund. Any PATRULL KLÄMMA/SMIDIG safety gate extensions may also be returned for a full refund. Consumers who want to keep their PATRULL KLÄMMA or SMIDIG safety gate for limited use in a doorway between rooms or at the bottom of a staircase can contact IKEA to receive free updated user instructions and new adhesive warning labels to put on their safety gate. For More Information: Contact IKEA toll-free at (888) 966-4532 anytime or visit the recall page on the Ikea website. The Danger: The "Vintage Grey" color paint on cribs, furniture and accessories has been found to exceed federal limits of lead and can cause adverse health effects if ingested. Description: The recall involves approximately 4,600 Baby’s Dream full-size cribs, furniture and accessories sold in a vintage grey paint finish under the Brie, Braxton, Heritage, Everything Nice and Legendary collections. Cribs and furniture included in this recall were manufactured between March 2014 and March 2015 in Chile. A label affixed to the bottom of the crib’s back frame and the back panel of the furniture lists the product name, date and location of manufacture, model number and purchase order number (PO#). Click here for a list of model numbers included in the recall. Sold At: Specialty furniture stores nationwide and online at BabysDream.com from March 2014 through March 2015 for between $350 and $900 for the cribs, and between $450 and $1,000 for the dressers, hutches, nightstands, bookcases and chests. Additional accessories were sold for between $100 and $300. What to Do: Consumers should immediately contact Baby’s Dream Furniture at (800) 835-2742 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday to arrange for an exchange. For More Information: Visit the firm’s website at www.babysdream.com and click on the recall image. The Danger: Wire-edged ribbon used in the blanket's tags can become exposed, posing a laceration hazard to children. Goochie Goo Garbs received one report of a child getting scratched. Description: The recall involves about 125 blankets. The affected product is a 6-inch square of soft fabric with crinkle paper inside and ribbon tags in the middle of each of the four sides. One side of the blanket contains a white satin ribbon tag with the words "Goochie Goo Garbs" on it. The tags are black, blue, green, pink or red with white polka-dots. The blankets come in a variety of patterns including shapes, animals and superheroes and sold for about $10. Sold At: Various children's speciality stores in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas and Pennsylvania from July 2014 through March 2015. What to Do: Consumers should stop using the blanket immediately and return it to the store it was purchased from for a full refund or replacement. For More Information: Call Goochie Goo Garbs collect at (480) 773-1808 from 10a.m. to 4p.m. MT, Monday through Friday, email customercare@goochiegoo.com or visit www.goochiegoo.com and click on the "Recall Notice" link. The Danger: The baby food may be contaminated with small pieces of glass. Beech-Nut says it initiated the "voluntary recall" after receiving a single complaint from a consumer who found a small piece of glass in the product. Beech-Nut, of Amsterdam, N.Y., also received a report of an oral injury associated with the consumption of the product, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Description: The recall involves approximately 1,920 pounds of the baby food produced on December 12, 2014. The affected product bears the establishment number "P-68A" inside the U.S. Department of Agriculture's mark of inspection, expires in "DEC 2016" and includes product numbers 12395750815 through 12395750821. Sold At: Retail locations nationwide. When available, the retail distribution list will be posted on the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service website. What to Do: Beech-Nut is encouraging customers to return the recalled product to the store they purchased it from for a full refund or exchange. You can also call them at (866) 674-4446 for a full refund. For More Information: Call the Beech-Nut Consumer Hotline at (866) 674-4446 or visit the Beech-Nut website. The Danger: The sharp edges of the die-cast metal cars can pose a laceration hazard, though injuries were reported. Description: The recall involves approximately 254,000 Tough Treadz Auto Carrier sets, which include a plastic toy truck in black, blue or red, and six die-cast metal cars in various colors. Sold At: Family Dollar Stores nationwide from September-December 2014 for about $5. What to Do: Consumers should immediately take the toy sets away from children and return them to any Family Dollar Stores location for a full refund. The Danger: The robes and footed pajamas don't meet the federal flammability standard and pose a burn hazard, though no injuries have been reported. Description: The recall involves approximately 8,400 Lazy One robes and footed pajamas. The one-piece zip-up pajamas are beige with the words "I'm OWL yours" printed on it; it was sold in children's small through extra-large. The recalled robes are pink with moose graphics and “Don’t Moose With Me” printed on it and red with printed moose graphics and solid black trim. Both were sold in sizes 4T through 14. Sold At: Department stores and children’s boutiques nationwide and online at www.lazyone.com from October 2013 through June 2014 for about $22 for the pajamas and about $15 for the robes. What to Do: Consumers should immediately take the pajamas and robes away from children and return them to Lazy One. For a free replacement, including shipping, consumers should contact Lazy One toll-free at (866) 340-5278 between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. MT Monday through Friday, or online at www.lazyone.com and click on the "Product Recall" link on the bottom of the page. The Danger: The play yard's rails can collapse, posing a strangulation hazard. Description: This recall involves approximately 10,000 Dream On Me Incredible two-level deluxe adjustable height play yards with model number starting with 436A, 436B, 436G, 436O, 436P and 436R. The play yards, made with a steel, powder-coated frame base with rolling, hooded casters, have a fabric and mesh covering that comes in a variety of colors. The play yard includes a changing top, a toy bar with soft toys for entertainment, a side pocket for storage and a carrying case. It can be folded for storage. “Dream On Me” is printed on the bottom left-hand side outside of the product, and the model number is printed on a label attached to the play yard’s mattress. Sold At: Online retailers including Amazon.com, Kohls.com, ToysRUs.com, WalMart.com and Wayfair.com from March 2010 through January 2014 for about $60. What to Do: Consumers should immediately stop using the recalled play yards. To receive a free repair kit, contact Dream On Me at 877/201-4317 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Thursday and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday. The Danger: The folding hinge on the sides of the stroller can pinch a child’s finger, posing a laceration or amputation hazard. Graco has received 11 reports of finger injuries, including six reports of fingertip amputation, four reports of partial-fingertip amputation and one finger laceration. Description: The recall involves approximately 4.7 million strollers and 11 different models: Aspen, Breeze, Capri, Cirrus, Glider, Kite, LiteRider, Sierra, Solara, Sterling, and TravelMate. All manufactured between August 1, 2000 and September 25, 2014, they are single-occupant strollers with an external sliding fold-lock hinge on each side and a one-hand fold release mechanism on the handle. Sold At: Target, Toys R Us, Walmart and other retail stores, as well as online retailers including Amazon.com and Walmart.com for about $40-$70. What to Do: To order a free repair kit, consumers should contact Graco immediately at 800/345-4109 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET Monday through Friday or at gracobaby.com. (Click on the “Help Center” at the top and Recall and Safety Notifications for more information.) While waiting for a repair kit, consumers should be careful when unfolding the stroller to make sure the hinges are firmly locked before placing a child in the stroller. The Danger: Components inside of the whistle can detach, posing choking and aspiration hazards. McDonald’s has received two reports of children who coughed out pieces of the whistle that they had sucked into their mouths, including one child who received medical attention. Description: This recall involves approximately 2.3 million whistles in the U.S. and 200,000 in Canada. The recalled whistles are red, with pictures of Hello Kitty on both sides, and were included in a plastic Hello Kitty figurine holding a pink heart-shaped lollipop. When closed, the figurine measures about 3 inches in height and width and 1 3/4 inches in depth. The whistle measures about 1 3/4 inches in height and width and 3/4 inches in depth. The text “©1976, 2014 SANRIO CO., LTD.” appears above Hello Kitty’s face on the whistle, and “Made for McDonald’s China CCW Chine” appears below Hello Kitty’s face on the whistle. The bag containing the toy includes the text “Hello Kitty® Birthday Lollipop” and the number “6” in the upper right corner. Available At: McDonald’s restaurants nationwide from October 2014 through the first week of November 2014 with Happy Meals and Mighty Kids Meals. What to Do: Consumers should immediately take the whistle away from children and return it to any McDonald’s for a free replacement toy and either a yogurt tube or a bag of apple slices. The Danger: The wipes contain the bacteria Burkholderia cepacia (B. cepacia), and people with weakened immune systems or chronic lung conditions like cystic fibrosis may be more susceptible to infection. The company, Nutek Disposables, Inc., has received one report of irritation and numerous complaints ranging from rash, infections, fever and respiratory issues. These reports have not been confirmed to be related to the wipes. Description: The recall involves wipes distributed by Nutek prior to October 21, 2014, and manufactured under any of the following names: Cuties, Diapers.com, Femtex, Fred's, Kidgets, Members Mark, Simply Right, Sunny Smiles, Tender Touch and Well Beginnings. What to Do: If you purchased any of the wipes affected, stop using them immediately and return them to the place of purchase for a full refund. The Danger: When under pressure, the plastic toast can crack and break into small pieces, creating sharp edges and posing a choking hazard. Description: The recall involves approximately 30,000 Just Like Home brand toy toaster sets. Sold At: Toys R Us stores nationwide and online at toysrus.com from July 2013 through August 2014 for about $10. What to Do: Consumers should immediately take this product away from children and return it to any Toys R Us to receive a full refund.
2019-04-23T06:26:09Z
https://www.fitpregnancy.com/baby/baby-care/biggest-baby-gear-recalls
I’m busy in Leeds this weekend so unfortunately I won’t be taking a close look at Sunday bettingwise, abnormal service will be resumed tomorrow. There is a small recommended bet at the bottom of the post. Here is the match schedule. Recommended Bets: 2 x 2 point singles and a 2 point double on Chris Wakelin (5/4 Stan James) and Stuart Carrington (4/6 generally). The double pays just on 11/4 at Hills. You can view Apollobet’s outright prices here, match betting here and Daily Enhanced Specials here. From the semi-finals onwards today there will be Live Scoring online, the link to this will be posted later today. The four table set up inside the arena, two big, too small? While we are over in Leeds with the SB Classic at the weekend the UK Championship continues as the BBC coverage starts up in the afternoon, the morning sessions seemingly and unfortunately not covered anywhere anymore, which is a shame and in my view a bit of a shambles. The schedule is also now more condensed and there is no guarantees for any of the afternoon or for that matter evening matches that they will start on time. But that is how this tournament is going to run so the players will just have to put up with possible delays. I’m not going to ramble on ahead of previewing tomorrow’s matches as time is short, but I have to say a huge congratulations to Mitchell Travis, the amateur who knocked out Marco Fu against all odds. I hope nobody did one of those mad-accas on the short priced favourites as they will I’m sure have included that match, I didn’t see it coming that’s for sure. I don’t know Mitchell as he has never entered the SB Classic but by all accounts he played tremendously well to win. The betting is going well now that I’ve actually knuckled down and given it some time so let’s see if the decent run can continue. If you go over to Cue Tracker here you can enter both players names and see their head to head statistics. As I understand it we won’t be able to watch any of these which is frustrating as the session seems two world champions and further three world finalists in action in four second round matches. Graeme Dott seemed to be scoring well in his first match with two centuries and comes into this in form, he could be a dark horse in this event could Dotty and I think he’ll come through his match against Nigel Bond with a bit in hand. Ali expressed dissatisfaction with the whole format and venue after winning the other day and he now faces Jimmy Robertson for a place in the Last 32, I get the feeling that despite his feelings he’s bang up for this week and again I’d expect a win for the higher ranked player there. I’d also side with the favourite in the Barry Hawkins/Zhang Anda match and to be honest all three are backable as a treble so to me that’s your Saturday starter, Hawkins has admitted to taking his eye off the ball since the World Championship and usually that means he’s got his motivation back up and running, no doubt with the help of Terry Griffiths. I expect Peter Ebdon and Davy Morris to be a little closer, both scored consistently in their first matches without doing anything outstanding, but the bookies seem to have priced this one up bang on so there’s not really any value backing either in what I think will be a close one. Predictions: Dott, Carter, Hawkins, Ebdon. Recommended Bet: 2 point treble on Dott, Carter and Hawkins pays over 5/4 with Apollobet. Ant Parsons: In action against Ding. SB Classic Grand Finalist Ant Parsons has his time in the spotlight as he faces Ding, presumably getting some BBC coverage to boot. This and the second match on the list involving Ronnie O’Sullivan is a held over Last 128 match while the other 6 in this afternoon session are all second rounders. To see Ding or Ronnie lose would be a shock of epic proportions but I hope Ant gives a good account of himself as he’s a genuinely top bloke who works really hard at the game. Shaun Murphy had a bye in the first round so it’s also his first match and he faces local man Davison who landed us a nice touch in the last round. Paul is a tough match player and is more than capable of springing a surprise on his day and Shaun is a little out of sorts of late, maybe all these late night replicating kicks are taking their toll on him, Shaun is usually however a strong starter to the main events and I expect him to come through that one. The tightest match up may be Holt against Angles, Holt proclaimed himself satisfied and ‘like a box of chocolates’ after his first match and Alan came through a dramatic re-spotted black encounter against Joel Walker in Round 1, winning by virtue of his opponent going in-off the deciding ball. But this is another day and if any player can frustrate the sometime volatile Nottingham man it’s McManus, so I think I’ll side with him here. Gary Wilson is making giant strides on the tour this season already and is becoming one of the most reliable players to back in early rounds, his 6-0 demolition of Jamie Jones in Round 1 is enough to convince me he’s backable again here against arguably a less capable opponent in Vinnie Calabrese, Wilson remains a decent price and I’d advise a decent bet on that one. Sean O’Sullivan came from 4-0 down in Round One to shoot down the Sheriff of Pottingham but starts an outsider against Thai Noppon to progress again. I’ll admit that I don’t know a lot about old Noppy but his scoring in Round 1 indicates to me that if Sean can keep the momentum up he is very beatable. Xiao Guodong is playing very well lately and his opponent in the last round Andrew Pagett described his performance as awesome, you’d think he’ll have the firepower to fend off Jamie O’Neill and finally a real battle of the bruisers as The Ferginator takes on legendary grappler Mark King, impossible to call so I am happy to report that my old adage of not betting with a match with Mark King in it will hold, gun to head, King. Predictions: Ding, Ronnie, Murphy, McManus, Wilson, O’Sullivan, Guodong, King. Recommended Bets: Add Gary Wilson to the morning treble for a 3 pointer that pays almost 5/2 at Paddy Power. Two more first round matches pitching amateurs against professionals in the final session and again it would be a major shock if either Selby or Robertson were to lose, you can’t really see that happening. Michael Leslie is doing a lot better this season and is finding his feet at this level, he faces probably his stiffest ever test in a main ranker against Liang Wenbo, who missed out on a chance of the 147 in his first match breaking down on the yellow for the £58k bonus, I expect the Chinese player to come through that one. Finally, one of the hot prospects of the baize Michael white finds himself starting favourite against Marcus Campbell, while I think White will probably win, the odds on Campbell are quite surprising and it wouldn’t be a shock if he overturned the book. No bet in the evening session for me though. Predictions: Selby, Robbo, Wenbo, White. Thanks as ever to Monique for use of the original photo. The draws for the Leeds Snookerbacker Classic qualifying heats at the weekend have now been completed. Dress code is polo shirt, trousers and shoes and optional fancy hat (one of those is a joke, take your pick). Stand by for news of further qualifying events in the new year, the venues will be announced shortly. To read all about the SB Classic and why it’s the best amateur event in the UK click here. The current SB Classic Highest Break as well as the Crucial SB Order of Merit List is here – only half way through the qualifiers and we have Callum Lloyd remaining in poll position with Joe Steele in 2nd place. *Troy Brett will take the place of Saturday’s winner should they be entered into Sunday’s event. UK Championship Day 4: To Beeb or not To Beeb? He’s got the hump: Ali’s been giving it both barrels. Another day of qualifiers or first round matches if you prefer in York, with only the morning and afternoon sessions needed before the cameras and V-Neck jumpers from the Beeb are shipped in for the beginning of the TV coverage on Saturday. The reverberations surrounding the format change to this once great event on the calendar have been escalated today by the comments of The Captain Ali Carter, who is never short of a word or three and says amongst other things that the event feels like a PTC, which at this stage is probably true and something that surely has to be avoided. Maybe it will be when the schedule thins out a bit of course but by then we may have lost the interest of the BBC three times a year audience, which whether you or I like it or not, are still the vast majority of people who watch snooker on TV in the UK. All to me are very fair and valid points and the second one in particular is totally unacceptable for a professional snooker tournament of this magnitude and heritage. Another point of note that is worth mentioning is that when it starts on Saturday the vast majority of the live BBC coverage, almost all of it in fact, is in the afternoon. This means they are totally relying on morning matches finishing in three and a half hours to get the main event on live (I believe they are not even turning the cameras on until the live show starts). This is a big ask and I can almost see the scenario now where they are going off air before the conclusion of the match they are concentrating on, which they would have wanted to start a lot earlier and in line with the schedule. This also adds the risk that at least 66% of their commentary team don’t know anyone outside the top 16 and might have to commentate on them from the start of the broadcast. Expect lots of Hazel and discussion fillers is my prediction, it’s no wonder Ken lost, at least he knows what he’s doing. I really hope this has been thought through, I suspect/hope that it has and that this great Championship may well get a new lease of life away from the BBC, who are clearly now way behind Eurosport and ITV in terms of their commitment to snooker. Perhaps, they want to just keep the Masters and the World Championship, hence the deal to allow Bazza to try this for a tournament they clearly want to and will eventually ditch anyway. Predictions: Walden, Mavis, Fu, Milkins, Pengfei, Donaldson, Lawler, Maflin. In the main arena this morning it would be quite a shock if all four higher ranked players didn’t make it through. The Chinese player Xinlong is potentially a threat to an out of form Ricky Walden who seems to be in the middle of a bad run at the moment but you would expect him to get out of that one unscathed in a venue he has proved he likes in the past. Robin Hull from Finland is another that might pose a threat to Dark Mavis, but Mavis is another who has performed at his best in York and realistically should come through that one. Marco Fu faces amateur player Mitchell Travis and again should not really struggle while Rob Milkins faces Germany’s Patrick Einsle who I feel continues to struggle to compete at this level. The more competitive matches are in the Sports Hall, a cracker awaits between Tian Pengfei and Pankaj Advani, two players who are capable of upsetting anyone on their day, it’s too close to call for me that one but at the odds I’d chance a few quid on Pengfei. Another close call is Matt Selt and Scott Donaldson, Scott has started posting some decent results lately and it would be no surprise to see him prevail at backable odds, he has won their only previous meeting. Rod Lawler continues to play the game in his own unique way and I think will outwit Thanawat and justify favouritism in that one and finally the dangerous and heavy scoring but inconsistent Kurt Maflin takes on Liam Highfield who is struggling at the moment to hang on to his tour place, it has to be Maflin on form in that one. Recommended Bets: 3 x 1 point doubles and a 1 point treble on Pengfei, Donaldson and Maflin. The treble pays over 11/2 at Sportingbet. Predictions: Higgins, Maguire, Stevens, Perry, Burden, Brecel, Burns, Williams. Perhaps another session in the main arena which will see the four higher ranked players come through their first match unscathed. I’d argue that Bjorn Borg probably has more chance than Malta’s Alex of beating John Higgins, even if John is some way off his A, B or even C game. SB Classic regular and all round diamond geezer Sandi Lam gets his chance in the big arena against Maguire and what an experience that will be for him, I really hope he gives a good account of himself but realistically you’d have to say a win is heavily against the odds. Ryan Clark is capable enough but rarely wins and I reckon this point in the season will see Matthew Stevens start making strides, he’s been quiet so far but does tend to get his act together later than most. Joe Perry faces Stephen Hendry’s cousin James Cahill and is the higher ranked player with the stiffest task out there, Cahill is not without a chance there and despite Joe being in decent form a surprise is not beyond the realms of possibility in that one with the outsider at a very attractive price and for me he’s a very attractive handicap proposition to win at least 3 frames. You would have to wonder how prepared Alfie Burden is for this, he was last seen in the boxing ring knocking seven types of shite out of another bloke and taking a few blows himself which is hardly ideal preparation for the more gentlemanly pursuit of snooker, he faces Daniel Wells in what could be a close one, Wells pushed him close in the International Championship over the same distance and if The AB is a little underprepared the Welshman has a good chance in that one. Mike Dunn hasn’t been feeling well this week and faces Luca ‘Lovely Smile’ Brecel who did so well here last year but has struggled so far this season to get any type of winning run going, if Mike is to be believed he’s not a well man so Luca is probably worth a punt. Ian Burns has struggled a little with his Rookie of the Season status last time but is now beginning to post some wins, if he’s getting back to the form he showed last season I would expect him to beat the experienced James Wattana, who while still a great player is a little limited in the scoring department. Finally, Robbie Williams takes on Aditya Mehta, a battle between two players who might be fighting it out for the Rookie tag this time along with the likes of Gary and Kyren Wilson and Chris Wakelin. Robbie’s form of late has been very very impressive and Adi is a really solid player so that makes this very difficult to call, but the value is with the Scouser. Recommended Bets: 2 points on Cahill (+3.5 frames) at Evens with Paddy Power. 3 x 1 point doubles and a 1 point treble on Brecel, Burns and Williams. Treble pays over 11/2 at Hills. UK Championship Day Three – Has it Started Yet? I think it’s Day Three of the UK Championship but correct me if I’m wrong. It feels more like qualifiers for the main event rather than part of a global masterplan to me. I trust that this feeling I increasingly have of an administration intent on dumbing down professional snooker doesn’t detract from what should be a great snooker spectacle when it starts on the BBC on Saturday. However, it is with my head hung very low that I report disappointing coverage from the former broadcasting home of snooker. In terms of betting, I have that feeling I get when I am in a restaurant studying a menu so vast that you just don’t know which way to turn and inevitably end up ordering something that you don’t really want and leaving disappointed, feeling short changed. For me and my tiny and ever-shrinking brain there are simply too many matches happening at the same time to make this a tournament I can get excited about from a betting point of view at this stage, unlike the Champion of Champions, Masters or World Championship that force you to make a choice and hone in on a decent bet, they are increasingly the tournaments I’m having the most success in. Sometimes you just need to be given a smaller choice so you can drill down to the bets you really like. This flat field all at the venue thing is going to take a bit of getting used to for someone like me I reckon. I’d prefer them to just play it all somewhere else and leave us with the 32, whoever they may be for the venue, but Bazza seems to be steering the ship in a certain direction, let’s just hope it doesn’t end up shipwrecked while others say I told you so. There are a mere 24 matches on Thursday, can’t someone just give us a set meal deal? If you go over to Cue Tracker here you can enter both players names and see their head to head statistics. There are far too many matches for me to live link those I’m afraid, sorry Ron. Predictions: Astley,Dott, Carter, Holt, Woollaston, Bond, Robertson, Morris. John Astley, like Kyren Wilson, Gary Wilson and Chris Wakelin is a player I am keeping on the right side of at the moment while the bookies are giving us a fighting chance and I reckon he’s got a decent chance against Kendo, but it has to be said the bookies are not giving much away considering the gulf in experience between the two. It’s either playing when the Beeb go on air or filling the vacant Nugget spot which will define the UK Championship this year for Ken you feel. Graeme Dott is in decent form and does not struggle against lower ranked opponents when that’s the case, his recent record is played 14, lost 3, the three to beat him have been Mark Allen, Ding and Bingham all three being very close, he should progress against his very handy fellow Scot Fraser Patrick and he’ll probably have been thoroughly pissed off having watched the Champion of Champions too. Ratchayothin Yotharuck is no pushover, but Ali Carter’s form is enough to suggest he can get primed up for a decent run in this with a mildly testing starter (menu’s on the brain again) whilst I would also expect Michael Holt to coast past his first round opponent Lee Page in the main arena. In the Sports Hall is where the ‘shocks’ might be tomorrow I reckon. Stuart Carrington has shown enough to suggest that his price to beat Ben Woollaston might be long enough to have a punt on, if it was in the main arena I’d back Ben but from what I’ve heard the conditions in the Sports Hall are a little different so that may be a leveller, but Ben is the better player so I’ll leave it. Nigel Bond is ridiculously tricky to read these days and any bet for or against him should really carry a government health warning, no bet. Li Yan isn’t really beating a lot of players lately, particularly outside China so Jimmy Robertson should beat him, but Jimmy is another who is a little unpredictable so he’ll either win easily or struggle, never anything in between. The bookies aren’t daft when it comes to Morris v Cope, Cope you would think should be favourite for this match, but he isn’t, there’s a reason for that. Recommended Bets: 2 x 2 point accas with bankers Dott, Carter and Holt. Add Robertson pays over 5/4 at Apollobet. Add Morris pays 2/1 at Betfred. A 2 point 5 fold on all 5 pays over 3/1 at Apollobet. 2 points on John Astley to beat Ken Doherty at 6/4 with Stan James. An appointment with The Dentist. Predictions: Hawkins, Murphy, Bingham, Wasley, Yupeng, Davison, O’Donnell, Harold. I’ve been accused many times, sometimes even by myself to be fair of continually underrating Barry Hawkins, guilty as charged I reckon and I won’t be making the same mistake again as he takes on the young Swiss potter who rhymes with snookerbacker, I think the main arena setting will ensure that Barry progresses and the same can be said for Shaun Murphy and Stuart Bingham who both face opponents that they would be very disappointed to lose to, only a very bad day at the office for any of those three big names would see them fail to progress, but none of them are a backable price even in a treble. The most competitive match of this foursome is obviously Jimmy against Wazza. Michael is picking up a good winning habit lately and it’s fair to say that Jimmy hasn’t been firing on all cylinders since his foot operation. He’s fighting for tour survival so has a massive incentive to win but this is a tough match for him against an up and coming and very capable player, I’d marginally favour the Gloucester man who I don’t think will be phased by the main arena. UPDATE: Lee Spick has withdrawn and Shaun Murphy gets a bye. Paul Davison v Gerard Greene now in the main arena. The more competitive matches are again in the Sports Hall part of the venue. A golden rule of this blog is to avoid wherever possible betting on matches involving two Chinese players. Cao Yupeng for me along with Xiao Guodong is the next in line after Ding on the Chinese order of merit, but he’s still some way behind, he should beat Zhang Anda on form, he’ll probably win 6-5 as it’s amazing how many of these clashes go all the way. Local man and solid battler Paul Davison will fancy his chances of progressing against Gerard Greene, who I tend to bet against quite a lot. I still don’t know where his PTC burst of form came from to get the final against Ronnie in Germany and since then he seems to be losing again so I’ll take Snowy to progress, quite amazingly given their long professional careers they haven’t played each other for 12 years. Next up The MO’D faces The Dentist in what could be a long one if Rory gets his way. I think the bookies have priced this one about right and I’ll just cheer Martin on without a bet, he’s beginning to come good and let’s hope he can keep up the momentum with a timely win here. Finally, sleepy Chen Zhe takes on Bananaman Dave Harold, Big Dave for me still has the ability to grind down opponents and recent results suggest enough to me that he can progress in this one. Recommended Bets: 3 x 1 point doubles and a 1 point treble: Wasley, Davison and Harold (treble pays almost bang on 6/1 at Hills). 3 points on Davison at 13/10 with Hills. Predictions: Trump. Allen, Williams, Ebdon, Wheelbarrow Gang, Pinches, Baird, Chuang. Tonight sees two live title contenders in action in Judd Trump and Mark Allen. Judd’s form however has recently somewhat deserted him, barring a decent showing in Antwerp and a 147 to boot he’s not really firing at the moment. He faces Gareth Green who coincidentally is booked to play in the SB Classic on Saturday, needless to say he starts a very long outsider for this. Jak Jones played very well against Ronnie on TV in Antwerp and looks to have modelled his whole game on the Rocket, he could feasibly give Mark Allen a scare and is no pushover, Mark will have to be on his game to ensure a comfortable victory, anything less and there is a possibility that may go close. Scouser Allan Taylor takes on MJW and those who are familiar with the blog know of the special bond I have with The Assassin, I’d love to see him win and look forward to watching it, he is more than capable and you never know. Peter Ebdon is seemingly coming back to something like form after an absolutely awful run of results has seen him plummet down the rankings, he faces one of the nicest people in snooker Gloucester’s Andrew Norman who seems to simply play for pleasure these days, but players like that can be dangerous and I fancy that one to be quite close, marginally favouring the tough as teeth former world champion. The all Thai match is one to leave alone, I’m very disappointed that World Snooker have decided to take the PTC Grand Finals there rather than Ireland this year. There have been too many instances of hooky matches involving players from this part of the world and in my view, as well as a bit of brushing been done under the carpet, people in the game know what’s been happening but on the face of it are not really trying too hard to stamp it out. Barry Pinches has recently enlisted the help of SightRight’s Steve Feeney to help his bid to stay on the tour and the results seem to be paying off, I quite fancy him to use his experience to beat Sheffield’s Adam Duffy, who has only won 2 of his last 10 matches. Peter Lines continues to impress in qualifiers and is a really tough player to beat, he faces Gloucester’s Sam Baird, who still owes Mrs SB a gin and tonic. That’s a really tough call as Baird can be ruthless when he’s in form, as Sam has won their only two encounters to date I’ll side with him, but this could be down to the wire. I’ve no strong feelings about the other match between Drago and Chuang, though as Chuang is 2-0 up on the head to heads I would probably give him the nod, though he is a player that seems to have already peaked in his career. Recommended Bets: 2 x 2 point singles and a 2 point double Barry Pinches (17/20 Apollobet) and Lines v Baird over 9.5 frames (11/10 Paddy Power). Double pays almost 11/4 at Paddy Power. Recommended Bets for Wednesday: 4 point acca on Gilbert, White, Lisowski and Gould pays just on 5/2 at Ladbrokes. 2 points on Kyren Wilson at Evens with Hills and a 2 point double on Wilson and Joel Walker pays almost 7/2 at the same firm. Here are the opening day’s matches from the Sports Hall at the Barbican. Those marked (LS) are available on Live Stream at the World Snooker TV channel or the usual bookmaker sites. Recommended Evening Bet: With Dale losing in a decider, I think the treble on the other three in the original acca can get us out on top for the day so it’s 2 points on the other three at just on 11/8 with Apollobet. Add O’Brien for a 1 point acca which pays over 9/4 at Sportingbet. Monique’s shot of the Barbican, taken yesterday. Today sees the rather understated start of the UK Snooker Championship, heralded as one of the games blue riband events which this year reverts to a whole new format, with Bazza’s dream 128 player format with all players playing at the venue from the start being tested on one of the really big ones for the first time. I might as well get this out of the way before going any further but I was against this move when it was first announced. I think there is a place for a flat draw structure, in fact once the rankings are money based if anything isn’t a flat draw structure (which will be the case) then this whole list becomes a farce in my opinion, but I don’t like the money list concept either really. To me, what the Champion of Champions event proved was how much better snooker is as a spectacle when you are watching the best players playing each other. That whole premise is risked by adopting this structure, how will the BBC and more importantly the three times a year BBC snooker fans feel in the (albeit unlikely) event that the final four are all outside of the top 8 players? To get around this slight problem, the draw has been structured rigidly on rankings which minimises the risk of the big boys not being there at the end, so as things stand Mark Selby, Ronnie O’Sullivan, Neil Robertson and Ding Junhui, who I believe are currently the four best players in the sport by a little distance can form the final four. I was really interested last week in Ronnie and Robbo’s comments about staging more prestige events for the top players. Aussie Robertson even going so far as to say that these should be in the UK, pointing out that the crowds are more consistent and the tables always run better. Ronnie (half-joking) said he didn’t think Bazza would be presiding over a sport where players are falling asleep at venues waiting to play in poor conditions in the middle of the night and would instead be looking to increase the profile using the games top players, which to some extent I agree with. Ronnie also said that there was no longer any incentive to be a top 16 player, on that point he is wrong of course, unless Bazza decides to tamper with the World Championship format, which I sincerely hope that he never does. So what of the UK Championship? Once a huge highlight of the snooker calendar, but in the last few years for me not quite flicking the switch to the Christmas lights that it used to. York as a city to host a major snooker tournament is superb, there is plenty to do within a stone’s throw of the Barbican whatever your interests so this ensures healthy crowds, but I can’t help but miss the format of old if I am honest and I’m not sure every move that Bazza has made on this once great championship is right. I think these days the Masters is infinitely more enjoyable. But it’s still a great tournament to have on your CV and Mark Selby is back to defend his crown this year, this time with Ronnie in attendance and seemingly in superb form and I would not be at all surprised to see them fight out the final this year as seeded players number 1 and 2, what a spectacle that would be. Is there a player that can produce a shock and break into the elite top four semi-final line up of Ronnie, Selby, Robbo and Ding? Well, shock probably isn’t the right term to use but I’m sure what I regard as the current next tier down in John Higgins, Stephen Maguire, Judd Trump, Mark Allen, Ali Carter, Mark Williams and Stuart Bingham will fancy a good run in this. For all the players on view, I have a feeling we’re going to be seeing some familiar faces in this at the business end of things. I can’t see any outsiders (i.e. a player that I haven’t mentioned above) making an impact any further than the quarter finals but I’m sure we’ll see some shocks in the matches given there are a total of 127 of them in all. It would be a shock if there wasn’t a shock in fairness. I’ll be giving the matches a closer look as the days go on but for now I will leave you with three outright and fairly predictable selections and one who I think may be a little overpriced at longer odds. Recommended Outright Bets: 4 points on Mark Selby at 9/1 with Apollobet. 3 points on Ronnie O’Sullivan at 4/1 with Paddy Power. 2 points on Ding Junhui at 8/1 with William Hills. 1 point each way on Stephen Maguire at 28/1 with William Hills. Ant Parsons: A Grand Finalist again. Sunday saw heat five of this season’s qualifiers for the Snookerbacker Classic and after the last successful event at a new venue in Liverpool, this time we took the tournament to the Cueball in Derby for the very first time. It’s always a risk going to a new venue, I hadn’t had the opportunity to visit Derby before the weekend but had heard good reports of the venue from several trusted sources and the exchanges I had been having with Danny and Paul who run the place in advance of the tournament made it clear to me that this is a club with ambition, run by snooker people after the corporate fat-cats at Rileys had almost run the place into the ground with their pool, darts and ale focus and total lack of knowledge of how to run a successful snooker club. On arrival we were greeted by Marc, who showed us around the place and explained the lay out. It was smaller than I had imagined but that added to the feel of it, the snooker tables are nicely separated from the bar which is accompanied by a small area with pool tables (an unfortunate necessity of modern times, hopefully soon to be rid of for the next generation). The viewing area however is fantastic with a glass wall offering views of all the main tables in the snooker hall which remains the beating heart of the building. Also greeting us was Mark Jones, who was waiting for his daughter Hannah to finish her practice session for the day. Mark took no time in totally rubbishing Paul Beech’s hotel recommendation which we had followed to the letter and talking to us about all manner of things while telling Hannah to get back to the table until he said she could stop, in the nicest possible way of course. Mrs SB left proclaiming that the club had a nice ‘feel’ to it, I agreed and almost at once our minds were at rest and we were ready for a day which we were promised would involve much local rivalry and banter. I heard early the next morning from Syd Wilson, who would have been one of the favourites to progress, to say he was unable to make it and had to withdraw which left the path clear for another of the fancied runners, Middlesborough’s Ant Parsons, to the Quarter Finals whilst the other seven first round matches got underway. The players had already been marvelling at the lemon cheesecake bites that Mrs SB had supplied on her now legendary antique silver cakestand and the SB Classic first timers seemed delighted with this addition to the tournament, they also lapped up the goodies provided free of charge by generous sponsors John Parrott Cuesports. Highlights of Round 1 included what was (at that point) the highest break in this year’s Classic when former professional Jamie Bodle knocked in a classy 121 against Troy Brett. The two are local rivals and as Bodle went on to win 4-2 the rather unsympathetic local crowd, again with Jones as the ringleader of the tormentors, greeted Troy with the question of what it was like to be Derby’s number two player, clearly not adhering to snooker’s timeless etiquette of sympathy and pats on the back for the losing player, but I’m glad to say it was all in good humour, well at least I think it was anyway. In the meantime, Hannah, who had arrived without her disgracefully hungover parents was on her way to beating Paul Beech 4-1 eventually under the watchful and ever-critical eye of her doting father who managed to make it out of bed to catch the last few frames, in body at least. Hannah is clearly improving in leaps and bounds since going full-time and it’s there for all to see, something that Mark puts down to a number of factors, not least her coaching regime which he believes is bringing out the best in her, not that he’d tell her that of course. Mrs Mark eventually arrived wearing dark glasses fresh from some podium dancing under the influence of alcopops at a circus the previous evening. Yes, you did just read that last sentence correctly. There were also wins for Sean Hopkin, Bash Maqsood, Joe Steele, Andy Marriott and Stefan Mazrocis. Mrs SB took an instant liking to Stefan I have to say, his penchant and compliments for her cheesecake and general cheerful demeanour is always going to be a winner with her and she asked if he had entered any more, which is a sure sign that she likes someone. Meanwhile I chatted away with Andy Marriott about our mutual manlove of all things Morrissey, we’re having a race to the end of his poetic autobiography and I’m sure we’ll catch up on that again soon, we also both discovered a David Bowie / Wizard of Oz link that had seemingly passed us by for years, all courtesy of Mozza. Parsons took to the table to face Marriott in the Quarter Finals and after losing the first frame (one of only two he was to lose all day, both to this opponent) the North East man really got into his stride and even managed to better Bodle’s earlier break by a single point, setting the new highest break of the tournament which carries a £300 prize at 122. Obviously still with Mozza on his mind, Andy simply proclaimed afterwards ‘I know it’s over’. Roycey doing his Ref School thang. Local rivalry was meanwhile reaching fever pitch on table 10 as Bash Maqsood fist pumped his way to a deciding frame victory over Sean Hopkin. It’s fair to say that the two had a real battle out there, I would hope that if they faced each other again their behaviour at the business end of the match would be a little more in keeping with the spirit of the tournament. But it clearly meant a lot to Bash to win and Sean was obviously very disappointed to lose. It’s big stakes out there for the players and sometimes that can take over a little. Mazrocis rolled back the years in beating Hannah 4-0 which almost signalled the Jones family exit, but not quite yet as Mark was again holding court in the bar area. This was no disgrace for Hannah as the Crucible veteran obviously still has a really solid game and I think may be planning a comeback of sorts on the Seniors tour. Meanwhile Joe Steele’s dad was polishing off the lemon cheesecakes at a rate of knots as the Stoke Potter put paid to Jamie Bodle’s hopes, Joe coming through that one 4-2. The semi-finals saw a very one-sided affair between last year’s Grand Finalist Parsons and Maqsood, Ant rolling out a comfortable 4-0 winner under the watchful eye of Martyn Royce, who had spent all morning going through the motions with three Ref School hopefuls; David, Steven and Marc, who had travelled to Derby to learn some of the basics of snooker refereeing from the Roycemeister himself. Joe played solidly to end Stefan’s run and book a place in the final against Ant while his dad reached for more lemon cheesecake, it must have been nerves. It’s fair to say that Ant took control of the final from an early stage, Joe didn’t really do an awful lot wrong and Ant was clinical in his scoring to again score a whitewash and progress for the second year in succession to the Grand Finals. He was delighted at the end and as ever was very complimentary about the tournament, as were all the players we spoke to in fact. It seems a great day was had by all. Ant’s next stop last night was to go and film a feature with the BBC in York ahead of his match against Ding Junhui in the UK Championship which will be shown live on Saturday, be sure to tune in and cheer him on. A huge thanks goes to all at the Cueball that made the day go so well. The club is going from strength to strength and the enthusiasm of Danny, Paul, Marc and all the staff as well as the obvious gratitude of the local players at having a great club to play in shines through. We can’t wait to return there again. You can view and like their Facebook page by clicking here. If you’re in the area, pop in and see how it’s improved since they got hold of it. Ant’s win sees him join Ben Harrison, Kishan Hirani, Adam Wicheard, Jamie Clarke, Anthony Jeffers and Mitchell Mann in the Grand Finals and next weekend we’re in Leeds to find two more to join them. Currently Callum Lloyd and Joe Steele sit in pole position on the Order of Merit List with five more qualifying events to go. The top two from this list will also qualify for Grand Finals Day. You can view all the results from the Derby SB Classic qualifier here. The latest standings in the Order of Merit list are here.
2019-04-20T01:13:44Z
http://www.snookerbacker.com/2013/11/
Exactly what I needed after an accident involving my family. I had the pleasure of working with Michael N. Hoosein and his team. They were clear, competent, accommodating, and overall I was more than satisfied with the handing of my case. I will definitely be recommending them to anybody that I know in search of a top-notch injury lawyer. Exceptional and outstanding are a few of many words I could use for Lee Rusinko and his assistant Kelly. Words cannot express my gratitude. Very caring about there clients and their families with exceptional results. I would highly recommend J H Brown and Associates. I greatly appreciate all the hard work and dedication to my case from David Sowemimo and his assistant Kim. I never expected the results and I am grateful to them. I would definitely recommend them. I thought I would be out on my ear. What they did for me was take a old biker new hope of a better future. I can now afford to live. I will not lose my home. I am able to pay my taxes now. Was a long haul, but Rick and his team got me a fair deal.. That's all a person can ask for. I would like to say thank you. You fight a good fight and dam your good at what you do. Good people are hard to find and they are that. These are the people you want in your corner. And more so as friends. After all is said an done. I will be able to move ahead with my life now and that's because of them. We were in a head on collision on hwy 2 Dec 23, 2017. After leaving messages with 2 other law firms (who never did call us back) we called James H Brown who took our very first call and started to help us immediately. We would like to thank Michael Hoosein and his assistant Melissa who were both very helpful during our stressful time and helped to guide and resolve our case in a very professional and positive manner. We highly recommend James H Brown and we will definitely use them again if needed. I would like to thank David Sowemimo and his assistant Summer Abbassi for all their best effort in resolving my case. They are great in updating and following up on status of my case and they are very helpful answering my questions. I highly recommend them. I would like to thank David Sowemimo and his assistant Summer for their dedication and hard work on my case. I had a complex case and I could tell they spent countless hours working away to get me a fair compensation for my injuries. They were very personable and professional the whole time. The entire firm was very courteous and I could tell they truly cared and went out of their way to get me a fair compensation. I would recommend David Sowemimo and his assistant Summer to anyone who has a case they need resolved. David was caring and compassionate to my situation and payment was extremely prompt. They matter was resolved very quickly. I am very happy to have been paired with this team. I would like to thank David Sowemimo and his assistant Summer for everything they did for me.They were professional and courteous every time I spoke with them.I would recommend James H. Brown and Associates. For my vehicle injury claim at not fault (first time in my over 12 years driving history in Canada) I searched on internet the various injury claim lawyers and talked to them but at the end I opted for James H Brown, based on their reputation, less than five weeks before the limitation date on my file and I was transferred to Mr. David Sowemimo. My case was recently finalised to my satisfaction. Throughout my case (during last 12 months), Mr. Sowemimo, and his assistant, Ms. Summer Abbasi, provided a great professional service by guiding me through the process and keeping me updated on my file. I am highly impressed from them for promptly responding to my numerous phone calls and emails and scheduling multiple appointments with medical specialists and psychiatrists well in avance. At the end, Mr. Sowemimo checked with me to make sure that everything went well. I am really thankful to Mr. Sowemimo and Ms. Abbasi to make the whole process very smooth and comfortable to me. I am glad that I decided to go with James H. Brown and thanks to them to assign Mr. Sowemimo to my case. Also, many thanks to Ms. Abbasi for her contribution. Wishing them the very best. I hope, I will not need to go through an injury claim in the future but if that will be the case then Mr. Sowemimo will be my first choice as an injury lawyer. So, I strongly recommend to others to hire services of Mr. Sowemimo if you are looking for an injury claim as you will not be disappointed at all. I am Sharon Haines, nee Steele. In 1997, I was in a motor vehicle accident and was injured quite badly. So much so, that I was immobile for 2 months, and it took 6 months to get back to work part-time, and 1 full year to get back to full-time. The vehicle that hit me was at fault, but the driver was not forthright to the police as to what actually happened, claiming that I was the cause of the accident, and ultimately my own injuries. Through forensic investigation arranged by my injury lawyer, Alan Brackett, it was proven that I was not at fault for the accident, and that I was truly the victim. The case took some time to resolve, but with great guidance, support and service, I ultimately received a healthy and fair settlement for my specific injuries from that accident. Recently, 17 years post-accident, I was requiring documentation regarding this accident for personal reasons, and I contacted Alan Brackett, and after a brief conversation with him, he remembered me and my file, and although my original file had been rightfully shredded as per provincial regulations, he was still able to provide me with supporting documentation with details of my case within the same business day. I was truly amazed, and thankful for this timely service. I never believed that after so many years post-accident that this information on my case would still be available. I will always recommend Alan Brackett, and James H Brown and Associates to all my family, friends and business associates needing these injury services. Regards, Sharon Haines, Edmonton, AB. For the past 9 years Rick Mallett has worked diligently and with the utmost respect and understanding of our case that no one else would take on. Because of his perseverance and dedication, we are finally able to close this chapter. Rick’s understanding, patience and ability to truly listen to our concerns is what got us the best positive outcome. Thank you again! Car accident will change your life forever, so does the post traumatic stress that haunts you down,But God is so good not only that I am still alive but chance upon a very good and professional lawyer David Sowemimo and his asst. Summer Abassi.I will be forever grateful for the hardwork and dedication they put on my case, so I can received a fair & true settlement.It was remarkable.I would highly recommend them to anybody who needs help in times of pain and depression after a horrific car accident. God Bless. From the minute we walked in it was a positive experience, our Lawyer David Sowemimo and his assistant Kim where honest and understanding. The work they put in to our file and dedication to make sure we received a fair and true settlement was unbelievable. I would recommend them to any one that need help. thank you so much for everything what a great team. I would like to thank Rick Mallett for his service and dedication in the handling of my accident claim. For me and my family, the settlement brought closure to a difficult period in our lives. I would highly recommend Rick to anyone in need of an injury lawyer. "it was well worth It" It was a long process of treatments after the accident but when it was over it was well worth It. David Sowemimo is super easy to work with the same as his assistant Kim. You do not really feel you are dealing with lawyers. I would recommend David to anyone going through a bad car accident experience. Thank you so much guys. "completely dazzled by his communication skills" I want to thank David Sowemimo for helping to resolve my case quickly. I was completely dazzled by his communication skills and experience. I cannot thank him enough for the services that he rendered on my husbands and my behalf. It was a pleasure having him as the role of my lead counsel. Having an experienced attorney like him on our side was a good signal that we were walking into the case in very good hands. I'm grateful for your understanding and cooperation in this matter. I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to you for working tirelessly to ensure that the law worked in our favor. If it weren’t for your analytical skills and knowledge, the matter wouldn’t have been settled by now. David was able to prove the case beyond any reasonable doubt and we were more than pleased with the outcome. I feel so indebted to him for his hard work. Thanks to David for always informing me of the best option to take in resolving my problem. I really appreciate his negotiating skills and advice on the matter. "I was speechless when he settled my last claim!" Jim O'neil is easy to work with and professional I highly recommend him! He has helped me with 2 accident claims, I felt well taken care of and my cases were settled in a timely manner. Jim is exceptional at what he does I was speechless when he settled my last claim! Truly his work speaks for itself. With the complexity of my case and the help of David Sowemimo and his assistant Summer I understood the process and with the advice and help from both these individuals I am satisfied with the outcome. It was a big learning curve for me being hesitant and being able to put in trust to David and his assistant, but i'm glad I did. As I said to David in the beginning that what I wanted was what's right and fair and that's exactly what I got. This wasn't an easy thing to deal with, but David t took the pressure by reassuring that the case was in good hands. "exceptional job in dealing with my case" Thank you David Huculak and Keresha. You did an exceptional job in dealing with my case. Not only were you caring and sympathetic but you lead this case with determination and skill. At some points very sensitive issues were discussed but David handled it with compassion. I would not hesitate to recommend David or attain his legal services again. "super easy to work with" David Sowemimo and his assistant Kim handled my case, from the day my husband and I went in to meet with David initially to the day we finalized my case he was super easy to work with. I had never worked with lawyers like this before so I was nervous but there was no reason to be, I was kept up to date by both him and Kim on a regular basis and I never felt like they weren't working for me. Thanks so much ! Thank you to Michael Hoosein & his team for handling my case swiftly and making me feel at ease in the process..I would definitely recommend him to any family & friends. I had an amazing experience! When I got into my accident I was in a lot of pain and depressed. I was turned away by 3 lawyers before I found David Sowemimo. He and his assistant Summer worked hard on my case. They sent me to wherever I had to go for treatments and death with my insurance company directly. The psychology sessions were a blessing. I even got a settlement I wasnt expecting. David is a different kind of lawyer... Unlike the 3 that bluntly turned me away because I wasn't "injured enough", David didn't care about the money he cared about me as a person. 'knock on wood' I never have to go through this again but if it happened I would call David in a heartbeat and recommend him to everyone! "His compassion, knowledge and depth of experience is extraordinary" When dealing with a whiplash injury perhaps one of the most challenging things is that your injuries are not visible. As my health continued to deteriorate regardless of the numerous treatment modalities, Rick Mallett brought his expertise in setttling this matter to ensure that I will be able to continue to receive such maintanance treatments for many years to come. His compassion, knowledge and depth of experience is extraordinary and I am truly grateful for all of his efforts along with those of his assistant Cheryl in bringing my claim to a close. I would not hesitate to recommend Rick Mallett to anyone who is seeking legal assistance for an injury. Michael was very easy to deal with it. He went above and beyond to make sure my health and well being came first. He was always easy to get ahold of and wasnt pushy in any means. He listened to everything you said with no judgement. Micheal explained everything step by step and didn’t leave any details out. He explained all the legal terminology- which is good because I didn’t know anything. Michael and his team were very professional, outgoing, non-judgemental with a very positive attitude. I would highly recommend Michael Hoosein and his team! We were very pleased with the outcomes! I contacted James H Brown less than two weeks before the limitation date on my husband's file and I was transferred to Mr. David Sowemimo who took on the file. Our case was recently finalised and I must commend Mr. Sowemimo and his assistant Summer Abbasi on a job well done. You are such great professionals and my husband I appreciate the great attention to detail on our file. You communicated with us on a regular basis and responded promptly to all our emails. Thank you for scheduling the multiple appointments and checking in to make sure that everything went well. We really appreciate your time and effort and advice. Thank you and wishing you the very best in all you do. Great job in handling my case. I was so stress after someone rear ended me. James look after me really well. Especially I am from Out of province. He got me a very reasonable settlement. I am so happy that I had choosers this law firm. I will recommend to my friend any time when needed. Big thanks to sir Michael Hoosein for helping us out in our case with my wife. Very professional and very approachable person. Would like to thank Mr. Alan Brackett for his excellent service and professionalism. We appreciate all the time and effort helping us and would highly recommend James H Brown. Very appreciative for your time and expertise! Thank you David Sowemimo for the excellent experience. I would highly recommend James H Brown and associates to my friends and family. My settlement exceeded my expectations. Would like to take this opportunity to thank Mr Alan Brackett and his assistant Ms. Romina Fillice for their excellent service and professionalism. I appreciate all the time and effort they put in for me. About three years ago my wife and I were in a motor vehicle accident that left both of us injured. The insurance company seemed to be dismissive of our injuries. We had heard of James H. Brown and decided to give them a call. We were scheduled for an appointment with Alan Brackett who took a meticulous review of our accident details and our specific injuries. Alan was especially kind and empathetic to our situation. We were never left uninformed and were instructed in the legal issues regarding our case. We felt listened to and always felt we had a competent and capable advocate for us. We were more than satisfied with his professionalism and the outcome of our case. We are and continue to be very thankful for this firm and the legal help we received from Alan Brackett. We highly endorse and recommend him and this firm. 2001 I was searching for a lawyer to help in trying to bring truth to my 25 year old son who was hit and injured in a gravel truck crossing and died enroute to the Inuvik hospital. When I searched for a lawyer, three tries almost made me fail to search for a lawyer any further due to fees required and I could not afford. While in prayer I came across James H. Brown and Associates firm that have their office in Edmonton, Alberta. I contact their office and said I was searching for a lawyer because of the death of my son's vehicle being hit and died. They did not ask for any fees as they said they will represent me in a law suit and they will take care of all costs in the case and will do the work using their own pocket finances. Subject to the case the settlement that gave me the satisfaction the the death of my son was not at fault in his death. Six years later my wife of 32 years entered into a hospital and they admitted her for a day operation for a fractured wrist. During the operation she died and left me with no answers. I then contacted James H. Brown & Associates in Edmonton and immediately they put their lawyer, Rick Mallett in contact with me and a law suit case was launched. The case of my wife's death a settlment was successfully reached as well. Rick Mallett and his team worked on both cases and at the end of both cases I was 100% satisfied because the both my families deaths were not their fault. The James H Brown and Associates lawyer and his paralegals including the firm showed how loving and compassionate they meant so much to myself and family. They go out of their way and beyond as they demonstrated throughout both cases. I thank God in and through His Son Jesus Christ for revealing their Firm to me. After My daughter was injured in an accident she was confused and nervous about how this whole process works. We met with David Sowemimo and his assistant LeAnne. David answered all our questions and explained everything completely. We left that office well informed and confident that he would do everything in his power to make sure she would be compensated for her injuries. mr. lee rusinko worked on our lawsuit over several years. he worked hard to gather the information needed to win our lawsuit. his assistants were professional and understanding, i would recommend lee and james h. brown and associates to anyone injured in an accident. "He worked hard on my case" After being hit by a truck as a pedestrian on July 27 2014. My lawyer Richard Mallett was thorough with setting up all the test I would need to receive a far and just settlement. He worked hard on my case and I am very satisfied with the results. Michael N. Hoosein is a great lawyer who treats you with respect and works very hard for you. He helped me after my car accident and went above and beyond to help me. Definitely would highly recommend him to anyone who needs a great lawyer. I contacted James H. Brown after I had been injured in a rear end collision on the Henday. Michael was my lawyer and he was honest with us right from the start. I know that if I did not have a case, he would have told us right up front. We just settled the case and I would recommend Michael and James H. Brown and indeed already have. They will give you the truth and do what they say for you. Thank you for the work you did for me. My husband was in an accident on the highway which was the other drivers fault. He was injured and off work but David Sowimemo was always available with answers and helped us alot with the process. We could not thank David enough for all his support. I would recommend these lawyers to anyone who asks. I had a great experience working with Michael Hoosein. He handled the claim from start to finish and settled it for a very fair amount. He was very professional and made it easy every step of the way. I would recommend Michael to anyone looking to settle an injury claim. Contact Michael N. Hoosein, he is FANTASTIC!!!! In my case, the insurance company was giving him the “run around/who will blink first game.” Micheal doesn’t put up with any of that nonsense. He pushed and pushed the insurance company to pay what he believed was fair. At the end of the day, we got what we wanted. Do you want justice? Do you want fairness? Do you want someone who actually gives a damn about his clients? If so, contact Michael! I was recommend to this firm from a family member so thankful. I received much more then l thought l would after my accident. Would recommend them to anybody that needs help. I can only state that I was amazed by the efforts put forth on my behalf David Sawemimo with James H Brown and Associates. I Hardly had to do anything after the initial visit with David. I was hands off after that and he was definitely hands on at all times. He kept me apprised at all times and the settlement I received was beyond expectations. Due to Davids' perseverance, and knowledge of personal injury law he successfully settled with awesome results. He was very professional and thorough in what he did and his attention to detail made certain that he utilized all the information from myself and the Medical proffessionals necessary to my treatments, to get the settlement we did. I also found the administrative staff to be very much on the ball and very professional with me. I would not hesitate to recommend David personally, and highly recommend him and James H. Brown to anyone I know that would require their assistance. I would also return to them if I needed assistance again. Had a great experience at James H. Brown! Michael Hoosein did a great job and I will recommend him to anyone. Great and fast settlement, Michael Hoosein did a great job! Thanks Michael! I have had a great experience with this company. I am great full for the support that this company gave me. As an elder in my community I feel that James Brown Supported me through this process and educated me through the process. Their customer service was really great. It was very inspirational to find a company that offers this kind of support. I was in a car accident, my car was a right off and i had some injuries that i am still dealing with..i contacted James. H.Brown and meet Michael for our first meeting. He got the job done, when it came to settle there was a unfair settlement on the table, Michael fought for me and I am very happy with what I am receiving. Thank you very much for ur hard work. "Glad to have caring people to help in our time of need" My young daughter and I were injured in 3 different motor vehicle accidents. Michael Hoosein was exceptional at taking care of our cases and went beyond to make sure my daughter and I were entitled to the settlement we needed to heal from the injuries. Exceptional Lawyer! Fantastic and helpful. Wonderful person! Glad to have caring people to help in our time of need. "Alan went above and beyond..." On their way in to the city to receive the results for my Mom's PET scan, my parents were rear ended at a red light, three blocks from my house. Their vehicle was a complete write off. My father to this day still has a hard time talking about it and still experiences difficulties with his shoulder. Alan went above and beyond to ensure that they received fair compensation. Thank you Alan for looking after my parents! "Lee fought very hard...and we give him a 5 Star for all his hard work" After my mother was struck at a cross walk in 2013 my family contacted James H. Brown & Associates to handle are case. Lee Rusinko was assigned our case. He always keep my family informed immediately of any new news reference case. When my mother passed away about 4 months after incident Lee informed me that the coroner put down cause of death, natural causes. At this time my family & I thought that there was no way that we would receive a claim but Lee fought very hard to find a way for our family to receive a claim for our hardship. Very well recommended and we give him a 5 Star for all his hard work. Thanks James H Brown & Associates. I just want to take a moment to review what Rick achieved for me in my settlement was outstanding and greatly appreciated. He went beyond my expectation and I must say he is very good at what he does. Awesome Richard! Highly Recommend Rick Mallett along with his professionalism and caring! I was involved in a motor vehicle accident and I explained the details of my accident to Rick Mallett after which he determined that I had a valid case to pursue. From my very first encounter with Rick, I was confident that I was in very competent and capable hands. He was always kind, polite, caring and very empathetic and he always had my best interest at heart. Due to his perseverance, experience, and knowledge of personal injury law he was able to successfully settle with extremely good results. He was very thorough in what he did and his attention to detail made certain that he built the strongest case possible for me. My settlement was far above average and I truly appreciate Ricks hard work and time for leading me successfully through this process. I would not hesitate to recommend Rick Mallett and highly recommed his services to anyone that may ever be in need of them. "The whole team was professional, kind and responsive" Highly recommended to anyone seeking an injury lawyer! Michael was great in ensuring that I received a fair settlement for my injuries. With only a few days left in my limitation period, Michael told me all my options (even the ones that didn't directly benefit him). I ended up making a decision thanks to his expertise and I was able to settle before the period was up! Despite my decision not directly affecting him, he checked up with me routinely and was very helpful. I'd recommend James H. Brown and Michael to anyone looking to settle an injury! "I couldn't have wished for better representation" I wish I could write two reviews for how awesome my experience was with Michael Hoosein. Michael is a no-nonsense attorney that will get the job done! He knows exactly what he is doing and will put you at ease knowing he is on your side! He is professional and effective and still very personable all at the same time! The process was completely smooth and pleasant, and I never once felt overwhelmed with legal jargon. I couldn't have wished for better representation. If you need an injury lawyer, make sure you get Michael! I was skeptical about going into a settlement case. But after talking with Lee R. he had made me feel comfortable about what the plan of action was. All i had to do was focus on my treatment. I am very pleased with the outcome and cant thank Lee and his assitant Rebecca enough for support. I had a slip and fall on a buildup of ice infront of our office door that had not been removed for some time, resulting in a Left Head Splitting 4-Part Proximal Humerus Fracture. .Approximaty 6 months later I called Mr. Rusinko and met him at my officefor a consulation.At that time after a lot of physio. my Dr. had informed me i would never have full use of my arm again.Mr Rusinko was very kind and understanding ,but also very frim on a cause of action. I was so very happy on the outcome .he is very professional,I was always kept well informed .I would highly recommand lee Rusinko to my friends.He is a superb lawyer . Thank you Lee. "13 months later I had a nice large settlement" I came to James H Brown and associates about 4 months after my accident, as I was feeling apprehensive about the legal representation I had at the time. As soon as I spoke with Michael Hoosein I was completely confident that I had found the right person to handle my settlement. Everyone I dealt with at the firm, took excellent care of me and my case. My accident was a head on collision and 13 months later I had a nice large settlement. I honestly didn't think I would receive the amount I was hoping for, but I did, and am so happy I decided to go with Michael. I was in a no fault auto accident in 2014. Initially, I tried dealing with the insurance company but despite my injuries they would not even offer me pain and suffering compensation. My hours off work from the pain, physio and Doctor’s appointments started to add up and affect my family. In order to receive any compensation I would have to send the insurance company reports of time off and mileage every single time and then wait to hear back. When it came to extending my physio treatments it was even difficult to work with them for that. Eventually I had enough of dealing with them and being bumped from agent to agent and decided to find a lawyer. Not only was I dealing with the present effects the accident was having on my day to day life but my future as a Carpenter was at stake with the injuries I has sustained.My wife started chatting with a James H Brown associate online named Michael N. Hoosein and from there we simply set up an appointment to meet him. Michael was so helpful and explained the process so there was no confusion. We were no longer having to deal with the insurance company either as he handled all their requests from then on. James H Brown took ownership in some of my medical appointments as well, helping me get a private MRI instead of waiting a year on the waiting list it takes in Canada. He also helped me meet a surgeon at the University of Alberta whom was difficult to get into.I would highly recommend Michael at James H Brown. Without him I know we would not have gotten a settlement from the Insurance Company. He eased our families stress by managing our case and took on the burden of dealing with the difficult Insurance Company. We are also very happy with the compensation we received as a result of his hard work. Thank you James H Brown! I was in a no fault auto accident in 2014. Initially, I tried dealing with the insurance company but despite my injuries they would not even offer me pain and suffering compensation. My hours off work from the pain, physio and Doctor’s appointments started to add up and affect my family. In order to receive any compensation I would have to send the insurance company reports of time off and mileage every single time and then wait to hear back. When it came to extending my physio treatments it was even difficult to work with them for that. Eventually I had enough of dealing with them and being bumped from agent to agent and decided to find a lawyer. Not only was I dealing with the present effects the accident was having on my day to day life but my future as a Carpenter was at stake with the injuries I has sustained. My wife started chatting with a James H Brown associate online named Michael N. Hoosein and from there we simply set up an appointment to meet him. Michael was so helpful and explained the process so there was no confusion. We were no longer having to deal with the insurance company either as he handled all their requests from then on. James H Brown took ownership in some of my medical appointments as well, helping me get a private MRI instead of waiting a year on the waiting list it takes in Canada. He also helped me meet a surgeon at the University of Alberta whom was difficult to get into. I would highly recommend Michael at James H Brown. Without him I know we would not have gotten a settlement from the Insurance Company. He eased our families stress by managing our case and took on the burden of dealing with the difficult Insurance Company. We are also very happy with the compensation we received as a result of his hard work. Thank you James H Brown! I came upon Lee Rusinko on the recommendation from a friend that he was amazing. I had several questions about an MVA that I was inolved in and connected with him via telephone. Not only did Lee take the time to listen to my questions and clarify some things I didn't fully understand about the insurance claim process, but he provided me SEVERAL invaluable pieces of advice in a clear, succinct way. He followed up with me to see how things were going with my claim if he could offer more valuable advice (for free) and NEVER pressured me to retain him. An OUTSTANDING human being, he went the extra mile to help me out. HIGHLY RECOMMEND. Michael Hoosein did a great job in explaining the process to us. He was very informative and answered all my questions. I could not have done this without his help and expertise. I would highly recommend him to any one involved in a vehicle accident, as Insurance companies are there to make sure that you don't get what you are entitled to. Thanks Michael. "It's almost hard to believe such a nice person could be a lawyer" Rick is the best! I have done a few things with him. He has a way of making you feel like you've been heard. He doesn't get emotional with you but he does let you know that he's on your side. Rick has helped me in matters where I had been told that there was no help available, or that there was no hope for a settlement. Rick has succeeded in getting a settlement that is usually far a away better than I could have hoped for. He really knows what he is doing. There are a lot of jokes about snakes and lawyers but you never get that feeling from Rick. He's a very nice person, it's almost hard to believe such a nice person could be a lawyer, but he is. You can trust him to do what's best for you and your case. "Both my husnband and I walked away with 6 figures each!" In 2013 my husband and I were hit by another vehicle and sustained some injuries. We had heard through other friends that Jim was the best around, and I have to say that we totally agree now speaking from experience. My case specifically was somewhat complicated, but he made sure that I got everything needed and more. Leaving our first meeting with Jim, I felt at ease and very reassured that our case was in good hands. He made sure that we were informed throughout the whole process, and his assistant Natasha was great to deal with. She returned calls quickly, answered questions and gave us a good idea of what was coming next. When it came down to negotiating, I would say that Jim excells in this area as he was able to get us much more then we ever expected, and both my husnband and I walked away with 6 figures each! Thanks to everyone we dealth with at the office and to Jim and Natasha. I would recommend Jim Oneil to everyone! I am very satisfied with the work put into my claim with Lawyer Michael Hoosein. The claim was settled just under a year. Whenever i had questions or concerns Mr. Hoosein was there to answer them. I would highly recommend this company! Thank you for helping us and taking the stress off. We found Michael Hoosein to be very helpful, understanding and compassionate. He helped us reach a fair settlement with the other parties insurance company. Upon our initial conversation, he walked us through all the details and was straight forward with what was to be expected. Throughout the process he kept us informed and up to date on what was transpiring. Our settlement took a little over 2 years, but Michael took all the stress out of the ordeal. We can not thank him, and the staff, enough for all that he did for us. "Their level of professionalism was extremely high..." I found my experience with the James H. Brown & Associates Law Firm, and in particular David Huculak and Bonnie Kimball, to be a very positive one. I thought their level of professionalism was extremely high and I felt very comfortable in conversing and dealing with them. I found the interaction was good and I always received prompt replies to any questions or concerns I raised. Furthermore, I feel I received a fair and reasonable settlement as a result of their diligence and ongoing work. I would recommend this firm to anyone requiring injury litigation. Please accept our many thanks to your firm with recommendation to Lee Rusinko. Lee was a pleasure to have as our representation and far exceeded the professionalism and devotion to my brother and family. My brother was in a serious accident at the age of 42 which left him a quadrapalegic. Our family was left devastated by this tragedy and Lee relieved much of our stress by being there and taking care of everything necessary going above and beyond the services that your firm provides. His compassion and geniune care for our family at this time was evident throughout this long and painful journy. I highly recommend Lee Ruskinko to anyone, they will be thankful they chose him. "excellent job advocating for my best interests" I recently settled an MVA lawsuit from a car accident in 2014. The MVA has caused chronic pain despite extensive physiotherapy and treatment from specialists. The insurance company of the driver at fault was not offering a settlement that I felt comfortable with at all. I decided to hire a lawyer and met with Michael Hoosein. Michael did an excellent job advocating for my best interests and ensuring my claim was settled appropriately. Michael is an extremely intelligent and respectful lawyer and he explained every step of the process very clearly. I would highly recommend Michael to anyone seeking representation. "I did get what I think is a fair settlement" I had Michael represent me in a motor vehicle accident, an accident which left me in limbo with my insurance company especially since the other driver, who had lost control of their vehicle causing the accident, had the same insurance company. Before seeing him and dealing with the insurance company directly after a short while there were "issues" covering certain needed expenses, paperwork etc, etc, etc... and it was obvious I was being given the run around and that I needed a lawyer. I met with Michael, who extended his work hours for my convenience so that I could see him. He had me see a pain specialist immediately, which finally got the ball rolling in terms of recovery and was excellent, taking my concerns seriously. As for Michael, when emailing him with questions, he got back to me right away and his assistant Janet was excellent and had a very uplifting personality. As far as the settlement went although the final settlement fees were a bit confusing and did include utilizing the settlement amount put aside for expenses along with the actual settlement amount, which I am not entirely in agreement or was sure about, Michael did get back to me and address this immediately and we discussed. I do have to say what was additional was not completely outrageous, and in the end I did get what I think is a fair settlement for my injuries, that I would not have gotten otherwise if I went without representation. I have to say to anyone in an accident, wait to settle until you know what your rights are and have someone represent you as they do more understand the system which loves to take money but when you need them they are sometimes gone. From this experience the insurance company at first seemed good and fair but this did change as the claim progressed. Big thank you to James H. Brown and associates for all your hard work on my son's accident case! Highly recommend these guys!!! "Always going the extra mile..." Both my husnband and I walked away with 6 figures each! I had Michael represent me in a motor vehicle accident, an accident which left me in limbo with my insurance company especially since the other driver, who had lost control of their vehicle causing the accident, had the same insurance company. Before seeing him and dealing with the insurance company directly after a short while there were "issues" covering certain needed expenses, paperwork etc, etc, etc... and it was obvious I was being given the run around and that I needed a lawyer. I met with Michael, who extended his work hours for my convenience so that I could see him. He had me see a pain specialist immediately, which finally got the ball rolling in terms of recovery and was excellent, taking my concerns seriously. As for Michael, when emailing him with questions, he got back to me right away and his assistant Janet was excellent and had a very uplifting personality. As far as the settlement went although the final settlement fees were a bit confusing and did include utilizing the settlement amount put aside for expenses along with the actual settlement amount, which I am not entirely in agreement or was sure about, Michael did get back to me and address this immediately and we discussed. I do have to say what was additional was not completely outrageous, and in the end I did get what I think is a fair settlement for my injuries, that I would not have gotten otherwise if I went without representation. I have to say to anyone in an accident, wait to settle until you know what your rights are and have someone represent you as they do more understand the system which loves to take money but when you need them they are sometimes gone. From this experience the insurance company at first seemed good and fair but this did change as the claim progressed.
2019-04-23T14:43:05Z
https://www.jameshbrown.com/reviews/
Two of the country’s premier developers, Amona Metro Development and Metro Kajang Holdings, joined forces to create the latest innovative modern structure to grace Bangsar. Named Saville @ The Park, the freehold mixed development is a sight to behold in Pantai Hillpark. Upon completion by 2015, said development is poised to welcoming discerning buyers into a paradise of lush greenery and modern comfort. Nestled amidst serene surroundings without leaving the city, the project makes an ideal abode for those looking for an escape from the frenzied city life. Spanning 5.23 acres of freehold land, Saville @ The Park offers a mix of condo units and semi-d villas. A total of 408 condominiums are housed within the towering two 27-storey blocks boasting spacious built-ups from 1,019 to 2,528 sq.ft. If more space is what you want, the collection of 18 semi-d villas are perfect. Built-up for these units vary from 3,295 to 4,612 sq.ft., spacious enough to fit a growing family. > Type A – 1,019 sq.ft. > Type A2 – 1,390 sq.ft. > Type B – 1,253 sq.ft. > Type C – 1,646 sq.ft. > Penthouse A – 2,415 sq.ft. > Penthouse B – 2,528 sq.ft. Following a mid-density setting, there are 8 units per level served with lifts and there’s a multi-level carpark for residents. Launch price for the condominiums has been tagged from RM500,000 while Semi-D villas will cost investors from RM2.3 million to RM3.7 million. Want to confirm whether the price is fair and reasonable? If you do, you can use our free price valuation guide right here. Designed to be an oasis, Saville @ The Park is primed to provide the best of comforts. Through its collection of condo facilities, residents enjoy a a lifestyle of luxury and leisure. Situated within the development are the well-equipped clubhouse, gymnasium, games room, outdoor spa and children’s play area. There are also three types of swimming pools – infinity, wading and Jacuzzi. Keeping the development safe and sound is the multi-level 24-hour security complete with CCTV surveillance. There are also touch points at the guardhouse as well as in the lobby and lift. With strategic location as its main selling point, the residential is surrounded with ready and useful amenities. Get your shopping done at Mid Valley Megamall which is a mere 5 minutes away from the property. Also within reach are schools (University Malaya), medical centres (Taman Desa Medical Centre & Pantai Hospital) and recreational centres including the nearby Central Park. The rest of Klang Valley as well as key points such as KLCC, Subang, Petaling Jaya and Damansara are readily accessible via a network of highways. Serving the are are SPRINT, NPE and Federal Highway amongst others. With the proposed road linkage to NPE, easy access is further enhanced for residents. Trendy and exquisitely modern, Saville @ The Park is hard to miss. It offers the comforts of a modern lifestyle yet it was also able to pull off a setting enriched with lush landscaping and greenery. In other words, it is an ideal setting where eco-friendly features meet contemporary luxuries. With its array of choices, potential investors and buyers are presented with diverse options to fit one’s preference and budget. Talking about budget, Saville is surprisingly affordable compared to similar developments in neighbouring townships. It’s also complete with great facilities with quick access to important amenities making it a good prospect for young urbanites or couples who wish to upgrade their homes and lifestyles. If you’re interested and want to know more about the modern residential, you can start by double checking on its fair market value. To help you along, below is a free ebook guide. Sitting atop on Bangsar’s highest peak is Beneton Properties Bangsar’s posh development called the Rhombus, Bangsar. The luxurious boutique development is made up of a tower that boasts of a contemporary design, set within a lush, tropical environment. Being one of the handful of (newer) developments on top of Bukit Bandaraya on Jalan Penaga, expectations are high (pardon the pun). Jalan Penaga is also the home of various luxury properties such as The Loft and Cascadium. Rhombus is exclusively for lease only. The Rhombus offers a spectacular view of the city centre, as well as luxury facilities and amenities at par with any four or five star hotel in Kuala Lumpur. It consists of 12 storeys that houses two apartment units for each floor. Its single penthouse unit occupies one level. Residents will be catered to a life of convenience and luxury when living at the Rhombus. All 25 apartment units all come with a private lobby. Units are sized at 4,000 square feet. Living and dining areas measure at a roomy nine metre-wide spaces. There is also a dry and wet kitchen, a master suite with a powder room, four bedrooms and bathrooms, and a maid’s room. Each unit will have a million-dollar view of the Petronas Twin Towers and the KLCC enclave. For the apartment unit’s design, designers John Ding and Ken Wong of Unit One Design Malaysia made sure that it will exude elegance and class to keep up with the development’s high standards. Residents can expect three metre ceilings, modern-style balconies, and contemporary interiors for each of The Rhombus’ units. For its facilities and amenities, Beneton has made sure that the need for convenience and the high standards of living should be addressed. The Rhombus offers a private car park, a shared courtyard, and a function centre. One level is converted into the ultimate lifestyle area—in here you will find a lounge for visitors, an infinity pool, the change rooms, a barbecue area, and a playground. With a contemporary design that features mindblowing architecture, architects Ding and Wong created a tower that will definitely turn heads. The Rhombus lives up to its name, and its design features a sleek “twist” carefully created to allow the Rhombus to live up to its name. This “twist” is almost a feat in Malaysian architecture, because it allowed units to all have a panoramic view of the Twin Towers and KLCC. The tower is covered in charcoal black aluminum cladding. Every detail is crucial; even its car park is carefully-designed with timber screens and green walls. Every effort by the designers to turn The Rhombus into the next big thing in modern condominium living has been acknowledged, as the condominium was recently recognised as the winner of this year’s PAM Gold Awards, beating the competition in the multiple residential highrise category. Beneton strives to make The Rhombus as a premier development in the affluent neighbourhood of Bangsar, as well as make an effort to contribute in making the environment a safer place to live in. The Rhombus boasts of practically-designed balconies that also act as a sunshade, allowing natural light and for the tower’s interiors to be cool. The developers also used a rainwater harvesting system in order to save up on water costs. They use this for watering plants, and to clean the common areas. Furthermore, recycled timber planks are used in designing the balconies. A dual-flush system is used in toilets for units. In addition, LED lights are used to light up the tower. These features made the Rhombus receive a Green Building Index certification. Beneton Properties has long been in the Malaysian real estate industry, developing world-class properties such as the Stonor Park, and the 2 Hampshire series of condominiums located in the Kuala Lumpur City Centre. The world-famous Waldron House, located in London, remains one of their most successful property developments. Adding to this stellar roster of developments is the Rhombus, situated in Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur—which we predict will be the preferred address of the modern, the affluent, and the stylish. But that is quite fair – at least from PropertyReviews.my editors’ point of view. Really. To the many real estate investors, local and expatriate homeowners, and the plain patrons of good and outstanding home designs, the properties here on Federal Hill are well worth it. For one, many of the properties and buildings here hold historical value. The earliest of developments here have started at the height of the British colonial rule in Malaysia. The grandest of bungalows in the area have also been used in the 50s to house state rulers and other important government personalities – including a Prime Minister. And that is not even all the credit it holds. Federal Hill (also known as Bukit Persekutuan) is one of those few areas that is surrounded by awesome natural greenery but is still within close proximity with the urban landscapes. So whilst the residents are enjoying the conveniences of their city lifestyle with KLCC being close by and the thriving Bangsar urban landscapes literally just within the vicinity, they are also enjoying some of the most beautiful views not to mention the freshest air in probably all of urban Malaysia. The natural reserve park that engulfs the beautiful 18-acre grand estate of Federal Hill holds some of the best, rarest flora and fauna in the world; many of which are endemic only to the Malaysian rainforests. No wonder this is a favorite not only of real estate investors and buyers but of nature lovers as well. And of nature-loving real estate investors too. And if it is any convenience to the conservatives, the area is not getting any further developments and they are likely to preserve the park for much, much longer. The homes and condo units here could be as small and average-sized as 2,500 sq. ft. but the largest ones – the private bungalows – can be as huge as three-storey, 6-bedroom houses that can measure up to 12,000 sq. ft. Some may be even bigger. And these huge mansions could be well over RM 6-8 million in price tag. Definitely not something for the average real estate buyer, and may well not be within the budget of the so-called high-end. If one wishes to live in Bangsar, enjoying the best of both nature and the urbane landscape it holds, but not quite there yet to afford living in the more upmarket-y Ken Bangsar or One Menerung, then an apartment in Bukit Bangsar might just be the perfect place. See, Bukit Bangsar is practically one of the most affordable places to live in Bangsar area. It has homes, it has some of the views, and it’s ideally just as close to the city centre as most of the other, more high-end areas in the township. There are two main residential areas in Bukit Bansar at the moment: the low-cost, small flats and apartments of Sri Pahang and the condo units in the midrise condominium complex of Sri Bangsar. Both are popular for their relative inexpensiveness, making them a popular choice for regular income earners. Sri Pahang is an old flat complex that is priced on the average with a size that is roughly under 80 sq.ft. with 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom at most. The residents are currently hoping and banking on a promise of improvement – including upgrading the size and facilities of the apartment complex that they say are sure to improve the quality of their home life. Sri Bangsar, like Sri Pahang, is among the more mature real estate developments in Bangsar. It is in fact one of the first few ones of its caliber built in Bangsar – of amenities that come with full condo services. Currently, the list of amenities in this condo unit includes a swimming pool, barbecue area, playground, gym, and parking area. Residents are also assured of round the clock security within and around the area. Each unit has an approximate built up size of 1,254 sf housed in a single 12-storey building. Its closest residential neighbors include Menara Bangsar and Gaya Bangsar, and the more luxurious Bangsar Park. Amenities and accessibility-wise, the residents of Bukit Bangsar’s residential areas will definitely not have any problem being close to everything important. Apart from their in-house night market (scheduled regularly on Wednesday nights), several malls, shops, and schools are quite close. For one, the Plaza Sentral and the Gardens are quite close by. Several restaurants, food shops and food centres are also within the vicinity. This makes Bukit Bangsar quite a popular residential choice for renters, especially those who go to nearby schools like the Institute of Public Health, SJK Jalan Bangsar, and the SMK Bangsar. Condominiums in Bukit Bangsar does not have the usual grandiosity of the affluent residential areas in the Bangsar township, but it sure holds the same, exact Bangsar charm. We are pretty bullish on Bangsar properties given the simple fact that new launches are going to be few (or none at all) in the coming years, and given the fact that demand will greatly outpace supply means that capital appreciation could be high. However, there are pockets of opportunities in Bangsar which seem to be undervalued – and as properties in Bangsar Hill may often be overlooked there may be some good investment opportunities to be had. And as always, checking if a property is priced at fair market value is uber important, and may be the most significant factor on whether an investment would make sense if at all. Use the “How Much Is A Property Worth” guide which we will email you once you enter your name and email address below. Bangsar seems to be increasingly off the radar with few new launches due to the lack of development land. As the city’s “centre of gravity” remains entrenched within the confines of KLCC, areas which are deemed to be a little “off the centre” are getting less attention. Bangsar Indah happens to be one of the favorite spots for urban dwellers seeking escape from the usual bustles of high city life in KL but don’t really want to go too far from the conveniences of it. Fortunately for those living in Bangsar Indah, they also enjoy the beautiful, healthy lush greenery that (some areas in) Bangsar is naturally gifted with. True enough, this former rubber plantation has evolved into one great place to live in and raise a family, and a prime spot for real estate investors. And Bangsar Indah is a perfect proof for both. The leasehold condominium property sits in the mature real estate section of town. In fact, Bangsar Indah is not exactly young and ‘new’, but that does not make it any less interesting despite the healthy choices of properties in the greater Bangsar area that could impale the popularity of Bangsar Indah in the real estate market. But the charm of the suburban-moderne designed condo complex just cannot be fully drowned. And what does it hold over everyone else? Simple: location. Apart from the rolling lush, green hills around it for view, Bangsar Indah is right in the same neighborhood with Bangsar’s ‘Strip’ – an entire street of bars, clubs, pubs and restaurants – basically where all the happenings are at. Not to mention, shopping centers like the Plaza Damas and Midvalley Megamall are practically a stone’s throw away from here. That’s why it is a very attractive place for renters and of course, their investors. A regular unit at the condo complex, measuring between 800 and 1500 sq. ft., would only cost an investor roughly about RM 950,000 and then rent it out for about RM 2000 a month to some yuppie who works in either KL or in Bangsar. Not to mention, Bangsar Indah is about within a kilometer or so from several universities including the Health Management Institute, the SMK LaSalle Brickfields, and the Public Health Institute among others, making it a perfect rental place for students. There is a good several (and significant) hundreds or thousands of ringgits in between rental fees for similar places in Bangsar like, say, the venerable Menara Bangsar or the Cascadium. At that rate, and easy and constant demand for Bangsar Indah units for rent, any investor would probably get his or her return rather quickly. To check what’s the fair market value for a place here at Bangsar Indah, use this “How To Value A Property” e-booklet which you can download here. Set to rise on a lush six acre land in Bangsar (possibly the last tract of premium land on Bukit Bandaraya) is Bandar Raya Development Berhad (BRDB)’s latest luxurious development, the Serai Bukit Bandaraya. The development is slated to be completed during the third quarter of 2016. Bandar Raya Development has been mum about its luxurious development, however, we’ve been able to get a quick rundown on how Serai will fare against other luxurious condominiums. It will occupy the last available space on Bukit Bandaraya in Bangsar – specifically on Jalan Medang Serai.Its neighbours are Bangsar Villa and Tivoli Villas. The venerable Bangsar Shopping Centre is less than 1km away. Another top BDRB development, One Menerung, is also located within driving distance away from the Serai. The posh condominium will have two towers, both of which will comprise of 21 storeys. There will be 121 private residences up for grabs, and recent reports have stated that almost 54% of these units have already been sold ever since BRDB launched the project at the tail end of 2012. Luxurious condominiums also come with luxurious amenities and facilities. Serai Bukit Bandaraya is set to have a recreational podium that will house most of its facilities, such as a well-equipped gym. This podium will be located in an overhanging pavilion with excellent views of the condominium’s lush greenery and landscaping. Generous windows that allow natural light will be installed, as well as large balconies for its private residences. Depending on the units, residents will be able to avail of up to five parking bays. Each unit also comes with a private lift, ensuring privacy and convenience for its residents. We all know how Bangsar has been racking up expats and locals to its comfortable and relaxed environment. This is the perfect setting for the Serai Bukit Bandaraya. Being at the centre of it all would be a huge advantage for its residents. Locationwise, Bangsar is the centre of Kuala Lumpur’s renowned destinations, such as Mont Kiara, Damansara Heights, Petaling Jaya, and KLCC. Bangsar offers activities from left to right. From shopping malls, convenience stores, banks, hospitals, to a busy nightlife and hip restaurants and pubs, Serai Bukit Bandaraya’s residents will always have places to go and things to do to keep them occupied. During its launch late last year, units were sold at an estimated RM1,300 to RM1,600 square feet or about RM5.8 million. Its two penthouses were priced at a staggering RM22 million, estimated. However, there is still no word if these penthouses were already sold. Most of Serai Bukit Bandaraya’s buyers when it was launched were mostly Malaysian families, with less than 5% of the total amount of buyers being expats or foreigners. However, BDRB is expecting for an influx of Singaporean investors to come in around this time of the year. BDRB is confident that Serai will match the high capital appreciation of One Menerung—Serai Bukit Bandaraya’s neighbouring condominium. One Menerung’s launch sale prices were listed at about RM600 per square feet, and currently, sales prices for its units are hitting an estimated RM1,200 to RM1,500 per square feet. That’s pretty awesome capital appreciation by anyone’s standards. Since Serai Bukit Bandaraya is located in Bangsar, we can only expect that the demand for its luxurious condominiums will only rise, especially when its completion date becomes near. As of the moment, Bangsar is already a well-developed area, complete with all the modern convenience and luxury every resident wants. The fact that this may be one of the few launches in the recent years also means that the capital appreciation may be rapid. In addition, the credible reputation of BRDB will greatly affect the confidence of investors and residents towards the development (we are especially impressed with Troika in KLCC). With these in mind, plus the condominium’s facilities and Bangsar’s excellent location, it’s no surprise how the Serai Bukit Bandaraya will become one of Bangsar’s brightest in the future. Right across Pantai Medical Center is the high-rise low-density condominium Pantai Tower. Perched atop the Bukit Pantai hill, it gives residents a superb view of the Kuala Lumpur city skyline, Mid Valley City and neighboring communities. Recent listings for Pantai Tower indicate an average subsale price of RM460 psf. Rental rates are from RM1.25 to RM2.65 psf, depending on the condition of the units (unfurnished, semi-furnished or fully furnished). If we are to compare the asking price for sale with its neighbors Zehn Bukit Pantai and Bangsar Heights, Pantai Towers is the cheapest, as Zehn sells from RM680 to RM800 psf while Bangsar Heights ranges from RM550 to RM700 psf. To check if these are valued fairly, check out this free guide on valuing a property and determining its fair market price – click here to download. As for rentals, Pantai Towers is in the middle while Zehn is the most expensive at RM2.90 to RM3.40 psf. Bangsar Heights is lowest in rental rates and are let from RM1.90 to RM2.20 psf. Units at Pantai Tower start from 1,200 sqf with three bedrooms and three bathrooms. Bigger sized units have a built-up size of 1,600 sqf and have four bedrooms and three bathrooms. There are only two units on each floor, providing residents privacy. Although the property is low-density, residents enjoy full condominium facilities such as a gym, swimming pool, tennis court, basketball court and squash court. Additionally, round-the-clock security is also provided. Living in the Bangsar area in general is very convenient. Amenities are close by and the vicinity is easily accessible via public or private transportation. The Bukit Pantai area is a viable alternative to Bukit Bandaraya which does seem to be bursting at its seams with skyscraper condominiums and commercial buildings. Pantai Tower has been coated with fresh paint, giving it an instant facelift. Its lifts were also replaced with new ones, as the old ones went bonkers for months, and residents complained about it. Its garden is also well-kept with regular maintenance. We do note that unlike in Singapore, condominiums here rarely go though refurbishment like this, and so the management of Pantai Tower should be credited for this. However, the property is undeniably old, which is obvious from its building design. Newer ones seem to be more angular with a good blend of steel and glass (taking notes from Zehn Bukit Pantai and Ken Bangsar). A unit may be purchased at a reasonable price and yields a good rental rate. PropertyReviews.my reader and seasoned investor, Cliff ‘Burt’ Tan from Kajang, remarked, “It is also a good investment if intend to live in it, if you are not bothered by its age!” We tend to agree. It’s low density factor is a winner. Bangsar is running out of new development land. Bukit Pantai is fast shaping up as a good alternative to the frequently congested Bukit Bandaraya. All in all, Pantai Tower’s prices may seem to be low, but fair given that it’s going to get older and maintenance costs will only go up. Remember to factor these considerations into the price if you decide to invest in a unit here. For a guide on how to do this, use this downloadable e-booklet on “How To Value A Property” which we will email you once you filled in this handy little form below. One of the lowest density condominiums in the affluent neighbourhood of Bangsar is Merak Kayangan (which consists of only ten (ten!) units). This freehold apartment is situated atop Bukit Bandaraya, the highest point in Bangsar. As you would expect from a condo on top of Bukit Bandaraya (specifically on Jalan Kapas), the place is rather quiet and boasts of breathtaking views of the city centre, the mountains and the neighbouring communities. Close by Merak Kayangan Court are Araville (just right next door), Casa Vista (the Bangsar version obviously, not Mont Kiara’s), Ken Bangsar, Sri Kasturina, Park Rose and Bayu Angkasa. We like its location on top of the hill – the non-disrupted view and the lush greens surrounding it are perfect for busy families who want to spend quiet family time after work and school and during the weekends. Given the low density of Merak Kayangan, units for sale are usually few (or none) at any one time. In fact, at the time of writing this review, no “for sale” listing was found for Merak Kayangan at all the major property portals – iProperty, Propwall and Property Guru. As for rentals, rate for standard units is pegged at RM6,000 (or RM2.92) psf, while rates for penthouse units start from RM11,000 (or RM2.89) psf. These rates are relatively cheap compared to its neighbors such as Araville (which rents out from RM3.06 to RM5.20 psf) and Casa Vista (from RM3.50 psf). There are only ten units in Merak Kayangan spread on a single block of eight-storey building, making it one of the lowest density condominiums on Bukit Bandaraya, nay Bangsar! Built-up size of a standard unit is 2,050 sqf. Each unit has 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. Penthouse units have a built-up size of 3,800 sqf and has 4 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms. Overall, Bangsar is a great place to live in despite the annoying traffic going to and from the enclave. Further, Bukit Bandaraya is one of the best spots in Bangsar. It gives its residents an air of exclusivity and luxury – something that is almost impossible when you live in the city centre. Merak Kayangan’s location therefore is a top selling point – Bukit Bandaraya remains to be a sanctuary in the heart of the city, and since there’s no more land available for future development, we see demand far outstripping supply (which means escalating prices…). Additionally, if you’re into low density condominiums then Merak Kayangan is hard to beat. If you do not mind having little facilities, and are more concerned about bigger spaces, then Merak Kayangan is perfect for you, especially if you are working with a budget. This doesn’t mean that the property is cheap, but given its age, it’s bound to be cheaper than, say, Ken Bangsar. Bangsar has nailed it once again with its Balinese-inspired gated residential development called The Ara. Located next to The Loft, The Ara (also known as Bangsar Couture Homes) consists of 30 couture linked bungalow homes. It is a property developed by Mammoth Empire (the folks behind Empire Subang and Empire Damansara). This freehold property is situated on – you guessed it – Jalan Ara in Bangsar. Apart from The Loft, Contessa is also round the corner. Detailed landscaping and a tropical vibe is what The Ara offers for its residents. Its bungalow units all offer a grand panoramic view of Petaling Jaya and KLCC, with Telekom “Menara Rebung” majestically gracing the skyline during night-time. The Ara’s linked bungalows all have 3 ½ storeys that sit on a land area measuring 32 x 55. In total, this gated community is home to 30 units, with built-up areas ranging from 3,972 square feet to 7,760 square feet. Residents of bungalow units will enjoy a Jacuzzi in the master bedroom, as well as private lifts, a garden, and a private swimming pool. The developers made sure that each unit will be furnished with elegance in mind, as well as a designer kitchen that is equipped with world-class appliances. Furthermore, The Ara also offers barbecue areas, a fitness centre, a sauna, and a common swimming pool for all its residents. It also boasts of a 24-hour security system. Bangsar is famous as a popular destination for both locals and expatriates. With its bustling streets filled with shopping malls, restaurants, pubs, and cafes, it’s no wonder why living at The Ara would definitely be convenient. Malls that line the area include Bangsar Village 1 and 2, Mid Valley Megamall, the Bangsar Shopping Centre, and The Gardens. All these malls are within walking and short driving distances from the gated community. Another great thing about Bangsar is its location. It’s easy to go to KLCC, as well as Petaling Jaya via Jalan Maarof or Jalan Bangsar. The Mahameru Highway and the SPRINT Highway can also be used alternatively if one should travel to the city centre. Puchong and Kepong can also be accessed via the SPRINT Highway and Lebuhraya Damansara-Puchong Highway. Bangsar properties have grown in number throughout the years (although at a rather slow rate due to the lack of development land), but that has hiked up prices at a rather rapid rate. The demand is strong even if the prices continue to rise. In The Ara’s case, average sales prices have appreciated for the last couple of years. The launch price was at around RM650 PSF, and as it stands currently, the asking prices for a bungalow unit in The Ara is listed at a rather broad range from RM800 to RM1,200 PSF. These prices represent a 30% to 100% appreciation from its starting price back in 2010. For comparison purposes, The Loft is hovering just below RM900 PSF in terms of asking price, but do bear in mind that The Ara is a landed property and so this is not an “apple to apple” comparison. For a more robust method on valuing a property, use this guide (it’s free). Bangsar property prices have been on the upside for the past three years. Condominiums, gated communities, and retail outlets register rather muted growth in supply, and will not be able to respond to the demand from its current and potential residents and investors. Specifically, The Ara is making it big in Bangsar’s gated community properties. Its stylish design and elegant ambience is truly eye candy, and its location is golden. Investing or living at The Ara will be a great choice—its numbers stating appreciation in prices and capital yields don’t lie. Its couture homes, conveniently located in Bangsar, are definitely something to beat. On the downside, there won’t be units for everyone — even the smallest bungalow units that supposedly targets singles and young professionals are probably too big at 4,000 sq ft. The super spacious units at more than 7,000 sq ft that can accommodate growing and large families comfortably however. Additionally, if traffic jams aren’t your friend, it’s best we warn you about Bangsar’s roads during peak hours. Congestions normally take place in Jalan Maarof and Jalan Bangsar, as well as internal roads such as Jalan Bukit Pantai, Jalan Cenderai, and Jalan Ara. Named after a famous region in Italy, Tuscany in Bangsar is a four-storey exclusive condominium on Jalan Ara, further down the road from The Nomad Residences. Further up Jalan Ara is The Loft, The Ara and Sri Wangsaria. It is also located some 850 meters from the famous shopping hub, Bangsar Village. Aside from that, a lot of other amenities are close by, as Bangsar itself is just a few kilometers away from the city centre and is well connected via major roads. Living up to its name, Tuscany boasts of classical Roman architecture. The single block of this property is painted in white, designed with colonnades, arches and columns. Pretty classy! There are only 21 units in Tuscany on one acre of land, making it a very low-density apartment. Typical units have built-up sizes of 992 sqf, 1,053 sqf and 2,088 sqf, while penthouse units have built-up size of 2,500 sqf. The standard units have 2+1 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, while penthouse units have 4+2 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms. As for facilities, residents are provided a barbecue area, covered carpark, indoor swimming pool and round-the-clock security. Standard stuff you’d expect from a Bangsar condominium. Based on current listings for Tuscany (correct the the time of publication of this review), the average asking price is seems to be pegged at RM550 per square feet. If we compare asking prices with its neighbor Sri Wangsaria, Tuscany’s asking price is relatively lower. Sri Wangsaria’s listings at around RM800 PSF. Landed properties in the nearby Lucky Garden prices range from RM560 to RM1,150 PSF. The asking prices for the Tuscany seem to be quite erratic recently, and this could be driven by the recent uptick in Bangsar property prices. For a more accurate assessment of what the “fair market value” is for a unit here at Tuscany Bangsar, use this handy little guide which we have prepared with our partners at GoodPlace.my – download the “How To Value A Property” guide here. Rental rates range from RM2.65 to RM3.20 psf. However, rental rates for both Sri Wangsaria and Lucky Garden are lower at RM1.70 to RM3.15 and RM1.30 to RM2.30 psf, respectively. On a purely pricing level, there could be a good opportunity as the prices are still somewhat lower than its neighbours despite occupying a rather strategic location which is close to the commercial areas (accessible by foot). Besides its great location and moderate asking price, another selling point for Tuscany is its exclusivity. Both Sri Wangsaria and Lucky Garden are denser properties. Additionally, the Tuscany is perched on elevated ground, giving its residents a great view of mountains and the city. On the downside, its “romantic Roman” architecture may seem novel when it’s brand new, but it’s the type of design which doesn’t age well (case in point: the Corinthian in KLCC). The look and feel of this condominium may have “accelerated” the aging effect which is rather unfortunate. Additionally, the alleged lack of facilities could be a turnoff for some prospective investors. And although the property sits on an acre of land, only a small portion of the land was used as common grounds. That little portion could only accommodate some plants and trees, but do not really give much space for residents to walk leisurely. There are also resources that tell us Tuscany is rather run down.
2019-04-20T00:28:39Z
http://propertyreviews.my/category/bangsar/
No trace has been found of any prehistoric settlement in the Birmingham region: (fn. 14) the marshy Rea valley would indeed have been an unsuitable site for such settlement. The Roman road, Rycknield Street, passed through Edgbaston and Handsworth parishes and a Roman camp was established at Metchley in Edgbaston. (fn. 15) As its name implies, Birmingham was first settled during the early stages of Teutonic colonization in the 6th and 7th centuries. (fn. 16) Since it is also one of the most westerly places known to have been founded at that period it represents a particularly deep, as well as early, penetration of the forest that clothed the Midland Plateau throughout the Dark Ages. (fn. 17) The southern half of the plateau was covered by the Forest of Arden which was a barrier to Saxon colonization from the south: the most northerly site so far discovered is at Bidfordon-Avon, though early Hwicca penetration of the plateau is suggested by the salient of Worcestershire that contains King's Norton and Northfield parishes. On the west and south-west the plateau presents a shrugged shoulder to the Severn valley. Thus the main drainage system is directed towards the east and north-east and there is every likelihood that the Birmingham region was first settled by people moving up the valleys of the Trent and Tame. Structurally (fn. 18) Birmingham lies on the western edge of a syncline filled with Triassic sandstones and marls, mostly red in colour. These strata separate the two denuded and heavily forested domes of older rocks forming the South Staffordshire and East Warwickshire coalfields respectively. Earth movements have, however, disturbed the region since the Triassic rocks were laid down and have produced important orographical features which helped to condition the nature and direction of early colonization. (fn. 19) The site of the original village is a good example of this for it was established on the dry sunny slopes of the Keuper Sandstone ridge. The merits of the site are remarked by an 18th-century writer: 'Thus peculiarly favoured, this happy spot enjoys four of the greatest benefits that can attend human existence, water, air, the sun, and a situation free from damps'. (fn. 20) The sandstone ridge extends from Sutton Coldfield in the north-east to the Lickey Hills in the south-west, and is sharply defined on the side overlooking the Rea valley by a fault which has let down the Keuper Marl to the east and south-east and accounts for the steep drop from the Bull Ring to the bottom of Digbeth. The throw of the fault varies considerably: it is less than 150 ft. at Saltley and at least 600 ft. at Selly Oak. (fn. 21) The ridge is narrow, the total outcrop being only ¾ mile wide at Birmingham and seldom more than a mile elsewhere, but it has resisted erosion more successfully than has the softer Upper Mottled Sandstone of the Bunter series which outcrops immediately to the west of it. Thus, especially in the vicinity of Birmingham, the land falls away rather rapidly on both sides. The Triassic rocks of the region dip towards the south-east with the result that water falling on the porous sandstones and pebble beds tends to accumulate along the line of the fault and to issue in the form of springs into the valley of the Rea. The springs have been a key factor throughout the history of the city. The abundant water supply (as opposed to the supply of water-power, which was no more than adequate) remained sufficient for domestic and industrial purposes until the 18th century. (fn. 22) Although the spread of the industrial population polluted many of the springs and exhausted the rest, the supply was not augmented until late in the 19th century. (fn. 23) The flow was regular and in marked contrast with the violent fluctuations in run-off which occurred in the impermeable clays of the Rea valley. Moreover, where no supply was available from springs, wells might easily be bored. The bands of marl within the Keuper Sandstone prevented deep seepage of rain water and except during unusually dry periods offered a copious supply from shallow wells. The supply provided qualitative variations: water from the deeper levels of the Keuper Sandstone is usually hard because it contains calcium sulphate; water from the higher levels tends to be soft. Thus the brewing industry owed much of its success to the supply of hard water, while smiths and metal workers favoured the region because of the soft. (fn. 24) The water supply could be used for other than merely domestic or industrial purposes. Hutton speaks of 'two excellent springs of soft water' one of which fed Lady Well where, he claimed, 'are the most complete baths in the whole island'. They included a swimming pool 18 by 36 yds. and 'accommodation . . . for hot or cold bathing; for immersion or amusement; with conveniency for sweating'. (fn. 25) No spa is mentioned in connexion with the city. Keuper Sandstone therefore offered many natural advantages to early settlers in the midlands: its soil was lighter and warmer than that of the neighbouring clays; it carried a generally less dense vegetation which could be more easily cleared; an abundant water supply flowed from it; and it could be quarried for reasonably good building stone. Some of this stone may still be seen in the walls of old houses on the outskirts of the city. Locally it is red in colour but the corresponding formation outcropping along the eastern margins of the Arden country is grey. Red sandstone was used for the priory (fn. 26) (the Hospital of St. Thomas), for St. John's chapel, Deritend (probably quarried at Weoley) (fn. 27) and St. Martin's Church. It is not until the 14th century that there is any measure of the town's size or of its comparative importance. Its first appearance on a map dates from this period (c. 1335) though it is represented by the smallest symbol used. (fn. 40) In 1327 and 1332 the town's contribution to taxation assessments was greater than that of the majority of neighbouring settlements. Moreover Aston, which in earlier centuries had appeared so much the larger village, was by that time named 'Aston juxta Birmingham'. (fn. 41) In 1340 Birmingham ranked third, along with Stratford, among the Warwickshire towns in the contributions of its merchants to the levy on goods. Some of these merchants, particularly those of the Clodeshale, Deyster, Holte, and Mercer families, are known to have been men of substance. The fragmentary evidence for the existence of Birmingham's cloth and iron industries in the Middle Ages is discussed below. Apart from these and a mention of gold-working and tanning (fn. 42) no other industries have left any record. Much, indeed, of the town's labour and trade was still taken up with agriculture and marketing. 'I cam thoroughe a praty strete or evar I enteryd into Bremischam toune. This strete, as I remember, is caullyd Dyrtey, (fn. 44) in it dwelle smithes and cuttelers, and there is a brooke (fn. 45) that devydithe this strete from Bremisham. Dyrtey is but an hamlet or membre longynge to . . . (fn. 46) paroche therby and is clene seperated from Bremischam paroche . . . Two factors, peculiar to 16th-century history, very largely dictated this pattern of urbanization. First, in 1536 the Hospital of St. Thomas was dissolved, (fn. 52) and its lands, principally north of the Welsh Market surrounding the hospital itself, were released for private development. After 1545 guild lands lying mostly on and east of the main street were similarly made available. (fn. 53) Secondly, the manorial family in the town lost its control of the estates after 1536 (fn. 54) and the succession of absentee landlords that followed opened the way for development of hitherto tied land. The opportunities provided by the release of these lands were not immediately taken up. The rapid development of industry did not come until a halfcentury or more later. Throughout the 16th century and indeed until much later the greater part of the ancient parish remained rural in character. This fact is reflected both in the size of the population and in the occupations of the people. Although the various estimates of the size of the population at this period conflict, it is possible to gain an informative general impression. From an analysis of the survey of 1553, the first register of St. Martin's, and the subsidy rolls, the total population has been estimated at '1,400 or rather more'. (fn. 55) This is a lower figure than two contemporary estimates: in 1547 there were said to be 1,800, and in 1545, 2,000 houseling people in the parish. (fn. 56) On the other hand, in 1563 there were said to be 200 households in the parish of Birmingham, (fn. 57) which excluded Deritend. The 1,800 houseling people represent a total population of perhaps 2,200; to reconcile this figure with that of 200 households means an average of 11 persons to each household, which is unduly high. Two hundred households suggests a population smaller, even, than 1,400. Comparison of these figures with those for neighbouring settlements shows that Birmingham had not yet attained pre-eminence in size of population. In Aston parish there were 250 households, in Sutton Coldfield 114, Harborne 53, Lichfield 400, and St. Michael's, Coventry, 503. The occupations of the people, for which evidence may be drawn from contemporary taxation records, emphasize the rural character of the parish. Something like 60 per cent. of the working population appear to have been labourers, journeymen, and apprentices; 25 per cent. were small craftsmen, and the remainder were men of some substance. (fn. 58) Evidence from contemporary wills shows that the craftsman class and the richer merchants and manufacturers were yeoman farmers and no doubt employed some part of the labouring population in agricultural work. (fn. 59) In spite of the increase of manufactures, links with the land were not readily broken: and the tendency towards dual occupation is still to be seen in the 17th and 18th centuries. The built-up area of the town was not extended appreciably during the 17th century; the increasing population was accommodated within the old streets, some of which became badly congested with small property, especially in Digbeth and Deritend. The hearth tax returns for 1670, 1673, and 1683 record no new houses in Deritend in those years, which suggests that saturation point had been reached in that district. The creation of new roads within the town was in any case very difficult because the old burgage plots, which had been laid out when roads were few, were unusually long, and had only narrow frontages upon the street. Much of the new building was therefore on the 'backsides' of the houses facing the street. This involved the creation of numerous alleys or 'entries' giving access to secluded dwellings and workshops; a few examples survived in 1959 in parts of the old town. (fn. 62) Westley's plan of 1731 shows this feature of city topography very clearly and emphasizes the contrast between such areas as Deritend and the former priory lands where houses faced only upon the road. Expansion in other directions was made possible by a series of private Acts, the first of which, for the Colmore estate, was secured in 1746. (fn. 93) The land thus made available lay mainly along the northern flank of the ridge between Easy Hill and Snow Hill. (fn. 94) It was well drained, yet a good supply of water was readily available from shallow wells. Two large residential houses, Colmore's New Hall and Baskerville's house on Easy Hill, had already been erected on the ridge. (fn. 95) The new developments after 1746 catered for the small craftsmen, especially those engaged in making buttons, buckles, jewellery, and steel toys. (fn. 96) The estate was divided into plots of various sizes, all of which were leasehold, and by 1750 buildings had been erected along Colmore Row and what is now Edmund Street. (fn. 97) Some plots were at first taken over by builders, bricklayers, and carpenters, but many were leased direct to manufacturers, who were required to 'erect . . . upon the piece . . . of land, one or more good and substantial dwelling houses with proper and necessary outbuildings'. (fn. 98) Many small manufacturers moved from the more congested parts of the town and left their 'irregular foul-smelling buildings': (fn. 99) later, however, the process of sub-letting and the erection of workshops led to some congestion even here. a Based on Census Reports, 1801-41. A private Act for St. Martin's glebe land was passed in 1773 (fn. 106) on the petition of the rector, John Parsons, for power to grant longer building leases. (fn. 107) The principal area affected was one of 23 acres at Five Ways, bounded by Broad Street, Islington Row, and Bath Row, through the centre of which was cut St. Martin's Street. In this way, very little undeveloped space was left in the eastern half of the parish of Birmingham at the time of its incorporation as a borough. In 1838 this area comprised almost the whole town; changes that have taken place since then, resulting from the expansion of the town far beyond these limits, have transformed the area (with the exception of that part lying north of Snow Hill) into the nucleus of a city. The building of central railway stations, street improvements and slum clearance, and the specialization of central districts for administrative and commercial purposes have been the main agents of this change. The railways came to Birmingham before the town had extended far beyond the limits of the ancient parish, and (as with the canals at Birmingham and most of the railways in London) the termini were built on the edge of the built-up area. The siting of the stations was determined partly by the configuration of the land, and the four earliest lines (Liverpool (and Manchester) and Birmingham, 1837; London and Birmingham, 1838; Birmingham and Gloucester, 1841; Birmingham and Derby, 1842) arrived at Birmingham by the Rea valley. (fn. 117) The Curzon Street and Lawley Street stations, in Duddeston, were found to be inconveniently far from the centre of the town, (fn. 118) especially as the amount of road traffic between them and the centre increased. The existence of the railway lines in itself limited the way in which the land on the eastern edge of the town might be developed, but more obvious changes were caused in the fifties when buildings were cleared to construct the two central stations at New Street and Snow Hill and to allow the lines to pass through the heart of the town. (fn. 119) These stations displaced a large part of the central population and at the same time made for easier daily travel from the suburbs to the centre. After railway works and public buildings, it was shops and office buildings that began to replace the demolished houses. Along Colmore Row and Corporation Street, for example, office buildings took most of the valuable sites. (fn. 123) In close competition were the shops, which from the 1860s onwards began to appear with the full panoply of modern salesmanship - plate glass, bright lights, and shining metal - in response to the growing prosperity of the population. (fn. 124) Families which had moved to new suburbs to escape the crowded noise of the centre were lured to travel, by increasingly frequent trains and trams, to the new shops which had replaced their homes. It has been said that it was in the sixties and seventies that the centre of Birmingham began to take on something like its modern shape: (fn. 125) it was about that time that the office workers and the suburban shoppers came to outnumber the artisans and the local residents in the streets of central Birmingham. 1. Site of Christ Church. 2. Site of St. Bartholomew's Church. 3. St. Martin's Church. 4. Site of St. Mary's Church. 5. Site of St. Peter's Church. 6. Site of St. Martin's Rectory. 7. St. Michael's R.C. Church (formerly New Meeting). 8. Site of Cannon St. Baptist Chapel. 9. Site of Cherry St. Wesleyan Methodist Chapel. 10. Site of Old Meeting. 11. Site of Ebenezer Congregational Church. 12. Site of Birmingham Manor House. 13. Site of New Hall. 14. Site of Leather Hall. 15. Site of Public Office. 16. Town Hall. 17. Council House Extension, incl. part of City Mus. and Art Gallery. 17. Hall of Memory. 19. Birmingham Municipal Bank. 20. Site of Court of Requests. 21. Site of Old Workhouse. 22. Site of General Dispensary. 23. Site of Lench's Almshouses. 24. Site of Bluecoat School. 25. Site of King Edward VI School. 26. Queen's College Chambers. 27. Public Library. 28. Birmingham and Midland Institute. 29. Mus. of Science and Industry (formerly Elkington's Wks.). 30. College of Arts and Crafts (formerly Sch. of Art). 31. Theatre Royal. 32. Site of Royal Hotel. 33. Masonic Temple. 34. Site of Birmingham Canal Office. 35. Site of Carless's Steelhouse. 36. Site of Kettle's Steelhouses. 37. Site of Town Mill. 38. Anderton Square. Deritend has already been mentioned as an early suburb of Birmingham. (fn. 144) In many ways Deritend was related to Birmingham in the same way as Southwark to London. Administratively separate from it, Deritend's closest links were with Birmingham, and the foundation of a chapel at Deritend at the end of the 14th century (fn. 145) weakened its connexion with the parent parish of Aston. Since Deritend lay at the focal point of Birmingham's system of external communications it was natural that the town should grow outwards in this direction. By 1810 buildings had reached along Bordesley High Street as far as the junction of the Coventry and Stratford roads, and along the Stratford road about as far as Highgate Park. (fn. 146) The population of Deritend and Bordesley had passed 18,000 by 1841 (see below, Table 2). Deritend was an area of piecemeal development on small sites, in courts and narrow streets, while the proximity of the Warwick and Birmingham Canal encouraged the building of workshops and warehouses. The main changes in the area have been brought about by the gradual diminution of the Rea as a natural barrier and the widening of the main road. The principal industrial feature at the middle of the 20th century was the gas works and electricity station near the canal, between Adderley Street and the Coventry road. From this area in the middle of the 19th century buildings spread south along the Moseley road to cross the borough boundary on Balsall Heath and west along the Coventry road over Small Heath (at the far end of which the Birmingham Small Arms factory, built 1861, acted as a magnet) and Bordesley Green, making two arms of closely built workingclass houses. A railway station was opened at Small Heath in 1863. (fn. 147) Between Balsall Heath and Small Heath was the small valley of the Spark Brook, and this area, known as Sparkbrook, had been filled up with cheap housing by 1890. By the end of the century buildings reached almost to the edge of the River Cole, the city's boundary. (fn. 148) The systematic character of development in this area can be seen in the existing pattern of the houses there, and is reflected in the rapid rise of population in the sixties and later (see below, Table 2). Edgbaston is remarkable for having retained most of the characteristics intended for it when it was developed as a suburb. The parish comprised 2,598 acres of undulating land drained by the Chad Brook, which divides the main part of the parish from Harborne and from the southern tip of Edgbaston, bounded on the south by the Bourn Brook. There appears to have been no rural village at Edgbaston: the parish was originally a chapelry of Harborne, its church standing beside, and presumably owing its foundation to, the manor house, (fn. 149) and in 1703 (before the formation of Edgbaston Park) the houses of the parish lay scattered around, most thickly near the crossing of the Chad Brook by the Harborne road. (fn. 150) The population rose rapidly in the first half of the 19th century, from 1,155 in 1801 to 3,954 in 1831. (fn. 151) The part nearest Birmingham between Edgbaston Park and Lee Bank Road, was partitioned into plots and built over in this period. (fn. 152) Sir Henry Gough, lord of the manor of Edgbaston, had contrived to avoid the building of factories or warehouses along the Worcester and Birmingham Canal, (fn. 153) foregoing any immediate profits for the sake of maintaining the residential value and character of the area. Moreover, the building leases that were granted precluded the denser development of the sites. In this way Edgbaston avoided the decline of all the other late 18th and early 19th-century suburbs of Birmingham from polite middle-class spaciousness and dignity to the noise and dirt of manufacture or the crowded closeness of an industrial population. The building of substantial houses in fair-sized gardens was continued along either side of the Hagley road and the Harborne road, reaching as far as the eastern end of Portland Road by 1863. (fn. 154) In the next twenty years, with an added incentive provided by Hagley Road railway station on the Harborne Railway (opened 1874), nearly the whole of the tongue of Edgbaston projecting north-west was built over in the same way, and a triangular area between Edgbaston Park and Harborne, with its railway station at Somerset Road (opened 1876) on the Birmingham West Suburban Railway, was developed. (fn. 155) With some further development in the early years of the 20th century along the north-west side of the Bristol road and at the extreme north-west tip of the parish, and with the building of the new university buildings (opened 1909) and the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (opened 1938), (fn. 156) Edgbaston achieved the appearance it presented in the middle of the 20th century, a leafy, low-density area close to the centre of Birmingham. In spite of the use of a few sites for tall commercial and residential buildings, it has retained much of its open space. Edgbaston has been called Birmingham's Belgravia, a description which indicates only its select residential character and its nearness to the centre. a Based on Census Reports, 1841-1911. b Wards subject to intercensal boundary changes. c No separate figures published. d No earlier figures published. aBased on Census Reports, 1841-1911. The figures for Aston include, of the areas mentioned in the text, Deritend and Bordesley, Duddeston and Nechells, Aston Manor, Bordesley Green, Gravelly Hill, Erdington, Lozells, Small Heath, Sparkbrook, Saltley, Washwood Heath, and Ward End and Little Bromwich (see also Tables 2 and 4); those for King's Norton include Balsall Heath, Moseley, King's Heath, Stirchley, and part of Bournville; those for Yardley include Sparkhill, Hay Mills, and Hall Green; those for Northfield include Bournbrook, Selly Oak, and part of Bournville; those for Handsworth include Perry Barr (see also Table 5). Two phenomena hastened the process of urban extension. One was the readiness of manufacturers to build or develop their factories beyond the edges of the developed area, (fn. 169) where land was cheaper and space more ample. The pattern of transport services encouraged this tendency, for it was more important for industry to be sited near a railway or canal than near the centre of the town. The other phenomenon was the desire of the workers in these factories to move away from the crowded, noisy, and often squalid areas of the centre of Birmingham - and some were forced to move by street improvements - into new houses built conveniently nearer to the out-of-town factories. (fn. 170) This double process is illustrated by the examples of Hay Mills, Bournville, and, in more recent times, Longbridge. As the town expanded, earlier rural communities were swallowed up. The expansion of Birmingham has been a relatively simple growth outwards from the centre, for of the villages around Birmingham which are now included in the city none developed as a town or urban centre in its own right, but mainly as an offshoot or satellite. Thus in each case a rural pattern was overlaid, often quite rapidly, by an urban one. The process of change often displayed several phases, and the suburbs of Birmingham afford many examples of successive 'in-filling'. In the first phase merchants and manufacturers acquired substantial plots for their suburban houses on agricultural land or in the grounds of country houses; in their turn the large suburban houses were surrounded by, or were demolished to make room for, smaller villa-type houses; and in some instances these villas were themselves removed and replaced by rows of small modern suburban houses. One or more of these phases occurred in all Birmingham's suburbs, with a number of local variations, and the first suburban use of a particular area usually had a strong influence on the later and quite different type of development in the area. The change in suburban land-use often depended on such fortuitous factors as the fortunes and ambitions of the families who first inhabited the suburb, the proximity of a railway station, the enterprise of local builders and building societies, or the terms of a conveyance. In this Birmingham is like many other industrial towns, but the size of Birmingham and the great demand for building sites there make it a striking example. An account of the historical topography of those parts of Birmingham not already described, that is, of the areas joined administratively to Birmingham since 1838, can most conveniently be covered by describing each in turn, as is done in the following section. The 80 square miles of the city's area comprise the central area (already described), the older suburbs in the immediate neighbourhood of the central area (large parts of which lay within the borough of 1838 and are therefore described above), and the newer suburbs and industrial localities nearer to the city's boundaries. These three divisions of the city have often been characterized as the Inner, Middle, and Outer Rings. (fn. 174) In the last there still remained in 1961 a few areas, notably in the south-west, not developed for industrial or residential purposes and still used for agriculture. In the seven ancient parishes of Aston, Sheldon, Yardley, King's Norton, Northfield, Harborne, and Handsworth, which together with the ancient parishes of Birmingham and Edgbaston make up nearly the whole of the area of the modern city, rural villages and hamlets have developed gradually into well populated suburbs. Other localities, with a much shorter residential history, have developed rapidly, and often with startling speed, or have been part of the steady, but seldom slow, expansion outwards from the central area. ASTON, the largest of these ancient parishes in area (14,074 a.), also included the largest number of old rural hamlets and showed the most marked increase in population in the 19th and 20th centuries. It now forms the north-east quarter of the city, lying on the heathland north and south of the Tame below its confluence with the Rea. The southern boundary is formed by the Cole, and part of its western boundary by the Rea and the Tame before they join. The western boundary at about its middle makes a salient across the Tame between Perry Barr and Birmingham. (fn. 175) From 1821 to 1851 the population of Aston rose almost as sharply as that of Birmingham ancient parish, and from 1851 it rose even more sharply so that by 1891, when the population of central Birmingham was already falling, Aston had surpassed Birmingham in population. Between 1841 and 1911 over half the population of Aston ancient parish lived in the two townships included in the borough of Birmingham in 1838, Duddeston and Nechells, and Bordesley and Deritend (see above, Tables 2 and 3). a Based on Census Reports, 1841-1921. b No figure for this precise area was published in 1921. South and east of the Tame and the Rea, Aston parish had for long been divided into a series of townships. Farthest upstream were Deritend and Bordesley which, included in the borough of Birmingham from 1838, are described above. (fn. 204) Then came Saltley (which included Washwood Heath) and the township of Ward End and Little Bromwich. Beyond Ward End was Castle Bromwich, of which only part has been included in Birmingham, and beyond that again Water Orton, which has remained wholly outside Birmingham. (fn. 205) Saltley centred on a small hamlet east of Saltley Bridge, which linked it with Duddeston on the other side of the Rea, and by 1760 there were a few larger houses on the western edge of Washwood Heath. Ward End and Little Bromwich on the other side of the Wash Brook, contained at that time only scattered houses. (fn. 206) During the 18th century a few of the wealthier Birmingham merchants had bought or built houses in these two areas, (fn. 207) but by the second half of the 19th century the railway works which had been built on the right bank of the Rea and the working-class houses in compact rows which extended increasingly further east over the fields of Saltley, and especially around Adderley Park station (opened 1860), were beginning to threaten the seclusion of these retreats. (fn. 208) By 1890 three streets of small houses had been built in the neighbourhood now called Little Bromwich, the southern tip of the township of Ward End and Little Bromwich. (fn. 209) Before the First World War about a dozen streets of working-class houses were built east and south-east of Ward End Park, in the north end of the township, eclipsing the small suburban village which had grown there in the early 19th century, and separated by only a narrow stretch of open ground from the houses which had been built south of Ward End Park right up to the boundary between Saltley and Ward End along the Wash Brook. (fn. 210) The building of railway works and the Wolseley motor-car factory north of Washwood Heath, the extension of the residential area north and east of Ward End Park, and the building of a housing estate (fn. 211) and an isolation hospital (fn. 212) in the angle between the London-Birmingham railway line and the River Cole completed the urban pattern which characterized Saltley and Ward End in 1950. Since that time corporation houses and blocks of flats have appeared on the Ward End Hall site near St. Margaret's Church. The ancient parish of NORTHFIELD, (fn. 253) covering 6,011 acres, was also originally part of Worcestershire, its northern boundary with Harborne (formerly in Staffordshire) and Edgbaston (formerly in Warwickshire) being marked by the Bourn Brook, part of its eastern boundary with King's Norton by the Rea and Griffin's Brook. Except for under 200 acres of the north-west tip of the parish, which was added to Lapal civil parish, Northfield was included in Birmingham in 1911; from 1898 until then it had been part of the Urban District of King's Norton and Northfield. (fn. 254) The old parish church stands 5½ miles from the centre of Birmingham and half a mile from the southern boundary of the parish, with the old village grouped around it. A subsidiary settlement developed north and west of the village on the Bristol road, and by 1840 had grown larger than the original village. (fn. 255) The Worcester and Birmingham Canal, opened in 1815, cuts across the north-east corner of the parish, making a junction at Selly Oak with the Selly Oak branch of the Dudley Canal, opened in 1801. This branch runs along the northern edge of the parish, entering the Lapal tunnel (fn. 256) near the ruins of Weoley Castle at California, where a small colony of brickmakers was established after 1840. (fn. 257) Until 1876 the only railway in the parish was the Birmingham and Gloucester line, which cuts across its southern tip. In 1876 the Birmingham West Suburban Railway was built through Selly Oak and a station was opened there in the same year. (fn. 258) It was natural that the first part of the parish to undergo suburban development should be Selly Oak, where road, railway, and canal meet; it is also the part of the ancient parish closest to central Birmingham. By 1882 industrial buildings and working-class houses had been built along the Bristol road around the railway station and the canal junction, with a district of larger, middle-class houses at Selly Park between the Bristol and Pershore roads. In the next twenty years houses were built along the Pershore road for almost the whole of its length in Northfield, and from Selly Oak working-class houses extended east and south-east over the area called Bournbrook. (fn. 259) In this period, however, the Bournville estate began to rival Selly Oak as the main area of suburban development. A station had been opened at Bournville in 1876, (fn. 260) and in 1879 the Cadbury brothers built a new factory there. The building of houses followed the building of the factory, and by 1900, when the Bournville Village Trust was founded, the estate had grown to 330 acres containing 313 houses. From the start, the development of the estate, which by 1939 stretched to over 1,000 acres, was carefully planned, and it played an important part in the growth of the idea of the 'garden suburb'. (fn. 261) The result of building in Selly Oak and Bournville can be seen in the increase of the population of the whole parish from nearly 10,000 in 1891 to over 31,000 in 1911. (fn. 262) By the First World War almost the whole of the eastern part of Northfield parish had been built over. In the central and western part there had been very little building by that time. (fn. 263) Northfield village, where a station was opened in 1869, (fn. 264) had grown slightly and there had been some building along the Bristol road west of the village: by 1840 there was a small hamlet at Bartley Green, where in that year a chapel of ease was consecrated; (fn. 265) and north-west of Bartley Green there was a row of cottages by 1840 at Moor Street, just inside the parish boundary. (fn. 266) Between the wars there was steady development of the western part of the Bournville estate in the centre of the parish, and in the thirties large housing estates were built in the north at Weoley Castle and in the south-west beyond Northfield village. The undeveloped land between these two areas at Shenley Fields and in the north-west corner of the parish at Bartley Green began to undergo suburban development after the Second World War. (fn. 267) The chief corporation housing estates are at Ley Hill, Bangham Pit, Woodcock Hill, and Long Nuke Road in the west and at Wychall Farm, Bunbury Road, and near Staplehall Farm Recreation Ground in the east. Before suburban development took place there, the population of Handsworth and Perry Barr lived in widely dispersed farms and cottages, without a village centre. (fn. 316) There was a number of groups of dwellings, hardly large enough or concentrated enough to rank as hamlets, on the Holyhead road, at Birchfield End, Perry, Old Oscott, Queslett, Hamstead, and (outside the modern city boundary) at Newton End; near the church, at the centre of the southern division of the parish, were the rectory and a few cottages. (fn. 317) From the 16th century the mills along the various water-courses of the parish afforded opportunity for minor industry. (fn. 318) The establishment of Matthew Boulton's factory at Soho in the years 1761-4 began a new phase in Handsworth's history, as in England's, (fn. 319) but it was rather the fact that he and James Watt made their homes there (fn. 320) that indicated the lines of Handsworth's modern development. At about this time some large houses were being built nearby on Handsworth Heath. The inclosure of most of the heath in 1793 encouraged further building there, and by 1840 the southern part of the parish, from Birchfield Road along Heathfield Road and the Holyhead road to Rookery Road, had become a suburb with the same sort of social standing as Edgbaston, (fn. 321) though without Edgbaston's safeguards against future degeneration. In the next twenty years the area of suburban development in Handsworth extended very little, though the houses within it became more numerous. (fn. 322) The opening of Perry Barr station (1837) (fn. 323) and Handsworth and Smethwick station (1854) (fn. 324) encouraged the northward and westward expansion of this area. By 1888 the area of suburban development covered about half of Handsworth Urban District, reaching north through Handsworth Wood and as far as Perry Bridge: in these districts the houses were mostly large and widely spaced, but along the Holyhead road and near Soho Park (by then built over) such houses had given place to meaner dwellings. In 1888 there remained a few gaps in the suburban belt of Handsworth: they lay between Birchfield Road and Aston Park, between the Holyhead road and the Great Western railway, and adjacent to Victoria Park (itself preserved as an open space when purchased by the local authority) on its south and west. These gaps were also filled in, mainly with working-class houses, in the next 25 years. (fn. 325) The movement of workingclass families into Handsworth and the results of the builders' efforts to meet their needs can be traced in the character of the houses in southern Handsworth and in the figures published in the census reports: the population of Handsworth (excluding Perry Barr) showed a steady but relatively unspectacular increase from 2,157 in 1801 to 14,359 in 1871 and then began to rise more strikingly, especially between 1891 and 1901, (fn. 326) although the built-up area did not expand much between 1888 and 1914. (fn. 327) Between 1914 and 1938 housing estates were built along the right bank of the Tame north of Handsworth Wood and north of the Holyhead road where it leaves the city. (fn. 328) Even so, the main increase in the population of the Handsworth division of the parish was over by 1911, the building of new houses there being roughly balanced by the decrease in population of the older streets, (fn. 329) and there was still some open land in the north-west in 1961. Sandwell ward, which includes this area, had in 1931 and in 1951 one of the lowest population densities in the city. (fn. 330) By 1961 a corporation housing estate at Birchfield which included three sixteen-story tower blocks of flats as well as lower houses and maisonettes, was nearing completion. a Based on Census Reports, 1871-1951. b Minor changes in the boundaries of wards mean that the combined areas to which the 1951 figures apply exclude 27 acres included in the corresponding 1931 areas. See opposite, p. 24, n. 95. c i.e. Handsworth, Sandwell, and Soho wards. d i.e. Perry Barr and Kingstanding wards. 1. This section was completed in 1961. 2. Census, 1961, Preliminary Rep. 32. 3. V.C.H. Warws. i. 299 et passim. 4. Hutton, Hist. Birm. (1835), 5. 7. Pearson and Rollason, Birm. Dir. (1777), p. xxvi. 8. Hist. Corp. i. 36; Hardware District, 211. 9. e.g. Gill, Mid. Hist. 90. 10. B. Walker, 'Notes on the Rea Valley', T.B.A.S. lii (2), 231-9. 12. G. C. Allen, Industrial Development of Birm. and the Black Country, 29. 13. For further discussion of these topics see pp. 75-76, 78, 81-84. 14. Gill, Hist. Birm. 2. 15. Ibid. 3, and see p. 26. 16. P.N. Warws. (E.P.N.S.), 34. 17. See map Xb in R. G. Collingwood and J. N. L. Myres, Roman Britain and the English Settlements. 18. There is a recent, comprehensive account of the physical background of the Birm. region in Birm. and its regional setting (Brit. Assoc. 1950). 19. C. Lapworth, Birm. Country, 50; Quart. Jnl. Geol. Soc. lxviii. 252-80; Memoirs of the Geol. Surv., Geology of the Country around Birmingham, 81. 20. Hutton, Hist. Birm. (1781), 6. 21. L. Richardson, Wells and Springs of Warws. 150. 22. Gill, Hist. Birm. 4, 20, 415, et passim; cf. pp. 253 sqq. 23. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 72-77. 24. Gill, Hist. Birm. 57. 25. Hutton, Hist. Birm. (1835), 7; cf. W. Bennett, John Baskerville, ii. 65; Langford, Birm. Life, i. 108. 26. R. K. Dent, The Making of Birm. 8. 28. Richardson, Wells and Springs of Warws. 164, 166, 173. 29. Geol. of Country around Birm. 106, 123. 30. Proc. Birm. Phil. Soc. vii. 85-112. 31. Geol. of Country around Birm. 122. 32. Hutton, Hist. Birm. (1835), 6. 33. See pp. 26-27, 31-32. 34. V.C.H. Warws. i. 299 sqq. 35. See pp. 251, 252. 36. Gill, Hist. Birm. 13; but see pp. 76-77, 78-79. 37. 1553 Survey, 56; see also pp. 74-75. 40. Gough's map of England, Warws. portion, printed T.B.A.S. (1870), 42. 43. Leland, Itin. ed. Toulmin Smith, ii. 96-97. 45. i.e. the River Rea. 47. The upper part was known as Well St., the lower end as Digbeth: 1553 Survey, map. 48. Camden, Brit. ed. Gough (1806), ii. 446. 49. B.R.L. 90377, 94314; 1553 Survey. 50. Gill, Hist. Birm. 32. See also p. 73. 51. W. Westley, Plan of Birm. . . . 1731. 52. Gill, Hist. Birm. 37. 53. Ibid.; Recs. of King Edward's Sch. ii (Dugd. Soc. vii), 72-78. 55. Gill, Mid. Hist. 143; cf. Gill, Hist. Birm. 42. 56. J. Toulmin Smith, Eng. Gilds (E.E.T.S. xl), 247-9; the larger figure may include Deritend. 57. B.M. Harl. MS. 594. 58. Gill, Hist. Birm. 42. 59. Trans. Mid. Rec. Soc. ii. 28; iv. 6; vi. 6. 60. Gill, Hist. Birm. 43. 62. Off Dale End and Digbeth. Rebuilding after 1945 removed many others; see also p. 53. 63. Cal. S.P. Dom. 1633-4, 222. 65. See Allen, Ind. Dev. 26-27. 66. See p. 89, and also pp. 413-14. 67. For a full discussion of this register see R. A. Pelham, 'Immigrant Population of Birm. 1686-1726', T.B.A.S. lxi. 45 sqq. 68. Hutton, Hist. Birm. (1835), 68. 70. Allen, Ind. Dev. 29. 71. Westley's figures for 1700 and 1731 are not perhaps reliable and have been omitted here. 72. Dr. Thomas gives the numbers of houses only, as follows: St. Martin's Parish, c. 986: Dugdale, Antiquities of Warws. ii. 908, St. Philip's Parish, 700-800: Dugd. Warws. ii. 908; Deritend, 158: Dugd. Warws. ii. 882. An average of 6 persons per house has been assumed. Coventry at the same date had 2,063 houses: Dugd. Warws. i. 200. 73. Printed on his Plan of Birm. 1750. 74. Printed on his Plan of Birm. (1778), see plate facing p. 7. 75. Printed on his Plan of Birm. (1785). 76. These figures give an average of 4.7 persons per house, which compares with 5.5. for 1785, 5.9 for 1778, 5.8 for 1750, and, if we include Westley's figures, 6.3 for 1731 and 6 for 1700. These averages appear high in comparison with Gregory King's figure of 4.5 persons per family, though the special circumstance of overcrowding might account for the discrepancy. 77. 1553 Survey, 50-56, 78-79. 78. J. Hill and D. K. Dent, Memorials of the Old Square, 14, 15. See pp. 377, 506, and plate facing p. 378. 80. Recs. of King Edward's Sch. i. (Dugd. Soc. iv), p. lxviii. 81. Hutton, Hist. Birm. (1835), 79. 85. Hill and Dent, Mems. of Old Square, 10; 1553 Survey, 32. 86. Hill and Dent, Mems. of Old Square, 17. John Pemberton himself lived at No. 1 the Square: ibid. 21. 87. Hill and Dent, Mems. of Old Square, 16. 88. Ibid. 17; see also p. 456. 90. B.R.L. 181709; see p. 47, and for the Old Square, plate facing p. 378. 91. 1553 Survey, map, and p. 78. 92. Westley, Plan of Birm. ... 1731. 93. 20 Geo. II, c. 16 (priv. act). 94. See Colmore Estate Map, (B.R.L. 411566). 95. 1553 Survey, 77, 78. 97. Cal. of Colmore Deeds (B.R.L.). Edmund St. in 1750 was known in sections as Harlow St., Charles St. and Hill St.: Bradford's Plan of Birm. (1750). 98. Cal. of Colmore Deeds (B.R.L.). 99. B.R.L. Contemporary rate books and directories. 100. See Hanson, Plan of Birm. (1778) (plate facing p. 7). 101. B. Walker, 'Some 18th-cent. Birm. houses', T.B.A.S. lvi. 31. 102. 6 Geo. III, c. 61 (priv. act). 104. Langford, Birm. Life, i. 107. 105. 26 Geo. II, c. 12; 26 Geo. III, c. 50; 6 Geo. IV, c. 34 (priv. acts). 106. 13 Geo. III, c. 6 (priv. act). 107. C. J. xxxiv. 90. 108. cf. Gill, Hist. Birm. 125. 109. J. Kempson, Map of Birm. in 1810. 110. Gill, Hist. Birm. 142. 111. See p. 8; Dent, Making of Birm. 335. Cf. Kempson, Map of Birm. in 1810 with later maps, e.g. Public Works Cttee. Birm. Plans (1884). See also plate facing p. 12. 112. Beilby, Knott & Beilby, Map of Birm. in 1824-5; J. Arrowsmith, New Plan of Birm. (1834). 113. Birm. and its regional setting, 217-18. See p. 325. 114. Gill, Hist. Birm. 451. 115. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 18, 277. See pp. 12, 334. 118. Langford, Birm. Life, ii. 579. 120. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 11-12, 19; see also pp. 44-45, 343. 121. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 86, 234-5; see also pp. 56-57. 122. Conurbation, A Planning Survey of Birm. and Black Country by West Midland Group (Architectural Press, 1948), 91n. 123. See, e.g., Kelly's Dir. Birm. (1908). 124. cf. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 13-14. 127. cf. Briggs, Hist. Birm. ii. 129. See pp. 46, 334. 130. See City of Birm. Official Handbk. (1958), 182, 184. 131. Ibid. 19-20, 22-24, 181-4; Birmingham (City of Birm. Information Dept. Publication No. 131), 1-3; ex inf. the City Engineer and Surveyor; see p. 46, and plate facing p. 26. 132. Birm. and its environs (1838) (B.R.L. Map 14020); cf. Tithe Map of Birm. 1845. 133. See pp. 62, 67. 134. e.g. West, Dir. Warws. (1830), 277. 135. Dugd. Warws. 881. The licence was for an oratory at Etchells (Ches.): Stretton's Reg. (Coll. Hist. Staffs. N.S. viii), 8; cf. J. P. Earwaker, East Cheshire, i. 322 (for Etchells). 136. Dugd. Warws. 881-2; cf. Public Works Cttee. Birm. Plans (1884), Duddeston and Nechells in 1758. 138. cf. Gill, Hist. Brm. 125. 139. See pp. 38, 40. 140. Post Office map of Birm. (1863); O.S. Map 1/2,500 Warws. XIV. 2, 6 (1st edn.). 141. Cornish, Map of Birm. (1860); cf. Arrowsmith, New Plan of Birm. (1834). 142. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. VIII. 13, 14; XIV. 1, 2 (1st and later edns.). 144. See pp. 6, 7. 146. J. Kempson, Map of Birm. in 1810. 148. See maps on pp. 2, 15. 150. T.B.A.S. xxxix, map facing p. 34; cf. Public Works Cttee. Birm. Plans (1884), Edgbaston in 1718. 151. Census, 1801, 1831. For the subsequent steady rise of the population see Table 2. 152. e.g. Kempson, Map of Birm. in 1810; Arrowsmith, New Plan of Birm. (1834). 153. Gill, Hist. Birm. 125. 154. P.O. map of Birm. (1863). 155. See map on p. 15; for stations see p. 40. 156. See pp. 45-46, 232, 349. 157. Hockley, Soho and Winson Green, and Monument Lane in 1854, Icknield Port Road and Rotton Park on the Harborne Railway in 1874, and Winson Green in 1876: see p. 40. 158. Census, 1841 and later years. 159. See map on p. 15. 160. The new towns will in fact accommodate only one half of the original residents in these areas. Arrangements have therefore been made by the city council with local authorities in Staffs. and Warws. for the 'overspill' population to be housed in 'reception areas' outside the city boundary: Birm. Official Handbk. (1958), 196. 161. Birm. Official Handbk. (1958), 124, 194-5; see also pp. 347-8. 162. See, e.g., P.O. map of Birm. (1863). 164. See map on p. 15. New building in the Aston Manor area was not sufficiently extensive to be shown on the map. 165. See map on p. 15. 166. Census, 1841-1901; see Table 2. 168. See Tables 2 and 3. 169. cf. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 135. 170. cf. ibid. 135, 138. 172. For a detailed account of the proposals and arguments put forward at the time see Briggs, Hist. Birm. 135-57. 174. e.g. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 302. 175. See map facing p. 1. 176. Local Govt. Bd. Ret. 1888, H.C. 333, p. 11 (1888), lxxxvi; Local Govt. Act, 1888, 51 & 52 Vic. c. 41, s. 100. 178. L.G.B. Order 31,859 (appointed day, 1894). 179. Census, 1911; Briggs, Hist. Birm. 145. 181. V.C.H. Warws. iv. 46, 262, and see pp. 364, 365. 182. Public Works Cttee. Birm. Plans (1884), Aston in 1758. 183. See pp. 34, 37. 185. P.O. map of Birm. (1863). 186. Ibid.; and see B.R.L. 259304. 187. O.S. Map 1/2,500 Warws. VIII (Staffs. LXIX), 13 (1st edn.). 188. Ex inf. Brit. Rlys. London Midland Region. 189. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 43. 191. The name Witton has been applied to localities outside the historical area of Witton: some maps mark the name on the W. bank of the Tame, and Upper Witton on the right bank of the Hawthorn Brook, and Witton Station is on the W. bank of the Tame. 194. Ex inf. Birm City Architect. 196. See list of tax assessments, 1327 and 1332, printed in Gill, Hist. Birm. 17. 197. Gill, Hist. Birm. 46; see p. 82. 198. M. Port, Six Hundred New Churches, 42, 51, 69; see p. 385. 199. P.O. map of Birm. (1863); cf. Sale particulars of building sites at Gravelly Hill and Erdington, 1854, at B.R.L. 201. For housing estates see pp. 56-57. 202. O.S. Maps 1/2, 500 Warws. VIII (Staffs. LXIX), 6-7, 10-12, 14-16 (1st-4th edns.). 205. See map facing p. 1. For the history of Water Orton see V.C.H. Warws. iv. 262-3. 206. Public Works Cttee. Birm. Plans (1884), Saltley in 1760; Little Bromwich in 1759. 207. Ibid.; and see e.g. Gill, Hist. Birm. 126. 208. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIV. 2, 6 (1st edn.); ex inf. B.R. (L.M.R.). 209. Little Bromwich appears to be the original name of the whole area, Ward End being its northern end named after a family that held land there. By the 17th cent. the two names were regarded as alternatives: see Dugdale, Warws. 885. In modern times the northern end has been known as Ward End and only the southern as Little Bromwich: O.S. Map 1/25,000 42/18 (prov. edn.). 210. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIV. 2, 3, 6, 7 (1st-3rd edns.). 213. Public Works Cttee. Birm. Plans (1884), Little Bromwich in 1759. 214. A history of Castle Bromwich is given in V.C.H. Warws. iv. 43-47, and the part of the area in Birm. is therefore covered here only briefly. 215. Kelly's Dir. Birm. (1908), 326. 216. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIV. 3, 4 (4th edn.); ex inf. Birm. City Architect. 217. For its history between the landing of an aeroplane in 1911 and its closure in 1958, see Birm. Mail, 21 Mar. 1958. 220. Census, 1931; O.S. Map 1/2,500 Warws. VIII. 16 (3rd and 4th edns.). 221. A history of Sheldon parish is given in V.C.H. Warws. iv. 200-5, and it is therefore covered here only briefly. 222. Census, 1931; O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIV. 12, 16; Warws. XV. 5, 9, 13 (3rd and 4th edns.). 224. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIV. 12, 16 (4th edn.). 225. Ex inf. B.R.(L.M.R.); Birm. and its regional setting, figures on pp. 324-7. 226. A history of Yardley parish is given in V.C.H. Worcs. iii. 238-45, and it is therefore covered here only briefly. 227. See map facing p. 1. 228. See pp. 40, 42. 230. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIV (Worcs. VI), 9, 10, 11, 14, 15 (1st edn.). 231. Ibid. (2nd-4th edns.); Worcs. XI (Warws. XIX), 2, 3, 6, 7, 10 (2nd-4th edns.). 232. A history of King's Norton parish is given in V.C.H. Worcs. iii. 179-91, and it is therefore covered here only briefly. 234. See map facing p. 1, and maps on pp. 36, 41. 235. Cornish, Map of Birm. (1860); cf. Arrowsmith, New Plan of Birm. (1834). 236. Ret. of [Local Government] Districts. . . 1867, H.C. 8, p. 3 (1867), lix. 237. P.O. map of Birm. (1863). 239. Local Govt. Bd.'s Prov. Order Conf. (No. 13) Act, 54 & 55 Vic. c. 161 (local act); Balsall Heath became a civil parish separate from King's Norton in 1894: Census, 1901. 240. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIV. 9, 13 (1st and 2nd edns.). 242. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws XIV. 13, Worcs. XI. 1 (1st-4th edns.). 243. See p. 45. The station was known as Moseley until 1867. 244. B.R.L. 299993 (map of King's Norton parish, 1840); Littlebury, Dir. Worcs. (1873), 412; O.S. Map 1/2,500 Worcs. XI. 1, 5 (1st edn.). 246. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Worcs. X (Warws. XIXa), 8, 12; Worcs. XI (Warws. XIX), 5, 6, 9, 10 (2nd-4th edns.). 247. Bournville is largely in Northfield ancient parish: see below. 249. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Worcs. X (Warws. XIXa), 8, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16 (1st-4th edns.). 250. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 45, 218, 300. 252. Census, 1901, 1911; see map facing p. 1, and map on p. 2. 253. A history of Northfield parish is given in V.C.H. Worcs. iii. 194-201, and it is therefore covered here only briefly. 254. Census, 1911; see map facing p. 1, and map on p. 2. 255. Northfield Tithe Map (B.R.L. 299991). 256. See pp. 34, 37. 257. Northfield Tithe Map; V.C.H. Worcs. iii. 194; for California's name, see T.B.A.S. lxx. 60. 259. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Worcs. X. 3, 4, 7, 8 (1st and 2nd edns.). 260. It was called Stirchley St. station until 1880 (ex inf. B.R.(L.M.R.)). Bournville station, together with a small part of the Bournville estate, is in fact not in Northfield ancient parish but King's Norton. 261. The Bournville Village Trust, 1900-1955, 9 sqq.; see p. 56. 262. See Table 3, above. 263. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIXa (Worcs. X), 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11 (3rd edn.). 264. Ex inf. B.R. (L.M.R.). 266. Northfield Tithe Map (B.R.L. 299991). 267. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Warws. XIXa (Worcs. X), 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11 (4th edn.); Bournville Village Trust, 23 sqq., 16 sqq. 268. Census, 1901; Kelly's Dir. Birm. (1908), 345. 269. Local Govt. Bd.'s Prov. Order Conf. (No. 13) Act, 54 & 55 Vic. c. 161 (local act). 270. Ret. of [Local Government] Districts. . . 1867, p. 11 (1867), lix. 272. O.S. Maps 6" Staffs. LXXII. NE, SE; Worcs. V. NW, SW (1st and 2nd edns.); and see map facing p. 1. 273. Sherriff, Map of Harborne, 1790 (B.R.L. 282533); T. Presterne, Harborne once upon a time (Birm. 1918), reproduction of map of 1834; mention of some of the older houses there is made in 9th Rep. Com. Char. H.C. 258, pp. 551, 553 (1823), ix. 275. cf. J. Kenward, Harborne and its Surroundings (Birm. 2nd edn. 1885), 50; Gill, Hist. Birm. 126; Presterne, Harborne, 40-42. 277. See above, Table 2. 279. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Staffs. LXII. 11, 15 (1st edn.). 281. Presterne, Harborne, 45; see p. 50. 282. Ibid. 129-30 et passim. 284. cf. Briggs, Hist. Birm. 161; Harborne Tenants Limited (1908) (B.R.L. 206840), 15; see p. 56. 286. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Staffs. LXXII (Warws. XIII), 11, 15 (3rd edn.); 1/25,000 42/08 (prov. edn.). 287. Census, 1911; Briggs, Hist. Birm. 144. 288. O.S. Map 1/2,500 Warws. XIII (Worcs. V), 10 (1st-3rd edns.); 1/25,000 42/08 and 32/98. 289. Census, 1891, 1901; O.S. Maps 6" Staffs. LXIV (Warws. IV), SW; Staffs. LXVIII NE and SE; Staffs. LXIX (Warws. VIII), NW and SW; Staffs. LXXII (Warws. XIII), NE (1st edn.); O.S. Maps 1/25,000 42/08 and 42/09 (prov. edn.). 290. 37 & 38 Vic. c. 89; Hackwood, Handsworth Old and New, 75, where the new authority is described as a local board. 291. Local Govt. Bd. Ret. H.C. 333, p. 10 (1888), lxxxvi; Local Govt. Act, 1888, 51 & 52 Vic. c. 41, s. 100. 293. The boundaries of the city wards have undergone frequent and radical changes, and no single ward retained unchanged boundaries between 1931 and 1951 (Census, 1951). Handsworth and Perry Barr, however, are unlike every other part of the city in that the boundaries of the ancient parish and its divisions survive almost intact as ward boundaries (see Bartholomew's Pocket Atlas of Birm. (1952), 4) except where parts of the ancient parish have remained outside the city. Apart from that and very minor changes in the boundaries between the 5 wards named above, the only change has been the subtraction from Perry Barr of the 27 a. between the Tame, Aldridge Rd., College Rd. and the old line of the Rycknield St. 294. 9th Rep. Com. Char. H.C. 258, p. 546 (1823), ix. 296. Local Govt. Bd. Order 31,988 (appointed day, 1894). 297. Birm. Extension Act, 17 & 18 Geo. V, c. 102 (local act). 298. Plea Roll (Coll. Hist. Staffs. iv (1)), 201. 299. Subs. Rolls (Coll. Hist. Staffs. vii), 228; x. 102. 300. See pp. 70, 71. 301. D.L. 30/111/1674. Later rolls in the series do not mention the name Little Barr: D.L. 30/111/1675, /1679. 302. e.g. C.P. 43/602 rot. 314; /625 rot. 290; /997 rot. 291. 303. e.g. Yates's map of Staffs. in S. Shaw, Hist. of Staffs. 304. Bartholomew's Pocket Atlas of Birm. (1952), 4, 7. 306. See, e.g., Bartholomew's Pocket Atlas of Birm. (1952), 14; O.S. Map 1/25,000 42/09 (prov. edn.). 307. O.S. Map 1/25,000 42/09 (prov. edn.). 308. See pp. 69, 71-72. 309. Gill, Mid. Hist. 166 sqq. 310. Tithe Maps of Handsworth and Perry Barr (Tithe Redemption Commrs.). 311. O.S. Map 1/2,500 Staffs. LXVIII. 12 (1st-3rd edns.). 312. Rot. Hund. (Rec. Com.), ii. 116. 313. Gill, Mid. Hist. 191. 314. Shaw, Staffs. ii. 112; see also p. 69. 315. O.S. Map 1/25,000 42/09 (prov. edn.). 316. cf. Gill, Mid. Hist. 165-6; A. E. Everitt, 'Handsworth Church and its surroundings', T.B.A.S. (1876), 65. 318. See pp. 81 sqq., 253 sqq. 319. See, e.g., W. E. H. Lecky, Hist. of Eng. in the 18th cent. vii. 277-8: W. Pitt, Topog. Hist. Staffs. (1817), 158; see also p. 258-9. 320. Shaw, Staffs. iii. 117. 321. B.R.L. 601704; Tithe Map of Handsworth; J. A. Chatwin, 'Handsworth about 1835-6', T.B.A.S. lvi. 102-3; see p. 51. 322. P.O. map of Birm. (1863); and see Plan for Soho Park (1845) (B.R.L. 369956). 324. Ex inf. B.R.(Western Region). 325. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Staffs. LXVIII. 12, 15, 16; Staffs. LXIX (Warws. VIII), 9, 13; Staffs. LXXII (Warws. XIII), 4 (1st-3rd edns.); and see map on p. 15. 326. Census, 1801-1901; and see Table 5. 327. O.S. Maps 1/2,500 Staffs. LXVIII. 12, 15, 16 (1st and 3rd edns.); and see map on p. 15. 328. O.S. Map 1/25,000 42/09 (prov. edn.). 332. O.S. Map 1/2,500 Staffs. LXIX (Warws. VIII), 5 (4th edn.); 1/25,000 42/09 (prov. edn.).
2019-04-19T17:00:06Z
https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/warks/vol7/pp4-25
When aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart went missing over the Pacific in July of 1937, the United States Navy and Coast Guard launched the most massive aerial and sea search and rescue effort the world had ever seen. The Coast Guard cutter Itasca and the seaplane tender USS Swan, a converted minesweeper, already in the neighborhood of Howland Island – Earhart’s destination at the time of her disappearance – searched widely in the area and penetrated both the British-administered Gilbert Islands (now Kiribati). Float planes from the battleship USS Colorado conducted an aerial inspection of the Phoenix Islands. The aircraft carrier USS Lexington and her aircraft, with escorting destroyers, searched the sea seas between Howland Island and the Gilberts. Although the search was unsuccessful, and criticized by some Earhart investigators today as far less thorough than it was touted to be,2 the search was an impressive effort at the time. The official conclusion of the U.S. Government was that Earhart had crashed into the ocean, sinking without a trace. No evidence of wreckage was ever sighted on land or at sea. In the course of investigating a different hypothesis – that Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, wound up on the island of Nikumaroro in the Phoenix Group4 – researchers from The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) have examined records of the Western Pacific High Commission (WPHC), the colonial organization that oversaw the G&EIC. We are by no means sure that we have examined all the pertinent records, but what we have found is interesting enough to justify this short paper. We also hope that by publishing it we can encourage people still living today who participated in or had first-hand knowledge of the search to share their recollections, which may fill some of the gaps in the written record. Relations between the British Empire and the United States in the Pacific were not entirely cordial during the late 1930s. Each wanted its airline companies to be the first to establish commercial flying boat service between North America and Australia/New Zealand for the lucrative mail business. Over-water seaplane service required rest, repair, and refueling stations en route. The United States took the position that no foreign airline would be allowed to fly into Honolulu, Hawaii, as the seaplane facilities there were adjacent to military ports, and would be an easy target for espionage. Without the key stop of Honolulu, all cross-Pacific flying service was doomed to failure. Extensive discussions were conducted between the US, New Zealand, and Australia to help come to some accommodation that was beneficial to all sides. Other islands between Hawaii and Australia were also considered as possible refueling stations, including the Phoenix and Line Islands and their outliers, largely uninhabited coral atolls lying astride the equator in the central Pacific. Sovereignty over these uninhabited islands was problematic. British ships had been first to raise the flag on some, American ships on others. Each nation had asserted ownership of or interest in particular islands, and citizens of each had carried out commercial ventures there. The American Guano Company had mined phosphates on McKean and Enderbury Islands; the British Arundel Company had done the same on Ocean, Nauru, and in the Phoenix Islands. The British issued a license to entrepreneur John Arundel to establish coconut plantations on Hull, Sydney and Gardner Islands (now Nikumaroro). The islands were subsequently controlled (prior to 1937) by the Pacific Islands Company, Lever’s Pacific Plantations Ltd., the Samoa Shipping and Trading Co., Ltd. and the Burns Philp Company;5 but by 1930 or so, most of these islands had been abandoned. In the 1930s, both British and American exploration parties passed through placing plaques and raising flags. Having asserted ownership of Howland and nearby Baker and Jarvis Islands in 1935, the U.S. placed colonizing parties from Hawaii on each. The Phoenix Islands Settlement Scheme, a 1938 program of colonization on three of the Phoenix Islands undertaken by the WPHC, though designed to relieve real population pressure in the southern Gilberts,8 also served the geopolitical purpose of welding Gardner, Sydney, and Hull Islands (now Nikumaroro, Manra, and Orona) to the G&EIC. The 1938 British declaration of McKean and Phoenix Islands as bird sanctuaries served a similar purpose, though entirely justified on conservation grounds. Other incidents exacerbated tense diplomatic relations. For example, the crew of the U.S. private yacht Yankee removed pieces from the wreck of the H.M.S. Bounty at Pitcairn Island.9 Despite these incidents, diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Great Britain in the Pacific were generally friendly. However, British colonial authorities in the G&EIC and in Fiji, headquarters of the WPHC, had every reason to be suspicious of U.S. adventures in the Central Pacific. Via the U.S. State Department, Amelia Earhart and her husband, George Putnam, sought permission from various governments for overflight and landing rights. Most were granted, but occasionally, problems cropped up requiring a change in routing. No specific request was made to overfly the Gilberts, which were on the direct path between Lae, New Guinea, and Howland Island. The formal request from the U.S. State Department to British Authorities states that the route was from Honolulu to Darwin, Australia via New Guinea, and did not mention Howland Island or the Gilberts. The British passed the request to authorities in Australia, who had jurisdiction over New Guinea. The Gilbert Island chain was not included in the U.S. request, so neither Earhart nor the G&EIC had much knowledge of one another. Had Earhart inquired seriously about facilities in the Gilberts, she would have learned that there were a few commercial radio stations which she could have used for navigational aides using her radio direction finding instruments. Use of commercial wireless telegraph stations could also have improved her rather poor communication channels between the Itasca at Howland Island and Lae, New Guinea, and these same stations could have been actively used in monitoring her in-flight broadcasts, as the Nauru wireless station. Miss Earhart arrived at Honolulu but crashed on taking off at Wheeler Field12 on continuation of flight which was therefore abandoned. After the crash, Earhart refitted her plane in Burbank, California, and departed with Fred Noonan in May, this time flying east. Neither this event nor any of her subsequent stops, often in parts of the British Empire, are noted in the file, although they were widely reported in the media. Earhart eventually left Lae, New Guinea on July 2, but was unable to find Howland Island. While the crew of the US Coast Guard Cutter Itasca heard radio broadcasts from Earhart as she approached, no two-way radio communication could be established, and the crew believed that she had eventually run out of fuel and crashed into the sea. The next item in the WPHC files is a cutting from the Fiji Times and Herald dated July 9 – seven days after Earhart’s disappearance – reporting on the U.S. search in the Phoenix Islands. A number of amateur and professional radio stations had heard signals thought to be broadcast from Earhart after her disappearance, and some rather crude direction finding bearings indicated an origin in the Phoenix Islands. The US Navy sent the battleship Colorado with three float planes to investigate all of the Phoenix Islands. In what appears to have been be a cursory flyover the pilots and observers aboard the planes did not find a plane, nor much in the way of human activity. On Hull Island, one plane did land in the lagoon to inquire of John William Jones, the local resident, and his Tokelau copra workers if he had heard anything of Earhart. This breach of U.S. Naval protocol (one must first meet with official representatives of the government upon arrival) caused problems for the US Navy and State Departments. US Navy representatives in Washington conferred with State Department officials to determine whether the British should be notified. Legal opinions indicated that the US did not recognize the sovereignty of the Phoenix Islands by Great Britain (as evidenced in the Canton eclipse party), and that to notify them would jeopardize any future claims to the Phoenix Islands by the U.S. Meanwhile, on July 3 the US Navy tasked the aircraft carrier USS Lexington, stationed in San Pedro, California, to immediately depart with three destroyers to Honolulu to refuel and assist in the aerial search for Earhart. The search was overseen by the Commandant of the 14th Naval District, headquartered in Honolulu. Once the Colorado finished its aerial search of the Phoenix Islands, the Lexington would search the waters directly west of Howland Island, possibly to the Gilbert Islands. Active correspondence began to obtain British approval to search those islands. On July 13, the Acting Secretary of the Navy, William D. Leahy, wrote to the US Secretary of State to obtain permission for the Lexington to search the Gilberts, should that become necessary.13 The State Department notified the Navy that the British had already been informed of the desire to search the Gilberts. Shortly thereafter, the American Ambassador in London informed the US State Department that verbal permission had been granted. The WPHC office received a telegram to that effect on July 13 as well. The US Navy told the Commandant to go ahead, and immediately the Itasca was tasked to search Arorai, Tamana, Onotoa, Nonuti, Kuria, Maiana, Tarawa, Apia, Taritari, and Maraki. The USS Swan was tasked to investigate Nukunau, Beru, Tabituea, and Nonuti. Your telegram of 13th July, first report received this morning that coastguard vessel "Ithica" (is also "Nuasca") sighted by motor ship "Ralum" off Arorae a.m. 14th July and left in afternoon in direction of Tamana. Urgent. My telegram of 15th July, reports received this afternoon state it as C.A. (?) has visited Arorae, Tamana, Kuria, Aranuka, and Tarawa, having left Tarawa today, Friday, in Westerly direction. Vessel may possibly visit Ocean Island if oil fuel procurable. "Swan" understood due Onotoa, Beru, Tabiteuea, today. The Itasca met with the Senior Administrative Officer of Tarawa, C.A. Swinbourne. He told the Itasca officers that they needed to contact Ocean Island regarding the approval to search the Gilberts, as he had not been notified. The Itasca replied that all clearances had been filed. Apparently, the Itasca also was inquiring about procuring fuel, being somewhat unsure as to future duties and fuel availability. … United States Government has represented that development in search for person named makes close search of Gilbert Islands desirable. In the circumstances permission has been given for United States cutter "Itasca" and mine sweeper "Swan" to search uninhabited islands and to establish contact with inhabitants of other islands. The Assistant High Commissioner passed the message regarding approval for the Swan and Itasca to search the islands on to Barley without comment on July 19. Here the matter seems to have rested for some three weeks – not entirely surprising, since the U.S. officially gave up the search and called its ships home on July 18. No one from the U.S. Government seems to have officially notified the WPHC or G&EIC about Earhart’s first or second World flight attempt – despite the fact that her course lay directly over the Gilbert Islands. Upon Earhart’s disappearance on 2nd July, the U.S. launched its search without notifying British colonial authorities. The initial search, of course, took place around Howland Island and in international waters, but even as the search expanded and U.S. ships sailed into the Gilberts, the U.S. delayed notifying British authorities, and then did so in a rather confusing way – referring at first only to Lexington (which arrived on the scene on July 12) when Itasca and Swan had been hard at work since the 2nd. There is no evidence in the file that the WPHC was ever notified of Colorado’s cruise through the disputed Phoenix Islands, which took place between the July 9 and 12. The U.S. requested no help from Great Britain other than access to the islands and residents of the Gilbert Islands and perhaps a fueling stop at Ocean Island. As it happened, the G&EIC had few assets of its own to throw into the search, but the Americans could hardly have known this. Moreover, the colonial government certainly did have contact with the several copra traders whose routes criss-crossed the area. It seems odd that those responsible for the world’s greatest air-sea search should not have thought to ask help from others on the scene, but the Earhart disappearance is fraught with mistakes and missed opportunities. Amelia Earhart alive on coral shoal on one of Gilbert Islands latitude 2 above equator 174 longitude. This messaged [sic] received by Mr. L–– New York medium. The nearly simultaneous receipt of these two messages by Putnam was remarkable, and Putnam sprang into action, but he was reluctant to disclose the source of his information. In a follow-up telegram, Putnam stated “… can’t rationalize or make public why. This is written by practical person.” The Lexington already had searched westward to approximately 176° East, and the suggestion that it to steam 720 miles without justification and with low fuel reserves caused headaches for Navy officials. The CNO asked the Commandant of the 14th Naval District about the idea, and the reply came back that it would require abandoning the existing search plan, but that it would be done if ordered. The CNO telegraphed Putnam of the impracticality of his proposal and reported that all areas where the plane could drift were being searched. On the 18th, Putnam clarified his request, saying that he wanted the planes from the Lexington to search the area, not to have the ship steam to that location. The CNO firmly replied that all possible areas were being searched and that nothing had been overlooked. Putnam then turned to his good friend Gene Vidal, head of the Bureau of Air Commerce, a branch of the Commerce Department. Vidal contacted Marvin McIntyre, Presidential Aide to Franklin Roosevelt, who wrote a memo on July 20 reporting that Vidal was in touch with Putnam, and had some interesting sidelights and speculations as to what happened. Would FDR be interested in spending some time with Vidal? Another ten days elapsed before this meeting. On July 23, Putnam wrote the Secretary of the Navy, thanking him for all the efforts by the Navy. Putnam requested that the Secretary ask the British and Japanese to continue their searches in the Ellice, Gilbert, Ocean, and Marshall Islands, and to the northeast. He also asked if the islands north and northwest of Samoa could be searched.17 The Secretary of Navy responded the following day that the Navy had been informed that British and Japanese had given assurances that all shipping in the area would keep looking for the plane and the fliers. On July 26, Putnam had the Coast Guard office in San Francisco inquire of the Itasca if Beru and the southern Gilberts were searched, and was Beru inhabited? The Itasca responded that all of the Gilberts are thickly inhabited, and that there was no evidence of plane wreckage. On July 30, the meeting was held, presumably in the White House, between FDR, Marvin McIntyre, Gene Vidal, and Sumner Wells, the primary point of contact in the State Department working on Earhart matters. While no notes of the meeting are available, we can discern what was discussed based upon later correspondence and the actions of the principals involved. Apparently, Putnam was willing to put up a $2000 reward for information leading to a definitive resolution of what happened to Earhart and Noonan, and he asked that a search be made of an uncharted reef at 2°36′N, 174°10′E, bearing 106° from Making [sic] Island,18 which was reported to lie about 85 miles east from Tarawa. The next day, Putnam wrote McIntyre, thanking him for his help, and inquired as to what the Japanese were doing regarding a search of the eastern Marshalls, which Putnam thought was the most fruitful location for wreckage. Similarly, Putnam wrote Sumner Wells, clarifying the position as being 106°T from Makin Island. “A former commander of a copra vessel,” he said, “confirmed by a reliable American, claims there exists an uncharted reef, and visited by natives for turtle eggs.” Putnam stated that he believed Capt. I. Handley of Tarawa knew of the island. … United States Ambassador states that evidence, which to many sources seems positive, indicates that Miss Earhart was on land two nights following disappearance. Note proceeds to ask if further search of Gilbert Islands could be made at expense, if necessary, of husband, Putnam, who urges immediate search of position 174 degrees 10 minutes east, 2 degrees 36 minutes north, where he has reason to believe that uncharted reef exists of which Captain Handley of Tarawa said to know. Reward of 2,000 dollars offered for any evidence leading to solution of disappearance. Please telegraph what action can be taken. On August 8, Putnam telegraphed the US State Department, asking if there “isn’t some way to expedite things?” If the British won’t cooperate, says Putnam, then “I need to find private actions.” The next day, the State Department responded that there was no reason to think that the British are stalling, as these things take time. The uncharted reef, according to the position given, would be about 72 miles N.E. of an island in the Gilbert Group named Marakei. As Ocean Island Radio Station is temporarily out of commission owing to the illness of Mr. Moore it has been necessary to send (the telegram) to Nauru. From there it will be sent by the British Phosphate Commission's wireless telephone to Ocean Island. On August 9, the Resident Commissioner on Ocean Island cabled the Senior Administrative Officer at Tarawa that the British Secretary of State reported a substantial rumor of Earhart’s plane being down on an uncharted reef, possibly being Bikeni-karakara, and that “Handley would know of the position.” The cable went on to note Putnam would pay any expenses associated with a search and offereds a reward of $2000. It asked whether any local firms could take action? The following day, the C.A. Swinbourne, the Resident Administrative Officer on Tarawa, gave a copy of the August 9 telegram to representatives of Burns Philp Company, and asked if any action could can be taken. Swinbourne prepared a letter of introduction for Handley to proceed in the cutter Kawaetate of Abaiang, a neighboring island in the Tarawa Atoll, to search for Earhart. Handley left Tarawa to Abaiang to see a David Randolf, who he thought had a sailing vessel suitable for the task. Randolf was ill, but offered full use of his boat. After preparing the sailboat, and finding a crew of 5 natives, Handley left Abaiang on the afternoon of August 12, estimating that the search would take about seven days. Meanwhile, Burns Philp representatives formally responded to the request from Swinbourne with a letter on the 12th, stating the inter-island trading vessel Ralum is unable to take any action. The US State Department, having not heard from any British official since August 6 as to what was going on, asked the embassy in London on August 12 if there is any word from the High Commissioner in Suva. The answer, sent the following day, was no, but reported that a reply had been requested, and that London would would provide any word when it was received. Swinbourne sent a telegram to the H.M.C.S. Nimanoa, apparently to the Resident Commissioner of the G&EIC, that the vessel John Bolton is at Tulagi, Solomon Islands, and Ralum is enroute to the Ellice Islands. The message further stated that Handley doubted the existance of the reef, but left for Abaiang on the 19th to sail Randolf’s cutter to Marakei and thence to the position of the uncharted reef. The next day, Swinbourne sent a letter to the Acting Secretary at Ocean Island, stating that the couple of vessels available to the F&EIC were unsuitable for deep sea navigation, and that government had to go to Burns Philp for assistance. He enclosed the letter from Burns Philp, stating that Handley was taking the matter up promptly. On August 14, the British Foreign Office contacted the American Embassy, stating that the information regarding search plans and Putnam defraying expenses was sent on the 6 to the HCWP, who was instructed to report by telegram as to what action could be taken. Meanwhile, the High Commissioner’s office in Suva had heard nothing back since the telegram went out on August 7, so they asked the Resident Commissioner of the G&EIC to inform the High Commissioner of any information obtained from Capt. Handley, and to advise what actions hadve been taken. The following day, the Officer-in-Charge at Ocean Island responded to the HCWP, stating that he had contacted J.C. Barley, H.M.S. Leith, and the Senior Administrative Officer on August 9, and had requested information from the Senior Administrative Officer in Tarawa. He reported that the vessel Ralum was the only one in the area, and that Handley was serving aboard, but that his whereabouts were unknown. The uncharted reef exists in native legends, he went on, and may have been sighted by a trading schooner in 1900. It is clear that the Officer-in-Charge had not seen much of the correspondence from Tarawa, and was unaware that Handley by now was now deep into his search for of the uncharted reef. Sometime during this same day, the Senior Administrative Officer on Tarawa sent the identical message he sent the Nimanoa the day before to the Acting Secretary on Ocean Island. It appears that the Resident Commissioner of the G&EIC was aboard the Nimanoa, and his personnel back on Ocean Island were not fully aware of circumstances. The situation at the U.S. State Department was getting tenser. A memo from Moffett, from the Division of Western European Affairs, to Sumner Wells, stated that he was not certain whether the British were reluctant to participate in the search or whether the U.S. didn’t emphasize the matter enough. Moffett had drafted a stiff telegram to London for Wells to send. Later that day, Gene Vidal contacted the State Department, asking them to write Putnam, now in Burbank, California, as to the status of the search. The State Department then telegraphed Putnam that they had instructed the American Embassy in London twice to press the British in the search, but no word had been heard from the High Commissioner in Suva. As soon as the State Department heard anything, they reported, they would forward the information to Putnam. We are at a loss to understand failure of High Commissioner at Fiji to indicate what action he is able to take in response to your repeated requests. It has now been 16 days since we telegraphed you. Please take the matter up once again with the appropriate authorities. The American Embassy responded by saying that the Foreign Office hadn’t heard from the High Commissioner, and would telegraph him requesting an immediate report by telegram. The British Secretary of State promptly sent a telegram to the High Commissioner, asking for an expedited reply. Meanwhile, the Resident Commissioner of the G&EIC telegraphed the High Commissioner on August 19, reporting that Handley left Tarawa on the afternoon of August 10 for the uncharted reef via Abiang and Marakie. He reported that Handley doubted the position of the reef. The vessel Ralum, he reported, was en route to the Ellice Islands. This was the first real news that the High Commissioner had seen, except for the telegram from the Officer-in-Charge at Ocean Island the previous day. Despite the request from the Foreign Office, and the information now available, the High Commissioner’s office did not send anything to London until August 23. Thanks wire. Confidentially, newspaper here now aware request made for specific search my expense three weeks ago and inquiring if action taken. If their investigation discloses cooperation unforth coming resulting publicity might be deeply embarrassing hurtful for all concerned. After all, I could have arranged privately direct with Gilbert long since but relieved the proper course proceed through official channels. Regret being troublesome and appreciate your help. The State Department responded to Putnam that they appreciated his worry. They reported that Sumner Wells had called the American Embassy, which reported that they hadn’t heard from the High Commissioner for the Western Pacific, but that an immediate reply had been requested. At the mutual desire of yourself and the Manager of Messrs. Burns Philp S.S. Co. I undertook to go in search of Mrs. Putman (sic) alleged to be on an uncharted reef. Position given. Nothing known locally of such a reef. There is a native tradition say, there is an isle of Spirits all right in this alleged position but the human eye is not permitted to see it. However, after a search of three days within a radius of some twenty miles of given position. And no sign of Bird Life. I conclude that it is none existent there. The natives of Marakei give the name Katagateman to the supposed isle. Half man half devil that discovered it. Sorry the eventure was unsuccessful. But fate. Swinbourne then forwarded Handley’s letter to the Acting Secretary to the Government on Ocean Island, and added that the search was not at the direction of the G&EIC officials. He summarized by noting that Handley had returned to Tarawa having searched the position and finding no trace of the plane. Burns Philp and Company submited a debit of £75 to the G&EIC, of which £10 was is for rental of the launch from Tarawa to Abaian, £24 for rental of David Randolf’s sailing boat, and £41 for labor of 6 men for at 9 days plus rations. Putnam was still perplexed at the situation. He telegraphed the U.S. State Department that he was puzzled about “why the British are not telling us of their actions,” particularly since they were responding to a humanitarian request at his expense. He noted that a potential newspaper explosion would be embarrassing to all. He had, he said, informed the press that the British were are doing all that they could. This telegram basically described the situation as the High Commissioner knew it, since his office had not received the news of Handley’s return. The High Commissioner’s message was passed to the American Embassy in London, who forwarded it to the US State Department, and then to George Putnam, all on August 24. On August 24, the Resident Commissioner, G&EIC, telegraphed the High Commissioner to report that Handley had returned to Tarawa, having found no trace of the plane or the uncharted reef. On August 28, Putnam thanked the U.S. State Department for the copy of the High Commissioner’s August 23 telegram, expressing hope that the “position mentioned” is the uncharted reef that he wanted inspected. Finally, on August 31, the High Commissioner for the Western Pacific telegraphed the British Secretary of State that Handley had returned without finding any trace of the reef or plane. Surprisingly, this information was held by the HCWP offices for a full week. The telegram was forwarded to the American Embassy in London, who forwarded it to the US State Department, and thence to George Putnam, all on the 31st. We have no record that Putnam acknowledged receipt of the State Department’s telegram, as he would have normally thanked them for their efforts. On October 12, 1937, the Resident Commissioner of the G&EIC wrote to the HCWP regarding the debit it received from Burns Philp and Company for £75 for Handley’s services. A request was made for authorization to pay out of the G&EIC accounts, with repayment from George Putnam. On December 1, the High Commissioner telegraphed the British Secretary of State regarding the Burns Philp debit, reporting that payment has been authorized, and asking for the Secretary of State to pursue recovery of the amount from Putnam. The High Commissioner also telegraphed the Resident Commissioner of the G&EIC of these same facts, referring to the telegram sent to the Secretary of State of the same day. On February 1st, 1938, British authorities contacted the American Embassy in London about the charges, and they provided information as to how to deposit funds in the Crown Agents accounts on behalf of the G&EIC. The following day, the Embassy contacted the US State Department regarding the charges. Another 16 days transpired before the US State Department contacted Putnam about the search expenses. Putnam finally sent a check on April 26 for $375.06 in US dollars, using the then-current conversion rates. The US State Department contacted the American Embassy to have them draft a check for £75 Australian to the Crown Agents, which was done on May 18. By then, however, the exchange rate had changed, and a rebate of $76.11 was due to Putnam, according to a telegram from the Embassy in London to the State Department. A check was provided to Putnam in that amount on July 18. It may be that the G&EIC authorities made other efforts to search for Earhart, though none are documented in any of the files we have searched. The reference to notifying HMS Leith suggests that this Royal Navy cruiser may have been in the vicinity, but we have no record of her movements. If J.C. Barley was at sea in Nimanoa, as Swinbourne indicates, he may have done some searching himself, but if he did, he did not report it in a way that is reflected in the file. Foua Tofinga of Tuvalu, who was a student on Tarawa in 1937, has told us he remembers being called out to search the reef, presumably for wreckage,19 though no such search is recorded in the file. Anyone with information on such other contributions to the search is urged to contact the authors. What are we to make of the spirit island Katagateman – or Bikonikarakara – according to the August 9 telegram from the Resident Commissioner to Swinbourne? Islands that come and go, and that can be seen only under certain conditions, are not uncommon in the sea lore of Micronesia and Polynesia. Certainly among the world’s most skilled navigators, Micronesian and Polynesian canoe sailors used the stars, animal behavior, currents, sea conditions, and what I Kiribati (Gilbertese) call “sea marks” to guide them. Sea marks could be phenomena that the European mind can understand as permanent markers – whirlpools and reefs, for example, but they could also be whales spouting or fish jumping. They could be metaphorical; one traditional authority in Chuuk in the Federated States of Micronesia alluded to a huge spirit-octopus whose arms extend out from Wene Island across Chuuk Lagoon and beyond.20 A spirit island could be such a metaphor, describing some kind of sea mark. It could also be – or be a memory of – a real island; volcanic islands do rise and subside, sometimes repeatedly and rather suddenly. As for the hero of this story, Captain Handley – who took the initiative to search for Katagateman even though he disbelieved in it – his fate was a sad one. Remaining on Tarawa after it was invaded in 1941, he was one of the several Europeans murdered by the Japanese along with Reverend Alfred Sadd, when Sadd refused to obey the order to trample on the Union flag. According to Earhart biographer Doris Rich, Earhart’s plan on the Lae-Howland leg of the world flight was to “hunt for Howland until she had four hours of fuel left, and then, if she had not located it, to turn back to the Gilberts Island and land on a beach.”21 This reported plan, which Rich says was conveyed by Earhart to her friend and backer Eugene Vidal, has led some Earhart researchers to suggest with some confidence that it was in the Gilberts that Earhart and Noonan crashed. Countering this proposition are the negative results of Itasca’s and Swan’s searches and interviews, the equally negative results of a subsequent cruise through the Gilberts by the U.S. yacht Yankee, and the fact that no physical evidence of Earhart’s aircraft has turned up there. The documents reviewed in this paper do not support the proposition that Earhart landed or crashed in the Gilberts, but neither do they provide any strong evidence that she did not. The colonial authorities in the Gilberts made an effort to search for the Earhart plane, so their negative results may be added to those of Itasca, Swan, and Yankee. On the other hand, there is no documentary evidence that any search was laid on until over a month after the disappearance. As noted, we have one verbal report of a search of the Tarawa reef, which may have happened at the time the G&EIC was first notified of the U.S. search, but we have found no corroborative data in the WPHC file. For this reason, and simply to complete the historical record, it would be very helpful if anyone with knowledge of search efforts in the Gilberts to contact the authors. Capt. Isaac Handley, August 20, 1937. Back. 2 C.f. John P. Riley, Jr., The Earhart Tragedy: Old Mystery, New Hypothesis, Naval History, Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 20-29, 2000. Back. 3 M.S. Lovell, The Sound of Wings, pg. 294, 1989. Back. 4 T.F. King et al., Amelia Earhart’s Shoe, AltamiraShoes, AltaMira Press, 2001; www.tighar.org. Back. 5 See Maude 1968:327. Back. 6 Letter from American Consulate General in Wellington, NZ to Secretary of State, Washington, DC dated July 24, 1937. Back. 7 Equatorial Islands Cruise Report, National Archives, Record Group 26. Back. 8 See Maude 1968. Back. 9 Luke, 1962: 88. Back. 10 WPHC Archives, file MP N957(MG), Hanslope Park, England. Back. 11 8th edition, Earhart Project, TIGHAR, www.tighar.org. Back. 12 This report is accurate except that the crash, on 20th March, took place at Luke Field. Presumably Garvey was reporting an item in the newspaper. Back. 13 National Archives and Record Administration (NARA), Records of the State Department, Record Group 59, 1930-1939, File 800.79611 Putnam Amel. Earhart/1. Back. 14 NARA, Sec'y. Navy General Correspondence, 1926-1940, A4-5(5)(361030), RG. 3780. Back. 15 Dean S. Jennings, “Is Amelia Earhart Still Alive?”, in Popular Aviation, Dec., 1939. Our thanks to Ronald Reuther for uncovering this document. Back. 16 Navy Historical Center, File Leahy/CNO. Back. 17 NARA, RG. 80. Back. 18 Makin Island or Atoll, now Butaritari. Back. 19 Personal communication to author King and other TIGHAR members, 1999, Suva. Back. 20 Reported in King, Thomas F. and Patricia L. Parker, Piseken Noomw Noon Tonaachaw: Archaeology in the Tonaachaw Historic District, Moen Island. Micronesian Archaeological Survey, Saipan 1984. Back. 21 Doris Rich: Amelia Earhart, Smithsonian Institution, p. 273, 1989. Back.
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http://tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Archives/Research/Bulletins/47_Katagateman.html
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It supplies individuals with a chance for social communication, as tasks are frequently arranged for them to take part in if they wish. This is beneficial as it avoids isolation. Care Homes likewise supply 24 hr look after individuals, which suggests that they are more probable to get all the relevant assistance they require. Individual’s moving into Treatment Houses can additionally minimize the strain on a family members, as they will certainly no more need to offer care for their relatives, which indicates that they can be there simply for support. Depending upon the sort of care that a person needs it may be a lot more advantageous for a specific to obtain treatment within a Care House setting because it might decrease the prices for them a little if they need a lot of assistance, they typically Home Treatment is much more tailored and more affordable. 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Nonetheless the choice of which sort of treatment an individual must get ought to be made on the basis of their scenario, to make sure that they can locate an alternative that is ideal matched to what they require. Running a Residence Treatment organisation predispositions us in the direction of Residence Treatment yet in reality individuals can get to a point where a Care Residence is the only practical choice due to the intensity of care needed. Why might You need a Google Rank monitoring API? whether or not you very own an search engine optimization up to dateolsupdated website or you run an seo business, the capacity up-to-date song and report up to date up-to-date the Google ranking for their precise keywords can be an critical a part of the carrier which you offer. Of course, you could usually do a guide Google seek after which sift through the effects up-to-date locate placed in which a up to date’s internet site is ranked on the Google engines like google, however no person desires upupdated ought upupdated do that, seo api which is wherein a Google Rank monitoring API comes inup-to-date play. when you have get right of entry upupdated up-to-date a rank tracking API, you can embed rating information for websites and keywords up to date yourupdated own packages and for your web sites and provide your clientsupdated with the key performance up to date that they want. A Google SERP checker API may also give you the insights which you need up-to-date refine your seo campaigns for the optimum results. The demand for accurate and up to date dateupdated seo facts is clearly endless. seo agencies need up to date up to datedisplay the effectiveness of their search engine optimization campaigns, e-trade web sites want up to date moniupupdated the location in their very own products and role of competiup to dater’s products, associate entrepreneurs need updated have the ability the tune the placement of their web sites, in truth, all of us with a presence at the internet will need up-to-date recognise wherein their sites are ranked in Google and other search engines like google. in this particular scenario, an API is a piece of 0.33-birthday celebration code that an utility or internet site can pass parameters up-to-date and receive facts from. A Google rank checking API, as an instance, will take the key phrases which can be entered on a internet site and go back the present day Google rating for that key-word. What Does a Google Rank monitoring API do? The pleasant providers of seo monitoring APIs will typically have a number of distinct APIs that can be used software program and web sites. here are a number of the primary sorts of seo tracking APIs. A rank tracking API will go back the 3177227fc5dac36e3e5ae6cd5820dcaa rating for a specific keyword for a given region. A key-word statistics API will go back the keyword statistics that you might otherwise up to date appearance up manually in the Google AdWords planner, which includes search volumes, common price perupdated click on, and the fitness center of opposition for that keyword. A competiup-to-dater API will locate all relevant data as regards upupdated a competiup-to-dater’s internet site, including up-to-date volumes, up-to-date assets, the average time spent on the website, page views perupdated session and the leap costs. A URL metrics API will provide the important statistics on a URL, which include area Authority (DA), page Authority (PA), trust glide (TF) and quotation waft (CF). Why would You need a Google Rank monitoring API? An search engine optimization tracking API presents seo software program agencies and search engine optimization businesses with the possibility of adding price updated their offerings. they are able upupdated use the functions of an API updated search engine optimization campaigns, provide branded reporting offerings updated their up-to-date, or truly add search engine optimization information offerings updated their website up-to-date extra up-to-date. I Don’t Want To Spend This Much Time On FOOTBALL DATA FEED. How About You? Senior High Schools that Want You to Run “Their System” at the Youth Degree. A handful of Young people Football instructors obtain pressure from the neighborhood Secondary school to run their infraction. The High School trainer in these scenarios commonly assume that by instructing 8 years of age kids to run his system, by the time the gamers are 18 years old, they must be very efficient at running said system. I am 100% opposed to the Senior high school train enforcing his will certainly on the Youth Program. For lots of factors I am 100% opposed to the instructors imposing this will certainly upon the youth coach as well as youngsters. My initial factor concerns basic control and initiative. The usually handsomely paid for his time, High School instructor is telling a non-paid volunteer of a program not run or paid for by the College, to run his High School system. Part of the “advantage” of spending loan out of your very own pocket to train young people football, is you reach select what you are going to run as well as just how you are mosting likely to run it. If I stop working as a coach, I’m going to fail running something I did the study on and believe in, not something shoved down my throat by somebody not also associated with my young people football program or by someone that most likely never coached a down of Youth Football. Who is to claim this College trainer will also be at the institution 10 years from now, or even better that he will be running the very same infraction? Among the regional teams we feed right into has actually run 3 different Offenses in the last 5 years and also had 2 different Head Coaches. So which of the 3 offenses should my teams be running currently? Yes allows train 70+ youth trains a very challenging offense each year or 2, when nearly fifty percent of them have no football training experience. The majority of these offenses had we decided to soccer data provider run them, had zero youth products or support system available for our trainers. I’m sure we would certainly have failed miserably and also lost lots of gamers had we embraced these systems. I have actually also seen on some training online forums where some trainers claim it does not matter in any way if any group wins or loses listed below the varsity degree. The “varsity” is all that issues, even their Junior high school, Fresher and also JV groups don’t matter. Well, it matters to the kids and parents playing on these groups and isn’t that why we are expected to be mentoring football to begin with? I question exactly how that High School coach would certainly really feel if a college instructor came up to him and claimed that it didn’t matter if the Secondary school won or shed, all that matters is what occurs at the college level and that the Senior high school should run the Colleges infraction? Don’t bother the fact that few of the children will ever play College round, equally as simply 25% of youth players will certainly play High School ball. Audio enough thinking for you? Allow’s take it an action better, shouldn’t the professional instructors be informing the College trains their victories as well as losses indicate absolutely nothing, all that matters is that the College children are running the Pro Offense? This “following degree” baloney is just that, hogwash. Any kind of trainer with also reasonable training skills can establish gamers for whatever system he choses to run. Such arrogance is frustrating to see from anybody associated with training youth football. This kind of perspective is hardly ever discovered among successful coaches, it is most conveniently seen from reason making oaches that are doing badly and also are seeking to lay the blame of their poor efficiency at somebody else’s feet. I’ve really seen High School trainers condemn Jr High coaches for their university teams troubles, that’s somebody desperate to keep a work he most likely shouldn’t have needed to start with. At the big facilities I do for Glazier as well as Nike, I always sit in on a session or more. Along with a Darrin Slack session, I such as to see what the best High School trains in the nation are doing, groups like Southlake Carrol, Jenks, Union, Hoover, Colton, De LaSalle etc. The guys that trainer these teams care little about whether the kid entering their program can read a 3 strategy and also can run their infraction. They just want an opportunity to instructor the kid, that he pursues football. They desire the young people train to instruct safe basic barring as well as taking on and NOT to run the child off. The excellent coaches are wanting to get a player that has a love for the game as well as is coachable. These successful trainers tell me they are quite confident they have the mentoring capacity to show a player concerning anything over a 4 year time frame with almost 4 months of 6 day a week contact in addition to year round, strength, agility as well as skills training. On the other hand we youth coaches get the children for a couple of months of very shortened 2-3 day a week practices, a mere portion of what the High Schools get as well as we are supposed to have the most significant technological impact on them? we all love our pets and need to make certain that we do nothing out of stupidity to harm them…yet lots of pets are hospitalized each 12 months for issues due to their owners feeding them desk scraps. The extraordinarily conservative factor of view is to now not feed our pets something apart from a weight-reduction plan prescribed via our veterinarian. welsh love spoons As accountable pet owners we want to be conscious that some cats and dogs genuinely can not digest anything other than a prescribed food regimen. in case your veterinarian indicates such a restrained eating regimen, then just “say no” to table scraps. Why torment your puppy allowing a desk scrap now after which best to stop the practice whilst the pet gets unwell? Alcohol – ingesting alcohol can purpose a drop in blood sugar, blood stress and body temperature and may result in seizures and respiration misery. And be conscious that your pet’s temperament can alternate, often to the poor. a friend had a St. Bernard that loved to drink beer! He might end up competitive towards youngsters and other pets. just say NO to alcohol! Broths – beef or chicken broth are a top notch supply of nutrients, however be cautious of the high salt content. I as soon as had a canine that was fed his dry dog food in a bowl of pork broth each day and he lived to be 19 years of age! Caffeine – often located in weight loss program drugs, espresso, tea and electricity liquids, caffeine can adversely have an effect on the coronary heart, stomach, intestines and nervous system. Carrots – My West Highland Terriers like to bite carrots. however be careful not to offer your puppy a chunk that due to it’s size, is effortlessly stuck in their throat. I take a seat on the fence on this table scrap. If there is any hazard of your pet choking on a chunk of carrot (some dogs simply “wolf down” their food) then don’t feed them carrots. The hazard is not well worth the reward. Chocolate – The chemical theobromine is found in cocoa and chocolate. Fed to our pets in small amounts, it is able to motive vomiting and diarrhea. In focused quantities theobromine can reason disruption of the primary apprehensive gadget (epileptic seizures), stimulate cardiac activity (heart assaults) and growth blood stress (internal bleeding). Caffeine is likewise found in chocolate and may adversely affect the heart, stomach, intestines and of path the anxious system. Cooked bones – You by no means understand what bone goes to splinter whilst chewed by your pet, resulting in sharp portions of bone being ingested and getting caught on your puppy’s gut. dying from a punctured intestine is a completely painful manner to go. Do not feed cooked or raw animal bones, in particular bird or turkey bones. comply with your veterinarian’s recommendation on permitting beef bones. Mobile responsiveness is should- A mobile responsive layout is definitely important to any kind of sports associated website. As it is Google have actually announced its preference for mobile-friendly websites and designers throughout the world are striving to follow this. But only being mobile pleasant will refrain for your sports website. It ought to be jet quick in packing rate regardless of the kind of device that is being made use of. This will make it possible for users to grab pertinent details like real-time scores and sports stats as, when and anywhere they please. Using a wide variety of font colors is a large no-no – Yes, some sporting activities websites I have actually discovered try to make their material eye-catching by using a myriad of font shades as well as designs but this is a substantial error on the part of the designers. You must make your web content readable with unwinded eyes. Why the customers need to stress their eyes to read your material? They will instantly leave your site as well as go to your competitors’ websites for a clearer as well as much more detailed display screen. Therefore, it is reckless to make use of numerous font shades on your sporting activities internet site. Dark fonts on a lighter background is the best means you can present your sports content. Entirely upgraded web content- Yes, this is one of the most important high quality that your audience are mosting likely to rate you on. They will certainly see whether you are the very first one amongst your peers to update the live ratings or push old web content lower on your websites, hence making space for fresh ones. Keeping a sporting activities website requires tremendous skills and also you need to show your well worth and also keep up the excellent efficiency regularly. Hence, make sure you have proper sources prior to you dive right into it. If you don’t then it is better to ask for it as opposed to suffering later on. Easy navigation- Navigation is a vital component of any type of website designs and sports websites are no exemption to this rule.on the contrary, they need to utilize top-of-the-market approaches to enhance individual experience. If the individuals can not locate what they are seeking, they will not also take a microsecond (naturally relying on the speed of broadband) to bounce off. Make everything easily offered to them. Attempt and conserve their time as much as feasible. Begin. They have a live match to catch. The above discussed attributes are a few of the basic requirements of a sporting activities website. There are other areas that calls your focus too like the installment of appealing sporting activities widgets showing real-time ratings and football data, mini videos revealing live matches, message commentaries and live sports stats ideally. These are a few of the crucial elements that can help your internet site to attract attention from the rest. Whatever relies on exactly how you await your site visitors to have a boosted experience on your site. Be it content, widgets or live discourses, you should make sure your internet site has all the tools ready to bind even the most causal visitors. Football enthusiasts are insane people. They like every little thing completely arranged as well as well organized. It is a good idea to keep in mind that most of are missing on a real-time suit for job or other personal/professional factors. Your web site must be able to make up for it. Or else there is no point investing in something that might not obtain you the results you are entitled to. With the discharge of the trendy international of warcraft expansion % Will of The Lich King enlargement comes many new modifications and additions to the game. The maximum extremely good is the addition of the primary Hero elegance, the loss of life Knight. in case you’ve been gambling for the reason that growth launch, you’ve probably visible what seems like a million “DK’s” jogging round in your server, DEATH SPELLS in particular if you want to PVP in the battlegrounds and are in the 50-59 bracket you’ve got possibly had video games were the entire other crew is dying Knights. The motive at the back of that is due to the fact, while growing a dying Knight you start at level fifty five and once you end all the fundamental dying Knight quests you will have all Blue pleasant gear, which means at stage fifty eight you can visit the Battlegrounds and pretty lots kill all people in web site easily. So right away everyones yelling how Overpowered loss of life knights are, the actual reality is, like every instructions first comes equipment, then comes “ability” and right off the bat the loss of life Knight has higher tools than the general public in the 50-59 PVP BG bracket. So, let’s get within the the demise Knight skills Builds. like all lessons there may be three expertise timber. The Blood tree isn’t always very good while you first begin your death Knight, as a minimum in PVP. i found it true in PVE but the different bushes provide lots greater first of all in PVP (in a while however Blood is very good in PVP). The Blood tree is stated for it is ability to present you self recovery skills. The blood tree may be looked at as a self recovery, Semi excessive single goal DPS build. The Frost tree is what maximum don’t forget the Tank and Burst FPS tree, in my opinion it is also tougher of the three to grasp due to the fact you may be using many spells and timing spells whilst certain talents burst off to get large burst harm. This is a good tree for PVP however notice, you really want to learn to use it efficaciously, otherwise you’ll suppose it’s far total rubbish and nugatory. possibly the maximum famous tree of them enthusiastic about maximum dying Knights. surely most loss of life Knights at 80 are Unholy or Blood. The unholy tree presents some precise blessings. First, theres a expertise which makes your ghoul pet permanent, so that you always have a pet out doing damage, and secondly the potential to upon death come back in ghoul shape for every other forty five seconds to kill things. In PVP getting back from the lifeless you can truly dish out damage, i was surprised how tons harm you can do in ghoul form. Unholy is also the “AOE” tree and DOT tree. Your harm spells that do harm over time last longer and have shorter cooldowns. Is Cloud-primarily based software in reality the destiny of Recruitment? have you ever taken any calls currently from software program providers? Calls where you’re promised the world if most effective you’ll transfer from your present software program issuer? The probabilities are that you’ve taken some of those, and that is a conservative estimate. For the ones of you who haven’t it begs the query, what exactly is cloud-primarily based recruitment software, and how can it help recruiters? Reliance on submitting shelves and paper-primarily based administration. Compensating for his or her lack of generation with the aid of hiring professional administrators. gradual, cumbersome reaction while making ready for audits. administrators spending valuable time correcting errors affecting the business. while this continues to occur in recruitment, it’s best fair to consider why small businesses retain to persist down this road. historically the fee of enforcing new software or IT infrastructure has been exceptionally high priced, supplying a enormous barrier to access for commercial enterprise proprietors. i’ve misplaced rely of the number of corporation proprietors i’ve spoken with who admire the deserves of technology, however they could not take the monetary chance to put in force it. it would appear then that recruiters rest on the horns of a dilemma. How can recruiters keep precious time and money, with out exposing themselves to needless danger? The early adopters within recruitment have already begun to change the manner which they do enterprise. that is due to recruitment software program carriers imparting a modern-day distribution model, one that removes the fee of installing the era within their client’s enterprise. That distribution version is cloud computing. software program carriers host their own IT infrastructure and allow their customers far flung get admission to to the offerings which they have got subscribed to. not will small recruitment groups be quoted lots of pounds to buy and configure their own server farm at head office. To the recruiter this is of vital significance. The most substantial barrier stopping the adoption of generation hasn’t just been eliminated; it’s been vigorously swept aside. in the wider commercial enterprise global we most effective must have a look at the novel changes Adobe has made to their personal distribution model. they have got replaced their annual software improvement cycle with a cloud-based distribution version, permitting clients to actually join their offerings each month in place of buying the software outright. we have installed that cloud computing can save the employment enterprise time and money, however can it truly turn out to be the recruiter’s fine pal overnight? As recruiters, we recognise that there is more to the industry than creating wealth. every day recruiters place applicants in new roles, making a advantageous, existence converting impact on their candidate’s lives. however a massive part of recruitment in 2013 is the way that recruiters construct relationships with their customers. A pediatric dentist is a clinical professional who focuses on treating all types of dental issues faced by children. Such people no longer simplest want to realize approximately wellknown dentistry, but they ought to also look at primary orthodontics, and have to be able to administer anesthesia for appearing dental surgical procedures on youngsters. The people need to be approved by using the yankee Dental association (ADA) or different relevant bodies. They have to also have a truthful expertise of the psychology of youngsters and their behavior in an effort to make their patients sense as at ease as feasible. Pediatric dentists are extraordinarily in demand, in locations around the sector. on the way to emerge as a pediatric dentist, people want to finish unique degree applications supplied by means of recognized colleges and universities around the arena. Children kids Pediatric dentist goodyear az Pediatric Dentistry falls beneath uniqueness dentistry, which means that that the diploma packages combine the knowledge of pediatrics and dental research to provide a complete expertise of both of these topics. The folks who sign up for these diploma packages need to undergo as a minimum years of classroom and lab education to effectively whole the stages. best the ones those who are capable of coping with the needs of young children have to practice for degree packages. in view that a pediatric dentist is focused on providing right dental care to children, they must be able to manage teenagers behaviors and assist the children in overcoming the fears related to traveling a dentist. They must additionally be capable of cope with the special wishes of kids with special bodily conditions or disabilities. Such scientific specialists ought to also have sizeable understanding of the usage of anesthesia and sedative capsules so that you can carry out numerous dental surgeries readily and preserve the youngsters calm and confident in the course of the treatment. individuals with correct children control abilities make exact pediatric dentists. perhaps the most critical issue of Pediatric Dentistry is the consider and the relationship constructed between the dentist and the child. A dentist for kids have to be able to address the special personalities that can be discovered inside the youngsters of today. this will help in ensuring that the kids acquire the great oral fitness without any fear of traveling the dentist. The clinical expert who presents right dental care to children ought to teach the youngsters about the do’s and don’ts of dental care, apart from encouraging them to cultivate appropriate conduct like brushing the tooth regularly, well chewing their meals and so on. German food isn’t all sausages and also sauerkraut; actually, you’ll find a vast array of restaurants near me one-of-a-kind dining establishments near Berlin hotels. These restaurants range from the conventional where stewards in Leiderhosen offer schnitzels as well as steins, to the completely bizarre – we’re speaking garlic ice-cream and food selections published on commode rolls right here! Can You Spot The A PRIVATE PAY COUPLES THERAPISTS Pro? Happiness as well as grief are two sides of a coin. They state love is blind and it is simpler to come under it than to rise. Individuals do devote and enter a relationship nevertheless many a times are not able to keep it for also lengthy. Over the time period distress and also unhappiness begins flowing in and also things start coming to be from poor to even worse. It has actually been seen that two individuals living under the very same roofing do not engage with each other for a very long time which usually results in serious problems and also they begin breaking a partnership. Relationships are priceless, and they need to be looked after in a delicate fashion. Like we care for our much-loved points, be it a cars and truck or a gadget and offer them routine upkeep as well as fuelling or solution, so are our connections which we mostly take for granted. We just begin working with boosting our relationships when the significant damages has actually been done. It is said that when an issue appears it is best to resolve it after that and there but strangely in a partnership we do specifically the opposite. Active payment from the therapist side in treating the connection overall as well as involving both of them. Developing the clear objective of treatment. After that the specialist will assist the couple to determine the problem and marriage counseling midtown Manhattan continue the therapy based on that. With this, he also shares his point of views about the toughness of their connection as well as binds the spirit. When the treatment gets on, the specialist attempts to aid the pair obtain an understanding of the connection and its altering aspects keeping in emphasis the primary concern. The last action is to customize the behavior of the pair, improve the interaction, as well as aid them engage in a different fashion as well as for this, they even assign some sort of job the pair which they require to apply while communicating every day. It helps to boost the level of recognizing relating to each various other’s needs and feedbacks. It assists in reclaiming the lost distance and understanding and also revives the love in the partnership. Negotiation or re-negotiation of commitments has actually been a feature of this treatment by the couple as they are aided in this by the specialist. It can thus be seen that most of the couples have had the ability to restore their lost partnership from this treatment efficiently but majorly we need to keep in mind that we need to value our relationships and also not drag as well as make small blunders right into a big disaster. Preparation a wedding event can be crazy, fun, as well as overwhelming at one time! A lot of decisions, so little time. Menu? Decors? Blossoms? Wedding celebration Invitations? Bridal Showers? Music? Lets concentrate on the songs and also share suggestions to ensure a successful wedding party. Points take place so just keep one’s cool and let the wedding event experts help you by virtue of their know-how! If you are a do it yourselfer, enable extra time for the knowing contour. Simply kick back if things goes wrong like the ring holder neglecting the call on the 16th flooring of the resort room or the event beginning 35 minutes late because Uncle Bob took a wrong turn driving to the church. Always trust a specialist. Keep in mind: You are intending one wedding. Specialist assistance strategy thousands. Many individuals are trying to find value today as well as might think that because Aunt Bertha plays the piano, she ‘d be excellent as your alcoholic drink pianist. Auntie Bertha may recognize “Love Me Tender” ~ but do you intend to hear it over as well as over? Don’t dissatisfy your guests or on your own by reducing corners? If she wants to play as her present to you, invite her to play a couple of tracks. Allow Auntie Bertha be a guest. Leave the music to the expert that has a large arsenal for every person. They are able to take requests, play polished, expert setups ~ and do it all while grinning and also carrying on a conversation without taking their hands off the keys. For a stunning, classy, as well as stylish wedding and also function utilize “live” music. Keep the CDs in the vehicle. If you are definitely on the tightest spending plan ~ you can employ a solo musician of what 2 supper entrees or a beautiful blossom plan would certainly set you back. Do not reduce edges with your ambience. Music establishes the tone for your day. Your guests WILL CERTAINLY discover. Keep this idea in mind for your wedding celebration showers, rehearsal suppers, as well as your article nuptial sparkling wine breakfasts. Trust fund your pals for recommendations that they have managed for their special celebrations. If you don’t understand of any individual, the center where you are planning your event typically has a list of favored Artists for concentrating on Wedding, Receptions, as well as Corporate Events. Ask your buddy as well as the place concerning Bands, Orchestras, DJ’s, Florists, Photographers, and wedding ceremony music also Event caterers. Just ask a Wedding catering Planner for their checklist of Expert Musicians; this listings of suggested suppliers more than likely did not PAY to be listed! Any individual can obtain noted in a phonebook or a wedding celebration magazine for a fee. Suggestions cost absolutely nothing yet are enormously valuable sources. Brides preparing Catholic wedding require to speak with the Music Director of their regional churches prior to picking artists. It prevails method for the church to REQUIRE you utilize their “in home” musicians and also will not permit you to generate “outside” vendors. Bear in mind when preparing your wedding celebration, constantly count on an expert with a tried and tested reputation. Appreciate your big day! Erectile dysfunction is the only disease men worry and discover difficult to deal with. Many guys enjoy this regular but with new research, this circumstance may be dealt with obviously with actually zero facet effects. most guys that do enjoy erectile disorder revel in it on a temporary foundation. there are numerous medications and other motives why an adult male ought to suffer from this dysfunction. Frustration, strain, lack of energy and even side consequences from different medicines can motive erectile disorder either temporarily, or completely. determining the foundation cause for erectile dysfunction may be pretty hard as the motives generally range from person to character. This disorder may be induced from obesity, smoking, erekciq certain surgical procedures, immoderate alcohol intake and a negative weight-reduction plan. the majority don’t comprehend that the majority of the time, erectile dysfunction is honestly a aspect impact from some different acknowledged or unknown difficulty. The troubles that reason this dysfunction are severa, and that is why it’s far difficult to pinpoint what is causing ED from person male to adult male. one of the important acknowledged reasons that are found common in maximum person males is the experience of distress and emotions of inadequacies. the best information is there are natural erectile dysfunction remedies that are established to assist get rid of the sickness all collectively. studies has proven that certain natural remedies and remedies are powerful enough to opposite and completely heal this circumstance. those natural treatments variety from herbal oils that may be massaged inside the male organ place, or other herbal products that can be taking in tablet form or introduced to a every day weight loss plan. natural supplements are bought over-the-counter without the need for a prescription this is demonstrated to help guys experiencing this disorder. other supplements like herbal testosterone boosters are crafted from herbal extracts that have virtually no aspect effects. Low testosterone is one of the principal causes of erectile troubles. keeping a healthful balance of testosterone to estrogen can be finished by means of incorporating positive foods which are known to reinforce testosterone stages and inhibit estrogen. meals excessive in protein like eggs, nuts, hen and tuna can assist improve testosterone levels. even as meals which are excessive in sugar and processed meals can paintings in opposition to someone trying to boost their stages of testosterone. by using making a few adjustments in a day by day diet, and including sure effective herbs, erectile disorder can be defeated with out the concerns of side consequences from medical doctor prescribe medicines.
2019-04-25T22:24:41Z
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The Battle of Kursk was a World War II engagement between German and Soviet forces on the Eastern Front near Kursk (450 kilometers or 280 miles southwest of Moscow) in the Soviet Union in July and August 1943. The German offensive was code-named Operation Citadel (German: Unternehmen Zitadelle) and led to one of the largest armored clashes in history, the Battle of Prokhorovka. The German offensive was countered by two Soviet counteroffensives, Operation Polkovodets Rumyantsev, and Operation Kutuzov. For the Germans, the battle represented the final strategic offensive they were able to mount in the east. For the Soviets, the decisive victory gave the Red Army the strategic initiative for the rest of the war. The Germans hoped to weaken the Soviet offensive potential for the summer of 1943 by cutting off a large number of forces that they anticipated would be in the Kursk salient assembling for an offensive. By eliminating the Kursk salient they would also shorten their lines of defense, taking the strain off of their overstretched forces. The plan envisioned an envelopment by a pair of pincers breaking through the northern and southern flanks of the salient. It was thought that a victory here would reassert Germany’s strength and improve her prestige with allies who were considering withdrawing from the war It was also hoped that large numbers of Soviet prisoners would be captured to be used as slave labor in Germany’s armaments industry. The Soviets had the intelligence of the German intentions, provided in part by British intelligence service and Enigma intercepts. Aware that the attack would fall on the neck of the Kursk salient months in advance, the Soviets built a defense in depth designed to wear down the German panzer spearheads. The Germans delayed the start date of the offensive while they tried to build up their forces and waited for new weapons, mainly the new Panther tank but also larger numbers of the Tiger heavy tank. This gave the Red Army time to construct a series of deep defensive lines. The defensive preparations included minefields, fortifications, pre-sighted artillery fire zones and anti-tank strong points, which extended approximately 300 km (190 mi) in depth. In addition, Soviet mobile formations were moved out of the salient and a large reserve force was formed for strategic counteroffensives. The Battle of Kursk was the first time a German strategic offensive had been halted before it could break through enemy defenses and penetrate to its strategic depths. Though the Soviet Army had succeeded in winter offensives previously, their counter-offensives following the German attack were their first successful strategic summer offensives of the war. German penetration during the Battle of Kursk. Soviet counter-attacks after the battle. Memorial on Prokhorovka Field near Kursk. Tiger engaging a target at the Battle of Kursk. Buchterkirch (left) in discussion with General Model. German soldiers in Orel pass by the Church of the Intercession, Spring 1943. 2nd SS Panzer Division soldiers, Tiger I tank, during the battle. Waffen-SS soldiers aboard a Panzer IV in Kharkov, March 1943. German Panzer IV and Sdkfz 251 halftrack at Kursk. Two Tiger tanks of “Totenkopf” and a StuG assault gun carrying infantry. The conditions during the battle were hot and humid. Here, Alfred Kurzmaul, of the 503rd Heavy Panzer Battalion, drinks water aboard a Tiger I during a lull in the fighting. German motorized troops prepare to move out. Tiger I tanks spearhead the assault in the northern sector at Kursk. Exhausted German soldiers pause during the fighting at Kursk. German soldiers move along an anti-tank ditch, while pioneers prepare charges to breach it. Thunderclouds over the battleground. Intermittent heavy rains created mud and marsh that made movement difficult at Kursk. Wespes at the Battle of Kursk. Luftwaffe flak units protected bridges and were drawn into the ground combat at Kursk. Guderian being transported to the eastern front, 1943. A Tiger tank undergoes repair from mine damage suffered early in the battle of Kursk. German infantry pass a knocked out Soviet KV-1 heavy tank. German soldier inspects a knocked out T-34 during the Battle of Kursk. Soviet KV-1 heavy tanks prepare to counter-attack at Kursk. Soviet PTRD anti-tank rifle team, during the fighting. Soviet troops follow their T-34 tanks during a counterattack. M3 Lee lend-lease tanks at Kursk. Unpopular with its crews, the M3 was nicknamed “A coffin for seven brothers”. Soviet Ilyushin Il-2 ground-attack aircraft. The grave of Heinz Kühl, a German soldier killed at Kursk. Captured Soviet prisoners are being moved from the battlefield. Major General Hans Speidel in conversation with Lieutenant Colonel Josef Graßmann during the company “Citadel”. Werner Kempf (right) at a briefing with Hermann Breith (center) and Walter Chales de Beaulieu (left) near Kursk on June 21, 1943. A Tiger of the heavy tank battalion 503 is towed. 2nd SS Panzer Division soldiers, Tiger I tank, during the Battle of Kursk. As the Battle of Stalingrad slowly ground to its conclusion the Red Army moved to a general offensive in the south, pressuring the exhausted German forces who had survived the winter. By January 1943, a 160 to 300 km (99 to 186 mi) wide gap had opened between Army Group B and Army Group Don, and the advancing Soviet armies threatened to cut off all German forces south of the Don River, including Army Group A operating in the Caucasus. Army Group Center came under significant pressure as well. Kursk fell to the Soviets on 8 February 1943, and Rostov on 14 February. The Soviet Bryansk, Western, and newly created Central Fronts prepared for an offensive which envisioned the encirclement of Army Group Center between Bryansk and Smolensk. By February 1943, the southern sector of the German front was in strategic crisis. Since December 1942, Field Marshal Erich von Manstein had been strongly requesting “unrestricted operational freedom” to allow him to use his forces in a fluid manner. On 6 February 1943, Manstein met with Hitler at the headquarters in Rastenburg to discuss the proposals he had previously sent. He received approval from Hitler for a counteroffensive against the Soviet forces advancing in the Donbass region. On 12 February 1943, the remaining German forces were reorganized. To the south, Army Group Don was renamed as Army Group South and placed under Manstein’s command. Directly to the north, Army Group B was dissolved, with its forces and areas of responsibility divided between Army Group South and Army Group Center. Manstein inherited responsibility for the massive breach in the German lines. On 18 February, Hitler arrived at Army Group South headquarters, at Zaporizhia, hours before the Soviets liberated Kharkov and had to be hastily evacuated on the 19th. Once given freedom of action, Manstein intended to utilize his forces to make a series of counterstrokes into the flanks of the Soviet armored formations, with the goal of destroying them while retaking Kharkov and Kursk. The II SS Panzer Corps had arrived from France in January 1943, refitted and up to near full strength. Armored units from the 1st Panzer Army of Army Group A had pulled out of the Caucasus and further strengthened Manstein’s forces. The heavy losses sustained by the Heer (army) since the opening of Operation Barbarossa had resulted in a shortage in infantry and artillery. Units were in total 470,000 men understrength. For the Wehrmacht to undertake an offensive in 1943 the burden of the offensive, in both attacking the Soviet defenses and holding ground on the flanks of the advance, would have to be carried primarily by the panzer divisions. In view of the exposed position of Army Group South, Manstein proposed that his forces should take the strategic defensive. He anticipated that a Soviet offensive would attempt to cut off and destroy Army Group South by a move across the Donets River toward the Dnieper. In February, he proposed waiting for this offensive to develop and then delivering a series of counterattacks into the exposed Soviet flanks. Hitler, concerned about the political implications of taking a defensive stance, and preoccupied with holding the Donbass, rejected this plan. On 10 March, Manstein presented an alternative plan whereby the German forces would pinch off the Kursk salient with a rapid offensive commencing as soon as the spring rasputitsa had subsided. On 13 March, Hitler signed Operational Order No. 5, which authorized several offensives, including one against the Kursk salient. As the last Soviet resistance in Kharkov petered out, Manstein attempted to persuade Günther von Kluge, commander of Army Group Centre, to immediately attack the Central Front, which was defending the northern face of the salient. Kluge refused, believing that his forces were too weak to launch such an attack. Further Axis advances were blocked by Soviet forces that had been shifted down from the Central Front to the area north of Belgorod. By mid-April, amid poor weather, and with the German forces exhausted and in need of refitting, the offensives of Operational Order No. 5 were postponed. On 15 April, Hitler issued Operational Order No. 6, which called for the Kursk offensive operation, codenamed Zitadelle (“Citadel”), to begin on 3 May or shortly thereafter. The directive was drafted by Kurt Zeitzler, the OKH Chief of Staff. For the offensive to succeed it was deemed essential to attack before the Soviets had a chance to prepare extensive defences or to launch an offensive of their own. Some military historians have described the operation using the term blitzkrieg (lightning war); other military historians do not use the term in their works on the battle. Operation Citadel called for a double envelopment, directed at Kursk, to surround the Soviet defenders of five armies and seal off the salient. Army Group Centre would provide General Walter Model’s 9th Army to form the northern pincer. It would cut through the northern face of the salient, driving south to the hills east of Kursk, securing the rail line from Soviet attack. Army Group South would commit the 4th Panzer Army, under Hermann Hoth, and Army Detachment Kempf, under Werner Kempf, to pierce the southern face of the salient. This force would drive north to meet the 9th Army east of Kursk. Von Manstein’s main attack was to be delivered by Hoth’s 4th Panzer Army, spearheaded by the II SS Panzer Corps under Paul Hausser. The XLVIII Panzer Corps, commanded by Otto von Knobelsdorff, would advance on the left while Army Detachment Kempf would advance on the right. The 2nd Army, under the command of Walter Weiss, would contain the western portion of the salient. On 27 April, Model met with Hitler to review and express his concern for reconnaissance information which showed the Red Army constructing very strong positions at the shoulders of the salient and having withdrawn their mobile forces from the area west of Kursk. He argued that the longer the preparation phase continued, the less the operation could be justified. He recommended completely abandoning Citadel, allowing the army to await and defeat the coming Soviet offensive, or radically revising the plan for Citadel. Though in mid-April Manstein had considered the Citadel offensive profitable, by May he shared Model’s misgivings. He asserted that the best course of action would be for the German forces to take the strategic defensive, ceding ground to allow the anticipated Soviet forces to extend themselves and allow the German panzer forces to counterattack in the type of fluid mobile battle at which they excelled. Convinced that the Red Army would deliver its main effort against Army Group South, he proposed to keep the left wing of the army group strong while moving the right wing back in stages to the Dnieper River, followed by a counterattack against the flank of the Red Army advance. The counteroffensive would continue until the Sea of Azov was reached and the Soviet forces were cut off. Hitler rejected this idea; he did not want to give up so much terrain, even temporarily. Hitler called his senior officers and advisers to Munich for a meeting on May 4. Hitler spoke for about 45 minutes on the reasons to postpone the attack, essentially reiterating Model’s arguments. A number of options were put forth for comment: going on the offensive immediately with the forces at hand, delaying the offensive further to await the arrival of new and better tanks, radically revising the operation or canceling it altogether. Manstein advocated an early attack, but requested two additional infantry divisions, to which Hitler responded that none were available. Kluge spoke out strongly against postponement and discounted Model’s reconnaissance materials. Albert Speer, the minister of Armaments and War Production, spoke about the difficulties of rebuilding the armored formations and the limitations of German industry to replace losses. General Heinz Guderian argued strongly against the operation, stating “the attack was pointless”. The conference ended without Hitler coming to a decision, but Citadel was not aborted. Three days later, OKW, Hitler’s conduit for controlling the military, postponed the launch date for Citadel to 12 June. Following this meeting, Guderian continued to voice his concerns over an operation that would likely degrade the panzer forces that he had been attempting to rebuild. He considered the offensive, as planned, to be a misuse of the panzer forces, as it violated two of the three tenets he had laid out as the essential elements for a successful panzer attack. In his opinion, the limited German resources in men and material should be conserved, as they would be needed for the pending defense of western Europe. Despite reservations, Hitler remained committed to the offensive. He and the OKW, early in the preparatory phase, were hopeful that the offensive would revitalize German strategic fortunes in the east. As the challenges offered by Citadel increased, he focused more and more on the expected new weapons that he believed were the key to victory: principally the Panther tank, but also the Elefant tank destroyer and greater numbers of the Tiger heavy tank. He postponed the operation in order to await their arrival. Receiving reports of powerful Soviet concentrations behind the Kursk area, Hitler further delayed the offensive to allow for more equipment to reach the front. With pessimism for Citadel increasing with each delay, in June, Alfred Jodl, the Chief of Staff at the OKW, instructed the armed forces propaganda office to portray the upcoming operation as a limited counteroffensive. Due to concerns of an Allied landing in the south of France or in Italy and delays in deliveries of the new tanks, Hitler postponed again, this time to 20 June. Zeitzler was profoundly concerned with the delays, but he still supported the offensive. On 17–18 June, following a discussion in which the OKW Operations Staff suggested abandoning the offensive, Hitler further postponed the operation until 3 July. Finally, on 1 July, Hitler announced 5 July as the launch date of the offensive. A three-month quiet period descended upon the Eastern Front as the Soviets prepared their defences and the Germans attempted to build up their forces. The Germans used this period for specialised training of their assault troops. All units underwent training and combat rehearsals. The Waffen-SS had built a full-scale duplicate Soviet strong point that was used to practice the techniques for neutralizing such positions. The panzer divisions received replacement men and equipment and attempted to get back up to strength. The German forces to be used in the offensive included 12 panzer divisions and 5 panzer grenadier divisions, four of which had tank strengths greater than their neighboring panzer divisions. However, the force was markedly deficient in infantry divisions, which were essential to hold ground and to secure the flanks. By the time the Germans initiated the offensive, their force amounted to around 777,000 men, 2,451 tanks and assault guns (70 percent of the German armor on the Eastern Front) and 7,417 guns and mortars. In the first phase the enemy, collecting their best forces—including 13–15 tank divisions and with the support of a large number of aircraft—will strike Kursk with their Kromskom-Orel grouping from the north-east and their Belgorod-Kharkov grouping from the south-east… I consider it inadvisable for our forces to go over to an offensive in the near future in order to forestall the enemy. It would be better to make the enemy exhaust himself against our defenses, and knock out his tanks and then, bringing up fresh reserves, to go over to the general offensive which would finally finish off his main force. Stalin consulted with his frontline commanders and senior officers of the General Staff from 12 to 15 April 1943. In the end, he and the Stavka agreed that the Germans would probably target Kursk. Stalin believed the decision to defend would give the Germans the initiative, but Zhukov countered that the Germans would be drawn into a trap where their armored power would be destroyed, thus creating the conditions for a major Soviet counteroffensive. They decided to meet the enemy attack by preparing defensive positions to wear out the German groupings before launching their own offensive. Preparation of defenses and fortifications began by the end of April and continued until the German attack in early July. The two-month delay between the German decision to attack the Kursk salient and its implementation allowed the Red Army ample time to thoroughly prepare. The Central and Voronezh Fronts each constructed three main defensive belts in their sectors, with each subdivided into several zones of fortification. The Soviets employed the labor of over 300,000 civilians. Fortifying each belt was an interconnected web of minefields, barbed-wire fences, anti-tank ditches, deep entrenchments for infantry, anti-tank obstacles, dug-in armored vehicles, and machine-gun bunkers. Behind the three main defensive belts were three more belts prepared as fallback positions; the first was not fully occupied or heavily fortified, and the last two, though sufficiently fortified, were unoccupied with the exception of a small area in the immediate environs of Kursk. The combined depth of the three main defensive zones was about 40 kilometers (25 mi). The six defensive belts on either side of Kursk were 130–150 kilometers (81–93 mi) deep. If the Germans managed to break through these defenses they would still be confronted by additional defensive belts to the east, manned by the Steppe Front. These brought the total depth of the defenses to nearly 300 kilometers (190 mi). The Voronezh and Central Fronts dug 4,200 kilometers (2,600 mi) and 5,000 kilometers (3,100 mi) of trenches respectively, laid out in a criss-cross pattern for ease of movement. The Soviets built more than 686 bridges and about 2,000 kilometers (1,200 mi) of roads in the salient. Red Army combat engineers laid 503,663 anti-tank mines and 439,348 anti-personnel mines, with the highest concentration in the first main defensive belt. The minefields at Kursk achieved densities of 1,700 anti-personnel and 1,500 anti-tank mines per kilometer, about four times the density used in the defense of Moscow. For example, the 6th Guards Army of the Voronezh Front was spread out over nearly 64 kilometers (40 mi) of the front and was protected by 69,688 anti-tank and 64,430 anti-personnel mines in its first defensive belt with a further 20,200 anti-tank and 9,097 anti-personnel mines in its second defensive belt. Furthermore, mobile obstacle detachments were tasked with laying more mines directly in the path of advancing enemy armored formations. These units, consisting of two platoons of combat engineers with mines at division level and one company of combat engineers normally equipped with 500–700 mines at corps level, functioned as anti-tank reserves at every level of command. We can expect the enemy to put [the] greatest reliance in this year’s offensive operations on his tank divisions and air force since his infantry appears to be far less prepared for offensive operations than last year … In view of this threat, we should strengthen the anti-tank defenses of the Central and Voronezh fronts, and assemble as soon as possible. Soviet preparations also included increased activity of Soviet partisans, who attacked German communications and supply lines. The attacks were mostly behind Army Group North and Army Group Centre. In June 1943, partisans operating in the occupied area behind Army Group Centre destroyed 298 locomotives, 1,222 railway wagons, and 44 bridges, and in the Kursk sector, there were 1,092 partisan attacks on railways. These attacks delayed the build-up of German supplies and equipment and required the diversion of German troops to suppress the partisans, delaying their training for the offensive. Central Partisan Headquarters coordinated many of these attacks. In June, Soviet Air Forces (VVS) flew over 800 sorties at night to resupply the partisan groups operating behind Army Group Centre. The VVS also provided communication and sometimes even daylight air-support for major partisan operations. Special training was provided to the Soviet infantry manning the defenses to help them overcome the tank phobia that had been evident since the start of the German invasion. Soldiers were packed into trenches and tanks were driven overhead until all signs of fear were gone. This training exercise was referred to by the soldiers as “ironing”. In combat, the soldiers would spring up in the midst of the attacking infantry to separate them from the spearheading armored vehicles. The separated armored vehicles – now vulnerable to infantry armed with anti-tank rifles, demolition charges, and Molotov cocktails – could then be disabled or destroyed at point-blank range. These types of attacks were most effective against the massive Ferdinand tank destroyers, which lacked machine guns as secondary armament. The soldiers were also promised financial rewards for each tank destroyed, with the People’s Commissariat of Defence providing 1,000 rubles for destroyed tanks. The Soviets employed maskirovka (military deception) to mask defensive positions and troop dispositions and to conceal the movement of men and material. These included camouflaging gun emplacements, constructing dummy airfields and depots, generating false radio-traffic, and spreading rumors among the Soviet frontline troops and the civilian population in the German-held areas. Movement of forces and supplies to and from the salient took place at night only. Ammunition caches were carefully concealed to blend in with the landscape. Radio transmission was restricted and fires were forbidden. Command posts were hidden and motor transport in and around them forbidden. According to a Soviet General Staff report, 29 of the 35 major Luftwaffe raids on Soviet airfields in the Kursk sector in June 1943 were against dummy airfields. According to historian Antony Beevor, in contrast, Soviet aviation apparently succeeded in destroying more than 500 Luftwaffe aircraft on the ground. The Soviet deception efforts were so successful that German estimates issued in mid-June placed the total Soviet armored strength at 1,500 tanks. The result was not only a vast underestimation of Soviet strength but a misperception of Soviet strategic intentions. The main tank of the Soviet tank arm was the T-34, on which the Red Army attempted to concentrate production. The tank arm also contained large numbers of the T-70 light tank. For example, the 5th Guards Tank Army roughly contained 270 T-70s and 500 T-34s. In the salient itself, the Soviets assembled a large number of lend-lease tanks. These included U.S.-manufactured M3 Lees and British-built Churchills, Matildas and Valentines. However, the T-34 made up the bulk of the Soviet armor. Without including the deeper reserves organized under the Steppe Front, the Soviets massed about 1,300,000 men, 3,600 tanks, 20,000 artillery pieces, and 2,792 aircraft to defend the salient. This amounted to 26 percent of the total manpower of the Red Army, 26 percent of its mortars and artillery, 35 percent of its aircraft and 46 percent of its tanks. By 1943, the Luftwaffe’s strength on the Eastern Front had started to weaken after Stalingrad and the siphoning of resources to North Africa. The Luftwaffe forces in the east were further depleted with fighter units being shifted back to Germany to defend against the escalating Allied bombing campaign. By the end of June, only 38.7 percent of the Luftwaffe’s total aircraft remained in the east. In 1943 the Luftwaffe could still achieve local air superiority by concentrating its forces. The majority of German aircraft left available on the Eastern Front were slated for Citadel. The goal of the Luftwaffe remained unchanged. The priority of the German air fleet(s) was to gain air superiority, then to isolate the battlefield from enemy reinforcements, and finally, once the critical point had been reached in the land battle, to render close air support. The changing strengths between the two opponents prompted the Luftwaffe to make operational changes for the battle. Previous offensive campaigns had been initiated with Luftwaffe raids against opposing airfields to achieve air superiority. By this point in the war, Red Army equipment reserves were extensive and the Luftwaffe commanders realized that aircraft could be easily replaced, making such raids futile. Therefore, this mission was abandoned. In addition, previous campaigns had made use of medium bombers flying well behind the frontline to block the arrival of reinforcements. This mission, however, was rarely attempted during Citadel. The Luftwaffe command understood that their support would be crucial for the success of Operation Citadel, but problems with supply shortfalls hampered their preparations. Partisan activity, particularly behind Army Group Center, slowed the rate of re-supply and cut short the Luftwaffe’s ability to build up essential stockpiles of petrol, oil, lubricants, engines, munitions, and, unlike Red Army units there were no reserves of aircraft that could be used to replace damaged aircraft over the course of the operation. Fuel was the most significant limiting factor. To help build up supplies for the support of Citadel, the Luftwaffe greatly curtailed its operations during the last week of June. Despite this conservation of resources, the Luftwaffe did not have the resources to sustain an intensive air effort for more than a few days after the operation began. For Citadel, the Luftwaffe confined its operations to the direct support of the forces on the ground. In this mission, the Luftwaffe continued to make use of the Junkers Ju 87 “Stuka” dive-bombers. A new development to this aircraft was the “Bordkanone” 3,7 cm caliber cannon, one of which could be slung under each wing of the Stuka in a gun pod. Half of the Stuka groups assigned to support Citadel were equipped with these Kanonenvogel (literally “cannon-bird”) tankbuster aircraft. The air groups were also strengthened by the recent arrival of the Henschel Hs 129, with its 30 mm MK 103 cannon, and the F-subtype ground attack (jabo) version of the Focke-Wulf Fw 190. In the months preceding the battle, Luftflotte 6 supporting Army Group Center noted a marked increase in the strength of the opposing VVS formations. The VVS formations encountered displayed better training and were flying improved equipment with greater aggressiveness and skill than the Luftwaffe had seen earlier. The introduction of the Yakovlev Yak-9 and Lavochkin La-5 fighters gave the Soviet pilots near parity with the Luftwaffe in terms of equipment. Furthermore, large numbers of ground-attack aircraft, such as the Ilyushin Il-2 “Shturmovik” and the Pe-2, had become available as well. The Soviet Air Force also fielded large numbers of aircraft supplied via lend-lease. Huge stockpiles of supplies and ample reserves of replacement aircraft meant the Red Army and VVS formations would be able to conduct an extended campaign without slackening in the intensity of their effort. German Panzer IV and Sdkfz 251 halftrack. For the operation, the Germans used four armies along with a large portion of their total tank strength on the Eastern Front. On 1 July, the 9th Army of Army Group Centre based in the northern side of the salient contained 335,000 men (223,000 combat soldiers); in the south, the 4th Panzer Army and Army Detachment “Kempf”, of Army Group South, had 223,907 men (149,271 combat soldiers) and 100,000–108,000 men (66,000 combat soldiers) respectively. The 2nd Army, that held the western side of the salient contained an estimated 110,000. In total, the German forces had a total strength of 777,000–779,000 men and the three attacking armies contained 438,271 combat soldiers. Army Group South was equipped with more armored vehicles, infantry, and artillery than the 9th Army of Army Group Center. The 4th Panzer Army and Army Detachment “Kempf” had 1,377 tanks and assault guns, while the 9th Army possessed 988 tanks and assault guns. The two new Panther battalions – the 51st and 52nd – together equipped with 200 Panthers, for which the offensive had been delayed, were attached to the Großdeutschland Division in the XLVIII Panzer Corps of Army Group South. With the 51st and 52nd Battalions arriving on 30 June and 1 July, the two units had little time to perform reconnaissance or to orient themselves to the terrain they found themselves in. This was a breach of the methods of the Panzerwaffe, considered essential for the successful use of armor. Though led by experienced panzer commanders, many of the tank crews were new recruits and had little time to become familiar with their new tanks, let alone train together to function as a unit. The two battalions came directly from the training ground and lacked combat experience. In addition, the requirement to maintain radio silence until the start of the attack meant that the Panther units had little training in battalion-level radio procedures. Furthermore, the new Panthers were still experiencing problems with their transmissions and proved mechanically unreliable. By the morning of 5 July, the units had lost 16 Panthers due to mechanical breakdown, leaving only 184 available for the launching of the offensive. The Red Army used two Fronts for the defense of Kursk and created a third front behind the battle area which was held as a reserve. The Central and Voronezh Fronts fielded 12 armies, with 711,575 men (510,983 combat soldiers) and 625,591 men (446,236 combat soldiers) respectively. In reserve, the Steppe Front had an additional 573,195 men (449,133). Thus the total size of the Soviet force was 1,910,361 men, with 1,426,352 actual combat soldiers. Soviet armor strength included 4,869 tanks (include 205 KV-1s heavy tanks) and 259 SPGs (including 25 SU-152s, 56 SU-122s, and 67 SU-76s) Overall a third of the Soviet tanks at Kursk were a light tank, but in some units, this proportion was considerably higher. Of the 3,600 tanks in the Central and Voronezh Fronts in July 1943, 1,061 were light as T-60 and T-70. With very thin armor and small gun, they were unable to effectively engage the frontal armor of German medium and heavy tanks or AFVs. Most capable Soviet tank at Kursk was the T-34, the original version was armed with a 76.2mm gun, the gun struggled against uparmoured Panzer IVs, and the frontal armor of Tigers and Panthers was essentially impenetrable. Only SU-122 and the SU-152 had the power to destroy the Tiger at short range, but they were not equal to the Tiger’s 88mm gun at long range, and there were very few SU-122 and the SU-152 at Kursk. Fighting started on the southern face of the salient on the evening of 4 July 1943, when German infantry launched attacks to seize high ground for artillery observation posts prior to the main assault. During these attacks, a number of Red Army command and observation posts along the first main belt of defense were captured. By 16:00, elements of the Panzergrenadier Division “Großdeutschland”, 3rd and 11th Panzer Divisions had seized the village of Butovo and proceeded to capture Gertsovka before midnight. At around 22:30, Vatutin ordered 600 guns, mortars, and Katyusha rocket launchers, of the Voronezh Front, to bombard the forward German positions, particularly those of the II SS Panzer Corps. To the north, at Central Front headquarters, reports of the anticipated German offensive came in. At around 02:00 5 July, Zhukov ordered his preemptive artillery bombardment to begin. The hope was to disrupt German forces concentrating for the attack, but the outcome was less than hoped for. The bombardment delayed the German formations but failed in the goal of disrupting their schedule or inflicting substantial losses. The Germans began their own artillery bombardment at about 05:00, which lasted 80 minutes in the northern face and 50 minutes in the southern face. After the barrage, the ground forces attacked, aided by close air support provided by the Luftwaffe. In the early morning of 5 July, the VVS launched a large raid against German airfields, hoping to destroy the Luftwaffe on the ground. This effort failed, and the Red Army air units suffered considerable losses. The VVS lost 176 aircraft on 5 July, compared to the 26 aircraft lost by the Luftwaffe. The losses of the VVS 16th Air Army operating in the northern face were lighter than those suffered by the 2nd Air Army. The Luftwaffe was able to gain and maintained air superiority over the southern face until 10–11 July, when the VVS began to obtain ascendency, but the control of the skies over the northern face was evenly contested until the VVS began to gain air superiority on 7 July, which it maintained for the rest of the operation. Model’s main attack was delivered by XLVII Panzer Corps, supported by 45 Tigers of the attached 505th Heavy Tank Battalion. Covering their left flank was XLI Panzer Corps, with an attached regiment of 83 Ferdinand tank destroyers. On the right flank, XLVI Panzer Corps consisted at this time of four infantry divisions with just 9 tanks and 31 assault guns. To the left of XLI Panzer Corps was XXIII Army Corps, which consisted of the reinforced 78th Assault Infantry Division and two regular infantry divisions. While the corps contained no tanks, it did have 62 assault guns. Opposing the 9th Army was the Central Front, deployed in three heavily fortified defensive belts. Model chose to make his initial attacks using infantry divisions reinforced with assault guns and heavy tanks, and supported by artillery and the Luftwaffe. In doing so, he sought to maintain the armoured strength of his panzer divisions to be used for exploitation once the Red Army defences were breached. Once a breakthrough had been achieved the panzer forces would move through and advance towards Kursk. Jan Möschen, a major in Model’s staff, later commented that Model expected a breakthrough on the second day. If a breakthrough did occur the briefest delay in bringing up the panzer divisions would give the Red Army time to react. His corps commanders thought a breakthrough extremely unlikely. Following a preliminary bombardment and Red Army counter bombardments, the 9th Army opened its attack at 05:30 on 5 July. Nine infantry divisions and one panzer division, with attached assault guns, heavy tanks, and tank destroyers, pushed forward. Two companies of Tiger tanks were attached to the 6th Infantry Division, and were the largest single grouping of Tigers employed that day. Opposing them were the 13th and 70th Armies of the Central Front. The 20th Panzer and 6th Infantry Divisions of the XLVII Panzer Corps, spearheaded the advance of the XLVII Panzer Corps. Behind them the remaining two panzer divisions followed, ready to exploit any breakthrough. The heavily mined terrain and fortified positions of the 15th Rifle Division slowed the advance. By 08:00 safe lanes had been cleared through the minefield. That morning information obtained from prisoner interrogation identified a weakness at the boundary of the 15th and 81st Rifle Divisions caused by the German preliminary bombardment. The Tigers were redeployed and struck towards this area. Red Army formations countered with a force of around 90 T-34s. In the resulting three-hour battle, Red Army armoured units lost 42 tanks while the Germans lost two Tigers and a further five more immobilized with track damage. While the Red Army counter-attack was defeated and the first defensive belt breached, the fighting had delayed the Germans long enough for the rest of 29th Rifle Corps of the 13th Army – initially deployed behind the first belt – to move forward and seal the breach. Red Army minefields were covered by artillery fire, making efforts to clear paths through the fields difficult and costly. Goliath and Borgward IV remote-controlled engineer mine-clearing vehicles met with limited success. Of the 653rd Heavy Panzerjäger Battalion’s 45 Ferdinands sent into battle, all but 12 of them were immobilized by mine damage before 17:00. Most of these were later repaired and returned to service, but the recovery of these very large vehicles was difficult. Over the next three days from 7 to 10 July, Model concentrated the effort of the 9th Army at Ponyri and Olkhovatka, which both sides considered as vital positions. In response, Rokossovsky pulled forces from other parts of the front to these sectors. The Germans attacked Ponyri on 7 July, and captured half of the town after intense house-to-house fighting. A Soviet counterattack the following morning forced the Germans to withdraw, and a series of counterattacks ensued by both sides with control of the town being exchanged several times over the next few days. By 10 July, the Germans had secured most of the town, but Soviet counterattacks continued. The back and forth battles for Ponyri and the nearby Hill 253.5 were battles of attrition, with heavy casualties on both sides. It became referred to by the troops as “mini-Stalingrad”. The war diary of the 9th Army described the heavy fighting as a “new type of mobile attrition battle”. German attacks on Olkhovatka and the nearby village of Teploe failed to penetrate the Soviet defences; including a powerful concerted attack on 10 July by about 300 Germans tanks and assault guns from the 2nd, 4th, and 20th Panzer Divisions, supported by every available Luftwaffe air power in the northern face. On 12 July, the Soviets launched Operation Kutuzov, their counter-offensive upon the Orel salient, which threatened the flank and rear of Model’s 9th Army. The 12th Panzer Division, thus far held in reserve and slated to be committed to the northern side of the Kursk salient, along with the 36th Motorized Infantry, 18th Panzer and 20th Panzer Divisions were redeployed to face the Soviet spearheads. Wespe self-propelled artillery battery in position to provide fire support. At around 04:00 on 5 July, the German attack commenced with a preliminary bombardment. Manstein’s main attack was delivered by Hoth’s 4th Panzer Army, which was organized into densely concentrated spearheads. Opposing the 4th Panzer Army was the Soviet 6th Guards Army, which was composed of the 22nd Guards Rifle Corps and 23rd Guards Rifle Corps. The Soviets had constructed three heavily fortified defensive belts to slow and weaken the attacking armoured forces. Though they had been provided superb intelligence, the Voronezh Front headquarters had still not been able to pinpoint the exact location where the Germans would place their offensive weight. The panzergrenadier division Großdeutschland, commanded by Walter Hörnlein, was the strongest single division in the 4th Panzer Army. It was supported on its flanks by the 3rd and 11th Panzer Divisions. Großdeutschland’s Panzer IIIs and IVs had been supplemented by a company of 15 Tigers, which were used to spearhead the attack. At dawn on 5 July, Großdeutschland, backed by heavy artillery support, advanced on a three-kilometre front upon the 67th Guards Rifle Division of the 22nd Guards Rifle Corps. The Panzerfüsilier Regiment, advancing on the left wing, stalled in a minefield and subsequently 36 Panthers were immobilized. The stranded regiment was subjected to a barrage of Soviet anti-tank and artillery fire, which inflicted numerous casualties. Engineers were moved up and cleared paths through the minefield, but suffered casualties in the process. The combination of fierce resistance, minefields, thick mud and mechanical breakdowns took its toll. With paths cleared, the regiment resumed its advance towards Gertsovka. In the ensuing battle, heavy casualties were sustained including the regimental commander Colonel Kassnitz. Due to the fighting, and the marshy terrain south of the village, surrounding the Berezovyy stream, the regiment once more bogged down. To the east, during the night of 4–5 July, SS combat engineers had infiltrated no-man’s land and cleared lanes through the Soviet minefields. At dawn, 5 July, the three divisions of II SS Panzer Corps – SS Panzergrenadier Division Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, 2nd SS Panzergrenadier Division Das Reich and the 3rd SS Panzergrenadier Division Totenkopf – attacked the 6th Guards Army’s 52nd Guards Rifle Division. The main assault was led by a spearhead of 42 Tigers, but in total 494 tanks and assault guns attacked across a twelve-kilometre front. Totenkopf, the strongest of the three divisions, advanced towards Gremuchhi and screened the right flank. The 1st SS Panzergrenadier Division advanced on the left flank towards Bykovka. The 2nd SS Panzer Division advanced between the two formations in the center. Following closely behind the tanks were the infantry and combat engineers, coming forward to demolish obstacles and clear trenches. In addition, the advance was well supported by the Luftwaffe, which greatly aided in breaking Soviet strong points and artillery positions. By 09:00 hours, the II SS Panzer Corps had broken through the Soviet first belt of defence along its entire front. While probing positions between the first and second Soviet defensive belts, at 13:00, the 2nd SS Panzer Division’s vanguard came under fire from two T-34 tanks, which were destroyed. Forty more Soviet tanks soon engaged the division. The 1st Guards Tank Army clashed with the 2nd SS Panzer Division in a four-hour battle, resulting in the Soviet tanks withdrawing. However, the battle had bought enough time for units of the 23rd Soviet Guards Rifle Corps, lodged in the Soviet second belt, to prepare itself and be reinforced with additional anti-tank guns. By the early evening, 2nd SS Panzer Division had reached the minefields that marked the outer perimeter of the Soviet second belt of defence. The 1st SS Division had secured Bykovka by 16:10. It then pushed forward towards the second belt of defence at Yakovlevo, but its attempts to break through were rebuffed. By the end of the day, the 1st SS Division had sustained 97 dead, 522 wounded, and 17 missing and lost about 30 tanks. Together with the 2nd SS Panzer Division, it had forced a wedge far into the defences of the 6th Guards Army. Soviet PTRD anti-tank rifle team during the fighting. Facing Army Detachment Kempf, consisting of III Panzer Corps and Corps Raus (commanded by Erhard Raus), were the 7th Guards Army, dug in on the high ground on the eastern bank of the Northern Donets. The two German corps were tasked with crossing the river, breaking through the 7th Guards Army and covering the right flank of the 4th Panzer Army. The 503rd Heavy Tank Battalion, equipped with 45 Tigers, was also attached to the III Panzer Corps, with one company of 15 Tigers attached to each of the corps’ three panzer divisions. Delaying the progress of Kempf allowed Red Army forces time to prepare their second belt of defence to meet the German attack on 6 July. The 7th Guards Army, which had absorbed the attack of III Panzer Corps and Corps “Raus”, was reinforced with two rifle divisions from the reserve. The 15th Guards Rifle Division was moved up to the second belt of defence, in the path of the III Panzer Corps. The 10th Tank Corps, then still subordinate to the 5th Guards Army, was rushed ahead of the rest of the army, arriving at Prokhorovka on the night of 7 July, and 2nd Tank Corps arrived at Korocha, 40 km (25 mi) southeast of Prokhorovka, by morning of 8 July. Vatutin ordered a powerful counterattack by the 5th Guards, 2nd Guards, 2nd and 10th Tank Corps, in all fielding about 593 tanks and self-propelled guns and supported by most of the Front’s available air power, which aimed to defeat the II SS Panzer Corps and therefore expose the right flank of XLVIII Panzer Corps. Simultaneously, the 6th Tank Corps was to attack the XLVIII Panzer Corps and prevent it from breaking through to the free Soviet rear. Although intended to be concerted, the counterattack turned out to be a series of piecemeal attacks due to poor coordination. The 10th Tank Corps’ attack began on the dawn of 8 July but they ran straight into the antitank fire of the 2nd and 3rd SS Divisions, losing most of its forces. Later that morning, the 5th Guards Tank Corps’ attack was repelled by the 3rd SS Division. The 2nd Tank Corps joined in the afternoon and was also repelled. The 2nd Guards Tank Corps, masked by the forest around the village Gostishchevo, 16 km (10 mi) north of Belgorod, with its presence unknown to the II SS Panzer Corps, advanced towards the 167th Infantry Division. But it was detected by German air reconnaissance just before the attack had materialized, and was subsequently decimated by German ground-attack aircraft armed with MK 103 anti-tank cannons and at least 50 tanks were destroyed. This marked the first time in military history an attacking tank formation had been defeated by air power alone. Although a fiasco, the Soviet counterattack succeeded in stalling the advance of the II SS Panzer Corps throughout the day. By the end of 8 July, II SS-Panzer Corps had advanced about 29 kilometres (18 mi) since the start of Citadel and broken through the first and second defensive belts. However, slow progress by the XLVIII Panzer Corps caused Hoth to shift elements of the II SS-Panzer Corps to the west to help the XLVIII Panzer Corps regain its momentum. On 10 July the full effort of the corps was shifted back to its own forward progress. The direction of their advance now shifted from Oboyan due north to the northeast, toward Prokhorovka. Hoth had discussed this move with Manstein since early May, and it was a part of the 4th Panzer Army’s plan since the outset of the offensive. By this time, however, the Soviets had shifted reserve formations into its path. The defensive positions were manned by the 2nd Tank Corps, reinforced by the 9th Guards Airborne Division and 301st Anti-tank Artillery Regiment, both from the 33rd Guards Rifle Corps. Though the German advance in the south was slower than planned, it was faster than the Soviets expected. On 9 July, the first German units reached the Psel River. The next day, the first German infantry crossed the river. Despite the deep defensive system and minefields, German tank losses remained lower than the Soviet’s. At this point, Hoth turned the II SS Panzer Corps away from Oboyan to attack toward the northeast in the direction of Prokhorovka. The main concern of Manstein and Hausser was the inability of Army Detachment Kempf to advance and protect the eastern flank of the II SS Panzer Corps. On 11 July, Army Detachment Kempf finally achieved a breakthrough. In a surprise night attack, the 6th Panzer Division seized a bridge across the Donets. Once across, Breith made every effort to push troops and vehicles across the river for an advance on Prokhorovka from the south. A linkup with the II SS Panzer Corps would result with the Soviet 69th Army becoming encircled. Throughout 10 and 11 July, the II-SS Panzer Corps continued its attack toward Prokhorovka, reaching within 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) of the settlement by the night of 11 July. That same night, Hausser issued orders for the attack to continue the next day. The plan was for the 3rd SS Panzer Division to drive northeast until it reached the Karteschewka-Prokhorovka road. Once there, they were to strike southeast to attack the Soviet positions at Prokhorovka from the flanks and rear. The 1st and 2nd SS Panzer divisions were to wait until 3rd SS Panzer Division attack had destabilized the Soviet positions at Prokhorovka; and once underway, the 1st SS Panzer Division was to attack the main Soviet defenses dug in on the slopes southwest of Prokhorovka. To the division’s right, the 2nd SS Panzer Division was to advance eastward, then turn southward away from Prokhorovka to roll up the Soviet lines opposing the III Panzer Corps’ advance and force a gap. During the night of 11 July, Rotmistrov moved his 5th Guards Tank Army to an assembly area just behind Prokhorovka in preparation for a massive attack the following day. At 5:45 Leibstandarte headquarters started receiving reports of the sound of tank engines as the Soviets moved into their assembly areas. Soviet artillery and Katyusha regiments were redeployed in preparation for the counterattack. At around 08:00, a Soviet artillery barrage began. At 08:30, Rotmistrov radioed his tankers: “Steel, Steel, Steel!”, the order to commence the attack. Down off the west slopes, before Prokhorovka, came the massed armour of five tank brigades from the Soviet 18th and 29th Tank Corps of the 5th Guards Tank Army. The Soviet tanks advanced down the corridor, carrying mounted infantrymen of the 9th Guards Airborne Division on the tanks. To the north and east, the 3rd SS Panzer Division was engaged by the Soviet 33rd Guards Rifle Corps. Tasked with flanking the Soviet defences around Prokhorovka, the unit first had to beat off a number of attacks before they could go over onto the offensive. Most of the division’s tank losses occurred late in the afternoon as they advanced through mine fields against well-hidden Soviet anti-tank guns. Although the 3rd SS succeeded in reaching the Karteschewka-Prokhorovka road, their hold was tenuous and it cost the division half of its armour. The majority of German tank losses suffered at Prokhorovka occurred here. To the south, the Soviet 18th and 29th Tank Corps had been thrown back by the 1st SS Panzer Division. The 2nd SS Panzer Division also repelled attacks from the 2nd Tank Corps and the 2nd Guards Tank Corps. Luftwaffe local air superiority over the battlefield also contributed to the Soviet losses, partly due to the VVS being directed against the German units on the flanks of II SS Panzer Corps. By the end of the day, the Soviets had fallen back to their starting positions. Neither the 5th Guards Tank Army nor the II SS Panzer Corps accomplished their objectives. Though the Soviet counterattack failed with heavy losses, and were thrown back onto the defensive, yet they did enough to stop a German breakthrough. On the evening of 12 July, Hitler summoned Kluge and Manstein to his headquarters at Rastenburg in East Prussia. Two days earlier, the Western Allies had invaded Sicily. The threat of further Allied landings in Italy or along southern France made Hitler believe it was essential to move forces from Kursk to Italy and to discontinue the offensive. Kluge welcomed the news, as he was aware that the Soviets were initiating a massive offensive against his sector, but Manstein was less welcoming. Manstein’s forces had just spent a week fighting through a maze of defensive works and he believed they were on the verge of breaking through to more open terrain, which would allow him to engage and destroy the Soviet armoured reserves in a mobile battle. Manstein stated, “On no account should we let go of the enemy until the mobile reserves he [has] committed [are] completely beaten.” Hitler agreed to temporarily allow the continuance of the offensive in the southern part of the salient, but the following day he ordered Manstein’s reserve – the XXIV Panzer Corps – to move south to support the 1st Panzer Army. This removed the force Manstein believed was needed to succeed. The offensive continued in the southern part with the launch of Operation Roland on 14 July. But after three days, on 17 July, the II SS Panzer Corps was ordered to end its offensive operations and begin withdrawing. This marked the end of Operation Roland. One of the panzer corps’ divisions was transferred to Italy and the other two were sent south to meet new Soviet offensives. The strength of the Soviet reserve formations had been greatly underestimated by German intelligence, and the Red Army soon went onto the offensive. In his post-war apologist memoirs Lost Victories, Manstein was highly critical of Hitler’s decision to call off the operation at the height of the tactical battle. The veracity of Manstein’s claims of a near victory is debatable. The extent of Soviet reserves was far greater than he realized. These reserves were used to re-equip the mauled 5th Guards Tank Army, which launched Operation Rumyantsev a couple of weeks later. The result was a battle of attrition they were ill-prepared for and which they had little chance of winning. During the Operation Citadel, Luftwaffe units in the area had 27,221 flying sorties with 193 combat losses (0.709% loss rate per sortie). Soviet units made from 5 July to 8 July 11,235 flying sorties with combat losses of 556 aircraft (4.95% per sortie). So in battleground itself Germans surely were destroying Soviet armor and aircraft with better kill rate of 1:6. The problem was that the Germans were now lacking strategic reserves when western air power had started viciously devastating the Luftwaffe and penetrating into Italy. In fall of 1943 just 25% of Luftwaffe day fighters were in the Eastern Front. From now on the Luftwaffe didn’t have any kind of air superiority in the east. During the defensive preparations in the months leading up to Citadel, the Soviets also planned and prepared counteroffensives operations that would be launched after the German offensive had halted. Soviet offensive operations for the summer of 1943 were planned to begin after the strength of the German forces had been dissipated by their Kursk offensive. As the German momentum in the north slowed, the Soviets launched Operation Kutusov on 12 July against Army Group Centre in the Orel salient, directly north of the Kursk salient. The Bryansk Front, under the command of Markian Popov, attacked the eastern face of the Orel salient while the Western Front, commanded by Vasily Sokolovsky, attacked from the north. The Western Front’s assault was led by the 11th Guards Army, under Lieutenant General Hovhannes Bagramyan, and was supported by the 1st and 5th Tank Corps. The Soviet spearheads sustained heavy casualties, but pushed through and in some areas achieved significant penetrations. These thrusts endangered German supply routes and threatened the 9th Army with encirclement. With this threat, 9th Army was compelled to go over fully to the defensive. With the failure of Zitadelle we have suffered a decisive defeat. The armoured formations, reformed and re-equipped with so much effort, had lost heavily in both men and equipment and would now be unemployable for a long time to come. It was problematical whether they could be rehabilitated in time to defend the Eastern Front … Needless to say the [Soviets] exploited their victory to the full. There were to be no more periods of quiet on the Eastern Front. From now on, the enemy was in undisputed possession of the initiative. Though the location, plan of attack, and timing were determined by Hitler, he blamed the defeat on his General Staff. Unlike Stalin, who gave his commanding generals the liberty to make important command decisions, Hitler’s interference in German military matters progressively increased while his attention to the political aspects of the war decreased. The opposite was true for Stalin; throughout the Kursk campaign, he trusted the judgment of his commanders, and as their decisions led to battlefield success it increased his trust in their military judgment. Stalin stepped back from operational planning, only rarely overruling military decisions, resulting in the Red Army gaining more freedom of action during the course of the war. Memorial “Teplovsky’s Hills” in Ponyri region in honour of the memory of the fallen on the northern face of the Battle of Kursk. According to historian Christer Bergström, Soviet Air Forces losses during the German offensive amounted to 677 aircraft on the northern flank and 439 on the southern flank. Total casualties are uncertain. Bergström’s research indicates total Soviet air losses between 12 July and 18 August, during the German offensive and the Operation Kutuzov counteroffensive, were 1,104. Karl-Heinz Frieser, who reviewed the German archive record, calculated that during Operation Citadel 54,182 casualties were suffered. Of these, 9,036 were killed, 1,960 were reported missing and 43,159 were wounded. The 9th Army suffered 23,345 casualties, while Army Group South suffered 30,837 casualties. Throughout the Soviet offensives, 86,064 casualties were suffered. In facing Operation Kutuzov, 14,215 men were killed, 11,300 were reported missing (presumed killed or captured) and 60,549 were wounded. During Polkovodets Rumyantsev, 25,068 casualties were incurred, including 8,933 killed and missing. Total casualties for the three battles were about 50,000 killed or missing and 134,000 wounded per German military medical data. Due to enemy action and mechanical breakdowns, the combat strength sank rapidly during the first few days. By the evening of 10 July, there were only 10 operational Panthers in the frontline. 25 Panthers had been lost as total writeoffs (23 were hit and burnt and two had caught fire during the approach march). 100 Panthers were in need of repair (56 were damaged by hits and mines and 44 by mechanical breakdown). 60 percent of the mechanical breakdowns could be easily repaired. Approximately 40 Panthers had already been repaired and were on the way to the front. About 25 still had not been recovered by the repair service… On the evening of 11 July, 38 Panthers were operational, 31 were total writeoffs and 131 were in need of repair. A slow increase in the combat strength is observable. The large number of losses by hits (81 Panthers up to 10 July) attests to the heavy fighting. By 16 July, Army Group South claimed 161 tanks and 14 assault guns lost. Up to 14 July, 9th Army reported they had lost as total writeoffs 41 tanks and 17 assault guns. These losses break down as 109 Panzer IVs, 42 Panthers, 38 Panzer IIIs, 31 assault guns, 19 Elefants, 10 Tigers and three flame tanks. Before the Germans ended their offensive at Kursk, the Soviets began their counteroffensive and succeeded in pushing the Germans back into a steady retreat. Thus, a report on 11 August 1943 showed that the numbers of total writeoffs in Panthers swelled to 156, with only 9 operational. The German Army was forced into a fighting retreat and increasingly lost tanks in combat as well as from abandoning and destroying damaged vehicles. Across the entire Eastern Front ,50 Tiger tanks were lost during July and August, with some 240 damaged. Most of these occurred during their offensive at Kursk. Between 600 to 1,612 tanks and assault guns sustained damage in the period from 5 July to 18 July.
2019-04-26T08:09:03Z
https://historicalsocietyofgermanmilitaryhistory.com/german-history-of-world-war-ii/world-war-two-battles/battle-kursk/
Note: As with all my work, I ?stand on the shoulders of giants?, those who have spent their time methodically pulling together the findings for each one of the pieces I write utilizing information from other sources. Reference to the original articles is included or listed at the end of this article. If you haven?t realized it until now . . this whole war that has been raging in this corner of the Universe for eons is over the issue of control?the power to control the lives and energy of those beings who reside, not only on this planet, but also on all the other planets in this vicinity, and even into the other dimensions. As always, the best allegory I can find for this situation is in the book A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L?Engle. Simply put, the whole thing is a battle between the Darkness and the Light (in it?s true form from the Creator or Source, not the Light which is also that of Lucifer) for the ultimate control of the Universe. If this sounds like you are living in another episode of the Star Wars series, welcome to reality and the biggest thing going on in Creation right now. This bigger war which is raging in the macrocosm of the Universe, is also raging within each and every one of us, also called the microcosm. Planet Earth and its inhabitants, as the prizes in this latest and final battleground of the Galactic war, are crown jewels to the victor, not only because of the position this planet holds on the outlying edge of the galaxy, but as is explained further in my upcoming book, because it is a microcosm of the galaxy. Much like the United States is on planet Earth ? Earth itself is a melting pot of so many different alien races, that it?s conquest represents a conquest of all the home planets as well.. The key to this penultimate battle is the coming ascension of planet Earth back into the fifth dimension, and the choice its people to either stay here in this dimension, or to go with it. The chemtrails fulfill that part of the Hopi prophecy spoken of about the Day of Purification when cobwebs would be spun in the skies. But what you do if you were already in control of this planet? What would you do if you had already spent inordinate amounts of time and energy making it into the most sophisticated prison camp in the Universe?so much so that most of the inhabitants didn?t even know they were prisoners? What lengths would you go to in order to prevent them from pulling off the Great Escape by beaming themselves and the whole camp up and out of your self-governing enclosure? close or control the doorways or portals in and out of your camp (the always crucial ?head ?em off at the pass? in Earth wars); and keep the prisoners ? preoccupied with their health and the day-to-day grind, genetically incapable of making the jump into hyper-space. The ultimate purpose of the chemtrails can be seen in the most ubiquitous of symbols seen everywhere in the trails left behind over so many cities?the X. As one researcher discovered while researching the source of the X rune (Gebo) in the original Teutonic texts, it literally means a gift, or offering?the symbolic meaning being ?sacrifice of the lower for the higher.? Certainly that is a familiar theme in the ways of the Illuminati here on planet Earth. All the true knowledge of Creation is withheld from us, the lower, and our lives and very existence here on the planet are sacrificed in service to those who deem themselves the higher and therefore more worthy to retain this cosmic wisdom. The first part of the New World Order?s solution concerning the blockage of the portals into and out of the planet is dealt with in my upcoming book (available soon through my website). This blockage is being done from both inside the planet?s atmosphere (at ground level), and also from outside the atmosphere through the many ?secret missions? carried out over the past decades of ?space exploration? by NASA and by the space shuttle, as well as many other earth-based space programs. Part A of the second aspect of the solution has to do, obviously, with keeping the economy insecure. This involves taxing the people so heavily as to keep the power out of their hands and with little or no money left even to stay alive. If this means inflating the stock market and the economy, or plunging us all into a ?recession? or a depression as they have done before, then so be it. The evidence of these things is all around us if we simply choose to open our eyes. The whole idea behind the old ?company store? was to keep the workers alive and working, reaping a windfall for the company, while growing further and further into debt by buying necessities at inflated prices through the company store. The workers then became hopelessly reliant on the ?social security? of their benefactors, using their own free will to sell themselves into a lifetime of self-imposed servitude. Not only are food supplies and housing now the most expensive commodities available, but we even have to buy such things as water and even air to remain even somewhat healthy and alive. The medical system is a crushing blow to freedom as it is now not only responsible for as many deaths as for the lives it saves?but it has also been positioned to bleed the economy dry of all its resources through high-priced sugar pills and drugs which cause more problems than they cure in the hands of ill-trained practitioners. All this, while never once dealing with what is really killing the people---fear and emotional stagnation. Part B of this scenario is to keep the people unhealthy, all the while genetically altering them enough so that they cannot even conceive of making the proposed jump back into hyperspace along with the struggling planet. The process of doing this began a long, long time ago with the infamous Annunaki race of aliens featured so prominently in Sumerian and Babylonian history and the work of Zecharia Sitchin. These beings were responsible for originally stripping us of our 12-strand DNA in order to make of us a slave race. By doing this, the also stripped us of our God-given connection to our Higher Selves, that part of ourselves which is truly interdimensional and in touch with its Creator. By manipulating both the portals to the planet and the personal portals in our own DNA, the New World Order and its controllers hope to keep both us and the planet trapped here in the third dimension indefinitely for their own personal uses. This has already created a problem in that so many of those who have been passing on over this period of time have been reincarnating back onto the planet instead of going on to other places and other lessons, simply because they have been trapped here by the dense physicality created on this planet, and by their attachments to worldly things and their inability to reconnect with their Higher Selves. As more and more children and adults become re-attuned to their original 12-strand DNA status with the increase in the planet?s frequency, and as the date for planetary ascension draws ever nearer, the urgency to control this re-connection to our original selves has become an urgent and necessary part of the New World Order?s agenda. What is being referred to is that the planet is already passing through the fourth dimension of vibration as of about 1982, headed for a quantum leap into the fifth level in about 2012-2013, the famed end of the Mayan Calendar. Hence we have the increase in UFO sightings (dimensional phenomena), and also in people?s telepathic and intuitive abilities. ?We are being changed physically from carbon-based beings with 2 strands of DNA into crystalline beings with 1,024 strands of DNA (eventually), because only crystalline substances can exist on higher dimensional levels. the progression through changes compels us to let go of current relationships, jobs, careers, homes, possessions, and so on, if they are unable to support our new way of being . . . ?Is it any wonder therefore, that there is a great deal of anxiety and fear being felt because these changes are already in progress, even though most people are not conscious of it . . . ?These changes are not necessarily being experienced by everyone concurrently. A very small percentage of adults have already completed the entire change into crystalline form and now embody 1,024 strands of DNA . . .Some people are only just starting to move through these changes, and many others have yet to start. This process of change is known as the Awakening, or as the Ascension process, or known as achieving the Merkabah, or light body. ?We need to transcend our fears and learn about love, real love, which has to start with the self. Because, until we can love and trust ourselves, we cannot truly love or trust anything or anybody else.? How does all this relate to the chemtrails and to the New World Order? The original three major theories explaining the chemtrail phenomenon i.e., weather modification, mass inoculation, and population control, have all been pretty much discounted by researchers as pointed out in Stan and Holly Deyo?s May 31st newsletter. None of these theories adequately explains the range of data gathered. Right now, people are still recovering from chemtrail induced sicknesses. Since chemtrail related deaths have been extremely low, the possibility of chemtrails containing only one single agent is very low. Double agent spraying is more likely. One somewhat benign agent is applied now, and its combination with an activator in the future would turn it lethal or at least trigger the desired results. The activator can then be another biological or chemical substance which triggers this new reaction in tandem with the first agent. Pseudomonas aeruginosa - A common hardy bacteria that can be found in dirt. This could suggest possible contamination of chemtrail ground samples but also perhaps not considering that it is commonly genetically engineered by companies as PathoGenesis for various purposes. The natural strains have been found to contaminate hospitals and drinking water. When inhaled into immunosuppressed lungs such as those of victims with cystic fibrosis, it forms slime clusters called biofilms which are virtual bunkers against immune system defenses and antibiotics. It can transfer horizontally, meaning between species, genetic information to the host via transduction and conjugation. Conjugation involves the bacteria injecting a genetic package called a plasmid via a ?handshake? into a host cell, which receives it and in effect makes it a part of its own DNA. Transduction is similar, but instead of the bacteria sending a plasmid into the host, it sends bacteriophages (viruses) that contain some of the original bacteria?s DNA and implants it within the host?s DNA. This allows for genetic manipulation to occur. Aerosol Barium salts such as were used in Libya, Panama and Desert Storm where they were sprayed and exploded overhead to make the people extremely sick and weak. It s a radioactive material that accelerates and magnifies the effects of other mix ingredients by altering the chemical structure of the other agents. A spectrum analysis reveals only the barium compounds and hides the ?bad stuff? by placing a shell around it. After time, it releases the other agent. Think of it as a time release death pill Ethylene dibromide (dibromethane) - Banned in 1984 by the EPA, EDB (C2H4Br2) is a carcinogenic fuel additive and insecticide with a chloroform-like odor. It is claimed to be similar to silver iodide, which was once used for cloud seeding and weather modification purposes. When absorbed, EDB causes central nervous system depression and pulmonary edema, which is fluid accumulation in the lungs. Symptoms of pulmonary edema include shortness of breath, anxiety, wheezing, and coughing. It is extremely irritant to mucous membranes and to the respiratory tract. These are all symptoms associated with the ?chemtrail cough,? and with the growing lethargy noticed in populated areas both here and around the world where spraying is taking place. If anything, EDB serves partly as a condensation nuclei around which water vapor in the atmosphere can condense, making thick chemtrails visible for satellite tracking. Enterobacteriaceae - Includes E.coli and salmonella which are culprits in cases of food poisoning. Most interesting of the Enterobacteriaceae family is the Klebsiella genus, whose species is responsible for pneumonia infections (enough said). One link from the Canadian Intelligence Security Service formation on the San Francisco 1950 biological testing reports that ?One of the biggest experiments by the government involved the use of Serratia marcescens being sprayed over San Francisco. This organism is especially nice because it produces a red/pink pigment when grown on certain media, which makes identification very easy. At one point, 5000 particles/minute were sprayed from the coastal areas inward. During this time, 1 man died (in hospital) and 10 others became infected in what was described as ?a mystery to doctors.? Although the military claimed it never did many follow up studies on these tests, one result was that it showed nearly every single person became infected with the test organism. In hindsight, now that some of this information has become declassified, it?s been shown that during periods following spraying tests, there were 5-10 times the normal infections reported.? Although attributed to the military and government sources, similar experiments were revealed to have also been performed by the Australian government on its people using various bacteriological agents, a country known for its extremely high rate of asthma and chronic lung problems. This advance testing was obviously an early phase for the NWO?s ?final solution. Streptomyces - ?Streptomycetes are used to produce the majority of antibiotics applied in human and veterinary medicine and agriculture, as well as anti-parasitic agents, herbicides, pharmacologically active metabolites (e.g. immuno-suppressants)? A restriction enzyme used in research labs to snip and combine DNA?such an enzyme cleaves open DNA and allows desired segments to be inserted before recombining. Other bacteria and toxic molds capable of producing heart disease, encephalitis, and meningitis?of which there are renewed outbreaks, especially in heavily sprayed cities such as Houston?as well as acute upper respiratory and gastrointestinal distress. It is known that within three days of a particular heavy spraying, outbreaks of respiratory illnesses occur in the exposed population. Some develop pneumonia, others colds, flu-like symptoms, and depressed immune functions. Instances of meningitis and encephalitis have also increased in correlation with sprayings. Note that no viruses are listed above. This is because viruses are difficult to detect in the laboratory, much less identify. However, most of the resulting illnesses do not respond to antibiotics, suggesting their causes are indeed viral. Such viruses are most likely retroviruses such as the adenovirus for use in the genetic manipulation. Chemtrails now appear worldwide, though it has been claimed that none have been sighted in China. The Chinese influence on the Clinton presidency has been well established, not to mention the increasing dependence so many countries now have on China for both their manufactured goods and as a source of cheap labor. U.S. military and scientific technology has been freely given to China under much protest in spite of its aggressive stance towards this country. The New World Order seems to have made China into a new power base for capitalism since the death of its infamous Communist leader, Mao Tse Tung. Another researcher in a bedroom community of Portland, OR, a city which is sprayed often, relates that chemical tankers have been photographed on the ground at the Oregon National Guard base adjacent to the Portland International Airport just a few miles from his home. Considering the frequency and density of coverage of the chemtrails, the urgency of the NWO?s agenda to head off the ascension process is self-evident. The project has risked discovery by employing commercial airlines to help with the spraying, and such a risk can only be justified if the project itself were in the nature of an emergency. They have also risked their secrecy by spraying during the day (especially on weekends) to affect as many people as possible, when all below can plainly see these contrails are anything but. ?One of the indications that vaccinations may in fact be changing the genetic structure of humans became evident in September of 1971, when scientists at the University of Geneva made the discovery that biological substances entering directly into the bloodstream could become part of human genetic structure. ?Yet another technique is to simply inject naked DNA. This approach wouldn?t work well as direct injection into the bloodstream because the body?s DNA degrading enzymes would quickly digest it. But some experiments have shown that when naked DNA is injected directly into muscle tissue [as in a vaccine injection], say, the cells start producing whatever proteins the DNA codes for.? ?To turn viruses into gene ferries, scientists have developed ways of stripping the genes out of a virus and substituting copies of the genes they want to transfer into cells. The virus is then mixed with cells taken out of the body that are then returned. Or they can be injected directly into the body itself, homing in on the cells of interest. Retroviruses, which insert their genetic code directly into the chromosomes of the host cell, have been used a lot because of their ability to break into chromosomes and insert the DNA. Other viruses are now also being used. One of the big drawbacks of viruses is that the immune system can?t tell the difference between bad viruses and those that carry a beneficial gene. So, many of the viruses are rapidly wiped out [that is, of course, unless the immune system is weakened by other chemical/biological agents such that these viruses survive long enough to transduce their DNA into the host].? The article which first got me interested in this whole field was one I found in a newspaper about viruses being found in the tails of comets passing through space. The theory was that this might be how ?life? and diseases could be spread from one planet to another, like in some weird science fiction movie such as Day of the Triffids or Invasion of the Body Snatchers. To exist in such an environment as space, however, viruses would not be considered a life form as such. Viruses tend to travel through the nervous system, and are more like a parasite, living off its biological host?a true alien invasion indeed, energy vampires, much like those creatures portrayed in the recent hit movie, The Matrix, for the nervous system is in fact the electromagnetic system of the body. Non-invasive methods of gene therapy are already well established. A team at the Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia accomplished just that using an oral method of gene therapy. Even madsci.org has something to say about these non-invasive methods: ?Gene therapy is one of the most interesting and valuable techniques to come out of the field of genetic engineering. The adenovirus used to deliver the CF gene to human cells for gene therapy is known as a vector. Since most cells normally will not take in or absorb DNA, we need a delivery system to get the gene into the cell. Adenovirus is a good vector since it can infect cells in vivo, or while they?re in the body, which means that the gene can be delivered through an inhaler (instead of having to manipulate the cells in vitro, or in the laboratory, then return the cells to the body). To use the adenovirus as a vector, it?s genome was first altered by removing all the virus DNA except for the minimum necessary for the virus to live and infect the cells. Genetically engineered viral vectors like this are harmless and usually can?t live outside of the laboratory. ?But some virus vectors are not without drawbacks: All viral approaches suffer from the drawback of introducing unwanted viral genetic information into the recipient host. Retroviral vectors and adenoviruses have additional disadvantages. Retroviruses are only suitable for delivery of DNA to replicating cells, and present a risk of reversion to replication competent infective particles, whilst DNA expression using adenovirus delivery systems tends to be short lived [thus the need for the repeated chemtrail sprayings over the past two years in the same geographic areas and the use of a host of vectors to ensure success if one fails].? ?A novel vector with potential for use in gene therapy has been developed by Professor Beverly Griffin and colleagues in the Department of Infectious Diseases at the Hammersmith Hospital Campus of Imperial College. Her team has shown that pseudocapsids of the mouse polyoma virus, consisting solely of the VP1 protein, can be used to transfer DNA into mammalian cells in vivo, to give expression at clinically-relevant levels over a period of weeks.? This work and its subsequent implications suggests a reason for the dramatically increased investment by governments and industry alike over the past few decades into research at educational institutions of higher learning?now part of the expanded military-industrial-education complex. It also should make us all stop and remember the Hanta virus carried by the deer mice of the Four Corners region of the United States and its subsequent deadly effects over the past decade. ?Polyoma virus has a very broad host range which means that the pseudocapsids will be taken up by essentially any human or other mammalian cell. Development and selection of mutant VP1 proteins, together with engineered specific labels may enable cell-specific targeting for in vivo applications. Pseudocapsids completely free of viral genetic material can be produced easily and economically.? In other words, the technology already exists for allowing virus vectors to effectively alter the DNA of a host?s cell. This is not science fiction. One company among many, AEA Technology, is presently researching and selling aerosol products for use in gene therapy. Conceivably then, one could become infected with either such a bacteria or virus and would feel sick as a consequence. Meanwhile, the bacteria or virus goes to work altering one?s cellular DNA slowly, before later being wiped out by the body?s immune system. After the illness is eliminated, the altered cells remain and continue to reproduce. Sometimes it becomes malignantly cancerous if the gene transfer is crude and faulty (as in vaccinations), and other times the changes are so subtle the body continues to operate as previously, or so the victim thinks (as in chemtrail exposure). The easiest way to mutate our DNA is through a virus [in this case, the easiest way to un-mutate DNA or suppress it from mutating is also a virus. The chemtrails then are ultimately attacking our cellular DNA?it?s only possible explanation to head of the pending ascension process to keep us as a slave race to do the bidding of our masters. Mutation and its implications are therefore most relevant in explaining chemtrails. The X-Men movie is a good analogy for what is happening here on planet Earth at this very time. It has also been confirmed that DNA?s crystalline helical structure makes it very sensitive to low strength but specific magnetic frequencies and wave shapes. Depending on the field strength and Fourier components, the effects can vary from rejuvenation to cancer, with one possible effect being the unlocking or suppression of junk DNA. Since some of the ?new? strands of DNA are actually electromagnetic or multi-dimensional in nature, DNA is also sensitive to not just earthly electromagnetic fields, but it also responds to the body?s soul-nature. Soul nature is the vibrational etheric/astral composition or signature of a particular soul. Genetic structure and soul-nature are intimately coupled; a change in one can lead to a delayed change in the other. Manipulation or control of our earthly behavior can simply be garnered by the use of low-watt microwave transmissions, the effects to the cerebellum of the human brain when it is within three feet of such a device are devastating to the organ. FM, AM, and the microwave GWEN towers can all be used to manipulate or to control the unruly masses in this way. The author of some of this included material (the full text of which can be found at: http://www.angelfire.com/mt/montalk/chemtrails.html) gives as his conclusion the following: ?Humanity is evolving, emerging from the past millennia of abysmal darkness and oppression. The power structure, knowing its reign is about to end, has worked tirelessly in a last ditch effort to keep us suppressed. Chemtrails are but one small weapon they are employing to accomplish this.? A very true statement. His suggestion that ? their ultimate goal is a New World Order, global totalitarianism and a reinstatement of their absolute power? and that ?the NWO will fail if citizens become genetically empowered to wake up and fight with superhuman powers against tyranny? and that ?this is already occurring, and the chemtrails are ultimately ineffectual at preventing the inevitable? is highly debatable, however. It is even incorrect in terms of what is truly going on. It is fairly obvious to anyone who tries to talk to the ?man in the street? that firstly, they haven?t noticed this problem; secondly, that if they have noticed it they simply don?t seem to care about it; and thirdly, that if they have seen them and do seem to care, then they certainly do not feel they have any power to do anything about them, and so must just suffer. As I?ve said in previous articles, despite what you read anywhere else, the general consciousness of planet Earth has decided NOT to go on with the ascension process ?whether this be through coercion or through their own free will, does not really matter. There is now only the choice left to the individual whether he or she wants to take that next step for themselves, into a higher dimensional state. Two ?anonymous? emails sent to www.SurfingtheApocalypse.com seemed to come from someone in the know on the subject of chemtrails. These e-mails talk about the ?culling? of the population. This is a word I, too, have been given in guidance as another aspect of the chemtrails. It is also a word used in these e-mails as being attributed to a four-star Admiral in the Office of Naval Intelligence. One of these e-mails has been titled ?The Great Dying?The Real Reason Behind Chemtrails.? It speaks of the overall scope and agenda behind Chemtrails (Operation Clover Leaf, Operation Red Sky, Operation Rain Dance being the code names for these operations), and harkens back to what it calls the beginnings ?way back in the late 1950s? with fluoridation, aspartame, and illegal street narcotics.? It also speaks of the fact that the agenda is ?at the 80% completion point in these CT operations? (when the e-mails were written) with the final completion date to be ?by March of 2001.? To understand this objective necessitates an understanding of the human Soul, the spiritual Self and the connection between the two as related to the endocrine system functioning within each human host, and remembering what Dr. Fox said about our immune and endocrine systems showing the most evidence of these changes?these seeming to be the most important targets of the chemtrail?s ingredients. The endocrine system is the group of specialized organs and body tissues that produce, store, and secrete chemical substances known as hormones. As the body?s chemical messengers, hormones transfer information and instructions from one set of cells to another. Because of the hormones they produce, endocrine organs have a great deal of influence over the body. Among their many jobs are regulating the body?s growth and development, controlling the function of various tissues, supporting pregnancy and other reproductive functions, and regulating metabolism. Endocrine organs are sometimes called ductless glands because they have no ducts connecting them to specific body parts. The hormones they secrete are released directly into the bloodstream. The primary glands comprising the endocrine system are the hypothalamus, pituitary, thyroid, parathyroid, adrenal, pineal body, and reproductive glands?the ovary and testis. The pancreas, an organ often associated with the digestive system, is also considered part of the endocrine system. The hypothalamus, found deep within the brain, directly controls the pituitary gland (also known to be the source of psychic vision or what spiritualists call ?the third eye,? that which sees inter-dimensionally). It is sometimes described as the coordinator of the endocrine system. When information reaching the brain indicates that changes are needed somewhere in the body, nerve cells in the hypothalamus secrete body chemicals that either stimulate or suppress hormone secretions from the pituitary gland. Acting as liaison between the brain and the pituitary gland, the hypothalamus is the primary link between the endocrine and nervous systems (remembering that viruses commonly travel through the nervous system). If changes are to take place in the body, then this system is also the guardian over those changes as well as being the director of them. To genetically manipulate mankind through the ingredients in the chemtrails, one must first suppress the endocrine system, and second, the natural defenses of the immune system?the two most directly targeted areas of chemtrail spraying. The e-mails go on to say that the goals of the chemtrails are to make ?the overall ?frequency? of each of their charges (human beings in each country) to function at a specific rate below the threshold of awareness. The study of brain-wave, Remote Viewing techniques, and other related research holds the key to this. As we know, a physical brain functioning at 12 to 14 cycles per second is agitated and cannot, therefore, become perceptive of any cycle not within the same frequency, especially if that BRAIN IS ARTIFICIALLY stabilized to that frequency. How can one perceive love, when the brain can only register impatience, anger, etc?? FEAR is a key factor here, and it is through fear that we open ourselves up to control. Fear is the frequency which registers most with our fourth and fifth dimensional manipulators, and allows our auras, our protective shields, to be breached, leaving us open to their Light-sucking, energy-sucking control. The e-mails also say that ?the immune system of the host must be depleted. This relates to control, simply put. If the slightest breeze makes you dizzy, what kind of defense can you be expected to put up if you can?t lift your arms above your head without getting a headache? . . . This is the main reason for much of the desiccated red blood cells found in chemtrails: biowarfare. This also allows the parasite to latch onto the human host with little resistance from the organism so attached.? ?This last statement is by far the MOST CRUCIAL STAGE of all. It isn?t enough to make us slaves, we MUST WANT TO BECOME SLAVES. Food scarcity, low wages, false idealism as propagated via network commercials, all create a state of low-level dependency to a state system, but it is not enough. To win . . . (they) need our permission to do what they will to us (Universal Law). The system of this biosphere has one final gate that only each of us can open or close and it is, in fact, free will . . .? How and when will they do this? According to the e-mails ?a fake alien invasion? or a biowarfare incident on a major U.S., European or Australian city could be used to trigger us to give up out free will in return for the safety and protection of a seemingly benevolent but in the end dictatorial force. With regard to this, be careful of ?announced disclosures? from seemingly reputable alien-seeking organizations. The control goes deeper than you suspect, and these organizations are needed to feed this supposed threat. As any good researcher or experiencer can tell you, they are already here?in more ways than you know. Preserve your free will. Make a choice for ascension rather than remaining. Utilize love in all your actions rather than dwelling in fear. Be an observer rather than a victim. And trust that there are THOSE who care about what is going on here, and will take care of things as long as you do your part. Two ?anonymous? emails??The Great Dying?The Real Reason Behind Chemtrails.?
2019-04-25T14:36:26Z
http://www.4truthseekers.org/articles/chemtrails_explained__putting_the_pieces_together.php
Middle Eastern governments and companies rose to the financing challenge set by falling oil prices in 2016, rethinking their operations, cutting costs and turning to the international bond markets in committed fashion to plug funding gaps. Issuers in the Gulf Cooperation Council countries raised $66bn last year, and this year’s first quarter total of nearly $25bn suggests issuance will be similarly high in 2017. At GlobalCapital’s roundtable in Dubai on March 27, hosted by Standard Chartered, leading participants discussed the steps needed to take the region’s debt capital markets from nascent to mature, to ensure that they can continue to function, whatever happens to the oil price. GC: Gulf borrowers have a lot to raise this year in the international debt markets. But there are headwinds: a new US president, disappointing global growth, rising US interest rates and geopolitical unrest, to name but a few of the known issues we have to face this year. Yet the capital markets are still enjoying exceptionally bullish conditions. Gulf issuers have had an excellent 2017, so far. Can it last? Mohieddine Kronfol, Franklin Templeton: We’re in a much better situation than a year ago when oil prices were south of $30 a barrel and people weren’t confident that we would be able to implement any of the structural reform or fiscal consolidation measures being announced. Globally there was a very optimistic outlook for the US, but a fairly pessimistic outlook for Europe, emerging markets and the rest of the world. Today the optimistic outlook for the US may still be there but it is a little more challenged. Europe has done much better and China and the emerging markets have been doing better with the recovery in commodity prices. In this part of the world we’ve seen an improvement in oil prices, where the downside risk seems to have been diminished by the OPEC agreements, and governments have done a very impressive job with implementing fiscal consolidation. I expect between $50bn-$60bn in total international issuance. Also investor demand will be there, with this window lasting for the next couple of years. Dima Jardaneh, Standard Chartered: For Gulf issuers and their external funding needs we see two distinct routes. For Abu Dhabi, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, funding needs may have peaked so there might be more opportunity for corporates in that space. But Oman, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia may still need to raise funding in similar amounts to last year. Mike Wallace, Aldar: I think it’s mainly risks around how relevant the region is in terms of fixed income for investors, and that will be primarily driven by rates in the US. As soon as yields start lifting there, then the relevance of the GCC and emerging markets becomes less, and the money just flows back. Zeina Rizk, Arqaam: The identified risks from last year, which were recession risk in Europe, China’s hard landing, US economic slowdown and oil dropping further, didn’t materialise. The two risks that actually were considered as tail and highly unlikely both materialised: Brexit and Trump. Despite that, emerging markets had a good year, and a very strong start to 2017. If you had asked me in Q4 last year, I would have said rates can’t stay here. Yields should move higher and the curve is going to steepen. However, now there is a greater uncertainty with regards to yields’ trajectory. Trump came into office with the agenda to ‘make America great again’. The fact that the Healthcare Bill didn’t pass shows that he’s not as strong as markets perceived him to be, which puts a question mark on the magnitude of the fiscal plan that he’s going to be able to pass. This being said, the reflation trade is on hold for now, the risk of the 10 years blowing out is reduced; and short term rates are contained. I think the 10 years will trade within a 2.3%-2.5% range, which is going to be supportive for the market. GCC spreads are at tight levels compared to their historical levels. However, if you compare the GCC to other markets, mainly Asia, the region still looks attractive. GC: Dima, how long can the good market conditions last, and what is Standard Chartered expecting in terms of rate hikes this year? Jardaneh, Standard Chartered: We believe that the market was somewhat complacent on, or extra euphoric on, Trump policies. We have been more cautious on the impact of the Trump administration’s economic plans and we didn’t necessarily expect the fiscal stimulus to be of the size that the market was pricing. We’re expecting there to be another two hikes this year, and another two next year. Increases in the Fed Funds rate may not translate to a meaningful pick-up in longer term yields, that is if the reflation story disappoints and inflation does not rise meaningfully in the US. At the current juncture of the US economy, there is a possibility that inflation will just really not pick up to a high extent, and so the market will become less and less euphoric and hence yields will probably be capped at much lower levels. GC: We’ve talked about external factors impacting the region, but what about specific GCC concerns? Kronfol, Franklin: It is relevant to make clear to policymakers that it would be a big mistake, from a systemic point of view, to continue to rely almost exclusively on trying to attract foreign funding. It is almost impossible to figure out what is going to be driving that sentiment. One day it is Brexit, then Trump. The next there could be an Asian financial crisis. Every time we go through these different taper tantrums there’s a risk. So far, we’ve been able to deal with this because the liquidity domestically has been so strong, and banks have been able to absorb a lot of this volatility and step in, buy debt and anchor these markets. But as the market grows and develops, we need to focus on generating or building a local demand base outside of the banking system. And that means promoting inward investment, promoting local asset management, promoting insurance and pension companies. We need to prioritise non-bank investors in these markets because when times are good people focus on the upside and the potential, and think how attractive we are. If we want the GCC bond markets to remain resilient and to attract foreign investors year in and year out, we need to have that resilience embedded structurally. Tom Koczwara, Government of Sharjah: Governments in the GCC have not seen market development as a main objective. We may have talked about it, but we haven’t actually done it. We have used issuance as a way of raising funds to plug budget deficits and to pay for projects. That is a relatively immature way to approach government borrowing. It means that, from the perspective of higher volumes of issuance, we remain dependent on a volatile global market. The GCC market is seen as self-contained from a global perspective, and it is so tiny. It’s just a flea on the back of the debt capital market dog. We talk about Trump and Brexit fluently but are reluctant to talk about local factors. Even in these bumper deals, where are the biggest orders from? The GCC. The big questions for us are whether governments can find the right balance between raising funds, supporting financial markets, generating economic growth and controlling fiscal deficits. And these conflicting or competing objectives will drive the shape of the market and the quality of sovereign credits, and therefore the rest of the market beneath that, over the next two or three years. trying to help to address these aims? Koczwara, Sharjah: In some ways, we’re more like a corporate. We’re not going to be driving the market. But the advantage we have is that we’re inside the tent, so we do get to have these sorts of discussions with the bigger brothers, in terms of policy making. We expended a lot of negotiating capital in the better times trying to push for development of local debt capital markets, local currency debt capital markets, which is one of the key steps in developing a deeper, more liquid, more predictable debt capital market in the region. As an issuer, I think we are very focussed on our relationship with our key investor base, which is here in the GCC. GC: So how important is the local investor base, and how can that be harnessed to further develop the GCC markets? Rizk, Arqaam: I agree that the local investors are as important as the internationals, but we have a chance of attracting new money, which we need. The GCC market is very much a one-way market. Everybody’s buying and no one wants to offer, or everybody’s selling and no one wants to buy. Attracting a larger investor base may normalise the market and we may start seeing proper two-way flows and a more mature market. The growth in the regional capital markets last year was significant and the inflow of international funds increased accordingly. This leaves us with the risk that the usual backstop of the regional markets, the local bid, won’t be able to absorb all this liquidity. The flipside of this is that the Asian buyers are arguably buy and hold accounts and therefore they will not be dumping as heavily as we would expect them to. Kronfol, Franklin: To be really significant, you need to develop the local capital markets, and you need to disintermediate the banks. If you look at the loan market, it’s also substantial. If some share of that market could be captured, the bond market could be north of $150bn a year. Then issuers would start to be included in indices, do more 144A trades, and place more deals internationally. That’s just the dollar side. If you can mobilise the domestic market too, the whole block becomes more significant. I’d like to see insurance companies in the region buy our paper in size. When I look at our insurance companies buying real estate I find it worrying. We’re beginning to get insurance companies and other large investors to want to farm out fixed income mandates. But still, it’s very small considering the potential size of capital markets, the size of GDP, or compared to the level of savings. We need better regulation and more effort to promote financial services. A proper market is a function of different investors having different investment objectives, not about all buying or all selling. A bank looks at things differently than an insurance company, different than a private bank, different than an asset manager. That is what makes a market become more efficient. Koczwara, Sharjah: I don’t think people have realised just how lucky we are at the moment; that we’ve just got away this huge Kuwaiti deal, and last year we had the huge Saudi deal, and so on. We are so fortunate that global market conditions allow us to do this. If the fall in the price of oil had coincided with more difficult global liquidity conditions we would have been absolutely stuffed. Our tendency is always to think that was a job well done, that there’s nothing to worry about. But that’s not the case at all, actually. We need to plan for next time we have a sudden fiscal gap, in case markets at that time are less accommodating. Kronfol, Franklin: Yes, when this happened to us in 2009 and 2010, the GCC could barely borrow, while Egypt was able to do all their financing in the local market. GC: Can you foresee a situation where that happens again? Markets have moved on, and the likes of Saudi Arabia have created these large liquid benchmarks. Will these help with returning access? Koczwara, Sharjah: If oil goes back to $90, Saudi perhaps won’t issue again. Kronfol, Franklin: There’s limited credibility to the idea of Saudi maintaining a dialogue with fixed income investors. It’s like them talking about wanting to be leaders of Islamic finance when they still haven’t closed a single sovereign sukuk until now. The market’s grown to $400bn, and I’m yet to see the Saudi government be proactive in structuring and issuing Sharia-compliant securities. Jardaneh, Standard Chartered: But I sense there might be a shift in Saudi from thinking of the capital markets as just a means of filling a fiscal gap to looking at a more holistic approach. Rizk, Arqaam: Exactly, the GCC sovereigns issued because they needed to, not because they want to develop and support the capital markets. As such, if the situation gets better, the capital markets will not be a priority anymore and we will go back to the situation of discontinued GCC sovereign curves. Kronfol, Franklin: Yes… but up until a year ago, it was never really fixed income securities that were envisaged. A seed has been planted but I still feel like, across most of the region, we have a strong equity culture with a limited focus on debt markets. The development is driven by the private sector, by banks, by issuers, by a few companies. But you don’t feel that there’s a policy response there. We need a holistic policy framework that encourages the development of non-bank financial services and bond markets. GC: OK, let’s look at a specific example. Thuwaini, what drove Kuwait to issue this year? Thuwaini Al-Thuwaini, Warba: When you dig deep enough, you see that there is no real necessity [to fund]. Despite all we hear about fiscal deficits, leverage, for countries of comparable ratings, they’re still way below the median when it comes to the debt-to-GDP ratio. Using Kuwait for example. Did it really have a fiscal deficit? What it reports is oil price versus an assumed fiscal break-even budget oil price per barrel, which they assumed at $45 per barrel. The KIA has assets of around $600bn-$650bn. You have the Future Generations Fund, which is speculated to be around $380bn. You have the General Reserve Fund at $250bn. So you’re talking about a country with over $1tr in assets outside of oil. So, why did Kuwait end up issuing? Does it really have a problem? No. It went with the flow and the trend being followed by the other GCC members. And it feared that non-conformity would negatively impact the local market, specifically, local Kuwaiti issuers trying to access the international debt capital market, without having a benchmark to guide pricing. Outside of Oman and Bahrain there isn’t a necessity to fund fiscal deficits by the other GCC members. Even Saudi, you don’t know what the actual requirements are. I think Saudi has taken a political decision that it wants to be more independent, to be less reliant on US policies, and on foreign policy. I’m highly sceptical that Saudi’s decision to tap the debt capital markets is driven by fiscal deficits as much as it is driven by the aspiration to position itself to be more independent of its long-standing Western allies. Rizk, Arqaam: Kuwait is the exception, I think. It is the only GCC sovereign that issues because it can, not because it needs to. GC: How can you encourage non-bank investors in the region to participate? Kronfol, Franklin: The banks may be providing all the necessary capital, but if you look at private credit, or SMEs, there is a massive funding gap there. It’s $70bn-$150bn, depending on estimates. You should encourage that sort of funding because it drives employment and economic growth. Governments try to get banks to plug that gap but they end up mispricing it, and not doing so well. They’re not really geared towards it. If you want to promote the private sector, you need to specialise in lending to private credit. There is a consequence to relying on the status quo. The banks could be a stabilising influence when they’re doing well. But when they’re not doing very well, they can, and have in the past, become a liability. Koczwara, Sharjah: The driving force needs to be at an even higher level. It’s the tension between the closed economy, the kind of model that says ‘we’ve got all the money; we’ve got all the oil; we own all the banks therefore we’re fine’, versus the more open economy like Dubai. Dubai is the pioneer of the open GCC economy. Which one is more successful in delivering economic and social development for its inhabitants? Most people will say Dubai is ahead. So the most successful model is the open model, which depends on attracting capital, talent and permitting competitiveness. Rizk, Arqaam: But that makes you more vulnerable to external shocks; which is not necessarily negative when see from a higher risk, higher return perspective. Koczwara, Sharjah: Day-to-day it makes you more open to external bumps in the road, but long term, it allows you to build diversity and resilience. The biggest shock we’re going to face is when people stop wanting to buy oil. It feels that the UAE is the only country that can lead this. We need to promote openness to capital flows; encouraging competitiveness in the banking sector; encouraging the development of a proper insurance sector, which is not cross-subsidised by real estate. As policymakers, we need to think in both the good and the bad times, how do I focus on that long term goal of developing a more open and diverse economy? You see some good examples of that. Clearly, Saudi is trying to take the bull by the horns and setting up a planning ministry. Al-Thuwaini, Warba: The regulator has a lot of responsibility in driving a deeper debt market, but for some reason they are not. One thing that always puzzled me is that you don’t have to reinvent the wheel here. Look at Malaysia. It did not focus on international money for its development. Yes, attracting FDI was a factor. But because it was a ringgit economy, it focused on developing a local debt capital market to help it withstand any international shocks, which can adversely impact its local economy. I don’t think even the UAE has accomplished this yet. The first serious step in establishing a robust debt capital market is that we establish a local rating agency which caters to the nuances of the local industries because you can’t compare the rating of our companies to, say, blue chip companies in the US, Europe or Japan. Salman Ansari, Standard Chartered: While encouraging non-bank investors is a critical next step, to date regional issuers have managed to successfully place primary issuances with relative ease. Looking at last year, when the region saw challenges associated with the oil price crunch, some market participants questioned whether GCC issuers would easily be able to raise funding at price-efficient levels. Yet if you look at the 150-plus deals that were completed last year across both public benchmark and private placement transactions, the market did not see a single failed deal. GC: So clearly there needs to be a change at government level, but what about corporates, are bank loans still a more attractive funding option? Wallace, Aldar: The first observation I made, having moved over here from the UK a couple of years ago, was that we can borrow from our banks far more cheaply than we can on the debt capital markets. At least 50% of our debt is from bank loans, which we can get out to 10 years, so if I can get that, I’ll take it. Bank debt is more flexible. It’s cheaper to arrange. I can work on the relationship side of things. I don’t have distant investors who maybe aren’t so flexible or accommodating to change. But everything I know from back home says this is wrong, this isn’t how efficient capital markets should be working. But, as a corporate, you know, you’d take it all day because I can’t change it. But it can be risky and more volatile. Kronfol, Franklin: I don’t think you’d be extended the same privileges if you were an independent corporate. Al-Thuwaini, Warba: I think you really hit it on the head there. The difference is that there is a scarcity of quality credit in the private sector. And those that are of quality usually are long-standing merchant families, or quasi-government entities with some support from the government sector. If we go to one of our clients and say: ‘well, instead of giving you a 10 year facility, we’ll take you to the debt capital markets’ that’s business I’ve lost for the next 10 years from this corporate, because what I’m doing essentially is not using my balance sheet and that is very challenging for us to replace. So, if I turn over my balance sheet, I’m going to have a big problem maintaining my business. Most banks that continually aspire to grow their balance sheets find it challenging to replace bankable credit. Wallace, Aldar: The irony is that the people who are buying my notes are the same people providing the loans, the banks. Ansari, Standard Chartered: Undoubtedly there is a dichotomy between what the international debt markets will offer versus lending rates available locally. In particular, high yield issuers who look at the possibility of approaching the international debt markets with yields at high single digits will often find their local bank partners offering them mid-single digit loan pricing. This is a key reason why we have not seen any meaningful growth across the high yield sector in the region. The availability of cheap lending rates is even more prevalent at the higher end of the rating scale. This is a key reason why the region’s DCM volumes remain dominated by sovereign and bank issuers, while corporate volume averages between 10%-15%. GC: So if there isn’t a pricing benefit, how can you encourage issuers to turn to the capital markets? Rizk, Arqaam: You’re right on the differential and that the banks are the go-to for lending, but the first step is for sovereigns to have a curve, to set a benchmark for the corporates. The next step should come from the regulators. They should incentivise corporates to turn to the capital markets when funding is needed. A head of treasury won’t choose to raise funds in the capital markets for the general improvement of the markets. He would only do so if it makes economic sense for him and so far, banks are being more competitive and that is where the regulator should have a role. Step four is to encourage the construction of indices and ETFs. Kronfol, Franklin: If you just left it to market forces or the private sector you can’t compete with the banks when they’re so big, and they have entrenched relationships, and government backing, with an interventionist policy. It’s almost impossible to circumvent and that’s why there’s no consolidation. We in the GCC have a history of using government funds to kick-start industries, whether it’s airlines, or telecoms, or logistics. I think the same should be done, especially with pension funds; especially with insurance companies. Those would play a big role in trying to create those domestic pools of capital that can then compete with the banks and provide different types of funding. Sharia-compliant finance is a very good innovation to be leveraged as well. Ansari, Standard Chartered: But we are seeing some very positive developments, particularly versus the last two years. We’ve seen the GCC sovereigns building curves, which can be easily leveraged by other GCC issuers. We have also seen non-traditional investor participants becoming more active, such as the US base on the back of the sharp rise in 144A issuances. The Asian investor base has also been a large contributor to the growth of volumes. But sustaining this proactive attitude towards the international debt markets is critical to giving international investors confidence that this is not a one-off approach, and if oil prices rise then local GCC issuances will shut down. The development of the local market is also very important. At the moment, we only have one major investor – the region’s banks. Even with over 300 transactions in the last two years, we’ve been very reliant on domestic liquidity, which still represents 50%-60% of most GCC order books. More importantly, these books have been anchored by a small range of anchor investors, which are the mega-banks of the region, and international investors have come to rely on this. While a core focus must be to expand the non-bank investor base, I do think this may be subsided by the fact that Asia is coming in and driving a lot of these deals. But we need to get away from the over-reliance on this domestic liquidity. GC: How important is the Asian bid for the GCC? Ansari, Standard Chartered: On average over the last two years, Asian investor participation in GCC deals has more than doubled. Some of this growth comes from the continued relative value differential seen between similarly rated issuers from the GCC versus Asia. This increased interest from the Asian market is opening up interesting avenues — of late we have even seen, for example, select Taiwanese investors looking more closely at sukuk formats — a welcome investment in the region. GC: Where are the pockets of demand coming from, apart from Taiwan? Ansari, Standard Chartered: We have seen a healthy pick-up in interest from markets such as Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong and Malaysia. New markets like Thailand have also been showing increased interest, with participation in both public and private formats. Asian interest has been so strong that many ‘myths’ that existed in the market are now proving false — for example, the myth that Asian investors only look at rated products. If you look at the most recent transactions — including those that are unrated — Asian distribution has increased twofold versus the last five year average. Asian investors are looking actively at this region and historically what we perceived as no-go areas for them — such as unrated credits — are of strong interest now. You’re seeing those boundaries being pushed. In addition, we’re seeing new pockets of non-deal roadshow locations being explored by GCC issuers. Historically, issuers only targeted deal-related roadshows, going to Hong Kong, Singapore and London, and pricing the deal in London. Now you’re seeing issuers travel on a non-deal roadshow basis to keep investors educated on their credit story, while also targeting new markets like Taipei or Seoul. A lot of regional borrowers have gone to Taipei and Korea of late. This is adding to the diversification element of transactions. GC: Are you looking, Tom, at the Asian market? Koczwara, Sharjah: Yes, we’d look at some of the market-specific products, whether it’s Formosa or Panda bonds, or others. Some of these options are attractive in some ways, less attractive in others. They’re not straightforward. There’s a relatively high degree of execution risk. When we market a standard or sukuk issue, or through the private placement market, or indeed the loan market, we have seen some of these Chinese banks in particular being, I was going to say proactive — probably more than that — pushy even. They work a bit behind the scenes so you don’t get a sense of how active they are. They don’t really have a general banking platform, but they’re coming and writing some huge cheques. They are the biggest banks in the world in terms of balance sheets and they can make a big difference to this market and put pressure on the traditional big ticket lenders in the GCC. On the one hand, for Chinese lenders, there can be a restriction, which is they need a Chinese angle to get things signed off back home. On the other hand, they are keen to do deals and to build their book. As a result, the people on the ground here are flexible in terms of what that Chinese angle can be. GC: Turning to practical examples of market access, what about our issuers’ funding plans for the year? Koczwara, Sharjah: We’ve got financing requirements of around Dh3.5bn ($1bn) which I expect to be made up of one or two large transactions of multiple hundreds of millions of dollars, plus two or three smaller transactions. For the large transactions, we’ll look at different options. So we have people marketing quite innovative markets that we should go and issue into. In addition we’d consider a repeat of our previous debt capital market sukuk issuance, which we’ve done twice before. For the smaller transactions, either we’ll look for our traditional bilateral banking relationships or at private placement opportunities that normally come from proactive investors. That’s for the government itself. Then we also have 19 government-owned entities that we manage the financing for. There, we’ve got a big focus on export credit agencies and guaranteed or direct funding from foreign governments for exporting countries. We see that as the most attractive source of low cost long term finance, and it’s a big growth area for us. We just closed our first export credit deal in January, and we’ve got six or seven which we’re working on. More generally, across the GRE sector, we’re consolidating. I think we will end the year with less GRE debt on a net basis than we started the year. Wallace, Aldar: Our next priority is looking at our December 2018 sukuk, which is $750m. So we’re thinking about how we deal with that. We’re also looking at our capital structure. We are a pure play developer on one side, and an asset manager on the other. And the capital structures for those businesses are very different. But because we are one entity, we need to maintain an investment grade rating. And I’m pleased to say we’ve been upgraded over the last 12 months. But it means that one business compromises the other. And so we’re thinking about how we manage that. In that context, refinancing a sukuk is not simple. We are thinking about whether we can create some sort of structure that allows us to efficiently issue the sukuk in the right sort of format, in the right entity with the right structure for investors. The sukuk/conventional debate is an interesting one. As a real estate company, we have assets. But it’s not necessarily as simple as that. We have land that we need to develop — so we need flexibility and freedom around that. Sukuk has the provisions of being flexible in moving things around, but it’s not necessarily an easy process. We have operating assets, so maybe we could look at those instead. But we need to work out if they are fully sharia-compliant in all areas. Hotels, as an example, may not be. We need to make sure that whatever structure we go into is as simple, efficient and flexible as possible and that if there is a meaningful pricing difference of being in a sukuk then you need to consider that sukuk maturity profiles are different to conventional profiles. So we factor in all this before deciding which route to go down. GC: Is refinancing risk in the region a problem? Wallace, Aldar: The $750m sukuk is half of our debt at the moment. But we’re not highly geared so I’m not concerned about the financing. Koczwara, Sharjah: You are quite typical of issuers in the region. There are a lot in the sovereign and corporate sectors who do nothing, do nothing, do nothing, do a huge issuance, do nothing, do nothing, do nothing. Wallace, Aldar: But it goes back to the bank capital markets question. Half of my current debt is with the banks, which I wouldn’t normally do, by which I mean I wouldn’t normally structure my long term debt with 50% in bank debt. I’d have an RCF with a bunch of banks, and then the rest would be capital markets and then I wouldn’t have the maturity cliff I’m facing now. Koczwara, Sharjah: I’m sure there are a hundred solutions to it but this is one of these risks that is created by the state of the market, essentially. Wallace, Aldar: We did a 10 year last year with one local bank, which was really pushing them. They did it at pricing levels that were probably inside those available from the capital markets. But that’s the problem. The banks are feeding companies like Aldar because it’s easy to do so. As a bank, you don’t need to do all the work you’re going to have to do for small and medium size businesses and it’s less risky. You can just give the money to Aldar. Sarmad Mirza, Standard Chartered: It certainly is little surprise in the debt capital markets sphere how the longer maturities have become the strong preference of investors. One thing we hear from every investor is the need for more yield. In addition, one of the themes we have been trying to drive in our capital markets platform in the past couple of years is to try and encourage the middle tier names to come to the private placement market. However, even now, when we go to bank investors, who are the key players in the regional private placement market, they still express concerns around the unrated nature of an issuer, or that they’re single-B or double-B rated credit, or the sector that the issuer is in. The investors often question if it is really worth doing the work for a smaller sized, unrated or high yield deal. Wallace, Aldar: The efficiency of the market needs to change. Because if one goes to the capital markets and can issue sukuk and bonds 50bp within what you [the banks] can lend me, then you’ll be forced to look at that market because you won’t be able to lend to me. GC: With such large sovereign funding needs, is there a risk of crowding out smaller issuers in the region? Koczwara, Sharjah: A slightly more mature approach would be good. But the second point I was going to make is one of my most painful experiences in the government of Sharjah, one we discussed already, was the transparency journey. The other one is convincing my organisation to do less business with our local banks and forcing them to work with the private sector in Sharjah. It’s so easy for us to rely on our local banks. Funding is available the next morning and we can put our feet up for the rest of the month. But if we step back, they will be forced to lend more to the local SMEs and, indeed, larger corporates. This is the lifeblood of our economy: we’re the most private sector-driven part of the UAE. And you find that some of the banks tend to be very volatile in their appetite when lending to this sector. They come in when times are good and then suddenly, they step back and close all of the SME accounts in the UAE overnight. We need our local banks to be supporting the private sector. But it’s incredibly painful to get people to think that way. Kronfol, Franklin: That’s exactly how you could encourage the banks to do more plain vanilla banking. If you or the government or GREs were all told that X% of your funding needs to come from international markets. GC: Mike, how would this work in practice for you as a borrower? Wallace, Aldar: I agree that a regulator needs to promote and emphasise this but if you start setting hard thresholds of what you can do, I’m not sure that gets you there. To your earlier points about having institutions like insurance companies and pension funds bringing capital: that will make the capital markets more efficient, better priced and more competitive to the banking sector, so that they’re forced to look at different avenues. I’m going to struggle and you’re going to struggle to go to our boards and say, ‘no, we’ve got to take money from this more expensive group over here because it’s better for the rest of the economy’. They’re just not going to do it. GC: Thuwaini, what was your experience of issuing the sukuk recently? Would you do it again? Al-Thuwaini, Warba: Our options were limited. We’re a bank that was in a unique position. We’re a newly created bank. Our licence was granted as part of an initiative of the government to promote the financial sector with shares issued in the form of a grant to Kuwaiti nationals. It was also one way for the government to redistribute the country’s wealth to its citizens. The first few years were set-up costs. So we accumulated some negative reserves, negative retained earnings. By the time we wanted to issue, we couldn’t by law, because we had to recover the accumulated losses before issuing capital again. We couldn’t raise equity capital. We witnessed new bylaws issued by the capital markets authority in late 2015, allowing sukuk issuances. If it wasn’t for this positive regulatory development, I don’t think you’d have seen Boubyan issue, thereafter AUB, and then us as the third bank. The primary reason for the success of the issuances, despite the overload of challenges, was demand and supply. Demand for sukuk in the market far surpassed supply, coupled with the perception of quality credit and the chunky yield the issue promised. We achieved our target, which was to pick up on the momentum of the debt regulatory changes, the lack of supply in Islamic debt instruments, and third, our unique challenges of raising additional capital with accumulated losses incurred due to set-up costs. This gives other issuers the courage to go ahead and issue. The next stage is: how do you take that outside the banking sector? Because the banking sector has an advantage as it’s an extension of the sovereign credit. That doesn’t usually translate to corporates. So this will remain a challenge. GC: Do you see more innovation in terms of products on offer this year? GC: Let’s look more closely at sukuk — growth of the market has been slow. How can development be accelerated? Kronfol, Franklin: It is a growing market. Islamic finance remains robust and the source of that demand is really strong at the retail level. Everywhere you see Islamic banks operating, they’re capturing market share, they’re gathering deposits, and so these treasuries are always looking for paper. If it’s investment grade, and it’s in that comfortable 10 or five year tenor, it will be bought. Al-Thuwaini, Warba: Sukuk issuances significantly help Islamic banks because when you look at the new banking regulations, Basel III standards and all that, where you have stricter liquidity standards to abide by, conventional banks have a lot more flexibility. Whenever the bank deposits decrease, conventional banks can still tap high quality liquid assets such as bonds to fill that gap. The Islamic banks have fewer tools at their disposal to meet Basel III liquidity ratios. All they have, currently, are deposits and some sukuk and some products that they can replace with retail deposits. The fact that Saudi Arabia and others are bringing high quality sukuk to market gives Islamic banks more flexibility to manage their liquidity ratios. It will have a greater impact on the development of Islamic banks, in particular. Rizk, Arqaam: The proof of the market growing is that more exotic issuers are considering issuing sukuk; the likes of Ecuador, for example. The finance minister came to the region for a non-deal roadshow to sense the appetite of GCC investors for such an issue. We definitely would. The problem with sukuk is the lack of structure standardisation: one Sharia board can approve a structure as compliant while another can reject the same. This makes issuing and structuring a sukuk a lengthier process with higher closing risk and arguably more expensive. Standardisation of structure would make it easier for issuers to consider sukuks and therefore have new names issuing. The regulator needs to step into the sukuk markets too to encourage market development. Yes, it may take longer to structure a sukuk. Yes, it may be more expensive. Yes, it’s harder to keep in contact with your investors. But, longer term, having diversified sources of funding and investor bases would help in difficult times. Kronfol, Franklin: I don’t think aiming for standardisation is a necessarily good objective because it may come at the expense of innovation and new structures. The market can establish its own standards and comfort with different structures. Mirza, Standard Chartered: Three years back, issuers would bring a five year instrument, and Singapore would buy some, and Malaysia. Now we see Hong Kong as a regular stop on deal roadshows, with HK investors buying actively. Across Europe, the format has become a mainstay of local investors and European demand is as strong as for any bond issuance. Even across select pockets in Asia which have traditionally shied away from sukuk, like Taiwan, onshore investors are taking a closer look and starting to nudge the regulators to start thinking about the format more seriously. The other thing I find interesting is that everyone who is buying sukuk knows well that the issuance will likely price 10bp-15bp inside the issuer’s conventional bond curve, and yet investors seem eager to take a sukuk over a bond. Maybe it’s a sense that the sukuk is going to have a wider investor base and there are more exit options for investors in the secondary market if needed. GC: Do you feel the same way Dino, just take a sukuk whenever it comes? Kronfol, Franklin: Well, yes, but with the same caveat. The primary source of demand for sukuk is Islamic banks. And the treasurers of banks are the same everywhere — they want five year fixed, investment grade, etc. So for the development of the sukuk market, we need these non-bank investors, the pension funds, us, insurance companies, to have that diversity. It’s very important for the development of the sukuk market. You want it to be authentically Sharia-compliant, you want it to have more risk sharing. For these different risk sharing structures to occur, you need longer term money, private banking money, asset managers. The banks will make the sukuk look very much like a bond. And then people will ask, what’s the point? This thing looks the same, it’s just an expensive way of doing it. Whereas if you have more risk sharing, more equity-like characteristics, that helps the development of the sukuk market. That will distinguish sukuk and make people that much more interested in making an allocation, regardless of where we are in the business cycle. Rizk, Arqaam: But desperate times call for desperate measures. Taiwanese and Hong Kong pensioners are in need of yields, given how tight their markets are. They need to diversify across regions and GCC is the most logical choice given the comparable high credit rating. Standardising sukuk would help the market by making it easier for investors to understand. GC: What is the pricing dynamic between sukuk and conventional bonds? Kronfol, Franklin: Including sukuk in JP Morgan indices was a big step. Sukuk are, without a doubt, becoming more mainstream, more widely accepted. Rizk, Arqaam: Agreed, which also led the gap between conventional and sukuk spreads to narrow. Earlier this year, we got instances where bonds and sukuks traded flat, the likes of Majid Al Futtaim 2024 conventionals and 2025 sukuk, Qatar 2022 conventionals and 2023 sukuk. The conventional spreads tightened to their similar sukuk levels. This was driven by Asian demand that was more into conventionals because of simpler, more straightforward structures. GC: What other barriers do you see to the development of the sukuk market? Mirza, Standard Chartered: One of the things that needs to be, and will be, addressed soon is the adoption of the sukuk format in the US market. I’m confident that many of the GCC sovereigns would’ve very happily taken a sukuk for all their jumbo trades recently if the US was a very active participant in the format. But with the US being a question mark, it is understandable that large issuers would side-step sukuk to ensure that US investors continue to play in a big way on jumbo deals. The minute you unlock that, you will have this massive opening of the sukuk market. That said, the momentum is shifting and we are seeing global sovereigns increasingly bring 144A format sukuk with increasing adoption. GC: How will the forthcoming Saudi and Oman sukuk impact the market? Perhaps they will bring in more US investors that bought into the Saudi sovereign issue? Kronfol, Franklin: It’s an important development. It will change the make-up of the index for an investment grade issuer. Definitely Asian demand will be enormous. For the local market here we’re already at the stage where sukuk are so widely accepted that it doesn’t really make a difference in the GCC. It’s an important milestone for the development of the industry, just like we were saying it’s good for Kuwait to issue. Now we have all six GCC sovereigns with issues outstanding. We’ve never really been there before. GC: Are the GCC’s currency pegs here to stay? Jardaneh, Standard Chartered: Our in-house view is that the pegs will be maintained over the medium term. The policy adjustment to the oil price shock has been through the fiscal channel, which makes sense from an economics standpoint for the time being. The pegs are the mainstay of the GCC economies, and play an important role as nominal anchors. So it would be difficult for the governments to figure out an alternative. The move needs to be towards more flexibility at a later stage when the GCC economies have achieved a higher degree of diversification. But for that, there needs to be building of institutional capacity at central banks. Kronfol, Franklin: And without local markets, how are you going to set interest rates? Jardaneh, Standard Chartered: There has to be better liquidity management, better forecasting of liquidity needs to be able to set interest rates and deepening of capital markets to strengthen monetary transmission channels. You’ll need to be able to set a nominal anchor, which is something that cannot be done now. But just doing, let’s say, a re-peg to a new level does not solve a problem. More exchange rate flexibility would be needed to enhance the policy toolkit sustainably. Kronfol, Franklin: Bahrain’s reserve position and their finances are arguably inconsistent with having a dollar peg, which will come under pressure at some point. We suspect that they will find a big deposit by Saudi Arabia into their central bank or they will figure out a way to make sure that the external deficits are addressed. But it does need to be addressed, if you want to remain credible and continue to access bond markets independently.
2019-04-22T12:50:00Z
https://www.euromoney.com/article/b12kq8376bd60x/taking-gcc-debt-capital-markets-to-the-next-level
Click to expand titles below or click on "+" sign to expand. Alhamdo Lil Lahil Lazee Ja-aa-la Kalematal Imamate Baqeyatan Fee Zurriyatil Husain(a.s.) Wa Nazahoma Min Kulle Maineen Wa Shain. Was Salato Was Salamo Ala Sayyedena Mohammadenil Ameenis Sadiqey s.a.w. Allazee Howa Fil Khasaesil Malakutiyyate Le Saa-E-ril Ambiyaa-E-Faeqoon Wa Ala Wasiyyehee Ali (s.a.) Ibne Abitaleb (s.a.) Allazee Howa Fee Tablighr Risalate Wazeerohoo. Wa Fee Esha-Atil Haqqey Naseerohoo. Wa Alal Aimmatil Haqqeil Fatemiyyeen Min Zurriyatehemal HafezeeNash Shareea. Wa Hoom lil Wusoolil Haqqey Ela Daris Salaamey Nemaz Zareea. All the praise be for Allah s.w.t. who has preserved Kalema (Holy sentence) of Imamat in Holy progeny of Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. and kept both of them (Imamat and Holy progeny) away from every falsehood and disgrace and peace be upon our Lord Sayyedena Mohammed s.a.w.w. who is honest and truthful and who is on the top most position to deserve the Divine, Holy, Godly qualities among all previous prophets a.s. and peace be upon his Vicegerent (Vasi) Ali a.s. ibne Abi Talib a.s. who is his right hand in conveying Risalat (Godly message) and he was his true helper in spreading the truth and peace be upon true Fatemi Imams a.s. from the Holy progeny of both of them (Hazrat Mohammed s.a.a.w. and Hazrat Ali a.s. who are the true protectors of Sharia and who are very good means to reach paradise. ​Now we clarify that we did not want to involve ourselves into discussion regarding the disputed problem of Imamat of Janab Musa Kazim and Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. however, from Janab Shaikh Ahmedali Raj, we came to know that without any reason in Udaipur and in other places our those Ismaili Brethren who do not understand the greatness and deep secrecy of Imamat, are being tried to be misled from the true path, though it is in vain. In view of the above, we deem it quite essential to write something on this subject. By this book it is not at all our aim to hurt the religious feelings of anyone. Only our purpose is that we want to show the other side of the picture. Birth Of Holy Imams A.S. First of all it is quite essential to understand that there is huge and vast difference between the stuff by which the existence of all true Holy Imams a.s. and that of all ordinary persons comes into life. Only because of this difference, it can be said that the bodies of all true Holy Imams a.s. are made of very-very much finer gentle stuff gifted with Divine, Godly Holy light and their souls are also made of Godly, Holy substance. The bodies of all true Holy Imams a.s. are even far better in piety and in gentleness than the souls of all other human beings. Ismaili philosopher Moyyed Shirazi r.a. has very nicely drawn the picture of this difference. He states Inna Ajsamokoom Lana Sheatut Teen Allazee Shuqqa Minho Minnal Quloo Boo i.e. the soil form which our souls and hearts have been created, from that soils only your bodies have been created. ​Over and above this Divine Gift, Holy Imams a.s. has divinely lighted altar specially for him only. The soul of True Holy Imam a.s. holds this Altar. True Holy Imam a.s. himself is called Imam and this Holy Divinely lighted altar is called imamat. The books of Shia Imamiyya support this theory, therefore one riwayat (hearsay) is quoted here from 'Oosule Kafi' as a proof of our argument "aanabi abdillah annahoo qala allaho khalaqna min nooreen azeematin summa sawwara khalqana min teenin makhzoofatin min tahtil arsh fa askana zalekan noora feehey. fa kunna nahno basharan nooraniyyeen. lam yaj aal ley ahadin fee misli lazee kholiqna Minho Naseeban" i.e. Hazrat Imam Jafrus Sadiq a.s. said, "Allah s.w.t. has created us from His own Great Divine light and then He framed our image from the divine and most valued soil underneath His throne. After that He mixed this Holy Divine light with that Holy divine light. At last we have been made as one of the creature of Allah s.w.t. As such we are divine Holy human-beings gifted with Divine light. No other creature of this world has a slight share in this divine quality (Oosoole Kafi page No. 714) and True Holy Imam a.s. used to have so many other sons. However only one son has been gifted with this divine Godly, Holy qualities. The true Holy Imam a.s. of the time knows very well this most lucky son of him who is gifted with this Holy, Godly Divine qualities and when this Holy son is born, True Imam a.s. is very much happy because the True Holy Imam a.s. achieves his purpose for which he founds his Dawat (Holy Godly Mission). It is found in Oosle Kafi and other Kitabs (Religious Books) that aan abi abdillah annahoo qala innal imama a.s. earful imama allazee yakuno min bad hee fayoo see elaihey. There is one riwayat (hearsay) from Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. that he said, “The True Holy Imam a.s. very well knows The Imam who is going to be his successor after him. Then he declares Nas on him and appoints him as his Vicegerent. Only this is called khilafate ilahiyya (Godly Ruler ship) which is being transferred from Holy Father to Holy son and because of this reason only ordinary people have Not been given any right of selection or election in this matter. As in Holy Quran "warabboka yakhloqo ma yshaao wayakhtar makanalahomul khiyara” i.e. Your Lord creates whatever He wants and He selects whatever he wants. They have NO right. This Holy Aayats clearly guides and points out to the above referred theory. Because Ordinary people can not know which person has been gifted with the body gifted with Divine Holy Godly qualities and also gifted with the Holy Altar. This is not any worldly kingdom for which any person can be elected or selected as a King. Because so far as outward bodily formation is concerned, all Holy Imams a.s. and all other human beings are alike since in the law of nature, the composition of body of all Holy Imams a.s. and that of all other ordinary human beings is equal. The limbs and feelings of all Holy True Imams a.s. and those of other ordinary human beings are equal. Therefore, The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. said “anabasharun mislo kum” i.e. I am as human being as you are. Hence, the True Holy Khalifa appointed by Allah s.w.t. who is also Holy Imam knows very well which of his son gifted with Holy Godly Divinely qualities, and who deserves Holy Imamat among all other his sons. To point out to these Holy Godly Divinely light The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. said:- “awwalo ma khala- qalllho nooree” i.e. the first thing which Allah has created is my divine light. In other Hadees (saying) The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.ww. said, “noqilto min kiramil aslab ela motah-haartil arham." (kitab Bahrul Anwar etc). I was being transferred from Gentle backbones to pious wombs. In other Hadees, the Holy Prophet s.a.w.w. said, “ana wa anta ya aliyyo min noorin wahedin" i.e. I and Ali s.a. have been born from one and the same Divine light. This Divine Holy, Godly-light was being transferred among Holy pious personalities till it reached the backbone of Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. here this Divine Holy, Godly light was divided into two parts. One part reached the backbone of my father Hazrat Abdullah a.s. from that part I was born and the other part reached the backbone of Hazrat Abitalib a.s. and from that part O' Ali a.s. you were born. Sayyed Rahat Husein writes in Anwarul Quran this Riwayat (hearsay) which reads ana wa aliyyoon min noorin wanhedin (I and Ali a.s. are from the one and the same light) has been so many times narrated repeatedly in so many books that it can be said that it has reached the climax of repetition. Therefore, this is the true fact that the respected fore-fathers of the Holy Prophet s.a.w.w. and the Holy Prophet s.a.w.w. himself, not only were true-Mumins (True Believers) and true Muwaahid (Belivers in oneness of Allah s.w.t.) but each of them was True Imam a.s. of their era. The writer of Akhlaqe Mohammed (s.a.w.) has said “Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. said “Allah s.w.t. ordered Hazrat Adam a.s. to protect the Holy Godly, Divine light of Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. which I have deposited in your back or backbone and you should transfer this Holy Godly Divine light into Pious Holyand Good wombs because only due to this Holy, Godly, Divine light you have been gifted with prophethood. When this Holy, Godly Divine light reached the backbone of Hazrat Hashim a.s. his face was so fresh and so bright due to this Holy, Divine Godly light, that when he used to enter Khana-e-Kaba, it used be illuminated with Godly Divinee Holy light. In this way this Divine, Holy light illuminated in the forehead of Hazrat Abdullah a.s and then it appeared in the image of Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. (Book Akhlaqe-Mohammed s.a.w.w. page No. 456). Then he writes that this Hadees is proven due to its repetition and that Hazrat Ibrahim a.s. and Holy progeny of Hazrat Ismail a.s. who were forefathers of Holy Prophet of Islam s.a.w.w. were protectors of Sharia. They were anoint ending defining, and determining their successors among each other. This practice of Nas continued till the era of Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. anoint ended, defined, and determined Hazrat Abutalib a.s. as his successor and Hazrat Abutalib a.s. finally gave all the Holy and Divine Deposits and traces of previous prophets to The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. when he was ordered to open the office of the Prophethood. Sayyed Rahat Husein has also written almost the same story as good as above. All the Aalims (Religious learned persons) of Shia Imamiyya have consensus that all these Holy persons who were forefathers of the Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. were Prophets. And Vicegerents, and bearers of the flag of true religion and that holy progeny of Hazrat Ismail Bin Ibrahim a.s.who were the forefathers of the Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. were the Vicegerents of Hazrat Ibrahim a.s. and were of on the top most position of best characters and that faith and religion of Hazrat Ibrhaim a.s. was saved among them and that Sharia (Religious dogmas) of Hazrat Musa a.s. and that of Hazrat Isa a.s.was not abolished. These people were its protectors and they were proclaiming Nas (to anointend With defining and determining their successors) among each other and blessed traces of previous prophets a.s. were being entrusted among them. This practice continued till it reached up to Hazrat Maulana Abdul Muttalib a.s.Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. proclaimed Nas on Hazrat Abutalib a.s. as his vicegerent, who was respected father of Hazrat Amirul Mumeneen (Mulana Ali a.s.) and gave all blessed traces of previous prophets a.s. to Hazrat Abutalib a.s. and Hazrat Abutalib a.s. gave all these blessed traces to The Holy Prophet, Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. after he was ordered to open the office of the Prophethood (Anwarul Quraan Muqaddma No.19). In view of the above fact there is no doubt that Respected forefathers of the Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. were the flag bearers of the true religion of Hazrat Ibrahim a.s. and Vicegerents of Hazrat Ismail Ibne Hazrat Ibrahim a.s. As per Ismaili faith all these pious persons were holding the post of Mustaqar Imam (The Imam who is Divinely born and in whose generation Godly Imamat is fixed). In the context of the above referred statement that these Holy persons used to entrust blessed traces and deposits among each other clearly shows that chain of Imamat used to continue among themselves. Every True Imam a.s. of his era used to anointed (determine and define) his successor among each other. Hazrat Abdullah a.s. the Respected father of the holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. was also true Imam. When Hazrat Abdullah a.s.was on the death bedpan the Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. was in his mother's womb or as per other statement the Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. was infant so at this critical moment Hazrat Abdullah a.s. requested Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. to take the responsibility of guardianship of the holy Prophet s.a.w.w. and to look after him and to bring him up. Hence Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. used to discharge this responsibility till the time of his death approached. At this critical moment Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. appointed Hazrat Abutalib a.s. as a guardian and gave him the responsibility to look after The holy Prophet s.a.w.w. Hazrat Abutalib a.s. with utmost kindness favoured the holy Prophet s.a.w.w. and helped him and took great and major part in founding the religion of Islam. Hazrat Abutalib a.s. on the other hand appointed Hazrat Ali s.a. as a helper of The holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. thus the holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. and Hazrat Ali a.s. both together founded Dawate Ilahiyya (Godly mission). Then The Holy Divine Godly light again divided into two parts. From one part Imam Hasan a.s. was born and from the other part Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. was born. When Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s.died then the holy Divine, Godly light again gathered into Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. because Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. was co-partner and match of Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. in purity and in infallibility and because Hazrat Imam Husain a.s. was the sum of all fixed divine Holy Godly light and Hazrat Imam Husein's a.s. sons have the first and foremost right and preference for Imamat. In Holy Quran Allah s.w.t. says “wa oolul arhamey badohoom awla be badeen” i.e. “some of the blood relatives deserve more than other blood relatives. Therefore, now divine Holy, Godly light of Imamat will be transferred in Holy progeny of Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. till the day of Qiyamat resurrection without any break. Thus Imamat will reach from father to son in this Holy progeny. The Holy prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. said “La Imamata Lil Akhawain Badal Hasane Wal Husain (a.s.). i.e. there will be No Imamat between two brothers after Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. and Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. When Imam a.s of the era makes well known one of his sons for Imamat it is called 'Nas' (anoint ending, determining and Tauqeef (defining)) thus Nas and Tauqeef are only original and root cause of the proof of Imamat. Hence when True Imam a.s. of the time declares and shows that his particular son is IMAM after him then it becomes quite clear that only the said son who is declared as Imam, is gifted with the Divine Holy Godly qualities. Except that son, all other sons of Imam a.s. can not become Imam because they are not having any Divine Holy Godly qualities by which true Imam's existence becomes reality. Only one son is gifted with the Divine Godly Holy light. Imam Ismail & Nas with defining and determining. There are plenty of proofs in Ismaili Religious Books and in Non-Ismaili religious books about the Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. First of all we produce extracts from Ismaili Books. Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. declared Nas for his son Hazrat Ismail a.s. and appointed him as Imam. However Abbasi khalifa Abud Dawaniq was trying desperately to kill Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. and for this purpose he used to call Imam a.s. every now and then, but he was not successful. It was his first and foremost desire that the Imam a.s. who is from the holy progeny of Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. must not exist on this earth. So When he came to know that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. has declared Hazrat Ismail a.s. as Imam, his anger found no boundry. So he decided to kill Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. by hook or crook. He spread his spying network to find him (Imam Ismail a.s.). In view of of the above circumstance, Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. mystified death of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s., therefore, as per the order of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s., Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s.went into seclusion. To declare this seclusion Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. adopted the trick which requires deep thought and consideration. He covered the face of Hazrat Ismail a.s. with a long piece of cloth and then when anyone used to visit, he (Imam Sadiq a.s ) used to uncover the face of Hazrat Ismail a.s. and used to show the person the face of Hazrat Ismail a.s. and used to ask the visitor “Is this not my son Ismail? Then when coffin was raised, he used to stop the coffin many a times and at many places on the road and used to show the face of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. to the people and used to ask them “Is he not My son Ismail? and then Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. used to record the witnesses of people by taking their signature in a book. When Khalifa Abbasi came to know this news, he called Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. and asked him about the amazing news about Hazrat Ismail a.s. that you had declared that he (Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s.) had died. However he is alive and he is in Basra. At this point, Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. produced the minutes wherein total witnesses of all eye witnesses were recorded and said I have got these witnesses as my proof that Hazrat Ismail a.s. had died. Khalifa kept his both lips tight, but he started all his efforts at his level best to arrest Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. but he failed to arrest Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. and this riddle was not solved and because of this mystifying event and seclusion, there arose different opinions about the date of death of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. some understood that he (Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s.) has in fact died during the lifetime of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. However the actual fact is that, the great Masihai position (like Jesus Christ) was displayed here. Regarding this Allah s.w.t. says in Holy “maqatalooho wama salaboo ho wa lakin shubbeha lahum”. Ismaili Dai Khattab Bin Hasan r.a.writes in his Book Ghayatul Mawaleed that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. gave Imamat's authority to his son Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. and since Imamat can not go back to Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. as it has not gone back to any Imam a.s. in the past. Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. entrusted position of Imamat of Hazrat Mohammed bin Ismail a.s. to his highly reverend Hujjat (strong argument of True Imam in public) Maimunul Qaddah as a trustee and Janab Maimunul Qaddah r.a. looked after Hazrat Mohammed bin Hazrat Ismail a.s. and brought him up till he became mature. When Hazrat Imam Mohammed Bin Ismail a.s. became mature, he took back his Imamat and blessed deposits from Janab Maimunul Qaddah r.a.. Then the chain of Holy Imamat continued in his generation from Holy father to Holy son (Book Ghayatul Mawaleed). Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. entrusted the Kafalat(Responsibility of bringing up minor) of Hazrat Imam Mohammed bin Ismail a.s. to Janab Maimunul Qaddah r.a. in the same manner as Hazrat Musa a.s. appointed Hazrat Yusho bin Noon a.s. as Kafil (One who is given responsibility of bringing up a minor). Zainul Aabedeen a.s.) returned from Karbala. Now we shall copy some statements from Religious Books of Ithna Asheri and Non-Shia sources by which solid proof for Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. is found. Maqrezee writes, “Inna Ismail Howa Ibnul Akram Lil Imam Jafar us Sadiq a.s. wa howl lazeena asalaihey Bil Imamate Ghaira Inna Ismail Waffa 138 A.H. Wa Jafarus Sadiq a.s.Waledohoo Layazalo ala Qaidil Hayate Wa Khalafa Min Awladehee Mohammed, Wa Aliyaan,WaFatema Wantaqalatil Imamato Fee Aqabehee." (book of Ittifazul Honofa page# 6): Indeed Hazrat Ismail a.s. was the eldest son of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. and he declared Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s. for Imamat. However Hazrat Ismail a.s. died during the life time of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. when Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. died, he was survived by three siblings whose names were Mohammed, Ali and Fatema and Imamat was transferred among the Holy sons of Hazrat Ismail a.s. Shehersatani (Sheherstani is an Ithna Ashier scholar) writes: Ismail was the eldest son of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. and he was only one for whom Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s. declared Nas of Imamat and from this incident only (incident of Nas)the difference about his death occurred. Some says he died during the life time of his father Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. However there was one great advantage of declaring of Nas on him that Imamat was now fixed for transfer to the Holy sons of Imam Ismal a.s. because Nas-EIlahi (Allah's selection) does not go back to its predecessor (Shehrastani). Imam a.s. does not declare Nas upon his son unless and until he listens about the exactness of him from their forefathers. As Hazrat Musa a.s. declared Nas on Hazrat Haroon a.s. However Hazrat Haroon a.s. died during the life time of Hazrat Musa a.s. But this death was in his benefit in the sense that Imamat was being transferred among his Holy progeny. Shehrastani has also written that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. did not marry any other lady till the respected Mother of Hazrat Ismail a.s. was alive keeping the traditions of Hazrat Rasulullah s.a.w.w. who did not marry any other Lady during the life time of Hazrat Khadija a.s. and Hazrat Ali a.s. did not marry any other lady during the life time of Hazrat Fatema-tuz-Zahra a.s.This is also one of the proof and one of the sign that Hazrat Ismail a.s. was a true Imam because it was the practice of every Imam a.s. that he did not marry any other lady during the life time of the mother of his Holy Divine son who is going to be Imam after him. Further, Sheherastani writes that some people say that Imam Ismail a.s. has in fact not died but he has declared his death (mystifying death) Taqiyyatan (concealing the real fact from opponent) to protect his life so that he can save himself from being killed. Because Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. was seen in Basra after news of his death was well known in public (Book Al mallwnahal). In the book, ”Umdatut-Talib" he writes copying the quotation of Ifanof that Hazrat Maulana Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. produced the dead body of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. to the Jamat committee, members of the community and also so many people watched the dead body of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. and they were sure that he was dead. However he writes that Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. in fact died in 145 A.H. However he also adds that Ismailis say that Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. did not die during the life time of his respected father but was alive after the death of his father and his many miracles appeared in public. The writer of the Book Al Harkatul Bateniyyah Fil Islam Sayyed Mustafa Ghalib writes that so many Ismaili Historians write that main purpose of Hazrat Imam Ismail’s a.s. appearance of his mystifying death during the life time of his father was in fact to conceal the real fact to Abbasi Khalifa who wanted to kill him (This is called Taqiyya in Arabic). Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. saw the risk of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. being killed and that was the only reason he (Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s.) disclosed the death of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s.. He also made to write minutes in presence of so many witnesses. This minute was dispatched to Abbasi Khalifa. He was so much glad to hear the news of the death of Hazrat Maulana Ismail a.s. who was gifted with the throne of Imamat. However Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. was seen in Basra and died after the death of his respected father Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. Ismaili followers say that all Riwayats, which Sunni historians narrate about Hazrat Ismail a.s. that he was in contact with Abul-Khattab and he used to drink alcohol, are fake and that enemies of Ahle-Bait a.s. had fabricated such wrong stories about them, (this is the common practice of enemies). Mustafa Ghalib writes that going through all these Riwayats(hearsay) I have concluded that when Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s. was scared that his son Ismail's a.s. life was in danger so he called his Four great Dais and Ismail a.s. in his court and consulted them about the appearance of mistyfying death of Hzrat Imam Ismail a.s. and sent secretly Hazrat Ismail a.s. with his Duats from Madina to Kufa. (Hazrat Ismail a.s. was seen there and used to travel from one place another for so many years till he in fact died in 158 A.H. Khawaja Ataullah Malik in his book “Tareekhey Jehan Kushaaee” and Mohammed Qasim in his book “Tareekehey Farishta narrates in details that Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s. did Nas upon Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s and Allama Majlisi who is believed to be a trustworthy Aalim (Learned Person) of Shia Imamiyya, narrates the Riwyat (hearsay) that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. declared Hazrat Ismail a.s. his successor, but once upon a time he (Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s.) acted against Sharia i.e. He drank alcohol. So his Respected father (Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s became very angry and as a result he transferred position of Imamat to Musa Kazim (Book BAHARUL ANWAR). In this Riwayat there is a solid proof of Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. However AllamaMajlisi has taken support of a fabricated, unfounded allegation that Imam Ismail a.s acted against Sharia, to prove the abolishment of this Nas. But those Historians who are fair and who understand the truth, have with one voice said that this allegation is definitey false and have written that this story is definitely fabricated that Hazrat Ismail a.s. had consumed alcohol. He never ever had drunk alcohol. On the contrary. He was very much pious and God fearing person and due to this false allegation Ismat (infallibility)of Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s.comes under severe criticism that he had selected for Holy position of Imamat a person who used to drink alcohol. The Historian Mohammed Amin who has fair opinion writes in his book “Tarikhil Alawiyyeen” when Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s got the position of Imamat, his eldest son Hazrat Ismail a.s. was declared as his Crown Prince. However Hazrat Ismail a.s died during the life time of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. and therefore position of crown prince and succession was transferred to Musa Kazim. However, one of the sect of Shia, after the death of Hazrat Imam Sadiq a.s. believes Mohammed Bin Ismail a.s. as Imam and did not agree with the Imamat of Musa Kazim. They argue that Imamat is a Holy and Divine matter and since Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. already had anointnded and determined and defined his son Hazrat Ismail a.s. for Imamat, then the matter is indispensably resolved that Imamat will be restricted in his own Holy sons. This was the only reason that Malawian believed all of them as Imam. Every sect of Malawian believed each of them as their own Imam. But there is no doubt that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. anoint ended and pre-defined and determined his son Hazrat Ismail a.s. for Imamat. But Hazrat Ismail a.s.died before the death of his Respected father. So Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s.willed for his second son.But Ismailies did not agree with this Riwayat. They say that since Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. was Masum (infallible) Imam and since he has performed Nas on his eldest son Hazrat Ismail a.s.and that it is not permissible to take back that Nas.On the contrary Imamat was to be continued in the generation of Hazrat Ismail a.s. and as a result Hazrat Mohammed Bin Ismail a.s was crowned with Imamat after death of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s (Book Tarikhil Alawiyyeen) From the above referred all Riwayats there is clear cut and irrefutable proof that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. performed Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s.and there is Not a single different opinion about this matter. However, there are different opinions about the exact date of his death. And this is only because Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. declared mystified the death of Hazrat Ismail a.s. therefore, some say that Hazrat Ismail a.s. died during the life time of his Respected father while others believe that Hazrat Ismail a.s. died after the death of his Respected father. But looking as per both the angles, Imamat of Hazrat Ismail a.s. does not go wrong and does not get any harm and Mohammed Saheb himself has sent a long letter to one Haji Saheb who is also Ismaili, but he has sent a long letter in connection of abolition of Nas in his own opinion. However the strange fact is that Mohammed Zaki saheb himself accepts the Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. But he has objected to the word min badehee (i.e.after him) which is found in phrases of some of the Historians. Mohammed Saheb says that Hazrat Imam Jafrus Sadiq a.s. performed Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s. after him. However since Hazrat Ismail a.s. died before the death of Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadiq s.a. Nas of Hazrat Ismail a.s. has been nullified. Subhanallah!! And that is why he has concluded that Nas of Hazrat Maulana Imam Ismail a.s. has been limited up to a certain time. a certain time. On the contrary it clearly proves that Hazrat Jafarus Sadiq a.s.has not only anointended,determined and definded Hazrat Maulana Ismail a.s. as Imam during his life time but also included him in all Imams a.s. after him. The clear meaning of this (word Min Badehee) is only that Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s should be believed as IMAM even if he dies during the life time of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. It does not mean under any circumstance that Hazrat Ismail a.s is Imam if he lives after the death of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s.and if he does not, he should not be believed as Imam. This can be understood by any ordinary person who has little understating and common sense and No example of such an incident has happened in the previous eras. Because there is only one way of transfer of Imamat which has been fixed in the Holy generation of Hazrat Imam Husein s.a. that after Holy father, Holy son should be appointed as Imamandthat once former Imam a.s. give the position of Imamat to the person,then under No circumstance it can be robbed off him or it can be cancelled. This is quite against the principles of Religion of Ahlebait a.s. that any Imam a.s. declaresNas on his son on this condition that if he survives (during his life time) then andthen he is Imam. In previous eras it has never happened that any Imam'sNas was cancelled, because the would be Imam who has been anoint ended defined and determined as Holy Imam, assembles, in himself all Godly Holy Divine qualities andthis fact comes at once into light as soon Nas is declared on him. Except this Holy son No other siblings of Holy True Imam has this Divine, Holy, Godly, light which shines in the son who is declared as Imam (a.s.) and it is mandatory that this Divine light must be transferred to the Holy son of the successor on whom Nas has been declared. And if we start thinking which is quite impossible that Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. was cancelled or restricted then it means that chain of Imamat has ended and has been cut, and it can never happen. Because when Nas has been declared on Hazrat Maulana Ismail a.s,.it has become quite clear that no other son of Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadi a.s. had assembled such Godly Holy, Divine, qualities in him and if it had not been so, Nas can’t be declared on Hazrat Ismail a.s. but Nas would have been declared on the other son except Hazrat Ismail a.s. and when No other son (Except Hazrat Ismail a.s.had this Godly, Holy Divine qualities, and as such Nas was declared on Hazrat Ismail a.s. However according to the opinion of Mohammed Zaki Saheb, Nas has been nullified and that (after this cancellation) he has been no more Imam and Imamat. This can never happen and it is impossible and this fact brings Ma-aa-Zallah (May Allah protect us) allegations that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. was not aware of the fact that whether his son Hazrat Ismail had acquired the Godly, Divine, Holy Qualities or not. However, Imam of the time certainly knows whose son has been gifted by Allah s.w.t with Godly Divine Holy light of Imamat. By and with this exact accurate knowledge only he declares Nas on his son. Now is it possible that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. committs such a blunder mistake by which his own Imamat comes under severe criticism and allegation? Moreover it is possible that to complete the sequence the word Min Badehee may be used. It means that calculating the number of Imam after Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s., Hazrat Maulana Ismail a.s.is also Imam. At the end of the day,it is the clear fact that according to the sequence of Imamat every Imam a.s. is counted as Imam only after his predecessor. Hence Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. is counted as 2nd Imam after Imam Hasan a.s. and Imam Ali zainul Aaabeden a.s. is 3rd Imam and Hazrat Mohammadul Baqir Imam a.s. is 4th Imam and after Hazrat Mohammdul Baqir a.s. Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. is on 5th Number. This theory can be applied only if we believe that Hazrat Ismail a.s. had died during the life time of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. however on the contrary if we believe that Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. died after the death of Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s. as many believe then no question arises (about Nas of the Imamat of Hazrat Ismail a.s.) and no objection can be entertained under any circumstance, In any way if as per the requirement of Godly wisdom, he would have died during the life time of his Respected father, his Imamat can not t be lapsed or cancelled as it has been made quite clear with strong arguments. Likewise Hazrat Musa a.s.has declared Nas and appointed Hazrat Haroon a.s.as his Vasi (Vicegarant) but as per Godly wisdom Hazrat Haroon a.s. died during the life time of Hazrat Musa a.s. and at the time of his death his son who was to be Imam was a minor, hence Hazrat Haroon requested Hazrat Musa a.s. to appoint a guarantor for his teenage son who can bring him up and can look after him. Therefore, Hazrat Musa a.s appointed Hazrat Yushe bin Noon a.s. as his guarantor (to bring up and to look after the son of Hazrat Haroon a.s. and his Imamat also) till the son of Hazrat Haroon a.s becomes mature. When he becomes mature then position of Imamat should be given back to him. So it happened as it was planned. Hazrat Yushe bin Noon handed over the position of Imamat to the son of Hazrat Haroon a.s. Likewise since Hazrat Imam Mohammed Bin Ismail a.s. was minor, Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. as per the will of Imam Hazrat Ismail a.s. appointed his glorious and most important HUJJAT Maimunul Qaddah as his Guarantor and Veil. When Hazrat Imam Mohammed Bin Hazrat Ismail a.s. became mature Janab Maimunul Qaddah handed over Imamat and Holy deposit to him. Can Mohammed Zaki Saheb restrict Nas of Hazrat Musa a.s. on Hazrat Harun a.s. because Hazrat Harun a.s. died during the life time of Hazrat Musa a.s. Moreover, is Mohammed Zaki Saheb ready to say that position of Imamat of Hazrat Harun a.s. was abolished or was being lapsed, because Hazrat Harun a.s. died during the life time of Hazrat Musa a.s. Can he say that Hazrat Harun's (a.s.) position of Imamat and Wasayat was after Hazrat Musa a.s. but he (Hazrat Harun a.s.) died before the death of Hazrat Musa a.s. So he did not remain Wasi of Hazrat Musa a.s. Likewise Hazrat Adam's (a.s.) Wasi Hazrat Habil a.s. was killed during the lifetime of Hazrat Adam a.s. can this fact nullify the position of Wasayat of Hazrat Habil a.s.? All these are great Godly secrets and to understand them profound capacity of brain is needed. As per those who follow the right path, The respected father of the Holy Prophet, Hazrat Abdullah a.s. was also True Imam as it was stated before. And the proof about this fact was also produced from the books of Shia Imamiyya that Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. had handed over position of Imamat to Hazrat Abdullah a.s. But he died during the life time of Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s and at that time Hazrat Rasulul-Lah s.a.w.w. was in his mother's womb and as per other statement, the Holy Prophet s.a.w.w. was a child and as such he (Hazrat Abdullah a.s.) requested his respected father Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s.to look after and to up bring him (The Holy Prophet s.a.w.w.). Therefore Hazrat Abdul Muttalib with utmost care and kindness looked after and brought up Huzur Hazrat Rasulul-Lah s.a.w.w. and Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. Hazrat Abutalib a.s. as his (The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed (s.a.w.w.).Guarantor and protector to look after The Holy Prophet s.a.w.w. after his death, so that The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w.could achieve his purpose. Now the main object of narrating this fact is that since Hazrat Abdullah a.s. who was the respected father of The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. died during the life time of his father Hazrat Abdul Muttalib a.s. so can we conclude that his position of Imamat is cancelled or is dropped? No and not at all. When position of Imamat of Hazrat Habil a.s. and that of Hazrat Harun a.s. is not dropped or abolished though both had died before the death of the person who had declared Nas on both of them, then how can position of Imamat of Hazrat Maulana Imam Ismail a.s. be cancelled or dropped? (If it is taken as granted that he died during the life time of Hazrat Maulana Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s.) and it has been made quite clear that birth of True Imam a.s. comes into existence from the extremely finer generous andpious stuff. The extremely generous finer (Lateef) pious (pakeeza) stuff comes out from the pious backbone of the previous Imam a.s.and comes into existence in the form of future Imam a.s. and when the father of this future Imam a.s. declares Nas on that divine son it becomes quite clear that only this son has been born from the extremely pious, finer and generous stuff.Because from outward appearance this cannot be determined. onerous) Material must come out and must come into existence in the form of his Holy son. And this son was Hazrat Mohammed Bin Ismail on whom Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. declared Nas. Those who believe that Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. was cancelled or nullified can not think, that to say that Hazrat Imam Ismail's a.s Nas was cancelled, brings a very great insult to Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s.Because when Hazrat Maulana Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. declared Nas on Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. was he not aware that Imam Ismail a.s.was to die during my own life time? So what purpose will it (The Said Nas) serve? Why didn't he declare Nas on his another son from the very beginning This type of act from a true Imam a.s. who is infallible is quite impossible and unimaginable. Moreover it is also to be noted that in “Bahrul Anwar” Allama Majlisi has put forward one argument in support of cancellation of Nas of Hazrat Maulana Imam Ismail a.s that once upon a time he acted against Sharia laws and that is why he was dismissed and then Janab Musa Kazim was appointed as Imam. This means that according to Allama Majlisi, reason for cancellation of Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s was not his death during the life time of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. Otherwise he would have not overlooked this and would have not taken support from a very unfounded and fabricated story andhe would have certainly argued taking support from the death of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. during the life time of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. and he would have said that this the very strong proof of cancellation of Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. but when the present time Shia Imamiyya found that the above allegation (That Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s acted against Shaira laws) on Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s was proved quite baseless and incorrect, and as such they invented another theory that Hazrat Imam Ismail's a.s Nas was restricted and that since Imam Ismail a.s died during the lifetime of Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s., his Nas was lapsed and instead of him Musa Kazim was appointed Imam. They did not try to think slightly and deeply that Imamat is not the game of children and also not the worldly kingship wherein anyone can be declared as king. Imamat is a Godly Gift and Godly tradition. “Wallaho Yaalamo Haiso Yajalo Risalatahoo” Allah knows better where He will deposit His message. (Prophethood Wasayat, Imamat). Therefore, when, in court of Hazrat Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s also discussion about Wasaya (successors) was held and someone questioned about Hazrat Ismail a.s.? Is he your Wasi (vicegerent or successor?) He (Imama Jafarus Sadiq a.s replied very wisely that I personally or according to my idea have not appointed or declared Nas for him as my successor. Therefore, Hazrat a.s. replied I swear by Allah s.w.t.that we appoint as Wasi or Imam only the person for whom Allah s.w.t commands us to do so. Wallah Wallah Ya Aba Mohammed Ma Zaleka Elaina Up to the end. ”By God, O Aba Mohammed, it is not in our hands. (Ooosle Kafi). It is only in power of Allah s.w.t. In this reply Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. did not deny Wasayat (successor ship) of Hazrat Ismail a.s. as some Shia Imamiyya thinks that Hazrat Imam Sadiq a.s has denied the successor ship of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. only denied that he has declared successor ship of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. not as per his opinion and thinking. Here word “La” should be joined with the word“Wallah” This Riwayat is found in Oosole Kafi and other books. This Riwayat gets the support from one Riwayat in Majalise Mustanseriyya. This Riwayat has been quoted by us in some other pages. In this Riwayat (Hearsay) ”Qalas Sadeqo a.s. Le Baze Shiatehee Wa Qad Sa-ala Hoo Aan Waliyyel Amre Badahoo” Laallaka Tazunno Anna Shaian Min Zaleka Elaina. Nafalo Feeha Aradna.La Walllahe La Nattabeo Fee Zaleka Illa Sunnatal Lahey” up to the end. Imam Sadiq a.s. said for one of his Shia (follower) who inquired about the successor after him that “you guess that is it something which is in our power, that whatever we wish to do we do. No not at all, By God in this matter we follow nothing except the tradition of Allah s.w.t and His prophet s.a w.w. This Riwayat completely explains the Riwayat of Oosle Kafi that Imam Sadiq a.s. did not deny the successorship of Hazrat Ismail a.s. on the contrary He has said that I have declared Nas on him and anointended him as my successor) only by the order of Allah. Now the most shocking fact is that Shia Imamiyya of present time, do not discuss from the very beginning, about Hazrat Ismail a.s. they show that from the very beginning Nas was declared on Janab Musa Kazim. This is totally incorrect and fabricated story. This has been explained in detail,and it will be made evident in future. Moreover it is a quite seperate dispute that Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. died during the life time of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. or died after the death of Imam Jafar'us Sadiq a.s. however, it is quite certain that Hazrat Habil a.s. died during the lifetime of Hazrat Adam a.s. and Hazrat Harun a.s.died during the life time of Hazrat Musa a.s. and about them there was No dispute and there is No dispute at present also about them and there was No definite purpose behind their death. Still their position of Wasayat (successorship) was not abolished. Or nullified. So how Hazrat Imam Ismail'sv(a.s.) position of Wasayat can be nullified or lapsed and Hazrat Ismail a.s. can be deprived of his position of *Wasayat (though Nas on him is already proved from the books of Both the parties(Shia Ithna Asharee and Ismaili books) Moreover behind the death of Hazrat Ismail a.s. there was a purpose of mystifying. Not a single statement or action of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. is not produced by which it can be proved that Imamat of Hazrat Ismail a.s. was abolished or nullified and this point also should be taken into account that Mohammed Zaki Saheb and all Shia Imamiyya claimed that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. after the death of Hazrat Ismail a.s. declared Nas on Musa Kazim and appointed him as Imam. If they had cited proofs in support of their claim from Ismaili Books it would have been much better because this is a matter of dispute between Ismaili and Ithna Asharee. (but they have-not done so Ismailis completely deny that Nas was declared on Janab Musa Kazim. Mohammed Zaki Saheb should have produced proofs of Nas on Janab Musa Kazim from Ismaili Books because only by this way, debate can be finished against Ismailis and they can not find any argument for their denial of Nas on Janab Musa Kazim. Still can they produce any proof from Ismaili Books about Nas on Janab Musa Kazim? As Ismaili produce proofs for Nas on Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. from books of Ithna Asharee and there is no any refutable proof for cancellation of Nas of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. and also it is quite impossible matter. Therefore Imamat and Nas is certainly to be transferred to his (Imam Ismail's a.s.son) son Hazrat Mohammed Bin Hazrat Ismail a.s. and Hazrat Mohammed Bin Hazrat Ismail a.s is the essence of Ismaili Dawat and after him Chain of Imamat is certainly and finally to be transferred from Holy father to Holy son till the Zuhoor (Advent) of Hazrat Qaemul Qiyamah a.z.s. who will be the last and final Imam of the era of Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w. who will establish rule of law and justice as it is now ruled by unjust and wrong doers. This great person is being addressed with the title of Yawmil Aakhir (The last and final day) and as long awaited Mehdi a.z.s. and with the title of Ghayatul Ghayat (extreme of extremity) for whose Zohoor (advent) The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w. has foretold so many prophecies and to day on this earth every Religion and every sect is waiting for his advent in different different names. But that Holy person is only the last Imam of era of Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. and who will be from the Holy progeny of Hazrat Fatematuz Zahra a.s. and he will be from the Holy Progeny of Hazrat Imam Husein Salamullahaey Alaihim Wa Salawatohoo. The Admittance of Ismat (Infallibility) of Hazrat Ismail a.s. Mohammed Zaki saheb writes that I believe that Hazrat Ismail a.s. was Masum (infallible) this fact is indeed verified without any doubt that Ismat is most special virtue gifted to true imam a.s. only and nobody except the true Holy Imam a.s. is gifted with this Godly gift. This is quite wrong to say that he was Masum for some period but he was not imam. Janab Imam Hasan a.s. and Janab Imam Husein a.s. were imam and that is why they were masum. Otherwise by separating imamat from them they can not be called masum, though in the presence of Imam Hasan a.s. the responsibility was not on the shoulder of Hazrat Imam Husain a.s. to take responsibility is quite different and imamat is quite different. Imamat is only proved by Nas and for both Imam a.s. there is the Nas from the chief of both the worlds Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. said: ”Al Hasano a.s. wal Husaino a.s. Imama Haqqin Qama AwQaad" Hasan a.s. and Husain a.s. both are true imams, whether they execute peace treaty or they start holy war and in both the circumstances they are true Imams. ​And this is the fact that when imam is minor, and the imam who has declared nas on him, dies then in this circumstance, his guarantor, his Agent, works on his behalf. So in this circumstance it should be quite wrong to understand that he is not Imam. Moreover imam is imam by birth this fact has been admitted even by Mohammed Zaki Saheb. He writes that imam is imam and masum by birth. The reason is that imam is born specially from strong generous finer (Divine, Godly) stuff and because he is Imam by birth, he is masum as well. Imamat and ismat is so strongly inter connected that they can't be separated. Now when Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. was Imam as per the admittance of Mohammed Zaki Saheb himself, then it is proved that except him other sons of Hazrat Imam Jafar Sadiq a.s. were not gifted with this special quality. Because from Holy progeny of Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. chain of 'istiqrariyya imamat' (It means the imamat which is fixed in one holy generation) is continuing and divine light of Imamat can't be divided. Only one son of Imam Mustaqar (whose imamat is gifted by Allah and it is fixed in his holy progeny is called Imam Mustaqar) is gifted with divine holy Godly light of imamat and that was only as per the admittance of Mohammed Zaki Saheb, it was none except Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s. because he has admitted that Hazrat Ismail a.s. was Masum. And this fact is definitely proved and verified that only Imam can be Masum. The first and foremost condition of true imam a.s. is Nas and Tawqeef (definition and determination) from his predecessor. There is no doubt that imam is imam by birth of course to make the common people understand (the true Imam) Nas is quite essential so that proof of his imamat can be well known. Because on the forehead of any Imam a.s. it is not written that he is imam. That is why to make him well known and well informed, Nas and Tawqeef is mandatory. This Nas most probably is declared at the last time of present Imam a.s. however sometime it also happens as per the Godly wisdom that before the last time Nas is declared. As it happened in the case of Hazrat Habil a.s and Hazrat Harun a.s., and as per the true faith and belief it happened in the case of Hazrat Abdullah Bin Abdul Muttalib a.s. also, Nas was not declared for these three holy personalities at the last time and Nas was declared before well ahead. These three Holy personalities died during the lifetime of their predecessors who appointed and declared Nas on them and when present living Imam a.s. declared Nas, he becomes helper and supporter for the person whom he has declared as his successor. This support is given in two ways: First of all when imam a.s of the era dies, so after his death he reaches the highest spiritual degree (neighbourhood of Aashir) and in a sprinkle status he gives supportand help to his son who is Imam after him. Secondly sometime as per Godly wisdom, he lives in this worldly life, and being in this bodily life, he gives support and help to his son who is declared by him as Imam after him. Looking at both the angles former Imam's a.s. position will be the highest because on the strength of Nas, his son (for whom Nas is declared) gets support in abundance. He (imam of the time who has declared Nas on his Holy son) is not dismissed from his position and rank and grade. Hasha Wa Kalla. (Never and We ask Allah to prevent us to think on that line). On the contrary he gets the top most and the highest (spiritual) position. He paves way for Dawat (religious Mission) of his son (on whom Nas has been declared) for this reason he does not become the servant of his son or Grandson (seeking protection of Allah s.w.t to think on that line) on the contrary he acts as a Guardian. Sometime it happens Imam on whom Nas has been declared, is minor, his predecessor appoints a trust worthy person as a guardian and carer for him. Incident of Minor son of Hazrat Haroon a.s. has been detailed and this type of incident again happened in the case of Hazrat Abdullah a.s., the respected father of the holy Prophet s.a.ww. Here the incident of the death of Hazrat Ismail a.s. is a big riddle which requires to be solved, whether He actually died during the lifetime of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. or his death was mystified. Because so many historians – say that due to the oppression and torture of Abbasi Khalifa Abu Dawaniq (l.a.) his death was made public. This fact becomes quite clear by the act of Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. because if death was not mystified, then Hazrat Iamam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. would not have shown the face of Hazrat Ismail a.s., every now and then and would not have sought the witnesses of the people and well known personalities. Inspite of this fact, if we take it granted that he (Imam Ismail a.s.) actually died during the life time of his respected father, as it is said, the Imamat of Hazrat Ismail a.s. is in no way disturbed (majrooh) or lapsed (dropped off) as the positions of Hazrat Harun a.s. etc were not disturbed and when imamat of Hazrat Ismail a.s. is proved his son Hazrat Mohammed bin Ismail who is his Mansoos (one on whom Nas has been declared) is then right heir apparent of his imamat because Nas was declared on Hazrat Ismail a.s. for which solid proof has been produced. (1) Either Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. declared Nas on his second son (Musa Kazim) after the death of of Hazrat Ismail a.s. as it is said, though the son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. was alive or Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. declared Nas on Musa Kazim because there was no son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. (2) Secondly we can say that Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. did not declare Nas on anyone else after declaring Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s. If Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s.declared Nas on Musa Kazim inspite of the fact that the son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. was alive, then Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sasdiq a.s. acted clearly against the Book of Allah s.w.t. because inspite of the fact that the son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. was alive still Hazrat Sadiq a.s. gave inheritance of Imamat of Hazrat Ismail a.s.to his brother. And at that time there was no any reason which compelled to deprive the son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. from Imamat. As it happened in the case of Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. the holy progeny of Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. was forbidden and holy progeny of Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. was specially gifted with inheritance of imamat. Allah s.w.t. says in holy Quran "Wa Oolul Arhame Badohum Awla Be Badin", and because Hazrat Jafarus Sadiq a.s is Imam and also masum (infallible), he can never act against the holy instructions of Holy Quran. Therefore it is quite wrong and false to say that Hazrat Imam Sadiq a.s. declared Nas on Musa Kazim after declaring Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s. and when this fact is quite false so the inheritance of Imamat in holy progeny of Hazrat Ismail a.s is proved. sons, then it is a quite forbidden and invalid act that why did Hazrat Imam Sadiq a.s. who was Masum (infallible) declared Nas on a person whose generation was to be ceased inspite of the fact that he was well aware that imamat is preserved in Holy progeny of Holy Imam a.s. this type of invalid guessing about Hazrat Imam Sadiq a.s. is the sign of non-Godliness act so at the end we conclude that Hazrat Imam Sadiq a.s. has declared Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s. only after by his Godly and divine knowledge, he came to know he (Hazrat Ismail a.s.) is not the person whose generation is to be ceased (who has no siblings) and when the real fact is clearly as such, then it is proved that imamat is definitely for the holy son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. after his death. ​The third opinion is Hazrat Imam Sadiq a.s. did not declare Nas on anyone else (including Musa Kazim) after declaring Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s. then also it is indispensable that imamt should be transferred to the holy son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. as per the law and principle of religious dogmas and that chain of imamat will continue in holy progeny of Hazrat Ismail a.s till the day of Judgement and till the zuhoor (advent) of the last Imam a.s. of era of the Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. has said “Yowati Ismohoo Wa Ismo Abihey Ismo Abi", his name will be similar to my name and his father's name is my father's name i.e. his name will be Mohammed and his Respected father's name will be Abdullah. ordered to be obedient to you as he has ordered to obey us The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. has communicated about your greatness as he has done so for us also. So when Hazrat Ali s.a.died Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s was the best of all, due to his elderly position However Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. had no power to appoint, anoint (to declare Nas) anyone from his own sons as his successor. If Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. would have done so then Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. would have objected and would have asked why did you do that? Because Allah s.w.t has ordered for my (It'aat) obedience as He has ordered to be obedient to you and to to Hazrat Ali a.s. The Holy Prophet Hazrat Mohammed s.a.w.w. communicated about my greatness as he has done so about yours. Mohammed Zaki Saheb writes that this idea and faith is not correct that the one who is addressed or Titled as Imam, chain of Imamat should continue in his generation till the day of Qiyamat. Because it did not happen in the case of Imam Hasan a.s. When Janab Ismail a.s. was the elder brother and according to his statement he got the divine position of Imamat. and thereafter he died. Therefore Imamat was transferred to the generation of younger brother Imam Musa Kazim, as it was transferred in the generation of Hazrat Imam Husain a.s. instead of generation of Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. However, it is not only quite necessary but also quite mandatory that once the divine person is titled with the title of Imam then till the day of Qiyamat chain of Imamat must continue in his own generation. that Divine position of Imamat must be transferred from Holy father to Holy son in the generation of Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. Please refer OOSL E KAFI and other books of Ithna Asharee where in it has been written, "Aan Abi Abdillah a.s.Innahoo Qala, LaTaudul Imamato Fil Akhawaiyne Badal Hasane a.s.Wal Husaine a.s. abadan, Innama Jarrat Min Aliy ibnil Husain a.s.Kama Qalal Laho Ta-aala Oolul Arhaame Badohoom Awla Bebadeen Fee Kitabil Lahey. Fala Takuno Bada Aliybnil Husain a.s. Illa fil Aaqabey Wa Aaqabil Aaqabey (Kitab OosuleKafi 1st volume page page329) Imam JafarusSadiq a.s.said, "After Hazrat Imam Hasan a.s. and Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. Imamat will not be gifted among 2 brothers. After Imam Husein a.s. this chain continued via Maulana Ali Ibnil Husain a.s. Allah s.w.t. says in Allah's kitab some of the relatives of Holy Prophet (s.a.w.w.) are better than some of them” One more proof can be quoted from “Kitab Tafseerus Safi Part 10). among two brothers in the generation of Hazrat Imam Husein s.a. and this fact has been proved as per the Books of both the sect (Ismaili sect and Ithna Asharee Sect) that Imam Sadiq a.s. did Nas on Hazrat Ismail a.s. This has been narrated in above pages. Then inspite of this fact that holy son of Hazrat Ismail a.s. was present, how can Imamat be transferred into generation of Janab Musa Kazim!!! Allah s.w.t. says in Holy Quran, “WaOolul Arhame Badohum Awla BeBadin", some of the blood relatives are better than some of them and there is religious law also that in the presence of the son, brother can’t inherit. Why such a profound love was shown for Hazrat Ismail a.s. Imam Sadiq a.s. profound love for Imam Ismail a.s. What is the purpose of the end of the period of Imamat. Countless number of Imams a.s. About the age of Hazrat Nuh a.s. Imamat must be in the holy generation of Imam Ismail a.s. One irrefutable proof of Imamat being continued in Holy generation of Imam Ismail a.s. Ibne Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. is the possession of Tabarrukat (Holy blessesd things) of The Holy prophet s.a.w.w. and that of all other Imams a.s in the hands of them.(in hands of Holy progeny of Hazrat Imam Ismail a.s) About This Tabarrukat enough text is found in Kitab Baharul Anwar and other religious books of Shia Imamiyya.It has been written in these books that these Tabarrukat are like Holy box of Bani Israeel. Ravi (The narrator) says that I have heard Hazrat Imam Jafarus Sadiq a.s. "Simile of the Salakh (Skinning) of the Holy Prophet s.a.ww. among us is the Holy Box of Bani Israil. Wherever they are, the Holy Box was on their door, and they were gifted with prophet-hood. Hence, it can be easily concluded that wherever Tabarrukat (The Holy blessed things) of The Holy Prophet.s a.w.w. are found they are sure to get Imamat. where hewas guided and brought all Tabarrukats.(Tareekhul Islam). us as Holy Box of Bani Israil wherever these weapons of Rasu Lul Lah s.a.w.w. S.A.) was a true Imam. because we are not concerned with this dispute and it is out of our subject. One more proof for the truthfulness and reality of Ismaili Imam a.s. At the end one more evidence is produced to prove the Imamat of Ismaili Imams a.s. and that is one Article which is being published in Monthly Magazine “Tajallee” from Devband .In September 1961 issue, it has been written in taunting language that Shia believes that Allah s.w.t. gets Bida which means something which has been prophesied or promised by Allah (s.w.t) does not happen. e.g. It was promised by Allah s.w.t. that in the 300 year of Hijri Imam Mehdee a.s. will come out from seclusion after he will attain his maturity, and this promise was being awaited from the day when "Arsh" (Allah's Holy throne) was founded. However in between because of Shahadat (Martyrdom) of Hazrat Imam Husein a.s. Allah s.w.t. was so angry that he could not keep the promise of Zuhur (Coming out from seclusion). The Editor of “Tajallee” perhaps was quite in inadvertence and unaware that Allah s.w.t. in fact fulfilled His promise in time. It means that Sun will rise from the west when the third century will be at its top. According to this prophecy Hazrat Imam Abdullah Mehdee a.s. with his son Hazrat Imam Mohammdil Qaem a.s. did Zuhur and Bani Fatma's a.s. Dawat (Religious Mission) spread far and far. However it must be noted that this Zuhur of Imam Mehdee a.s. is only a small portion (part) in comparison of the Zuhur of Hazrat Maulana Qaem a.s.who is being awaited. This book was originally written by Al Ālim ur Rashid Sheikh al Fazil Hasan Ali Sarangpur wala in Urdu. This was translated in English by Janab-a-Aali Mohammad bhai Sarangpur Wala s/o Martyr Sheikh al Muqaddas Al Alim ur Rashid Sheikh Sajjad Hussain Sarangpur Wala. power to appoint successor whatever we do we do with the order of Allah s.w.t. highest position of Hazrat Ismail a.s. position of Imamat.and he dared to use very inappropriate and unsuitable words. location of Hazrat Ismail a.s. Why Such A Prfound Love Was Shown For Hazrat Ismail A.S.? the real position of Imamat of Hazrat Ismail a.s.andit was not fatherly love. uncover the face of Ismail again and as before, he kissed the forehead etc. testifies There is No God But Allah”. the contrary it is the solid proof of his highest divine degree and position. meaning less talks of Mohammed Zaki Saheb. What Is The Purpose Of The End Of The Period Of Imamat? Imamat or impossible,is a blunder or and it is enmity with the truth. Countless Numbers Of Imams A.S. must have come acrossAayat Karima“WA lillahil asma ul husna fadooho beha”. period then it changes. Human-beings are also part of this changing world. No circumstance worth for consideration anddoes not deserve any attention. is the same Mohammed Bin Abdullah a.s. of Hazrat Imam Husain's s.a. 12 Chiefs and Duats were,Hazrat Sadeerus Sair r.a. a.s.of the time like 12 chiefs there use to be 12 Hujajs who are called chiefs. be of so many different angles e.g. It can be 10 Imams instead of 12 Imams. Shia sect of Islam in anatomy of this Hadees produces their 12 Imams. other pious souls of other human-beings can’t associate themselves with him. trillions years old, and only 12 imams to guide this world. a.z.s.Muntazir(Mehdee a z.s.who is waited) and Qaaeme Aale Mohammed s.a.w. w. father's name is Hasan.This has been clearly explained in the previous pages. did not survive and only 12th Imam has got such a unique and special quality? alive till the day of Qiyamat. only the small and ordinary miracle of what The True Imam a.s. starting from Hazrat Adam a.s till The Holy Prophet Hazrat Rasulul Lah s.a.w.w. Imamiyya when 12th Imam is still alive,No other Imam or13th Imam is needed. alive why did the chain of all other prophets and Imams continue? gifted only to these FOUR prophets a.s. but all the prophets a.s. and Imam a.s. are provided their sustenance from their Lord. false proud and malice in his heart against him.So he opposed Hazrat Adam a.s. Mumeneen A.S.Not Be Called Shaitan ? The Very Childhood Of 12th Imam. upto the day of Qiyamatand also with the so long life of world. matter in previous pages Now we produce in these pages the some of its details. perfect Holy human-beings(perfect in all human-beings best qualities)is born. believes in this chain of Imamat.
2019-04-25T12:18:20Z
https://www.thebohras.com/imam-ismail-as-ibn-jaffer-sadik-as.html
The first substantive history of science post that I wrote on this blog was about the Jesuit mathematician and astronomer Christoph Clavius. I wrote this because at the time I was preparing a lecture on the life and work of Clavius to be held in his hometown Bamberg. Clavius is one of my local history of science celebrities and over the years I have become the local default Clavius expert and because of his involvement in the Gregorian calendar reform of 1572 I have also become the local default expert on that topic too. The new lead astronomer on the project, Jesuit prodigy Christopher Clavius, considered this and other proposals for five years. The brief statement contains three major inaccuracies, the most important of which, is that Clavius as not the lead astronomer, or lead anything else for that matter, on the project. This is a very widespread misconception and one to which I devote a far amount of time when I lecture on the subject, so I thought I would clear up the matter in a post. Before doing so I would point out that I have never come across any other reference to Clavius as a prodigy and there is absolutely nothing in his biography to suggest that he was one. That was the second major inaccuracy for those who are counting. A hundred years later, Pope Gregory XIII rolled up his sleeves and went for it in earnest. After a call for suggestions, he was brought a gigantic manuscript. This was the life’s work of physician Luigi Lilio, who argued for a “slow 10-day correction” to bring things back into alignment, and a new leap year system to keep them that way. This would have meant that years divisible by 100 but not by 400 (e.g. 1800, 1900, and 2100) didn’t get the extra day, thereby shrinking the difference between the solar calendar and the Earthly calendar down to a mere .00031 days, or 26 seconds. This is correct as far as it goes, although there were two Europe wide appeals for suggestions and we don’t actually know how many different suggestions were made as the relevant documents are missing from the Vatican archives. It should also be pointed out the Lilio was a physician/astronomer/astrologer and not just simply a physician. Whether or not his manuscript was gigantic is not known because it no longer exists. Having decided to consider Lilio’s proposal this was not simply passed on to Christoph Clavius, who was a largely unknown mathematicus at the time, which should be obvious to anybody who gives more than five minutes thought to the subject. The problem with the calendar, as far as the Church was concerned, was that they were celebrating Easter the most important doctrinal festival in the Church calendar on the wrong date. This was not a problem that could be decided by a mere mathematicus, at a time when the social status of a mathematicus was about the level of a bricklayer, it was far too important for that. This problem required a high-ranking Church commission and one was duly set up. This commission did not consider the proposal for five years but for at least ten and possibly more, again we are not sure due to missing documents. It is more than likely that the membership of the commission changed over the period of its existence but because we don’t have the minutes of its meetings we can only speculate. What we do have is the signatures of the nine members of the commission who signed the final proposal that was presented to the Pope at the end of their deliberations. It is to these names that we will now turn our attention. The names fall into three distinct groups of three of which the first consists of the high-ranking clerics who actually lead this very important enquiry into a fundamental change in Church doctrinal practice. The chairman of the committee was of course a cardinal,Guglielmo Sirleto (1514–1584) a distinguished linguist and from 1570 Vatican librarian. The vice chairman was Bishop Vincenzo Lauro (1523–1592) a Papal diplomat who was created cardinal in 1583. Next up was Ignatius Nemet Aloho Patriarch of Antioch and head of the Syriac Orthodox Church till his forced resignation in 1576. Ignatius was like his two Catholic colleagues highly knowledgeable of astronomy and was brought into the commission because of his knowledge of Arabic astronomy and also to try to make the reform acceptable to the Orthodox Churches. The last did not function as the Orthodox Churches initially rejected the reform only adopting it one after the other over the centuries with the exception of the Russian Eastern Orthodox Churches, whose church calendar is still the Julian one, which is why they celebrate Christmas on 6 7 January. Our second triplet is a mixed bag. First up we have Leonardo Abela from Malta who functioned as Ignatius’ translator, he couldn’t speak Latin, and witnessed his signature on the commissions final report. He is followed by Seraphinus Olivarius an expert lawyer, whose role was to check that the reform did not conflict with any aspects of cannon law. The third member of this group was Pedro Chacón a Spanish mathematician and historian, whose role was to check that the reform was in line with the doctrines of the Church Fathers. Our final triplet consists of what might be termed the scientific advisors. Heading this group is Antonio Lilio the brother of Luigi and like his brother a physician and astronomer. He was here to elucidate Luigi’s plan, as Luigi was already dead. The lead astronomer, to use the Atlas Obscura phase, was the Dominican monk Ignazio Danti (1536–1582) mathematician, astronomer, cosmographer, architect and instrument maker. In a distinguished career Danti was cosmographer to Cosimo I, Duke of Tuscany whilst professor of mathematics at the university of Pissa, professor of mathematics at the University of Bologna and finally pontifical mathematicus in Rome. For the Pope Danti painted the Gallery of Maps in the Cortile del Belvedere in the Vatican Palace and deigned and constructed the instruments in the Sundial Rome of the Gregorian Tower of Tower of Winds above the Gallery of Maps. Map of Italy, Corsica and Sardinia – Gallery of Maps – Vatican Museums. After the calendar reform the Pope appointed him Bishop of Altari. Danti was one of the leading mathematical practitioners of the age, who was more than capable of supplying all the scientific expertise necessary for the reform, so what was the role of Christoph Clavius the last signer of the commission’s recommendation. The simple answer to this question is that we don’t know; all we can do is speculate. When Clavius (1538–1612) first joined the commission he was, in comparison to Danti, a relative nobody so his appointment to this high level commission with its all-star cast is somewhat puzzling. Apart from his acknowledged mathematical skills it seems that his membership of the Jesuit Order and his status as a Rome insider are the most obvious reasons. Although relative young the Jesuit Order was already a powerful group within the Church and would have wanted one of theirs in such a an important commission. The same thought concerns Clavius’ status as a Rome insider. The Church was highly fractional and all of the other members of the commission came from power bases outside of Rome, whereas Clavius, although a German, as professor at the Collegio Romano counted as part of the Roman establishment, thus representing that establishment in the commission. It was probably a bit of all three reasons that led to Clavius’ appointment. Having established that Clavius only had a fairly lowly status within the commission how did the very widespread myth come into being that he was somehow the calendar reform man? Quite simply after the event he did in fact become just that. he granted Antonio Lilio an exclusive licence to write a book describing the details of the calendar reform and the modifications made to the process of calculating the date of Easter. The sales of the book, which were expected to be high, would then be the Lilio family’s reward for Luigi Lilio having created the mathematical basis of the reform. Unfortunately Antonio Lilio failed to deliver and after a few years the public demand for a written explanation of the reform had become such that the Pope commissioned Clavius, who had by now become a leading European astronomer and mathematician, to write the book instead. Clavius complied with the Pope’s wishes and wrote and published his Novi calendarii romani apologia, Rome 1588, which would become the first of a series of texts explaining and defending the calendar reform. The later was necessary because the reform was not only attacked on religious grounds by numerous Protestants, but also on mathematical and astronomical grounds by such leading mathematicians as François Viète and Michael Maestlin. Over the years Clavius wrote and published several thousand pages defending and explicating the Gregorian calendar reform and it is this work that has linked him inseparably with the calendar reform and not his activities in the commission. This is the story of two brothers born into the working class in a small town in Germany in the late eighteenth century. Both of them were recognised as mathematically gifted whilst still teenagers and went on to study mathematics at university. The younger brother was diligent and studious and completed his doctorate in mathematics with a good grade. There followed a series of good teaching jobs before he obtained a lectureship at the then leading university of Berlin, ten years after graduating. In due course, there followed positions as associate and the full professor. As professor he contributed some small but important proofs to the maths cannon, graduated an impressive list of doctoral students and developed an interesting approach to maths textbooks. He became a respected and acknowledged member of the German mathematical community. The elder brother’s life ran somewhat differently. He started at the local university but unlike his younger brother he was anything but studious preferring a life of dancing, ice -skating and playing billiards to learning mathematics. His father a hard working craftsman was disgusted by this behaviour and forced him to leave the university and take up a teaching post in Switzerland. On the advice of his mathematics professor he taught himself mathematics by reading the greats. He returned to his home university and obtained his doctorate in the same year as his brother. There then followed a series of dead end jobs first as a badly paid university lecturer with little prospect of promotion and then a series of deadbeat jobs as a schoolteacher. In the last of these he had access to a good physics laboratory and began a series of investigations in a relatively new area of physics. At the age of thirty-eight, something of a failure, he published the results of his investigations in a book, which initially failed to make any impact. At the age of forty-four he obtained an appointment as professor at a polytechnic near to his home town and things began to finally improve in his life. At the age of fifty-two his work received acknowledgement at the highest international levels and finally at the age of sixty-three he was appointed professor for physics at a leading university. The younger brother whose career path had been so smooth, fairly rapidly disappeared from the history of mathematics after his death in 1872, remembered by only a handful of specialists, whereas the much plagued elder brother went on to lend the family name to one of the most frequently used unit of measure in the physical sciences; a name that can be found on multiple appliances in probably every household in the western world. The two bothers of my story are Georg Simon Ohm (1789–1854), the discover of Ohm’s Law, and his younger brother, the mathematician, Martin Ohm, who was born on 6 May 1792 and the small German town where they were born is Erlangen where I (almost) live. Georg Simon and Martin were the sons of the locksmith Johann Wolfgang Ohm and his wife Maria Elizabeth Beck, who died when Georg Simon was only ten. Not only did the father bring up his three surviving, of seven, children alone after the death of their mother but he also educated his two sons himself. The son of a locksmith he had enjoyed little formal education but had taught himself philosophy and mathematics, which he now imparted to his sons with great success. As Georg Simon was fifteen he and Martin were examined by the local professor of mathematics, Karl Christian von Langsdorf, who, as already described above, found both boys to be highly gifted and spoke of an Erlanger Bernoulli family. I’ve already outlined the lives of the two Ohm brothers so I’m not going to repeat myself but I will fill in some detail. As above I’ll start with Martin, the mathematician. He made no great discoveries as such and in the world of mathematics his main claim to fame is probably his list of doctoral students several of whom became much more famous than their professor. It was as a teacher that Martin Ohm made his mark, writing a nine volume work that attempted a systematic introduction to the whole of elementary mathematics his, Versuch eines vollkommenen, consequenten Systems der Mathematik (1822–1852) (Attempt at a complete consequent system of mathematics); a book that predates the very similar, but far better known, attempt by Bourbaki by one hundred years and which deserves far more attention than it gets. Martin Ohm also wrote several other elementary textbooks for his students. In his time in Berlin Martin Ohm also taught mathematics for many years at both the School for Architecture and the Artillery Academy. I first stumbled across Martin Ohm whilst researching nineteenth-century algebraic logics. When it was first published George Boole’s Laws of Thought (1864) received very little attention from the mathematical community. With the exception of a small handful of relatively unknown mathematicians who wrote brief papers on it, it went largely unnoticed. One of that handful was Martin Ohm who wrote two papers in German (the first works in German on Boole’s logic). Thus introducing Boole’s ground-breaking work to the German mathematical public. Boole had written and published other mathematical work in German so he was already known in Germany. Later Ernst Schröder would go on to become the biggest proponent of Boolean logic with his three volume Vorlesungen über die Algebra der Logik (1890-1905). It is perhaps worth noting that Boole like the Ohm brothers was the son of a self-educated tradesman who gave his son his first education. Martin Ohm has one further claim to notoriety; he is thought to have been the first to use the term “golden section” (goldener Schnitt in German) thus opening the door for hundreds of aesthetic loonies who claim to find evidence of this wonderful ration all over the place. We now move on to the man in whose shadow Martin Ohm will always stand, his elder brother Georg Simon. The school where Georg Simon began the research work into the physics of electricity was the Jesuit Gymnasium in Cologne, which even granted him a sabbatical in 1826 to intensify his researches. He published those researches as Die galvanische Kette, mathematisch bearbeitet (The Galvanic Circuit Investigated Mathematically) in 1827. It was the Royal Society who started his climb out of obscurity awarding him the Copley Medal, its highest award, in 1842 and appointing him a foreign member in the same year. Membership of other international scientific societies, such as Turin followed. Georg Simon’s first professorial post was at the Königlich Polytechnische Schule (Royal Polytechnic) in Nürnberg in 1833. He became the director of the Polytechnic in 1839 and today the school is a technical university, which bears the name Georg Simon Ohm. Georg Simon ended his career as professor of physics at the University of Munich. The town of Erlangen is proud of Georg Simon and we have an Ohm Place, with an unfortunately rather derelict fountain, the subject of a long political debate concerning the cost of renovation and one of the town’s high schools is named the Ohm Gymnasium. The city of Munich also has a collection of plaques and statues honouring him. Ohm Straße in Berlin, however, is named after his brother Martin. Any fans of the history of science with a sweet tooth should note that if they come to Erlangen one half of the Ohm House is now a sweet shop specialising in Gummibärs. On the 8 January 1610 the Ansbach court astronomer Simon Marius first observed the four largest moons of Jupiter just one day later than Galileo Galilei, although he would delay four years before publishing the results of his observations unlike his Tuscan rival, who famously rushed into print with his amazing discovery. It seemed somehow appropriate to post this press release here on this anniversary of that, for Marius, momentous event. Press Release – The Simon Marius Anniversary Celebrations 2014 have been a great success. The initiators of the ‘The Simon Marius Anniversary Celebrations 2014’ can look back over a very eventful year. More than 60 lectures and exhibitions corrected the public image of the margravial court astronomer both at home and abroad, and more than 200 articles appeared in newspapers, magazines, and other media. Motivation was the publication of Simon Marius’ magnum opus Mundus Iovialis (The World of Jupiter) four hundred years ago in 1614. The first high point of these activities was the launching of the Marius-Portal, www.simon-marius.net, in The State Archives in Nürnberg. This Internet site contains a bibliography, with 28 menu languages, of all the publications by or about Simon Marius (1573-1624), who discovered the four largest Jupiter moons at the same time but independently of Galileo Galilei in 1610. A substantial number of these publications have been digitised and can – where legally permitted – be viewed directly. The medium-term aim is to create a virtual ‘Collected Works’. The designation of an asteroid by the International Astronomical Union was very pleasing. The asteroid “(7984) Marius” is about 10 km in diameter and is situated in the so-called main belt between Mars and Jupiter. It orbits the sun once every 4.27 years and travels at a speed of 7.57 km/s. The final high point was the conference “Simon Marius und seine Zeit” (Simon Marius and his Times), which focused on the results of his researches. The conference report will appear in 2015. Galileo Galilei had accused the margravial court astronomer of plagiarism, however at the beginning of the 20th century he was rehabilitated and in 2014 Simon Marius was honoured in particular in Southern Germany but also in the Cosmonaut Museum in Moscow and in the USA. Galileo and Marius discovered the four largest Jupiter moons in January 1610, but Marius first published his results four years later than his Italian colleague. Today we know that in the 17th century Marius was an astronomer at the highest European levels. The ‘The Simon Marius Anniversary Celebrations 2014’ was initiated by the Nürnberger Astronomischen Gesellschaft (Nürnberger Astronomical Society) and will be set forth by the Simon Marius Gesellschaft (Simon Marius Society), which was founded at the end of December 2014. Any readers who wish to do so are cordially invited to become a normal or corresponding member of the Simon Marius Society, membership is free. A very similar luminous lustre appears when one observes a burning candle from a great distance through a translucent piece of horn. On 15 December 1612 (os) Simon Marius, Court Mathematicus in Ansbach, became the first astronomer to record a telescopic observation of the Andromeda Nebula. The importance of this observation was that whereas other known nebulae such as the Orion Nebula, had resolved into individual stars when viewed with a telescope, the Andromeda Nebula as recorded by Marius appears as “…a weak and faint lustre at the centre with a diameter of about one quarter of a degree. A very similar luminous lustre appears when one observes a burning candle from a great distance through a translucent piece of horn” (Simon Marius, Mudus Iovialis, 1614 my translation). In the history of astronomy the Andromeda Nebula would go on to play a central role in the deep space observations of Charles Messier (M31) and William Herschel in the eighteenth century. In the early twentieth century its nature and status then became the bone of contention in the legendary dispute between Shapley and Curtis. 2014 being the four hundredth anniversary of the publication of Marius’ major astronomical work the Mundus Iovialis we have been celebrating his live and work in Middle Franconia. First high point of the various activities were the launching of the Marius Portal, an Internet website giving researchers free access to all primary and secondary works by and about Simon Marius with navigation in almost thirty different languages. On 20 September a one-day conference was held with contributions covering the various aspects of Marius’ life and academic work (mathematics, astrology and astronomy) in Nürnberg. The proceedings of this conference are due to appear in book, form hopefully in 2015. This coming Wednesday, 17 December 2014, will see the founding of the Simon Marius Gesellschaft (Simon Marius Society) in Nürnberg to further research and promote his life and work. Anybody who is interested is herewith cordially invited to apply for full or corresponding membership. There are no membership fees! Anyone coming to the history of the search for a method to accurately determine longitude through Dava Sobel’s Longitude might be forgiven for thinking that the lunar distance method was just some sort of excuse dreamed up by Neville Maskelyne to prevent John Harrison receiving his just deserts. This is far from being the case. The lunar distance method first explicated by Johannes Werner in Nürnberg at the beginning of the 16th century was the method supported by nearly all astronomers since at least Newton as they were of the opinion that it would not be possible to construct a clock sturdy enough to survive a rough sea voyage and extreme changes of temperature and accurate enough to keep its time over several weeks in the foreseeable future. It should be remembered that it was the astronomers, responsible for keeping track of time since the dawn of civilisation, who had invented and developed the mechanical clock and it was the astronomical instrument makers who were the leading clock makers of the period so they really did know what they were talking about. For these highly knowledgeable men the lunar distance method genuinely seemed to offer more hope of a solution to the problem. The lunar distance method is one of several ‘astronomical clock’ methods of determining longitude. The theory says that if one has a set of tables detailing the position of the moon respective to a given star or group of stars for accurately determined time intervals for a given fixed position then by observing the moon’s distance from said star or stars locally and noting the local time it should be possible to calculate the time difference of the two observations, real and tabular, and thus determine the longitude of the current position relative to the fixed position in the tables. Four minute of time difference equal one degree of longitude difference. To make this system viable one needs two things, an instrument capable of accurately determining the lunar distance on a moving ship and accurate lunar distance tables. The first problem was solved by the English mathematician and instrument maker John Hadley who I’ve written about before and the second by the German cartographer and astronomer Tobias Mayer who died two hundred and fifty years ago today on 20th February 1762, aged just 39. Mayer was born on in 17th February 1723 in Marbach but his family moved to Esslingen less than two years later. He grew up in comparative poverty and when his father died in 1731 Tobias was placed in an orphanage. He received only very basic schooling and was a mathematical autodidact. However at the age of eighteen he had already published a book on geometry and a town plan of Esslingen. In 1743 he moved to Augsburg where he worked for the Pfeffel publishing house and where he published a Mathematical Atlas and a book on fortification. His publications led to him being appointed to a senior position at the Homanns Erben cartographical publishing house in Nürnberg, one of the leading cartography companies in Europe, in 1745. In his six years in Nürnberg Mayer published about thirty maps and numerous astronomical papers with a special emphasis on lunar research. It was during his time in Nürnberg that Mayer laid the foundations of his lunar tables for the lunar distance method. By 1751 Mayer enjoyed a reputation as one of the leading European astronomers and he was offered the chair of mathematics at Göttingen and the directorship of the university observatory. During the next ten years Mayer would publish extensively on astronomy, mathematics, geodetics, mensuration and the design and construction of scientific instruments. He died on 20th February 1762 of typhoid. Although the moon obeys Kepler’s laws of planetary motion, because it is fairly large and lays between the earth and the sun it gets pulled all over the place by the force of gravity and as a result its orbit is a very ragged and irregular affair. In both the systems of Ptolemaeus and of Copernicus the models for the moon’s orbit are less than successful. Kepler ignored the problem and did not supply a lunar model in his system. This omission was corrected by the young English astronomer Jeremiah Horrocks who proved that the moon also has, at least in theory, an elliptical Keplerian orbit and delivered the best lunar model up till that time. Even the great Newton had immense difficulties with the moon and although he based his efforts on Horrocks’ work he was unable to show that the moon really conforms to his gravitation theory. It would have to wait for Simon Laplace to tame the moons orbit at the end of the eighteenth century. Before Laplace none of the mathematical models of the moons orbit was accurate enough to deliver tables that could be used for the lunar distance method. Mayer took a novel approach, he argued that what was needed was not a new model but more accurate observations and more accurate calculations based on those observations and set to work to deliver and deliver he did. Over several years Mayer made very exact observations of the moons positions and very accurate calculations for his tables and thus he succeeded where others had failed. In 1752 he published his first set of lunar tables and in 1755 he submitted them to the Board of Longitude in London. With his tables it was possible to determine the position of the moon within five seconds of arc making it possible to determine longitude to within half a degree. I am the more unwilling my tables should lie any longer concealed; especially as the most celebrated astronomers of almost every age have ardently wished for a perfect theory of the Moon … on account of its singular use in navigation. I have constructed theses tables … with respect to the inequalities of motions, from that famous theory of the great Newton, which that eminent mathematician Eulerus first elegantly reduced to general analytic equations. Mayer’s preface to the 1760 edition of his tables. Combined with Hadley’s quadrant now modified to a sextant the problem of longitude was effectively solved, although only for days when the moon was visible. After trials and a new improved set of tables, published posthumously, the Board awarded Mayer’s widow a prize of £3000 a very large sum of money in the eighteenth century although only a fraction of the sum awarded to Harrison. The calculations necessary to determine longitude having measured the lunar distance proved to be too complex and too time consuming for seamen and so Neville Maskelyne produced the Nautical Almanac containing the results pre-calculated in the form of tables and published for the first time in 1766. The Tables of the Moon had been brought by the late Professor Mayer of Göttingen to a sufficient exactness to determine the Longitude at Sea to within a Degree, as appeared by the Trials of several Persons who made use of them. The Difficulty and Length of the necessary Calculations seemed the only Obstacles to hinder them from becoming of general Use. Contrary to the impression created by Sobel the two methods, lunar distance and marine chronometer, were not rivals but were employed together as a double safety system. Thanks to Sobel’s highly biased book John Harrison’s efforts have become well known and Harrison has become a household name. Mayer however whose services to navigation are just as important remains largely unknown, an anonymity that he does not deserve. Yesterday Paul Halpern at PACHS posted a nice short piece with a photo of the grave stone of the German mathematician Emmy Noether at Bryn Mawr College. As I wrote in an earlier post I (almost) live in Emmy’s home town and actually studied mathematics at the same university so having seen where her life ended I thought it would be nice to show some photos of where it started. Because her father was Professor of Mathematics at the university she was allowed to study mathematics there unusual for a woman at that time. The Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg was founded in 1742 in Bayreuth and moved to Erlangen in 1743. From 1801 the administration moved into this building where it still resides. All of these universty building are within a couple of hundred metres of Emmy’s birthplace so she didn’t have far to go to do her studies. Emmy is one of the greatest 20th century mathematicians and deserves to be much better known than she is. Nürnberg: Pencil Capital of the World! The title of this post is something I wrote in a comment on my previous post on Conrad Gesner. Nürnberg which is home-base to two of the world’s largest produces of drawing and writing instruments Faber-Castell and Staedtler Mars, both of whom started out as pencil manufacturers, could style itself in American fashion, “Pencil Capital of the World!” In fact it chooses to market itself as “Dürer City” figuring for some reason that a world famous Renaissance artist is sexier than the humble lead pencil. Now why Nürnberg is the major centre for the production of pencils and how this came about is something that has puzzled me since I settled here and being a historian I of course set about one day to find out why. I am now going to explain the answer to this question because it’s an interesting example of Renaissance knowledge and technology transfer. Before turning to Nürnberg and the manufacture of pencils I have to fill in some background about the growth of Nürnberg and its position within Renaissance Europe. Like many European cities Nürnberg was founded at the beginning of the second millennium CE and like most of the others it was originally just a fort or castle on a rock outcrop at a strategically important crossroads. In fact the crossroads was the cause of Nürnberg’s rise to fame and fortune. If you draw a line from the north coast of Germany, say somewhere around Kiel, down to Northern Italy and a second one from Paris to Prague, both of which were important prosperous mediaeval cities, Nürnberg stands where those two lines cross. Nürnberg was a Free Imperial City, which means that it owed feudal allegiance to the German Emperor but to no other more local potentate or ruler. Armed with special tax and customs privileges granted by the Emperor Nürnberg became a major trading power distributing goods brought in from Asia by the North Italian trading cities to the rest of Europe. By the late 14th century the Nürnberg traders had become very rich and started to invest their surplus profits in the new expanding mining industry of Middle Europe. The High Middle Ages saw a massive surge in demand for metals and a rapid expansion of the mining industry, most of the mines being situated in Middle Europe in what is now Eastern Germany, The Czech Republic, Hungary, Rumania etc. Most famous was Joachimsthal in Bohemia centre of the silver mining industry whose silver coins were called Joachims Thaler, which became corrupted to dollar. By the 15th century the rich Nürnberg merchants controlled the Middle European mining industry, at first just trading the ores but the step by step taking over the smelting and production of the metals and finally setting up production units in Nürnberg for all sorts of metal objects, from jewellery to armour and weapons. By the end of the 15th century Nürnberg was one of the leading centres in Europe for metal-based manufacture, amongst other things it was the leading manufacturer of scientific instruments. In this period Nürnberg was the second biggest city in Germany and one of the richest cities in Europe as well as being a leading centre for arts and crafts. For example it was the largest manufacturing centre in Europe for spectacle lenses. The Nürnberg merchant traders also maintained the largest trading post in Venice. We now turn our attention to the history of the pencil. Pencils originally consisted of a lead rod fitted with a silver tip, this enabled the user to make a faint grey line on his writing material. Sometime in the first half of the 16th century a large natural deposit of graphite was discovered on the surface near Borrowdale in Cumbria in Northern England, the only graphite deposit ever found on the surface. It was soon discovered that one could write better with the new ‘black lead’ than with silver point and the graphite pencil was born. The original deposit of graphite was cut into sticks that were then bound with cloth or string to fashion a writing implement. Over the next decades a healthy trade in the new English black lead pencils developed and the landowner in Cumbria started searching for new supplies of raw material. Because this meant mining he employed the best mining engineers available, the German miners from the metal mines in Middle Europe. These miners returning home at the beginning of the 17th century told their German employers, the merchant traders of Nürnberg, about graphite and the English pencils. Always on the look out to turn an honest Mark and having the best artisan craftsmen in Europe at their disposal they decided to try and get into the pencil market. Despite having the best mining experts in their employ the Nürnberger were unable to find massive graphite deposits in the English style but did discover deposits from which they could recover crushed graphite. They mixed the crushed graphite with other substances, originally various things and then finally clay, and encased their ‘leads’ in a wooden sheath consisting of two hollow halves glued together, a development in pencil making borrowed from the Italians who had replaced the original bindings with wood, and so the modern pencil was born. Staedtler was established in the late 17th century and Farber-Castell in the early 18th century and both are still thriving today although they have long gone beyond the humble lead pencil.
2019-04-25T06:27:13Z
https://thonyc.wordpress.com/category/local-heroes/
Does a Granny Hump Affect Confidence? Granny hump and hunchback are terms to describe the abnormal hump just below the neck. This abnormal hump can cause decreased mood and confidence. For this article, we will call granny hump, Anterior Head Syndrome (AHS). AHS is usually the cause of a granny hump. You’ve seen AHS at nursing homes, or your parents/grandparents may have one. Imagine going into an interview with a granny hump. You might feel less confident right? It’s similar to having a large zit on your nose during a cocktail party. You know it’s there, but it’ll continue to exist as is. It could be a confidence killer! Like normal body temperature, weight, and blood pressure, you have normal spinal alignment. The presence of AHS confirms a spinal segment is a deviation from normal. Prolonged AHS and slumped shoulders cause spinal segments to shift from normal range causing dysfunction. AHS will be more prevalent with kids and teenagers. 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Pros: Implementing UltiPro has allowed us to streamline many functions that were performed manually with paper documents. Internal staff transfers, promotions, salary changes, etc. are now handled within the UltiPro system (including approvals) where prior to that, paper forms had to be manually signed off by multiple managers before submitting them to HR for processing. Our benefit enrollment process has moved from an Excel enrollment form to an online enrollment that feeds directly into the payroll system once approved. A goal tracking system for employees has been created in UltiPro that allows employees/managers to create goals, rate them, track them with comments, and then show completion dates. Employees may now access their personnel record in UltiPro and make updates to home address, marital status, dependent/contact info, tax withholding as well as immediate access to W-2 forms and ACA forms. In addition, UltiPro offers an online PTO tracking system where employees can request time off and managers can immediately approve electronically. And, of course, what I like most is the amazing reporting capabilities that UltiPro offers. Besides the hundreds of standard reports already created, I can either edit/modify current reports or create my own report. Cons: This is rather minor, but there are functions I would like to create in UltiPro that I don't have access to do as an Administrator. I must submit them to UltiPro Support Team and some of the functions require an additional cost. It's not a lot, but it's just the principal. Overall: We have had a favorable overall experience with UltiPro since going live in October 2016. The support team we have now is incredibly responsive to our requests and the functions in UltiPro have improved the quality of our internal processes. When there have been issues with support, etc. UltiPro has been very quick to resolve the issue. They take client feedback very seriously. Comments: We launched with UltiPro a year and a half ago. The implementation team was very knowledgeable of the product and services offered. They were able to come to the house on many occasions for hands-on training prior to the launch. We also traveled to an On-Site Class near us. These were great to be able to talk back and forth through issues you had been experiencing. I recommend taking notes for questions you may have before going. In the Learning Center Online, there is an abundance of course and previously recorded webcasts for you to learn from. The levels range from the beginner to more complex detailed positions. The Security-Based features are wonderful for companies with multiple subsidiaries. The reporting has many standard reports built for you. It also has the ability for you as a customer to build unique reports to fit your companies' needs. Onboarding has been a way for us to eliminate a lot of paperwork and scanning of policies and documents. It has taken a while to get in groove with so many locations hiring all our seasonal employees at the same time. However, in the end this is saving enormous amounts of time. Pros: Security-based roles are great for top down management. Payroll processing is a lot faster. We have completely moved away from paper checks. The Community Groups and Knowledge Hours are a great tool to have to continually learn from other customers on how they are using the same programs in their company. Many customers are very quick to respond to simple or complex questions. UltiPro has an extensive collection of resource materials that are searchable to help quickly. In the beginning, the Quick Tour videos were a life saver. You learn so much information at once that you don't retain it all. These videos are brief and to the point. they are housed on each screen that it pertains to which is wonderful. Also, every screen has a "Things" I can do here. Another good tool when learning where to locate all of the information. Cons: For departments housing only human resource and payroll employees, the reporting is a very slow process to learn. While there are many courses offered, majority of which are online which is more difficult during the initial transition. The Rapid Response is not so rapid. You call in to log a case and wait for someone to call you back. Unless you are completely locked out of production, you could be waiting a long time for a return call. Logging a case on the website is not much faster. However there you are able to fully describe your issue and attach any documents needed to be examined. Recommendations to other buyers: If you are considering using the service of UltiPro I would definitely recommend you to pay to have your essential reports be custom built for you before launching. This will give you time to study those, take classes and participate in discussions in order to better learn how to locate what you need for your reports. It will require an individual with a report writing background. Most all of your reports work off of building expressions. Prior to the launch, I would highly recommend an in-house launch team that is the most proficient with UltiPro and able to help others internally. Comments: We began with UltiPro at the end of this summer, going from an antiquated HRIS system to what we (correctly) thought would be a significant upgrade. And while the cost does reflect that; and it is an upgrade; it has been an extremely rough road getting there. Technical issues, the amount of data required (most of it being a manual entry, in part to our antiquated system we were on before) and the level of depth you will go into building this system is outrageous. Each "silo" was assigned a technical SME who helped us build the program. Everything is incredibly customizable and easy to change once it is set up. Pros: Assigned help along the way, so you knew who your person was. You can build a system to your liking. Makes some functionalities very easy, like building out an "opportunity" or requisition. The system has some great possibilities and can support a lot of different functions through customizable reports. A lot of integrations into external vendor systems that make background checks, job posting, benefits, 401K very easy. Once it is BUILT, I can see how easy it will be to use. Cons: Each "silo" of the UltiPro function is usually created by that department - recruiting builds out recruiting and onboarding, payroll builds payroll, TD builds performance, etc. Problem is that WE, the builders, don't usually know how the other team will build their system so often times they don't talk well. You build it over a series of meetings with your SME, with can make it disjointed to build. There is a different SME for each function, so if I want to build a report that pulls from my onboarding module, I have to talk to a different SME because the onboarding SME doesn't know Business Intelligence SME. Building it is a second full-time job for your team. We had to build out own training for our employees on how to use the system because each system is so customizable, you won't have a packaged training you can plop in front of your employees. Recommendations to other buyers: Get help during the build phase. You will have so many homework assignments to complete, we pulled in two contractors and I don't know how we cold have done it without them. Have team meetings with your own internal team to discuss how you are building your module. Get a strong Project Manager to divide out the duties you will have, like the classes you will have to take and the time you will invest into building the modules. It is intense. Pros: Been using this site now for our clocking in and out at work for 5+ years. Very easy to use. Site has never been down, always up and works. The site is speedy to navigate. Allows me to easily and quickly log in and out. Allows me to pick easily pick my insurance every year and has all the information I need on the site. Allows me to quickly get a brief overview how many sick/personal/vacation days I have and will earn. Can hop in and request days off very easily and then view a yearly calendar to see what I have already added in the future and the past. We also use this for our performance reviews. Not a fan of those but the site makes it work OK. Site times out at 30 minutes and it gives you a countdown before it gets there, so it makes it easy for me to see when to clock back in for lunch. I can also view my paycheck stubs here. It is very nice to have access to all of this in one location. I also hear it integrates with AD credentials but we have not implemented that. I have used other HR websites such as Kronos and this one is so much easier to use. Cons: Honestly I cannot think of anything negative to say about the website. I have never had a problem with it. Overall: Allows me to view all my HR information all in one location. Hi Jamie, thank you so much for sharing with us. We're thrilled to hear you are enjoying your experience. We hope you have a wonderful day! UltiPro - Everyone Should Use It! Pros: UltiPro by far has the best customer service and training I've experienced (I've used ADP, Ceridian and SilkRoad products in the past). The system is user friendly and intuitive and customizable to meet our needs. In addition, the company truly cares about customer feedback - and works to implement solutions quickly. It's an all around solid HR system, with many modules that integrate to give you some great functionality and workflow. Cons: I hate to truly list a "con" here as I know Ulti is constantly working to improve their products. I would say though that the Recruiting tool needs continuous ramping up to become a true competitive ATS system. It's working for us now, but we need more from it. The GREAT thing is that every month Ulti is rolling out new features and updates to this module. I'm confident they will continue to enhance this product and make it a great tool for us. Overall: UltiPro has helped us integrate our 2000+ decentralized workforce into one HR system. We have a lot of HR users in our locations that are resistant to change, but we have been able to prove to them what Ulti can do for them and the time it can save. We use Ulti for HR, Payroll, Benefits, Open Enrollment/Life Events, Recruiting, Onboarding, Performance Management and Time and Attendance. It's great to have all of this in one system, with easily reportable data. As a decentralized workforce, we have many customizations. Ulti can handle all of them with ease. I truly can't say enough good things about the product, and the company. UltiPro is the primary UI that I use to access all my personal work information. Pros: UltiPro is an easy to use Software that provides me with easy access to all work related information. The mobile application is great when I am on the go and need to get access to a quick piece of information. It allows me to view all my tax information as well as insurance information. It allows me to export W2 and W4 information when doing my taxes and does so in an easy way. Cons: I would say the biggest Con for the software is the mobile app does have some missing features of that compared to the PC software. On the mobile app I am not able to access some features that normally I would be able to. Other than that I do not have many Cons for this software if anymore at all. Overall: I am able to keep track of my personal work information in one convenient software and mobile app. It allows me to view my payment history, my PTO statuses and many other things. I like being able to view all this information in one easy to use software. Hi Nathan, thank you for your feedback. We're thrilled to hear you are enjoying our Mobile App! I cannot wait to share your insights with the Mobile App team - they will be thrilled! If you don't mind, would you be willing to share your mobile experience on the Mobile App Store of your choice? Further, I did see you your request for more Mobile-specific features. I just wanted to let you know that Mobile App features are determined by an organization's HR department. It's possible there are features available that you may not have access to. If there are any specific features of interest, feel free to let your HR team know! Thanks for taking the time to leave us feedback. We value your insights and hope to continue providing you with a great experience. Have a wonderful day! Pros: I like the fact that we are able to customize and build the software package to our needs. The software has some amazing functionality that work well for our business. I like the vendor because the value of the company being "people first" shows in the way they care for their employees. I think that filters down to the customers. Cons: I would like Ultimate to finish things that need to be corrected that are known system flaws before they move on to new technology. It would be comforting to know as the system administrator that the system processed right from beginning to end before all the other "cool" features come out. Also, I wish the project focus was for system users first and then the employee user. Example, they listened to customers when we asked for the ability to change labels. That is great and the employee users are happy about that. But then they stopped the project without thinking what the system user would need. It is simple when you think about it. Everything that goes into Ulti - we have to report on. So that label project should have included those label changes in BI. Now the reports and the system will not match. Can you imagine having your payroll staff turn over and then trying to run a report based on names you don't have in system because the staff before you used the label edit feature? Nightmare. Recommendations to other buyers: Ask about skill level of staffing needed to run this software and also needed for implementation. The ability to customize is great, but someone has to be able to support it. Pros: Ultipro has the type of versatility and customization features needed for small and large companies alike. It's highly customizable so that you can use it for all of your HRIS needs. What I like most about Ultipro is the integration across multiple facets. Your employees' files are stored electronically and the permissions you give the employees allow you to use the system to track and approve changes to position, title, pay, benefits and employees can change their address and names, all electronically. Cons: Ultipro's customer service is probably the worst feature as getting anything changed or having to troubleshoot issues can take more time than you have, especially within a large corporation. Hi there, thank you for your feedback. We're thrilled to hear you enjoy our unified HCM. I do see you have some concerns and just wanted to let you know I have shared them with the team to help us improve. If you have any additional insights you would like to provide, feel free to reach out to feedback@ultimatesoftware.com. I hope you have a wonderful day! So much capability, so hard to navigate! Pros: Ultipro has a ton of options of what is available to you; I've seen it now in two different companies. In both scenarios, the capabilities of the software were not utilized to their fullest extent. It looks as if Ultipro can do far more than either used it for. The load times and menus for initially finding information are fast to navigate. Information on different pages is presented clear as well. PDFs and other files generated by the system load fast. Cons: The presentation of the material, menus, hotlinks, etc. is unwieldy and jumbled. It is hard to sort through all of the pages past initial launch ones. Drop down menus, if you move your mouse off of them, disappear; in 2019 that doesn't make sense. The ease of use is definitely missing. As mentioned, too, I've seen it in two scenarios, one with a company of 2000+ and one with around 200 employees. All of the features are not used and yet you can still open up menus and pages that do not have relevant information; if thats the system, it needs to be fixed, if its the user/moderator of the business, they need to be encouraged to get rid of it from the systems administrator from Ultipro. Just not an easy and clean tool to use. The Time Clock tool as an employee is very difficult to use, too; multiple pages/clicks to get to basic information is overkill. Even then, it has a very mid-range power user feel to it... if you don't know what you're doing you may break it! Overall: Overall, if you are only looking for basic information as an employee its easy; find paychecks, find personal info, etc. As a long-term solution, unless you do a great job of training and modifying the tools and menus, its easy to get lost; both because of the interface is not clean and it has too many options. Pros: It is very easy to navigate when you're searching for some info on your health benefits, and looking for other higher up employees if you have issues you need to report such as conflicts with other employees. It list everyone above you without having to ask your manager for email addresses from say the person who handles HR issues. Cons: Nothing I have always found it easy to navigate and if you can't figure something out say for instance logging into some of our companies intranet websites for training and other purposes it has a step by step solution for anything you can think of company related. Overall: My experience with UltiPro has always been great for the 4 1/2 years I've been with PSAV (Presentation Services Audio Visual). The old way we used to ask off for days from work was writing it on paper and then submitting to your Director of Operations. Now you just log in to UltiPro and go to scheduling, and then click on time off request and submit. It is so much easier than how we had to do it 4 years ago before they introduced UltiPro to our intranet websites. Pros: It's nice to be able to view an employee's information via a report. I recognize that you won't be able to gather all the info but having a consolidated PDF generated makes some of my duties a bit easier to begin with. I also really like the modules that accompanies UltiPro. We've used the main modules such as Payroll and Attendance, but it's nice to have things like Recruitment and Workforce Analytics as well. As an aside, I think that UltiPro has pretty strong online customer support. I've almost always found a resolution within a business day or so. Cons: It can seem a bit... redundant at time. I feel like some features that I have to go through should have already been expressed to another person, and I shouldn't have to input them again. For example, the time-sheet feature feels like it can be incorporated to add minute schedule changes and unexpected TO off a bit better. Also, some of my team says it's a bit tricky for them to find pay-stubs or that it might be delayed in showing up, but I've personally never had that happen. Overall: I've been on both the end user and HR setup sides of UltiPro, so I have multiple opinions on it. For the most part, I can see how HR and management likes it. UltiPro cuts down on a lot of manual lookup and integrates many tools and features into one package. And if you're an employee who really only uses it for time&attendance, then it's not really a big change. For the most part, I like using UltiPro and it's a solid HR MS that helps me manage my team in a more concise manner. Ultimate Software has allowed us to leverage their technology to enhance and improve our internal HR/PR functions to not only handle the day to day, but also be strategic in what we do for our internal and external clients. Comments: Ultimate has been a good business partner. They listen to our feedback and truly partner with us in our business initiatives; even if the answer is no they work with us to find other alternatives to help us achieve our business goal. Pros: We most like the Business Intelligence reporting and ease of navigation throughout the product. We like the ability to configure fields and screens to meet our specific needs. We are very pleased with the ability to have a paperless onboarding experience for our new hires and also configure the onboarding process to meet our business needs. We also appreciate the ability to provide feedback on product enhancements and see that Ultimate listens and responds to that feedback. Cons: We would like the enhancements requested to come a little quicker to market, but understand some of these enhancements do take time. We would like to see a more consistent response time in Customer Service. Pros: The delivered product has loads of functionality that is immediately ready to use. The portal is very easy for employees to navigate and very little training is needed to get started. Ultimate Software also provides all of their training free of charge with the subscription, this is a huge help in developing your support team and super users. Ultimate takes customer feedback seriously & puts significant releases in place twice a year. There are normally around 100 user suggestions implemented each year in the releases. Cons: The Benefits module is not very robust and electronic open enrollment works well, but the confirmation statements are very clunky. Also while the support from every Ultimate team is always very friendly, they can be very slow and it is not uncommon for you to have to escalate requests in order to get programmers to respond to emails. Pros: I like the various functions that Ultipro is capable of. From payroll, Time clock and time off control, keeping a database of employees positions, salaries, name, address, email address, PTO and Personal Day bank and actual time clock. There is an applicant tracking system but we don't use it at this point. Cons: There is a lack of support from the Ultimate software team. Any requests for service take an inordinate length of time. (months). The service is then not done correctly. We had file feeds giving our 3rd party providers wrong dates of employment, number of hours worked incorrectly. So we had to manually update this provider with the correct information. This delayed our employees getting approved for Family Medical Leave Act and Short Term Disability. When contactly Ultimate, they were not accommodating in getting the file feeds corrected, even though it was their fault. The initial launch of Ultipro was rough as well. Wrong data and mistakes in the files with Ultimate Software Team unaccommodating. Pros: As a user - The categories are pretty easy to find - and labeled well so that you know what you're going to find under each category. You can add Favorites - so places that you go frequently, so that you don't have to drill into the categories to get to them. I'm also an administrator of certain data - so being able to take care of things for other staff is also easy and manageable as well. You can even get notifications that what you do is taken care of as a user and as an administrator. Cons: There is one limitation to the product that I notice and deal with - it is for me the limitation of field length (amount of characters per field). You have to be creative when you're setting up items in dropdown lists for staff to be able to choose from and still be able to push across what they're choosing. I love the UltiPro experience. Pros: The UltiPro user interface is intuitive,easily customizable ,easy to navigate and i have been impressed with how UltiPro has continuously improved over the years ,with new features being added regularly. UltiPro has been superb for my team as a tool for time keeping. Cognos analytic is a stand out tool on UltiPro , and simplifies the process of reporting on our payroll. I like the standardized report ,and the freedom to edit the names and modify them to fit our business need is priceless. Cons: Ultipro's workflows are very limited . I will like the user interface remodeled in a way that we are able to view the "compensation-history" from one page , for every staff in the organization. Hi Yeni, thank you so much for the kind words. We're thrilled to hear you enjoy our business analytics features. Have a great day! Pros: There are so many modules to Ultimate that we haven't even had the opportunity or time to fully implement yet! We keep hearing about something we haven't learned about yet and are excited to ask questions and find out where we can put that module in our roll out schedule! Cons: I was excited (and very relieved) to hear about the structure changes that recently occurred within the Ultimate staff. When we have a problem, we don't necessarily have time to wait for our request to be "kicked up" to second tier or third tier. Especially when we're "in the weeds" processing a payroll. Putting thru a case doesn't necessarily mean we're going to hear from someone soon enough to get our payroll run completed on time. Having a "no tier" system is a much better way to handle these issues. Recommendations to other buyers: My biggest recommendation is to be ready to be overwhelmed with all the available modules Ultimate has in their suite. Also - be fully cognizant this is a system YOU will be setting up ... in it's entirety ... and you will need to have staff members knowledgeable on the various components you wish to implement. EX: If you have a very complex taxation situation (multi-tax employees), you will want to have a tax specialist on your team. A good third party company to help you implement AND continue on in a consulting environment would be the next best thing. Pros: The visual layout of Ultipro makes managing time, payments, and benefits simple and easy to understand. The layout menu that shows all your options is an additional reminder to pay attention to important dates and to keep track of hours logged. I receive emails from Ultipro about managing time and paydates which I find extremely useful. Complicated documents are easy to pull up - I never feel like I'm forgetting to do something important with Ultipro. Cons: Although Ultipro provides many options for managing time, pay, and career goals, it's hard to work outside the guidelines put down for it. This has only come up a few times, when I've wanted to request unpaid time off but the layout only suggests that I can take paid time off. However, Ultipro provides so many options that this is not a common problem. Overall: Ultipro has worked very well with managing time from both desktop and mobile devices and provides many options to work with. It is a good fit for someone who does not want to spend too much time setting up a time/payment program and would like a lot of options already loaded. Using Ultipro has made time and pay management easy and understandable for me. I am very happy with UltiPro and all that it has to offer, including the robust reporting tool, Business Intelligence. Comments: The support staff at Ultimate Software are very friendly, great to work with and knowledgeable about the product. Pros: I like the updates to the program because it enhances the work that we do. One of the more recent updates was the Smart Tax Search. It is a feature that returns tax codes when an employee enters their address. Really cool feature for payroll! I also like the reporting tool, Business Intelligence. Reporting is one of the key functions of my role and we use the reports for upper management as well as to process payroll. Cons: We switched to UltiPro from ADP in 2010 and it was difficult to make that transition. I believe that Ultimate Software could have provided detailed written instructions as well as live personnel to assist with the switch. It may be different now. Ultipro meets all our needs. Comments: Ultipro meets all our needs and then some. The customer service we experience from this company cannot be compared. Our CSR is an amazing person and if she cannot fix something, she finds someone who can. Timely. With a great attitude. I have never found that kind of support with any other company I worked with. If a payroll problem crops up, they have a dedicated line for that, realizing payroll is very deadline driven. Pros: Ease of use, tons of virtual training available, top notch customer service, customization available. Ease of use for employees. Import and Export integration. Reports readily available both in Ultipro Web and Cognos. Report writing ability available. Dashboards available. SSO configurable. Integrated Tax Setup. Cons: We are a large enterprise, some of the modules are for smaller customers. Tax recon can be a bit cumbersome, but manageable. Comments: Overall UltiPro is a superb product that has many different modules to meet the demands of growing companies. From payroll, time and attendance, and benefit administration, UltiPro can help lead the way to drive efficiency and promote a better experience for administrators and employees. Pros: The ease of which one can use UltiPro is second to none! The user experience is easy to navigate and they are constantly adding new features. The extensive modules that are available under the Human Capital Management umbrella like benefits, applicant tracking, time and attendance, compensation management, and more! Excellent customer service 24/7. Cons: The mobile app integration and functionality needs some work, mainly with push notifications. The ability to make global or batch changes on groups of employees is very difficult, if not impossible. It can be difficult to understand the reporting features, you must build your own as the provided template reports just don't cut it. Comments: The UltiPro product that Ultimate Software has provided us is great. Our HR department is able to provide numerous departments real-time and historic reports in minutes. We can schedule reports as well so that everyone has what they need every moment of the day. The product has grown with us as we have grown as a Firm. Pros: Reporting; All in one solution including Payroll, Performance Management, Recruiting, Onboarding, Benefits; UltiPro listens to customers for changes to the software and puts it into its quarterly updates; cloud based; Customer service availability and response; mobile application; ease of use for administrators and end users; training is free. Cons: There is nothing that I can really think of at this time. UltiPro has so many positive attributes and there just not any negative. Comments: Overall, Ultipro is a pretty solid software and it is an extremely vital tool that adds great value to companies looking for payroll and other Human resources solutions. Pros: Ultipro does a great job to not only provide solutions for a company's payroll but is an extremely helpful and intuitive tool for managing employee benefits and showing pay history, PTO balances, tax forms all in one place. Cons: One of the downsides of Ultipro is that it sometimes the way it is configured in such that the information it is providing is not real time and is contingent on when the time sheets are actually posted to the accounting system. An employee does not have the ability to check real time pay history or tax information unless that period is completely processed. Pros: We didn't have an HRIS system at all and had over 1,000 employees. Getting a system is better than nothing. We are paperless in the onboarding of new employees which has saved me a lot of tracking down of I9s like we used to have to do. The onboarding has been a great asset for new hires - they can complete all policy forms before starting as well as complete direct deposit, I9, W4 info. That has been very beneficial and new hires say that impressed them! Pros: We converted to this system in January 2016 and were 100% paper. Two years later and we are almost 100% paperless. This system has a number of resources that allow you to structure your organization. Cons: The overall conversion process was confusing because we were coming into a system that was already setup. The integration team assumed that we knew everything about the system and several functions were setup incorrectly. However, after they were found it was fairly simple to fix. Overall: UltiPro has completely changed to the way we as a company perform. Everything is more streamlined and allows us to track the progress electronically versus attempting to reach out via phone. The system has allowed us a company to move forward with a paperless movement. Comments: I have found the customer service to be very good. I appreciate that I can activate a case online, describing my need/issue in detail, so that when a customer service rep responds to the case, they have the background needed to research and call with an answer versus tons of questions. I find the response time to be good, typically same day or next day response. Pros: Thorough, integrated, and fairly easy to use system with a very powerful reporting tool. System is very powerful and Ultimate offers online learning opportunities but it still takes a time commitment to learn the system. Cons: This is a payroll system first, HCM second so the focus is on employees paid through payroll. No ability to track positions (vacancies) unless you are actively recruiting. The online learning modules are easy but not quite as thorough as needed to connect the dots between modules so it's a good thing they have good customer service. Pros: 1. I find Ultipro to be very user friendly for both admins and our employees. 2. The ability to import one time earnings into the payroll gateway saves a ton of time. 3. By having Ulitpro file our taxes for us, we are able to save time. 4. Their customer service is amazing. When something is urgent, I get it resolved within an hour, at most. If you are considering transitioning to UltiPro, be extremely cautious. Pros: Please ignore the "Pros" and "Cons" headers. This review was written as a whole. My company transferred from PayChex to UltiPro in mid-2018. To be fair to UltiPro, the undersigned was not present for any kind of sales pitch, and is not familiar with any of the promises that were made by the UltiPro reps to our company executives. The decision to make the transition was executed without the knowledge or input of the undersigned, who handles approximately 220 employees in a fast-paced, 24-hours-a-day, 7-days-a-week, high-turnover retail operation. Most of our employees are hourly entry-level retail staff. The transition was extremely painful, and we received very poor support from the UltiPro transition team, all the while trying to run the regular, already-demanding day-to-day business of our 24/7 organization. Their "support" consisted of providing us with a number of empty spreadsheets, and expecting us to extract an excruciating amount of employee data from PayChex and enter it into their spreadsheet in their alien format. Again, the undersigned was not present for any sales pitch. I would strongly advise any company considering a transition of this kind to insist that UltiPro shoulder the burden of the transition i.e. give them full and complete access to any information retained by your previous payroll/HR provider, and insist that they and their team transfer the data. Confidentiality of information, while always a concern, should not be an issue - UltiPro is going to have the same information retained by your current payroll provider regardless of who transfers the data. Even in a perfect world, where UltiPro shouldered the burden as described above, some additional work is bound to fall upon your shoulders. In my case, a perfect example was the implementation of a more automated paid-time-off (PTO) accrual system and accompanying PTO request/tracking system. Our company had always done this manually, meaning that the undersigned would have to calculate each qualifying employee's vacation and/or sick leave time and submit it to UltiPro. Calculation and submission of this information to UltiPro through their spreadsheet was a considerable but gladly-accepted chore, given the expected benefit of an automated PTO system. A spreadsheet was completed and submitted to UltiPro for implementation into their system. Several months later, while preparing to go "live", UltiPro informed the undersigned that they would need updated PTO totals. I always love to spend hour upon hour repeating tedious, mind-numbing work. But we're not done yet: After going live & receiving numerous calls from frustrated employees complaining that they were receiving errors whenever they attempted to request vacation time, the undersigned discovered that most of the PTO balances submitted to the UltiPro transition team in the spreadsheets had not accurately transferred into the UltiPro "TIME" module. Almost all of my employees had a balance of zero. The UltiPro transition team's assurance that they would manually compare the spreadsheet with the balances and make the appropriate corrections went unfulfilled, whether due to technical or human error, and one of the undersigned's co-workers was tasked with checking each of the balances one-by-one. Cons: Another major disappointment with UltiPro is the number of different modules. There is the UltiPro CORE module. There is the UltiPro TIME module. There is the UltiPro TIME OFF AND ALLOWANCE module. There is the UltiPro BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE Module. There is the UltiPro CUSTOMER SUCCESS PORTAL, which not only requires a separate login and password, but UltiPro recommends you use the Internet Explorer browser when utilizing it, while recommending the Google Chrome browser for the others. The separate modules leave plenty to be desired in the transfer of information between them i.e. a change to any one piece of employee data may be require multiple entries - one for each module. Multiple modules also mean multiple different departments you may need to contact if you have an urgent issue you need resolved. If you are hoping (as I was) that UltiPro would mean only one phone number or one representative that could handle any of your customer service issues, forget it. Another major disappointment: with the transition from PayChex to UltiPro, we went from having a payroll processing deadline of 4pm for next-day delivery to a payroll processing deadline of 12pm for second-day delivery of hard-copy paychecks. To be fair, every time the undersigned has failed to meet this infeasible deadline (to wit: every single payroll), UltiPro has been able to get the checks to us on the 2nd day following completion. But if a holiday falls between completion of your payroll and your company payday, your employees will not see their hard-copy paychecks until the 3rd day following completion. Another: their inability to customize the interface for our company's needs vs. the needs of all their other clients. Example: while entering newly-hired employee data into their system, there are (as would be reasonably expected) a multitude of data fields to complete: i.e. name, SSN, address, hourly rate, etc. etc. One of the necessary fields UltiPro requires for every employee is TIME ZONE. Our company only operates in the U.S. central time zone. Can the system be set up so that this field automatically defaults to U.S. Central Standard Time? Nope. Why not? Because other UltiPro clients operate in other time zones, or in multiple time zones. Repeat this "because our other clients" answer for a substantial number of other required data fields. It's simply more chances for things to be entered incorrectly; more invitations for other complications and issues. Another: as issues, difficulties or complications arise, UltiPro expects you reduce the problem you are having to writing for entry into their separate CUSTOMER SUCCESS PORTAL, where you receive a claim number, and hopefully a response of some kind within 24 hours. Describing an issue in writing is often challenging & time-consuming, depending upon the complexity of the issue, even for someone with exceptional writing skills. If you're lucky, your problem might have an easy solution. If not, you might engage in a friendly little game of phone tag over the course of the next few days. I'm sure UltiPro loves this complaint system, as it most likely serves to discourage complaints or service requests from being made at all. To be fair, there is an UltiPro Rapid Response phone number, but they ask that you use this line only for urgent matters affecting a payroll with a payday within 72 hours of your call. I have yet to experience the standard end-of-year duties and chores with our new UltiPro system. I'm sure it will be an absolute delight, all things considered. I'm afraid. Very afraid. Please keep me in your thoughts and prayers, and if you are considering making this transition, BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL. Thank you for taking the time to leave us with feedback. We¿re really sorry to hear about your experience with us. It seems like there are many things to address, and I would love to assist in improving your experience. If you're interested in working with me on this, please email me at feedback@ultimatesoftware.com. I hope you have a wonderful day and look forward to hearing from you soon. Pros: UltiPro has helped our company transition from a mainframe and many paper processes seamlessly. We can now offer employee self service (and transparency), quick report building and generating, process improvement for performance management, a candidate friendly experience and endless possibilities for enabling future functionality (mobile, LMS, etc). Cons: We are not crazy about the salary planning feature. It is a little clunky for our organization and we wish it was as easy as it is to distribute reviews. This can certainly be improved upon and Ultimate Software listens to their customers, so I think it will be in the future. Pros: UltiPro is very user friendly. The implementation process is very thorough and the specialists make sure you know how to do what you need to do before they let you go on your own. There are always tutorials and trainings to take if things are unclear or if you forget how to do something. They are very supportive. There are many modules/packages to fit every company's needs. The staff are great and it goes all the way up to upper management/CEO. Cons: It can get very pricey but they work with you to fill your needs the best they can. Certain things that might sound simple may be a custom, which does cost extra. I really loved this HRIS system. It was innovative and kind of a one stop shop. Pros: I loved being able to keep payroll and other human resource information in the same system. I also loved being able to post jobs and gather applications from this resource. Cons: The worst part about this system was the changeover and start up. The customer service was not great and it seemed like the turnover for that company during our transition was really high and a lot of communication was lost. Overall: I loved the experience of launching a different HRIS system and I really appreciated having so much information all in one system. Hi Angie, thank you for your feedback! We're happy to hear you are enjoying our unified HRIS! I'm sorry to hear that implementation was tedious. We actually have been working on a new process to help improve this for new customers. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I have shared your comments with the team to help us improve. I hope you have a wonderful day! Pros: I used Ultipro at my most recent job and I loved having quick online access to my pay stubs, benefits, etc. I was able to enroll in benefits very easily and I received my W-2 much faster by opting in for an electronic document. Having this platform even helped me during a busy time in my life where I had to find a new apartment and purchase a car within the same week (job moved). Having proof of income on hand at all times is one of the best benefits of having Ultipro. I can get whatever I need without adding anything to HR or Accounting's workload. Cons: The worst part about having Ultipro had shown itself around review time. The platform was absolutely not intuitive and the entire company had a hard time submitting reviews. The way the questions were worded was so odd and the instructions were so vague and unclear. We eventually had to move the due date for reviews and give all of the managers an additional 30 days to complete reviews because no one knew what to do. It was ridiculous. Hi Brittney, thank you for your feedback. We value your insights and appreciate you taking the time to share your experience. Have a wonderful day! Pros: Ultipro best trait is the ability to customize the settings or features in a way to mold it on how the business works.This is a very intuitive tool, that even our non tech people can manage and control their own data and find everything they need on UltiPro. The cloud provides a real-time information including reports and dashboards that has the ability for employees to be able to navigate seamlessly and manage their information is made an impact. Very easy to use. Cons: Very limited on the workflow process in web based. Some features are slower than other, not sure if its because the data is too much. This are small bumps compared to the benefits that this tool offers, so overall it doesn't have too many flaws. Overall: It help us speed the payroll process by 45% more fast. Pros: We use UltiPro for our payroll and benefits administration. As an employee, I've found this software to be user-friendly and easy to navigate. The web-based portal provides step by step instructions for me to update my benefits and payroll deductions and also provides detailed guidance for annual benefit elections. I also really appreciate that I can go into my Ultipro account and manually update my direct deposit instructions if there's ever a time when I want to split part of my paycheck between multiple financial institutions. Within Ultipro I can select either a fixed dollar amount or even a percentage of my paycheck to be split between accounts. Cons: As with any payroll software, there are some limitations. I have found that Ultipro does not process payroll information quite as quickly as I would like, specifically, they issue the end of year W-2 data much later than other payroll systems that I have used. Pros: Intuitive look and feel for Core and some of the other modules. I don't think UTM's layout / screens are intuitive to the end-user, Requesting PTO, etc. Cons: UTM - as mentioned above. Performance Management in terms of when employees transfer from one manager to another during the process. Webinars/documentation in the learning center sometimes don't tell you everything you need to know. We have learned the hard way many times. Maybe have a "Tips"/ "Things to consider" or Keep in Mind" documents. I find that I create my own UltiPro functionality document containing this information because it wasn't mentioned in any webinar or documentation. And, again, it's because I/managers/employees learned the hard way. We would much rather be prepared before we roll out a process or module rather than always reacting to it after the fact. Recommendations to other buyers: Continue to ask the questions that don't get discussed in the webinars. Like, what are the best practices, how are other companies solving these issues, what is the impact of....., what limitations are there, what can I expect if...., what else do I need to know? Pros: There is a million things you can do on Ulti Pro. There are plenty of canned reports that I find useful as well as the ability to create your own reports based on your specific company needs. Customer service is excellent. Cons: At times, it can be difficult to navigate through. There is so much information and tools that it can be hard to sort through. I will say although the customer service is great, the ulti pro university training page is hard to know what you want to sign up for and when. There are tours or actually online courses you can take but it is not very clear what you are signing up for. Pros: The ability to add many different HR items on 1 site. Cons: Sometimes the software runs a little slow but it usually doesn't last long. Overall: I can't say enough good things about Ultipro. This system is by far the easiest HR system I have ever used. As an end user - I find it EXTREMELY helpful to have the ability to log into 1 site for all my HR related needs. From obtaining yearly W-2s, viewing weekly pay stubs., or updating direct deposit or benefit options is user friendly and not much training required at all. Recommendations to other buyers: I would keep doing what they are doing! Great product thanks! Hi Jaqui, thank you for providing us with feedback. We're thrilled to hear you are enjoying your experience with us. Have a great day! Company that CARES about its users! Pros: I like that UltiPro asks for and implements features that its users ask for. They are constantly finding ways to improve the system and make it more relevant and user-friendly. Most HRIS/Payroll systems don't ask for feedback and even more rare is when they actually implement it. Our company had 3 suggestions implemented within the first year of being with them. I love UltiPro and have been a customer for over 7 years with multiple companies. Cons: No system is perfect, but for the price and the caring that they provide it more than outweighs the minor irritations that all systems have. Easy to use, great customer support. Company is always looking at ways to improve and update. Pros: All of your HRIS info in one spot. Easy to locate and add documentation. Graphs, reports and so much more. In the process of implementing onboarding to make the experience easier for new hires. Cons: Would like to use other features and programs. The cost is a little high. Have not been able to get upper management onboard yet. Will keep trying. Overall: Being able to put all of our employee information into one system is fantastic. We are able to run reports, input training as well as confidential paperwork. Paperless is so much easier than keeping track or loosing the info. The programmer's are always looking at ways to improve the system and add more features. Comments: I think this product has a lot of bells and whistles. Like most software products, we are not utilizing all the great features. Sometimes it is frustrating to get a correct answer when calling in for specific questions. I like the product - I think it is easy to use. Cons: That sometimes the added modules do not work seamlessly with the Core product. That everything has to go through a 'case' when simple questions can be answered quickly. Recommendations to other buyers: Make sure you define your needs and set up a plan to implement new functions in stages. Make sure you get your structure defined from the beginning and think of future growth and needs and what you will need for reporting. Cons: same complaint I have with all solutions of this kind: too many unnecessary steps. Ultipro (like all others) could be simplified and streamlined. Overall: Having used several competitors in this space, Ultipro provided a clear advantage in terms of simplicity, functionality & overall value. I (hopefully) will never have to use another. Hi Travis, Thank you for providing us with feedback. We're happy to hear you are enjoying your experience with us. We appreciate the kind words you shared. Have a great day! Pros: I like that it's easy to use and I can favorite certain items to keep on my dashboard for easy clicking. Cons: Submitting Paid Time Off requests was a nightmare. It often times messed up what I was trying to do, and it almost always gave some sort of error. Overall: I used it every day for four years and I got used to it. Despite how used to it I was, it still gave me issues with small things like PTO requests. That being said, they also made some helpful updates that made life easier. Before the updates, it would allow me to clock on or off twice by mistake, but after the updates it gave a warning saying "you've already clocked on" if you tried to clock on again. Nifty. Comments: A lot of features you will be sold and shown at a demo will make you think it's amazing, but in the end they will UltiMately not work as they take a lot of maintenance and training to utilize...meaning they won't be used or liked. Basic reports are missing, and the number of errors are terrible. Changing a person's title and who they report to failed all the time. My own title did not change in 2 years in UltiPro even after I had 2 promotions. Why? UltiPro couldn't get it to. My employee had a vacation request from 2013 that UltiPro could not delete....the biggest problem with that is he didn't work there in 2013 and UltiPro wasn't installed till 2014. That request is still on his account after multiple support tickets. Pros: The interface is clean and friendly looking, menus look intuitive, but once you think you are where you need to be, you have to go to a different menu to actually access what you need. Easy to approve request and approve vacation from employees. Approving time was simple as well. Pros: I like the easy to use menu option, the punch in time card is easy to access. Although we use a different software for my benefits, I can still access the link through this software application. It is very clean and easy to read, visually appealing. It also has a "most recently used" drop down menu which is very nice because I usually just use about 3 different tabs within that menu daily and then the rest of the tabs I use maybe once a month. Cons: The accruals section is a bit confusing to navigate as a user. The customer service works on a case system which is usually always a slow response time. Overall: Benefits is that it allows us to become an electronic and we can focus on improving and streamlining processes into the system for tracking/reporting. Pros: I like that the product is extremely adaptable to the many changes HR often has to make in order to comply with laws and regulations. Our vendor keeps up-to-date with the changes and is proactive in adapting the software to accommodate the changes. Cons: Sometimes the cost factor for entering data is a bit pricy for our organization. I least like that some of the data (that we chose to enter ourselves) can be tedious to enter (e.g., college information). However, I am sure if we wanted to pay the cost, we could have the vendor enter the data. Recommendations to other buyers: I recommend that when others are evaluating software, it is very important to find out how adaptable the software is to changing laws and regulations. I know that when the regulations for healthcare was instituted, I knew many organizations that were trying to adjust their HRIS software and found it difficult. Most ended up purchasing new software. Whereas, with Ultipro, they were so proactive in updating their software to comply with the regulations, that when the time came for our organization to comply, all I had to do was "push a button". I had no stress!!! Comments: UltiPro is a single source cloud-based software that meets all of our needs. In addition to significantly reducing the paper trail on HR, Payroll and Benefit functions, the business intelligence reporting capabilities provides unlimited access to data stored in UltiPro. The software is user friendly for both administrators and employees. Our employees appreciate having quick access to their payroll records, W-2s, benefit elections and personnel data via the web and the personal UltiPro app. Cons: We're a small company so the use of vendor feeds to manage our benefit enrollments and changes were not helpful to us. Pros: I love the ability to see your timesheet and paystub in one program. I love being able to go into your timesheet and adjust your hours in the event you forgot to clock in. Cons: I wish there was a way to see all the PTO requests for my team members. Often times, if I knew that my team members already have a certain day off or have put in requests for a certain week I would know to look for alternate days off. Overall: This makes tracking my PTO and work hours so easy! I don't have to try and track my hours on a spreadsheet...I can see all of my previous timesheets and current weeks hours in Ultipro. Comments: I really like the product and wish I had more time to learn and test the system. I am the only person on my team, from conversion left with the organization. That creates it's own challenges as I am the primary payroll processer and report writer. Cons: I don't like that we have to pay for some add on features per user. I understand that this is a software company but sometimes the development is really cool and would be a great add on, but organizationally we are not able to pay for this feature. Pros: Has provided time savings related to payroll; good to have all data in one place - benefits, HR, payroll; we have both US and Canadian employees and were looking for a software that would provide services for both and UltiPro has served us well in this regard. Appreciate the high level of security standards. Account Manager is responsive. I've sent staff to Connections and have heard very positive reports. Cons: e-Recruit has been problematic for us and though a new platform is being released this year it was slow to come. It's also been very frustrating when we've wanted any modifications that these were always "customs" and we were charged an hourly rate to make these modifications. We also experienced delays in receiving these "custom" fixes, at times the work being scheduled months down the road. This aspect was far from clear when we entered into the contract. Recommendations to other buyers: Ask to speak with companies/organizations similar to yourself and ask specific questions about what has worked well or not so well.
2019-04-19T21:35:30Z
https://www.capterra.com/p/480/UltiPro/
This chapter positions the current research problem on the existing literature of strategic management in the police force. With much of the focus in this study being to explore how the adoption of specialised strategy in the ADP has impacted on its performance, literature drawn from different databases would be reviewed to explore the concept of strategy and strategic management, which will be linked to operations in the police force. Emergence of innovations through specialised strategies in the police departments would be reviewed. Along with these, the key theories that can be used to explain the need for specialised strategy in the police force and the subsequent effect on the performance in the police department. One of the outstanding approaches of specialised strategy in the police force is through specialised training, which would also be highlighted in this review. Moreover, the key performance indicators and parameters that are mostly adopted in the police force are also brought into focus in this chapter. In addition, they empirical researches conducted across the world with regard to specialised strategy and performance in the police department. Throughout the review, potential gaps in literature are pointed out, which will guide the researcher in the development of conceptual framework adopted in this study in order to answer the research questions. Freedman (2015) defines strategy as “being about maintaining a balance between ends, ways, and means; about identifying objectives, and about the resources and methods available for meeting such objectives” (p. ix). The concept of strategy is one of the management concepts that have attracted massive attention among scholars and practitioners over the recent years (Seidl & Whittington, 2014). In broader terms, some researchers consider strategy as a plan, pattern, and a perspective that people adopt as a means towards realising their vision (Langley & Tsoukas, 2016). Strategy in practice is this related to how managers adopt the strategies based on their specific organisational needs. Initial works on strategy in practice can be traced in Mintzberg’s (1973) research that investigated how managers develop and implement strategies based on the changes in their environment and the internal competencies and capabilities in their organizations. From the findings, Mintzberg found that managers follow different routines and hence adopt unique strategies. Although there has not been standard definition of strategy agreed by researchers and scholars, Bynum (2001) pointed out that the concept of strategy development and implementation is largely guided by the identification of resource and capability gaps in the organizations in respect to the vision and mission of the organizations. On this basis, therefore, the process of strategy development and implementation is guided by the need to not only achieve a competitive advantage, but also enable an organization to be in a better position to achieve its goals. Researchers agree that strategies that fail to integrate human capital may not be sustainable because through effective human capital strategy, organizations are able to achieve sustainable competitive edge. As such, one of the fundamental strategies that Al Darmaki (2015) considers to be critical for the success in any organisation is the identification of the necessary skill requirements in an organisation and invests accordingly to human capital requirement. This is because researchers have evidenced that human capital is a central element for any successful organisation, even for capital intensive organisations (Lynch, 2015; Rao, 2016). As such, human capital development should be given a priority in strategy development in any organisation, since without the necessary skills and expertise, attaining organisational goals may not be actualised. Human capital refers to the stock of human resources and skills available in an organisation that helps it to achieve its strategic objectives (Grunig & Kuhn, 2015). In the currently knowledge based global economy, researchers agree that human capital is a central resource in any organisation, since its effectiveness contributes massively towards successful implementation of the capital investment strategy (Wood & Watson, 2016). Considering the way environment is becoming highly dynamic as a result of globalisation, developing human capital has become an inevitable human resource management function. Among the key human capital development practices that most organisations employ include staff training through workshops and organisational learning practices, and acquisition of more skilled and experienced employees. As such, it has been agreeable by researchers that strategy development is largely centred on human capital development alongside leveraging of other strategic resources that would enable an organization to be in a position to achieve competitive advantage in performing its activities more efficiently. Over the recent years, strategic management and planning practices have gained popularity in the public institutions, as governments seek to foster service delivery to the public. According to Hill et al. (2016), strategic planning enables organisations to establish a strategic match between their internal competencies and resources, and the external environment. What is evident in the exiting literature is that, strategic management and planning activities are largely informed by the internal environment of an organisation, and the opportunities and risks in the external environment. Researchers agree that, majority of the success organisations across the world use strategic management and planning as a tool that enables them to optimise their operations and achieve maximum productivity in their resources (Grunig & Kuhn, 2015). However, Seidl & Whittington (2014) pointed out that since organisations operate in different environments and also have unique and different internal competencies, various strategies work differently in different organisations. This implies that, there is no single strategy that suits all organisations, since one strategy may work in one organisation, but fail to yield positive results in another. As such, it has become increasingly important for organisations to analyse their organisational needs and align their strategies on their vision. From this perspective, therefore, it can be argued that strategic management and planning ought to be customised in each organisation based on its capabilities and external context in order to foster a strategic fit between the organisation’s internal and external environments. In the spheres of management, researchers and practitioners are recognising part of successful strategic management is effective implementation practices. Although researchers acknowledge that the implementation process of strategies is the proving to be the most challenging (Pfeeffer, 1996), a study conducted by Ansoff (1999) revealed that successful implementation of strategies is mostly associated with the aligning of the strategic resources in the organisation with the organisational vision. Nonetheless, researchers agree that effective integration of the implementation strategy components including effective communication, adoption, interpretation, and action play an important role towards ensuring a successful implementation of strategies. Barney (2001) observed that, despite most practitioners knowing the importance of effective strategy implementation, more emphasis is often put on strategy formulation but when it comes to actual implementation, many of them end up failing. Although strategy implementation is very critical success factor, most of the literature seems to be dominated by focus on long-term planning and strategy ‘framework’ with scanty or very little research on the actual implementation of strategies (Alexander, 1995; Beer & Eisenstat, 2000). Among the major reasons put forward for this noticeable scarcity of research efforts is that the aspect of strategy implementation is perceived to be less enchanting, which makes researchers face a lot of difficulties when investigating such topics. However, Mintzberg (1998) pointed out that most organisations may adopt different implementation strategies because of their differences in structures. Since the structure of an organisation largely influences the flow of information, and the nature and context of interpersonal relations in the organisation, the way strategies are implemented in a particular organisation may largely vary from the other. This can be the main reason why many scholars have yet not established a standard implementation framework for organisations, since it varies from not only one organisation to another, but also is influenced by quite a number of contextual factors (Hitt, 2013). However, researchers agree that the basic requirement for successful implementation is to address the aspects of coordination and cooperation within organisational key stakeholders involved in the implementation of the strategy (Beer, & Eisenstat, 2000). This is because with poor coordination, it may be difficult to track down the actual process of strategy implementation in order to be in a position to monitor the actualisation of the deliverables (Grant, 2002). Nonetheless, the leadership styles in organisations play a central role towards the achievement of success in the implementation of strategies (Barney, 2001). This is because leadership that offers support, guide, and is keen on ensuring that organisations achieve its planned strategies through leading in the implementation of the project. More importantly, research has shown that one of the emerging issues in strategic management is the role played by the board of management in not only formulating strategies, but also defining the key implementation actions (Al Darmaki, 2015). This is because strategy formulation without a clear implementation framework is bound to fail, as suggested by Freedman (2015) who argues that clear implementation actions determine largely the success of organisational strategy implementation. Nonetheless, a review of how the field of strategic planning has been evolving over the recent years is necessary. This is because unlike in the past where strategy implementation was solely a responsibility of the organisational managers, in the recent days researchers point out the emergent of multi-level teams in the implementation of strategies (Grunig, & Kuhn, 2015). For example, the emergent of project management office (PMO) in many organisations makes it easier for organisations in the planning and execution of strategic projects because it involves setting aside a team of experts to advise, control, and monitor the implementation of strategic projects in the organisations (Hill et al., 2016). This means that, modern day project implementation is faced with complexities associated with the changes in stakeholder expectations, advances in technology, and highly turbulent environment that necessitates a highly control project execution practices. Moreover, resource allocations decision making have become proxies for the role played by managers in the implementation of strategies. As a result, researchers agree that strategy implementation has been faced by the challenges of improper understanding of the strategy by some of the players in the implementation of the strategy (Langley & Tsoukas, 2016). Considering that lack of understanding and inability to connect with the strategy makes it difficult for strategy implementers to achieve the expected deliverables, the importance of prior communication of new changes based on the proposed strategy is critical as it enables organisations to be in a position to achieve a cohesive team towards the implementation of the project. Nonetheless, the inability to establish congruence between the organisational structure and the strategy are critical in the sense that it leads to lack of strategic fit between the organisational internal environment and the strategy, and this leads to eminent failure of the organisation to successfully implement the strategy (Lynch, 2015). On this basis, failure to address the structural design in the organisational design with respect to structure of the existing organisational structure plays a central role towards determining the overall success of the project. In the past several decades, we have witnessed advancement in technology which has largely impacted on the police organisations. Besides posing new threats to the security systems, advancement in technology has largely revolutionised the way operations in the police departments are executed. As a result, practitioners and scholars have largely engaged into the research on how the new technology and the changes in the environment have impacted on the operations of the police force. At the bottom line, researchers agree that the police forces have become more innovative by deigning more specialised strategies aimed at making their work more effective in controlling crime, especially in the wake of the advancing technology in the 21st century. As a result, institutional changes in the police force have been necessitated in the bid for organisations to be in a position to achieve their performance targets (Hitt, 2013). By restructuring their conventional ways of operations, the police department have been able to achieve strategic competitive advantages that enable them to be in a position to curb the modern day face of crimes which seems to be quite different from the traditional ones. According to a study conducted by Grant (2002), strategic innovations that are emerging in the police departments can be attributed to advancements in technology and the changes in the environment leading resulting into new challenges. For instance, since the September 11, 2001 attack in the United States, a study conducted by White (2004) revealed that there has been a renewed interest in crime and intelligence alertness in the functions of the security agencies. In the study, White particularly pointed out that the attack of September 11 motivated the adoption of several strategic changes in the Ohio police department. However, what seems to be unclear in the field of research is whether the changes in the police field are reactive or proactive. And if they are reactive or proactive, what circumstances leads to the adoption of strategies in the police force? It is evident from research that in the policing department have institutionalised strategic analytical functions which initiate changes and aligning of strategic resources in the departments to enable them to be in a position to respond more effectively to crimes (Miller, Wilson, & Hickson, 2004). What is apparent in the security agencies in the modern world is that, more sophisticated tactical approaches seem to be adopted, as the police departments gear up towards fighting more advanced crimes. Nonetheless, the motivations for the tactical approaches remains scantly explored in the world scholarly research, with much of research being focused on police benchmarking by the development countries’ police departments on the developed world countries (Hill, Schilling, & Jones, 2016). Nonetheless, Islam (2016) suggested the importance of crime analysis as an important approach in the police department aimed at fostering increased crime intelligence, effectiveness, and confidence from the public. According to Ratcliffe (2008) defined out that analytical function as the process through which data is transformed into knowledge and intelligence with an aim of taking more informed decisions. Analysis involves the application of scientific methods in solving a problem by first understanding its cause-effect relationship. In the security systems, data can be described as any observation or measurement regarding to crime, disorder, and other challenges associated with fighting of crime (Genet, & Hayward, 2017; Grunig, & Kuhn, 2015). When the data is analysed, presented, and interpreted, the security agencies are more informed on the areas to focus on or improve based on their current competencies and capabilities. The production of intelligence is discussed by Carter (2009) where he pointed out that the process analytical function in the security agencies is largely associated with collection of data, collating it, analysing, and disseminating actionable intelligence information. Although some studies (e.g. Hill et al., 2016; Lynch, 2015) argue that the analytical function in the police department is often useful in both short-term and long-term security operational planning, research on the key factors that inform the specific strategic decisions adopted by the police remains scanty. This has left too much confusion in the police agencies regarding the analytical function, given the many departments in the police force with each having its specific role and function. While in the developed countries like the United States a study conducted by Miles-Johnson, Mazerolle, Pickering & Smith (2016) revealed a high level of policing coordination between the intelligence and the criminal investigation department; very little research is available on the agencies involved in the analytical functions in the police departments in the developing countries. Lack of understanding of the analytical function of the police and the stakeholders involved in the complex chain of the analytical function in the police department especially in the developing countries creates a knowledge and practical gap. Much of the confusion is further enhanced by the dualistic nature of the police in controlling crime, and enforcing law and order. It is also important to also note that, there are various types of analytical policing which include intelligence analysis, criminal investigation analysis, tactical crime analysis, strategic crime analysis, and administrative crime analysis. Peterson (1994) defines intelligence analysis as the analytical function concerned with the identification of networks of offenders and criminal activities in order to help in the apprehension of the perpetrators. It involves the establishment of networks aimed at tracking down activities related to organised criminal groups so as to be in a position to gather sufficient evidence to prosecute them before a court of law. As a result, based on the technology has been on the rise, it has necessitated the police force to up their systems as well in order to be able to gather sufficient and foolproof evidence against criminals and organised gang groups (Barton et al., 2016). However, although there is some research (e.g. Miles-Johnson et al., 2016) that shows most of the developed countries have specialised police departments, it has not been clear in the available literature on whether the police department have a generalised system of conducting intelligence analysis in the developing countries like UAE. Further, criminal investigative analysis involves the construction of offender profiles for serious crimes so as to use the information to infer the characteristics of the offenders like based on their social habits, personalities, or work habits in order to be in a position to develop proactive measures against deterring such crimes in the future (Boba, 2001). Tactical crime therefore involves the characteristic profiles of offenders to establish if there is a link between crime perpetrators and certain characteristics. Unlike criminal investigative analysis, tactical crime involves the study of recent criminal incidents so as to be in a position to establish criminal behaviours and certain identity patterns and identify the ways through which the crimes can be solved (Boba, 2001). Strategic crime analysis on the other hand entails the analysis of the crime related problems in order to be in a position to identify long-term solutions for certain criminal behaviours. Further, Boba (2001) described administrative crime analysis as being related to legal, political, and practical areas of concern so as to be able to inform the public on what is expected of them. While there is sufficient research on the types of analytical functions in the police department, there is often a lot of confusion that comes as a result of semantic differences, especially when it comes to international security systems. Moreover, researchers have established that in most cases special security enforcement units hardly use analytics for intelligence functions, and rarely share information with other security units. Strategic changes in the police department institutions necessitate the redefinition of the policing goals and align them with the changes in the environment. According to Mitrović et al. (2016), the need for innovative approaches through specialised strategies is emerging out to be one of the key areas that contemporary researchers and practitioners in the security agencies consider to be critical. However, research remains unclear on whether benchmarking in security design succeeds everywhere, since the nature of crimes vary from one country/region to another (Wood, & Watson, 2016). Nonetheless, it is important to note the changing face of technology has largely influenced global crimes, since the free movement of people from one country to another, and interconnectedness through the internet and technology presents new frontiers for criminal perpetration. From this point of view, therefore, it has emerged that benchmarking of policing operations helps to curb most of these internationally perpetrated crimes. This implies that, although researchers have not clearly pointed out the specific benchmarking practices in the police force that contribute towards improved security and performance in the disciplined forces, there is a potential link between effective benchmarking and improved security in a country; which this study seeks to explore. A growing body of literature seems to be establishing a strategic link between specialised innovations in the police force and strategic analytic functions. Whether with the issue of the implementation of problem-oriented policing strategies, intelligence-oriented strategy, of internal security policing strategy, research confirms the importance of analytical functions. However, in the absence of strategic crime analysis team, policing departments adopt rule-driven bureaucracies with incident-driven decision making approach (Wu, Chen, & Yeh, 2010). Although in most cases bureaucracies adopt specialisation in addressing changes and execute missions, the currently increasing uncertainties in the environment poses challenges to bureaucratic security agencies. This is because specialised units are often difficult to coordinate, resources are wasted, and in most cases they are reactive as pointed out by Gottschalk & Gudmundsen (2009). Institutionalising strategic analytical functions allows the policing agencies to be in a position to culturally and structurally transit to a mission-driven organisation that adopts problem-driven decision making. Although many organisations have been able implement innovative strategies, there is scanty evidence on how strategic decisions are implemented. Moreover, research is not clear whether one-size-fits all with regards to security strategies that can guarantee successful security systems exist. Therefore, there is need for up-to-date research on whether specialised strategies work in some of the developing countries like the UAE. According to Harvey (2005), open systems theory is a modern-based approach in strategic management aimed at designing and creating healthy, innovative, and resilient organisations in the highly changing and turbulent world. According to Harvey, this theory is based on the influence of external environment on the strategies adopted by organisations in the sense that, it is the changes in the external environment that dictates certain changes. Nonetheless, it is important to note that, as organisations conduct their operations, they also impact or change the environment they are operating, and hence the changes in organisations are not only influenced by the external environment, but also the organisation has some impact on the environment as well. Open systems is based on the assumption that enterprises/institutions and the society are open systems, that change and influence each other over time (Alexander, 1995). This implies that, institutional strategies are not only influenced by the changes in the environment, but also the societal expectations from them as well. According to Pfeffer & Salancik (2003), an organisation adopting open system should be active in adapting to the relationship with its external environment. This explains why most organisational strategies are informed by external factors like social changes, socio-demographic factors, economic factors, political/legal systems, and environmental changes. By focusing on the external environment, organisations are able to align their strategic resources and capabilities with the opportunities and threats in the external environment. Based on this theory, strategic management in the policy department can be considered to be largely influenced by the changes in the external environment, so as to establish a strategic fit between its strategies and the expectations of the society (Grant, 2002). This implies for sustainable relationship between the police force and its ability to effectively curb crime it means that it should remain open to receive and disseminate information to the public effectively. Through adopting an open system, it becomes easier for the police force to even respond more proactively rather than mainly being reactive. The resource based view theory is based on the conception that organisations adopt strategic decisions based on their available resources or with an aim of making their resources more efficient and valuable (Barney, 2001). Researchers agree that each organization has its own unique resources and capabilities which enable it to be able to sustain its operations in line with its vision and mission (Barney, 2001). According to Hitt (2013), resource based is based on the concept of competitive advantage in an organisation based on its capabilities and strategic resources. For a resource to be considered to be useful to the organisation, it must be valuable, rare, difficult to imitate, and non-substitutable. This implies that, for resources and capabilities to be useful for an organisation, they should be able to add value to the organisation’s operations. According to Miller et al. (2004), strategies are developed based on the organisation’s capabilities and resources, since there should be a balance between the internal and external environment in an organisation so as to be able to foster competitive advantage. However, researchers agree that even if a resource or capability is valuable and potentially rare, without the aspect of inimitability that resource or capability may not be sustainable. In most cases, resource based view is based on the assumption that organisational success is mainly determined by their resources and capabilities, and hence when these resources and competencies are developed to make them less vulnerable to imitations, rarity, and value to the organisational core activities contributes largely towards the success of the organisation. Although researchers acknowledge that there is now one-size-fits-all with regards to resources and capabilities in organisations (Boba, 2001); the most important factor to consider how the available resources and competencies in an organisation contributes towards the achievement of the organisation’s vision and mission. From this point of view, therefore, it can be argued that each organisation seeks to develop its own resources and capabilities that enable it to be in a position to achieve a competitive edge. Institutional is related to deep and more resilient aspects of an organisational social structure which includes the processes through which schemes, structures, norms, and rules are established as authoritative parameters for social behaviours (Scott, 2004). Various components of the institutional theory include how behaviours and strategies are created, diffused, adopted, and adapted over space and time. The institutional theory is largely established on social relations within an organisation which has direct impact on how strategies are developed and implemented within the organisation. For example, if an organisation is characterised by highly bureaucratic culture and centralised structure, planned strategies may be faced with challenges at the implementation stage because highly bureaucratic organisations face the challenge of open communication and sharing of information, and thus it may be difficult to implement some strategies. Moreover, the social behaviours expected of the players in the organisation plays a central role in determining how effective some strategies may be successful than others. The institutional theory assumes that organisations survive because they have a certain set of values and norms that all the stakeholders are expected to operate within in order to enable the organisation to continue enjoying their competitive advantage. Although this theory has received massive acknowledgment in academic and practical realms, it fails to define more clearly how strategic practices are related to behaviours in the organisation. This relationship is not well developed which leaves systemic gaps with regard to how institutional values and norms relate to effective strategy implementation and success. A number of models have been established to illustrate training needs analysis in organisations. Organisation-task-person (OTP) models emphasise on training for perfection, whereas performance analysis models emphasise on performance, as they link training needs more unequivocally with the desired work behaviours (Smith-Jentsch & Sierra, 2016). Though performance analysis models have been considered to be more attractive to practitioners than OTP models, they fail to distinguish work behaviour and relevant organisational results, alongside failing to consider continual knowledge improvement among the staff members. On the other hand, OTP models integrate micro and macro analysis of the need for training in order to allow the identification of the needs of the organisation in relation to the external environment (Philips & Philips, 2016). Nonetheless, researchers acknowledge that both OTP and performance analysis models play a central role in explaining the importance and processes of training need analysis in organisations. One of the training needs analysis models is the McGehee and Thayer’s Framework which was established by McGehee and Thayer in 1961. This model stresses the examination of the training needs in three key levels, which include the organisation, tasks, and the individuals (Philips & Philips, 2016). Based on this model, designing a training program should be guided by the organisational, operational, and individual characteristics. At organisational level, emphasis should be made on the specific requirements for the organisation to achieve its strategic goals and objectives; while at individual level emphasis is made on the identification of how employees perform their job, alongside developing their career goals (Smith-Jentsch & Sierra, 2016). On the other hand, task or operational analysis entails the identification of the nature of the tasks that need to be performed on the job and the skills, knowledge, and abilities required (Cekada, 2010). By adopting a holistic approach in training needs analysis through focusing on the organisation, operations, and staff members, it becomes easier for the organisation to achieve success. The second model is the Content-Level Approach established by Ostroff and Ford as an extension of McGhee and Thayer (1961) framework. This model combines a dual perspective the three perspectives of training content (organisation, task, and person) and levels individual, organisational, and sub-unit. As a result, this model presents a nine cell matrix that is used to present a more detailed analysis of the training needs in an organisation than its former version presented by McGhee and Thayer. However, this model has often been criticised because of its complexity (McManus et al., 2016). Although the author succeeded in clearly defining how effective training should be guided by organisation, task, and person strategic fit, it fails to establish clear and simplified framework on how the three aspects are interrelated. Nonetheless, the theory forms a suitable starting point for determining the key elements to consider when designing a staff training and development framework where the organisational values, nature of work, and the personality of individual staff members are integrated. This model therefore has been found to be fairly useful in strategy development with regard to staff training and development, since researchers agree that at the centre of every strategy there must be a critical consideration of human resources and the type of work or activities required. The third model is the Lutham’s Model, which represented an expended McGhee and Thayer’s (1961) model where Latham (1988) added a fourth macro-type level where he linked person analysis to demographic analysis. The demographic analysis identifies the specific needs of various worker populations in organisations. Such demographic groups in an organisation may be based on gender, age, or experience in order to identify the specific training needs in each demographic group. However, this model has received massive criticism from scholars because it fails to recognise the different abilities, expertise, or roles of individuals in the same demographic group in an organisation (McManus et al., 2016). Although researchers tend to link this theory so closely with Ostroff and Ford model, the aspect of team demographics seems to stand out in this theory; and the authors seem to recognise the importance team dynamics as an important factor that determines the success of the entire organisation. On this basis, this theory suggests rather designing training programs for individuals, much of the focus is given on the team skills requirements in order to ensure cohesive implementation of activities and projects, since when some of the team members are not fully equipped with the required skills and knowledge to execute the project, it is possible that they would derail success in the implementation of the projects. This implies that, although the complexity found in Ostroff and Ford’s theory is still apparent in Lutham’s Model, its ability to bring in the concept of demographic dynamics of staff members in various teams is an important consideration that contributes largely towards the success of strategies in organisation. Another model is the Hierarchy of Needs Assessment Approaches, which was proposed by Gupta (2007). This model suggests that strategic needs assessment is guided by existing performance gaps, competency-based gaps, job and task analysis gaps, and skills and knowledge assessment gaps (Grunig & Kuhn, 2015). Managers are thus required to implement training programs based on priorities place in each of the needs identified. While this model has widely been supported for its practicability, critics argue that some of these needs in an organisation are inter-linked, and hence implementing one without the other may not solve the performance gaps in the organisation. It is therefore important that organisations also determine the inter-related resources and systems in an organisation in order to provide a holistic training approach. While this theory considers the importance of performance and skills gaps in organisations, managers find it easier to design training and staff development programs when they conduct skills analysis and audit among its workers in order to be able to identify the areas of focus. Researchers agree that the police force plays a central role in responding to and preventing crime in the society (Genet & Hayward, 2017). However, because of the wide scope of crimes in the society which include technology-based crimes, domestic violence-based, traffic law offenders, and corporate-based crimes among others, it has become increasingly important for the adoption of specialised training in the police force in order to foster their effectiveness in curbing crime. Research has shown that, specialised police units are more efficient in conducting investigations and collection of evidence, coordination of operations, and providing practical solutions to the society with regard to particular types of crimes (Wood & Watson, 2016). From this perspective, therefore, it can be argued that specialised training in the police force is not only a strategic approach towards improving security in their areas of jurisdiction, but also contributes towards improved proactive responses on crime (Kumar & Kumar, 2015). As such, it has become increasingly critical for specialised officer training in the police force as a way of improving their effectiveness and performance in their work. Researchers agree that, although sophistication in technology plays a central role towards the success of operations in the police department, the role played by human resources is considered to be the most important (Friedmann, & Cannon, 2007). As such, focusing on developing the skills and knowledge on the police officers helps them to be in a position to secure the society better against criminals and perpetrators of illegal activities. Police training is therefore considered to be an effective way through which police officers can be prepared to improve the efficiency in their work. Although researchers agree that there is no standard definition of training, since it has been evolving due to changes in the environment (Coleman, 2008); Crutchfield (2000) considered it as the process through which knowledge and skills are gained with an aim of improving the performance of individuals. In most cases, training helps to facilitate upward job mobility within the organisation, as it equips both junior and senior employees with more skills and knowledge which increases their competencies to serve in higher ranks. However, specialised training in the police force most of the times is meant mainly to prepare them better to serve in their job, especially in the wake of highly turbulent environment. Nonetheless, researchers agree that one of the most important strategies when planning to develop the skills of police officers to conduct training needs analysis so as to be in a position to determine any gaps in the skills requirement in the organisation, and identify the training methods required (Gottschalk, & Gudmundsen, 2010). A critical focus on the concept of training needs analysis is therefore necessary in order to be in a position to understand in details what it entails. Training need analysis is defined by McManus, O’Driscoll, Coleman & Wiles (2016) as the process of assessing the skills gap in an organisation in order to identify the specific set of skills that need to be instilled into the staff members. On this basis, training need analysis is mainly meant to identify the training needs in an organisation in order to bridge an identified skills gap due in the organisation. Training need analysis is therefore a critical strategic management tool that enables managers and organisational leaders to plan and implement training programs. According to Altschuld & Lepicki (2010), training needs analysis entails measuring the current state of skills among the staff members, and the desired state (what should be) (p. 772). The identified skills gaps informs the managers on the nature of training required on the staff members, so as to be in a position to achieve a desired state of skills in the organisation. Through an effective training need analysis, organisations are able to solve the problems of skills shortage, by identifying new and relevant skills that are necessary for the staff members in order to achieve the organisational goals and objectives more efficiently. Existing research on training needs analysis indicates that most of the practices involving the identification of skills gaps are often conducted in the developed countries like the United States, and some Far East countries like Japan (Pickering, & Klinger, 2016). Although some few studies of training in the police department have been conducted in UEA (e.g. Barton, Ramahi & Tansley, 2016), it is yet not clear whether training needs analysis is practiced or not. This shows that there is knowledge gap with regards to the practice of training needs analysis in the police department of Abu Dhabi, and this necessitates up-to-date research to identify the key training needs analysis practices involved in the department. The first step that Smith-Jentsch & Sierra (2016) considers to be critical in training needs analysis is the evaluation of the job and task analysis in order to identifying the special skills and knowledge required to execute the job more effectively. By conducting job and task analysis, the organisation benefits by enabling the establishing a clearer picture of what the jobs in the organisation entails, and establish performance criteria for the employees. By first understanding the nature of job and tasks required in the organisation, employees find it easier to work towards achieving their performance expectations (Ansoff, 1999). As a result, buy-in interests are stimulated among the employees, especially when they are involved in the definition of what their jobs entail. Moreover, by analysing job and task requirements in the organisation, leaders in organisations are able to guide their staff members during on-the-job training practices. Nonetheless, when the nature tasks and job requirements are clearly determined, the human resource management department is able to identify more accurately the required skills and abilities required in the organisation, it becomes easier to deign more relevant and effective training programs that equip the staff members with skills and knowledge required to complete their job more efficiently. Further, Hitt (2013) pointed out that job and task analysis acts as benchmark to determine what knowledge, skills, and abilities are required so as to be in a position to determine the category of people to be trained or moved across/upwards within the organisation. Through conducting job and task analysis within the organisation, the management is also in a position to be able to establish the profile of their specific job positions and tasks which would help it to be able to outline the key personalities, skills, and knowledge levels for their current and future employees. Although conducting job and task analysis does not take into consideration the external environmental factors and how they can affect job performance, researchers agree that it is a basic practice that enables organisations to be in a position to determine the skills gaps in their organisation, and thus enabling them to make more informed decisions with respect to the training programs for their staff members. Organisational analysis is also suggested by McGehee and Thayer (1961) who argues that it is important to determine when a training program is needed based on the organisational culture and changes in the external environment. Information about where and when training is required is the bottom-line of this model, as it involves an exploration of organisational wide needs. Although research is not clear whether the needs of an organisation are integrals of both internal and external environment or both; some researchers agree that organisation-wide practices are largely informed by the changes in the environment (Boba, & Crank, 2008). However, what many researchers agree is that the way many organisations operate is largely influenced by the external environment. It is therefore critical to consider how the external environment influences the way organisations operate. Among the key environmental factors pointed out by Atkinson (2006) include political/legal environment, economic factors, socio-cultural factors, technological development, competition, and physical environment factors. Although all the factors do not have the same effect on organisations, it is important for organisations to conduct due diligence on these factors to determine their effect on their operations. This may form a basis for developing training programs in the organisations with an aim of aligning the changes in the external environment with their internal resources and competencies. In the police department, changes in law, increases in crime, advances in technology, and changes in other environmental factors largely determines the need to develop specialised program for them (Bynum, 2001). This is because given the sensitive nature of the policing functions in any country, equipping the officers with sufficient skills is not only important, but also necessary in order to foster security in the country. Benchmarking is one of the training strategies aimed at setting standards based on an existing practice with an aim of improving performance and productivity (Coleman, 2008). Benchmarking from the best internal police practices is considered by Lynch (2015) as one of the evolving paradigm in the police force from the developing countries. It is important to note that, although the nature of crimes in various countries are influenced by contextual factors, a study conducted by Islam (2016) revealed since the psychology of crime is common across the world, training police through benchmarking from the best known police forces has been attributed to improved performance in many police departments across the world. Considering that apprehending criminals is the central rationale for the establishment of the police all over the world, learning on specific methods and tactics to curb some of the common crimes like fraud and traffic offenses are quite common all over the world; and thus the need to established specialised training programs to curb some of these crimes via benchmarking. Although benchmarking may involve the adoption of machinery and equipments used in curbing crime, Lynch (2015) pointed out that benchmarking training of human resource on tactics and methods used to curb crime is a critical factor that determine the success of many police departments. This is because when they benchmark on human practices that are necessary to achieve sustainable crime curbing, it becomes easier for organisations to be able to not only achieve sustainable competitive advantage, but also revamp their productivity through improved staff performance. When police forces from less developed countries learn new tactics from their counterparts from the developed countries, it becomes easier even to curb global crimes because of the expertise in the police force is distributed across the world. Through benchmarking practices, therefore, police officers from developing countries are able to learn new specialised strategies that enable them to be in a position to improve on their performance. Considering that specialised training in the police force entails deeper dissemination of skills associated with a particular function, police officers that undergo specialised training are able to curb even more complicated crimes (Miles-Johnson et al., 2016). Although some studies (e.g. Mitrović, Janković, Dopsaj, Vučković, Milojević, Pantelić, Nurkić, 2016) argue that specialised police forces are difficult to coordinate, Pickering, & Klinger (2016) suggested a framework of ensuring that police officers in various functions are not only given specialised training on their core areas of work, but also are equipped with skills and knowledge to be in a position to coordinate with other specialised forces as well. Through this strategy, it becomes easier for the police departments to respond in a coordinated manner on cases on insecurity in their country. With specialised training and development of a well coordinated security systems communication system, it becomes easier for specialised forces to share intelligence with other specialised team of police officers to act on the crimes. On this basis, adopting specialised training in the police force enables for effectiveness in dealing with crimes in a country and this contributes largely towards increased performance in the police force. Empirical studies have established a critical link between human capital development and organisational performance (Aristovnik et al., 2014). Staff training has been pointed out by practitioners and scholars as the main staff development tool that many organisations have found useful in their strategies. Alkinani (2013) defined training as “an organised process concerned with the acquisition of capability or the maintenance of existing capability” (p. 48). As such, training aims at not only maintaining the existing skills among the staff members, but also create an opportunity to acquisition of new skills and expertise through learning experiences. In the context of this study, therefore, the need for specialised training in the police force is critical in order to enable them to be in a position to effectively manage the changing face of crime as a result of the advancing globalisation, technology, and social behaviours. Measuring performance in the police force has attracted massive attention among scholars and practitioners in the field. While researchers agree that performance in the police force is relative, and hence there are no standard parameters of determining performance (Wu, Chen & Yeh, 2010), a study conducted by Aristovnik, Seljak, & Mencinger (2014) revealed that performance management in the police department largely relies on benchmarking from well performing police service providers. This brings in some of the key performance indicators that are used to determine performance in the police force in many countries. However, most of the developing countries have reportedly been benchmarking from the developed countries, and hence most of the KPIs in the police force are largely attributed to the police department in most developed countries. According to Genet & Hayward (2017), some of the most common performance indicators in the police force include the number of crimes committed and reported, the number of crimes detected before being executed, complaints against the police officers, and the number of emergencies responded to and the time taken to respond to such emergencies. In the UAE, the police force heavily benchmarks from the Western countries, although there are some systemic strategies that mainly apply to the UAE context. Although each police force faces different challenges within the regions they service (area of jurisdiction), and hence one-size-fits-all approach usually does not work (Barton et al., 2016), most of the performance indicators outlined above often apply in most areas. As such, based on a study conducted by Islam (2016), the police must be accountable for their functions based on the performance indicators in order to create public confidence, which largely fosters a favourable business environment both for locals and international investors. Although police performance has been an interesting area of research over the last few decades, research on the impact of specialised strategy in the police force in the UAE and other developing countries remains scanty. Although a study conducted by Al Darmaki (2015) revealed ADP has over the last ten years been adopting specialised strategy in its police officers, unfortunately very little research is available on the impact of the specialised strategy on the performance of the police department. Researchers agree that when individuals are specially trained on a particular function, they become more effective in their job and this contributes massively towards their improved performance in their job (Alkinani, 2013). The same applies to the police department where Andersen et al., (2015) argues that when police officers are specialised, their skills, knowledge, and abilities to curb crime are improved and thus making them more effective in their work. On this basis, therefore, although adopting specialised strategy is pointed out by some researchers (e.g. Aristovnik, Seljak, & Mencinger, 2014) to be a recipe for uncoordinated operations in the police force, available research confirms that adopting specialised strategy in the police department would largely impact on the performance of the police officers, since it contributes towards improved skills and knowledge among the police officers to execute their job more effectively. This implies that, adopting specialised strategy in the police force can be more advantageous, as it avails special skills and tactics among the police forces, which largely enables the police officers to be more effective in their job, leading to the general improvement in performance of the entire police department (Kumar & Kumar, 2015). Nonetheless, while research points out that some parameters used to measure police performance are common, there are no standard policing practices, and hence performance measurement in the police department in various parts of the world cannot be standardised. However, the most important consideration when measuring performance is the evaluation of the achievement of goals, targets, and working in line with the vision of the police organisation (McManus, O’Driscoll, Coleman, & Wiles, 2016). As earlier pointed out, training planning involves the identification of skills requirements in the organisation, so as to be in a position to align the training content with these skills requirement. This means that, every police department has its own unique training needs, based on its vision and operational guidelines. With very limited research of police performance measurement in the ADP, there is need for up-to-date research to determine whether the specialised strategy that has been adopted in the department over the last decade has impacted in any way on the general performance of the police department. With some researches indicating that when police officers are exposed to specialised training, they often find it easier to not only detect crimes, but also act on those crimes more diligently (Pickering & Klinger, 2016). However, the most important consideration when designing a specialised strategy is to ensure that the planned training content is well aligned with the performance expectations in the organisation in order to be able to facilitate improved performance in the police force. A number of empirical studies have been conducted across the world to determine the impact of specialised training in the police force on their performance. Although research on specialised strategy in the police department is not widely covered, much of the available research seems to be largely based in the Western context. Specifically, scanty empirical research is available on the impact of specialised strategy in the police department in UAE. One of such studies was conducted by Ghufli (2009) on a case study of Abu Dhabi Police where much of the focus was to establish a training need analysis in the police department. With a sample of 29 police officers from the department, Ghufli’s survey found that training need analysis is scantly developed in the ADP. The researcher found out that despite the benefits of training needs analysis in the police department, training needs were scantly developed in the ADP. Nonetheless, the researcher adopted a very small sample, which to a great extent compromised the external validity and generalisability of the research findings. In addition to this weakness, the researcher’s methodology is scantly developed and it is not clear how the participants were selected. However, this study provides springboard for further investigation on specialised strategy in the ADP and the overall performance of the police department. Further, from a research conducted by Andersen, Konstantinos, Kiskelainen, Nyman, Gustafsberg, & Arnetz (2015), special training in the special weapons and tactics (SWAT) police increased their resilience and improved their capabilities in responding to critical situations. With a research sample of 18 police from SWAT, the researchers found out that specialised training promoted their resilience, and hence improving their capabilities to work and respond to stressful situations. Similarly, an empirical research conducted by Miles-Johnson, Mazerolle, Pickering & Smith (2016), police training on the awareness of prejudice improves their effectiveness in assessing prejudiced motivated crimes. Using a sample of 1,609 from police recruits and protective service officers in the United States, the researchers found that specialised training on prejudice training among the police officers improved their ability to assess positively prejudiced motivated crime by 61%. This reflects a positive effect of specialised training among the police force on their performance. Another study conducted by Andersen et al. (2015) in the United States to analyse post-academy training needs for a selected police school district in Texas was also analysed in this study. The research mainly focused on the identification of the internal and external factors influencing operations and training needs of staff officers already employed after the initial training. This study adopted a sample of 37 Independent School Department of police training with 425 participants in the survey. The findings obtained in the research revealed that majority of the police officers who return back for further training are brought for specialised training, which the police departments share their training needs with the school to ensure conformity with the police department expectations. What remains outstandingly convincing for this study is the way the researcher presented a comprehensive analysis of the findings from a diverse sample. Another study conducted by Kumar & Kumar (2015) on the impact of modernisation in terms of equipments and training had any effect on the performance of the Indian police. Using output function as the analytical tool and estimating it using stochastic frontier analysis model, the researchers established a positive relationship between modernisation and police performance. However, the empirical research revealed that modern training alone is not sufficient to guarantee improved performance, since the need for modern equipments in applying the modern tactics was equally important. This implies that it is important that policy makers in the police department to consider updating both skills and equipments in the police force in order to achieve holistic increase in the performance on the police force. Moreover, in a study conducted by Pickering & Klinger (2016) on the impact of specialised safety culture training among the police on their effectiveness in the reduction on the use of force against citizens was also pointed out. This means that, adopting specialised strategy in the police contributes towards improving their moral and ethical duties on their job. The importance of specialised physical training on the morphological characteristics and motor abilities of police trainees was explored by Mitrovic et al. (2016) in the empirical research with a sample of 137 police recruits in Brazil. The research findings revealed a significantly decreased favourable morphological characteristics and motor abilities after the students were left for 8 months without specialised training. Since morphological characteristics and their motor abilities are critical in the performance of the police force (Aristovnik et al., 2014); the findings by Mitrovic and his colleagues reveals a positive relationship between specialised police training and their performance. However, a study conducted by Landman, Nieuwenhuys & Oudejans (2015) revealed that although professional experience and specialised training had significant impact on the performance of police officer’s shooting performance under pressure, personality traits plays significant impact on the performance of the police officers. From the researcher’s findings, police officer’s performance is a function of both personality traits and professional experience and specialised training. Further, a study conducted by Abdulla (2009) on the determinants of job satisfaction among the police staff members on Dubai revealed the importance of specialised training and availability of specialised equipments and tools to enable them do their work effectively as one of the major factors that determined staff satisfaction. With a sample of 1075 respondents and mixed research approach where data was collected using interviews and questionnaires, this study revealed that the need for achievement among the police officers was critical, and hence the need for specialised approach aimed at enabling the police officers to execute their job more effectively. Although the researcher did not explain the various training practices and specialised strategies adopted in the Dubai police department, it was clearly from the findings obtained that adopting specialised training and availing specialised equipments contributed largely towards the satisfaction of the employees, which subsequently contributed towards improved performances among the police officers. Moreover, based on a study conducted by Al-Muhairi (2008) on the corruption and strategies to prevent it in the ADP, it was revealed that majority of the police officers engaged in corrupt deals due to lack of specialised training to enable them to be in a position to not only curb crime, but also develop strong moral and ethical connections with their job. With the research revealing that unacceptable behaviours in the police department was about 64%, and thus based on the recommendations provided specialised training and equipping the police officers with modern equipments to work with were critical determinant factors for improved service delivery in the police service. However, what was not clear from the research was on whether lack of training alone was the main contributing factor for corrupt deals in the police force. Nonetheless, it was evident that adopting specialised strategy in the police force was a recipe for improved staff performance. Further, another study conducted by Peters & Cohen (2017) in the Canadian policing agencies with regard to specialised training provided an insight on how specialised training and performance in the police are inter-related. With data collected from RCMP and CRU in examining how officers articulated specific tasks established in their mandates, the researchers found that specialised training in the police had direct impact on the police officers’ conformity with task requirements and expectations of their job. However, the researcher pointed out the importance of coordination and communication in the police department in order to foster successful operations in prevention of crimes, as well as response to criminal activities. However, the researcher did not indicate whether benchmarking was part of the specialised training strategies in the Canadian police force or not. Moreover, an empirical study conducted by Gottschalk & Gudsmundsen (2010) on intelligence strategy implementation using systemic literature review revealed that failure to implement new strategies in the police force can adversely affect its performance in the police force because the environment is changing very fast. As a result, organisational that fail to develop specialised strategies to deal with the changing face of technology and environmental dynamics were found by Gottschalk & Gudsmundsen to be having weak intelligence system. Further, a study conducted by Storey & Hart (2011) to determine how the police respond to stalking with focus on risk management strategies and tactics used in ant-stalking law enforcement revealed that specialised police training is an important factor that contributes largely towards the improved performance of the police forces as reflected in the achievement of their strategic goals and objectives. However, the researchers revealed some specialised strategies were more effective than others; although they did not give the reasons for the superiority of some strategies than others. Table 2.1 below shows a summary of the key empirical studies explored in this study, with respect to the methodologies adopted, and the main findings that each researcher presented. Ghufli (2009) To establish a training need analysis in the police department in Abu Dhabi Police Department Survey with sample of 29 police officers from the department The findings revealed that training need analysis is scantly developed in the ADP. The researcher found out that despite the benefits of training needs analysis in the police department, training needs were scantly developed in the ADP. Miles-Johnson, Mazerolle, Pickering & Smith (2016) To determine whether police training has any impact on the effectiveness of their assessment of prejudiced motivated crimes. A survey with a sample of 1609 police officers in the United States The researchers found that specialised training on prejudice training among the police officers improved their ability to assess positively prejudiced motivated crime by 61%. Pickering & Klinger (2016) This study explored the impact of specialised safety culture training among the police on their effectiveness in the reduction on the use of force against citizens This study adopted systematic literature review In their research, the authors found that adopting specialised strategy in the police contributes towards improving their moral and ethical duties on their job. Al-Muhairi (2008) To find out the extent of corruption in ADP, and the possible reasons for the levels of corruption revealed. Survey was conducted with undisclosed sample of participants from the ADP. The research findings revealed that majority of the police officers engaged in corrupt deals due to lack of specialised training to enable them to be in a position to not only curb crime, but also develop strong moral and ethical connections with their job. Peters & Cohen (2017) The aim of this study was to explore how specialised training impacted on the performance in the police Primary data was collected data from RCMP and CRU by examining how officers articulated specific tasks established in their mandates. The researchers found that specialised training in the police had direct impact on the police officers’ conformity with task requirements and expectations of their job. From the key literature materials reviewed, it is evident that the strategy of specialised training in the police force plays an important role towards improving their performance based on key performance indicators. However, the review of literature pointed out the important training need analysis, where the stakeholders in the police department identifies the knowledge, skills, and abilities gap in their police force departments in order to develop specialised training programs aimed at revamping the performance of the police force. As such, environmental factors (and changes) are expected to play an important role in the development the specialised training programs. In most cases, due to the advancing globalisation, it is expected that the Abu Dhabi Police would benchmark their specialised training programs from the Western countries. Figure 1 below presents the conceptual framework that would guide the researcher when conducting the study. The literature reviewed in this study revealed that strategy development and implementation are critical for success in any organisation. With the focus in this study being in the police department, analysis of the specialised strategy implementation in the police force was conducted. Researchers agree that since the role of the police is to enforce law and order in the society in order to reduce crime, there are set of universal key performance indicators in the police force. 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2019-04-24T08:08:30Z
https://www.allacademicanswers.com/2018/06/12/literature-review/
In Fabry disease (α-galactosidase A deficiency) accumulation of Globotriaosylceramide (Gb3) leads to progressive organ failure and premature death. The introduction of enzyme replacement therapy (ERT) was the beginning of a new era in this disorder, and has prompted a broad range of research activities. This review aims to summarize recent developments and progress with high impact for Fabry disease. A Pubmed analysis was performed using the search terms "Fabry disease", "Anderson-Fabry disease", "alpha-galactosidase A" and "Gb3". Of the given publications by 31st January 2009 only original articles recently published in peer reviewed journals were included for this review. Case reports were included only when they comprised a new aspect. In addition we included relevant conference abstracts when the results had not already been published as original articles. Apart from Gb3-accumulation cellular and organ specific damages may be related also to inflammatory and immunological consequences. It will be interesting whether this may lead to new therapeutic strategies in the treatment of Fabry disease. Since newborn screening is still difficult in Fabry disease, detection of patients in populations at risk is of great importance. Undiagnosed patients with Fabry disease may still be found in cohorts of subjects with renal diseases, cardiomyopathy and TIA or stroke. Efforts should be undertaken to identify these individuals and initialise ERT in order to hault disease progression. It has also been demonstrated that Gb3-accumulation leads to pre-clinical damages and it is believed that early treatment may be the only possibility so far to prevent irreversible organ damage. The introduction of enzyme replacement therapy (ERT) for Fabry disease in 2001 was the beginning of a new era for this lysosomal storage disorder. More than 2000 patients have been treated with either one of the two available formulations of genetically engineered α-galactosidase A. In general, safety and efficacy of both, Agalsidase alfa (Replagal, Shire Human Genetic Therapies) and Agalsidase beta (Fabrazyme, Genzyme Corp.), have been demonstrated [1, 2]. The introduction of these drugs was not only the desired hope for patients. It broke also new ground in research including a better understanding of pathology, natural course of the disease, treatment and outcome. Before the introduction of ERT for Fabry disease it had already been known that the basis of this disorder is the X-linked deficiency of the lysosomal enzyme α-galactosidase A . The accumulation of globotriaosylceramide (Gb3) had been regarded as the key link between pathology and clinical symptoms. Typical manifestations had been described as angiokeratoma, sweating disturbances, neuropathic pain, and hearing impairment. In addition, affection of the heart, the kidney and the central nervous system had been seen [4, 5]. To keep up with newest research in such a developing field is important, but may also be difficult. This review aims to summarize recent developments in the understanding of pathology, symptomatology, diagnosis, and treatment effects in Fabry disease. A particular focus is brought on publications appeared in 2008 as some of them are of outstanding importance and high impact. A Pubmed-research was undertaken by the end of January 2009 for publications covering all aspects of Fabry disease. Search terms were 'Fabry disease', 'Anderson-Fabry-disease', 'alpha-galactosidase A', 'enzyme replacement therapy', 'globotriaosylceramide', 'Gb3' and 'lysosomal storage disease'. For this review, only recently published original articles have been considered. Case reports were included only if they described new findings. In addition to this, we included available abstracts from international conferences if the corresponding publications have not yet been appeared in peer reviewed journals. Overall, 37 publications from different peer reviewed journals and 9 conference abstracts were appraised for this review. We classified these publications into eight categories focussing on (1) pathology, (2) heart, (3) neurology, (4) kidney, (5) children with Fabry disease, (6) diagnosis, (7) treatment, and (8) monitoring in Fabry disease. The absence of infantile manifestations of Fabry disease despite deficient α-galactosidase A and Gb3-accumulation supports the hypothesis that Gb3 is not solely responsible for disease manifestation. However, Valbuena et al. hypothesized that the overloading of lysosomes with Gb3 may simply lead to the rupture of cytoplasma and in consequence to cell death . Secondary effects of Gb3 accumulation which might be responsible for disease pathology include also inflammatory processes . Recently, Gb3 has been shown to be identical with membranous CD77 which is supposed to play an important role in apoptosis and necrosis . In addition, Rozenfeld and co-workers reported perturbed leukocyte function in Fabry disease compared to healthy controls and abnormal numbers of different immune cells, including lymphocytes, monocytes, CD8+ cells, B cells and dendritic cells . Noteworthy, in another study no correlation was found between CRP-levels as a global inflammatory marker and the Mainz-Severity-Score-Index (MSSI) as a marker for disease severity . Other authors reported on auto-immunological reactions in α-galactosidase A deficiency. Moore et al. found higher expressions of neuronal apoptosis inhibiting protein as a key anti-apoptotic mediator in children with Fabry disease compared to healthy controls . Noteworthy, this upregulation did not change after institution of ERT, whereas apoptosis inducing factor appears to be upregulated under ERT. The authors were not able to explain their observations, but further research has to be directed on this topic. Finally, Gb3-accumulation has been reported to induce oxidative stress and/or the formation reactive oxygen species (ROS) . Lipids and proteins may be oxidised and may be unable to function. Of note, ERT increased the generation of ROS in vitro, and up-regulated the intracellular adhesion molecule ICAM 1. The authors hypothesized that ERT may enhance endothelial damage, allowing to understand continuously occurring strokes in patients on treatment. Another gateway into alteration of endothelial function may be given by the Nitric-Oxide-Synthase-3-genotypes. Endothelium-derived nitric oxide is a key regulator of vessel wall function and cardiovascular homeostasis. A genetic variant of the Nitric-Oxide-Synthase-3-gene is suspected to disturb this homeostasis and has been found to be associated with a decreased thickness of the posterior wall of the left ventricle . This observation may in part explain the large variability of cardiac phenotypes in Fabry disease. A so far unknown observation of Gb3-accumulation has been made by Wang and colleagues who described Gb3 storage in pulmonary smooth muscle cells and vascular endothelium of a female patient with Fabry disease . This finding offers an explanation for dyspnoea in the context of Fabry disease apart from cardiac involvement. Four years of ERT in the 51-years old woman led to significant clinical improvement of pulmonary symptoms and in part improved lung function. However, CT-scans continuously showed fibrotic alterations. Despite the high frequency of cardiomyopathy in Fabry disease , only little is known on the mechanisms leading to functional impairment and on the early cardiac affection. To identify early cardiac abnormalities Toro and colleagues performed Tissue Doppler Imaging (TDI)-studies in 59 adult patients and compared these results with that of 24 healthy controls . The authors demonstrated significant abnormalities of systolic and diastolic ventricular function with TDI even in patients with normal conventional echocardiography. In addition, isovolumetric contraction time was found to be the most sensitive parameter for detecting these functional changes. Consistent with this, Kampmann et al. reported on cardiac manifestations of Fabry disease in 20 children below the age of 18 years prior to ERT . Thirty-five percent of the children already had left ventricular hypertrophy, and the remainder subjects had a LVM-index above the 75th percentile of healthy controls. During the 26-months follow-up period the LVM-index increased in more than 85% of the patients, while the remainder patients entered the echocardiographic criteria for LVH. Noteworthy, the increase in LVM was not followed by abnormalities in either systolic or diastolic function, and in general there were no signs of LVH seen in ECG. Another warranting observation of this study was the demonstration of reduced heart rate variability (HRV) in boys with Fabry disease suggestive of an impaired autonomic control of the heart which may be responsible for the increased cardiac morbidity. Palecek et al. demonstrated that also affection of the right ventricle is a common finding in both, males and females with Fabry disease . Impaired diastolic function was observed in about 50% of the patients, and the authors speculated that involvement of both ventricles may reflect the progressive character of the disease. Weidemann et al. stressed the involvement of the heart valves in particular in patients with advanced cardiomyopathy, where insufficiencies of the mitral, aortic and tricuspid valve were found . It is likely that the altered myocardial morphology in advanced cardiomyopathy maybe together with fibrosis of cardiomyocytes may indirectly lead to heart valve regurgitation. Apart from fibrosis of the myocytes, disturbances of the myofilamental structure has been observed in isolated cardiomyocytes of male patients with Fabry disease and LVH . A high percentage of Gb3 was found widely distributed over the cells, and it is not unlikely that the storage material directly impairs ventricle function (e.g. by impaired relaxation or stiffening of cardiomyocytes). The authors hypothesised that such changes may be responsible for diastolic dysfunction in Fabry disease. On a more functional level, Chimenti and co-workers found that the maximal isometric tension of a single cardiomyocyte was reduced . This reduction correlated with the decreased systolic velocities from TDI and with the degree of myofibrillolysis. In addition, myofibrillolysis was associated with degradation of myofilamental proteins suggesting that cardiomyocyte impairment may in part be explained by proteolysis. Progression of Fabry disease cardiomyopathy may be related to fibrosis of endomyocardial tissue, but was not correlated with TDI measurements of systolic or diastolic LV function in this study. Cardiac involvement in Fabry disease is one of the major causes for premature death in Fabry disease . However, it is generally accepted that classic myocardial infarction as a result of atherosclerotic coronary heart disease is rare. Coronary angiographic properties were determined by intravascular ultrasound in nine patients and ten atherosclerotic controls . Atherosclerotic plaques in Fabry disease were suspected to have a larger number of lipid cores, and the pattern of the lesions was more echogenic. The authors speculated that Gb3 and disease-specific trophic alterations may explain the differences to regular atherosclerotic formations. In a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled study sixteen adults were followed over a period of six months before 10 of them entered a two years extension study. The authors found a mean decrease in myocardial Gb3-content of ~20% in the treated group whereas the placebo-group showed a mean increase in Gb3 of ~10% . Though reduction of myocardial Gb3-content did not reach significance, LVM as measured by cardiac MRI and echocardiography was significantly decreased in the patients treated with Agalsidase alfa compared to an increase in the placebo group. After two years of treatment these results were confirmed by repeated cardiac MRI. Ejection fraction as a measure of cardiac function remained normal or hypernormal in the entire cohort. Shortening of QRS-duration confirmed previous reports on normalized conduction . The authors indicated that the significant reduction in LVM may be clinically relevant since LVM has been demonstrated to be an independent risk factor for premature mortality in other conditions. From an observational study it has been reported that ERT with Agalsidase beta may reduce LVM and interventricular septum thickness . In contrast to this Koskenvuo et al. reported only minimal effects of Agalsidase beta on cardiac symptoms of nine patients with Fabry disease who were enrolled in an open-lable study . Only resting heart rate was significantly decreased over a follow-up period of 2 years, but no improvement in echocardiographic measures, ECG or exercise capacity was observed. Improvements seen in stroke volume on cardiac MRI after 12 months ERT were not retained after two years, and no other parameter reached significance. Echocardiographic follow-up over more than three years in 29 males and females with Fabry disease under ERT with either of the available Agalsidase formulations failed to prove a decrease in left ventricular wall thickness, or left atrial size though improvement of diastolic function was observed . However, it has to be noted that the age of the study population was relatively young (37 ± 12 years) and that no further progression of the disease was observed in respect to cardiac manifestations under ERT. This observation is supported by a study from Kampmann et al. on the natural course of cardiomyopathy in male and female patients with Fabry disease . Repeated echocardiography was performed over an average time of 4.5 years in 76 patients. There, left ventricular mass index increased with age in both, males and females, respectively. Median time of onset of left ventricular hypertrophy was 44 years in males and 55 years in females. As expected, LVH was more frequently found in male patients and was also related to age. No functional measure was related to left ventricular mass index or left ventricular hypertrophy. Of note, left ventricular mass index increased by some 4 g/m2.7*year in men and slightly more than 2 g/m2.7*year in women. Following the authors, this difference may be explained by the mosaic-like distribution of Gb3 in female cardiomyocytes compared to male patients. In summary, these studies recommend initiation of ERT at an early stage of the disease since at least some of the cardiac manifestations may be irreversible [26, 27]. Recent data showed that left ventricular wall thickness showed significant improvement over a period of eight years in patients under ERT with Agalsidase alfa . Apart from morphologic improvement of LVH and cardiac mass, Lobo and co-workers tried to evaluate a clinical effect of ERT on cardiac function by performing a 6-minute-walk-test and bicycle stress testing . However, the authors mixed male and female patients despite the different clinical affection. Moreover, females were on ERT only one third of the time males were treated with one of the enzyme formulations. In addition, both tests used may be significantly biased, e.g. by motivation, neuropathic pain in feet or aggravation of pain under physical exercise. Probably the most debilitating symptom in Fabry disease is neuropathic pain. Though often labelled as "acroparaesthesia", it is well known today that virtually the whole body can become place of painful experiences . The typical neurophysiologic pattern of pain in Fabry disease allows discrimination from other sensory neuropathies. Standardized quantitative sensory testing demonstrated severe impairment of thermal discrimination compared to patients with sensory neuropathies of large nerve fibres and to patients with other small fibre neuropathies . Apart from the peripheral nervous system, the central nervous system is also known to be affected in Fabry disease, too. Cerebrovascular events significantly contribute to the pre-term mortality of Fabry disease with a median cumulative survival time of 50 years . Based on clinical-neurological and MRI evaluation Buechner et al. reported on a prevalence for CNS-involvement in up to 72% of patients with Fabry disease . Cerebrovascular disease occurred at a mean age of 42 ± 11 years in males and approximately 10 years later in females. In contrast to other reports, the authors found a nearly equal distribution of cerebrovascular involvement between vertebrobasilar and carotid districts. Alari et al. observed changes in cerebral blood flow velocities (CBFV) in patients with Fabry disease who were treated with ERT . At baseline, there was a tendency towards higher CBFV in patients with Fabry disease compared to age-matched healthy controls. After 30 months ERT CBFV decreased significantly, which is in good agreement with previous observations over a shorter period of time . Neuropsychiatric symptoms in Fabry disease were evaluated by Schermuly et al. together with MRI and diffusion tensor imaging . Patients with Fabry disease were significantly more depressed and showed a lower cognitive performance than healthy controls. Interestingly, pain interference was significantly correlated to white matter lesions supporting previous observations by Cole et al. . Close examination and laboratory analyzes is important to detect also pre-clinical affection of the kidney in Fabry disease. Tøndel et al. performed kidney biopsies in nine children, including two boys under ERT. Accumulation of Gb3 was found irregardless of clinical nephropathy, and structural changes of the kidney were observed in nearly 80% of the patients including glomerulosclerosis and interstitial fibrosis already in these young patients. Moreover, changes were seen in the glomerulum, the tubulo-interstitial space and small renal vessels. Noteworthy, the two boys receiving ERT developed de novo albuminuria despite treatment. The authors suggested kidney biopsies in all children and adolescents with Fabry disease and albuminuria in order to evaluate the extent of renal damage. Erroneously, for decades females with Fabry disease were considered as carriers only. Meanwhile, there is no doubt that they are in fact patients who may develop the whole spectrum of the disease [5, 38]. A cross-sectional analyzes of the Fabry Registry focussing on kidney involvement in females revealed that renal impairment occurs in all classes of the chronic kidney disease classification including end-stage renal disease . Consistent with this other authors found proteinuria in one third of the female and nearly two third of the male patients, increasing with age in both genders. The latter finding is in contrast to a previous report by Deegan et al. , but was confirmed by other authors . Kidney affection was clearly evident by Gb3-accumulation in every glomerular cell type, and accumulation in peritubular capillaries was grossly related to the severity of nephropathy. These changes were observed in an early stage of the disease, and the authors speculated on its value as an indicator for ERT efficacy. In addition, non-specific glomerular and tubulo-interstitial lesions of degenerative origin were also seen. The authors concluded that kidney involvement in females with Fabry disease is not different from findings in male patients. Rather seeking for morphologic but functional alterations in patients with Fabry disease, Vylet'al and co-workers reported on quantitative and qualitative changes in the excretion of uromodelin (UMOD) . Attenuated UMOD-expression was suspected to be directly linked to lysosomal storage processes as both, UMOD and accumulated Gb3 meet in the Henle-Loop of the kidney. Deficient UMOD-expression has been reported in association with impaired tubular function, in particular with impaired urine-concentration. Hence, the reported observations may explain the changes in tubular function seen in Fabry disease, and in particular the phenomenon of hyperfiltration reported in some patients. Treatment effects have been analyzed based on data from 165 patients with Fabry disease enrolled in the Fabry Outcome Survey . Feriozzi et al. demonstrated that ERT with Agalsidase alfa may slow the decline in renal function of male and female patients. Moreover, this effect was also seen in patients with advanced renal failure (eGFR ≤ 59 ml/min*1.73 m2), and it was sustained over a period of three years. Both, diagnosis and monitoring of kidney involvement in Fabry disease is hindered by the repeated discrepancies between estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), 24-hour urine creatinin clearance (Cr) and isotopic GFR measurement. An observational study on children enrolled in the Fabry Registry characterized disease manifestation in 352 children (194 boys, 158 girls) before the institution of ERT . In this cohort reported age at onset of symptoms was 6 years in boys and 9 years in girls, respectively. The most frequent symptom was neuropathic pain which was reported in about 60% of the boys and some 40% of the girls. Gastrointestinal symptoms were frequently reported with more than 1/4 of patients affected also on follow-up (baseline definition not clear). The frequency of abnormal skin findings (i.e. Angiokeratoma) in this group of patients was about 25% for abnormal sweating, and slightly more for abnormal heat tolerance. Abnormal cold intolerance was documented in 10-18% of patients (females vs. males). Cardiac involvement included mainly cardiac valve dysfunction (~19% of patients) and arrhythmias (~5% of patients). In addition, conduction disturbances were also seen. Renal insufficiency was reported in 3/144 patients with information on eGFR. The increased frequency of hyperfiltration may be due to an overestimation of eGFR in patients with chronic kidney disease. However, it is also not unlikely that hyperfiltration is an early sign of kidney affection in the context of Fabry disease. Of note, the information regarding quality of life and pain assessment in this study have to be taken with caution since both questionnaires (SF-36 and Brief Pain Inventory) are validated for adults, but not for children. Several studies on the natural history of Fabry disease as well as analyses of the two available patient registries have shown that diagnosis often is carried out more than a decade after onset of first symptoms [44, 45]. Indeed, there are patients with a diagnosis not before irreversible organ damage has taken place. Several authors suggested early institution of ERT in order to prevent irreversible organ damage. Projects are ongoing to evaluate the feasibility of newborn screening for Fabry disease, and pilot studies have been taken place in several countries [46, 47]. Males may be easily detected by determination of α-galactosidase A from dried blood spots, but there are still difficulties in detecting females with this method. Determination of residual enzyme activity in females may deliver erroneously normal activities in up to 40% of females with Fabry disease despite significant clinical disease . However, newborn screening for Fabry disease may once be incorporated into already existing screening programs using tandem-mass-spectrometry. Such an implementation would not only allow early diagnosis of Fabry disease, but may also provide valid information on the real prevalence of Fabry disease. This may be even more important since the pilot studies in newborn screening as well as secondary screening of populations at risk suggested a much higher prevalence than previously reported [1, 49]. In Austria screening of male kidney transplant recipients revealed an incidence of 1:262 in this population , which is markedly higher than previous studies on a similar cohort [51, 52], but less than reported by Nakao et al. several years earlier in patients undergoing haemodialysis . Porsch et al. detected two patients with deficient α-galactosidase A activity out of 577 male patients with unknown reason for renal failure and haemodialysis . The authors agreed that Fabry disease is still under-diagnosed also among patients on dialysis, and they emphasized the importance of proper medical work-up in patients with end-stage renal disease or renal failure. Providing the missing enzyme to patients with Fabry disease sounds easy and in fact is simple to perform. Confirming previous reports, Keslová-Veselíková et al. reported that intravenously administered enzyme reaches the lysosome via Mannose-6-phosphate-receptor mediated uptake . The uptake of Agalsidase beta into the cells was higher than in Agalsidase alfa, a fact attributed to the enrichment with mannose moieties in Agalsidase beta. In both enzymes a total clearance of the fibroblastic lysosomes from Gb3 was observed after 24 h, and total quantitative analyzes of this clearance revealed a dose-dependency. However, the consumption of Agalsidase beta within the fibroblasts was much faster compared to Agalsidase alfa. The different pattern of enzyme consumption in different cell types and tissues support the idea of early treatment in Fabry disease in order to prevent functional organ damage. Noteworthy, uptake of Agalsidase into endothelial cells was better compared to uptake e.g. into cardiocytes and perineural cells. Hence, for some tissues it may be more effective to prevent Gb3 accumulation rather than cleave the storage material after years. Such a preventive effect may be needed in particular in cells after mitosis and cells with low potential for regeneration, e.g. myocardial cells. However, clinical studies on these effects are lacking. Though several authors suggested early treatment of patients with Fabry disease using ERT, no randomized double-blind placebo-controlled studies have been performed in children, and most information in the paediatric age group results from observations based on the two clinical surveillance programmes. Anyhow, Ries et al. have evaluated the pharmacokinetic profile of Agalsidase alfa and have shown that this is comparable with that in adult patients . Moreover, Wraith et al. evaluated safety and efficacy of Agalsidase beta in children aging 8-15 years in an open-label study . There, ERT resulted in a decrease of Gb3-accumulation in skin biopsies and improvement of gastrointestinal symptoms after 24 weeks treatment. Interestingly, the authors did not find renal or cardiac symptoms at baseline, and stabilisation was reported under ERT. Forty percent of the patients experienced infusion associated reactions, and nearly 70% of patients developed IgG-antibodies. Vedder et al. found that α-galactosidase-A-antibodies in adults occurred in about every third patient, but twice as often in Agalsidase beta compared to Agalsidase alfa . Confirming previous observations and in agreement with current understanding of pathology in females, no female patient developed antibodies. Of the patients with neutralizing antibodies more than 75% were treated with Agalsidase beta, and the authors found a correlation between antibody formation and dosage, but no correlation between antibodies and residual enzyme activity/GLA-mutation. In contrast to previous reports [2, 59] and independent from the administered enzyme, no decline of antibody levels was observed after 24 months. Clinical parameters such as renal function did not change over a follow-up period of 12 months in any of the treatment groups, and were not related to antibody formation. A decrease in LVM was reported only for 1.0 mg/kg Agalsidase beta, however, the combination of patients who received 0.2 mg/kg Agalsidase beta with those receiving 0.2 mg/kg Agalsidase alfa may be unfortunate as both drugs are different from each other . The authors concluded that high dose treatment may be more effective in reducing Gb3-levels, however, following treatment failure seven patients in this cohort received increased dosages of Agalsidase during the study, and five of them developed worsening of ischemic lesions in the CNS. Hence, a higher dosage may overcome antibody formation, but may not necessarily lead to clinical improvement. In addition, the authors stated that a translation to clinical efficacy is difficult to make as there are no reports available on the clinical outcome of patients with Fabry disease receiving enzyme replacement therapy in relation to antibody formation. Apart from ERT there is another treatment strategy currently under investigation that is chaperone therapy. Chaperones are able to increase the residual activity in affected individuals, and as they are small molecules they are supposed to cross the blood brain barrier. Shin et al. reported on an association between genotype and response to chaperone therapy , a fact that may not surprise. The effect of chaperone therapy is, e.g. to correct the structure of misfolded proteins which in their faulty configuration may not be effective. Hence, only those patients with misfolded enzyme products as a consequence of GLA- mutations may benefit from chaperone treatment. Both, the pattern of clinical symptoms as well as the response to ERT is heterogeneous and not foreseeable. A biomarker that is uniformly found throughout male and female patients representing the total load of Gb3-storage throughout the body would be very helpful. Ideally, such a biomarker should allow also diagnosing patients independent of their gender. In this context, Aerts and co-workers reported on the occurrence of lyso-Gb3 in plasma of patients with Fabry disease . Lyso-Gb3 is structurally similar to Gb3 which could not be identified in plasma from control individuals. In hemizygotes a strong correlation between plasma Gb3 and lyso-Gb3 was found, but there was no correlation observed between lyso-Gb3 and the Mainz-Severity-Score-Index as a clinical index for disease severity in male patients. The latter finding may not necessarily limit the impact of lyso-Gb3 but may be related to methodological concerns regarding the MSSI as a cross-sectionally used severity score. However, the MSSI has recently been shown to correlate in a more longitudinal setting with changes under ERT . Lyso-Gb3 in females correlated with the MSSI and with left ventricular mass. In a cell culture, lyso-Gb3 promoted proliferation of smooth muscle cells when given in concentrations similar to those found in plasma of symptomatic patients with Fabry disease. In contrast to Gb3, lyso-Gb3 influenced vascular remodelling in vivo, and ERT with either form of Agalsidase lead to decreased concentrations of lyso-Gb3 over a period of one year, but not to complete absence of the compound. In summary, lyso-Gb3 cannot be used as a biomarker. Another approach for a biomarker was presented by Thomaidis and co-workers, who suggested membranous CD77, the membranous form of Gb3 . The amount of membranous CD77 shall mirror the tissue load of Gb3, and it has been shown to decrease under ERT with Agalsidase alfa in a kidney cell model. Since CD77 may play an important role in apoptosis and necrosis , there may be a link to kidney failure in patients with Fabry disease and accumulation of Gb3. Important progress has been made regarding the understanding of disease pathology, diagnosis and treatment effects in Fabry disease. Obviously, Gb3-accumulation alone is not responsible for the cellular and organ specific consequences. In fact, inflammation and immunological aspects have to be considered in the development of Fabry disease, too. It remains open whether or not these findings may lead to future treatment options. Selective screening of populations at risk have clearly shown that there are still undiagnosed patients with Fabry disease, and efforts should be undertaken to identify these individuals, e.g. in cohorts of patients with cardiomyopathy, unexplained renal disease and/or populations with stroke. This is even more important since there is good evidence that ERT may at least halt progression of Fabry disease. Moreover, the publications reviewed here demonstrate pre-clinical damages of heart, kidney and CNS. If there is, however, the possibility that ERT in Fabry disease may prevent irreversible organ damage as it is suggested by some authors and believed by experts in this field, treatment has to be started in young age. Dr. Hoffmann received travel grants and honoraria for lectures from Genzyme Corp. Germany, from Shire Human Genetic Therapies Germany and Biomarin Germany. There are no conflicts of interest to be declared.
2019-04-24T14:30:34Z
https://ojrd.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1750-1172-4-21
Welcome to the tutorials on Linux. [this] is first of the 18 part video series Helping you become a linux pro. [so] [what] is an operating system? Every time you switch on your computer you see a screen where you can perform different Activities like write browse the internet or watch a video What is it that makes a computer hardware work like that? How does the processor on your computer know that you are asking it to run an MP3 file? Well, it is the operating system or the Kernel which does this work a Kernel is the program at the heart of any operating system that takes care of fundamental stuff like letting hardware communicate with software So to work on your [computer] you need an operating system in fact. We are using one as you read this on your computer now You may have used popular operating systems like windows Apple os x but here we will learn what linux is and what benefits it offers over other os choices So what is linux and who created it? Linux is an operating system or a kernel which Germinated as an idea in the mind of young and bright [cleanest] or valves and [he] was a computer science student Used to work on the Unix operating system And thought that it needed Improvements however When his suggestions were rejected by the designers of Unix he thought of launching an os which will be receptive to the changes modifications Suggested by its users Selina's divides the colonel named Linux in 1991 though he would need programs like file manager document editors [Audio-video] programs to run on it Something as you have a cone, but no ice cream on the [top] as time passed by he collaborated with other programmers in places like mit and applications for Linux started to appear So around 1991 a working linux operating system with some applications was officially launched And this was the start of one of the most left and open source os options available today the earlier versions of Linux were not so user-friendly as they were in use by computer programmers and Leanest or [valves] never had it in mind to commercialize his product [it] is definitely curved Linux is popularity as other commercially oriented operating system windows got famous Nonetheless the open Source aspect of the Linux operating system made it more robust But now linux has got its new attention The main Advantage of Linux was that programmers were able [to] use the Linux Kernel in order to design their [own] custom operating systems This has now made linux one of the most popular and widely used Kernel and it is the Backbone of popular operating systems like Debian ubuntu and Fedora the list doesn't end here as there are thousands of operating systems based on Linux which offer a variety of functions to [the] users, so [what] are the benefits of using Linux? Linux now enjoys popularity at its prime, and it's famous among programmers as well as regular computer users around the world Its main benefit is that it offers a free operating system? You do not have to shell hundreds of dollars to get the operating system like windows But the benefits are being [open-source] anyone with programming knowledge can modify it The Linux operating systems now offer millions of programs and applications to choose from most of them free Once you have linux installed you no longer need an anti-virus Linux is a highly secure system more so there is a global development community constantly looking at ways to enhance its Security with each upgrade the operating system becomes more secure and robust linux is the operating [system] of choice for server? environments user stability and reliability [mega] companies like Amazon Facebook and Google use linux for their servers a linux based server could run non-stop Without a reboot for years on end So is it for you? users who are new to Linux usually shun it by falsely considering it as a difficult and technical operating system to operate But to state the truth in the last few years the next operating systems have become a lot more [user-friendly] Than their counterparts [bank] [windows] so trying them is the best way to know whether linux suits you or not [I'm] asked to learn Unix and why Linux Unix is the mother of the operating systems which laid out the foundation to Linux? Unix is designed mainly for mainframes and used in enterprises and Universities while Linux is fast becoming a household name for computer users Developers and server environment you may have to pay for a Unix kernel while in Linux it is free But the commands used on both the operating systems are usually the same there is not much difference between Unix and Linux Though they might seem different at core They are essentially the same since linux is a clone of Unix so learning is same as [learning] another This was a short introduction to Linux. Thank you for watching I will [see] you the next tutorial Welcome to the video tutorial on selecting a linux distribution and types of installation now that we know what clinic says it is time We learn how we should install it on the computer and choose which distribution. We should use Let's start by understanding, what a linux distribution is Well now as you know that your next is an open source free to use kernel. It is used by programmers organizations profit and nonprofit companies around the world in order to create operating systems to suit their individual requirements these versions types the kinds of Linux operating systems are all distributions or in the stores, so [how] many distributions are out there there are hundreds of Unix operating systems or distributions available these days? Many of them are designed with a specific purpose in mind for example To run a web server or to run network switches like routers or Modems the latest example of one of the most popular smartphone based [Unix] distribution is Android so let us learn about some popular Linux distros Starting with arch Linux this Linux Distro is popular amongst developers [it] is an independently developed system. It is designed for users who go for a do with [yourself'] approach The next is the Center Force it is one of the most used Linux distribution For enterprises and web servers it is a free enterprise class operating system And is based heavily on Red Hat Enterprise Distro The next is gen it is [a] source based [distribution] which means you need to configure the code on your system before you can install it it is not for Linux beginners But it sure is fun for experienced users Linux mint, it is one of the most popular desktop distributions available out there It launched in 2006 and is now considered with a fourth most used operating system in the computing world Next is ubuntu This is the third most popular desktop operating system after Microsoft windows and Apple mac os it is based on Debian Linux distribution and it is known for its desktop and Violent so which one is the best linux distribution? Well each linux distribution is built for a [specific] purpose to meet the demands of its target users Most of the distributions are available for free at their respective websites You might want to try them one by one till you get to know which distribution you [like] the most each one of them offers its unique design Applications and secure it We will be using ubuntu for our learning purpose as it's easy for a beginner to understand Now let us look at the various methods. We can use to install Linux The first type of installation is from the USB stick This is one of the easiest methods of installing ubuntu or any other linux distribution on your computer So let's start with the uSB stick Installation for this you are going to need the ubuntu iso, or os files? You can download them by visiting ubuntu. Com forward slash download [or] slash than stop let's visit this page as You can see here there are two versions of ubuntu available free for download Let us go ahead and download it will do 1210 The second software that you are going to need is a program which will install the ubuntu iso files on the uSB stick So for this you can install the universal usB installer Available for free a pendrive linux comm so let [us] go ahead and download it So once you have the [given] to iso files and the universal usB installer Downloaded on your computer It's time to run the universal usB installer The first step is about selecting a linux Distro The drop-down menu here shows the list of different distributions and their versions We will choose ubuntu 1210 next you need to click on browse and Here we have that would do 12 10 iso files on the desktop So go ahead and click on it Now you need to choose the uSb flash drive. [so] let us go ahead and click on this drop down menu here It shows that we have a uSb stake mounted on the drive. I so let's select it Now if you want to format the usb flash drive before it installs ubuntu you can click on Format the drive then click [on] create You would get a pop-up message informing you that the universal usB installer Will work on the following actions click on yes? Then the universal usB installer program will start moving the ubuntu iso files to the uSB stick Once done you have the uSB stick ready with ubuntu to install it on your system So let us go ahead and click on close [now] your uSB [stick] is an installation media with the window on it Now you can boot your computer Through this uSB stick and you will be able to run [move] [into] without installation The second method of installation is by Live CD This is another effective [way] of installing linux on your system for this you again need to visit ubuntu. Com forward slash download forward slash desktop in order to download the iso files Once you are done with the download and you have open to installation files on your computer Burn them to a CD and then you need to boot your computer Through the optical drive and follow the instructions as they come the next and the most popular method to install a linux operating system is virtual installation it offers you the Freedom of running Linux on an existing operating system already installed on your computer This means if you have windows or mac os running then you can just run linux with a click of a button Virtual Machine Software like Oracle VM Can install ubuntu in easy steps let us look at them again? You first need to download the ubuntu iso files on your computer Then you need to download the installation files for oracle VM virtualbox [as] we are running on windows right now. We will go ahead and download these files So let us download and install oracle VM on the computer Once done, you need to click on the virtual box icon on your desktop, and this is the screen that will open then you need to configure the virtual operating system by clicking on new Which will create a new virtual machine? You can have multiple os installations in your virtual machine at the same time then click on next Type in a name for your virtual machine and then choose the operating system and the version that you would like to install Click next and Define the memory size for the virtual machine Right now the memory allocated for the virtual machine is 512 and B You can always increase the base memory size for the virtual machine then click on next Create a new hard disk this does not create a new drive like c. D or [e] in your machine Instead it creates a vDI. Which is a virtual disk image This virtual disk will contain your os installation Click on next and you will find that there are many options to create a virtual disk choose vDI. Which is virtualbox disk image select between dynamically allocated or fixed size virtual disk storage a Dynamically allocated [virtual] disk file with only you space on your physical hard disk which is used by your VM installation While fixed size will use the entire allocated space in your physical hard drive click on next Define the location for virtual this file on your physical hard drive And the file size the recommended file size is 10 GB click on next you are then shown a summary screen click on create and this is the virtual machine that we created so [let's] go ahead and power the virtual machine This will boot forward to on virtualbox now let's go ahead and install ubuntu If you want to download updates while installing you can check this thick box let's click on continue So if you want to go ahead And install [ubuntu] directly you can choose this option here It will not affect the hard drive instead with only [arrays] the virtual disk that you have created Otherwise if you want to work on the partitions, you can choose something else Let's go ahead with [arrays'] disk and install ubuntu right now and click on continue We can type in the city you live in here, and then you need to click on continue Then choose the language that you would want to work [with] and click on Continue now. This is an important step and it will define your rights on the linux system so put in your name here and Then choose a computer name you will leave it like this Then you can put in a username of your choice and after that put in a password Then you can choose any of these two options here and click on continue Now this would install ubuntu on your system Those who want to test the distribution before installing it on a computer and replacing the existing operating system would be surprised to know that you can easily run it from the uSB [stick] or a Cd in the trial mode as you can see here. We have a try ubuntu option available [if] we go with it Ubuntu would start in the trial mode and you can easily check out the interface This way you can learn whether you like the [distribution] or not and can either install or move on to another one You can even install linux [side-by-side] with Windows or any other os which is called dual booting let us quickly summarize what we [learned] today an Operating system based on the Linux Kernel is called the distribution or Distro. There are hundreds of distributions available Some of which are designed to accomplish a sole purpose like running servers act as network switches Etc Naming the best linux distribution is difficult as they are made for different needs Linux can be installed in your system while [the] below mentioned methods The first one is the USB stick the second one is the live CD and the third one is virtual installation Thank you for watching I will see you in the next tutorial Welcome to the video tutorial on the big switch to Linux now [that] you have installed linux. It is time to make the big switch from your windows or the Mac operating system [Mac] always uses a Unix call your switch from Mac os to Linux will be relatively smooth It's the windows users who will need some adjusting in This tutorial we will introduce the linux operating system and compare it with windows Starting with file system in Microsoft Windows files are stored in Folders under different data drives like Cd. E Button Linux files are ordered in a tree structure starting with the root directory This root directory can be considered as [the] start of the file system, and it further branches out various other sub directories the root is denoted with the forward slash a General Tree file system on your linux system may look like this Moving on to the types of files in Linux and Unix everything is a file Directories are files files are files and the devices like printer mouse keyboard ETC are all files the first type [of] files are general files also called ordinary files they can contain image video program or simply text it can be a sky or a binary Format These are the most commonly used files by Linux users next are the directory files These files are a warehouse for other file types We can have a directory file with them a directory you can take them as folders found in windows operating system here the difference between Linux and windows becomes Significant in Windows system and program files are usually saved in the drive [sea] But in linux you would find the system and program files and different directories under the file System same is the case with CD-Rom while we see it as a drive in windows It is a directory named as CD-Rom and Linux Removable Media files are also shown as a drive in windows Whereas in Linux, they are a directory Common programs and [windows] are stored in the program files and linux you would find them under the bin directory The last type is the device files in Microsoft Windows devices like printers CD-Rom and hard drives are represented as drive letters like the e g h and Linux they are represented as files for example if the first sata drive had three primary partitions They will be named as the [file] systems that you can see on the screen It is important to note here that all the device files reside in the [def] directory all Of these file types including the devices have permissions which allow a user to read Edit or execute them This is a powerful Linux or Unix feature access Restrictions can be applied [for] different kinds of [users] by changing permissions let us discuss user accounts and Linux the first type is a regular user a regular user account is created for you when you install ubuntu on your system, or Your files and folders are stored in home guru 99 Which is your home directory as a regular user you do not have access to directories of other users other Than regular user another user account called runed is created at the time of installation The root account can access the structured files install software and has [administrator] It is also called the super user Whenever you want to perform any administrative tasks on Linux. You need to log in as a root user The third type is the service user Linux is widely used as a server operating system Services such as apache Squared have their own individual service accounts Having services accounts increases security of your computer it is important to note here that You will not see service accounts in a bin to desktop version, but only in the open to server edition Regular accounts are also called standard accounts in windows desktop Let Us move on to file name convention In windows you cannot have two files with the same name in the same folder With the second file with the same name is created you would get an error While in Linux you can have two files with the same name in the same directory provided they use different cases for [every] user in Linux a directory is created under the home directory Now consider a regular user [through] [nine] [nine] He can store his personal files and directories in the directory home below nine nine But he cannot save files outside his user directory and does not have access to directories of other users as well The concept is similar to the user's folder found in windows for every user in Linux A Directory is created as home the user name when you put the linux operating system [a] user directory home Guru nine Nine is the default working directory hence the directory home rule [ninety] [nine] is also called the home directory Which is a misnomer? The working directory can be changed using some commands which we will learn later. Let's summarize Unix or Linux uses a hierarchical file system. There are no drives and Linux unlike windows [files] like hard drives CD-rom printers are also considered files, Unix or Linux There are three types of user counts the first one being regular? Second one root and the third one is service account root user is the super user and has all the administrative Privileges when x file naming convention is case-sensitive Thus sample and sample are two different files in Linux or Unix operating System for every user home user [named] directory is created. Which is called his home directory Thank you for watching this tutorial. [I] hope to see you in the next ones Welcome to the video tutorial on terminal [Vs. File manager Have [you] wondered what is the most frequent [tasks] let you perform on your computer is it playing games? Listening to Music or browsing the internet This may be surprising [to] some but the most frequent tasks performed by an average user on a computer is browsing creating moving and deleting files So what are the ways to manage files efficiently there are two main ways? The first one is the Cli or command-line interface like the terminal in a bunton The second one is the graphical user interface or Gui Which is like the file manager on any operating system Most of the beginners as [well] as the experience to users prefer to use the Gui but Cli has its own Advantages which we will discuss in this tutorial So why learn the command-line interface? First the command-line interface is highly flexible and offers options which are not available in the Gui mode Second some configurations in Gui are up to four screens deep while in the CLi It's just a single command for example Creating a new account can take forward different steps through the graphical user Interface Whereas the same can be done with a single terminal command third If you are thinking of moving hundreds of files it can take hours using the Gui mode Whereas using regular expressions on Cli you can do the same within seconds Forth Cui loads fast and does not consume ram compared to Gui so it does not affect system performance at all This is important [in] crunch situations when a server is down But Gui has its importance to and especially useful while viewing performance graphs editing images and videos Creating sketches and trying out other graphic intensive tasks the look Feel an Operation of Gui based file manager is similar across major operating systems like windows Mac operating system and Linux It's the command-line interface which people find challenging to use and it will be the focus of our Tutorials So starting with how to launch the command-line interface on the ubuntu operating system You can try the same with the following two methods first click on – and type terminal Then you would be able to see a thumbnail with Seis terminal go ahead and click on it This way the terminal window would pop open Or you can simply press the CTRL alt? And t keys on [benet] ssin to launch the same window Once you have launched the Cli you would find some information already populated on the screen Let us learn what it is about The first part of this line is the name of the user which can be Bob Tom ubuntu Home or Guru 99 The second part is the computer name or the host name the host name helps identify a computer over the network in a server environment host name becomes important [the] Colon is a simple separator The teal sign shows that the user is [working] in the home directory If you change the directory the sign will vanish Later we will learn how [to] move between different directories, and you would see that the sign would not display the Dollar Sign Suggests that you are working as a regular user in Linux while working as a root or the master user The hash sign is displayed now in order to work on your files You need to know which directory you are in on the terminal this brings us to what as a present working directory The directory that you are currently browsing is called the present working directory We log on to the home [directory] by default when you boot your computer otherwise you can use the Pwd command For knowing which directory you are working on let's try the same on terminal here by using the PWd command We got to know that we are in the home guru nine-nine Directory which also happens to be the home directory for this computer Pwd stands for print working directory Moving on to changing directories. You can do so by [using] a CD Well it is not the actual CD, but the command Let us look at how it works Here by using the CD. Command you would move from the home directory to the tMP directory Then again using the same command we would move on to the bin directory Trying the same we would then move back to the tMP directory if you want to navigate to the home directory, [then] you need to type CD or Cd space team in case you want to move to the root directory you would have to type CD space forward Slash It should be noted here that the root of filesystem and [Linux] is denoted by a forward slash Which is the same as c. : backward slash [in] windows? The apparent difference is in windows. Where you use a backward slash while in Unix or Linux A forward slash is used Let us try the same on terminal So by using the CD. Space field command we would move to [the] home directory Then if you want to move to the root directory we would use CD. Space forward Slash Do not forget the space between CD and forward slash to avoid error So how do we navigate through multiple directories you can navigate through multiple directories at the same time? by Specifying its complete path So if you want to move to the cPU directory under dev you do not need to break this operation [into] parts Let us look at it on terminal here by using a single command we would move from the home directory to the cPU directory under DEv in Case you want to move up one directory you can easily do [so] by trying CD. Space dot dot By using the CD Space dot dot command we would move from the cPU directory to the [DEV] directory Then again using the same command we would move from DEv directory to the root directory It is important [to] understand What is path in computing and what are its types? Just like a path can make you reach your home a path in computing is the address of a file or folder so the C documents and settings user downloads in Windows and home user downloads Path and Linux would take you to the downloads folder There are two kinds of parts absolute and relative let's start with the first one Let's say you have to browse [the] images stored in the pictures directory of the home folder Guru [nine] [nine] The absolute [filepath] of pictures directory is then home go nine nine pictures So to navigate to this directory [you] would have to use the command CD home Guru nine nine pictures and This way you would [read] the pictures directory This is called absolute path as you are specifying the full path to reach the file of the directory Relative path comes in handy when you have to browse another subdirectory Within a given directory it saves you from the effort to type complete parts all the time Suppose you are already in your home directory, and you want to navigate to the pictures directory for this you do not need to type the absolute path with the command as You're already in the home guru [9:9] directory. You can simply type CD space The name of the directory and you would reach it This way you do not have to specify the complete path to read a specific location within the same directory in the file system So to summarize what we have learned today To manage your files you can use either the Gui or the Cli and linux You can launch the terminal from the dashboard or using the Shortcut Key CTRL alt and t the PWd commands gives the present working directory You can use the CD command to change directories Absolute path is complete address of a file or directory Relative path is relative location of a file or directory with respect to the current directory Relative Path Helps avoid typing complete paths all the time Let us also refresh our memory on the Cli commands learnt in this tutorial Use CD. Space directory named command to navigate to a [particular] directory Use Cd or CD space field command to move to the home directory? Use CD. Space forward Slash command to navigate to the root directory use CD space dot dot Command to move one level up in the directory structure Thank you for watching I will see you in the next tutorial Bienvenido al video tutorial sobre importantes comandos de Linux en El último tutorial, aprendimos la importancia de usar la interfaz de línea de comando continuemos y aprendamos los debe saber los comandos de Linux Para verificar una lista de archivos en su sistema Unix o Linux, puede usar el comando "LS" Muestra los archivos o los directorios en su directorio actual. Vamos a ver esto en la terminal Al escribir el comando "LS", podemos ver todos los archivos y el directorio en el directorio de inicio Es importante observar aquí, que los directorios se denotan en color azul y los archivos se denotan en blanco Encontrará esquemas de colores similares y diferentes distribuciones de Linux. El comando:LS "muestra los archivos solo en el directorio actual Supongamos que desea verificar la presencia de un archivo MP3 en su carpeta de música que se encuentra bajo el subdirectorio English y el subdirector Hardrock para listar este archivo MP3, puede usar el comando "LS-R" Mostrará todos los archivos y las carpetas no solo en los directorios, sino también en los subdirectorios Aquí, podemos ver todos los directorios, los subdirectorios y los archivos Presentes en ellos para obtener información muy detallada relacionada con los archivos y directorios puede escribir el comando "LS" de guión de espacio "-al" Una vez que escribe el comando Se le presentan muchos detalles en la pantalla. Vamos a aprender cuáles son, la primera columna aquí muestra el tipo de archivo y los permisos de acceso la segunda columna muestra los bloques de memoria ocupados por el archivo o el directorio La tercera columna aquí muestra el propietario o el creador del archivo. la cuarta columna muestra el grupo de usuarios del propietario. la quinta columna muestra el tamaño del archivo y los bytes. La sexta columna aquí muestra la fecha y la hora de la creación del archivo o el directorio. La séptima y la última columna aquí muestra el directorio o el nombre del archivo. Los elementos ocultos en Unix o Linux comienzan con el símbolo de punto al comienzo del archivo o directorio. Cualquier directorio que comience con el período no se verá a menos que usted lo solicite. Para ver los archivos ocultos usa el comando Espacio "LS" Hyphen "-a" al escribir este comando en la terminal, podemos ver todos los archivos ocultos que comienzan con un símbolo de punto. Cuando se trata de crear y visualizar archivos, es hora de traer al gato El comando "cat" el comando "cat" se usa para mostrar archivos de texto. También se puede usar para copiar, combinar y crear nuevos archivos de texto. veamos cómo funciona en la Terminal para crear un nuevo archivo. Debe escribir el siguiente comando en la terminal. Archiva uno aquí siendo el fuego que crearemos. Una vez que haya ingresado al comando, la terminal le solicitará que agregue el contenido. agreguemos el contenido de este archivo. Una vez que haya terminado de agregar el contenido del archivo Debes presionar "CTRL + D" en tu teclado para regresar al comando Indicar Así es como crearemos un nuevo archivo usando el comando "cat" Para ver el mismo archivo, puede escribir en el espacio "cat" el nombre del archivo. Vamos a crear otro archivo usando el mismo método Ahora tenemos dos archivos aquí, "archivo1" y "Archivo2" Permítanos tratar de combinarlos juntos la sintaxis para combinar dos archivos es "gato" espacio "Nombre de archivo 1" Espacio "Nombre de archivo 2" que luego sería enviado a un nuevo archivo. Tan pronto como inserte este comando y presione enter, los archivos estarán Concatenados. pero no ve un resultado. Esto se debe a que el shell bash o el terminal son de tipo silencioso. Nunca le dará un mensaje de confirmación como "ok" o se ha invocado un comando. Solo mostrará un mensaje cuando algo vaya mal o cuando haya ocurrido un error para ver el archivo nuevo archivo combinado, usemos el mismo comando "cat" Tenga en cuenta que solo los archivos de texto pueden mostrarse y combinarse con el comando "cat" pasar a borrar archivos Usaremos el comando "RM" Space filename para eliminar los archivos que no necesitamos. Veámoslo en la terminal Aquí tenemos un archivo con un nombre "prueba" que nos gustaría eliminar el comando "RM" elimina archivos del sistema sin confirmación Para eliminar este archivo, debe escribir "RM" en el espacio "test" Esto eliminaría el archivo y la próxima vez que enumeremos los archivos en el directorio de inicio, no veríamos el archivo de prueba. para mover archivos a una nueva ubicación que necesita usar "" MV "" espacio "nombre de archivo" espacio "Nueva ubicación de archivo" comando Supongamos que queremos mover el archivo de prueba a una nueva ubicación, archivos home Guru99 Para esto tenemos que ejecutar este comando Al ejecutarlo, moverá el archivo. pero ¿por qué dice permiso denegado? Bueno, el comando move necesita permiso de superusuario. Actualmente estamos ejecutando el comando como un usuario estándar y no tenemos los permisos correctos para el directorio de archivos. Por lo tanto, obtenemos el error anterior. para superar el error use el comando "SUDO". El programa "SUDO" permite a los usuarios habituales ejecutar programas con los privilegios de seguridad de Superusuario o raíz. El comando "SUDO" solicitará la autenticación con contraseña. No necesita saber la contraseña de root para esto y puede ingresar su propia contraseña después de la autenticación, el sistema invocará el comando solicitado. "SUDO" mantiene un registro de cada comando, los administradores del sistema de ejecución pueden rastrear a la persona responsable para cambios indeseables en el sistema. Cabe señalar aquí que de forma predeterminada La contraseña que ingresó para "SUDO" se conserva durante 15 minutos por terminal. Esto elimina la necesidad de ingresar la contraseña una y otra vez. para cambiar el nombre de los archivos, utilice "" MV "" espacio "nombre de archivo" espacio "nuevo nombre de archivo" Vamos a cambiar el nombre del archivo de prueba a uno nuevo. para esto, tenemos que escribir "" MV "" prueba de espacio y un nombre de archivo que sería, test1 en este caso Una vez hecho esto, podemos enumerar los archivos y veríamos que el nombre del archivo para la prueba se cambiaría para probar uno. Se trataba de hacer cambios en los archivos. ahora aprendamos un poco sobre la manipulación de directorios. comenzando con la creación de directorios, este comando creará un subdirectorio en su actual directorio de trabajo. Que es, generalmente su directorio de inicio. Veamos cómo funciona en la terminal escribiendo el comando "mkdir" con el nombre del directorio Podríamos crear un nuevo directorio. Aquí, crearemos un nuevo directorio llamado Songs. Así es como crearemos un nuevo directorio en el directorio de inicio. si desea crear un nuevo directorio en una ubicación diferente a la del directorio de inicio, debe usar el siguiente comando por ejemplo, escribir el siguiente comando crearía un nuevo directorio de música en el directorio "TMP". como podemos ver aquí Tenemos un nuevo directorio de música creado bajo Tmp. También puede crear más de un directorio a la vez. vamos a ejecutar este comando en la terminal y mirar los resultados. Para crear múltiples directorios, debe escribir el comando "mkdir" Seguido por los nuevos directorios que le gustaría crear Aquí creamos tres nuevos directorios como los siguientes Ejecutar el comando "LS" mostraría que estos tres nuevos directorios se han creado en el directorio de inicio. para eliminar un directorio Use el comando "rmDir" nombre de directorio espacial ahora, queremos eliminar el directorio "direc" usando el comando "RMDir" Para esto, debe escribir lo siguiente Pero asegúrese de que no haya ningún archivo en nuestro subdirectorio bajo el directorio que desea eliminar. Borre los archivos y los subdirectorios antes de eliminar el directorio principal. Al ejecutar el comando list veríamos que el directorio "dirEc" ha sido eliminado para cambiar el nombre de los directorios, use el comando "MV" que cubrimos anteriormente. ahora nos gustaría cambiar el nombre de "Direct2" a Directorio a uno nuevo. para esto necesitamos ejecutar el comando "MV". Así es como lo haríamos. al ejecutar el comando "LS" veríamos que el "direct2" a "directorio" ha sido renombrado como directo para. pasando al comando "hombre", "Hombre" significa manual que es un libro de referencia de un sistema operativo Linux. es similar al archivo de ayuda que se encuentra en el software popular. Para obtener ayuda sobre cualquier comando que no comprenda, puede escribir "man" space Comando el terminal abriría la página de manual para ese comando Por ejemplo, si escribimos el comando "man" space "LS" y presionamos Enter la terminal nos daría información sobre el comando list directory contents El siguiente es el comando "historial" El comando "historial" muestra todos los comandos que ha usado en el pasado para la sesión actual de la Terminal. esto puede ayudarlo a consultar los comandos anteriores, los ha ingresado y reutilizarlos nuevamente en sus operaciones. En la terminal, este comando nos daría la siguiente salida También puede presionar la tecla de flecha hacia arriba en su teclado y seguir el comando que ha ejecutado antes De esta forma, puedes ejecutarlos nuevamente. El siguiente es el comando "borrar". Este comando declara todo el desorden en el terminal y le da una ventana limpia para trabajar. Al igual que cuando inicias la terminal. veamos cómo funciona este comando. Aquí, tenemos una ventana de terminal con muchos comandos y su salida. ahora si quieres limpiar todo esto Simplemente podemos ejecutar el comando "borrar" y todos los comandos y su salida serán limpiados. Muchas veces tendrías que escribir comandos largos en la terminal, a veces puede ser molesto y si quieres evitar tal situación luego copiar pegando los comandos puede venir a rescatar Para copiar el texto de la fuente, puede usar "CTRL + C" Pero para pegarlo en el terminal, debe usar la combinación de teclas "CTRL + shift + V" también puedes probar "shift + insert" Ahora vamos a resumir rápidamente todos los comandos aprendidos hoy El comando "LS" enumera todos los archivos y directorios en el directorio de trabajo actual El comando "ls-R" enumera archivos y subdirectorios. el comando "Ls-a" enumera los archivos ocultos El comando "ls-la" enumera los archivos y el directorio con información detallada como permisos, tamaño, propietario, ETC. el comando de nombre de archivo "cat" crea un nuevo archivo el nombre del archivo "gato" muestra el contenido del archivo, con este comando puede unir dos archivos y Almacenar la salida en un nuevo archivo "MV" File new, file Path moverá un archivo a su nueva ubicación el siguiente es El siguiente es el nombre del archivo "MV" nuevo comando de nombre de archivo que cambiaría el nombre del archivo a un nuevo nombre de archivo. "SUDO" es un comando importante Y permite a los usuarios habituales ejecutar programas con los privilegios de seguridad del superusuario o raíz el comando RM borra un archivo El comando "mKDir" seguido del nombre del directorio crearía una nueva victoria en el directorio de trabajo actual. Usando el mismo comando seguido por el camino y el nombre del directorio crearía un nuevo directorio en la ruta especificada. "rmdir" eliminaría un directorio del sistema. El nombre "MV" nuevo, el nombre le daría a un directorio un nuevo nombre El comando "hombre" nos da información de ayuda sobre un comando. Este comando da una lista de todos los comandos pasados ​​escritos en la sesión de terminal actual. El último es el comando "borrar" que borra la terminal. gracias por ver que te veré en el próximo tutorial. Welcome to the video tutorial on setting file permissions on Linux Security [is] a big concern [for] Linux. Which is a clone of Unix the multi-user operating system as Linux is used in mainframes and servers it is vital to keep it safe from a maligned user who can corrupt change or remove crucial data This is why for effective Security Linux divides? authorization into two levels ownership and permission The concept of permissions and ownership is crucial and Linux Here we will discuss both of them. Let's start with ownership and the next files Every file in directory in your Unix or linux system is assigned three types of owner The first one among them is User a user is the owner of the file by default [the] person who created a file becomes its owner Hence a user is also sometimes called an owner the next one is a group a User group can contain multiple users all users belonging to a group will have the same access permissions to the file So you can add many users to a group and assign group permission to a file So [that] only the group members can read or modify them Furthers other who is any other user who has access to a file? This person has neither created the file nor does he belong to a user group which owns the file Practically it means everybody else Hence when you set the permission for others it is also referred as set permissions for world Now the big question arises, how does Linux? distinguishes between these three user types so that a user a Cannot affect [a] file which contains some other user B's vital information or data It is like you do not want your colleague who works on your linux computer to view your personal images This is where permissions set in and they define user behavior let us understand the permission system on Linux every File in directory and your Unix or linux system has three permissions read write and execute Define for all the three users that we discussed earlier This permission gives you the authority to open and read a file read permission on a directory gives you the ability to list its content the Write permission gives you the authority to [modify] the contents of the file The write permission on a directory gives you the authority to add remove and rename files stored the directory In windows an executable program usually has an extension Exe which you can easily run in Unix or Linux. You cannot run a program unless the execute [permission] is set for example in The sample File here the user does [not] have the permission to execute it hence we would get an error message If we try to open it Therefore if the execute permission is not set you will not be able to run the file Let us learn more about Linux security by examples running the LS L command on terminal gives us the following result by picking the Details for the first file we get to know that the file types and access permissions are displayed by [this] Weird-lookin code let us learn what it is [about]? Let's first learn about the characters R stands for read permission W is for Write Permission x is? execute permission and the – stage no permission Here the first – Implies that we have selected a file else if it were a directory d would have been shown The next part of the code is our w – and it tells us the permissions for the [Amna] This suggests that the owner can read the file write or edit the file But he cannot execute the file since the execute bit is set to – which is no permission The next part is our [w] – it is for the user group which is going and the group members can read the file and Write or edit the file by design many Linux distributions like Fedora sent us Ubuntu ETc, we'll add users to a group of the same group name as the [username] Thus a user Tom is added to a group named Tom The third part is for the world which means any user it says are – – this means that the user can only read [the] file Moving on let's say you do not want [your] colleague to see your personal images You can easily do so by changing file permissions We can use the chmod command which stands for change mode Using the command we can set permissions Is that read write and execute on a file or directory for the owner group and the world? There are two ways to use the command The first one is the absolute mode and the second one is the symbolic mode starting with the first one in this mode file permissions are not represented as characters, but a three-digit Octal number the table shows numbers for all the permission types For [example] the number 0 states no permission and the symbol for it is three hyphens? successively, the number 1 would be 4 execute and the symbol for the same is – – x Let us understand this by an example Here we have a file with the main test We will change the permissions for this file using the absolute mode of chmod command Here we use the seven six for absolute code and now the permissions for test file would change Let's examine the changes to the permissions Seven six for absolute code says the Following read write and execute for the user or the owner Read and write for the user group and read only for other users So this is how we can change the permissions using the absolute mode of the chmod command? Moving on to the next way in the absolute mode we change permissions for all three owners But on the symbolic mode you can modify permissions of a specific owner as well. It makes use of mathematical symbols to modify the file permissions So the plus sign would mean adding a permission to a file or [directory] – would suggest removing the permission and equal to we'll set the permission and override the permissions set earlier the various owners are represented as u g o and a Let us learn it with some examples Again, we would use the same test file and change its permissions using the symbolic mode By using oh is equal to r. Wx we have changed permissions for the other users? Let us check what the new permissions are as you can see here the other users have the read write and execute permission for this test file with g + x we have added execute permission to the group Now if you will check the test file it will show the read write and execute permission for the Crew by Running [u-] [R] we will remove the read permission for the user or the owner of the file let us see how [it] looks [now] as We can see the permissions for test file. Do not show any read permission for the owner This is how we can use the two methods for Chmod command and change permissions? for changing the ownership of a file or directory You can use this command in case you want to change the user as well as group for a file or directory You need to use this command that is try them on terminal Let us change the file ownership for the file command Right now it shows that the owner of the file is guru 99 By running the town command with sudo we would be able to change the owner of this file to [root] As you can see the new owner for the file commands is root Now let's try changing the user group and group ownership of the same file Right now the owner of the file is root and the user group of the file is also root We will change it to guru 99 for this we would need to run the command sudo shower on the owner name then the group name and then the name [of] the file let us see the changes in the user and group ownership as You can see here the commands file is now owned by [Guru] 99 and it also belongs to the same user group in Case you want to change only the group owner of a file you will need to run the following command Here we will again change the group owner of the file commands to root the Chgrp Command Stands for change group now let us go through some important tips on user groups the file [ETC'] group contains all the groups defined in the system In order to reach this file. You need to go to the file system click on EDC directory and then search for the group file Upon opening this file. You would be able to see all the groups present on your [linux] system You can use the command groups to find all the groups you are [a] member of So it shows here that the guru user is a member of the following groups You can use the command new grp to work as a member of a new group other than your default group Let's see how it works. Let us now change the user group for the user guru 99 to cD-Rom Let's create a new file as test Upon checking the detailed information for this file you will find That they use a group for the test file is CD-rom instead of the default guru 99 The next step says that you cannot have two groups owning the same file The one group can be [a] subgroup of another which can own a file Let's now quickly summarize. What we have learnt the [next] being a multi-user system uses permissions and ownerships for security They are free user types on a linux system user group and other Linux divides the file permissions [in] to read write and execute denoted by are w and x the Permissions on a file can be changed by [ch] Mod command which can be further divided into absolute and symbolic mode? The ch o w and command can change the ownership of a file or a directory? Use the following command [for] changing the user or the user and the user group at the same time the chgrp command Can change the group ownership the command is Chgrp? group and the file name Thank you for watching I will [see] you in the next tutorial welcome to the video tutorial on print email and install software on [Linux] as We already [know] now that commands clear vital [road] and performing different Processes on Linux easily let us learn some more of them for performing Day-To-day tasks For printing in Linux you need to use the Pr command This command helps in formatting the file for printing on [the] terminal But more your original file does not get affected at all by the formatting that you do There are many options available with this command which help in making desired format changes on the file for example using the option – x will divide the Data into x Columns if you want to assign a header value to the text file you can use the [hyphen] h? Space the header name option with the Pr Command let us learn some of them by examples tools is a file We would like to print, but we want to divide its content and three columns for this we will use the command Pr Space – space the file name 3 being the number of Columns that we would divide the data of this file and dip Upon entering the command we would see the file contents have been divided into three columns If you want to assign a header to the file print you can do so with the help of this command Home tools would be the title or [the] header of the file tools And running the command we would see that the file tools has a header now For denoting all lions with numbers you can try this command This command Denotes all the lines in the file with numbers Once you're done with the formatting and it is time for you to get a hard copy of the file you need to use The Following command [it] can be LP filename, or LPR [filename] in case you want to bring multiple copies of the same file you can use the number Modifier [M] and the commands will change to LV Space [Hyphen] N The number of copies then the file name or the other one displayed on the screen If you have multiple printers installed on your system Then you can specify them using these commands the first one says LP space – d the name of the printer and then the name of the file that you would like to print in Windows the Installation of a program is done by running the setup dot exe file The installation file contains the program as well as various dependent components required to run [the] program correctly in Linux or Unix installation files are distributed as Packages, but the package contains only the program itself Any dependent component will have to be installed separately which are usually available as packages themselves? You can use the apt commands to install or remove a package You need to run this command with sudo let us use it to install Vlc media player on the system On running this command sudo would ask us for the password Upon entering the password System would start installing the VLC media player The easy and popular way to install programs on ubuntu is by using the software center Most of the software packages are available on it, and it is far more secure than the files downloaded from the internet So if you want to install the VLc media player you can either click on This thumbnail or you can search [for] it on the search bar Clicking on it will give you the option installed this way, you can install the software easily moving on to sending emails You will need to install the package mail [x] for it on terminal this can be done by using the sudo apt-get, install command Terminal will prompt if you want to continue or not press y to that once you hit the enter key The Postfix configuration screen would open and it will ask you to select the mail server configuration type Choose the one that you want and hit ok this will install the mail x package on your linux system Once done, you can then use the following syntax for sending an email Going by the Syntax that we saw in the slide We would have to type in mail x followed by the email address that we want to send the email to Once you hit the enter key the prompt would ask you to enter the subject To enter the body of the message [you] would have to hit the enter key again, and then you can type in The message that you want to Convey Once you reach the end of the message press control-D and your email would be sent Let us quickly recap [what] we have learnt in this tutorial Using the Pr Command you can format and print the file directly from the terminal the formatting you do on the files does not affect the file contents In Unix and Linux software is installed in form of packages a package contains the program itself [any] dependent component needs to be downloaded separately You can also send emails from the terminal using the mail x command Let us go through the commands as well pr x divides the file into x Columns Pr each command Assigns a header to the file pr n. Is used to denote the file with line numbers LpN C file name and Lpr C file name and C copies of a file and Pd printer name and L Pp printer name followed by the file name Helping specify the name of a printer ab get is a command used to install and update Packages e-mail acts followed by the address followed [by] the body is the command to send email. Thanks for watching this tutorial Welcome to the video tutorial on redirection in Linux most of the commands we have learned so far [take] an input and give an output the standard input device is the keyboard and The standard output device is the screen Linux is a very flexible operating system And you can change the standard input and output devices that is learn how this redirection works starting with output redirection The more than symbol is used for output or std out redirection let us try this on terminal Using the Ls. L command we can see the detail information of the files and directories in our home directory Now we can redirect the output of the command and is al to a new file listings instead of the screen this is how we would do it on Viewing the contents of the file listings we would see [that] the output of the command LS [L] has been stored in this file This is how we can redirect the output of a command It is important to note here that you should use the right file name while free Direction If there is an existing file with the same name [it] will be overwritten so if we redirect this statement to the same file listings We would find that the contents of this file have been overwritten So if you do not want the file to [be] overwritten, but want to add more content to an existing file You should use the more than more than or creative. This is how we would try it Now if we run the cat command for the same file, [we] would see that it has not been overwritten Instead the new content has been added [to] it Moving on to input redirection The less than symbol is used for input or stdin redirection an Example of this is the mail program in [Linux] which can help you send emails from the terminal? You can type the contents of the email using the standard device keyboard But if you want to attach a file to email you can use the input redirection operator Let Us move on to some advanced redirection techniques Which make use of file descriptors, but before this we must know that in Linux or Unix Everything is a file be it a regular file directories or even devices all of them are files moving on to descriptors every file has an associated [number] called file descriptor or Fd your screen also has a file descriptor When a program is executed the output is sent to file descriptor of the screen and you see program output on your monitor So whenever you execute a program or a command at the terminal 3 files are always open They are the standard input the Standard output and the Standard error by default error Stream is displayed on the screen and Error redirection is routing the errors to a file Other than the screen these files are always present whenever a program is run as explained before a file descriptor is Associated with each of these files. So why error redirection error redirection is one of the very popular features of Unix or Linux? Frequent Unix users will reckon that many commands give you massive amounts of errors for instance while searching [for] files One typically gets permission denied errors these errors usually do [not] help the person searching for a particular file While executing shell scripts you often do not want error messages cluttering up the normal program output The solution is to redirect the error messages to a file. Let's learn our interaction with some examples The first one is for redirecting an error log to a file here we are executing a program called Telnet and Running it gives us the following error the file descriptor for the Standard error S2 So by using [two] with the [mode] [in] sign really direct the error output to a file named error File thus the program output is not cluttered with errors and if we want to see the error file we can do It this way Let us go through another example which uses the fine statement using the find statement We are searching the current directory for a file with main starting with mine On running the command it finds a file with the name my texts But it also shows an error for the directory files which cannot be accessed Now using the output redirection. We will now redirect the error message to a file named error lock Now we can see the error in the file contents Let's see a more complex example server administrators frequently list directories and store both error and The standard output into a file which can be [processed] later they use this command Here the more then ampersand writes the output from one file to the [input] of [another] file Error output is then redirected to standard output which in turn is redirected to the file dir List has both the output is written to file the [ir] list [let's] try it on terminal Let us first is the contents of the directories documents and Abc The command says that the directory ABc was not found and it lists the contents of the documents directory Now we add the output redirection to a file named dir list, but we would see that the error still shows To correct this we now redirect the error output to standard output by using to more than sign Ampersand and one Hence both standard and error output are written to the file dir list This is how we can use output redirection [let] us now go through the key points of this tutorial Each file in Linux has a corresponding file descriptor associated with that The keyboard is the standard input device while your screen is the standard output device The more then is the output redirection operator More than more than appends output to an existing file less than is the input redirection operator More than 10 percent redirects output of one file to another you can redirect error using its corresponding file descriptor [-] Thank you for watching I'll see you in the next tutorial Welcome to the video tutorial on Linux Pipes gre [p] and Sort command If you are new to linux you might wonder what role do pipes play and running the operating system While they are not the real pipes that you have in mind the symBol pipe Denotes a pipe and Linux If you want to use two or more commands at the same time and run them consecutively you can use pipes Pipes, enable Unix or Linux users to create powerful commands which can perform complex tasks in a Jiffy? Let us understand this with an example when you use the cat command to view a file Like the file fruits here which has a lot of pages the Prompt quickly jumps to the last page of the file And you do not see the content in the middle to avoid this you can pipe the output of the cat command To less which will show you only once call lengths of content at a time This way you can scroll the file content using the arrow keys and Once you reach the end of the file has cue to exit instead of less you can also use the PG and more commands and You can view the file in Digestible bits and scroll down by simply hitting the enter key once You reach the end of the file you can again hit the enter key And you would see the command prompt this was about reading the file So what if you have to search a file for text or a piece of information? For this we need to use the gre key command Using this command you can scan a document and reverse you can also customize the search results the way you want The syntax for this command is gre p space the search strength let us see it in action These are the contents of the file fruits Now we will [use] the gre P command to look for avocado The syntax for this would be cat space the file name space the pipe Then the gre P command followed by the string that we [want] to search which would be avocado in this case Hitting enter would search the file fruits for the string avocado Let's also use the same command to search for Melon This is how the command search for the desired strength in a file? You can [use] the following options with the Gi Ep command So if you want to display the lines that do not match the searched Strength you can use the option – V with the Gi Ep command Let us try some of them on terminal here. We will try the option I with the gr. Ep command The I option filters the string which is a from all the lines in the fire. This is why we would get this result The Sort command comes in handy when [you] are trying to list the contents of a file alphabetically the syntax for this command is sort space filename let Us say we want to sort the content of the same file fruits? Alphabetically right now. We see that the name of fruits are all jumbled up Using the Sort command we will easily be able to do it in a jiffy You can use the following extensions for the sort command and get different results so if you want to reverse the sorting of the Contents of a file you can use the option hyphen r. Let us try it and see how it works out Using reverse sorting we have changed the alphabetical order of the contents of the fruit file It is now understand. What our filters? Filter is the output from the first command which becomes the input for the second one When you pipe [to] commands the filtered output of the first command is given to the next one? Let us understand this with the help of an example. We will again use the same file for this example now We want to highlight only the lines that do not contain the character a in lowercase You will do it this way This is how we can filter the output of the first command and use it as the input for the second one Now [what] [if] we want this result in the reverse order? We will need to run this command or the same Here the cat command will display the contents of the file fruit the result would be outputted to the gre [P] command which will not search for strengths which contain the character a The output of this command would be then worked on by the Sort command To display the result in the reverse order This is how we can use filters And summarize what we have [learned] today pipes help combine two or more commands a Filter in a pipe is an output of one command which serves as the input to the next The gre P command can be used to find strengths and values in a text document Sort command Sorts out the content of a file Alphabetically less PG and more commands are used for dividing a long file into readable bits Thank you for watching I will see you in the next tutorial Welcome to the video tutorial on regular expressions in Linux. So what are regular expressions? Well, they are special characters. No not these Yes Which help search Data and match Complex patterns regular expressions are shortened as reg exp or reg x Some of the commonly used commands with regular expressions are tr Sed Vi and gr. E p these are some of the basic [projects] Let us learn their practical use Let's consider the sample file Now we will use the gre p command to look for lines containing the letter a let's use a regular expression now Using the cat symbol we will search [for] the content let's start with the character a the caret matches the start of a string This is why only lines that start with the character a are filtered lines which do not contain the character a at the start? arek note Let us look into another example Here we will look for the character t in the same file sample Now let us select only those lines which end with the character t for this we will need to use this regular expression Which matches the end of the string this [is] how we can use regular expressions moving on to the interval regular expressions? They tell us about the number of occurrences of a character or string. They are So if we use the first expression it will match the preceding character appearing and times exactly Let us try it on terminal Let us filter out all the lines that contain the character p Now if we want to check the character p appearing exactly two times in a string one after the other for [this] the syntax would be which will give us this result it should be noted here that you need to add – Capital E with these regular expressions the next is the extended regular expressions these contain combinations of more than one expressions some of them are So if we use the backward slash with [a] plus sign [it] will match one or more occurrence of the previous character Let us learn their practical use Here we have searched for the character t Suppose we want to filter out lines where character a precedes character t. We would have to use the command like sense Running this command would give us this result this is how we can use the extended regular expressions the syntax for base expansion is either a sequence or A comma separated [list] of items inside curly braces the starting and end of items in a sequence are Separated by two periods let us go through some of the examples here [we] would use the echo command to create strings using the brace expansion another example of the same would be This would create a string from a to z one more example would be this an advanced example of the breast expansion is this This is how we can create strings using the bass expansion? To recap what we have learned regular expressions are a set of characters used to check patterns and strengths They're also called read Exp and regex it is important to learn regular expressions for writing scripts some basic regular expressions are the [period] Symbol replaces any character the caret matches the start of the string the dollar sign? matches the end of a string some extended regular expressions are Here the backslash used with the plus sign matches one or more occurrence of the previous character the backslash used with a question mark Matches [zero] or One occurrence of the previous character some interval regular expressions are Here the N in the curly braces matches the preceding character appearing N Times exactly in the second expression the N And m and the curly braces Match preceding character Appearing n times but not more than m and the last regular expression displayed here matches the preceding character Only when it appears and times or more the brace expansion is used to generate strings It helps in creating multiple strings out of form thanks for watching this tutorial. [I] hope to see you in the next one Welcome to the video tutorial on environment variables. So what is a computing environment it is the platform? Constituting an operating system with a processor where a user can run programs The Springs [are] [stored] [as] a variable in Computer science [a] variable is a location for storing of value which can be a file name Text number or Any other Data It is usually referred to with its symbolic name which is given to it while creation the value the stowed can be displayed deleted edited and resaved variables play an important role in computer programming because they enable programmers to write flexible programs as They are related to the operating systems that we work on it is important to know some of them and how we can influence them So what are environment variables? Well, they are the dynamic values which affect the processes or programs on a computer? They exist in every operating systems and their types may Vary They can be created edited saved and deleted They also give information about the system behavior and they change the way software or programs behave for example the lan g environment variable shows the value of the language that the user understands this values read by an application Such that a Chinese user is shown a Mandarin interface while an American user is shown an English interface These are some of the common environment variables will go through them once we know how to access variables in order to Determine the value of a variable You need to use this command it [is] echo space the dollar sign then the variable name Now we'll use some common environment variables starting with echo Path variable This variable contains a colon separated list of directories in which your system looks for executable files When you enter a command on terminal the shell looks for the command in different directories? [mention] in the path variable [if] the command is found it executes otherwise it returns with an error command if not found Variables are case sensitive Make sure that you type the variable name in the right letter case otherwise you may not get the desired results So if we type in the path variable this way, we will not receive a result Moving on to another environment variable the user environment variable gives us the name of the user trying out the home environment variable Would give us the default path to the [user's] home directory the ENV command displays all the environment variables You can create your own user-defined variable with Syntax Variable name is equal to the variable value Again bear in mind that variables are case sensitive and usually they are created in the upper case So let us make a new variable with this value Now for checking the value of the newly created variable you would have to type in this command make sure you do not leave space between the variable name and the equal to sign otherwise you will get an error and Do not miss out on the dollar sign when you are checking the value of a variable if you press the enter key Without the dollar sign the echo command would take the variable name as a string instead of a variable Moving on to deleting variables the following syntax can be used to remove a variable from the system It says unset space the variable name that is try it on terminal so now if you want to remove the new Variable and its value that we created earlier. We would have to type in [less] on the terminal now [if] we run the echo command followed [by] the new variable We would not get a result the unset command removes the value of a variable permanently Let us do a quick recap environment variables govern behavior of programs in your operating system? Let us also go through the commands that we have learned the echo variable command is used to display value of a variable The ENV command displays all environment Variables the variable name is equal to variable value command creates a new variable unset followed by the variable name removes a variable from the system export Variable is [equal] to value is used to set value of an environment variable Thank you for watching this tutorial. [I] hope to see you in the next one Welcome to the video tutorial on Communication in Linux While working on a linux operating system you may need to communicate with other devices for this you can use some basic utilities which will help you communicate with Networks are the linux systems and remote users So let us learn them one by one starting with pain This utility is commonly used to check whether your connection to the server is healthy or not This command is also used in analyzing network and [host] connections Tracking Network performance and managing it testing hardware and software issues The Ping Command is [peng] space IP address or the [host] name let's try some of its examples on terminal on running ping space the IP address system sends 64 bytes of Data to the IP address if Even one of the data packets does not return or is lost it would suggest an error in the connection you can press the cTRL C key combination to exit from the pain loop Similarly we can use peng space the hostname, we will try WWL comm here and check the connection to the server? This is how you can use the ping command? Moving on to FTP it stands for file Transfer protocol And it is the most preferred protocol for Data transfer Amongst computers you can use FTP for logging and establishing a connection with the remote host uploading and downloading files navigating through directories and Browsing contents of the directories the syntax to establish an FTP connection with the remote host is FTP space IP address or the host name let us check this on terminal when you have entered the command it will ask you for authentication wire username and password Go ahead and enter the username and then the password Once connection is established and you are logged in you may use these commands to perform different actions So let us run some [of] these commands on terminal so if you want to display the files in the current directory Of the remote computer you need to type in the dir command if you get an error While running commands then you can turn on the passive mode this mode ignores Firewalls and Data port errors, so let us go [ahead] and run the dir command again With the help of the put command we will upload a file with the name local file Press [enter] and the file will be uploaded on the remote computer Now if you want to check the presence of this file, you can again run the dir command And you will be able to see the local file on the remote computer Now let us go ahead and download a file from the remote computer Here we have a file Which we would like to download the command to download a file from the remote computer is get Space the file name which is remote file in our case, so let us go ahead and run this command FTP says that the file was successfully transferred The quit command would log us out from FTP This is how you can use FTP for Data transfer amongst computers the next utility is telnet It helps connect to a remote linux computer [then] programs remotely and conduct Administration this utility is similar to the remote desktop feature found in Windows machine The syntax for this utility is telnet space IP address or hostname For demonstration purpose here we have connected to our own computer or the local host using telnet Once you have put in your username and pass good And you are authenticated you can execute commands just like you have been doing so far using the terminal The only difference is if you are connected to a remote host the commands will [be] Executed on the remote machine and not your local computer Talat has become obsolete over the years as more secure protocols to connect to remote computers have come up This is why we move on to the next utility which is ssh It stands for secure shell and is used to securely connect to a remote computer Compared to ten net ssh [is] secure We're inclined server connection is authenticated using a digital certificate and passwords are encrypted Hence it is widely used by system administrators to control remote linux servers the Syntax to login to ssh is Ssh, space username at IP address or the host name let us try it on terminal So let us login to ssh using the command and so sage space username, and IP address or hostname Once you enter the login command the terminal would ask you for the password upon entering the password Ssh, would be logged in now You can go ahead and run commands on it like the way you do on terminal the difference Is that the command would be executed on the remote computer? So let us try one more command dir this would list all the directory contents in the home directory So let us find out. What [is] the present working directory? [so] right now. We are working on home. Similarly on typing an exit You [would] be logged out off as as age Let us go through the key points of this tutorial communication between Linux or Unix and other different computers networks and remote users is Possible the ping command checks whether the connection with a host name or the IP address is working or not? Run Ping IP address or hostname on the terminal FTP is preferred protocol for sending and receiving large files you can establish an FTP connection with the remote host and then use commands for uploading downloading files Checking file and browsing them telnet utility helps you to connect to a remote linux computer and work on it Ssh, is a replacement for telnet, and it is used by system administrators To control remote linux servers. I would see you [in] the next one Welcome to the Video tutorial on managing Processes in Linux so what is the Process an? Instance of a program Is called the Process in Simple Terms Any Command That You give To your linux Machine Starts A [new] Process [for] example When you launch offers to Write an Article it creates This Process and it's Possible to have Multiple Processes Aka Instances for the Same Program There are Two types of processes The First one Are the Foreground processes They run On the Screen and need input from the user [an] Example of them are the office Programs The Second One are the Background processes There are in The Background and Usually do not need user input Them an Example of them is the Antivirus That You use you Can start A foreground Process either from the Dashboard or you Can run it from the Terminal so if You want to run the [Badge] your Media Player you can go to – Type in Banshee and You Can run the Media Player this way Otherwise you Can go to terminal and Type in Banshee and Execute The Command When using the terminal you will have to wait until the Foreground Process runs If You start a foreground Process Or a Program From the terminal then you cannot Work on the terminal Till the Program is Up and Running to avoid such A? Situation [You] Can Run the Program and send it to the Background so [that] the terminal Remains available to you, let's learn how To do This for Running a Process on the Background you need to start the Program by typing in the Command Main Once Execute The Program you need to present CTRl + Z then Type Bg to send Process to the Background so if We try the same on terminal? We need to put in the Command Name for the Process or the Program and When it Starts Running, We need to Press in CTrl + z which will stop the Process Then We need to type in Bg to send the Process Into the Background This way you Can send the Process to the Background and Keep the terminal free you can use the Command Fg to Continue a Program Which is Stopped and bring it to the Foreground The Simple Syntax for This Utility, Is Fg. Space the Job Name an Example for this [S]. We will launch the banshee Media Player stop the Process and Then? We will type in Fg to Continue the Process on the Foreground? Let's Look at some other Important Commands to Manage processes starting With Top this Utility Tells The user about all the running Processes on the linux Machine the Syntax for this Utility is talked so when We run This [Utility] on the terminal you Would find A lot of Fields With Different Abbreviations Which we'll learn now one by one? So starting with the Pid it is the Process Id of each Task You Can See here that it Differs for each task or a process The user is A user Name of the task, owner so it Can vary from root to as, Many user Accounts that you have on your linux System The Pr. Is the Priority It can Be 20 which Would be highest or Minus 20 Which Would be lowest and? I is a nice value of a task the vi rt That you Read on [the] Screen is the Virtual Memory used it Shows Memory in Kilobytes The re S is the Physical Memory used and it also Shows in Kilobytes As [h] [R] is a Shared Memory used and it also Shows in Kilobytes The S. Is the Status There are five Types of the same the first one Is d which Says Uninterruptible Sleep [Our] is Running? S is Sleeping T is traced or stopped and the last one Z is for Zombie the Cpu Percentage that you See is the Percentage of [Cpu] Time The Percentage of Memory Is the Physical Memory Used Time Plus Tells Us about the total Cpu Time and the Command Is the Command Name We will Discuss Some of These Fields in This Tutorial? The next One is the Ps Utility This Utility Stands for Process Status It is similar to the task Manager that Pops Up in A windows machine When, We use CTRl + alt + Delete? This Command Is similar to the top Command but the Information Displayed is Different You Can use These in Texas with the ps Command That Is try Them so to Check all the processes Running under A user you need to use this Command It will Give Us all the Information On Processes and Programs Running under Guru 99 you can Also Check the Process Status of a single Process by using the Syntax Ps Space Pid but First, We need to find the Pid of a Process which, we can do by typing in Pid of Space the Process Name here We'll type in Banshee and Check its Pid So it Says Two seven eight Three So let's go Ahead and Check the Process Status of This single Process This is how you can get Information on the Status of A single Process This Command Terminate Running Processes on A linux System The Syntax for The kill Command Is kin Space Pid In order to use this Utility again you need to [know] the Pid of the Process that you want to kill Let us Try it With an example let's Say We have the mozilla Firefox Program Running on our System and We want to kill it using the terminal? for This you need to find out the Pid of the Program Firefox So now We know the Pid of the Program Firefox Let's go Ahead and kill it? If The terminal Does not return With an error It implies that the Program was Terminated Successfully Linux Can Run A lot of processes at a time Which Can slow Down the Speed of some HiGh-Priority Processes and Result in Poor Performance to [avoid] [this] you Can tell your machine to Prioritize processes as per your Requirements This Priority Is Called Niceness and Linux and it has A value between Minus 20 to 19 the lower the Niceness Index the higher Would be the Priority given to that task The default Value of all the processes IS To start a Process With an Iceless Value other Than the default value you need to use the Following Syntax It Says Nice Space – N Then The nice Value then the Process Name if There's some Process Already Running on the System then you can Realize its Value using the Syntax Let Us Understand this by an Example so let [us] launch the banshee Media Player with A Nice Value other Than The default value Which is [Zero] so here We have chosen 19 as a nice Value for this? Program Now Let Us run it Now after Cleaning the terminal With [the] clear command, We will now run the Top Utility and Check the Niceness Value of the Program Banshee So here We have the banshee Media Player and its Niceness value Shows 19 Now for realizing The value of an Already running Process We need to know it Pid and as it Shows Here The Pid for The Banshee Media Player Is 3 8 4 4 So let us go Ahead and Realize its Value From 19 to Minus 20 for this We need to type in Sudo [Realize] then the New Nice value Which Would be 20 here Then – P Then The Pid Which was Three eight Four four Once We execute This Command? Sudo Would ask for the Password Upon Entering the Password Terminal Would Tell Us that the nice Value of the Process Id [Three] [eight] [Four] [Four] has Been Changed from 19 to Minus 20 This Is how you Can Prioritize the processes Running on your linux System and Make it more efficient Moving on to df Utility it Suppose the free Disk Space on all the file System the Syntax Says Df Upon Running This Utility, We will See all The file Systems on our? Computer With The used and The available Disk [Space] If You want the above Information in A readable format [then] you can use the df Utility With this Option Now you can See the total Size the used and The available Disk Space on [your] Computer This Command Shows The Free and The [used] Memory on the linux System you can use the arguments free Space – M to Display Output in Megabytes Or you can go with free Space – gene to Display the Output in Gigabytes Let's try, Them so if We type in free Space – Enemy, We will See that the total Memory on the System is One Thousand Two megabytes and out of it? 860 megabytes Have Been Used this is how you Can Check the free and The used Ram on your linux System Let us Summarize Quickly Any [Learning] Program or a command given to a linux System is called a process A Process Could Run in Foreground or Background The Priority Index of a Process is called Nice and Linux Its default Value Is 0 and it Can vary Between 20 to Minus 19 The lower The Niceness Index the higher Would be the Priority given to that task Let Us go, Through the Utilities as well The Bg Command Sends a Process to the Background the [Fg] Command Runs a stopped Process in Foreground Use Top to get Details on all active processes Ps Gives The Status of Processes Running for End-User Ps Space Pid Would Give The Status of A particular Process Pid Off Space Process Name Gives the Process Id of the Process or Program kill Space Pid Terminates a Process or a program Nice Starts a Program with A given Priority Green Eyes Changes The Priority of an Already Running Process df Would Give You the free hard, Disk Space Information on your System and free Because the free Ram Details on your system Thank you for Watching this tutorial [I] hope to see you in the next one you Welcome to the video tutorial on [VI] editor There are many ways to edit files on a linux operating system. You can either use the Gui or work on the terminal For those who like to go with the terminal the VI editor is the most popular and classic text editor in the Linux family Some reasons which make it a widely used editor are first. It is available in almost all the Linux distributions it works the same across different platforms and Distributions it is user friendly hence millions of [gen] [x] users. Love it and use it for the editing needs Nowadays they advanced versions of the VI editor available and the most popular one among them is well Which is VI improved? Some of the other ones are alvis and Vi [Nano] and While It is wise to learn VI because it is feature-rich and it offers endless possibilities to edit a file in order to work on VI Editor You need to understand its operation modes they can be divided into two main parts and the first part is the command mode The VI Editor opens in this mode and it only understands [commands] In this mode you can move the cursor and cut copy paste the text This mode also saves the [changes] you have made to the file Commands are case sensitive, [so] [make] [sure] you use the right [Linton] case The second part is then surd mode This mode is for inserting text in the file You can switch [to] the insert mode from the command mode by pressing I on the keyboard Once you are in the insert mode any key would be taken as an input for the file on which you are currently working To return to the command mode and save the changes you have made you need to press the escape key So moving on to starting the VI editor You need to open the terminal and type Vi is paste a new file name or VI space an existing file name You can create a new file or edit an existing one This is how we will create a new file in VI editor and it would open in the command mold On the launch screen, we see a lot of team decides on the left. They denote unused Lines For this the file length that you have created shows at the bottom now in order to add content to this file We need to press the I key on the keyboard and only then you would be able to type in something Now let's learn some of the VI editing command It should be noted here that you need to be in the command mode to execute these commands Also, Vi Editor is case sensitive. So make sure you type the commands in the right letter case so let us go ahead and try [some] of the VI editing commands on terminal as Mentioned [earlier] when you enter the VI mode it is on the command mode by a default In order to add content you need to press the I key on the keyboard and only then you would be able to write something Otherwise if I go ahead and type in hi right now, I would get the error buzz on the system Vi Editor does not display any change on the screen when you jump from the command mode to the insert mode or vice versa This is an important point to keep in mind while you are editing or creating files on the VI editor So let's press I and add some content Once you are done writing the content and you want to save the file You cannot do so in the insert mode you need to jump back to the command mode to do so and in order to move From the insert mode to the command mode you need to press the escape key on the keyboard Once you have done it You will no longer be [able] to write or edit the file So let's say I want to open a [new] lion when I am in the command mode I need to press the old letter on the keyboard and the VI editor would open a new line for me and then insert [mode] [I] can go ahead and type in more content and here if I want to undo all the changes to the entire line I need [to] go back to the command mode by pressing the Escape [Key] and Then press the letter U in the upper case this way all the changes made to the entire line would be Reverted now let's say if I want to write off the cursor I can press the letter a in the small case when I'm in the command mode once I do it I Can go ahead and write the content again? Make sure that you press the right command otherwise you will end up [making] undesirable changes to the file These are some more of the commands that you [can] use in the command mode Let us now learn how to move within a file You need to be in the command mode in order to navigate in a file the default keys for Navigation are k g h and L R you can also use the arrow keys on the keyboard Let us try some of them Right now I'm in the command mode now. I can always [use] the arrow keys to navigate within a file Otherwise you can use the L key on the keyboard to [move] right? the h key to move left The k key to move up and the key J to move down This is how you can navigate in a file that you are editing When it comes to saving and closing the file. You should be again in the command with mode the keystrokes are So if you want to save the file and quit you can either use the shift + z set key combination or you can use the : WQ if you want to save the file But keep it open then you can use the : w or if you want to quit without saving : q is the key combination So let us go ahead and save this file that we have created in Order to do so we will press the escape key to enter the command mode once done We will then press the shift + z z key combination and we would return to the terminal the other method to save and exit the file is by typing in : Wq when you are in the command mode? Once you have typed it in press enter and you would return to the command prompt Now in order to view the file that we [created] We need to type in cat space file [neal] and here is the file that we made This is how you can use the VI editor to create [a] new file or edit existing one let us quickly recap What we [learned] in this tutorial the VI editor is the most popular and commonly used linux text editor It is usually available in all linux distributions It works in two modes command and insert command mode takes the user commands and the insert mode is for editing text you should [know] the commands in order to work on your file easily learning to use this editor can benefit you in creating scripts and Editing files. [thank] you for watching this tutorial [I'll] see you in the next one Welcome to the video tutorial on Shell scripting Operating systems are made of many components, but there are two prime components [are] kernel and shell The Kernel is at the nucleus of a computer it makes the communication between the software and the hardware possible while the Kernel is the innermost part of an operating system a shell is the outermost one a Shell in a linux operating system takes input from you in form of commands processes them and then gives an output It is the interface [through] which a user works on the program's Commands and scripts a shell is accessed by terminal which runs it When you run the terminal the shell issues a command prompt Which is usually the dollar sign wherein you can type your input, which is then executed when you hit the enter key? [so] if we type in the Pwd command [and] hit the enter key the output or the result is thereafter displayed on the terminal? The shell wraps around the delegate interior of an operating system protecting it from accidental damage [hence] the name shell There are two main shells and neelix the first one is the bourne shell The prompt for this shell is [a] dollar sign and its derivatives Are the Posix Shell known as as h? The conch shell also known as as h and the bourne-again shell also known as bash, which is the most popular [of] them all? Second one is the C shell The prompt for this shell is a percentage sign, and it's subcategories are [sea] [Shell] also known as Cs. H Tops Sea Shell also known as TCs. H Will discuss bash shell base shell scripting in this tutorial? So what is shell scripting and why do I need it? Writing a series of command for the shell to execute is called Shell scripting it can combine lengthy and repetitive sequences of commands into a single and simple script Which can be stored and execute it anytime? This reduces the effort required by the [end-user] Let us understand the steps in creating a Shell script First create a file using a vI editor or any other text editor second nameless curve filed with an extension dot as h Side the script with the hash sign followed by Shriek followed by the been sh Path write some code save the script file as file name dot as h For executing the script type bash followed by file name dot as h Here the hash sign followed by Shriek is an operator [Khalsa] Bank which directs the scripts to the [interpretation] Location let's create a small script using the VI editor Will start with typing VI followed by the file name? Do not forget to enter the sh extension By pressing the I key on the keyboard will enter the insert mode of the VI Editor. Let's start with the script You need to start your script with Shebang sign followed by the bin sh. Path every time you create a shell script Let's type in the command and quickly go ahead and save this file now [in] order to run the script we need to type in bash followed by the script name Again do not forget to type in the sh extension Upon hitting the enter key we will see that the command LS is executed Commenting is important in any program in Shell the syntax to add a comment as the hash sign followed by the comment that is understand this with an example So let us create another Sample script Now [you'd] again start with the bank sign followed by the bin as age path Let us execute the command Pwd Now here. We would like [to] add a comment. Which will tell us that the PWd command stands for present working directory Let us quickly go ahead and save the script now upon Running script 1. 8, we will find that the PWd command was [executed], but the comment present working directory was ignored Moving on to what I shall variables has discussed earlier variable stored Data in form of characters and numbers Similarly shell variables are used to store information, and they can be read by the shell only For example this piece of script creates a shell variable and then prints end This is a small script which will create and it will use variables so let us start with creating the script we start the script as usual with the Shebang followed by the bend as h path Now let us start with writing the script As we have completed writing the script let us go ahead and save it now let us go ahead and run the script file for this we need to type in bash followed by The Script name which is easy script dot s h in our case once we hit the enter key The Script starts executing and it asks us, what is your name? We will type in the name Guru nine nine Upon hitting the enter again The Script now tells us. How do you do and it echoes our name? Let us put in good as You can see here the script repeats the remark that we have entered. This is how we can create script based on bash shell Now this is a simple script you can develop advanced scripts which contain conditional statements loops and functions Shell Scripting will make your life easy and linux administration a breeze Let us quickly recap what we learnt in this tutorial Kernel is the nucleus of the operating systems and it communicates between hardware and software Shell is a program which interprets user commands through Cli like terminal The bourne Shell and the [C]. Shell are the most used shells in Linux Shell Scripting is writing a series [of] commands for the shell to execute Shell variables store the value of a strength or a number for the shell to read? Shell scripting can help you create complex programs containing conditional statements loops and functions Thank you for watching this tutorial out. See you in the next one Welcome to the video tutorial on perl programming Perl is a programming language [specially] designed for text editing it is now widely used for a variety of purposes including Linux system administration Network Programming web development ETC. Well is of great importance in a linux operating system where it can be used to create programs Handle databases and emails graphical user interface Development and Networking and system administration Even though shell scripting is available to programmers. They prefer pearl because Programming on perl doesn't cause portability issues. Which is common when using different shells in Shell scripting Error handling is very easy on [firm] you can write long and complex programs on Perl easily due to its vastness This is in contrast with shell that does not support Namespaces or use objects Inheritance ETc Shell has fewer reusable libraries available Nothing compared to pearls [sipan] Shell is less secure it calls external functions for example Commands Like MV or Cp on the contrary holders useful work while using internal functions Let's learn how to create a perl script [you] should always start your script with [sabacc] User [Bill] heard the directs the execution [to] perl interpreter on your system now Let's learn how to add a variable and input or output it on perl so if you want to define a variable value You need to use the syntax variable is equal to value and this way you can store the values to a variable in form of strength and number when it comes to displaying a string or value on the screen you need to use the print command it would output the string of value and if you want to assign input to a variable in perl you to use the Stdin operator, so the syntaxes variable is equal to as dDim now Let us go through some important points add a comment on Pearl with [the] hash symbol Remember that every statement in perl ends with a semi Column [pearl] is case sensitive make sure you use the right case You can use any text editor to write your perl scripts You should then save the script file [in] dot [Pn] extension which will make it recognizable Make sure you do not use places when you are naming the perl script file Now let us understand the steps in creating a perl script Create a file using Vi or any other text editor named skip file with extension dot Pl Start the script with the shebang sign followed by user bin [perl] path write some code Save the Script file as file name dot Vl for executing the script type bash space filename Vl Let's write a perl script which will take input from the user [and] display it back through the script so let us go ahead [and] create a new pearl script file on VI editor as Discussed earlier [you] need to start your script with the shebang sign followed by user then pearl path Once done hit enter and write the script that [you] want to execute Now here is the script that we want to run? Now as we are done writing the script let us go ahead and save it Now is the time to run the script? For running the script you need to type in Fern followed by the script name Once you hit the enter key the file would ask you for an input So it says we are take your name please [let] us write our name guru Once you had enter the file returns the input value by displaying our name So this is how you can create perl scripts Let us quickly recap what we learned in this tutorial. Well is a general-purpose programming language originally developed for text manipulation Now it is used for [a] wide range of tasks including system administration web development Network Programming Gui development and more whole files have dot Pl extension There are three types of variables in perl scalar lists and hashes. Thank you for watching this tutorial See you in the next one Welcome to the video tutorial on virtual terminals Linux is a multi-user system which allows Many users to work on it simultaneously [so] what if different users need to work on the same system at a time? How do you do that? This is where we need the virtual terminals So let [us] learn about them virtual terminals are similar to the terminal that we have been using so [far] They are used for executing commands and offering input The only difference is that we cannot use the mouse with the virtual terminals Therefore you need to know the keyboard shortcuts they are one of the most distinguished features of Linux as Virtual terminals enable a number of users [to] work on different programs at the same time on the same computer so let us learn how to launch a virtual terminal the steps to launch a virtual terminal are press the CTRL + alt + F1 Key Combination on your keyboard Enter the user Id and password and you will be good to go Let's try it on a bun do So let us go ahead and press the cTRL + alt + F1 key combination as soon as we do it We see the login screen for the virtual terminal so let us put in the user name Upon entering the password We would be able to [login] to the virtual terminal 1 as Usually there are six virtual terminals on a linux operating system And you can log into them as different users to conduct different tasks You can navigate between the six virtual terminals using the following command it says CTRL + alt + F1 to F6 Key F1 being the first while F6 being the last virtual terminal you [can] work on all of them at the same [time] in Order to know which virtual terminal you are working on note the tty given at the top so right now We are working on the first virtual terminal so if you want to switch to the second virtual terminal you can press the CTRL + alt + F2 key combination to Navigate pressing CTRL + Alt + F3 Key Combination will take you to the third virtual terminal Tty is a teletype number which you can also know by typing the command tty on the terminal So right now We are working on tty it is important to note here that you need to log in to each Virtual terminal to be able to [work] on them The [7th] terminal is the one which we have been using so [far] in the Linux Tutorials it can be accessed by using the key [combination] CTRL + alt + F7 so let us try it on the operating system, so pressing the CTRL + alt + F7 key Combination would take you to the terminal window on the screen These are some of the shortcuts that you should be aware of while working on the virtual terminals So using the home or cTRl + a key combination would move the cursor to [the] start of the current line Preset would reset the virtual terminal history would list the commands executed by the user the [arrow] up shortcut would scroll up in history and You need to enter to execute a command cTRL [+] d would lock you out from the virtual terminal and using CTRL + alt + delete Key combination would reboot the system now. Let's try some of them on a virtual terminal Let's start with the history command [ensuring] this command would give us all the commands executed by the user in the past Now if you want to clean the virtual terminal window you need to type in Reset in order to run the commands from the history you can press the arrow up key And you would be [able] to see all the commands used in the past You can then hit the enter key and the command would be? executed Let's say we want to use the echo command with this strength But here we have misspelled the word echo as we cannot use the mouse with virtual terminals We need to use the left and right arrow keys to navigate Or I can simply [press] the home key and it would take me to the start of the current command line Pressing end would take me to the end of it. [so] [let's] say if I want to remove this letter [I] can take the cursor to the letter And then I need to press the [delete] key and it would clear out their own letter If you want to auto complete the command you can press the tab key So if I type Ec and press the tab key the command would be auto completed to echo This is how we can use the virtual terminal shortcuts? So let us press the cTRl + d key combination and logout from the virtual terminal Let us do a quick recap virtual terminals RCL eyes which executes the user commands There are six virtual terminals which can be launched using the shortcut keys They offer multi-user environment and up to six users can work on them at the same time unlike terminals You [cannot] use the [mount] with virtual terminals to launch a virtual terminal press CTRL + alt + F12 six key combination on the keyboard and use the same command to navigate To return to the home screen of the linux system use CTRL + alt + F7 and it will take you to the terminal Thank you for watching this tutorial. [I'll] see you in the next one Welcome to the video [tutorial] on Unix administration as Linux is a multi-user operating system There is a high need of an administrator Who can manage user [accounts] their rights and the overall system security? You should know the basics of Linux admin so that you can handle the user accounts and user groups [in] Linux every user is assigned an individual account which contain all the files information and data of the user you [can] create multiple users in a linux operating System so let [us] learn the different ways to do so right now We [only] have one account under this linux operating system now We'll go ahead and add some more accounts to it Let's start with terminal now in order to add a new user account using terminal you need to type in this command It would be sudo space add user space the new user name that you would like to add Once you enter the terminal would ask you to enter the password for the new account let us enter the password it Will then ask to Retype the New Unix password? Once done. It will ask you for the full name of the user We will use sap space 99 in our case now. Let us put in 101 The work phone you can put in any number [of] your choice Put in the home contact number then other you can leave it if you want press the y key on the keyboard If the ever given information is correct and hit enter once you see the command prompt on the terminal It means that the user account has been created [so] let us check it on the system in order to check the user accounts present orion system. You need to go to system settings Then you need to click on user accounts, and you would be able to see all the accounts present on computer so now here It shows your nine-nine as the administrator and [Sap] 99 as the standard user The other way to create a user account is by using the Gui In order to do so you need to click the unlock button here and then put in the password to authenticate Once authenticated [you] need to then click on the plus sign here to create a new user Now as you can see a new window has popped up here And it would ask us to fill in the information for the new account the account type offers two choices Standard and administrator if you want the new user to have administrative access to the computer select administrator as the account type Administrators can do things like add and delete users install software and drivers and change the data and time otherwise choose Standard let us now go ahead and fill in the full name as Java 99 if you want the username to be different as your full name you can do that, too So let us put in Java 1 0 0 here and click on create The new Account would show, but it would be disabled by default To activate it click [the] password option and add a new password Then retype the same password and click on change This way the new account would be enabled Let us now learn how to delete or disable an account So let's say we want to remove the Sap 99 user account from the system in order to do so using the terminal we need to first remove the password information For the account this is the command that we would use to do so now let us run it on the terminal On hitting enter the terminal would ask you for the password on entering the password terminal would say that the password expiry information was changed now all you have to do is delete the account and we will use this command to do so So let [us] go ahead and delete the user account Sap 99 So if you check the user accounts window you would see that the Sap 99 account has been removed In order to do so using the Gui you need to go to the user accounts window again and click on the unlock button Again put in the password for authentication, and then highlight the account that you want to delete right now We want to delete the Java 99 account once highlighted you need to click on the minus sign here Which will delete the selected user click on it? And then the system would ask whether you would like to delete the temporary Home directory and [Mail's] [Bui] files or keep them right now We do not need the files so we'll click on delete once done You would see that the Java 99 account has been deleted Now to add a user to a group you need to use the following syntax which says sudo space usermod space – a space hyphen capital g then the group name then the user name You can view the existing groups on your linux operating system by entering the following command It says group mod, then press the tab key twice Now let us go ahead and add the user group. Main to [their] user account guru [nine] [nine] and Two the password authentication and the user group would be added to your user account You can check whether the user is in a group by using the command cat space Etz space group, and you would find that the user account Guru 99 has been added to the user group mail For removing a user from the user group you need to use the following sentence It says sudo space del user space the user name then the group name, so let us try it on terminal Now for removing the user account guru [9:9] from the user group mail We need to type in sudo space then user space the username which would be guru 99 then the user group which was male and As you can see here that the user guru 99 was removed from the group mail successfully if you do Not want to run commands on the terminal for managing users and groups then you can install a Gui ad on the command for the same as So let us go ahead and install it on the system Once you had enter Thumbnail would start installing the Gui add-on and it would ask you whether [you] would like to continue the installation press y, and hit enter This would install the Gui add-on on the operating system Once the installation is complete [you] need to go to [dash] and type in user then click on users and groups Here you would be able to find out all the user accounts and you can click on manage groups to manage the groups that they [are] a part of Moving on to the finger command it is used to procure information of the users on a linux machine [you] can use it on both local and remote machines Thus index finger gives it out all the logged users on the remote and local machine Thus Index finger space the user name Specifies the information of a specific user so let us quickly recap what we have [learnt] in this tutorial You can use both Gui or terminal for user administration you can create Disable and remove user accounts, you can add or delete a user to a user group Let us go through the commands as well sudo space Adduser space the user name as a user Sudo space pa ss. WD space – L space the user name disables a user PSeudo userdel space – our username delete sir user Sudo space usermod space – a space – G in capital letter Followed by group name and then the [username] adds a user to a group you need to use sudo space Del user Space user than the group name to remove a user from the user group the finger command gives information on all logged Users the finger space username gives information of a particular user. Thank you for watching this tutorial [I] would see you in the next one.
2019-04-25T11:50:03Z
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To handle the persistent HIV epidemic in america prevention initiatives are concentrating on public determinants linked to HIV risk by targeting systems AG-120 and buildings such as for example organizational and institutional procedures practices and applications and legislative and regulatory methods to modify top features of the surroundings that impact HIV risk. equipment presented here can offer a releasing pad for various other coalitions wanting to build an HIV avoidance agenda as well as for practitioners wanting to incorporate structural adjustments for community wellness promotion. the precise problem is happening: Using regional data coalition partner understanding and a real cause evaluation approach examine problems linked to partner concurrency amount of companions intimate risk network coinfection occurrence viral fill and condom/clean needle make use AG-120 of. Determine involvement(s) may appear (i.e. areas buildings and systems to focus on). Identify can donate to determining specific solutions inside the buildings and systems and has the capacity to facilitate modification or maneuver assets. Determine specifically can be carried out (i.e. develop a Wise structural modification objective). Body 1 Structural Modification Development Tool Techie Assistance C2P coordinators distributed structural adjustments Mouse monoclonal to HSP70. Heat shock proteins ,HSPs) or stress response proteins ,SRPs) are synthesized in variety of environmental and pathophysiological stressful conditions. Many HSPs are involved in processes such as protein denaturationrenaturation, foldingunfolding, transporttranslocation, activationinactivation, and secretion. HSP70 is found to be associated with steroid receptors, actin, p53, polyoma T antigen, nucleotides, and other unknown proteins. Also, HSP70 has been shown to be involved in protective roles against thermal stress, cytotoxic drugs, and other damaging conditions. produced by the coalitions using the Country wide Coordinating Middle for verbal and created feedback linked to if the objective (1) fulfilled the study’s structural modification description and (2) was created using the Wise format. The responses process developed as time passes to help form AG-120 the coalitions’ concepts. Coalitions had been asked to think about the function (energetic or unaggressive) that the populace of AG-120 focus needed to believe for the modification to be turned on. Passive adjustments require no incredible action for the populace of focus to get take advantage of the modification; quite simply simply transferring through the transformed environment leads to personal advantage (e.g. fluoridated drinking water; immunizations; Williams 1982 Dynamic adjustments need engagement in components of the modification by the populace to receive advantage (e.g. taking part in a workshop; Williams 1982 Coalitions had been asked to think about the duration of the change-that is certainly was it designed being a regular event (e.g. workshop) or was the target ongoing and often around once executed (e.g. adjustments to insurance eligibility AG-120 requirements). Scope from the modification (i.e. the entity geared to bring about the brand new plan or practice) was also a account. For instance coalitions had been encouraged to focus on funding firms (e.g. the Section of Wellness [DOH] United Method) to need offer stipulations (e.g. personnel training ethnic competency requirements greatest practice standards) instead of concentrating on individual agencies. The assessment factors (i.e. reach range duration function of the populace of concentrate and prospect of sustainability) became a go with to the look steps by giving some prompting queries to assess structural adjustments (see Body 2). Body 2 Structural Modification Assessment Early concepts generated with the coalitions frequently focused on concentrating on youngsters to develop abilities understanding behaviors and behaviour regarding sexual health insurance and HIV risk (e.g. providing workshops marketing condom distribution and distributing brochures). Responses was conveyed towards the coalitions through reviews glide presentations and capacity-building exercises AG-120 to aid the coalitions in shaping their suggestions to promote concentrating on systems and buildings that modification the environment instead of counting on the youngsters to create behavior adjustments. Furthermore the coalitions had been encouraged to think about structural adjustments that might be “packed” to make a go with of practice or plan adjustments concentrating on a particular cause a strategy that could eventually increase the odds of having a direct effect on health final results (Frieden 2010 Structural Modification Objective Examples Desk 1 presents types of coalitions’ structural adjustments organized by cultural/structural determinant targeted technique employed as well as the youngsters population the modification was designed to eventually influence. To help expand organize the illustrations we utilized the Institutes of Medication risk types of (i.e. all youngsters) (i.e. the subpopulation of youngsters prioritized with the coalitions) and (i.e. within this whole case people that constitute a subpopulation that have a very particular risk aspect; Springer & Phillips 2007 Desk. Allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (Allo-HSCT) with donor lymphocyte infusion may be the mainstay of treatment for most varieties of hematological malignancies however the therapeutic effect and prevention of relapse is certainly difficult by donor T-cell recognition and assault of host cells in an activity referred to as graft-versus-host disease (GvHD). and perpetuation of GvHD. Right here we review the procedures of cellular reaction to damage and cell loss of life which are relevant pursuing Allo-HSCT and present the existing evidence to get a causative part of a number of endogenous innate immune system activators within the mediation of sterile swelling pursuing Allo-HSCT. Finally we discuss the restorative strategies that focus on the endogenous pathways of innate immune system activation to diminish the occurrence and intensity of GvHD pursuing Allo-HSCT. predicated on their content material of unmethylated CpG motifs (64). CpG ODNs are identified by TLR9 resulting in MyD88 activation and either an interferon (IFN) regulatory element 3 (IRF3)- and IRF7-reliant type-1 IFN response or an NF-κB (nuclear element kappa-light-chain-enhancer of triggered B cells)-initiated inflammatory response based on if they localize towards the endosomal or lysosomal area respectively (65-68). Furthermore mtDNA contains a higher percentage of 8-hydroxy-2′-deoxyguanosine (8-OHG) residues that produce mtDNA resistant to DNAses and boost their inflammatory potential (48 69 70 The high content material of 8-OHG may be the consequence of leaky oxidative equipment having less efficient DNA restoration mechanisms as well as the absence of protecting histones. The administration of CpG ODNs during Allo-HSCT accelerates GvHD in a bunch APC-TLR9-dependent way and a bunch IFN-γ-dependent way but 3rd party of sponsor IL-6 IL-12 or organic killer (NK) cells (71). Oddly enough CpG administration also improved bone tissue marrow rejection in a way reliant on donor APC-TLR9 activation. Within an MHC-mismatch murine style of HSCT using TLR9?/? receiver mice the GvHD medical rating of TLR9?/? mice was considerably less than that of wild-type mice while no significant variations were noticed when weight reduction was considered only (72). Another GvHD research examining the part of MyD88 TRIF TLR2/4 and TLR9 discovered that while insufficiency in every these molecules reduced the intestinal immunopathology of GvHD just TLR9 insufficiency improved success (73). Zero MyD88 and TLR9 also decreased the amount of Foretinib (GSK1363089, XL880) apoptotic cells within the gut within the same style of intestinal GvHD. To get these results the administration of the inhibitory ODN that Mouse monoclonal to THAP11 blocks TLR9 activation was proven to lower intensity of intestinal GvHD assessed by decrease in caspase-3 staining and reduced apoptotic cell matters (73). These outcomes suggest a job of TLR9 activation by unmethylated CpG including DNA an endogenous way to obtain that is mtDNA within the inflammatory pathology of GvHD. Mitochondrial-encoded protein are initiated with to avoid CpG related mortality in mice (111). Using these polymers during either irradiation- or chemotherapy-based fitness for Allo-HSCT or in the starting point of GvHD gets the potential to dampen the GvHD-immune response but hasn’t yet been examined. Chemotherapy irradiation Foretinib (GSK1363089, XL880) and GvHD bring about tissue damage that may also result in the degradation of Foretinib (GSK1363089, XL880) ECM as well as the launch of inflammatory glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) such as for example hyaluronate and heparan sulfate. GAGs could be released straight by glycolytic enzymes (e.g. heparanase) or from the Foretinib Foretinib (GSK1363089, XL880) (GSK1363089, XL880) proteolysis of extracellular or membrane certain proteoglycans to that they are attached. Alpha-1 antitrypsin (A1AT) can be an abundant serum serine protease inhibitor crucial for preventing neutrophil elastase-induced lung damage within the establishing of chronic swelling (112). The overall immunosuppressive properties of A1AT have already been observed in preventing severe myocardial ischemia-reperfusion damage (113) and ischemia-reperfusion-induced lung damage (114). A1AT in addition has been proven to prolong islet allograft success in mice (115 116 We among others show that administration of human being A1AT reduces GvHD in murine types of Allo-HSCT (90 117 118 and it has been proven to keep and improve the NK-mediated GvT impact (119). A1AT happens to be being researched in clinical tests for the treating steroid refractory GvHD (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT01700036 and NCT01523821). The receptor for alternatively. INTRODUCTION Focal adhesion kinase (FAK) is involved with every part of tumor cell development and metastasis [3 13 41 FAK acts while a scaffold to direct numerous Rabbit Polyclonal to CLCN4. signaling pathways to accomplish a multitude of cellular results such as for example cell proliferation motility invasion angiogenesis and success [22 42 The site structures of FAK promotes it is role like a scaffolding proteins where the capability from the N-terminal FERM and C-terminal Body fat domains of FAK to connect to a number of binding companions continues to be clearly buy 54952-43-1 demonstrated and these relationships with FAK work in concert to exacerbate tumor aggressiveness [1 11 23 So that they can focus on and inhibit FAK activity numerous techniques such as for example RNA disturbance knockdown antisense oligonucleotides and kinase inhibition [17 38 have got successfully decreased tumor cell success. these relationships with FAK work in concert to exacerbate tumor aggressiveness [1 11 23 So that they can focus on and inhibit FAK activity several approaches such as RNA interference knockdown antisense oligonucleotides and kinase inhibition [17 38 have successfully decreased cancer cell survival. FAK kinase inhibitors PF-562-271 PF-04554878 and GSK2256098 are being currently evaluated in clinical trials . However destabilizing the FAK scaffold might prove to be an advantageous approach to developing FAK targeted therapeutics than solely focusing on inhibiting the kinase function of FAK [4 26 In the pursuit of developing FAK scaffold inhibitors we previously discovered that VEGFR3 binds to the C-terminal FAT domain of FAK to promote cancer cell survival . We recently developed a novel FAK scaffold inhibitor C10 (previously compound 29) that disrupted the FAK-VEGFR3 interaction and showed a dramatic increase in potency and binding affinity to the FAT domain of FAK attributed mainly due to its proximity to the tyrosine 925 site in the FAT domain of FAK . FAK-Y925 can be phosphorylated by Src which in turn creates a docking site for the SH2 domain containing adaptor protein Grb2 that further activates the Ras/ MAPK pathway . Activation of FAK-Y925 has also been implicated in promoting VEGF induced tumor angiogenesis influencing FAK/ paxillin interactions and tumor metastasis [6 19 FAK is a target in pancreatic adenocarcinoma where a large subset of patient pancreatic tumors display increased levels of FAK where expression significantly correlates with invasive potential metastatic disease and poor prognosis [8 31 A significant correlation between FAK expression and tumor size in pancreatic cancer patients has also been reported . An increase in copy number of chromosome 8q24 where FAK localizes has been linked to pancreatic cancer disease [10 24 Furthermore increased expression of VEGFR3 and its ligand VEGF-C have been implicated in pancreatic cancer development . These results concur that the FAK pathway can be operative buy 54952-43-1 in pancreatic tumor and therefore disrupting the C-terminal FAK-VEGFR3 scaffold could decrease pancreatic tumor burden. With this research we examined buy 54952-43-1 the effectiveness of C10 inside a pancreatic tumor model program and discovered that C10 focuses on the FAK C-terminal buy 54952-43-1 scaffold by inhibiting FAK-Y925 and FAK mediated downstream signaling and induced powerful anti-tumor and anti-angiogenic results in FAK-Y925 and VEGFR3 positive pancreatic tumor cells. 2 Components AND Strategies 2.1 Chemical substance synthesis Substance C10 (previously chemical substance 29) was synthesized and its own purity was examined as previously referred to . 2.2 Cell tradition MiaPaCa-2-luc and Panc-1-luc human being pancreatic tumor cell lines had been transfected with buy 54952-43-1 retroviral manifestation vector pMSCV-LucSh (supplied by Dr. Andrew M. Davidoff St. Jude Children’s Study Hospital) which has a luciferase and zeocin level of resistance fusion gene was utilized to generate cell lines stably expressing luciferase. The BxPC3 human pancreatic cancer cell range was supplied by Dr kindly. Elizabeth Repasky Roswell Recreation area Cancers Institute Buffalo NY. The MCF7 cell range was bought from American Type Tradition Collection (ATCC Rockville MD USA). The cell lines had been taken care of in DMEM supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum and incubated at 37°C in 5% CO2. The MCF7-VEGFR3 cell range continues to be developed and characterized . 2.3 Reagents The next antibodies were utilized: FAK mouse monoclonal antibody (clone 4.47). VEGFR3 rabbit polyclonal antibody (Santa Cruz Biotechnology Inc Santa Cruz CA). Phosphorylated VEGFR3 rabbit polyclonal antibody (Cell Applications Inc. CA). Phosphorylated Akt (Ser 473) Erk (Thr 202/ Tyr 204) FAK (Tyr 925) paxillin (Tyr 118) Total Akt Total Erk Total Grb2 and Total paxillin rabbit polyclonal antibodies (Cell Signaling Technology Inc. Danvers MA). Grb2 (Y209) (Abgent NORTH PARK CA). FAK (Tyr 861) and GAPDH (Invitrogen Grand Isle. In these research we developed and tested a robust EMT gene expression signature capable of assessing the degree to which NSCLC cells have undergone EMT status of NSCLC cells and tumors from patients. the Axl inhibitor SGI-7079. Moreover Axl inhibition reversed erlotinib resistance in a subset of mesenchymal cell lines and in a mesenchymal xenograft model of NSCLC combine blockade of Axl and EGFR was more effective at controlling tumor growth than inhibition of either single target. A common limitation of gene expression signatures is their platform-dependence resulting from the derivation of the signature on a specific microarray platform. One particular strength of the study presented here was the use of microarray data from two independent mRNA profiling platforms Affymetrix and Illumina for the initial development of the personal in working out cell lines. This plan allowed us to recognize the most solid probe Bazedoxifene acetate manufacture arranged for four EMT markers (CDH1 VIM CDH2 and FN1) that have been then utilized to derive the 76-gene personal. The purpose of choosing the right cross-platform probe models was to improve the likelihood how the signature could possibly be applied to examples profiled on various kinds of LCK antibody mRNA arrays along with growing technologies such as for example RNA seq. The achievement of that strategy was demonstrated within the 3rd party testing sets including cell lines profiled on Illumina v2 and v3 arrays and affected person tumors profiled on Affymetrix Human being ST 1.0 arrays. We think that the usage of cross-validated solid probe models to derive the EMT personal also resulted in a personal enriched for genes with natural relevance in EMT. Oddly enough the EMT first primary element correlated better with E-cadherin protein level than do even the very best CDH1 RNA probe arranged. That observation helps our hypothesis a personal incorporating many relevant markers may very well be more advanced than any solitary marker for evaluating complex biological procedures such as for example EMT. Furthermore higher manifestation of two of the personal genes Rab25 in epithelial lines and Axl in mesenchymal lines was verified in the protein level. Those two genes are founded EMT markers in additional cancers types (32-34). Nevertheless to our understanding this is actually the first time they are proven markers of EMT in NSCLC. This finding has potential restorative implications especially for mesenchymal NSCLC provided the fast predevelopment of this several Axl inhibitors are in advancement or clinical tests. Furthermore the commonalities we noticed between our EMT personal and EMT markers in additional tumor types shows that our EMT personal can also be appropriate in additional epithelial tumors such as for example breast digestive tract or mind and throat. Another important consequence of this research Bazedoxifene acetate manufacture was that the EMT rating predicted erlotinib level of sensitivity both in EGFR-mutant and EGFR-wild type NSCLC. Even though personal was produced in cell lines it had been validated in medical examples where it successfully identified EGFR-wild type patients who benefitted from treatment with EGFR TKIs. Currently activating mutations of EGFR are the only validated biomarkers of response to EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors in NSCLC. However such mutations occur in only a minority of patients with NSCLC and cannot account for the subset of EGFR-wild type patients who have shown benefit from EGFR TKIs in several clinical trials (8-10). Therefore our demonstration of greater clinical benefit from erlotinib in EGFR-wild type patients with tumors demonstrating an epithelial phenotype from the BATTLE study suggests that EMT may be a clinically relevant predictive marker for patients lacking mutations known to be associated with drug sensitivity (EGFR mutation) or resistance (KRAS mutation) meriting further investigation. Consistent with these findings we observed significantly greater EGFR pathway activation in epithelial cell lines (both EGFR mutant and wild type) relative to mesenchymal lines in our protein analysis. Although the mechanism of activation in EGFR-wild type patients is not yet known the greater frequency of EGFR pathway activation in epithelial-like NSCLC probably accounts for the trend towards greater sensitivity to erlotinib in the epithelial. The histone lysine demethylase KDM4 subfamily comprised of four members (A B C and D) play critical roles in controlling transcription chromatin architecture and cellular differentiation. recurrent copy number alterations gene expression and breast cancer subtypes. We demonstrated that KDM4A and D are also significantly overexpressed in basal-like breasts cancers whereas KDM4B overexpression can be more dominating in estrogen-receptor-positive luminal breasts cancer. Up coming we looked into the restorative potential of the book histone demethylase inhibitor NCDM-32B in breasts cancer. The treating basal breasts cancers cell lines with NCDM-32B led to the loss of cell viability AP24534 (Ponatinib) and anchorage 3rd party growth in smooth agar. Furthermore we discovered that NCDM-32B impaired several critical pathways that travel cellular change and proliferation in breasts cancers. Our results demonstrate genetic overexpression and amplification from the KDM4 demethylases in various subtypes of breasts cancers. Histone methylation is reversible and KDM4 demethylases are druggable focuses on furthermore. Therefore KDM4 inhibitors might serve mainly because a novel therapeutic approach to get a subset of aggressive breasts cancers. gene originally termed (gene amplified in squamous cell carcinoma 1) was determined and cloned through the 9p24 amplified area of esophageal tumor cell lines . Previously we proven that KDM4C can be considerably amplified and overexpressed in intense basal-like breast cancers . KDM4C serves as a transforming oncogene: stable KDM4C overexpression in human non-tumorigenic mammary epithelial MCF10A cells induces transformative phenotypes whereas KDM4C knockdown in breast cancer cells inhibits proliferation and [18 20 Furthermore KDM4A and B are co-activators of the estrogen receptor (ER) and stimulate the transcriptional potential of the ER in breast cancer [22-24]. Recent evidence has suggested that alteration of the KDM4 demethylases is associated with breast cancer. However our current knowledge of the specificity of KDM4 demethylases in different types of breast cancer is still incomplete. Fur-thermore targeting epigenetic proteins such as KDMs is currently a highly active frontier of anti-cancer drug development. Here we conducted a meta-analysis of KDM4A B C and D in breast cancer and identified associations among recurrent copy number alterations gene expression and breasts cancers subtypes. We examined a book inhibitor from the KDM4 demethylases little molecule NCDM-32B because of its capability to attenuate breasts cancer cell development. We looked into the downstream pathways which are modified by NCDM-32B in basal breasts cancer. Our research show different patterns of DNA duplicate quantity mRNA and proteins manifestation degrees of the four KDM4 subfamily people over the subtypes of breasts cancer. Furthermore KDM4 inhibitors might serve as a novel therapeutic approach to get a subset of aggressive breasts cancers. Materials and strategies Cell tradition The ethnicities for the Amount series of breasts cancers cell lines and an immortalized non-transformed human being mammary epithelial MCF10A cell range have AP24534 (Ponatinib) been referred to at length previously [25 26 The Colo824 cell range was from DSMZ (Braunschweig Germany) and HCC70 HCC1937 HCC1428 HCC1954 MDB-MA-468 T47D and ZR-75-1 cell lines were obtained from ATCC (Manassas VA USA). The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) data for breast cancer The DNA copy number mutation and RNA sequencing datasets of 976 AP24534 (Ponatinib) breast cancer samples used in this research were obtained from AP24534 (Ponatinib) the cBio Cancer Genomics Portal [13 27 The copy number of each KDM was generated from the Cdh5 AP24534 (Ponatinib) copy number analysis algorithms GISTIC (Genomic Identification of Significant Targets in Cancer) and categorized as copy number level per gene: “-2” is a deep loss (possibly a homozygous deletion) “-1” is a heterozygous deletion “0” is usually diploid “1” indicates a low-level gain and “2” is a AP24534 (Ponatinib) high-level amplification. For mRNA expression data the relative expression of an individual gene and the gene expression distribution in a reference population were analyzed. The reference population was either all tumors that are diploid for the gene in question or when available normal adjacent tissue. The returned value indicates the amount of regular deviations from the suggest of appearance in the guide inhabitants (Z-score). Somatic mutation data had been extracted from exome sequencing [13 27 The breasts cancer subtype details was from a prior. Cutaneous lupus erythematosus (CLE) is really a persistent inflammatory SP600125 autoimmune skin condition. total of 2 g/kg/month for three months and the topics had been SP600125 monitored for extra six months off any medication for the feasible relapse. The cumulative outcomes revealed a standard improvement as evinced by way of a loss of both objective and subjective methods of disease activity. Probably the most delicate and particular objective and subjective equipment for assessment from the therapeutic aftereffect of IVIg had been CLASI-A (Cutaneous Lupus Erythematosus Disease Region and Intensity Index) calculating disease activity and Skindex-29 ratings respectively. The SP600125 CLASI-A rating fell down from the original value used as 100% and remained in the range of approximately 70% until the last check out. Three individuals (18.8%) had a short term flare of CLE symptoms but recovered within a month from your relapse. No severe side effects and adverse reactions occurred. Therefore IVIg monotherapy in CLE allowed to accomplish: i) quick and persistent decreased in disease activity; ii) constant improvement of individuals’ quality of life assessed by Skindex-29; iii) low relapse SP600125 rate; and iv) slight nature and short period of relapses. Since healing was managed for weeks after IVIg treatment it is possible the IVIgtriggered molecular events mediating the restorative action of IVIg that continued Rabbit Polyclonal to CIB2. to unfold after the end of therapy. Key terms: cutaneous lupus erythematosus IVIg case-series CLASI Skindex-29 Intro Cutaneous lupus erythematosus (CLE) is a chronic inflammatory autoimmune skin disease that may trigger permanent scarring. Discoid lupus erythematosus subacute cutaneous lupus erythematosus lupus lupus and panniculitis erythematosus tumidus all belong to the group of CLE. Encounter and head are most suffering from scarring within the discoid type of CLE commonly. The pathogenesis and etiology of CLE are multifactorial with genetic and environmental factors playing a job. Photosensitivity polymorphisms from the main histocompatibility complex resulting in increased immune reaction to self-antigens deficiencies of supplement elements gender and autoantibodies are thought to are likely involved. Anti-Ro anti-La anti-dsDNA and antinucleosome antibodies are believed to are likely involved in skin condition by increased epidermis cell apoptosis. Dysregulation of T cells might are likely involved within the pathogenesis of CLE also.1 2 Evidence-based therapy for CLE is lacking. Administration of systemic immunosuppressive SP600125 and anti-inflammatory realtors such as for example corticosteroids hydroxychloroquine mepacrine methotrexate mycophenolate mofetil cyclophosphamide and azathioprine oftentimes results in remission. Many individuals have problems with resistant cutaneous lesions despite therapy nevertheless. Choice systemic (dapsone thalidomide retinoids cyclosporine) and topical ointment realtors (thalidomide intralesional steroids retinoids tacrolimus ointment) in addition to laser beam therapy phototherapy photopheresis and cryotherapy are useful for resistant cutaneous lesions but a confident outcome isn’t assured.3-5 Intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIg) is really a fractioned blood product comprising pooled polyvalent IgG antibody extracted in the plasma of over 10 0 blood donors per batch. Historically it had been used to take care of primary and supplementary immune deficiencies nevertheless its use provides expanded tremendously within the last several years. Today it really is getting increasingly used as off-label therapy for a number of autoimmune and inflammatory circumstances specifically in dermatology. IVIg displays several effects with well described getting: i) supplement blockade and degradation; ii) neonatal Fc receptor saturation; iii) induction of immunomodulatory Fc receptors; iv) inhibition of B cells; and v) altering T cell function cytokine creation and migration.6 The increasing usage of IVIg continues to be connected with further knowledge of its systems of action clinical manipulation and associated unwanted effects along with the introduction of improved or new sorts of IVIg items. Ongoing research is constantly on the elaborate and recognize novel systems. One area where IVIg is carrying on to create dramatic improvements may be the ability to deal with derangements of immunity in immune-mediated illnesses.7 Even though usefulness of IVIg in CLE isn’t more developed IVIg continues to be utilized to successfully treat CLE either as monotherapy. and tumor cells are killed on contact by cytotoxic lymphocytes (CLs) which trigger intrinsic cell death programs by using either one of two systems. caspases follows leading to the degradation of a variety of nuclear and cytoplasmic substrates and the characteristic biochemical and morphological changes associated with apoptosis (reviewed in reference 24). Like other activated lymphocytes CLs die in response to a variety of apoptotic stimuli including Fas receptor ligation which is used to remove redundant CLs from the immune system postinfection to preserve long-term tissue homeostasis (analyzed in guide 24). Ahead of deletion working CLs will tend to be subjected to multiple cytotoxins because they sequentially employ and destroy focus on cells however they apparently usually do not commit fratricide or go through autolysis (13 17 25 To forestall early loss of life CLs must as a result have the ability to control misdirected granzyme B and also have some method of stopping caspase activation in response to Fas ligand. Research of viral inhibitors of apoptosis recommend several techniques Fas-induced death could be controlled. For instance herpesvirus and molluscipox pathogen make v-FLIPs which stop early occasions in Fas-mediated apoptosis buy Hoechst 33342 by avoiding the recruitment and activation of caspase-8 on the receptor organic (52) and mobile homologs from the v-FLIPs have already been defined (15). Among these is created early in T-cell activation Rat monoclonal to CD4.The 4AM15 monoclonal reacts with the mouse CD4 molecule, a 55 kDa cell surface receptor. It is a member of the lg superfamily,primarily expressed on most thymocytes, a subset of T cells, and weakly on macrophages and dendritic cells. It acts as a coreceptor with the TCR during T cell activation and thymic differentiation by binding MHC classII and associating with the protein tyrosine kinase, lck. but disappears because the sensitivity from the cells to Fas-induced apoptosis boosts making it a solid candidate being buy Hoechst 33342 a repressor of Fas-mediated apoptosis in T cells. Various other viruses generate caspase inhibitors like the baculovirus p35 proteins (4) as well as the orthopoxvirus cytokine response modifier A (CrmA) (33). CrmA potently inhibits turned on caspase-8 and it is considered to prevent both Fas- and tumor necrosis aspect (TNF)-induced apoptosis (40 49 63 It is one of the serine proteinase inhibitor (serpin) superfamily both in structure and setting of actions but is recognized from various other serpins by its capability to inhibit caspases. CrmA can be a moderately effective inhibitor of granzyme B that could prevent granzyme B-induced apoptosis under specific circumstances (21 32 51 Caspases and granzyme B would rather cleave substrates after Asp (29 53 which is reflected within the reactive middle loop of CrmA which includes an Asp buy Hoechst 33342 at the key P1 placement (33). Up to now a mobile homolog of CrmA using a P1 Asp is not discovered even though capability of buy Hoechst 33342 CrmA to inhibit Fas-mediated and (probably) granule-mediated apoptosis shows that endogenous serpins may regulate the apoptotic proteinases. We’ve recently defined a individual intracellular serpin proteinase inhibitor 9 (PI-9) that effectively buy Hoechst 33342 inhibits granzyme B in vitro and it is portrayed at high amounts within the cytoplasm of CLs (45). PI-9 is quite much like CrmA but has Glu instead of Asp on the P1 position surprisingly. Here we present that PI-9 protects transfected cells against granzyme B-induced however not Fas-induced apoptosis and that the P1 Glu confers specificity for granzyme B rather than buy Hoechst 33342 the caspases. We suggest that PI-9 protects CLs (as well as perhaps bystander cells) against early death set off by miscompartmentalized or misdirected granzyme B but will not hinder the deletion of cells in the disease fighting capability via the Fas pathway. Components AND Strategies Site-directed mutagenesis and plasmid constructions. Hexahistidine-tagged CrmA was produced by PCR amplification from a plasmid template (kindly provided by D. Pickup) with the primers (5′-TCTGCCATCATGCATCATCATCATCATCATGATATCTTCAGGGAAATC-3′ and 5′-TTAATTAGTTGTTGGAGAGC-3′. The PCR used 20 pmol of each primer and 1 ng of template in Vent polymerase reaction buffer (New Britain Biolabs) formulated with 200 μM deoxynucleoside triphosphates (dNTPs) and 1 U of Vent polymerase (New Britain Biolabs). Thirty cycles of 95°C for 90 s 57 for 45 s and 72°C for 60 s had been performed. Amplified fragments had been separated by 1% agarose gel electrophoresis purified in the gels and cloned into pCRII (Invitrogen) for series evaluation. A clone with an in-frame fusion from the His label no second-site mutations was selected for the next steps.. and Function of TFPI Tissue aspect pathway inhibitor (TFPI) is really a 276 amino acid (~43 kDa) proteins with an acidic N-terminal region accompanied by three tandem Kunitz-type serine protease inhibitory domains and a simple C-terminal region. If TF-fVIIa may be the major initiator of bloodstream clotting in vivo and in addition is a powerful activator of fX indie of fVIII or fIX after that why perform hemophiliacs bleed? The discovery and characterization of TFPI activity has answered this relevant question.3 The fast inhibition of fXa and TF-fVIIa as well as the extrinsic pathway by TFPI makes the necessity for propagation of coagulation through fVIIIa and fIXa from the intrinsic pathway. In vitro research have confirmed that reduced amount of the inhibitory aftereffect of TFPI is a viable strategy for prevention of bleeding in patients with hemophilia.4;5 In vivo Bufotalin supplier animal studies have exhibited that anti-TFPI antibody shortens the bleeding time in rabbits with antibody induced hemophilia A.6 In the context of patients with hemophilia the success of recombinant fVIIa therapy of patients with acquired inhibitors of fVIII or fIX has demonstrated the tissue factor pathway as an important target for treatment and suggests that therapeutic modulation of TFPI activity could be an attractive therapeutic target for the development of new therapies to prevent bleeding in patients with hemophilia. Thrombosis Associated With Use of Oral Contraceptives The plasma TFPI concentration decreases about 25% in women using dental contraceptives. The reduction in TFPI mediated anticoagulant activity in these females may towards the elevated Bufotalin supplier risk (2- to 6-fold) of thrombosis from the use of dental contraceptives.7-11 The physiological basis for the reduction in plasma TFPI isn’t known. Heritable thrombophilias are recognized to boost a woman’s risk for thrombosis when Bufotalin supplier working with estrogen therapies. Of the the aspect V Leiden (FVL) mutation an changed type of FV resistant to degradation by turned on protein C creates the most important risk. In dental contraceptive users with FVL the chance of thrombosis is approximately 5 moments that of either risk element in isolation.12;13 Pet models possess demonstrated that decreased TFPI in the current presence of FVL offers a essential “second strike” that makes a severe thrombotic condition. Mice with heterozygous scarcity of TFPI (TFPI+/?) develop nor have problems with spontaneous thrombosis normally.14 Mice genetically altered to create the FVL mutation possess a mild prothrombotic phenotype exhibiting occasional spontaneous thrombosis.15 once the FVL mutation is bred into TFPI+/ However? mice the mice have problems with severe disseminated thrombosis and full perinatal Bufotalin supplier mortality nearly.16 These research in genetically altered mice support the idea that reduced TFPI plays a part in increased risk for thrombosis connected with oral contraceptive make use of. Thrombosis Connected with Paroxysmal Nocturnal Hemoglobinuria (PNH) Sufferers with PNH possess a pronounced predisposition to intravascular thrombosis. PNH can be an obtained clonal disease seen as a insufficient glycosyl phosphatidylinositol (GPI)-anchored proteins appearance. The thromboses take place in an organ specific pattern. Most occur in the portal circulation (hepatic vein occlusion also called the Budd-Chaiari Syndrome occurs in 30% of patients) or in venous circulation of the brain.17 As GRK6 described below TFPI is a GPI-anchored protein. Defective expression of TFPI in patients with PNH and may contribute to the organ specific thrombosis observed in this disease.18 Association of TFPI Deficiency with Arterial and Venous Thrombosis TFPI null humans have not been identified suggesting that TFPI is required for human birth. However low plasma levels of TFPI are weakly linked to disease in humans. Several studies have suggested that Bufotalin supplier plasma TFPI levels may demonstrate a “threshold effect” where patients with free (non-lipoprotein bound) plasma TFPI concentration less than 10% of the normal mean value are at increased risk (~2-fold) for both deep venous thrombosis and myocardial infarction.19-22 In these studies there is no difference in the mean free plasma TFPI level between the disease and control groups. In other published studies there is a considerable amount of conflicting data about the contribution of plasma Bufotalin supplier TFPI levels and polymorphisms to the development of thrombosis.23-26 This is likely a result of the wide normal range for plasma TFPI 27 the various options for measurement of plasma TFPI28 and the indegent correlation between your soluble plasma TFPI focus and the quantity of cell surface area associated endothelial and/or platelet. ESCRT-III mediated membrane invagination and scission is a critical step in MVB sorting of ubiquitinated membrane receptors and generally thought to be required for degradation of these receptors in lysosomes. with ubiquitinated EGFR through the ALIX V domain name and increases ALIX association with membrane-bound CHMP4 through the ALIX Bro1 domain name. Under both continuous and pulse-chase EGF activation conditions inhibition of ALIX conversation with membrane-bound CHMP4 inhibition of ALIX dimerization through the V domain name or ALIX knockdown dramatically inhibits MVB sorting of activated EGFR and promotes sustained activation of ERK1/2. Under the continuous EGF activation conditions these cell treatments also retard degradation of activated EGFR. These findings show that ALIX is usually critically involved in MVB sorting of ubiquitinated membrane receptors in mammalian cells. for 10 min at 4°C. To prepare membrane p85-ALPHA solubilized cell lysates for immunoprecipitation pelleted cells were extracted by sonication in 50-100 μl of cell lysis buffer that omits 0.1% SDS and includes 10 mM N-Ethylmaleimide (NEM) (Sigma) whenever indicated. Cell lysates were cleared by centrifugation at 16 0 for 10 min at 4°C and diluted 10 fold before immunoprecipitation. Immunoblotting and immunoprecipitation were performed according to our standard protocols . Relative signals on immunoblots were quantified by analyzing scanned images with NIH ImageJ 1.41o. Antibodies used in immunoblotting and immunoprecipitation are summarized in Table S4. GST pull-down GST and GST tagged proteins were produced and purified using our standard procedures and immobilized onto Glutathione beads (GenScript). Isolation of membrane-associated proteins was performed as previously explained with minor modifications. Briefly mock-treated and EGF-stimulated HEK293 cells were lysed by sonication in chilly TBS which was supplemented with 10 mM NEM 100 μM sodium orthavanadium 100 μM sodium fluoride 100 μM sodium pyrophosphate 1 mM DTT and proteinase inhibitor cocktail and cell lysates were centrifuged at 130 0 for 30 min. After supernatants were discarded and Cilostazol pellets were washed with TBS membrane-associated proteins in the pellets were extracted with TBS supplemented with 0.1% TX and 1 mM NEM. The extracts were cleared by centrifugation Cilostazol at 130 0 for 30 min. Immobilized GST and GST tagged proteins were incubated with dissolved membrane proteins at 4°C overnight and then washed with 0.1% TX in TBS five occasions. Proteins remaining around the beads were eluted with SDS-PAGE sample buffer and subject to immunoblotting. Membrane flotation centrifugation Preparation and membrane flotation centrifugation of the post-nuclear supernatant (PNS) of cell lysates through a step sucrose gradient was performed according to published protocols [43 44 with minor modifications as explained previously . In brief HEK293 cells collected from one 60-mm dish were pelleted and resuspended in 100 μl of 10% (w/v) sucrose in TE buffer (TBS plus 1 mM EDTA) supplemented with proteinase inhibitor cocktail. After cells were lysed by sonication cell lysates were centrifuged at 1800 for 5 min at 4°C and the PNS was recovered. From each PNS 0.1 ml aliquot was taken and mixed with 0.4 ml of 85.5% (w/v) sucrose in TE buffer to give a final concentration of 73% (w/v) sucrose. The combination was then placed at the bottom of a 4-ml ultracentrifuge tube above which 2.3 ml of 65% (w/v) sucrose and 1.2 ml of 10% (w/v) sucrose in TE buffer were Cilostazol sequentially overlaid. The created step sucrose gradients were ultracentrifuged at 100 0 for 18 h at 4°C in a Beckman SW55-Ti rotor. Cilostazol After centrifugation ten 0.4-ml fractions were manually collected by pipetting and comparative aliquots were taken from collected fractions for immunoblotting. In a typical execution of this protocol fractions 3 and 4 contained membrane vesicles floating to the boundary of the 10% (w/v) and 65% (w/v) sucrose layers whereas fractions 9 and 10 contained soluble proteins unable to float up. Proteinase K protection assay Proteinase K protection assay was performed as explained in previous studies [23 46 47 In brief mock treated or EGF stimulated cells were collected and pelleted by centrifugation at 1 800 for 5 min. Pelleted cells were resuspended in 10 volumes of 6.5 μg/mL digitonin (Sigma) in PBS followed by incubation first at room temperature for 5 min and then on. Purpose. Results. Overall the imply PCT improved from 63.9 μm ± 18.1 at 0 to 250 μm to 170.3 μm ± 56.7 at 1500 to 2000 μm from BMO. Individuals of AD had a greater mean PCT than those of ED whatsoever distances from BMO (< 0.05 at each distance) and in each quadrant (< 0.05 in each quadrant). Results from multivariate regression show that ED subjects had significantly lower PCT compared to AD overall and in all quadrants and distances from BMO. Increasing age was also significantly associated with a lower PCT in both ED and AD participants. Conclusions. Peripapillary choroidal thickness varies with race and age as individuals of AD have a thicker peripapillary choroid than those of ED. (ClinicalTrials.gov quantity NCT00221923.) = 108; ADAGES) or 12 (= 60; ALSTAR). All other characteristics of the imaging protocols were identical in each study. In order to enhance NCT-501 the visibility of the deeper cells all B-scans from all SDOCT quantities were postprocessed using a customized adaptive payment algorithm with contrast and threshold exponents of 2.16 23 24 Two eyes were eliminated due to inadequate visualization of the anterior sclera (AS) following compensation. Adaptive payment allowed an enhanced visualization and a more reliable delineation of characteristic structures such as Bruch’s membrane (BM) and the AS. Radial SDOCT scan quantities were loaded and aligned in custom software (based Ik3-2 antibody on the Visualization Toolkit [VTK]; Kitware Inc. Clifton Park NY) that was developed for three-dimensional delineation of histologic and OCT data as explained in prior publications.25 26 Two trained observers masked to subject characteristics manually delineated 24 equally spaced radial sections of each eye. Reliability screening was performed by having each of the two observers delineate four different eyes (two AD eyes two ED eyes) on three independent occasions. Intraclass correlations (ICC) were used to evaluate the within- and between-person variance of the manual delineation of scans by the two observers.27 The ICCs for mean PCT were very high overall (>0.75 excellent reliability) indicating that the measurements at a given location from BMO were very similar between observers. Additionally ICCs were calculated based on race (AD eyes: 0.95 excellent reliability; ED eyes: 0.68 good reliability). Principal surfaces delineated included BM BMO and AS (Fig. 1a). A imply of 490 points (range 303 for BM and 505 points (range 457 for AS were sampled (Fig. 1b). The methods for defining BMO have been published elsewhere. 16 Peripapillary choroidal thickness is a measurement of the distance between BM and AS. Indeed this measurement can be made at numerous offsets from BMO (Fig. 2a). Suppose that we want to compute PCT at an offset of μm from BMO. On each BM half-section μm along the section away from the BMO to NCT-501 a point of the BM solid a ray along of the AS and compute NCT-501 the sectional PCT of at μm to be the distance between and (Fig. 2b). Under these assumptions PCT at μm is the mean of all sectional PCTs at μm. (Since the BM can show local irregularities yet is almost linear we regarded as two NCT-501 alternatives for and the normal to a linear approximation of range of 0 to 1000 μm and a range of 1000 to 2000 NCT-501 μm. The mean PCT was also compared between race (AD and ED) in four quadrants of the ONH (substandard nasal superior and temporal). Generalized estimating equations (GEE) were used to evaluate the association between race with PCT in each quadrant and at different distances away from BMO. Generalized estimating equations allow the model to account for the within-subject correlation among fellow eyes from your same individual. An exchangeable operating correlation matrix was specified because it minimized the difference in variance estimations between the empirical and model-based standard errors. Models were modified for the potentially confounding effects of age axial size and BMO area (a surrogate for optic disc size). An connection term was added to the models to evaluate whether the effect of age on PCT assorted by race. Age axial size and BMO area were continuous variables in the modified.
2019-04-25T06:41:04Z
http://www.researchatlanta.org/page/267/
Lagasse, Roberta L was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 10765 Eudora CIR, THORNTON, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6996557. Lagasse, Sheila Sue was born in 1971 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 12136 First ST, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5874424. Lagasse, Tyler Alexander was born in 1995 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1707 Abeyta CT, LOVELAND, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 600948109. Lagasse, Tyler David was born in 1984 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 608 Homestead ST, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 600056614. Lagasse Anderson, Ashley Blythe was born in 1979 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 801 W Douglas RD, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 1426897. Lagator, Calvin Christopher was born in 1973 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 435 Marine ST, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 200368868. Lagatta, Andrew Aaron was born in 1990 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1602 Grant AVE, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 200169775. Lagatta, Carol C was born in 1964 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1909 Bristlecone DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 491228. Lagatta, Paul Douglas was born in 1962 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1909 Bristlecone DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 492659. Lagattuta, Christopher Allen was born in 1988 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 475 W 12Th AVE APT 12G, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 601877520. La Gattuta, Michael Charles was born in 1986 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 300 W 11Th AVE UNIT 19B, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 600668575. Lagattuta, Valerie Nichole was born in 1984 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 772 23 1/2 RD, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2285637. Lagda, Adrielle was born in 2000 and registered to vote, giving the address as 9401 Cheyenne Arapaho Hall, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. Lagda’ voter ID number is 601947475. Lage, Ally Janae was born in 1998 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1680 Peregrine CT, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600947020. Lage, Austin Reed was born in 1997 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1680 Peregrine CT, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 601226938. Lage, Brita Lee was born in 1984 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 10450 Holly Springs PL, PEYTON, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 200039717. Lage, Caridad was born in 1958 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 9797 Terrain RD, FOUNTAIN, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601650132. Lage, Dakota Walter was born in 1994 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1868 Ralphs Ridge, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 601530378. Lage, Daniel R was born in 1980 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 334 Basswood AVE, JOHNSTOWN, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 6312488. Lage, Daniel Thomas was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 20448 Nolina CT, JOHNSTOWN, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 6396301. Lage, Ethan Thomas was born in 1989 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 20448 Nolina CT, JOHNSTOWN, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 600160192. Lage, Gregg L was born in 1957 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1680 Peregrine CT, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 3919699. Lage, Jason Cole was born in 1981 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 313 North Fork AVE, PAONIA, Delta County, CO. His voter ID number is 600174765. Lage, Jennifer Sue was born in 1973 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 11143 Navajo ST, NORTHGLENN, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600192324. Lage, Jesse David was born in 1973 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 11143 Navajo ST, NORTHGLENN, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 600192364. Lage, Jordan J was born in 1983 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6334 Casual DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 600150770. Lage, Keith Gerard was born in 1965 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1605 Cornice CT, STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Routt County, CO. His voter ID number is 601756568. Lage, Kyle Robert was born in 1981 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 10450 Holly Springs PL, PEYTON, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 245632. Lage, Lazaro Eduardo was born in 1982 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 9797 Terrain RD, FOUNTAIN, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 601631759. Lage, Lynn Denise was born in 1961 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1735 White AVE, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2307513. Lage, Lynn R was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6820 Tobin RD, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 192447. Lage, Maelin Ann was born in 2000 and registered to vote, giving the address as 222 Park ST, PALMER LAKE, El Paso County, CO. Lage’ voter ID number is 601879781. Lage, Melissa Dawn was born in 1978 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1865 Woodmoor DR, MONUMENT, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 77250. Lage, Michael Lee Jr was born in 1979 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 742 Cedar AVE, AKRON, Washington County, CO. His voter ID number is 7138364. Lage, Michael Penteado Barros was born in 1989 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6129 Wolff ST, ARVADA, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 601590955. Lage, Michelle Ann was born in 1972 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1605 Cornice CT, STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Routt County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601749781. Lage, Nancy C was born in 1960 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 20448 Nolina CT, JOHNSTOWN, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6396302. Lage, Patricia Marie was born in 1980 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 334 Basswood AVE, JOHNSTOWN, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6312792. Lage, Rachelle Jogette was born in 1991 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 742 Cedar AVE, AKRON, Washington County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600260277. Lage, Roger James was born in 1957 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6820 Tobin RD, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 192810. Lage, Sharon Ann was born in 1962 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1680 Peregrine CT, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3919858. Lage, Victoria Anne was born in 1993 and registered to vote, giving the address as 1358 N Ogden ST APT 9, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Lage’ voter ID number is 601937015. Lage, William Howard was born in 1957 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2357 E RD, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. His voter ID number is 600499782. Lagedrost, Christopher was born in 1989 and registered to vote, giving the address as 476 Murphy Creek DR, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. Lagedrost’ voter ID number is 601937238. Lagedrost, Sarah Catherine was born in 1990 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 476 Murphy Creek DR, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600197078. Lage Lopez, Diana Carolina was born in 1985 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 9797 Terrain RD, FOUNTAIN, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601634067. Lageman, Oreada Susan was born in 1959 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2615 Meadowlark LN, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600247515. Lageman, Robert Wayne was born in 1960 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7415 White Ash PL, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 5729851. Lageman, William D was born in 1957 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2615 Meadowlark LN, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 289211. Lagemann, Abby Elyse was born in 1986 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1024 Adams CIR APT F-212, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 200365521. Lagemann, Andrew Lee was born in 1961 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 9785 Jellison WAY, WESTMINSTER, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601071645. Lagemann, Lucy A was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 806 Robin CV, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 8159668. Lagendyk, Adam Alexander was born in 1981 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 10375 Zuni ST APT L106, FEDERAL HGTS, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 600647451. Lagenese, Ross Allen was born in 1971 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3857 Fig Tree ST, WELLINGTON, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 1411729. Lager, Andrew E was born in 1963 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 15943 Wildhaven LN, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 600403688. Lager, Barbara Ann was born in 1940 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5077 W Geddes CIR, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 819766. Lager, Barbara Johnston was born in 1950 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4804 Sleepy Cat DR, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4097993. Lager, Benjamin K was born in 1960 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1434 S Gaylord ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2734310. Lager, Bertil James was born in 1946 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3090 Carter CIR, DENVER, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 841161. Lager, Christenza Maurine was born in 1991 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 18013 E Atlantic DR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600554729. Lager, Christopher Whitney was born in 1976 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1340 Kline ST, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 2909466. Lager, Dorothy M was born in 1942 and registered to vote, giving the address as 3090 Carter CIR, DENVER, Arapahoe County, CO. Lager’ voter ID number is 841160. Lager, Edward Charles was born in 1950 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 18628 E Grand CIR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 709433. Lager, Eve Michal was born in 1990 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2217 N Eliot ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600905530. Lager, Gary George was born in 1943 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2575 Rossmere ST, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 531414. Lager, Janet Thoene was born in 1963 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 18013 E Atlantic DR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 698501. Lager, John C was born in 1951 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3553 N Wyandot ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2423309. Lager, John R was born in 1940 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5077 W Geddes CIR, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 819574. Lager, Katherine Mallory was born in 1999 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 15943 Wildhaven LN, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601871894. Lager, Kenneth E was born in 1934 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 4232 S Biscay CIR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 713338. Lager, Laurence Robert was born in 1929 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1050 S Monaco PKWY APT 145, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2706903. Lager, Linda Beth was born in 1945 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2575 Rossmere ST, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 531413. Lager, Marilyn Ann was born in 1942 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1140 S Gray ST, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2501946. Lager, Marjorie Maurine was born in 1922 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 39455 County Road Z, AKRON, Washington County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600658606. Lager, Mary Katherine was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 15943 Wildhaven LN, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600180789. Lager, Meridith Kay was born in 1978 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1340 Kline ST, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2920194. Lager, Michele Marjorie was born in 1942 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 19673 E Hollow Creek DR, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5851176. Lager, Natalie Katherine was born in 1993 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 555 E 19Th AVE APT 3420, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600519333. Lager, Penny Gale was born in 1949 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 18628 E Grand CIR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 709432. Lager, Raymond E was born in 1967 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3434 Foxridge DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 374207. Lager, Rebecca Elyse was born in 1974 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5821 S Netherland CIR, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 936733. Lager, Stephen Grant was born in 1963 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 18013 E Atlantic DR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 600593886. Lager, Terence Michael was born in 1953 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1255 N Galapago ST APT 301, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 4637467. Lager, Trevor was born in 1994 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 18013 E Atlantic DR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 600614479. Lager, Valerie F was born in 1934 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4232 S Biscay CIR, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 713337. Lagerberg, Eddie Kent was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 857 S Van Gordon CT # F-108, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 3967530. Lagerberg, Greg J was born in 1959 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 4220 Iris ST, WHEAT RIDGE, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4027729. Lagerberg, Jennifer Anne was born in 1972 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 799 S Cole CT, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3963835. Lagerberg, Joy B was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4220 Iris ST, WHEAT RIDGE, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4028946. Lagerberg, Joy E was born in 1932 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 11693 W 28Th AVE, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4016142. Lagerberg, Kyle Austin was born in 1997 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 4220 Iris ST, WHEAT RIDGE, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601355770. Lagerberg, Larry Scott was born in 1966 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 799 S Cole CT, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 3963282. Lagerberg, Spencer James was born in 1998 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 799 S Cole CT, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601482361. Lagerblade, Brett Russell was born in 1972 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3223 N Newton ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2904251. Lagerblade, Eric Paul was born in 1968 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 634 E 8Th AVE UNIT 17, DURANGO, La Plata County, CO. His voter ID number is 601553909. Lagerborg, Alexander Vincent was born in 1946 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7916 S Pierce WAY, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4104545. Lagerborg, Andrew Alexander was born in 1981 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7629 S Cove CIR, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 200008680. Lagerborg, Daniel Ryan was born in 1979 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6840 S Windermere ST, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 816713. Lagerborg, David A was born in 1953 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 766 S Glencoe ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2532805. Lagerborg, Deborah C was born in 1958 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 766 S Glencoe ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2540245. Lagerborg, Deborah Rose was born in 1983 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 7459 S Alkire ST # 304, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6360928. Lagerborg, Mary E was born in 1949 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 7916 S Pierce WAY, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4105375. Lagerborg, Michael was born in 1988 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2 N Adams ST APT 610, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 600584321. Lagerborg, Rebecca Johns was born in 1979 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2344 W Parkhill AVE, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600140869. Lagerborg, Stephanie Lea was born in 1980 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6840 S Windermere ST, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 816741. Lagerborg, Timothy David was born in 1976 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2344 W Parkhill AVE, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 4104342. Lagergren, Barbara Jean was born in 1960 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 316 W Song Sparrow DR, PUEBLO WEST, Pueblo County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6937570. Lagergren, Charles F was born in 1940 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1821 N 5Th ST APT 314, CANON CITY, Fremont County, CO. His voter ID number is 5958017. Lagergren, Deborah L was born in 1962 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 7730 Fall Brook CT, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 202353. Lagergren, Eric Miles was born in 1978 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1021 Garfield AVE, LA JUNTA, Otero County, CO. His voter ID number is 3166618. Lagergren, Eric William was born in 1994 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7730 Fall Brook CT, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 600742023. Lagergren, Kathleen Marie was born in 1980 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1021 Garfield AVE, LA JUNTA, Otero County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3163142. Lagergren, Lisa Yvette was born in 1968 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 8879 Yukon ST, WESTMINSTER, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4063057. Lagergren, Steven Charles was born in 1955 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 316 W Song Sparrow DR, PUEBLO WEST, Pueblo County, CO. His voter ID number is 7164782. Lagergren, Virginia M was born in 1946 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1601 Cimarron AVE, LA JUNTA, Otero County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3160380. Lagergren, William E was born in 1957 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7730 Fall Brook CT, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 202352. Lagerholm, Jeffery John was born in 1975 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 8445 W 59Th AVE, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 2673126. Lagerholm, Steven Andrew was born in 1993 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2601 Davidson DR # B1, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 601756836. Lagerholm Sepin, Amy Lynn was born in 1971 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1668 Highway 52, ERIE, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6421430. Lager-Levi, Cheryl Ann was born in 1954 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2093 County Road 228, DURANGO, La Plata County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600485900. Lagerlof, Danielle Beatrice was born in 1988 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1149 Parsons AVE, CASTLE ROCK, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2962922. Lagerlof, Erik John was born in 1987 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1149 Parsons AVE, CASTLE ROCK, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 600834121. Lagerman, Kathleen Mary was born in 1948 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 502 Ashford DR, LONGMONT, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 8159674. Lagerman, Peter Michael was born in 1948 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 502 Ashford DR, LONGMONT, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 8159787. Lagerman, Ronald Carl was born in 1962 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1003 Colorado DR, TRINIDAD, Las Animas County, CO. His voter ID number is 600175862. Lagerman, Shelby Lynn was born in 1993 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 7840 S Coolidge WAY, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601793491. Lagerman, Tammy Marie was born in 1961 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1003 Colorado DR, TRINIDAD, Las Animas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3844017. Lagermann, Steven Michael was born in 1975 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7777 E 23Rd AVE UNIT 1003, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 200337553. Lagerquist, Amy Joanne was born in 1934 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1005 W 44Th ST, LOVELAND, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601346681. Lagerquist, Clayton Ross was born in 1933 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1005 W 44Th ST, LOVELAND, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 600991424. Lagerquist, Leslie Lance Jr was born in 1986 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 208 W Cleveland ST, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 600808117. Lagers, James Andrew was born in 1992 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5540 S Elati ST # 207, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 601199500. Lagerstrom, Carly Jesse was born in 1993 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4095 Westmeadow DR APT 2317, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601347856. Lagerstrom, Christina Marie was born in 1985 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 801 Mulberry CT, BRIGHTON, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4177465. Lagerstrom, Darren Craig was born in 1963 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 9951 Willowstone PL, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 5782019. Lagerstrom, Darrin William was born in 1994 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5101 S Rio Grande ST # 9-306, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 600721878. Lagerstrom, Evelyn Ruthel was born in 1934 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6164 W 83Rd WAY, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4060781. Lagerstrom, Guy Dwayne was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6164 W 83Rd WAY, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4523502. Lagerstrom, Kyle Brandon was born in 1985 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 801 Mulberry CT, BRIGHTON, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 4177809. Lagerstrom, Larry W was born in 1939 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5003 Waddell AVE, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 230319. Lagerstrom, Linda was born in 1956 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 427 Cheyenne AVE, EATON, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6326558. Lagerstrom, Michelle Lynne was born in 1964 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 9951 Willowstone PL, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5765067. Lagerstrom, Myrna Lorraine was born in 1938 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1414 N Santa Fe AVE APT 6A, PUEBLO, Pueblo County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3047803. Lagerstrom, Paula Roe was born in 1945 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5003 Waddell AVE, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 230413. Lagerwey, Andrew William was born in 1996 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7381 W Kentucky DR # B, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601934813. Lageschulte, James Alan was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 9599 E 147Th AVE, BRIGHTON, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 7131938. Lageschulte, Martha Caroline was born in 1964 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 9599 E 147Th AVE, BRIGHTON, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6868558. Lagesse, Brittney D was born in 1991 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2800 Kalmia AVE APT A203, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601292782. Lagesse, Jacques Luc was born in 1992 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 15 S Clarkson ST APT 301, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 200315874. Lagesse, Jenny Heather was born in 1977 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 828 N Broadway ST APT 601, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4206348. Lagesse, Joseph David was born in 1957 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1755 E Noble PL, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 831202. Lagesse, Kimberly Sue was born in 1964 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3856 S Lowell BLVD, DENVER, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 200274736. Lagesse, Logan Joseph was born in 1995 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1755 E Noble PL, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 600920093. Lagesse, Mary Jo was born in 1959 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1755 E Noble PL, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 831843. La-Gest-Bailey, Elexis was born in 2000 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2809 Apricot AVE, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601893042. Lageyre, Andre was born in 1974 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7700 W 120Th AVE, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 601075928. Laggan, Babette E was born in 1940 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6302 S Killarney ST, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 759345. Laggan, Michael James was born in 1974 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 656 N Madison ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2919646. Laggart, John B was born in 1983 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 420 N Iowa ST APT 305, GUNNISON, Gunnison County, CO. His voter ID number is 2925279. Laggart, Richard Ambrose was born in 1980 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2280 Mesa RD, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 504391. Lagge, David Wade Edwin was born in 1978 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 17590 Sweet RD, PEYTON, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 600242476. Lagge, Donald Delmer was born in 1937 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 15860 W 66Th PL, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 600087437. Lagge, Heather Joy was born in 1984 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3666 S Depew ST # 305, DENVER, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600137921. Lagge, Jessica Nicole was born in 1998 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 15860 W 66Th PL, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601148571. Lagge, Joshua Ryan was born in 1976 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3666 S Depew ST # 305, DENVER, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601016930. Lagge, Kimberly I was born in 1981 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 17590 Sweet RD, PEYTON, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600576220. Lagge, Samuel Scott was born in 1970 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 15860 W 66Th PL, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 200308821. Lagger, Dorothy Edith was born in 1924 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2520 S Jackson ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2760712. Laggett, Nicholas Richard was born in 1991 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5614 Kipling PKWY # 05-304, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601702941. Laggis, Christopher S was born in 1971 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 129 Alpine CT, CRESTED BUTTE, Gunnison County, CO. His voter ID number is 5965767. Laggis, Jennie K was born in 1973 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 129 Alpine CT, CRESTED BUTTE, Gunnison County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601770816. Laggis, Joanna Lee was born in 1963 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 12315 Oregon Wagon TRL, ELBERT, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601187251. Laggis, Matt S was born in 1965 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2600 Roaring Judy RD, ALMONT, Gunnison County, CO. His voter ID number is 5965712. Laggy, Louis Ralph Iii was born in 1972 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 14 Lincoln PL, LONGMONT, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 600428792. Laggy, Pamela Walter was born in 1946 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 14 Lincoln PL, LONGMONT, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600939040. Lagi, Marta Yohannes was born in 1990 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1010 S Oneida ST APT C208, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601482561. Lagier, Robert Clifford was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2049 Navajo TRL, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 8159795. Lagier Mecham, Diane Marie was born in 1953 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 618 Boxwood DR, WINDSOR, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 1467447. Lagiglia, Dominic Louis was born in 1976 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1623 S Leyden ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2638300. Lagiglia, Donnalyne was born in 1959 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4002 County Rd 115, GLENWOOD SPGS, Garfield County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5525366. Lagiglia, Hanica Rose was born in 1998 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4002 County Rd 115, GLENWOOD SPGS, Garfield County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601470208. Lagiglia, Jill Marie was born in 1979 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 447 S 4Th ST, MONTROSE, Montrose County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5022965. Lagiglia, Kirk Michael was born in 1971 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 447 S 4Th ST, MONTROSE, Montrose County, CO. His voter ID number is 5022966. Lagiglia, Louis Michael was born in 1942 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 629 River Frontage RD # 14, SILT, Garfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 5526436. Lagiglia, Nathan Louis was born in 1992 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1068 E 17Th ST, RIFLE, Garfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 600270413. Lagimoniere, Courtny Lorraine was born in 1997 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3324 E 1/4 RD, CLIFTON, Mesa County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601168377. Laginess, James Edward was born in 1967 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5314 S Genoa WAY, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 755070. Laginess, Justin Scott was born in 1997 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5314 S Genoa WAY, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 601153033. Laginess, Kelli Lynn was born in 2000 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5314 S Genoa WAY, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601602777. Laginess, Shari Leigh was born in 1969 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5314 S Genoa WAY, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 755069. Laging, Alexander Sebastian was born in 1996 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1010 S Oneida ST UNIT C304, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 600908275. Laging, Brian William was born in 1972 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1825 Dover ST, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 663142. Laging, Darren Edward was born in 1975 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1255 N Forest ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2723489. Laging, Lora Kim was born in 1966 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 111 Bluegrass CT, MONTROSE, Montrose County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601962651. Laging, Michelle Anne was born in 1973 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1255 N Forest ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2748677. Laging, Paulette E was born in 1947 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6 Cedar CT, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3922363. Laging, William H was born in 1946 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6 Cedar CT, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 3922354. Lagioia, Frank Rocco was born in 1939 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 47 Palm CT, PAGOSA SPRINGS, Archuleta County, CO. His voter ID number is 4758741. Lagioia, Nicole Mariani was born in 1967 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 47 Palm CT, PAGOSA SPRINGS, Archuleta County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4757530. Lagios, Peter George was born in 1970 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1323 W Plum ST # 404, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 601833288. Lagisetty, Kalyani was born in 1974 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6393 S Salida ST, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601796485. Lagle, Christine Paige was born in 1991 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6508 Windom Peak BLVD, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 200262154. Lagle, Cynthia K was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1565 Luna Vista ST, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 475097. Lagle, Debra K was born in 1965 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6508 Windom Peak BLVD, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600215764. Lagle, Floyd Kevin was born in 1952 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3206 Mesa AVE APT A, CLIFTON, Mesa County, CO. His voter ID number is 601451617. Lagle, Richard Michael was born in 1960 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1565 Luna Vista ST, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 200029637. Lagle, Ronald Joe was born in 1968 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6508 Windom Peak BLVD, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 600026084. Lagman, Eileen Anne was born in 1982 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1650 Wewatta ST APT 1616, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601147949. Lagman, Orench was born in 1974 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1122 W 10Th AVE, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 601453612. Lagneaux, Noel Spencer was born in 1985 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 445 S Worchester WAY, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 600657744. Lago, Adrian Stuart was born in 1982 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 11922 W 77Th DR, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601127011. Lago, Albert A was born in 1976 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1636 S Jellison ST, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 3962452. Lago, Angel Jesus was born in 1951 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 55732 E Us Highway 50, BOONE, Pueblo County, CO. His voter ID number is 601185396. Lago, Brittany Renae was born in 1995 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2624 S Miller DR # 203, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601545193. Lago, Brooke Nicole was born in 1997 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2630 S Moore DR # 202, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601411582. Lago, Debra Diane was born in 1956 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4102 E 106Th CT, THORNTON, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6899380. Lago, Erica Shae was born in 1989 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 395 W Burgundy ST # 1827, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601487712. Lago, Gabriela Thereza was born in 1989 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1530 Lone Pine CIR UNIT 7208, DILLON, Summit County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601190406. Lago, Jennifer Lynn was born in 1972 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2630 S Moore DR # 202, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4277382. Lago, Joseph Anthony was born in 1963 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 10566 Bald Eagle CIR # 275, FIRESTONE, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 601125478. Lago, Joseph L Jr was born in 1953 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 4102 E 106Th CT, THORNTON, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 6970115. Lago, Joy Dejong was born in 1979 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1904 Mohawk ST, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600680756. Lago, Kevin Scott was born in 1968 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6070 W 28Th ST, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 601740495. Lago, Louis J was born in 1977 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 46630 Silver Fir ST, PARKER, Elbert County, CO. His voter ID number is 895538. Lago, Marjorie Frances was born in 1954 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 55732 E Us Highway 50, BOONE, Pueblo County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600782510. Lago, Melissa Danielle was born in 1985 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 46630 Silver Fir ST, PARKER, Elbert County, CO. Her voter ID number is 200249412. Lago, Paul Luis was born in 1976 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6178 S Madison DR, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 2696393. Lago, Rafael Antonio was born in 1959 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1042 E 25Th ST, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 6372311. Lago, Stacy Lynn was born in 1981 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6070 W 28Th ST, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601827036. Lago, Timothy James was born in 1977 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1904 Mohawk ST, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 600607728. Lago, Trayvon Joseph was born in 1991 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 4102 E 106Th CT, THORNTON, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 200321497. Lagoda, Jessica Lauren was born in 1990 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 8791 Pierce WAY # 104, ARVADA, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601961108. Lagodna, Martin Michael was born in 1960 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 4302 Northridge PL, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 601144571. Lagodny, Andrea Ruth was born in 1983 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 12846 Cook CIR, THORNTON, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 7105357. Lagodny, Michael Andrew Jr was born in 1980 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 12846 Cook CIR, THORNTON, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 200099192. Lagodny, Sandra M was born in 1946 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 12846 Cook CIR, THORNTON, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6912221. Lagodny, Susan Marie was born in 1955 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 7961 Grove ST, WESTMINSTER, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 7077472. Lago Eckley, Henrietta M was born in 1944 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1636 S Jellison ST, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4200208. Lagomarsino, Colleen Sue was born in 1954 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 7933 S Humboldt ST, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 834095. Lagomarsino, Jennah Montag was born in 1979 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1486 Cherry PL, ERIE, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600023837. Lagomarsino, Luis Alberto was born in 1987 and registered to vote, giving the address as 9705 Canberra DR, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. Lagomarsino’ voter ID number is 601605620. Lagomarsino, Peter J was born in 1954 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7933 S Humboldt ST, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 834091. Lagomarsino, Scott Charles was born in 1980 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1486 Cherry PL, ERIE, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 834090. Lagomarsino, Sheri Treadwell was born in 1973 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 431 S Vine ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601009641. Lagomarsino, Thomas Hugh was born in 1968 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 431 S Vine ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 601006446. Lagomarsino Rodriguez, Amanda Irene was born in 1987 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 9705 Canberra DR, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6407132. Lagomasino, Gail Gaudini was born in 1956 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1677 Prairie Owl RD, PARKER, Elbert County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600452185. Lagomasino, Hector was born in 1952 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1677 Prairie Owl RD, PARKER, Elbert County, CO. His voter ID number is 200169471. Lagomasino, Kelly Rose was born in 1990 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4672 W 20Th Street RD UNIT 2425, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600460541. Lagon, Martin Robert was born in 1964 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6630 S Locust WAY, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 785203. Lagoni, Casey Stetson was born in 1985 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7550 S Blackhawk ST # 8-208, ENGLEWOOD, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 772914. Lagoni, Kaia Rose was born in 1993 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2135 Scarecrow RD, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601331045. Lagoni, Laurel Studt was born in 1953 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5324 Paradise LN, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 1544807. Lagoni, Linda Karen was born in 1952 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 42511 London DR, PARKER, Elbert County, CO. Her voter ID number is 580030. Lagoni, Nicholas Brandon was born in 1981 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5515 N Lewiston ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 8159805. Lagoni, Peter Alfred was born in 1954 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5324 Paradise LN, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 1550139. Lagoo, David Wayne was born in 1952 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3516 Terry Lake RD, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 600596315. Lagoo, Elena S was born in 1986 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 525 Fox Glove CT, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 1487864. Lagoo, Jeremy Michael was born in 1986 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2525 Wewatta WAY APT 543, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 6585467. Lagoo, Karen Ann was born in 1954 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3516 Terry Lake RD, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600584614. Lagor, Samuel William was born in 1990 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 209 N 19Th ST, CANON CITY, Fremont County, CO. His voter ID number is 601797524. Lagorce, Joshua Mathew was born in 1992 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 7240 E 38Th AVE, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 601275394. Lagore, Kimber Danielle was born in 1997 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1665 N Logan ST APT 744, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601832357. Lagorin, Kip Matthew was born in 1963 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1460 Karlann DR, BLACK HAWK, Gilpin County, CO. His voter ID number is 610209. Lagorin, Luke Eric was born in 1968 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2322 Alpine DR, ERIE, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 6377016. Lagorio, Anthony Christopher was born in 1996 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 12267 St Annes RD, PEYTON, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 600969879. Lagorio, Sean Lee was born in 1982 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 25103 E Archer PL, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 601850268. Lagory, William Joseph was born in 1984 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3853 Boulder DR, LOVELAND, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 600598661. Lagos, Alba Maria was born in 1968 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 10636 Braselton ST, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600740972. Lagos, Amanda Jean was born in 1985 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 333 E 16Th AVE APT 612, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601757979. Lagos, Ana Ruth was born in 1983 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1160 Piros DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601025492. Lagos, Ashlie Nicole was born in 2000 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1319 6Th ST APT A, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601892362. Lagos, Axel Ajax was born in 1979 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 16420 Fairway DR, COMMERCE CITY, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 600679721. Lagos, James Joseph was born in 1992 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 254 S Meade ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 600544482. Lagos, Joan was born in 1924 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5261 S Jellison ST, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4281707. Lagos, Kara June was born in 1979 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1440 Gold Hill Mesa DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600719854. Lagos, Konstantinos V was born in 1953 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5261 S Jellison ST, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4281651. Lagos, Maria Gabriela was born in 1965 and registered to vote, giving the address as 806 Kestrel CT, BASALT, Pitkin County, CO. Lagos’ voter ID number is 601761624. Lagos, Maria Graciela was born in 1943 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 583 Silver Oak GRV, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600357807. Lagos, Martha Georgina was born in 1970 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 9746 Nucla ST, COMMERCE CITY, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 600166423. Lagos, Mary Elizabeth was born in 1979 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 786 N Leyden ST, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600941286. Lagos, Michael Thomas was born in 1981 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5139 S Malta WAY, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 600908631. Lagos, Miguel Orval was born in 1982 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1160 Piros DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 600766489. Lagos, Nancy A was born in 1953 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5261 S Jellison ST, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4151381. Lagos, Tom was born in 1955 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1112 Ridgeview CIR, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 3924553. Lagos, Walter was born in 1952 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 10636 Braselton ST, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 600766228. Lagos, William C was born in 1922 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 550 E 12Th AVE APT 804, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2428189. Lagos Hernandez, Dunia Etelbina was born in 1971 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 4926 W 2Nd ST, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601648538. Lagos Jiron, Brian was born in 1990 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 14355 E Pensacola DR, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 200175266. Lagoutte, Pascal Rene was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6911 E Baker PL, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 200176224. Lagow, Alan D was born in 1952 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1140 Atlantis AVE, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 8159814. Lagow, Clark H was born in 1946 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 559 Columbine RD, DURANGO, La Plata County, CO. His voter ID number is 4958718. Lagow, Dale Eugene was born in 1944 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2049 Hardscrabble DR, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 8159815. Lagow, Ellen Wehde was born in 1948 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2049 Hardscrabble DR, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 8159816. Lagow, Jeanne M was born in 1925 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1010 S Edison RD, YODER, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600413967. Lagow, John Michael was born in 1987 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 118 W Sterling AVE # 10, BUENA VISTA, Chaffee County, CO. His voter ID number is 601516800. Lagow, Samantha was born in 1976 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 702 E Ryus AVE # B, LA VETA, Huerfano County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4742911. Lagowski, Robert Theodore was born in 1951 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1509 3Rd AVE APT 4, GREELEY, Weld County, CO. His voter ID number is 6348784. Lagoze, Lucy Cedarholm was born in 1993 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 815 E 18Th AVE APT 7, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601876460. Lagradilla, Gloria Jean was born in 1947 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3160 Birmingham DR, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 1422565. Lagradilla, Susie Marie was born in 1974 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3160 Birmingham DR, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 1416960. Lagraff, Jennifer Ryan Louise was born in 1981 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1546 N Filbert CT, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2801925. Lagraff, John Eric was born in 1968 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 999 Fortino BLVD LOT 155, PUEBLO, Pueblo County, CO. His voter ID number is 600895823. Lagraff, Kristopher J was born in 1978 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1546 N Filbert CT, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 2934741. La Grand, Denise Michele was born in 1963 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 13760 County Road 261, NATHROP, Chaffee County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601057400. Lagrande, Alec Ronnie was born in 1999 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5920 S Rock Creek DR, CASTLE ROCK, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 601774288. Lagrande, Christi Lynn was born in 1975 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5920 S Rock Creek DR, CASTLE ROCK, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5798765. Lagrande, David Lynn was born in 1976 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 505 W Burgundy ST # 834, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 951601. Lagrande, Douglas Patrick was born in 1973 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5920 S Rock Creek DR, CASTLE ROCK, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 200064594. Lagrander, J M was born in 1947 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1906 Kaylix AVE APT 101, LOUISVILLE, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 8159817. La Grander, Nitra Layne was born in 1976 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3256 Alexander WAY, BROOMFIELD, Broomfield County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601651066. Lagrand-Quintana, Deborah E was born in 1965 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3281 S Quintero ST, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 725230. Lagrange, Adam John was born in 1983 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3711 Anemone CIR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 240652. La Grange, Andre James was born in 1978 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 13073 S Stuart WAY, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 601745809. Lagrange, Andrew Thomas was born in 1988 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 918 Rampart Range RD, WOODLAND PARK, Teller County, CO. His voter ID number is 600838291. Lagrange, Annie Fairbanks was born in 1986 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 404 Coraline ST, WOODLAND PARK, Teller County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601463945. Lagrange, Bill Lewis was born in 1960 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 10921 Newland ST, WESTMINSTER, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4181860. Lagrange, Brenda Jean was born in 1964 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 10921 Newland ST, WESTMINSTER, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4181933. Lagrange, Cora L was born in 1943 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 44 Estancia LN, DURANGO, La Plata County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5958365. Lagrange, Dale Frederick was born in 1951 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 33 Sawmill RD, EVERGREEN, Clear Creek County, CO. His voter ID number is 5012491. Lagrange, David Bernard was born in 1967 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 113 Mill Loft UNIT C214, EDWARDS, Eagle County, CO. His voter ID number is 6694897. Lagrange, David Paul was born in 1992 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 10364 Arapahoe RD APT E2B, LAFAYETTE, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 601296018. Lagrange, Diann F was born in 1960 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 19573 E Ithaca PL, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 708807. Lagrange, Drew Edward was born in 1984 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 404 Coraline ST, WOODLAND PARK, Teller County, CO. His voter ID number is 601463882. Lagrange, Elizabeth Marie was born in 1999 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 40 Stacy DR, WALSENBURG, Huerfano County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601580452. Lagrange, Gaven Michael was born in 1994 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6494 S Malaya ST, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 600780415. Lagrange, Harold Daniel was born in 1959 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 19573 E Ithaca PL, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 710282. Lagrange, Jason John was born in 1974 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6584 S Quantock CT, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 738506. Lagrange, Jeffery A was born in 1975 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 11054 Pastel PT, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 5741078. Lagrange, Jeffrey Eugene was born in 1972 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1345 Overhill RD, GOLDEN, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601888482. Lagrange, Jeremy Jules was born in 1987 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2700 W 103Rd AVE APT 113, FEDERAL HGTS, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 600377984. Lagrange, Joanna was born in 1981 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 10895 W Hialeah PL, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4274097. Lagrange, Joseph Roland was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 381 S 9Th ST, RIFLE, Garfield County, CO. His voter ID number is 5533293. Lagrange, Karen Lee was born in 1963 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 17820 Pioneer Crossing, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601782632. Lagrange, Larry Wayne was born in 1944 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 29040 Golf WAY, EVERGREEN, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4163762. Lagrange, Linda Marie was born in 1944 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 29040 Golf WAY, EVERGREEN, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4163911. Lagrange, Lois Anne was born in 1952 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 33 Sawmill RD, EVERGREEN, Clear Creek County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5012492. Lagrange, Mark Dean Iv was born in 1968 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 5716 Holman WAY, GOLDEN, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4196575. Lagrange, Martina Eva was born in 1968 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 5716 Holman WAY, GOLDEN, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4196573. Lagrange, Paul Kirk was born in 1962 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 17820 Pioneer Crossing, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 601800528. Lagrange, Peter Christian was born in 1984 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 107 N Harris ST UNIT 204, BRECKENRIDGE, Summit County, CO. His voter ID number is 200045861. Lagrange, Rae Ashlee was born in 1990 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 918 Rampart Range RD, WOODLAND PARK, Teller County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601369917. Lagrange, Robert Wayne Ii was born in 1979 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 659 Country CT, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. His voter ID number is 5517508. Lagrange, Samantha Leilani was born in 1989 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 659 Country CT, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600627191. Lagrange, Sarah Christine was born in 1977 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 11054 Pastel PT, PARKER, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5877080. Lagrange, Shane W was born in 1978 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 10895 W Hialeah PL, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4273983. Lagrange, Stephanie Marie was born in 1988 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2608 Kansas DR # I156, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600484443. Lagrange, Stephen William was born in 1988 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1060 S Parker RD APT 25, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 601104977. Lagrange, Tonya Marie was born in 1968 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 30153 Arena DR, EVERGREEN, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4166409. Lagrange, Virginia Mary was born in 1950 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 135 Ouray AVE, PONCHA SPRINGS, Chaffee County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4163426. Lagrange, William P was born in 1944 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 44 Estancia LN, DURANGO, La Plata County, CO. His voter ID number is 5959913. La Grassa, Luke was born in 1996 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 935 Broadway APT 106, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 601433226. Lagrassa, Thomas Anthony Jr was born in 1963 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 8405 Tarnwood PATH, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 492771. Lagrasta, Amy Michelle was born in 1977 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6507 Westbourn CIR, FORT COLLINS, Larimer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 200269477. La Grasta, Martin Jeffrey was born in 1975 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 43311 Pearson Ranch LOOP, PARKER, Elbert County, CO. His voter ID number is 601125337. Lagrave, Catalina Jean was born in 1997 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6138 S Killarney DR, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601260660. Lagrave, Charlotte Louise was born in 1963 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 6138 S Killarney DR, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 753748. Lagrave, Dean K was born in 1961 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 6138 S Killarney DR, CENTENNIAL, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 753579. La Grave, Jesus Rafael was born in 1959 and registered to vote, giving the address as 1371 Zephyr ST # 203, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. La Grave’ voter ID number is 601300722. Lagrave, John Barry was born in 1971 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 108 Sunset DR, BAILEY, Park County, CO. His voter ID number is 600719589. Lagrave, Lance Edward was born in 1969 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 347 Gold Flake TER, BAILEY, Park County, CO. His voter ID number is 601071962. La Grave, Marina was born in 1960 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 34 Pima CT, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600458672. Lagray, Frances Anne was born in 1961 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 2933 W Bryant CIR, LITTLETON, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600792079. Lagreca, Adina Gabrielle was born in 1982 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 3167 S Halifax ST, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600055877. Lagreca, Albert Christopher was born in 1925 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 8710 Franklin ST, DENVER, Adams County, CO. His voter ID number is 7015478. Lagreca, Amy Lynn was born in 1986 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 800 Snowmass Creek RD, SNOWMASS, Pitkin County, CO. Her voter ID number is 1431722. Lagreca, Bethany Jordan was born in 1992 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1185 S Oneida ST APT B, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600334814. Lagreca, Billie M was born in 1931 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 8710 Franklin ST, DENVER, Adams County, CO. Her voter ID number is 7112673. La Greca, Charles Thomas Angelo was born in 1967 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1000 N Speer BLVD UNIT 604, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 600707789. Lagreca, Cindy S was born in 1949 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 8601 Snowbrush LN, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5854580. Lagreca, Daniel Ryan was born in 1987 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 9563 Devonshire PL, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 600271914. La Greca, David Kenneth was born in 1987 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 800 Snowmass Creek RD, SNOWMASS, Pitkin County, CO. His voter ID number is 8160083. Lagreca, Erin Elizabeth was born in 1989 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 9563 Devonshire PL, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601336926. Lagreca, Gail Ann was born in 1961 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 12172 Mt Powell, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. Her voter ID number is 4121066. Lagreca, Jaren Christopher was born in 1988 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2128 Grove CIR W, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 200090365. Lagreca, Jeffrey Joseph was born in 1964 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1105 S Cherry ST APT 1304, DENVER, Denver County, CO. His voter ID number is 601182485. Lagreca, Joseph Anthony was born in 1978 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 2736 S Sedalia ST, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 913067. Lagreca, Kay Marlynn was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1002 Aspen DR, EVERGREEN, Clear Creek County, CO. Her voter ID number is 5011293. Lagreca, Kenneth William was born in 1956 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1002 Aspen DR, EVERGREEN, Clear Creek County, CO. His voter ID number is 5011294. La Greca, Michael John Stanley was born in 1983 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3167 S Halifax ST, AURORA, Arapahoe County, CO. His voter ID number is 918127. Lagreca, Nicholas Joseph was born in 1992 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 800 Mohawk DR UNIT 208, BOULDER, Boulder County, CO. His voter ID number is 601038274. Lagreca, Pauline Adeline was born in 1926 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 8968 Greenspointe LN, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. Her voter ID number is 634509. Lagreca, Philip D was born in 1958 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 12172 Mt Powell, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 4121065. Lagreca, Robert John was born in 1950 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 8601 Snowbrush LN, HIGHLANDS RANCH, Douglas County, CO. His voter ID number is 5722044. Lagreca, Ryan Joseph was born in 1994 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 12172 Mt Powell, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 600667550. Lagreca, Stephen William was born in 1984 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1002 Aspen DR, EVERGREEN, Clear Creek County, CO. His voter ID number is 5020197. Lagreca, Timothy Alan was born in 1962 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3749 Mckinley AVE, WELLINGTON, Larimer County, CO. His voter ID number is 1593551. Lagreca, William Michael was born in 1991 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 12172 Mt Powell, LITTLETON, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 600682868. Lagreco, Ann Louise was born in 1962 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1030 Wintergreen CT, WOODLAND PARK, Teller County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600265704. Lagreco, Todd Anthony was born in 1963 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 1030 Wintergreen CT, WOODLAND PARK, Teller County, CO. His voter ID number is 600265701. Lagree, Aleta Louise was born in 1983 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 19151 E Scott PL, DENVER, Denver County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2734586. Lagree, Amanda Lynn was born in 1982 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 22600 Silver Peak TRL, BUENA VISTA, Chaffee County, CO. Her voter ID number is 6908637. Lagree, Brenda L was born in 1965 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 1020 Sherman AVE, CANON CITY, Fremont County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3671841. Lagree, Carl was born in 1942 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 3108 W Monica DR, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. His voter ID number is 370120. Lagree, Cheyanne B was born in 1997 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 310 Crestone LN APT 25, COLO SPRINGS, El Paso County, CO. Her voter ID number is 601378884. Lagree, Debra Lynn was born in 1957 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 646 Brooks CT, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. Her voter ID number is 2257183. Lagree, Derek James was born in 1988 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 530 Ingalls ST, LAKEWOOD, Jefferson County, CO. His voter ID number is 601453876. Lagree, Jeanne Marie was born in 1950 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 130 County Rd 173, WESTCLIFFE, Custer County, CO. Her voter ID number is 3732189. Lagree, Jeremy Matthew was born in 1993 and he registered to vote, giving his address as 685 Polk CT, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. His voter ID number is 601042960. Lagree, Jordan Lynn was born in 1991 and she registered to vote, giving her address as 7301/2 N Valley DR, GRAND JUNCTION, Mesa County, CO. Her voter ID number is 600250287.
2019-04-20T04:34:05Z
http://coloradovoters.info/by_name/pages/l10016.html
ED note: The best way to read this is to download the PDF (above) as there are many illustrations that are not included here in the text. Whitesell, whose book is one of the most definitive scholarly works in print on Mitchell's music, supports his view of what may or may not be classified as "cyclic" using Ruth Bingham's definition of a song cycle, which, for him, seems most applicable to Mitchell's work: "In Bingham's description of the cycle, she emphasizes that coherence is not necessarily achieved through musical means, and in fact when Mitchell constructs cycles she works primarily with textual connections, concepts, or frames. Musical connections are supportive of a guiding textual rationale - in some cases perhaps accidentally so" (Whitesell 2008, 196). [More recent scholarship suggests that text may not have been the sole determinant in the conception of nineteenth-century song cycles. For example, David Ferris (2010, 398) noted that scholars are "further than ever from a definitive answer" to the question of what actually defines the quintessential song cycle, suggesting the issue is still under debate.] Using this viewpoint as a governing principle for his assessment and analysis of Mitchell's catalogue, he identifies ten of her releases as concept albums: six produced between 1968 and 1980 (Song to a Seagull, Blue, The Hissing of Summer Lawns, Hejira, Don Juan's Reckless Daughter, and Mingus) and four retrospective compilations produced since 1990 (Both Sides Now, Travelogue, The Beginning of Survival, and Songs of a Prairie Girl). However, he allows that "some listeners may wish to present arguments in favour of others as well" (199). This study is written in response to this invitation, offering evidence that Court and Spark (1974) is a song cycle and should therefore be added to the list of "inarguable concept albums" in Mitchell's catalogue. In this album Mitchell appears to have done the exact opposite of what Whitesell identified as her "usual" practice for achieving coherence. Although underlying textual themes unify the album's content to a certain extent, the musical elements play a more central role in forming the conceptual nucleus around which this album coalesces. These elements include motivic cross-referencing and return, segues between songs, pattern completion at key middle or background structural moments to define formal boundaries, and perhaps most surprisingly, a logical and symbolic progression of key or pitch centres that are directly related to the album's opening gesture. The presence and frequency with which these elements appear points to an overall musical structure that is much more than happenstance. Far from being an incidental aural vehicle for conveying Mitchell's poetry, the music on this album appears instead to be the result of a carefully planned compositional scheme in which the lyrics are only one active component. Since Mitchell's intent is always to create "art," all parts - text, music, and in some instances, album covers - are part of a whole. Therefore, an examination of all the unifying elements in this album - both text and music - only deepens the listener's understanding, enabling Mitchell to achieve her stated artistic purpose: that the listener see himself or herself in the work, for "at the point that they see themselves in it, the communication is complete" (Ghomeshi 2013). Concept albums and Mitchell's concept of "art music" As early as 1971, music critics observed unique features in Mitchell's compositional style that lay in a nebulous area between popular and classical music. In his review of Blue, New York Times critic Dan Heckman called Mitchell's evolving style "art song," warning that this direction would not necessarily lead to the commercial success she had enjoyed as a "folksinger": "I suspect [Blue] will be the most disliked of Miss Mitchell's recordings, despite the fact that it attempts more and makes greater demands on her talent than any of the others. The audience for art songs is far smaller than for folk ballads, and Joni Mitchell is on the verge of having to make a decision between the two" (Heckman 1971). The "art song" terminology apparently resonated with Mitchell; in 1979 she told journalist Cameron Crowe that she preferred this description of her work over the catch-all "singer-songwriter" categorization, adding that she always knew what she meant by the word art, as cited at the beginning of this study (Crowe 1979, 48 - 9). Alice Echols quoted Mitchell as having said her music was not meant to have the short life that popular songs typically enjoy: "My music is not designed to grab instantly. It's designed to wear for a lifetime, to hold up like a fine cloth" (Echols 2002, 208). She told U.S. National Public Radio reporter Liane Hansen, "None of my songs on my records are folk songs ... They're more like German Lieder ... more classical than folk" (Whitesell 2008, 233). [National Public Radio is a non-profit news and information network jointly funded by the United States government and contributing listeners. Many NPR-affiliated stations are located on college and university campuses throughout the United States.] This was evident to critics; New York Times critic John Rockwell's review of Mitchell's Hejira (1976) called Mitchell "the artist best able to link folk-rock with the older Western tradition of the art song" (Rockwell 1976). Mitchell expanded on this view in 2013, during an interview conducted by Jian Ghomeshi of the CBC. Speaking of her first album, Song to a Seagull (1968), she said, "[The] first album is semi-classical. It's almost like Schubert, you know. It isn't folk music. It was kind of mislabelled from the beginning. Folksingers went out, bought it, put it on their turntables and went, 'What?' ... It's more like classical arrangements on the guitar. Like it's kind of classical guitar more than folk-style guitar" (Ghomeshi 2013). The connection between Song to a Seagull and lieder tradition extends beyond Mitchell's almost Schubertian approach to song accompaniment on the guitar. Each of the album's two sides is given a specific title ("Part 1: I Came to the City" and "Part 2: Out of the City and down to the Seaside"), each of which is based on differing key relationship schemes (Whitesell 2008, 199 - 200). Like a song cycle, the album is built on dramatic storytelling elements such as strong subsidiary textual motifs and a logical dramatic progression in song order from which a story can be inferred. Mitchell also did the artwork for the album cover (suggesting the album might be considered a "total work of art"). This artwork incorporates pictorial references to song lyrics; among other things, one finds a pen-and-ink drawing of a ship on a calm sea at sunset (presumably the Dawn Treader of the second song on Side 2), and a saguaro cactus on the back cover (referring to "Cactus Tree," the album's final song). Court and Spark is perhaps more textually preoccupied with themes native to nineteenth-century vocal art music than is Song to a Seagull . In a filmed interview Mitchell called it "a discourse on romantic love against the backdrop of its time" (Lacy and Bennett 2003). Like nineteenth-century song cycles such as Schubert's Winterreise or Schumann's Dichterliebe, the story implied in the album's song order follows the familiar, even epic, arc of a romantic relationship from its beginning to its end and aftermath. As occurs in both the Schubert and Schumann song cycles, the listener is allowed an intimate view of the effect that the relationship's demise exerts on the cycle's protagonist. Since textual preoccupation alone does not give a work cyclic properties, the question is whether Mitchell employs further poetic techniques that lend unity to the album. This possibility will be explored below. Crosby's hands-off approach made it possible for Mitchell to act as her own producer in subsequent recordings - a rare occurrence during this era. This ensured that she would have complete creative control over her work, including the supervision of song arrangements, instrumentation, and selection of the order in which songs would appear on any given album. That Mitchell has acted as her own producer for most of her career is a significant point when considering artistic intent and a musical style that evolved over more than thirty years and through a number of discernable style periods. The progression of her musical style over her first creative period (1968 - 72) can be observed in the five albums released prior to Court and Spark, which marks the beginning of her second style period. [Mitchell's first six albums are, in the order of their release: Song to a Seagull (1968), Clouds (1969), Ladies of the Canyon (1970), Blue (1971), For the Roses (1972), and Court and Spark (1974).] Three of her first four albums (Song to a Seagull, Clouds, and Blue) consistently maintain the folk-related style characteristic of her first creative period. A gradual influx of rock- and jazz-related idioms commences in her third album (Ladies of the Canyon, 1970) and continues through For the Roses (1972), her fifth release. This includes an expanding variety of guitar effects, Mitchell playing piano rather than guitar on many tracks, and the incorporation of backup vocals (most often done by Mitchell herself) and ensembles of varying sizes and instrumentations. Jazz musicians comprise these ensembles more often than do rock musicians and include woodwind players such as Paul Horn (the improvised clarinet solo at the end of "For Free" on Ladies of the Canyon) and Tom Scott (four of the tracks on For the Roses, 1972), whose L.A. Express serves as the backup band on Court and Spark . Court and Spark was a deliberate stylistic departure from her earlier work. [When] I realized how popular I was becoming was [sic] right before Blue, and I went, "Oh my God, a lot of people are listening to me. Well then, they better find out who they're worshipping. Let's see if they can take it. Let's get real." So I wrote Blue, which horrified a lot of people ... [What] had happened is they're looking at me, and all I've done is reveal human traits. They haven't seen themselves in it. At the point that they see themselves in it, the communication is complete. Court and Spark was, by Mitchell's assessment, also the beginning of a six- year period (1973 - 9) during which she experimented with the boundaries of what she defined as a "song" (Garabini 2000, 115 - 16). Her music became even more infused with jazz elements, almost completely eclipsing the folk idiom on which her reputation had been built. Court and Spark is also the first of her albums to feature a backup band on every track, beginning a trend that would continue for the remainder of her career. The albums that immediately follow Court and Spark become more jazz-infused, gradually adding notable sidemen such as bassist Jaco Pastorius, saxophonist Wayne Shorter, and pianist Herbie Hancock. Her second style period culminates in 1979 with the release of Mingus, which began as a collaboration with avant-garde jazz bassist Charles Mingus. This avant-garde jazz album is one of the most experimental of Mitchell's catalogue. Song to a Seagull is clearly a cycle or concept album unified by recurring textual themes, particularly the idea of geographic location. Six years later, when Court and Spark was created, Mitchell was at the beginning of a stylistic evolution that affected her music, her poetry, and the way the two interacted with one another. While the music takes on a greater organizational role, it is also more subtly interwoven with Mitchell's poetry, allowing for more varied textual unification. This section will address the more significant textual features that argue in favour of the cyclic nature of Court and Spark, particularly song order and recurring textual themes. When speaking specifically of Court and Spark later in this same interview, Mitchell said she is always "very protective of [her] structure," being careful that the musicians of the L.A. Express "wouldn't just scribble all over the architecture of [her] music" (14). If the artwork (either song or album) is the authority in Mitchell's eyes, and she intended this album to be a "discourse on romantic love," it seems reasonable to deduce that the song order here was deliberate. She would no doubt have seen it as a significant part of the "architecture" she took such care to protect. In this light, the song order on Court and Spark takes on more significance than it has perhaps been given credit. Mitchell's vision of the album as a discourse speaks more in favour of a logical, integrated textual progression that is more cyclic than random ordering. Moreover, a closer examination of the lyrics reveals recurring textual motifs that run through most of the songs on the album, the most pervasive of which are freedom versus commitment and sanity versus madness. Both motifs are intensified at key moments with religious imagery, which infuses the protagonist's struggle to maintain her freedom and sanity with bitter irony. The madness motif is introduced almost immediately in the album's first track, "Court and Spark" (see table 1). Here the female protagonist describes her new love interest as having "a madman's soul," who "dances up a river in the dark." "Help Me" describes the initial euphoria of new love as a "crazy feeling" that the woman knows will mean trouble for her. In the fourth and fifth songs ("People's Parties" and "The Same Situation") she says, "I told you when I met you / I was crazy" and describes herself as being "tethered to a ringing telephone / In a room full of mirrors." Later in "Just Like This Train," each verse ends with some version of the sentiment: "Jealous lovin'll make you crazy." These implications prefigure the subject matter of the final two songs. "Trouble Child" describes the painful inner world of the protagonist's mental breakdown, while "Twisted" expands upon that theme, bringing the madness motif to full fruition, as occurs in a piece built upon cumulative form techniques. We don't understand that everything on the album points toward the final two songs until we arrive, perhaps almost as surprised by the outcome they depict as the protagonist herself. The song order on the album follows the familiar Mitchell arc of a romantic relationship, this time with greater focus on its aftermath for both parties (Klein 2000, 2). This arc may be less apparent because, as is usual to her songwriting approach, Mitchell plays the role of storyteller (Ghomeshi 2013; Whitesell 2008, 41 - 77). As narrator, she takes on the persona of each character, frequently offering their points of view in first person, creating a "she said, he said" or a "she did, he did" scenario. Although most of the songs are told from the woman's perspective, "Free Man in Paris" and "Raised on Robbery" are either about the male love interest or are presented from his viewpoint, providing a glimpse of who he is - or who the storyteller thinks he is. Who's strong, and somewhat sincere." "Car on a Hill" (the sixth song) implies that the relationship ends unexpectedly in a poignant, almost cruel way. The protagonist waits for her boyfriend to come home one evening. However, the repeating fade-out ending, which consists of repeating chords built on suspensions, suggests that he never comes. "Down to You," which is the musical high point of the cycle, is an ironic "breakup song" that portrays the protagonist's emotional devastation as she realizes the relationship has ended. The album's final four songs provide glimpses of the aftermath of the breakup. The woman first waxes prosaic about the fickle nature of romantic relationships in "Just Like This Train." "Raised on Robbery" then portrays the man as unready for even a casual sexual encounter: he spurns a prostitute who tries to pick him up in a bar. The final two songs make it clear that the woman's "jealous lovin'" really did drive her crazy. "Trouble Child" depicts the melancholy, frightening inner world of the protagonist's mental breakdown, while "Twisted," written by Annie Ross and Wardell Gray, adds a more sardonic coda to the cycle, portraying the outer manifestations of the protagonist's madness. Mitchell called "Twisted" an "encore piece," explaining that she had always loved it, and it seemed to fit here. Further, because she had recently undergone psychotherapy, she felt she had earned the right to sing it (Marom 2000, 70). In the context of the implied plot, the presence of a cover version of a song written by someone else suggests that through her mental breakdown the protagonist has lost not only her love, but also the freedom she so cherished. With the loss of freedom, she has lost her individual voice as well and can no longer speak for herself. The switch from outward to inward focus at the beginning of the textual frame is reiterated in reverse order (inward to outward) in the final two songs. "Trouble Child" presents the inner world of the protagonist's mental breakdown, whereas "Twisted" reflects her outward behaviour. With the exception of "Free Man in Paris" and "Raised on Robbery," the alternating inside-to-outside narrative perspectives continue throughout the album. Both "People's Parties" and "The Same Situation" present the female protagonist's inner state, but they are linked by a musical transition that suggests Mitchell might have conceived them as the two halves of a single song. "Car on a Hill" is again presented in a narrative style similar to the title track, making it another of the female protagonist's outward expressions. The text of "Down to You" is written in the third person and is therefore more cryptic. Whether the storyteller is speaking directly to, about, or as the female protagonist (using "you" in the more colloquial sense) is never quite clear. Following the reasoning that a single popular song can contain a "multiplicity of voices," and that "the author 'inside the text' may inscribe the author 'outside the text,'" this song could actually present the thoughts of both the female protagonist and the narrator (Brackett 2000, 16). Either way, the text is clearly more descriptive of the woman's inner state, perhaps told in the third person because her inner self is so detached from reality that she sees her actions from the perspective of an observer. "Just Like This Train" then reverts to the protagonist's outside world. The narrative tone is once again more objective, as one relating thoughts or feelings to an associate. It is self-analytical: the protagonist compares her life to a train that's never "on time" and has "count[ed] lovers like railroad cars." The biting humour in this song, in lines such as "I can't find my goodness / I lost my heart / Oh sour grapes" further suggests an outward focus. The self-deprecating "Oh sour grapes" line suggests that she is outwardly putting the best face she can on her broken heart. These two songs do not follow the previously discussed outside-to-inside or inside-to-outside narrative pattern. Instead, their placement, as third song from either the front or back end of the album, defines the boundaries of the romantic relationship itself. The female protagonist is alone at both the beginning and end of the relationship - whether alone with her thoughts in the relationship's giddy early days, or alone with her neuroses after its demise. Because the lyrics are created to fit the music rather than the other way around, analysis of the music takes on greater significance. If, for Mitchell, the communication is complete only when the listener sees himself or herself in the song, understanding the music in conjunction with the lyrics only deepens the comprehension of the whole. The album's opening gesture: "Chords of Inquiry" Court and Spark begins with a three-measure passage, played alone by Mitchell on the piano, which consists of a simple three-chord pattern (E - D - E - G), followed by a transitional phrase centred on G (see example 1). Although this passage seems harmonically innocuous, the gesture is completely unrelated to the remainder of the song. Indeed, Mitchell plays the F# at the end of the gesture as if it were marked with a fermata, aurally separating it from everything that follows. If this were classical music, one would immediately ask what function this opening gesture might serve. Mitchell explained in a filmed interview that her songs are often based on what she calls "chords of inquiry." Certain chords or chord patterns depict emotions for her; she prefers sonorities or progressions that "have a question mark in them" (Lacy and Bennett 2003). [Mitchell's songs often begin with what jazz musicians would call "sus chords" - chords with suspensions in them, which feature one or more sets of second intervals. She also frequently uses ninth chords whose third is missing, and the fifth, seventh, and ninth form a seemingly distantly related triad over the chord's root. Both types of "chords of inquiry" can be found in songs on Court and Spark . For instance, "Help Me" begins with Mitchell strumming an Asus2 on the guitar, and these specialized ninth chords are particularly prominent in the coda of "The Same Situation" (see example 5). Ninth chords voiced in this manner were part of a common harmonic language used by some of Mitchell's singer-songwriter contemporaries - most notably James Taylor (with whom Mitchell had a romantic relationship in the early 1970s) and Carole King. However, unlike those of Taylor and King, Mitchell's ninth chords don't always retain the harmonic function (usually as a dominant) implied by the bass note. Although they can be found in much of the popular music of the early 1970s, sonorities like these appear with particular frequency on James Taylor's Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon (1971) and on nearly every track of Carole King's Tapestry (1971), Rhymes and Reasons (1972), and Fantasy (1973).] The gesture that opens Court and Spark is constructed almost exclusively of simple triads, but quite clearly "has a question mark in it" in at least three respects. First, its aural separation from the title song seems deliberate - so much so that it was omitted by the publisher from the sheet music, as were passages in other songs on the album that didn't fit then-current norms for popular sheet music. [These omissions include lengthier instrumental interludes, such as the seventeen-measure coda at the end of "The Same Situation," the two-minute instrumental break between verses of "Down to You," and passages that serve as both transition and introduction, such as the opening four measures of "People's Parties." While it is common knowledge that the published sheet music of any popular song cannot be considered its "definitive version," the piano transcriptions and reductions in this instance are surprisingly true to the recordings. As a result, omissions are all the more notable because they are sometimes nonsensical. By omitting the transitional four measures at the beginning of "People's Parties," the printed version of the song begins in the middle of a phrase (Mitchell 1974, 84).] Second, the opening three triads are voiced in second inversion, providing Mitchell's requisite "question mark" by placing more emphasis on the melodic line and drawing the ear's attention away from the chords' roots. Third, the cadence on G in m. 2 is open-ended, as a question would be. Rather than providing an immediate response, the transitional phrase in m. 3 leads the ear away from the question just posed, via the F#, into a narrative-style passage that is more obviously the title song's actual introduction. Mitchell has said her music and poetry are more deliberate, calculated creations (as opposed to painting, which for her is intuitive) (Ghomeshi 2013). Critics have noted this quality in her music since very early in her career, calling it "carefully constructed" and "fully composed, with rhythmic and textural intricacies in its own right" (Traum 1967, 8; Whitesell 2002, 175). One cannot therefore help but wonder, given the distinct separation of the opening gesture from the title song, whether the album as a whole might be a response to or working out of the question or "problem" posed here. If this were a classical work, one might immediately explore how or if the E - D - E - G chord progression, or "chords of inquiry," exert an influence on the music that follows. Because modality is typical in Mitchell's harmonic palette (making VII a common pre-tonic chord if a pitch centre is given a Mixolydian modal inflection), the E - D - E motion in the opening gesture in the very least suggests a motivic axis that could be realized harmonically, melodically, or both (Whitesell 2002, 176 - 78). The question is whether Mitchell does any or all of those things here. Keeping these possibilities in mind, the influence the opening gesture exerts will be enfolded into the discussion below. Unusual harmonies and chord progressions, which arise in part from her use of open guitar tunings, are among the hallmarks of Joni Mitchell's music (Feather 2000, 97). Although her harmonic practice on Court and Spark might be more "mainstream," stylistically closer to that of her singer-songwriter contemporaries than her other work, it appears to play an integral role in both text painting and in the unfolding of the proposed plot. As table 2 illustrates, all but two of the songs on this album are in one of only four key or pitch centres: E, D, A, and C. [E, D, A, and C are key centres that share common first-position chords used by beginning or amateur guitar players. However, this point may have little relevance for Mitchell, who often uses "open" guitar tunings of her own invention. One might also attribute the more triadic nature of songs on Court and Spark to either the constant presence of a backup band, Mitchell's more frequent use of the piano (her piano skills seem at least somewhat limited), or both. One anecdotal source suggests that Mitchell used "open" guitar tunings on this album, despite the implied relationship between the most common key centres and first-position guitar chords. In his description of the recording sessions for "Free Man in Paris," singer/guitarist José Feliciano recalled offering Mitchell advice on her guitar playing: "She was playing with her guitar in an open tuning ... so I pointed out that although open tunings are nice, they can be restrictive. I said that she'd be better off just to tune her guitar in the normal way. She didn't like that. I think it put her off me a little" (Black 2004).] Even the two seemingly extraneous keys, G and F# minor, are related to one or more of the four primary pitch centres either functionally, through a common connection to the opening "chords of inquiry," or both. For example, F# minor, the key centre for much of "Car on a Hill," is the relative minor of A, one of the four common keys. F# is also the held (and therefore emphasized) "pivot pitch" between the opening gesture and the formal introduction of the title track. E and D as key centres are part of the "chords of inquiry," as is G, which serves as a pitch centre in both "The Same Situation" and "Trouble Child." G is also the dominant of C - the key centre for both the protagonist's and the love interest's "aftermath songs" ("Just Like This Train" and "Raised on Robbery"). A quick overview of where and when these key centres occur suggests that their placement, via the order in which individual songs appear, might be deliberate, implying a symbolic connection between pitch centres and the plot proposed earlier. The practice of associating key centres with individual characters or concepts is, of course, a feature common to many song cycles. It is also consistent with Mitchell's concept that songs are musical paintings (Feather 2000, 93). Keeping in mind that painting is Mitchell's "primary language" (Ghomeshi 2013), key or pitch centre might function as a colour of paint that can be varied in hue or shading through modal inflection - a trait recognized as part of Mitchell's common harmonic practice (Whitesell 2002, 173 - 83). Mitchell's commentary on this issue is a bit contradictory: while she claims to never know what key she's playing in, she has also noted at least once that pitch centre can carry musical and even symbolic significance. While describing the creation of "Paprika Plains" (Don Juan's Reckless Daughter, 1977 - 78) in 1985, she explained that "C was home and that then you could venture out anywhere, and if you were meandering out there and you felt like you were lost, you wandered home to C. And then you departed again" (Hale 1985). Likewise the progression of pitch centres is logical enough to suggest that as Mitchell fleshed out the lyric content of the songs for Court and Spark, certain pitches and the colours they implied, if not the key centres themselves, became associated with characters and events in the story Mitchell intended to tell. It seems more than coincidental that E, D, and A are the pitch centres most closely associated with the romantic relationship (the key of C never appears until after the relationship has ended). Moreover, E, D, and G appear as pitch centres only when the female protagonist is speaking to or about herself, as in "Court and Spark," "People's Parties," or "Trouble Child." This strongly implies that E, D, and G - the three harmonic components of the opening gesture - may be signifiers of the female protagonist. A as a pitch centre, on the other hand, seems to be specifically associated with the male character. "Free Man in Paris" is in A, which is the only song in which the man's speaking voice occupies all but a few words of the text. This is not, however, the first time A appears as an influential pitch. It is first emphasized in the "knocking" triplet figure introduced in m. 4 of "Court and Spark." In a subtle bit of text painting, the A, as the dissonance in a 4 - 3 suspension, acts as an insistent "foreign object" that is resolved only momentarily (example 2). When the triplet figure is then altered to create the plagal cadence at the end of each section of the song, the A, subdominant in the key of E, naturally begins the figure (example 3). Mitchell further uses A as a pitch centre that struggles to dominate keys associated with the female protagonist. A as a conflicting key centre first appears in "Help Me," where each verse begins in A, but ends in D. Although "Free Man in Paris" is solidly in A, the A versus D conflict resumes in the introduction of "People's Parties," where Mitchell plays an A triad with a D bass on the acoustic guitar, reducing this power struggle into a single chord and pairing the protagonist inextricably with her lover (example 4). This sonority appears not only in the song's introduction but also at the beginning of each stanza of poetry. The psychological and emotional enmeshment portrayed by this vertical sonority is further borne out in "The Same Situation," which follows without pause, bridged by a modulatory transitional phrase. The song is a litany on the question, "How and why did I get myself into this?" and has a key centre that is deliberately ambiguous, featuring another pair of conflicting pitch centres: G and A. Although G (the cadential sonority from the "chords of inquiry") is the pitch centre, the circling chord progression on which the verse is built (C - G - D/E bass - E - Am) makes the end of each of these progressions increasingly powerful. The repeating cadences on A minor create musical question marks that enhance the meaning of the text, carrying such contextual weight that the few cadences that occur on G are rendered almost impotent by comparison, further weakened by the addition of major sevenths and ninths. Ultimately, A triumphs over G in the fourteen-measure tag at the end of the song. While the strings play a plaintive melody in 3/4 time accompanied by an A minor pedal, one hears the piano's right hand playing quarter-note quadruplets on a G triad against it in a four-against-three rhythmic pattern (example 5). Although the quadruplets are an almost visual portrayal of the lyric "I called out to be released," they are strikingly reminiscent of the "knocking" triplet figure in the introduction to "Court and Spark." However, the roles have been reversed here: the protagonist, not her lover, is knocking or pounding on the virtual doors or walls that imprison her. Chillingly, the knocking gradually slows, weakens, and disappears completely, swallowed by the A minor harmony that carries the final four measures. Both "Car on a Hill" and "Down to You" have dual pitch centres - shifting F# to A (keys associated with the man) and D to E (keys associated with the protagonist), respectively. In this, too, the key selection seems symbolic. Although the protagonist is speaking in "Car on a Hill," she is talking about her boyfriend who, like the fade-out ending suggests, all but disappears at the end of the song, as does his home key. This is the last time we hear the key of A in anything except as an occasional passing tonicization. It therefore makes sense that "Down to You," which begins in D and ends in E, is written in the protagonist's keys. She is left to herself to pick up the pieces of the relationship that has just abruptly ended. "Just Like This Train" is in C, but the sudden drop down to this pitch level is not as jolting to the ear because Mitchell has prepared the listener for it in several places during "Down to You," the song that immediately precedes it. Most notable among these places is the bridge, which is composed entirely over a C/D bass chord, which acts as a tension-building pedal over which a three-note melodic motive is varied and repeated. In context of where it appears in the cycle, C as a key centre bears a symbolic connection to emotional conditions lying outside the frame of the relationship defined by the E - D - E axis in the "chords of inquiry." It is a "lower" pitch, suggesting an emotional letdown and therefore may be a harmonic "response" appropriate to songs dealing with the aftermath of the relationship. Musically, it lies outside the boundary set by the "chords of inquiry," yet is related to them via its dominant, G. It is where both parties go after the relationship ends. The harmonic "flat line" created by C serving as the key centre for two songs in a row - "Just Like This Train" and "Raised on Robbery" - particularly after the harmonic variety displayed in the key centres of the preceding songs, implies that the breakup may have been hard on both parties. But for the female protagonist in particular, the C pitch centre may be illustrative of the depths to which she sinks, both away from self-respect and sanity. The key centre of "Trouble Child" is perhaps appropriately ambiguous; it seems to be in both C and G at the same time, thus fusing a relationship between C and the G from the "chords of inquiry." "Twisted" serves as a sardonic coda for the cycle. It is in D, suggesting, if the pattern of characterization by key centre is still intact, that the woman might be in a phase of recovery; she never returns to E, because she is clearly not the person we met at the beginning of the cycle. The foregoing discussion of key relationships has alluded to the idea that in addition to the opening gesture's influence on issues of pitch centre, it also acts as an underlying motive that functions as a scaffolding in the deep background upon which the entirety of the album is built. This "controlling motive" surfaces at key structural moments during the cycle. The "chords of inquiry" appear either as key centres or as opening sonorities of songs related to the romantic relationship (see table 2). "Court and Spark" is in E minor, beginning on E chords in both the album's opening gesture in m. 1 (E major) and in the actual introduction in m. 4 (Em7). "People's Parties" is in D, suggesting a middle-ground realization of the E-D-E axis implied in the opening gesture. Then, despite vacillating between G and A minor, D is prolonged in the background of "The Same Situation" via the opening A/D bass sonority that also begins each verse. The second E major chord from the opening gesture first reappears as the opening chord in the transition between "Car on a Hill" and "Down to You," despite D serving as the primary key centre for the majority of the song. The first few measures of this transition are, in fact, a harmonic variation and expansion of the "chords of inquiry," minus the repeated E triad (example 6). Although the second sonority in this passage is a Bm7, Mitchell has preserved the second-inversion voicing of the D triad in the right hand. We see the E-to-D motion from the opening gesture once again at the end of the first verse, where the E triad, again in second inversion, appears as an accented passing chord (example 7). E major is heavily emphasized again at the end of the tune, which, because of its lengthy instrumental break, carries greater musical weight over the album as a whole. Its weight is further emphasized because the E - D - E axis pattern running through the deeper middle ground of the album is completed in the coda of "Down to You" (example 8). Given that the bulk of this song is in D, identifying the coda of "Down to You" as the structural moment where the axis pattern is completed in the background (symbolizing the end of the romantic relationship) is the most logical explanation for the unusual emphasis placed on E major in this song, particularly why it ends in E. While the end of "Down to You" acts as the background closure of the E-D-E axis, the full E-D-E-G pattern suggested by the "chords of inquiry" is fully completed on the background level in the penultimate song on the album. Although the key centre of "Trouble Child" is ambiguous at first, G is the tonic that emerges at the end of each verse, as well as at the end of the song itself. Given that Mitchell called "Twisted" an "encore piece," it seems that she considered "Trouble Child" the actual end of the cycle. Therefore it seems fitting that the cycle's final piece before the encore be in the key of the final "chord of inquiry." Given the topic of the text, the song may also serve as the ultimate sad response or resolution to the question posed at the beginning of the album by the opening gesture. Another musical element that seems to confirm the cyclic nature of Court and Spark is the previously mentioned "knocking" triplet figure that first appears in the introduction of the title track. When it first enters in mm. 5 - 7 of "Court and Spark" (see example 2), it seems no more than a subtle bit of text painting that introduces A as the "foreign object" pitch. When it recurs later in the song (example 3), it takes the form of an extended and reversed version of what Allan Moore called the "extended plagal cadence" (Moore 1995, 191). Moore's version of this cadence is VII-IV-I (which in this tune would be D-A-E); Mitchell reverses the VII and IV, adding an intermerdiary tonic chord, making the progression IV-I-VII-I (A-E-D-E). Although Moore emphasizes the commonality of the VII-I cadence in popular music, Mitchell's use of it here appears to serve another text-related purpose. Here A and E (IV and I in this key) are the two sonorities on which greater emphasis is placed. This is accomplished by accenting the A chord at the beginning of the figure, then holding the final E chord for two beats. Thus although the figure is made of four sonorities, one perceives the IV and I as its primary harmonic components. The three-fold repetition of the figure not only communicates the insistence of the "knocking," but emphasizes the cadential formula's plagality. It sounds like a series of repeated "Amens," reinforcing the religious imagery in the lyrics. Since the man is described in evangelical terms and the protagonist's acceptance of him akin to a religious conversion, the plagal cadence here is analogous to the "Amen" response one might hear sung by a choir at a religious revival. The triplet figure, or others that allude to it either rhythmically or gesturally, recurs periodically in strategic places throughout the album, particularly in songs connected to the romantic relationship. It appears in the coda of "The Same Situation" first as a triplet, then expanded into a quadruplet (see example 5). Here the connection to the initial triplet figure in "Court and Spark" is two-fold. The rhythm recalls the "knocking" figure, and the repeated G triads symbolize the woman pounding on the walls of the emotional prison in which she finds herself. The twenty-six-measure instrumental break in "Car on a Hill" is based almost entirely on the triplet figure, both literally and figuratively. It is first introduced quite cleverly three measures into the interlude by the interjection of a 3/4 bar (m. 24), which suspends the driving beat throughout the break, creating the impression of a more ethereal space where the sense of time is nearly lost (example 9). A rhythmic variation of the triplet figure also appears in this interlude. Here Mitchell takes the idea of three notes grouped together and relaxes the stricter triplet rhythm. She begins with the 3/4 bar in the third measure of the interlude (m. 24) with quarter notes on each beat, then softens the strict three-related rhythm two measures later by syncopating it. Three measures later this figure is transformed into a syncopated pair of arpeggiated triads, which is a variation of the introductory material played by the piano at the beginning of "The Same Situation" (example 10). One immediately hears the rhythmic relationship between what has come before and the triplet figure the moment it enters in m. 29. That Mitchell sees the arpeggiated figure and the triplets as interchangeable is confirmed as the break continues, with the two figures alternating back and forth. These figures are again united in the fading tag at the end of the song, perhaps again for symbolic reasons. Since the triplet figure always appears in some context related to the male love interest, the pairing of the triplet figure and its related arpeggiated eighth-note figure may symbolize the ongoing conflict between the protagonist and her lover - something that ends with this song. The triplet figure resurfaces at one more symbolic juncture in "Just Like This Train." In the concluding verse, quarter-note triplets are used to accommodate keywords in the acerbic lines, "Dreaming of the pleasure I'm gonna have / Watching your hairline recede, / My vain darling." The triplets occur on the words referring to the ex-lover's receding hairline, adding to the bitter sarcasm of the lyric. More significantly, the triplet figure appears in a line where the protagonist is referring directly to her ex-boyfriend, further connecting the figure to his character. In addition to harmonic and motivic elements that link the songs on this album, they are also connected through transitional material that clearly unifies them into a single narrative. These transitions are generally of two types: (1) a passage carried through the track-separating bands on the original LP, which, through the extension of musical material that precedes it, either softens or eliminates the effect of a hard final cadence; or (2) an introduction that recalls material from some pertinent part of the song immediately preceding it, through either quotation or variation. Table 3 summarizes the types of transitions between songs in the cycle. The two right-most columns may refer to the introduction of the song below it. One could point out many things about the musical aspects of these transitions. For example, it seems significant that the introduction of "Free Man in Paris" is based on the harmonic structure and rhythm of the figure that accompanies the word freedom in the preceding song (example 11). The link between the two is clearly a musical allusion to the dichotomy between autonomy and commitment, and more particularly the longing for no commitments, which is what the chorus of "Free Man in Paris" describes. Sometimes transitions carry the musical commentary beyond the final cadence of a single song, as is evident in the transition between "People's Parties" and "The Same Situation." In the introduction to "The Same Situation," the piano begins by playing the accompanimental material for "Situation," but in the key of "People's Parties." The key doesn't change until the singer enters. While the D pitch centre of the introduction serves as a dominant preparation for G, the change of key seems a little abrupt, perhaps even purposely so. Perhaps the most poignant of these overlapping transitions is the passage linking "Car on a Hill" and "Down to You" (see example 6). As previously pointed out, "Car on a Hill" ends with alternating variations of the quarter-note triplet figure. Although the tag of "Car on a Hill" fades out, the melody line of the piano introduction takes the eighth-note rhythmic variation of the figure in the first of the two repeating measures and restates it much more slowly and freely in the new key. The tempo and manner in which the figure is played indicates what has happened more eloquently than any lyric could. While it is not the most complex of the transitions, it is one of the most communicative - adding yet another teasing bit of evidence that the album is a song cycle. This study has highlighted a number of textual and musical elements that argue in favour of the cyclic nature of one of Joni Mitchell's most commercially successful albums. It has been shown that although oblique on the surface, two sets of conflicting textual ideas - freedom versus commitment and sanity versus insanity - run through the entire album, loosely tying the songs together and suggesting a plotline that follows the arc of a romantic relationship. This plotline is also unique in that the final four songs on the album describe aspects of the relationship's aftermath for both parties involved. Perhaps the most intriguing facet of Court and Spark, however, is that the album's cyclic properties are strongly supported through musical elements - a point that runs counter to what has been defined as Mitchell's more usual rationale of organizing cycles around textual connections. The presence of unifying musical elements suggests that for Mitchell, the music on this album may fill a more significant role than that of a convenient vehicle for conveying the text - a common assumption for singer-songwriters whose output is perceived to have followed in the stylistic footsteps of Bob Dylan. However, recognizing that the music exerts a stronger influence on the outcome of the whole is more in line with the way Mitchell has described her songwriting process. Because she has said she usually creates the musical structure first, her lyrics may serve a different function. If the harmonic structure or individual chords represent emotions or ideas to Mitchell, the text then becomes an articulation of the music, fusing both into a single entity like an item cast and hardened in a mould. Looking at Mitchell's music this way adds a new significance to the "careful construction" music critics described in her music from very early in her career ("Joni Mitchell" 1969). In Court and Spark, Mitchell has employed unifying musical elements with the deftness of a skilled composer, and too consistently for the music to be anything but carefully planned. One might ask how this could have been possible, given that Mitchell had little to no formal musical education and claims to be largely unaware of many of music's more technical aspects. Ignorance of traditional musical terminology, theory, or practice does not necessarily preclude the ability to carefully plan the music one writes. Mitchell told Jian Ghomeshi in 2013 that while painting is more intuitive for her, the creation of music and poetry are deliberate, even calculated acts. She briefly described her basic compositional method, much of it aurally based, to music journalist Leonard Feather in a 1979 interview: "I see music very graphically in my head - in my own graph, not in the existing systemized graph - and I, in a way, analyze it or interpret it, or evaluate it in terms of a visual abstraction inside my mind's eye" (94). Although Mitchell's idiom lies in the realm of popular music, the process she describes is in fact conscious composition, her "internal graphing system" not far removed from that of classical avant-garde composers who experiment with alternative notational systems. The unifying musical elements of Court and Spark identified here argue in favour of that conscious composition - a process not exclusive to any particular genre of music. Any composer, regardless of genre, employs similar systems of internal evaluation and organization during the compositional process. The study of Joni Mitchell's music is in its infancy. As scholars develop ways of looking at her unique output, both text and music need to be addressed without attributing greater importance to one or the other. Where the two are often created together or in close succession, to emphasize one over the other in importance may mean to miss significant components that would lend a deeper understanding and appreciation of the whole. If, as Mitchell recently said, understanding is complete only when one sees oneself in the work (Ghomeshi 2013), perhaps looking at the way the two interact and support one another is a step toward that understanding. In the case of Court and Spark, ignoring the way the musical elements unify the album into a single narrative may mean to miss the message contained in her "discourse on romantic love." As Mitchell told Ghomeshi, the point is that each of us sees ourselves in the music - we identify with Court and Spark's protagonist, in all her insecurities, uncertainties, hurt, and even insanity. For when we see ourselves, or human nature, in the music, the communication is complete. Beatles, The. (1967) 1987. Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band . Produced by George Martin. EMI CDP 7 46442 2, CD. - - - . (1969) 1990. Abbey Road . Capitol CDP7 464462, CD. Bingham, Ruth O. 2004. "The Early Nineteenth-Century Song Cycle." In The Cambridge Companion to the Lied, edited by James Parsons, 101 - 19. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Black, Johnny. 2004. "The Best Songs Ever! Free Man in Paris." Blender (September). http://jonimitchell.com/library/view.cfm?id=1171&from=search. Brackett, David. (1995) 2000. Interpreting Popular Music . Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Reprint, Berkeley: University of California Press. Brooks, Ben. 1982. "Joni Mitchell's Independent Art." Music Connection: The Alternative Trade Publication 6 (24): 1, 9, 14 - 15. Chicago. 1970. Chicago II . Produced by James William Guercio. Columbia KGP 24 CS 9962, LP. Stone, 26 July, 46 - 53. Echols, Alice. (1994) 2002. "'The Soul of a Martian': A Conversation with Joni Mitchell." In Shaky Ground: The '60s and Its Aftershocks, 207 - 20. New York: Columbia University Press. Originally published as "Thirty Years with a Portable Lover." Los Angeles Weekly, 25 November. Feather, Leonard. (1979) 2000. "Joni Mitchell Makes Mingus Sing." In Luftig 2000, 89 - 103. Originally published in Downbeat, 6 September. Ferris, David. 2010. Afterword. In John Daverio, "The Song Cycle: Journeys through the Divine Landscape," revised and edited by David Ferris. In German Lieder in the Nineteenth Century, edited by Rufus Hallmark, 363 - 400. New York. Routledge. Garabini, Vic. 2000. "Joni Mitchell Is a Nervy Broad." In Luftig 2000, 113 - 33. Ghomeshi, Jian, prod. 2013. CBC Music Exclusives: The Joni Mitch- ell Interview . Canadian Broadcasting Company. Broadcast 15 June. http://music.cbc.ca/standalone/embeddedvideopage. aspx?type =concerts&object=CBC-Music-Exclusives-The-Joni-Mitchell-Interview -2013 - 06 - 04&videotitle=The-Joni-Mitchell-Interview-A-CBC-Music -Exclusive& permalink=%2Fembedded%2Fconcerts%2FCBC-Music -Exclusives-The-Joni-Mitchell-Interview-2013 - 06 - 04%2Fvideos%2FThe -Joni-Mitchell-Interview-A-CBC-Music-Exclusive. Hale, Tony. 1985. "Rock Master Class Interview." Broadcast 29 December. Capitol 98.5, UK. Transcribed from the audio by Lindsay Moon. http:// jonimitchell.com/library/view.cfm?id=646&from=search. Heckman, Dan. 1971. "Pop: Jim Morrison at the End, Joni at a Crossroads." New York Times, 8 August. "Joni Mitchell." 1969. Rolling Stone, 17 May. http://jonimitchell.com/library/ view.cfm?id=312&from=search. Klein, Larry. 2000. Liner notes in Joni Mitchell, Both Sides, Now, 2. Reprise Records 9 - 47620 - 2, CD . Lacy, Susan, and Stephanie Bennett, prods. 2003. Joni Mitchell - Woman of Heart and Mind: A Life Story . London: Eagle Rock Entertainment, DVD. Luftig, Stacey, ed. 2000. The Joni Mitchell Companion: Forty Years of Commentary . New York: Schirmer. Macan, Edward. 1997. Rocking the Classics: English Progressive Rock and the Counterculture . New York: Oxford University Press. Marom, Malka. (1974) 2000. "Joni Mitchell: Self-Portrait of a Superstar." In Luftig 2000, 66 - 74. Originally published in Maclean's, June. Mitchell, Joni. (1968) 1990. Song to a Seagull . Produced by David Crosby. Reprise 693 - 2, CD. - - - . 1974. Court and Spark . Piano-vocal score. Crazy Crow Music, division of Warner Publications. - - - . 1998. Joni Mitchell: The Complete Poems and Lyrics . Toronto: Vintage Canada, division of Random House. - - - . Miles of Aisles . (1974) 1990. Live double LP with Tom Scott and the L. A. Express. Elektra B000002GWN, CD. Moore, Allan. 1995. "The So-Called 'Flattened Seventh' in Rock." Popular Music 14 (25): 185 - 201. RIAA. "Searchable Database." http://www.riaa.com/goldandplatinumdata .php?table=SEARCH_RESULTS. Rockwell, John. 1976. "Joni Mitchell Recaptures Her Gift." New York Times, 12 December. Sonenberg, Daniel. 2003. "'Who in the World She Might Be': A Contextual and Stylistic Approach to the Early Music of Joni Mitchell." PhD diss., City University of New York. Traum, Happy. 1967. "Joni Mitchell." Rolling Stone, 17 May. White, Adam. 1990. The Billboard Book of Gold and Platinum Records . New York: Billboard Publications. Whitesell, Lloyd. 2008. The Music of Joni Mitchell . Oxford: Oxford University Press. Current scholarship recognizes several of Joni Mitchell's albums as being cyclic, or based on a unifying concept. Court and Spark (1974), however, is not numbered among them, despite Mitchell's having described it as "a discourse on romantic love." Following the inference that this album may have been conceived as an extended, multi-movement work, this article examines both its textual and musical aspects, seeking unifying characteristics. The cyclic nature of the album is uncovered, showing it to be more unified from a musical perspective than a textual one. This approach is the opposite of Mitchell's perceived norm, suggesting her compositional process may have been more sophisticated than is currently thought. La recherche actuelle reconnaît que plusieurs albums de Joni Mitchell sont cycliques, ou basés sur un concept unifiant. Toutefois, Court and Spark (1974) ne fait pas partie de ces albums, bien que Mitchell l'ait décrit comme « un discours sur l'amour romantique ». En se basant sur l'idée que cet album pourrait avoir été conçu comme une œuvre d'ampleur à plusieurs mouvements, cette étude examine ses composantes textuelles et musicales dans le but de rechercher ses caractéristiques unifiantes. On y met en lumière la nature cyclique de l'album, en montrant que l'unité de ce dernier repose davantage sur ses aspects musicaux que sur ses aspects textuels. Cette approche va à l'encontre de la perception habituelle de l'œuvre de Mitchell, et propose que son travail compositionnel serait plus recherché que ce que l'on pense habituellement. This article has been viewed 472 times since being added on April 5, 2019. Bravo, I am reading this as I am writing this posting, The first album is really the opening act Song to a Seagull (1968) clearly from the point of view of wonder, sung from small stages (2nd Fret in Phila Pa) painted sidewalks and fire escape stairs to the highway ribbons call of Bright Lights and sad refrains of stardom Court and Spark. I, like many Joni Mitchell fans, were always amazed and we were part of that wonder she sung about, yes both male and females fans. Reading the essay on this masterpiece, brought a slight tear to my eyes, my youth, running wild on Sunset and Vine or watching the sunset on the beach in Malibu. I have to go play this album now, So I can sit back, let my mind's eye wonder back in time when one sunny day taking a shortcut I bumped into Joni, Court and Spark playing on the 8 track, VW BEETLE yet as I saw her familiar face I could hear the refrain from another time and place "the Pirate of Penance", as I stood there, not knowing what to say, I thought That was from another time and play.
2019-04-21T06:30:03Z
http://www.jonimitchell.com/library/view.cfm?id=4438
a lifetime of multitasking Cross Border, trans-cultural business development and Diplomacy. “First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a communist; Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist; Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out...—because I was not a trade unionist; Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew; Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out for me." "The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it." "From "aren't you?" to "didn't you used to be?" is a short journey. Prepare for it now." Institute of Directors since 1975, Institute of Telecom Resellers in EMeIAAA. Favourite Books: Sidharta and Google but don't have time to read much other than contracts and legal documents so i buy the tapes of books and listen to them while driving. Reading the extremely long biography that follows will assist you in understanding should you have the time. Barry’s thorough understanding of International business formation, marketing and operations have made him a respected International business trouble-shooter and business development expert and as one of the UKs first Franchise consultants enabled him to take many fledgling companies to replicate their operations on a global scale and become brand leader. Barry is able to rapidly grasp an idea or a concept and have the vision and then design the necessary plan and put it into operation. He can then implement all the necessary requirements to locate, staff, furnish and build the business or project. He is computer literate but knows his limitations as to when tasks should be handled internally or when outsourced. Conversant with most Microsoft packages he can quickly grasp any new software with which he is confronted. Having already designed and published many websites he is convinced of the power of this medium as a marketing tool using permission-based mailing and SEO but is also aware of its limitations. Barry is conversant with all relevant International laws, accounting practices and regulations as well as tax efficient national and offshore banking principles to implement, to legally reduce taxation due. He is a leader with vision and can lead and motivate at board level with a firm, yet understanding hand. He can steer companies to the position of their chosen exit strategy, driven by challenge but knowing when the task in question is over his head. Once, having accepted the task however he will follow it to it's logical conclusion, "success". He does this with a combination of many skills accumulated in life through experience, a hands-on pragmatic approach to management and a thorough understanding of the problems and solutions involved in International business. He has a talent for building enthusiasm, overcoming obstacles, mixed with high energy levels. This results in creative and productive but long days. Barry has no difficulty in multi-tasking and is able to concentrate and work on many projects in different countries at the same time due to his excellent skills in Human resource appointment, delegation and management while keeping within a budget. Barry has not just visited most countries in the world but has lived in 5 so when he speaks of the German mentality he can back this up with years of experiencing it first hand, likewise with the American, Spanish, Russian and British mentalities. Barrington Roy Schiller ( Barry to friends,) was born in Watford, England of humble beginnings, with his father being a factory worker and his Mother working in a Laundry. Barry is a British National. Most of his education was achieved after leaving school due to his early interest and involvement in the world of business and language. After passing his "11 Plus" examination he attended Watford Technical High school, a grammar school. At the age of 14 though he lost interest in regular schooling when he started to organize a local youth club. He quickly realized that it wasn’t ping pong and party games that teenagers wanted so he converted the youth club into a once a week disco evening with himself and a friend as the DJs. Realizing that the equipment for the disco was laying around 6 days a week he contacted other halls and provided the same service to other towns. Back then it was more common to hire a band for weddings and special occasions but slowly the concept of a "mobile Disco" was born/created. Demand was so great that soon he had to hire other DJs and established a business as an agent for DJ’s and bands in the entertainment industry . Barry, personally continued to DJ in and around central London at private venues and at BBC Radio 1 sea side locations. This first taste of entrepreneurial business forced him however to learn basic administration skills, presentation skills as well as human resources management and logistics at an age when most of his peers were interested in no more than football. He left school shortly after with minimal passes in GCSE "O" levels. After taking his "O" level examinations he left to take up a position of Trainee Manager at Hunt Kennard and Co Ltd., a Timber Merchants in Harrow to please his mother who did not agree with him working for himself while under 21 and "under his parents roof". At that time the age of adulthood was 21 and his working class parents had difficulty understanding business finance so he also had to learn how to grow a business organically, i.e. without the help of outside funding as he wasn’t old enough to take out any loans. He also took up racing tuned Lambrettas and Vespas at racetracks all around the UK at the weekends. He took on an apprenticeship and gained his formal office administration training due to the fact that his entertainment business operated solely during the evenings and weekends. The apprenticeship was coupled with a day release system where he attended college one day per week to be taught timber technology. After his apprenticeship in office management and timber technology was completed he left the company and never looked back. He continued to successfully run his entertainment business throughout London and a pattern of working evenings and nights in entertainment began leaving the days free for study and other ventures. At 18 Barry took a TEFL course in Teaching English as a foreign Language and gained a position mornings with a local school which specialised in teaching English to French exchange students, coming to the UK specifically for that purpose. Due to the bonds he formed teaching those students many years before the formation of the EU he got his first insight into the mentality of other Europeans as opposed to the insular thinking of many of his countrymen at that time. His desire to travel to visit these countries and learn more about their customs was also awakened so at the age of 20 he sold the entertainment agency business and travelled to Paris, France and Radio Hilversum, Holland for a period to work as a DJ. At Barry’s Invitation the British Consular General visited shortly after the opening. Barry learnt the importance of PR, the Press and how to deal with them to obtain maximum coverage in print, TV and radio. By developing the corporate identity of the British centre he then positioned the company such that it became a viable pilot object to become a franchised chain so he recruited franchisees in Hamburg and Berlin from the UK before selling the business outright in 1983 to concentrate on the knowledge he had gained in the fields of the travel business and franchising sides to become one of Europe’s first Franchise Consultants. The town council of the City of Brunswick asked Barry to take a position on the board of the City's Twinning Council together with the Lord Mayor, Gerhard Glokowski ( Interior minister of Lower Saxony in Germany) with the particular area of responsibility being their relationship with their twinning Town "Bath". Barry worked with the Town hall to organise official receptions for visiting delegations and was responsible for co-ordinating civic visits to Brunswick and civic visits from Brunswick. These included school exchanges allowing him to expand upon his insight into travel organisation and promotion. Soon, Barry was arranging educational travel to the UK from most European countries and became Managing Director and Director of Studies for Cambridge College. Utilizing his Team building and multi tasking talents Barry was soon able to be free to take on new challenges by building and appointing a management structure to take on all his current responsibilities. In 1979 Barry founded "the International Club of Braunschweig", which he proposed to the town council of the City of Braunschweig, Germany and its Mayor. The objective was to raise the image of the city by attracting International dignitaries to the city to discuss matters of political and social importance. Among his responsibilities was the welfare of such dignitaries who were amongst others, the General Secretary of NATO, Dr Josef Luns, ( combining his Intelligence Career and his "other" career together) and visiting Royal Family members such as Princess Victoria Louise of Prussia, Duchess of Brunswick , Princess of Preussen and Lower Saxony ( a cousin of the Queen of England and only daughter and the seventh child of William II, German Emperor and Empress Augusta Victoria – Princess Victoria Louise was the maternal grandmother of Queen Sophie of Spain and the former King Constantine II of the Hellenes. In February 1980 barry had a daughter, Saskia. Barry also personally looked after the protocol for visiting diplomats to the city and organised social functions such as formal balls, .together with Oberstadt director Hans-Günther Weber. It was here that he was first introduced to Franz Josef Strauss (German defence Minister and Minister President of Bavaria) who he shortly after visited in his home in Rottach Egern, Bavaria to discuss the workings and plans of the Pan Europa Unio. Since initially visiting SHAPE HQ Barry had been active parallel to his day job and Barry was head of operations for the visit of Dr Joseph Luns ( The General Secretary of NATO from 1971 to 1984 ). Barry had been living in Braunschweig but was then reassigned to Helmstedt (Checkpoint Alpha in the british occupied zone of North Germany. With everything running successfully Barry once again started searching for a new challenge and parallel to being the CEO of his travel company he was appointed as the Managing Director and CEO for Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Scandanavia by a Spanish Designer Bridal wear manufacturer (www.Pronovias.com) to launch their brand in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland. This involved being responsible for the marketing and distribution strategy forming the corporation, appointing accountants, solicitors and all other necessary professionals. He designed the merchandising strategy, the software programmes and all necessary back room systems. He was also personally solely responsible for the management of the company funds and budget and for all aspects of the production of two international fashion shows per year and the production of a corporate video for the company. He steered the company from nothing to become the brand leader taking the major share of the market within 3 years. Solely marketing their own brand language and cultural education centres in the UK (Cambridge College Ltd). Barry now formed a transatlantic and pan European Public Relations corporation to obtain maximum press coverage for his companies thus reducing the necessity of expensive advertising and Barry, who personally wrote the press releases became the most published travel journalist in Germany at the time. Barry was a member of the national union of Journalists at the time. Barry’s quest for new input and new learning was insatiable so he studied and gained the qualification to educate students obtaining their "diplomas in Administration Management" by the Chamber of Commerce of Helmstedt, Germany. After the spectacular success of Pronovias, the Spanish Fashion company , the garment export dept of the Spanish government contacted Barry requesting he inspect another manufacturer in Bilbao, which he visited but a stroke in 1985 and subsequent death of his Father on oct 7th 1986 resulted in him leaving his Intelligence duties at checkpoint Alpha and relocating BACK to the UK from where he continued the running of the companies as well as starting several new ventures. He did however work with a Fashion designer to create a brand of Jeans and Leisurewear. Being creative top class Denim was purchased in Japan and imported into Malta for production of the items which were them sent to Holland to finish and sell in the company’s own retail outlets. When the publisher (and Barry’s long time friend) of the leading Franchise magazine "Franchise Opportunities " took on the representation of the King of Malaysia’s UK businesses he offered the magazine and directory to Barry who purchased and rebranded it as FOPS (franchise Opportunities directory) and journal and it became the official organ of the association of Franchisees championing the rights of the Franchisee. This meant Barry designing systems for subscription procurement, advertisement design and sales, layout, editorial content and all the other aspects involved in the day to day running of a magazine. Barry undertook consultancy assignments from, amongst others, Property Rental and Management, Natural Beauty Products (a la Body Shop) and Carpet Cleaning companies. Barry’s main responsibilities for these companies was to re-organise their company in such a way that it became "Franchisable" i.e. a replicable business. This meant having to get their corporate identity designed, write their corporate manual, design office systems and practices, produce advertising materials, organise trade shows, media purchasing, marketing, public relations and contracts to sign up Franchisees. He would then build franchisee recruitment programmes and go on to recruit, interview and appoint franchisees in the UK and Master franchisees outside the UK. Part of the task of running a magazine and fashion Company involved the opening of a photo studio (photography being one of Barry’s hobbies) and working together with models. It was therefore a natural progression to train new models and assist them to find a reputable agency under the banner of a new company called Model placement Services. The Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany was signed in Moscow, USSR, on 12 September 1990, and that paved the way for German reunification on 3 October 1990. Under the terms of the treaty, the Four Powers renounced all rights they formerly held in Germany, including and in regard to the city of Berlin. As a result, the reunited country became fully sovereign on 15 March 1991 Shortly after Barry retired and received an honorable discharge from his Intelligence activities from SACEUR at SHAPE. And in April 1992 Barry had another son, Adam. Although no longer officially being involved in the Intelligence community Barry used his Intelligence experience to form INTERTECS. www.intertecs.com , an International Detection, Investigatiion, Surveillance and Counter-Espionage Specialist company in C3I, (Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence Systems) providing Intelligence training, close protection and investigations internationally to corporate, government and local government clients. In 1993 Barry relocated to Spain to retire (for the first time) but the lazy life proved not to be for him so he formed a Spanish Ltd Company (SA) with which he then purchased a 7 storey dilapidated run-down hotel on a lease purchase option on the beach in Mallorca on the Balearic Islands of Spain and refurbished it. To optimize revenues he negotiated a contract with Germany’s largest Tour Operator to obtain maximum occupancy for the rooms, converted the first floor which was totally empty when he took it over to build a 60 cover Tex Mex Restaurant and a 150 person British pub as well as re-styling the swimming pool and surrounding area to enable dining overlooking the pool and ocean for 60 people. He then franchised the food and beverage sections of the business as a turnkey going concern. In 1996 he sold the hotel as a profitable business and returned again to live in the UK. During his time in Spain Barry also made regular trips to the United States and actually resided in Highland Park, Dallas with his family for a 4 month period during the Spanish Winters. While in Dallas Barry purchased working interests in oil well fields in Texas and became involved in developing the oil field infrastructure to get transport to the derricks and the oil and gas by-products to the refinery. At that time telecommunications was still state owned in most countries and Barry became involved in competitive telecommunications to reduce the costs (outsourcing) of communicating between the various offices and agents that he had appointed throughout the world for his eclectic business interests. He was fortunate in meeting a founder member of the "Telecommunications Reseller Association" (TRA) and a man who had been involved in all aspects of Telecommunications before and since deregulation in 1984 in the USA and he was invited to attend meetings of the TRA and held office on the International Resale Committee of the TRA. Barry was involved with many differing types of Telecom companies, both in the United States and in Europe and was involved in the Research and development of a global network of Fax over Internet communications nodes as well as the early development of an internet Browser, a forerunner of Internet explorer at a time when to use the internet it was necessary to enter each line of code. When Barry proposed the opening of a UK Chapter of the TRA in the USA the board was divided with several board members believing that it would not be possible for the TRA to support a chapter so far away especially with European competitive telecoms still being in its infancy in the UK and not yet conceived in most other European countries. It was therefore decided to support the formation of a new European association founded by Barry with several of the TRA members being on the board and reciprocal memberships of each others associations. It was therefore as the Director General of the highly renowned "Institute of Telecom Resellers in Europe", that Barry was instrumental in promoting de-regulated telecommunications globally. He therefore has a thorough understanding of the challenges which companies face in a deregulated utility environment. As a regular speaker at industry conferences, both in Europe as well as the United States and the host of many conferences on deregulation Barry also acted as a source of information for journalists and Global telecommunication companies wishing to know more about Global telecom issues, direction and opportunities as well as being ultimately responsible for every aspect of the Companies Strategy, direction and day-to-day activities. International Event and conference organisation with gala Balls was a major part of the ITRE’s work with barry personally choosing the venues, arranging exhibition space, speakers, sponsors and all aspects of what is necessary to hold such an event for the CEOs and decision makers of fortune 500 telecom companies from across the globe. Members were such companies as British Telecom, France Telecom, Worldcom, Energis etc. until the full implementation of the WTO meant that the work of lobbying to promote competitive telecoms came to a natural conclusion with thousands of competitive telecom companies all around the world. From the original incumbents in 2002, deregulation and convergence, success!!!!! Barry had always been interested in psychology and mental health and had studied Homeopathy specializing in Emotional and mental health issues many years before so in 2002 he returned to a full time course at the UK’s leading University offering Occupational therapy which covered all Human Health subjects; anatomy and physiology, psychology and sociology, Understanding Occupational Beings, Professional practice, Clinical diagnosis, Personal and Professional Skills, ethics and Research. This also included a professional placement at St Andrews Hospital in Northampton, England which is a psychiatric hospital run by a non-profit-making, charitable trust. It is by far the largest mental health facility in UK providing national specialist and secure services for adolescents, men, women and older people with mental illness, learning disabilty, brain injury, autism and dementia. While studying Barry continued to grow the real estate property investment portfolio he had had since the early 80s becoming an expert in buy to let strategies and financing modules enabling properties to be purchased for little or no capital thus drastically increasing the ROI, return on investment. Always being a preponent of Multi tasking Barry entered into a Joint venture in 2004 with a travel tour operator specialising in the Chinese market and opened a retail travel agency staffed by Chinese staff living in the UK. The company also produced a newspaper printed in the Chinese language for Chinese people living in the UK. On a visit to China he aquired a company and an office in Beijing which had all the necessary licenses to allow Chinese students to leave China and study in the UK. In 2004 Barry was also approached by a Russian businessman, working and living in the UK, to develop the Cambridge College, English education programm for the Russian market. It was while working on that project that Barry met his future wife Tatiana (Tanya) when she assisted with the translation of the texts into Russian. Barry then spent several weeks in Russia , which he has subsequently visited often, over the Christmas / 2005 New Year period to learn more about Russia, its people, culture and customs visiting Moscow , Krasnodar and Sochi- the home of the 2014 Winter olympics. 2005 heralded the year in which Barry and Tanya started to seriously investigate real estate ventures outside of the UK and involved lots of travel starting with Istanbul in Turkey in february to learn more about the country and people and the possibilities of selling Real estate to Russian citizens. Due to the fact that barry wished to remain close to his 13 year old son from a previous marriage he had to still remain based in the UK. After spending some time in April in France on the Cote d’azur Barry then visited Turkish property developers in Bodrum on the Agean sea in July before spending the rest of the year with regular trips driving along the Turkish coast getting to know them in depth before finally settling for Antalya on the mediterranean which to this day he still believes to be an absolute paradise with a standard of living which he had not found on any of his many previous journeys around the world. By September Barry and Tanya were slowly tiring of living in hotels during their monthly trips to Antalya so they got a new build apartment there with incredible views over the ocean coastline of not only the city but also the whole coastline of the region of Antalya. An experience not to be missed but not to be repeated without guidance. However, now done, Barry has a full understanding of the difficulties involved with relocating to and living in Turkey as a Foreigner. It was here that they ended 2005 and welcomed in 2006 before returning to the UK in January. While taking his 13 year old son to Miami for a holiday in February of 2006 Barry got to know the stretch limo driver and the idea of running a stretch limo hire company in the UK was born. This resulted in his actually purchasing a stretch limousine while on vacation and having it shipped back to the UK. In March Barry and Tanya moved apartments to be closer to the mediterranean and In April Barry opened the first shopfront office of BA Realty in Antalya selling Franchises to sell Turkish apartments and houses to the Russian, British, Irish and other nationalities either wishing to re locate or obtain a second home in Turkey. The import to the UK from Miami of the stretch limo he bought on vacation was completed in May and the steep learning curve began in regard to the UK and International stretch Limousine market leading him to the oldest and most respected stretch limousine manufacturer in the USA, Tiffany. Negotiations were started and in June 2006 Barry became the UK Main dealer for Tiffany with a new company, Tiffany Coachworks Europe Ltd, set up to appoint dealers , both within and outside the UK. The deal was sealed with the purchase of 3 new stretch Limousines from the USA. While in the new home in Turkey Barry’s son who had been living with his mother informed barry that his mother was moving and he didn’t want to go with her. Tanya had fallen pregnant and the combination of these 2 events caused them to rethink the life they had had before, whereby when barry went back to the UK for a few weeks to look after the business and see his son, Tanya went back to Russia to stay with her Family and the decision was made to relocate permanently to the UK. Therefore in September Barry returned to the UK to live with his son in one of his Northamptonshire houses and in November Tanya joined them. Barry spent most of 2007 preparing for the birth of their son in April and restructuring his property portfolio and acquiring 3 more buy to let apartments. 2008: Sept 2008, was asked to become a community governor for a local school near his home, bringing him into contact with the workings of local government and the procedures involved in the running of a British state school. He attended several local government courses and became part of the "every child matters" program which involves the school, the community and the police to ensure that every child gets the help it needs both in school and in the local community. Barry’s speciality soon became rescuing companies where the company or the owners were having difficulties and either helping them to trade successfully again or help the current Directors to wind up the company with as little negative impact upon themselves as possible. In doing so he created the "Corporate Fostering" Concept allowing companies to be taken in on a temporary basis due to difficulties of the company or the Directors. Shortly after Barry was introduced to a static waterless wash vehicle valeting service The company was in serious trouble due to serious mismanagement and lack of successful operating procedures and policies which the company needed to operate in a blue chip environment. Barry took on the position of the Managing director and implemented policies and procedures which he had written. (please see list of policies below) Barry negotiated contracts with J Sainsbury’s supermarkets and a Major shopping mall, managed and successfully fought off certain litigation issues which the company had and assisted the previous owner with matters which he was being held personally liable for. However it soon became apparent that the problems caused by the previous owner and their continuing lack of understanding of the business world were insurmountable so barry saw no other option than to wind up the company and did so, first by ceasing trading and then having the company struck off the register. 2009 also saw Barry take over the reins of Attend. TV, a TV production Company specialising in visiting trade shows and exhibitions which they then broadcast on both sky satellite TV and the internet to reach a global audience. While there he set up exhibition and conference news crew globally with presenters and camera crews in all major cities globally. He also successfully managed to update and rebrand the bespoke operating system and update the look and feel of the Graphical User Interferface ( GUI) . Before passing the company back to the previous owner he added a Fashion Channel, a property Investment channel and an exhibition Channel to the programme channels with content being produced by camera crews and presenters and sold around the world. The idea of cleaning vehicles without water brought barry however into contact with the true facts of how many world problems are caused by a lack of Fresh water in the world today and how one child dies every 20 seconds because of that. Even in the UK there are hose pipe bans every Summer and in 2009 reservoir levels were at an all time low and droughts were expected despite certain areas suffering from floods due to too much rain falling in too short a period and then none at all. Barry therefore created a range of own brand waterless cleaning and valeting/detailing products, an online e-commerce website to sell the products and a highly developed valeting franchise to use and demonstrate the products before finally arranging a full international Franchise package. www.tiffanydrywash.com. At the time of writing this barry is seeking investors to take the company to the next stage. As of the beginning of 2011 Barry was looking for a new challenge but due to the majority of my time therefore being taken up for my philanthropic work I am now almost totally retired in my business ventures but am always open to FEE PAYING offers of the following activities in which I am well experienced and connected. Corporate Doctor and Foster parent. My executive assistant says that i give everything out at 100,000 volts and not many can take that so her job is to transform it down to 110 volts for normal people to swallow but even then they will note my sense of urgency in everything I do. People who meet me either wish to punch me or kiss me but they are seldom ambivalent to my presence. I just think that I am being honest and truthful but some others may interpret that as hostile which is not my intention. You will never get the best from me in a crowded room, I do not like to push myself to the front and give my opinion unless asked to do so but when i do give an opinion I will give an honest opinion and not many people can take the absolute truth so don't ask if you don't want or can't handle the total honest unbiased truth. I believe that a compromise is taking 2 good ideas and watering them down to one bad one so unless it is a matter of Life and death for ME I will not argue with you. I will just back away. It won't mean that you are right . It will just mean that I can't be bothered to argue. I am absolutely useless at small talk and I find it extremely painful so please do not make me suffer it. I follow the theory that :- "Great people talk about ideas. Average people talk about things and Small people talk about other people." but be nice to my kids and you have a sucker in your hands. I am not a sucker for beautiful women as I was already happily married to 3. I believe that networking is the blind leading the blind but am addicted to FB because I can interact with hundreds of people each hour. Positive thinking people terrify me and seem to be delusional most of the time. I want to work with hyper vigilant people who have a realistic view of the world and the challenges we need to overcome but if you cook me a meal i will say that it was lovely even if It was the worst meal I've ever eaten. Meetings are great but only after a strict agenda has been agreed or a business is developed so far that all that is needed is a signature. My word is better than any written agreement. It defines me and i keep it even if i regret the decision later. That is why i can do business globally on less than a handshake with hundreds of high level people who know that. Some only believe in things after they see them but a visionary must believe first so that he and others can see. Sometimes I am so stupid because I don't know that things are not possible, so I just do them and succeed whereas the clever people don't even start so always fail. .
2019-04-23T08:09:12Z
http://www.thebarringtongroup.org/whoisbarringtonschiller.html
Seven months later: Japan’s nuclear predicament. A radiation detector in Iitate, where some of the heaviest concentrations of fallout were found. Once known as one of Japan’s most beautiful villages, it was given an official order to evacuate. On the afternoon of March 11th—a Friday—the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, on Japan’s Pacific coast, had more than six thousand workers inside. The plant, about a hundred and fifty miles north of Tokyo, is painted white and pale blue and is a labyrinth of boxy buildings and piping on a campus larger than the Pentagon’s. It has six reactors. Yusuke Tataki was in the concrete building that contains Reactor No. 4. He is a tobi worker—a scaffolder—and, at thirty-three, is small and nimble. Like many of the plant’s employees, he grew up nearby. He often skipped classes to surf, and after high school he worked, unhappily, on an assembly line welding circuit boards, until he got into scaffolding, which has kept him employed, on and off, at nuclear plants ever since. “Even when there’s no work elsewhere, there is work at the plants,” he told me recently. At 2:46 P.M. on March 11th, an earthquake began to rattle the building, more violent than any Tataki could remember. It knocked him to the ground, and the lights failed. In darkness, he heard steel crashing against steel and men shouting. The building groaned. Heavy objects fell around him from heights of three or four stories. When the shaking stopped and emergency lights came on, the air was thick with a chalky haze of dust and concrete. Tataki knew that the only way out of the building was through an air lock—a set of parallel doors designed to prevent contamination—but the quake had jammed it shut. The workers around him were disciplined but anxious, and they banged on the door for help. “We all knew that during a quake everything in there could become contaminated with radiation,” he told me. The quake had erupted beneath the ocean floor two hundred and thirty miles northeast of Tokyo, at a magnitude of 9.0—the strongest ever recorded in Japan. On that day, three of the Fukushima plant’s reactors were down for routine maintenance; the other three shut down automatically, as intended. After a few minutes, a guard managed to open the jammed door, and Tataki hurried toward the parking lot. He has a wife and two children, and wanted to check on them and on his house. About seven hundred employees remained. “We had trained for this,” Keiichi Kakuta, a forty-two-year-old father of two, who worked in the public-affairs department, told me. “Of course, the mood was tense, but after someone said the reactors had shut down I saw the plant chief calmly instructing people what to do.” To ride out the aftershocks, Kakuta holed up, with most of the others, in the plant’s radiation-resistant Emergency Crisis Headquarters, situated on a small slope nearby. Japanese authorities had picked up the trail of a tsunami sweeping across the Pacific, but its precise approach was still a mystery. In the imagination, tsunamis are a single towering wave, but often they arrive in a crescendo, which is a cruel fact. After the first wave, survivors in Japan ventured down to the water’s edge to survey who could be saved, only to be swept away by the second. In all, twenty thousand people died or disappeared along a stretch of the Japanese coast greater than the distance from New York to Providence. At the plant, the first wave arrived at 3:27 P.M., but it did not overtop a thirty-three-foot concrete seawall. Eight minutes later, the second wave appeared: a churning white mass of water, four stories tall, that leaped over sixty thousand concrete blocks and barriers—designed to defend against typhoons, not tsunamis—and advanced toward the reactors. First, the water approached the turbine buildings, which had been built with large shutters facing the sea. It burst through the closed shutters and swamped the buildings. Inside, the plant’s emergency diesel generators, each the size of an eighteen-wheeler, were stored on the ground floor and in the basements. They were destroyed, and two workers who had been sent underground to check for leaks were killed. The water hurled pickup trucks pinwheeling end over end into delicate pipes and equipment, and it swamped the campus in roiling brown pools, fifteen feet deep, leaving the nuclear reactors protruding like boulders in a river. And then it recoiled into the sea. Two minutes after the water arrived, the plant’s main control rooms began to lose electrical power. Hundreds of gauges and instruments went dark or froze. A worker who was keeping a log of the deteriorating situation scribbled something unprecedented in a Japanese nuclear plant: “SBO”—station blackout. Kakuta said to himself, “What happens now?” Without a constant source of coolant, the nuclear fuel rods in the heart of the three active reactors would eventually boil away the water that prevents them from melting down. The log entry was grim: “Water levels unknown.” Workers desperate for electricity had to improvise: they fanned out into the parking lot to scavenge car batteries from any vehicles that had survived the wave. The story of how Japan became one of the world’s most devoted, and improbable, advocates of nuclear technology begins in August, 1945. In the days immediately after the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, radiation was largely a mystery to the Japanese public; men and women had survived the explosion but were succumbing to a new illness—an “evil spirit,” as a national newspaper put it. Nine years later, Japan had another encounter with nuclear technology: on March 1, 1954, the U.S. tested what was the world’s most powerful hydrogen bomb on Bikini Atoll, in the Pacific. The blast was more than twice the size that engineers had predicted, and a shower of radioactive ash reached far enough to envelop a voyaging Japanese tuna boat named the Lucky Dragon No. 5. The twenty-three crew members had no idea what had dusted them—“I took a lick; it was gritty but had no taste,” one wrote later—but by the time they returned to shore they were burned, blistered, and in the early stages of acute radiation sickness. Their contaminated tuna was sold at the market before anyone stopped it. The ordeal caused a panic in Japan; a petition against further hydrogen-bomb tests secured the signature of one in every three citizens. It was the start of what became known as Japan’s “nuclear allergy.” In less than a year, Japanese filmmakers had released “Godzilla,” about a creature mutated by American atomic weapons. “Mankind had created the Bomb,” the film’s producer, Tomoyuki Tanaka, said of his monster, “and now nature was going to take revenge.” Godzilla’s radioactive breath and low-budget special effects were campy to the rest of the world but not to the Japanese, who watched the film in silence and left theatres in tears. As it turned out, America’s emerging priorities coincided with Japan’s. After the Japanese surrender, in 1945, General Tomoyuki Yamashita was asked why his country had lost the war. He answered, “Science.” The triumph of American weaponry had convinced a generation of Japanese élites that their country must reëngage the world on the basis of trade and technology. But Japan’s islands were chronically short of coal and oil—the war had been partly a hunt for energy—and, as the country embarked on its economic growth spurt, it was desperate for new sources of electricity. The government made it clear to economically struggling villages in the countryside that a nuclear power plant held the promise of a fortune in property taxes and subsidies. “We were told that it would make us the Tokyo of Fukushima,” Kazuyoshi Satoh, a civil servant from the little town of Naraha, recalled. “Every time I went back, there was a new façade on the city hall or a new gymnasium or a new community center.” In one town, a plant even came with a subsidy for diapers. Satoh eventually became an opponent of the nuclear industry, which put him at odds with some neighbors. “Critics of nuclear power were seen as heretics,” he said. As night fell on March 11th, it became clear that the Fukushima Daiichi plant’s operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, which produces a third of the country’s electricity, had been unprepared for such a disaster. After the lights went out in the plant, engineers had to borrow flashlights from nearby homes in order to creep through dark, waterlogged passageways to study the gauges. There was no mystery about what they were facing: the core of each operating reactor held at least twenty-five thousand twelve-foot fuel rods—slender metal tubes filled with pellets of enriched uranium. When things were working normally, the nuclear reaction in the core produced enormous amounts of heat, used to boil water for steam. The steam drove a set of turbines that generated electricity. The reaction also produced radioactive isotopes, which are safely contained within a series of steel-and-concrete defenses arranged like nesting dolls. But, with the power out, and emergency systems down, there was no way to cool the hot fuel; it was rapidly boiling away the water around it—creating huge pressure in the reactor—and eventually it would begin to melt, eating through the shells encasing it. In a log later filed with the International Atomic Energy Agency, workers recorded frantic efforts to get water on the fuel. They tried to use a fire truck, but waves had thrown a storage tank across the road, making it impassable. To restore electricity, they called for emergency power vehicles, but those were stymied by traffic on damaged roads. In the dark, even familiar parts of the plant became perilous, because the tsunami had blown out the manhole covers. Of the six reactors, No. 1 needed the most urgent help: the uranium was melting through the fuel rods, and when the damaged rods mixed with steam they gave off hydrogen, which is highly combustible. In order to prevent an explosion, the steam had to be released through a vent, and that meant piping radiation straight into the air. But the alternative was worse: wait too long, and an explosion would release a far larger burst of radiation. By 3 A.M., the government and Tokyo Electric knew that the vent had to be opened, but four hours later it was still closed. Later, the company said that it was waiting to make sure that all nearby residents had evacuated. Government officials have alleged that the company didn’t want to release radiation, because it would have immediately invited comparisons to the Chernobyl disaster, in the U.S.S.R., in 1986. Opening the vent was such an unusual prospect that workers needed the blueprints to figure out how to do it, but the prints were in a building whose ceiling had collapsed. Only after they were retrieved did workers learn how the vent could be opened manually. Six workers divided into three teams of two. Going in alone would be impossible, because the men would be operating in darkness, amid aftershocks, without radio contact with headquarters. According to the log, the teams would work in a relay, so that no one would be exposed to too much radiation. A community center in Fukushima offers free radiation tests on food and household objects for local residents. The six workers assembled in the main control room. They had swallowed tablets that flooded their thyroid glands with iodine and hindered their bodies from absorbing radioactive iodine from the air; they wore dosimeters—portable radiation detectors that would warn them when they were nearing the legal limits of exposure. They were outfitted in heavy firefighting suits with oxygen tanks, gear that would shield them from inhaling and absorbing through their skin tiny particles that emit alpha and beta radiation, which can linger in the body for years, causing organ damage. The equipment, however, would provide little protection against gamma rays, so their only true defense would be to get out of danger as fast as possible. At 9:04 A.M., the first two workers, carrying flashlights, set off into the darkness of Reactor Building No. 1. They found the manual gate valve, which can be opened by laboriously cranking a metal handle through hundreds of revolutions, like a man pumping an old-fashioned handcar down a railroad track. They cranked it open a quarter of the way and retreated. They had been inside for eleven minutes. The second team went in, but, with the vent partly ajar, the radiation level was climbing fast, and the men were driven back before they could even reach their target. They had been inside for no more than six minutes, but one of them received a radiation dose greater than the legal limits allowed for five years of work in the plant. It was deemed too risky to try again, and the third team was disbanded. Despite those efforts, that afternoon, at 3:36 P.M., Reactor Building No. 1 exploded, hurling chunks of concrete that injured five workers and destroyed cables that had been laid in the hope of restoring electricity. With that explosion, the crisis passed an invisible line, as each problem triggered another. High radiation levels hampered workers trying to vent Reactor No. 3, and on the third day after the tsunami it, too, exploded. The following day, another blast occurred, this time at No. 4. On television screens throughout the world, three exposed steel carcasses were seen smoldering. An American aircraft carrier and its fleet left waters downwind of the plant after seventeen helicopter crew members returned from missions with traces of radiation. A few hours later, the Japanese government heightened its advisory to the public, but only slightly. N.R.C. officials watched the news on a flat-screen television in the fourth-floor operations center. Based on their view of the events unfolding, they were surprised that the order was not broader. By then, there was another problem: that morning, a fire had broken out around the spent-fuel pool on a floor above Reactor No. 4. It was a swimming-pool-like container where discarded radioactive uranium was held for storage. Each of the six reactors had a similar pool, an arrangement that had made it easy to load and unload fuel in normal conditions but now left the spent fuel acutely vulnerable to explosions and fires. To many experts, the pools posed an even greater potential threat than the reactors, because the pools were loaded with years’ worth of uranium and not encased on all sides in steel or concrete; they relied only on water to prevent them from overheating and spreading radiation. The timing was especially bad, because Reactor No. 4 had been down for maintenance at the time of the quake, so its nearly fresh fuel rods—more than thirteen thousand of them—were in the pool. Experts at the Departments of State and Defense were trying to anticipate what would happen next; the possibilities were extraordinarily dangerous, including one that became known as “the popcorn scenario.” If there was another explosion, the spike in radiation could prevent workers from being able to continue injecting water onto the fuel cores. Then “one will pop and then another one and then another one and then another,” a senior U.S. official told me. Fuel that had already melted into a heap at the bottom of the reactor could melt through the steel pressure vessel and react with the concrete below, releasing vapors carrying highly radioactive materials such as strontium and technetium. In that case, “the environmental impact from that many reactors is hundreds of kilometres,” Charles Casto, the top N.R.C. official on the ground in Japan, said. “That was the scenario we were working, and there were a lot of people who believed in that scenario.” He himself had been skeptical that it would come to that. There are four hundred and thirty-two nuclear power plants around the world. The closest America has come to a disaster was a partial meltdown at the Three Mile Island plant, near Middletown, Pennsylvania, in 1979. It did not produce any deaths or public-health problems, but it chilled the advance of nuclear power in America: a series of “No Nukes” concerts, led by Bonnie Raitt and others, helped galvanize opposition, and since Three Mile Island no new projects have been planned. The normal-accidents theory, which is now used to assess risk in fields ranging from genetic engineering to the banking system, explained one reason that nuclear plants melt down, but it took another incident to illuminate just how much the effects depend on the characteristics of the societies involved. On April 26, 1986, a power surge triggered an explosion at Reactor No. 4 in Chernobyl, in what is now Ukraine. Soviet propagandists used to say their reactors were so safe that “we could build one on Red Square,” but the design turned out to be surpassingly bad: Reactor No. 4 had no containment system to stop the spread of radiation, and when it caught fire the graphite core burned like charcoal for ten days, lofting radioactive material into the atmosphere, where it was carried as far as Ireland. The Soviets said nothing about the accident; it was discovered only when the plume tripped radiation alarms at a nuclear plant north of Stockholm. Local firefighters and first responders were dispatched with no special instructions. “They went off just as they were, in their shirtsleeves,” a fireman’s widow later told the journalist Svetlana Alexievich. They walked among shards of radioactive fuel and graphite. (A hundred and thirty-four developed acute radiation sickness. Twenty-eight men died within months and were buried in foil-lined coffins, beneath lead covers.) The nearly fifty thousand residents of the town of Pripyat, less than two miles away, were told nothing until more than twenty-four hours after the explosion, when they were ordered to evacuate temporarily and leave their possessions behind. Most never returned. Soviet authorities failed to warn people to protect themselves. Cows ate tainted grass, and children drank the milk, contaminating their thyroid glands with radioactive iodine. Local doctors were barred from mentioning the meltdown in their diagnoses, to prevent “radiophobia”—unhealthy fear of radiation. The greatest long-term impact has been an epidemic of thyroid cancer, mostly among children who drank the milk. Five thousand cases have been discovered, but most are treatable; so far, approximately ten people have died. According to the World Health Organization, Chernobyl will eventually have shortened the lives of four thousand people. A fifth of the farmland in Belarus was rendered unusable, and still accounts for seven hundred million dollars in losses each year. After the fire was put out, six hundred thousand workers were summoned from the corners of the Soviet empire to encase the remains in a concrete-and-steel “sarcophagus”; today, an area of the countryside within a thirty-kilometre radius of the plant is off limits and is known officially as the Exclusion Zone. It has become a nature sanctuary of sorts, home to wild boars and eagles and bears, and to pine trees that grow like bushes and other such mutations. Parts of the inner, most severely contaminated ring—the area within a radius of ten kilometres, known as the Ten—are expected to be uninhabitable for at least a hundred and fifty years. The visitors’ center at Tokaimura showed a short film that described uranium as “a gift from God” and “the fire of hope in the twenty-first century.” It did not mention the most famous event that had occurred in the town: the day, in September, 1999, when undertrained plant workers mishandled enriched uranium, causing Japan’s worst nuclear accident before Fukushima. Two of the workers died of organ failure brought about by acute radiation sickness, and more than four hundred people were exposed. Six power-company employees were prosecuted for professional negligence and violating nuclear-safety laws. The myth of total safety went beyond public relations and degraded the industry’s technical competence. According to Taro Kono, a legislator in the Liberal Democratic Party, emergency drills in the plants were scheduled to fit within an eight-hour workday, rather than simulating realistic conditions. A 2002 report by Tokyo Electric and five other companies declared, “There is no need to take a hydrogen explosion into consideration,” the Yomiuri Shimbun reported. (After the third hydrogen explosion at Fukushima, a company official conceded to the paper that “we were overly confident.”) Government regulators adopted a similar posture. A 1990 set of Nuclear Safety Commission guidelines announced, “We do not need to take into account the danger of a long-term power severance.” Even basic precautions were declared obsolete: Japan once developed a set of radiation-resistant robots to use in the event of a nuclear accident; in 2006, all but two of them were donated to a university and a museum. After the Fukushima meltdowns, Japan had to depend on devices from iRobot, an American manufacturer best known for producing the Roomba vacuum cleaner. Japanese nuclear regulators, like their American counterparts, have frequently been criticized for following a revolving door into lucrative jobs in the industries they police, and vice versa. Moreover, power-company executives are some of Japan’s most generous political donors; the utilities have not made corporate donations in a generation, but in 2009 individual executives gave seventy-two per cent of all personal contributions to the Liberal Democratic Party. In the late nineteen-nineties, a Tokyo Electric vice-president named Tokio Kano left the company to run, successfully, for parliament, where he led an effort to prevent the adoption of new textbooks until the Education Ministry removed references to the anti-nuclear movement in Europe. After leaving parliament, he returned to Tokyo Electric as an adviser. Nuclear-safety scandals began to emerge. In June, 2002, Tokyo Electric was forced to reveal that for two decades it had faked hundreds of repair records, at the Fukushima Daiichi plant and at several other reactors. Five years later, it conceded that it had lied in its previous acknowledgment of lying and owned up to six more emergencies at Fukushima Daiichi that had been concealed. The gravest error, perhaps, was underestimating the risk of tsunamis. The Nuclear Safety Commission’s official guidelines declared that, in the event of a big wave, “safety functions of facilities shall not be significantly affected.” But experts inside and outside the government had warned authorities about new research on the speed of meltdowns in the event of a power loss and the acute threat posed by storing diesel generators in a basement. Of all the warnings that were ignored, the most significant was from the past. On June 24, 2009, two senior Japanese seismologists appeared before a government-led safety panel to warn that the Fukushima Daiichi plant was acutely vulnerable to tsunamis. They pointed to the words of ancient historians who described a wave in the year 869 so large that it left “no time to get into boats or climb the mountains”; it devastated a castle and left “everything utterly destroyed.” According to a transcript of the hearing, a Tokyo Electric official responded that “future research should evaluate” the claim, because it appeared that “there isn’t much evidence of damage.” The plant was designed to absorb swells of up to about nineteen feet in height; the tsunami that arrived in March was more than twice that tall. By March 15th, the fourth day after the meltdown began, the radiation levels in the main control room of Reactor No. 2 were so high that workers once again had to rotate in and out. It was clear that in the process of bringing the plant under control some people would receive doses previously considered illegal. Normally, Japanese workers were barred from receiving more than a hundred millisieverts over five years; now the Health Ministry officially raised that limit to two hundred and fifty millisieverts—five times the maximum exposure permitted for American workers. “It would be unthinkable to raise it further than that,” the Health Minister, Yoko Komiyama, said at a news conference. Members of Japan’s defense forces arrived the next day. The results were not reassuring. Chinook helicopters scooped up buckets of seawater from the Pacific and nosed in toward Reactor No. 3, but they were forced back by high radiation. Lead plates were bolted to the bellies of the choppers for a second attempt, the next morning, but most of the water scattered in the wind. By evening, military fire engines had arrived, equipped with steel cladding and high-pressure hoses designed for jet-fuel fires. Water arced into the mangled remains, and steam poured out of Reactor No. 3. A more decisive maneuver had been gathering strength, with far less attention, for several days. Even as buildings exploded, some of the workers had hooked up a train of fire trucks capable of generating enough pressure to inject water directly into the fuel cores. (As with the helicopters, they drew water from the ocean—a desperate measure, because a multibillion-dollar reactor that has been bathed in saltwater can never be used again.) The drenching continued around the clock, and it went on for months—an approach known as “feed and bleed.” Casto, of the N.R.C., said, “No one ever envisioned steam-cooling reactors for long periods of time. In reactor world, this is all new.” The process was ungainly, and it produced millions of gallons of radioactive water that is dangerous to store, but it probably did more than any other measure to avert a far worse disaster. By the afternoon of March 16th, American officials had their first glimmer of decent news. To predict where a plume of radiation is likely to go, the N.R.C. uses a computer program called RASCAL, which weighs factors such as the quantity of radioactive material, the weather, and topography. When the model was released, that afternoon, it showed virtually no danger beyond fifty miles from the plant. “There was relief in the sense that, O.K., we don’t have to evacuate Tokyo,” Maher, of the State Department, said. The results still called for a dramatic step: Japanese authorities had ordered people within eighteen miles to evacuate or to stay indoors, but now the State Department warned U.S. citizens to stay at least fifty miles from the plant and to defer travel to Japan. It was the first time that American nuclear regulators had so publicly contradicted their counterparts in an allied country. Some U.S. and Japanese critics complained that the U.S. call for evacuation was excessive and sowed panic; those who fled came to be called “fly-jin,” a play on gaijin, the Japanese word for foreigner. The U.S. stands by the warning, which remained in effect for more than five months. After the pressure drop that so alarmed observers in Washington, Tokyo Electric temporarily pulled out most of its workers. Six hundred and fifty were sent away, leaving several dozen in the headquarters building. Reporters named them “the Fukushima 50.” They were actually seventy and, by the next day, after more workers returned, about three hundred, but the name stuck, and the concept earned instant fame abroad, where it fit comfortably into clichés about Japan. The Chicago Sun-Times called them “human sacrifices”; British tabloids hailed the “nuclear samurai.” A Facebook page popped up to suggest they be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. People saw in the Fukushima 50 what they wanted—“the exact opposite of the Wall Street bankers,” a blog commentator wrote. “Their nation will love them,” another wrote. But in Japan the reaction was noticeably different. The Japanese press praised the workers’ bravery and sacrifice, but it generally avoided discussion of the Fukushima 50; Asahi Shimbun suggested that “Fukushima 700” would be more accurate. In the Japanese edition of Newsweek, Takashi Yokota and Toshihiro Yamada wrote that, in the emphasis on the workers, the “predicament of the victims has been made secondary.” But Japan’s unease about the nuclear workers ran deeper than not wanting to distract from the suffering left by the tsunami: the workers were symbols not only of the failure to curb the abuses in the nuclear industry but also of an expanding underclass in a nation where ninety per cent of the public once identified itself as middle class. Years before the tsunami, labor activists had drawn attention to the dangers facing “nuclear gypsies,” the low-level workers who roamed from reactor to reactor looking for work. At the time of the tsunami, some of the workers at the Fukushima plant were earning the yen equivalent of eleven dollars an hour—the same as part-time help at McDonald’s in Tokyo. Over the summer, I met now and then with a worker at the plant who had returned shortly after the meltdowns. He had no illusions about why his country was uneasy with his assignment. “The company caused all these problems, so of course it will have to send people to solve them,” he said. “It’s something to be ashamed of.” He was boyish and animated, an amateur military buff, and he was resigned to the risks associated with his work. When he arrived, workers were still sleeping on the floor, subsisting on canned rations, crackers, juice, and instant rice. By late summer, the food had improved, but extraordinarily dangerous hot spots remained at the plant, including a pipe that was giving off ten sieverts of radiation per hour—enough to deliver a fatal dose in less than thirty minutes. farm in Iitate and move to a borrowed home forty minutes away. She hopes to return. “I won’t let a power plant take my life away,” she said. The bus from Tokyo to the center of Fukushima takes three hours and passes through a string of tunnels that divide the skyscrapers of the capital from the forested hills of the northeast. Much of Fukushima Prefecture—population two million—has the feel of Maine: organic farms, pine forests, coastal towns where the air is spiked with sea salt. Every year, it awards the title of Miss Peach to advertise the sweetness of Fukushima fruit. That kind of distrust was astonishingly pervasive; a poll in late May showed that more than eighty per cent of the population did not believe the government’s information about the nuclear crisis. That explains why, even long after the evacuation maps were clear and widely known, people in places that had been officially declared safe, like Tataki’s home town of Iwaki, were divided. “People are arguing at their dinner tables: Should we go; should we stay?” said Sayoko Ishihara, a seventy-eight-year-old woman I met one afternoon across from a Mr. Donut shop. The local newspaper was running charts of radiation readings regularly, like the weather report. There was also a lot of bad information going around: in a sign of how far public confidence had sunk, people were invoking the Soviet handling of Chernobyl as a standard to aspire to. When I visited a community center that was conducting free radiation checks of food and objects, people arrived with boxes of snow peas, turnips, eggs, and meat. A father whispered that he had secretly swiped a sample of swimming-pool water from his daughters’ school. Initially, public anger was fixed on Tokyo Electric. The families of senior executives were placed under police guard after their addresses were posted on a Web site critical of the company. But on a weekday afternoon in May protesters of a kind rarely seen in Japan turned up at the headquarters of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology, in Tokyo. They were parents and grandparents who had taken the bus from Fukushima. Their target was specific: in order to keep more schools open in Fukushima, the government had raised the limits on radiation exposure for the general public. Scientists said that the limits were safe, but people were unconvinced. Later, one of the organizers, Seiichi Nakate, a fifty-year-old father of two, told me he feels that he himself bears some responsibility for what happened. “If you look back to the Second World War, we waged war against the world’s major power, and that was the wrong decision for humanity. After we lost the war, Japanese people became even more politically indifferent. It permeated the whole social structure.” He went on, “By nature, Fukushima people are very calm and quiet, but we are standing up. We endured through years with the nuclear plants, and now we have woken up.” The group prevailed; a week later, the government went back to the old radiation limits. The Fukushima meltdowns scattered nuclear fallout over an area the size of Chicago. Government scientists estimate that the total radiation released on land was about a sixth of the level at Chernobyl. The government discovered stores selling beef, spinach, and other foodstuffs that contained small amounts of radiation, and it was racing to pull the products from shelves. Because of such measures, the health consequences of the meltdowns will likely be far smaller than the public imagines. Unlike the Russians, Japanese authorities warned parents not to give local milk to their children. (Because their cells grow at a faster rate, children are especially vulnerable to thyroid damage.) So far, none of the workers at Fukushima have been exposed to doses high enough to cause acute radiation sickness, and scientists do not expect a large increase in cancer cases. An analysis published last month by the Princeton University physicist Frank von Hippel estimated that roughly a thousand deadly cancers may result from the Fukushima meltdowns; he cautioned that the data are preliminary and that psychological effects should be considered as well. Dr. Fred A. Mettler, Jr., the American representative to a United Nations committee on radiation assessment, said, “Forty per cent of people in developed countries get cancer anyway, so, compared to that normal rate, I think the risk is going to be low—and may not be detectable.” Of nearly four thousand workers who have passed through the plant since the meltdowns, only a hundred and three have been found to have received more than a hundred millisieverts of radiation. At that level, scientists predict about a one-per-cent increase over the normal rate of cancer. The most serious cases are two workers who were exposed to more than five hundred millisieverts in the first weeks of the crisis. It is more difficult to pinpoint the toll on the land. The impact of a nuclear accident depends, to an extraordinary degree, on luck—not only on the fateful actions of workers in a crisis but on the direction of the wind. For four days after the meltdown, the wind blew out to sea. But then it swung sharply around and turned to the northwest. To make matters worse, there was rain and snow, which captured radioactive particles in the air and drove them deep into Fukushima’s mountain forests and streams. For days, the government stayed silent about where the fallout was going. Leaders were “afraid of triggering a panic,” Goshi Hosono, the minister in charge of the crisis, has said. It was unwise; some evacuees fled into the plume, a mistake that has prompted one local mayor to accuse the government of murder. When the oldest man in town—a hundred and two years old—heard the news, he killed himself, rather than flee, the papers reported. In front of the village hall, a machine that looked like an oversized parking meter flashed a real-time radiation reading in large red digits: 7.71 microsieverts . . . 8.12 . . . 7.57. Being there was equivalent to receiving a chest X-ray every twelve hours. In addition to its beauty, Iitate was known for its beef. Now the villagers had to kill their cows—nearly three thousand of them. Nobody wanted to see pictures of them wandering, skinny and abandoned, like the animals in some other evacuated towns. To guard against looters, the villagers had agreed to take turns patrolling in the months ahead. Village leaders were saying that they expected to return to their homes within two years. But the vice-mayor conceded to me, “There’s nothing to back that up; it’s just for the villagers’ morale. If people are told it will be more than two years, they might never come back.” The central government avoided making any predictions, but five months after the quake it acknowledged that areas within three kilometres of the plant will likely be uninhabitable for decades. When I returned to Iitate two months after the evacuation, I was joined by Mari Kobayashi, an outgoing forty-six-year-old widow who owns a twelve-acre farm. She was originally from Nagoya, Japan’s third-largest city, and had a career in fashion before moving up to the woods with her husband, a linguist who gave up his job as a Russian translator to work with his hands. They raised free-range chickens and organic fruits and vegetables. “Romantic, huh?” she joked, as she steered her Toyota along empty roads. On her dashboard, she had a laminated sign issued by the village, which identified her to the patrols as a local. After each visit, she tucked it away, to avoid unwanted attention. “Everybody from here has scattered now,” she said. “When I run into a patrol, I ask about this person or that person.” Approaching her house, we passed a strangely beautiful sight: where rice fields should be, workers had planted acres of blazing yellow sunflowers, a species that can leach some of the radiation out of contaminated soil. The sunflower seeds had been sown in patches all over Fukushima, by people in protective white suits, and once the blooms faded they were to be bagged and buried like toxic waste. Japanese scientists later concluded that the sunflower campaign had little effect. Kobayashi’s house was on a hillside, overlooking a lily pond and stands of mature cedar and pine. Bullfrogs belched in the creek. Inside, things were dusty but untouched: wool slippers in pairs; cat drawings on the kitchen walls; snapshots of Mari cracking up at a picnic table, her husband sleeping in the sun. Since the meltdowns, her relatives had pleaded with her to return to the city, but she had decided to stay in a borrowed house only forty minutes away. Her husband had died here, four years ago, and that made it especially hard for her to leave. “When he died, this forest saved me. My husband’s soul is in this land. I can’t abandon him. As the sun sank, we left the house and headed back by car across the darkened hills. We passed houses I’d seen on my previous visit, but now they were empty, with the shades drawn, and in the twilight they looked papery and ephemeral, as if they could slip back into the woods without anybody there to notice. Although an initial inspection of U.S. reactors by the N.R.C. in May found no “imminent threat,” it concluded that at about a third of them some emergency equipment might be vulnerable to extreme circumstances, such as fires and explosions, in ways that are startlingly reminiscent of details at Fukushima. At one plant, a single, diesel-driven pump was incapable of providing emergency water to both of the reactors on site. At another, firefighting equipment is stored in a building not fortified to withstand an earthquake, because a severe fire and an earthquake “were not assumed to occur coincidentally,” according to the report. Still, within months the American nuclear industry had regained its confidence. Its representatives endorsed some changes, including additional portable backup generators, but when an N.R.C. task force, created after Fukushima, recommended upgrading the “patchwork” of regulations that govern American plants, the Nuclear Energy Institute argued against making changes in haste. “It’s not that we’re not going to do it; let’s find out a little bit more about what happened, and then we can make the right decision and do it right once,” Adrian Heymer, the N.E.I.’s executive director for strategic programs, told me. On balance, the Fukushima disaster handed no easy victories to either side of the nuclear debate: defenders can no longer pretend to have engineered away the risks of generating a billion watts in a concrete building, and opponents cannot easily suggest that a meltdown will produce the huge number of immediate casualties that the public imagines. Even after Fukushima, several influential environmentalists have renewed their contention that nuclear power is an unavoidable part of weaning the planet from the burning of fossil fuels. But, for a while, the Fukushima meltdowns have returned nuclear technology to its rightful place: a target for vigilance, scrutiny, and a healthy degree of fear. Looking back, it is easy to see where the Japanese nuclear system lost its footing: when the industry stopped seeing the risks; when decisions that affected millions of people were left up to desperate villages; when urbanites paid their electric bills without knowing where, exactly, the power came from. And yet, for all that went wrong before the meltdowns, the fundamentals of Japan’s open society served it well in the aftermath: elected officials ordered evacuations and alerted people not to drink tap water and suspended shipments of raw milk; parliament launched investigations into all that went wrong; and the Japanese press chronicled a raging national debate about the future. The Japanese government ordered an initial round of stress tests—simulated disasters—for most of the nation’s nuclear reactors. It passed a tariff that promotes the use of renewable energy sources, which had withered during the heyday of the nuclear program. And, in an important legal change, it moved to separate the regulators in charge of policing the plants from the industrial ministry in charge of promoting them. Not long after the meltdowns, Japan’s anti-nuclear activists were convinced that they had won the debate, and Prime Minister Kan made the dramatic gesture of calling for a temporary shutdown of a plant in central Japan where scientists have estimated that there is an eighty-seven-per-cent chance of a big quake. Many other plants closed for regular maintenance and have delayed reopening; by the end of the summer, fewer than a third of Japan’s fifty-four reactors were in active use. But soon factory owners were warning that power cuts would lead to a recession, and that argument prevailed. Prime Minister Kan, unsurprisingly, did not last long; on August 26th, he resigned, and his successor, Yoshihiko Noda, reversed course, prodding local communities to allow plants to re-start. By fall, a consensus had taken hold among Japanese politicians and intellectuals: there would not be a sudden end to nuclear power in Japan. The country would possibly close some of its oldest plants, but the rest—by one estimate, thirty-six of the fifty-four reactors—would endure.
2019-04-19T20:56:59Z
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/10/17/the-fallout
Last week the Great Minnesota Give Together, Give to the Max Day, overcame some serious down-time and managed to raise $17.1 million for Minnesota nonprofits and schools. It was inspiring to see Minnesotans push through and give despite the site being down. We at the Council were also excited to be graced by the presence of Super Kris, our super hero Executive Director. If you were unable to give to your favorite organization because of the delay, don’t forget that you can always give online, year-round, 24 hours a day! You can donate to any organization that had an account on Give to the Max Day by searching for them givemn.razoo.com. If you like the chance to be part of a great day of giving again, Giving Tuesday is coming up after Thanksgiving. Inspired by Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and all the hubbub around shopping for the holiday season, Giving Tuesday is a great way to put some more Thanks and Giving into the increasing span of days after thanksgiving monopolized by consumerism, and to put a philanthropic and impactful spin on what is sometimes considered a troublesome holiday. Here’s to channeling all that Black Friday energy into some truly awesome giving! Be a Super Giver Today: Nonprofitopolis Needs a Hero like You! Here at Charities Review Council, we spend a lot of our time fighting the ‘good fight’ of supporting strong nonprofits and connecting them to smart givers. But usually we do that while sitting behind our desks, convening groups of nonprofits and donors, providing advice to donors over the phone, offering technical assistance to nonprofits, or pounding away on our keyboards. Not today. Today, we’re revealing that we at the Charities Review Council are, in fact, super heroes. Super Giving Heroes™ to be more specific. We’re led by our fearless leader, Super Kris, and we will stop at nothing to bring prosperity, good governance, and sound infrastructure to Nonprofitopolis. Will you join the Super Giving Heroes™ and help us give Nonprofitopolis the heroic support it needs? By donating to Charities Review Council and to one or more of your favorite organizations meeting Standards today, you’ll power up your donation and help us all! Indeed, when donors and nonprofits work together, we can truly mobilize the common good! Let us know you are a #supergiver by telling us on Twitter which organization meeting Standards you donated to today, and why. Stay tuned for updates on how we’re saving Nonprofitopolis! Typhoon Haiyan, the recent tropical storm that devastated the Philippines, Vietnam and South China, was the strongest ever recorded. It is estimated that as many as 10,000 people have lost their lives, and that millions will need basic aid, including access to food, medicine, clean water, and shelter, in the coming weeks. You can view specific organizations that are contributing to the relief effort here. Give financial gifts. The best and most effective type of assistance is a financial donation to a relief organization already operating in the affected area. Do not send goods to an organization unless specifically requested. Is the organization legitimate? If an organization is calling you, be wary. Established disaster-relief organizations are often too busy to implement a direct phone campaign during times of disaster. Don’t be afraid to say “no” over the phone and then contact the organization directly yourself to follow up. Are you confident the organization has the infrastructure and capacity to put your donation to good use? Does the organization already have a strong record of aiding victims of natural disasters? Learn more about making your donation count toward disaster relief efforts, and read the full article here. Our Executive Director Kris Kewitsch recently shared five questions to ask before giving to a cause or charity with Kare11 News. You can watch the segment below or read the full piece here. Question: What do you get when you renovate a 19th century horse barn, turn it into an open concept collaborative space, move a 67 year old organization into it, launch a new strategic plan, and invite a gang of strong nonprofits and engaged donors over for a party? Answer: A fantastic evening, and a mission that comes to life before our eyes. If you showed up to support us and see our new digs, we can’t thank you enough. Our doors opened right at 3:30pm, and friends aplenty (both old and new) stuck around until it was time to clean up. We had great conversations, a giving themed photo booth, and our event generated less than a half pound of waste, thanks to the incredible catering spread by Common Roots Café. We can’t promise a photo booth or catered appetizers every day, but we still would love to have you drop by and see us, especially if you haven’t had a chance to get to know us in a while. At the Charities Review Council, we believe that giving is a blend of art and science, and that everyone can be a smartgiver. Engaged philanthropy is about giving with your heart. And also with your head. You shared with us why you give with both, and your answers were powerful, insightful and inspiring. We’ll be posting your answers on Twitter over the next few days using the #smartgiving hashtag. Please follow along and share. It’s the perfect time to talk about your personal giving ethos, since Give to the Max Day is right around the corner, and of course, since the giving season is upon us. Like us on facebook to see more pictures from our #Smartgiving Open House photo booth (including gems of nonprofit and philanthropic all-stars like the ones above). Don’t forget to schedule your donation and show your support for the Charities Review Council on Give to the Max Day. Remember: your donation to the Charities Review Council strengthens the entire nonprofit sector. This blog was originally posted on givemn.org in preparation for Give to the Max Day 2013. Smart giving is a partnership between donors and nonprofits - a blend of art and science. Smartgivers believe their time, talent and treasure are important social investments. People give for all kinds of reasons, and there is no wrong way to do it. But by using your heart, your head, and these four tips, you can help make sure your giving has the greatest impact this November. Instead of focusing on a specific organization, start by asking which problems facing your community list of strong nonprofits that meet 27 Accountability Standards at smartgivers.org, look for organizations that want to solve the same problem that you do. These organizations have committed themselves to working hard to build a firm and solid foundation that includes accountability, transparency, good governance and public disclosure; that foundation allows them to focus on advancing their missions. It's easy to find information on an organization's mission, financial health, and impact online, using resources such as the Charities Review Council's list of charities meeting standards, as well as national resources like Charity Navigator, GuideStar, and Better Business Bureau. It is important to look for measures of performance beyond administrative expenses, or "overhead." An organization that invests in training, planning, evaluation, and internal systems is a stronger organization that can ultimately have the greatest impact on its community. Look for indicators of an organization's performance such as transparency, governance, leadership, and results. If you have questions or don't find what you're looking for, ask! Strong nonprofits always welcome all questions from donors. Nonprofits today are tasked with a huge challenge: serve more people with less money. Smart givers should invest their dollars into charities that innovate to work around those challenges. The willingness to take creative risks is key to finding new solutions to the problems we've faced since the dawn of humanity. It's up to this generation of donors to change the world, for good. Want to learn more about the work we do at Charities Review Council? Come to our SmartGiving Open House on Thursday, November 7 from 3:30 to 7pm. We invite you to tour our new collaborative workspace, learn more about our work and renewed focus, eat some delicious appetizers, and have a good time with us as we debut our new home along the Green Line in nonprofit alley! Three weeks from today is Give to the Max Day—the fifth anniversary of the one-day statewide fundraising campaign. Last year, 4,381 organizations raised $16,391,905 from 53,339 donors in 24 hours, setting Give to the Max records in dollars raised as well as donor and organization participation. The magnitude of donations on Give to the Max Day, when coupled with informed giving decisions, makes for a wonderful opportunity for Minnesotans to help usher in the chance they’d like to see in our state. We chatted with Dana Nelson, Executive Director of GiveMN, to find out what’s new for Give to the Max Day this year, what the best practices are for organizations new to Give to the Max Day, and who her dream celebrity endorser of Give to the Max Day is. Here’s hoping for a wonderful Minnesota Give Together in 2013! What do you think has made Give to the Max Day so successful in the past? A huge part of the success is owed to the nonprofits across Minnesota that take such great ownership of Give to the Max Day. Every year, more and more organizations build it into their end-of -the year development plan and come up with crazy, zany ideas to promote the day and really have fun with it. Also, I think we’re all wired to be really competitive, even if we don’t want to admit it. There’s something about the competition of giving—people give more than they might usually, because the get to see their favorite organization climbing up on the leader board. You get to see the impact of your donation alongside the thousands of other donations being made that day. It’s also a great day to get people involved in giving that maybe don’t normally give, or may be first time givers to charity. A huge goal with Give to the Max Day is to get folks involved that don’t normally give or aren’t normally asked to give. What resources can organizations access on the GiveMN website to prepare for Give to the Max Day? We have tons tools for nonprofits and for schools on our website. The goal is to make it as easy as possible for organizations to participate. We have templates available for email campaigns, direct mail campaigns, letters to the editor, radio PSAs, and press releases. Watch the Everything You Need to Know about Give to the Max Day 2013 webinar – you can skim through it because its pre-recorded. We also have webinars on our website on all aspects of marketing, including maximizing email campaigns, social media, and creating visuals for the web. To make preparing for the day as easy as possible, we also have a preparation checklist. Is there anything new GiveMN is doing for 2013 that smart givers and strong nonprofits should know about? We’ve changed a few parts of our prize structure this year. We have a new leader board just for greater Minnesota, for organizations outside of the metro area. We also have “power hours” this year, which are specific hours throughout the day at kind of crazy times: 2am, 5am, 5pm, 6pm, and 11pm. The concept is that the organizations that raise the most during those hours will win an additional thousand dollars. This is great for organizations that feel like they can’t sustain raising money for the full twenty-four hours, and can just hone in on one of these power hours. We’ll have our headquarters at the Mall of America again this year, where we’ll have live streaming coverage that shows up on our site. We’ll interview participating nonprofits and schools throughout the day. Last year we had principals ride the orange streak roller coaster in Nickelodeon Universe for hours at a time as our little stunt. This year, principles will be swimming with and feeding the sharks in the Sea Life Aquarium! What advice would you give to smaller organizations running their first Give to the Max Day campaign? If it’s your first campaign, decide on a realistic goal, and know who you’re trying to reach. You may be reaching different than in your current fundraising. Maybe you have twenty volunteers who work with you on a regular basis, but you’ve never asked them to give. Give to the Max Day is a great excuse to ask new donors for a donation. It’s also a great day to get your board involved in giving, if they aren’t already. We have some really wonderful and creative campaigns for Give to the Max Day, but if you’re a first timer, you don’t necessarily need to go all out. Also, don’t forget to steward the donor relationships you get! Sometimes online donors come so easily on Give to the Max Day, but you can’t forget that this is a real relationship, just like a donation you got face-to-face, or from a check in the mail. If you could get any celebrity to star in the next Give to the Max Day PSA, who would it be and why? That’s a tough one, but I really like the Hot Cheetos & Takis kids – Y.N.RichKids! I would love for them to do our next PSA! I’ve also always wanted Prince. Maybe a combination of Walter Mondale and Prince—two very different Minnesota icons, together. But I love this year’s PSAs with Janel McCarville and Jeff Locke. School fundraising has become a necessity for many schools to stay afloat. In order to maintain literacy programs, extracurricular activities, and classroom supplies, both public and private schools run fundraising programs in which their students participate. Traditionally, these fundraisers involve students selling candy, popcorn, or other items either through catalogues, door to door sales, auctions or raffles. According to the Association of Fund-Raising Distributors & Suppliers (AFRDS), each year, non-profit groups net approximately $1.7 billion by selling products. Some parents are beginning to grow weary of helping their children sell unwanted or unused products and ultimately buying these products themselves as a method of supporting their children’s schools. Although school administrators recognize that school fundraising is not ideal, they also understand that it is a necessity to keep the schools running smoothly and effectively. Plant Trees: Ask a nursery for seedling donations and then ask additional donors to sponsor a tree. This is a great opportunity for kids to learn a practical skill, and has the added benefit of beautifying your community. Cleanup Fundraiser: Choose a community to cleanup, and ask donors to give an amount for specific goals. For instance, they could donate a dollar amount per pounds of trash picked up, number of parks cleaned, or distance of road side cleaned. In wake of the current government shutdown, an important question arises: how are nonprofits affected by the shutdown and what can donors do to help? Many charitable groups rely on federal funding or federal grants, so a prolonged shutdown could have dire consequences for nonprofits. When funding for federal programs that provide social services such as food stamps, housing vouchers, and veterans’ services stops or slows down, the people who are affected are forced to find alternative channels for support. This creates a higher demand for services, putting a larger strain on organizations that are already faced with less funding and staff support. Meals on Wheels is one of the most prominent organizations affected by the shutdown. “We budget less than half a million dollars a year to run our entire organization which is for food costs, vans, staff, fuel and everything else. We get about $250k from the fed government so it’s more than half of our budget,” said Alison Foreman, the executive director of Ypsilanti Meals on Wheels. If this major source of funding is gone for an extended period of time, nonprofits face the tough decision of cutting expenses wherever they can: staffing, program services, or facilities. So, the most important question then is, what can donors do to help nonprofits in this critical time of need with little to no federal support? Donors can respond by recognizing organizations that are most affected by the government shutdown and attempt to help their local communities. One of the most significant areas that will be affected is food, either through lack of access or mobility to meals, food stamps or food scarcity. Donors can search for organizations that address hunger and meet Charities Review Council’s Accountability Standards here. Nonprofits that work with housing needs will also be affected by the shutdown. Federal programs that address homelessness through housing vouchers and shelters may be severely cut down or reduced, and nonprofits that address these issues might be similarly affected. Donors can find organizations that address homelessness and meet our Accountability Standards here. Allie Wilde is a junior at St. Catherine University and is a History and English double major. She just started in early September as the Engagement and Marketing Intern for the Charities Review Council. She is from and currently lives in Minneapolis. In her spare time, she likes to play, think, watch and talk about soccer. Can Charities Be Run Like Businesses? I’m finishing out my second week working with Charities Review Council, and I’m very excited to propel our mission of building up the nonprofit sector. Being relatively new to the nonprofit world, I've been spending a lot of time reading various thought leaders' takes on where the sector is going, what needs to be changed, and what practices are downright broken. One big hot-button issue right now is “the overhead ratio,” or the ratio of money a nonprofit spends on its mission versus employee salaries and other operating fees. My colleagues here at Charities Review Council have written a great deal in our blog about the overhead ratio, pointing out that the overhead ratio is generally just a data point; it is a poor measure of a charity’s overall performance or effectiveness when taken alone. One of the loudest champions of overhead ratio reform right now is Dan Pallotta, whose recent TED Talk illustrates how investing in leadership the way for-profit companies do can create unparalleled results in nonprofits. He goes beyond the argument that overhead isn’t an effective measure for nonprofit performance, suggesting that donors should accept charities taking on large risks in fundraising projects the way for-profit companies do. Recently, Pallotta has seen a barrage of backlash from respected leaders in the field. Pallotta argues that fundraising professionals should have every opportunity to make a fortune as their peers in the for-profit world. He promotes a meritocracy of fundraisers, where the most effective fundraisers get paid a competitive market wage. It’s easy to see how donors are wary of this mentality, especially with some of the more extreme cases of recent charity fraud—CNN reported this year that Florida-based Kids Wish Network spends less than three cents per dollar raised helping dying children and their families. Ken Berger and Robert Penna of Charity Navigator said in Huffington Post “We believe his message has gained tremendous popularity for one simple reason — he ultimately is arguing that charities should be held to virtually no accountability standards.” They don’t believe he has explained in enough detail how to measure the success of a charity, and whether the gains were worth the amount of donations expended. @danpallotta Wow. Really? Most Americans think corporate CEO pay is out of control and too often disconnected from performance. It’s also arguable that Pallotta’s ideas on charity have become popular because of the current reality of the nonprofit landscape. Organizations have been faced with increased need and decreased funding, so it’s easy to see the appeal of a charitable model that promotes capital growth on par with for-profit companies. As this conversation continues, debate will likely center around something along the lines of “can a charity be effective and responsible while taking greater risks and providing increased personal gains for individuals?” The answer isn’t necessarily cut and dry. The increased capacity of a charity run like a business comes with unprecedented barriers of donor trust. If Pallotta’s vision, or something like it, is ever to become a reality, it will require innovative standards of nonprofit performance that foster relationships between donors and charities. If Pallotta truly wants to change the way we think about charity, his first concern should be donor trust. Matt Beachey joined the council in September 2013, working on marketing and engagement. He graduated from Gustavus Adolphus College in 2010, and has since been living in the Twin cities. Matt served in AmeriCorps with the nonprofit Hunger Solutions and interned with Twin Cities Habitat for Humanity in their Marketing and Communications department. He also volunteers as the managing editor of Pollen, and as a blogger for FINNEGANS. Welcome Our New Fall Intern! Welcome Madeline Severtson, who joins us this fall as the Development and Communications Intern. This spring, she graduated from St. Olaf College with majors in mathematics and religion. Read on to learn a bit more about her. I grew up in St. Anthony Village, which is a very small first-ring suburb of Minneapolis located between NE Minneapolis and Roseville. A surprising number of people in the Twin Cities don’t know that it exists. 2. How did you end up as an intern for the Charities Review Council? During my last year or two at St. Olaf, I started exploring career paths in the nonprofit sector. I was intrigued by development work, so I was excited when the opportunity arose for an internship with the Charities Review Council. I had not heard of the organization, but I believe the Council plays an important role in the sector, both for nonprofits and donors. A beloved Christmas tradition in my family is to eat copious amounts of See’s chocolate while opening presents on Christmas morning. Last year, I was on a semester-long study abroad program that had me spending Christmas in China. My parents surprised me by sending a box of See’s, and it meant so much to me to be able to continue the tradition even though I was far from home. 4. If you could go back in time or leap ahead to the future, which would you choose and why? I would choose to go back in time because I am always curious about the way things used to be. Books, photographs, and other historical documents and records help to some extent, but they can never fully communicate what life was like in the past. I have often thought about the possible consequences of time travel, and I think it would be best if only observation were possible. It might be tempting to interfere in certain historical situations, but it would be impossible to know whether that interference would cause more harm than good. I’m reading The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family, by Mary S. Lovell, which is a biography of the six Mitford sisters. They were prominent in England during the early- to mid-20th century, and the family was divided when each sister chose a different political ideology. I’m also rereading one of my favorite books, Life of Pi by Yann Martel, because it contains beautiful passages about religion and the nature of God, and the story as a whole challenges the definition of truth and reality. 6. What are you most excited about learning/experiencing during your internship? So far, I have enjoyed experiencing the inner workings of a nonprofit organization in general, and I look forward to learning more about the development process. I am also excited to understand more about the issues surrounding nonprofit accountability. 7. Do you have a favorite cause that you support? I am passionate about interreligious dialogue because I believe there is a deep need for understanding and acceptance in American society. I have not yet determined what role this cause will take in my life, but I hope to help create a culture in which all religions are valued and celebrated. Twelve years ago today, the tragic events that transpired in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington D.C. led to a collective American response of passion, bravery and hope. There was a clear call to action, and the American people responded with an outpouring of support. More than 1.4 billion dollars was donated to 9/11 charities in the aftermath of the attacks. In the years since, Americans have further developed a tradition of community service and philanthropy as a tribute to the victims, survivors, and volunteers who responded to the tragedy. In 2009, September 11th was federally recognized as a National Day of Service and Remembrance with the goal of uniting Americans across the country in service. This recognition highlights the value of donations of all types, including community service and monetary gifts. Now, twelve years after the attacks, it is not always obvious where to direct commemorative donations so that they will be of the most help. For those wanting to make a 9/11-specific donation, look for an organization that directly benefits survivors, first responders, bystanders, and their families by providing support with ongoing physical and mental health care costs, as well as scholarships to fund college education. The September 11th Families’ Association maintains a list of organizations that provide this type of support. Additionally, countless veterans of the resulting wars in Afghanistan and Iraq need assistance with housing or health care. Many nonprofits work with veterans in our community to ease the transition back to civilian life. For example, the Minnesota Assistance Council for Veterans aids veterans affected by homelessness, and the Minnesota Veterans Medical Research and Education Foundation conducts research on physical and mental health conditions in order to improve veterans’ quality of life. Today marks a day of remembrance and honor. It’s important that we all take a moment to reflect on what happened on September 11, 2001, but consider taking it a step further this year by supporting those nonprofits working to help victims, survivors, veterans, and our own communities. The smell of freshly-sharpened pencils is in the air. Back to school season is upon us as children all over the country pack their backpacks with brand new notebooks, crayons, folders, and glue sticks. But some kids enter their classrooms on the first day of school without these necessary supplies. This time of year often presents a financial challenge for low-income families. Many parents have to make tough decisions; school supplies or breakfast? Pencils or bus fare? Though school supplies might seem like a trivial expense that doesn’t fall under the necessity category, the long list of supplies can be overwhelming and impossible to fulfill for some, leaving kids feeling inadequately prepared for learning. Just like at a job, having the tools you need to complete a task are imperative to successful implementation and completion. Many nonprofits recognize the implications that come with ill-prepared students and seek to equip children with these necessary items by holding school supply drives and collecting donations. Several of the organizations on our list of the Most Trustworthy Nonprofits work to ensure that every child’s school year starts off on the right track. Union Gospel Mission has backpack drop off sites all over the metro area. Simply fill a backpack with items from their list of supplies and drop it off at the location most convenient for you. St. Louis Park Emergency Program (STEP) distributes school supplies to St. Louis Park children. According to their website, “Our goal is for every St. Louis Park child to have a fresh start to the school year by providing a new backpack and grade appropriate school supplies.” In 2012, STEP provided supplies for 451 St. Louis Park students! To help with this year’s effort, drop items off at their St. Louis Park office. Keystone Community Services holds a school supply drive each year. Though the official drive dates have passed, Keystone accepts school supply donations all year at their St. Paul office. They provide a list of the most-needed supplied to make your shopping easy. Community Emergency Assistance Program (CEAP) is a community-based program that helps meet the basic needs of families living in the northern part of the Twin Cities. Every year CEAP hosts a Supplies for Success event, matching children in need in Anoka County, Brooklyn Park, Brooklyn Center, and East Champlin with age appropriate school supplies to help them in the coming year. In 2012, CEAP distributed 1,400 backpacks filled with supplies to children in need! CEAP invites community members to host a Supply Drive or make a monetary donation. C.R.O.S.S. serves individuals in Northwest Hennepin County. They provided school supplies to more than 800 children in 2012 and are collecting supplies this year in Rogers and Maple Grove. You can also purchase tickets from the Rotary Club of Northwest Hennepin County for $20 to provide a backpack filled with school supplied to one child in need. Even though school has started for most, all of the nonprofits listed above welcome supply donations throughout the year and gladly accept cash donations, as well. It’s never too late to help provide school supplies, as needs often arise throughout the year. Check out our list of trustworthy and accountable charities for more ways to help families in need. Donating school supplies is a simple, tangible way for the entire family to get involved in giving back to the community. Next time you find yourself at Target or Walmart, pick up a few extra boxes of markers or spiral notebooks for those children who don’t get to pick out their own. A small donation can make a big difference for students in need this school year. As an office full of self-proclaimed “nonprofit nerds”, it should come as no surprise that our lunchtime conversations often turn to the latest nonprofit headlines we see on twitter, hear on NPR, or read about in the Huffington Post. When Peter Buffet, son of the infamous Warren, took to the pages of the New York Times to express his take on philanthropy and the wrongdoings of the sector, his words sparked conversation in lunch rooms, news rooms, conference rooms and Facebook feeds across the nation. Buffet explains that philanthropy is actually feeding the cycle of inequality in our world and to combat it, we need “a new operating system. Not a 2.0 or a 3.0, but something built from the ground up.” He goes so far as to say that there is a “crisis of imagination” and whole-heartedly disregards the notion of ROI in the nonprofit world. While most reactions were quick to criticize, Chronicle of Philanthropy columnist, Phil Buchanan, made sure to point out some of Buffet’s valid arguments that we shouldn’t outright dismiss. The Chronicle ran a summary of many of the responses from thought leaders around the country. Mr. Buffet himself has continued to participate in the discussion and has responded to criticism by clarifying some of the points he made in his original piece. This American Life, the weekly show broadcast on National Public Radio, recently featured a story about an unusual sort of charity – one that provides money to those in need, instead of building houses, digging wells, or providing animals. GiveDirectly was founded in 2008 by a group of Harvard and MIT economic development students looking for a vehicle to send monetary donations directly to the poor, allowing them to decide how to best use it. Even with the explosion of mobile banking in developing countries, the founders realized that very few nonprofits were utilizing these tools and directly addressing the need with no-strings-attached financial assistance. According to its website, “As a non-profit created by donors, GiveDirectly is focused exclusively on giving to the poorest possible households at the lowest possible cost. Its leaders have no personal financial stake in the success of the organization, as their time is all volunteered.” GiveDirectly recently completed an in-depth report on their work in Kenya, expansion into a second country, and the long-term outlook of the organization. Listen to the NPR story here, and tell us, do you think giving money directly to those in need is an effective way to address poverty? There you have it – a sneak peek into our lunch room. Though these conversations often happen spontaneously, they always leave us with a new sense of inspiration and motivation to work harder and think more innovatively. What have you been talking about lately on your lunch break, around the conference table, or at the water cooler?
2019-04-20T14:14:27Z
http://blog.smartgivers.org/2013/
One of the ways in which government can help address the economic hardship we face today is through increased investment in public infrastructure. Investing in infrastructure creates needed construction-related jobs now and literally builds a foundation for economic growth and job creation over the long-term. This means making investments needed to maintain our existing infrastructure – roads, bridges, schools, public housing, etc. – and it means making investments in new types of infrastructure needed to support economic growth in the 21st century – clean energy and energy efficiency, broadband expansion, life sciences, etc. At the national level, President Obama is working with Congress, Governor Patrick and the nation’s other Governors to develop a federal economic stimulus package that will, among other things, provide billions of dollars to states for infrastructure investments like those described above. This funding is expected to be targeted to projects that can start quickly to increase the job-creation impact of the investments over the near term. In anticipation of this influx of federal funding, the Patrick-Murray Administration has already begun to plan and mobilize to ensure that the funding is used promptly for needed projects throughout the Commonwealth. At the state level, the Patrick-Murray Administration is well aligned with the direction being contemplated by the new administration. One of the Governor’s top priorities since taking office has been to reverse years of neglect of our public infrastructure by increasing the level of state capital investment. Over the last year, the Governor worked in partnership with the Legislature to conclude the most productive legislative session in state history with respect to the authorization of capital investments for high-priority public infrastructure projects. Since this Administration took office, there have been 10 bond bills enacted into law, authorizing funding for the capital investments reflected in the five-year plan recently published and available at mass.gov/capital. The capital investments authorized by the bond bills reflect shared priorities of the Governor and the Legislature, including investments in schools, infrastructure to support economic development, roads and bridges, affordable housing, parks, a clean environment and the efficient functioning of state government. The five-year capital investment plan for fiscal years 2009-2013 is built on the foundation of the Administration’s work with the Legislature over the past year to begin reinvesting in our state’s infrastructure in a fiscally responsible, targeted and transparent manner. The capital investments in this plan will create thousands of jobs in the near term and will ensure that Massachusetts continues to be a great place to live, work, start a business and raise a family for years to come. The capital investment plan continues to implement the vision and priorities established in last year’s, first-ever comprehensive and transparent five-year capital investment plan covering fiscal years 2008-2012. In large part, the investments included in the 2009-2013 plan continue projects launched last year or beforehand, or commence projects anticipated by last year’s five-year plan. The current plan also reflects adjustments to target additional funding to “ready-to-go” repair and construction projects to increase the extent to which the capital investment plan serves as an economic stimulus for job creation in the near term. The plan also includes some refinements to the investment priorities identified in last year’s plan, based on updated information about capital needs, project cash flows and project authorizations. The capital investment plan is also fiscally responsible. Last year, the Administration developed and published a debt affordability analysis and policy to ensure that the annual borrowing needed to support the capital investment plan is set at affordable levels. This debt affordability analysis and policy was a first for the Commonwealth, and it was positively reviewed by the credit rating agencies. The Administration has recently updated and republished the debt affordability analysis and the borrowing levels used to develop the five-year plan were determined based on the debt affordability policy. Through the capital investment plan, the Patrick-Murray Administration is taking advantage of an opportunity to address the current challenges we face in a manner that will position the Commonwealth for economic growth and prosperity over the long-term. The plan provides for the Commonwealth to invest significant resources into capital expenditures, which the Commonwealth defines as investments in infrastructure and other long-term public assets that are critical to our quality of life, the strength of our economy, and the efficient functioning of government at every level. Among other things, these capital expenditures and investments will help build and maintain roads, bridges and rail we use for our daily commutes; public college facilities that educate our workforce and nurture our innovation economy; state parks and open space that enhance our landscape and protect our environment; and safe, affordable housing for the people of Massachusetts. Through the investments included in the plan, we will create thousands of jobs in the near-term and the environment to support job creation and economic growth over the long-term. There was a need for increased infrastructure investment in Massachusetts before the economic crisis; now the need is even more urgent. This capital plan answers the call for increased capital investment in a thoughtful and fiscally responsible manner. The complete Commonwealth of Massachusetts’s FY2009-2013 Five-Year Capital Investment Plan, including project and program descriptions and an updated Debt Affordability Analysis, may be accessed at mass.gov/capital. Technologically-advanced systems and well-maintained facilities that make state government more efficient and customer-friendly. The Patrick-Murray Administration has made significant progress in setting the Commonwealth’s capital investment program on the right course toward achieving the Administration’s vision of a high-quality network of public infrastructure that supports a strong economy and high-quality of life for citizens in the Commonwealth. However, much work remains to be done as the Commonwealth faces significant challenges in addressing its capital investment needs. One of the most significant challenges facing the Administration is the backlog of deferred maintenance it inherited as a result of years of neglect of our public infrastructure. The Commonwealth has immense investment needs for every type of capital asset and throughout every region of our state. Many of these needs have long been evident but left unaddressed due to inadequate investment in our public assets. At the same time, the size of the capital budget is subject to significant fiscal constraints. The Commonwealth’s debt is among the highest in the nation by some measures. Moreover, the portion of the state’s operating budget that can be spent on debt service is limited not only by statute but, more importantly, by the fact that tax revenues are falling in the current fiscal environment. Compounding this fiscal challenge, the need to cut spending in the operating budget in recent years resulted in capital project-related personnel being shifted from the operating budget to the capital budget. The FY08 capital budget funded approximately 2,000 full-time equivalent state employees (FTEs), almost twice the number of FTEs carried on the capital budget in 2001. These personnel expenses crowd out investments in capital as every dollar in the capital budget used to fund personnel costs results in one less dollar available to fund capital investments. Funding these employees on the capital budget is also more expensive than funding them on the operating budget due to the interest expense incurred on the related borrowings. As a result of the immense backlog of capital investment needs, the need to continue to make targeted capital investments to support economic growth and the limited resources available to fund these needs, the Commonwealth simply cannot address all of its capital investment needs in the near term. The recently-enacted bond bills authorized approximately $16 billion of capital investments. However, these bond authorizations were sized with the intention of funding multi-year capital investment programs – in some cases, 10-year capital investment programs. Consequently, the Administration will need to prioritize authorized capital investment needs within the fiscal constraints of the capital budget. Unfortunately, there are many worthy and needed projects that will not be funded in fiscal year 2009, or even in the next few years, because of the demands and constraints on our capital investment program. In the face of these challenges in achieving the Administration’s vision for a high-quality network of public infrastructure, the Administration has been guided by three core principles in the development of its capital investment plan – affordability, targeted investments in projects that maintain our existing infrastructure and in projects that promote economic growth, and transparency. Last year, the Patrick-Murray Administration undertook a rigorous analysis of the Commonwealth’s capacity to issue debt and adopted a policy to ensure that Commonwealth debt is kept to affordable levels. The policy ties the annual borrowing limit, or “bond cap”, determination to the impact any new borrowing will have on debt service as a percentage of total budgeted revenues. This thoughtful, fiscally responsible approach allows not only for steady growth in the bond cap to increase capital investment in the near term, but also ensures that the budgetary impact of debt issued to fund the Commonwealth’s capital program is managed within affordable levels. The policy strikes the right balance between maximizing our capital investment capacity without undermining other state programs and services. The credit rating agencies have reviewed the Commonwealth’s debt policy and have indicated that they view it as a positive step forward for debt management by the Commonwealth. Based on the debt affordability policy, the annual bond cap for fiscal year 2009 will be $1.575 billion. In addition, because legislative authorization for planned capital spending was obtained later than originally anticipated, capital spending was lower than originally planned in fiscal year 2008 and $152.3 million of the unused bond cap from that year will be carried forward to support spending in fiscal year 2009 (additional unused fiscal year 2008 bond cap will be carried forward to future years). While the recently announced accelerated structurally-deficient bridge program will be funded outside of the bond cap, the related debt service costs of the program have been fully accounted for under the debt affordability policy in setting the bond cap at the designated levels. As with the Administration’s first five-year plan, the FY09-13 Five-Year Capital Investment Plan was developed following thorough consideration and careful decision-making aimed at striking the appropriate balance between maintaining our existing infrastructure and making targeted new investments to support job creation and economic growth over the long-term. Specific highlights of the FY09-13 capital plan are included later in this section. Lastly, the Administration believes the Commonwealth’s capital budget should be transparent. Transparency enhances public understanding of the Commonwealth’s capital investment program and thereby improves public discourse and accountability with respect to the capital budget. Historically very little was understood or known about the state’s capital budget. There was never a published explanation or rationale justifying the annual borrowing limits set by prior administrations. Moreover, there was little information published about how and when prior administrations planned to use bond authorizations to carry out particular capital projects or programs. We have made significant improvements in the area of transparency. In August 2007, the Administration published for the first time ever a five-year capital investment plan. The FY09-13 plan is the second such publication, providing the public with comprehensive and detailed information concerning the Commonwealth’s capital investment program. Both last year’s published capital investment plan and the FY09-13 plan also include a debt affordability analysis and description of the Commonwealth’s debt policy, neither of which existed in the past. These publications are posted on the Commonwealth’s website and are available in printed form. Building on the Administration’s commitment to improving transparency, the version of the FY09-13 capital investment plan and updated debt affordability analysis posted on the Commonwealth’s website have increased functionality and information available to the public. By adhering to these three principles in developing the capital investment plan – affordability, targeted investments in maintenance and in projects promoting economic growth, and transparency – the Patrick-Murray Administration has made great progress in pursuing the vision and addressing the challenges described above. The investments included in the plan – and the additional resources that they leverage – will make meaningful progress in meeting our state’s immense inventory of capital needs and will fund high-priority projects that will make Massachusetts a better place to live, work, raise a family and grow a business. They will also provide an economic stimulus by creating thousands of construction jobs at a time when they are desperately needed. If matched with a significant infusion of federal funding for infrastructure projects, the citizens of the Commonwealth will experience the most comprehensive rebuilding of our state in decades – the type of bold action that the economic circumstances require and that the citizens deserve from their government. The Patrick-Murray Administration has made great progress in improving the Commonwealth’s capital investment program since taking office less than two years ago. The following highlights some of the Administration’s accomplishments in the areas of capital investments and capital finance generally. First-Ever Debt Affordability Policy: The Patrick-Murray Administration developed and published the first-ever debt affordability policy, which was positively reviewed by the credit rating agencies. First-Ever Five-Year Capital Investment Plan: The Administration published the first-ever comprehensive and transparent five-year capital investment plan based on the new debt affordability policy. The second report represents the second annual five-year capital investment plan and it relies on the affordability policies developed in connection with last year’s plan. Bond Bills to Fund Capital Investment Plan: The Administration and Legislature worked together to promptly enact the $1.8 billion Immediate Needs Bond Bill early in 2007 to ensure completion of on-going capital projects, secure federal funding for transportation projects, and fund urgent capital investment needs of the Commonwealth. In addition, the Governor filed a series of multi-year bond bills authorizing over $16 billion in capital investment priorities for the Commonwealth included in the five-year plan. The Legislature overwhelmingly approved each of the bond bills, which are described in more detail below. On March 23, 2007, the Governor approved a $1.8 billion immediate needs bond authorization. The legislation provided for the completion of on-going capital projects, federal funding for transportation projects and funding for urgent capital investment needs of the Commonwealth including projects related to state buildings, energy and environment, public safety, health and human services, and transportation. On April 17, 2008, the Governor approved a $1.6 billion bond bill for transportation improvements which will leverage an additional $1.9 billion in federal reimbursements. This legislation included $150 million for Chapter 90 grants to cities and towns for local roads and bridges in fiscal 2009 and $700 million for certain mass transit improvements required as part of the state implementation plan. On August 8, 2008, the Governor approved a second transportation bond bill authorizing $1.445 billion for road and bridge projects and other transportation-related capital investments. On May 29, 2008, the Governor approved a $1.275 billion affordable housing bond bill which includes $500 million for the preservation and improvement of the Commonwealth’s 50,000 units of state-owned public housing. The legislation also provides authorization for various programs that subsidize the development and preservation of privately owned affordable housing, including $200 million for the Affordable Housing Trust Fund and $125 million for the Housing Stabilization Fund. On June 16, 2008, the Governor approved legislation in support of the life sciences industry. Among other initiatives and provisions relating to the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, the legislation authorizes borrowing $500 million over a 10-year period to fund capital investments and infrastructure improvements around the state to support the life sciences industry. On August 4, 2008, the Governor approved legislation creating a Massachusetts Broadband Institute within the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative. The Institute is to administer a new Broadband Incentive Fund, to be capitalized by general obligation bonds in the amount of $40 million, to invest in long-lived, publicly owned broadband infrastructure, enabling private firms to partner with the state to connect the Commonwealth’s un-served and underserved communities to broadband services. On August 4, 2008, the Governor approved legislation authorizing $2.984 billion in Commonwealth bonds to finance an accelerated structurally deficient bridge program. The program, which was developed in collaboration with the State Treasurer, is expected to finance over 250 bridge projects over the next eight years with approximately $1.9 billion of special obligation bonds secured by a portion of the gas tax and $1.1 billion of grant anticipation notes secured by future federal funds. By accelerating the investment in bridges, the Commonwealth expects to realize hundreds of millions of dollars of savings from avoided inflation and deferred maintenance costs. On August 7, 2008, the Governor approved a $2.2 billion higher education bond authorization. The legislation includes authorizations for new buildings, renovation projects and capital improvements at each of the Commonwealth’s public higher education campuses. Of the $2.2 billion total authorization, $1.2 billion will be dedicated to capital investments at state and community colleges, and $1 billion will be dedicated to capital investments at the University of Massachusetts. The authorized amounts are expected to be expended over a ten-year period. On August 11, 2008, the Governor approved a $3.3 billion general government bond bill making targeted investments in public safety, city and town facilities, state buildings, and information technology systems. Included in the bill is authorization to assist communities with local infrastructure needs, improvements to state and county correctional facilities, improvements to court facilities throughout Massachusetts and capital repairs, on-going maintenance and unforeseen emergency capital needs at state office buildings and facilities. The legislation also authorizes targeted infrastructure investments to spur economic development in our communities. To enhance government services provided to all citizens of the Commonwealth, the legislation includes funding to modernize critical state information technology systems, including funding to replace and upgrade the outdated and overburdened systems at the Department of Revenue and the Registry of Motor Vehicles. On August 14, 2008, the Governor approved a $1.64 billion land, parks and clean energy bond bill. This legislation includes funding for land protection and acquisition and funding to enhance state parks and rebuild related infrastructure. The legislation also includes authorization for new programs to address environmental challenges. Initiation of Key Projects: A number of important new capital projects have been initiated by the Administration, including: the South Coast Rail, the new Worcester State Hospital, the Nano-Bio Manufacturing Facility at the Lowell campus of the University of Massachusetts, new courthouse projects in Taunton, Salem and Fall River, the correctional facilities master plan, certain transit projects legally-required as mitigation for the Central Artery project and many more. Accelerated Structurally-Deficient Bridge Program: The Administration, working with the Legislature and the Treasurer, developed a $3 billion accelerated structurally-deficient bridge program which will repair hundreds of structurally-deficient bridges, create new construction jobs, build conditions for long-term economic growth, and save the Commonwealth hundreds of millions of dollars in avoided construction cost inflation and deferred maintenance costs. Implementation of Recommendations for the Joint Committee on Bonding, Capital Expenditures and State Assets: The legislative committee that oversees capital finance for the Commonwealth is the Joint Committee on Bonding, Capital Expenditures and State Assets. In its Report on Capital Investment and State Assets in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (Fiscal Year 2006 Edition), the Committee made ten recommendations for improving various aspects of capital finance in the Commonwealth. The Patrick-Murray Administration has implemented all ten recommendations. Refinancing and Defeasing Debt for Savings: Pursuant to legislative authorization sought by the Governor and included in the Immediate Needs Bond Bill, the Executive Office for Administration and Finance worked with Treasurer Cahill to issue Commonwealth bonds to refinance bonds issued by other governmental entities that the Commonwealth was required to pay, saving the Commonwealth millions of dollars in debt service costs. Pursuant to further legislative authorization sought by the Governor and included in the Immediate Needs Bond Bill, the Administration also worked with Treasurer Cahill to use cash appropriated for certain capital projects to pay off high interest cost bonds and to issue lower interest cost bonds to pay for the capital projects. This effort saved the Commonwealth millions of dollars in debt service costs. State Facility Maintenance: The Administration has taken steps to improve maintenance of state facilities. Funding in the capital budget is dedicated for small capital maintenance and repair projects. By dedicating more and more funding to these types of projects, the state will defer less of its capital investment needs and avoid larger, more expensive capital project needs in the future. The funding for these projects is allocated based on a new, need-based evaluation process through the Division of Capital Asset Management. The Administration is committed to continuing to build on its efforts to improve the maintenance of state facilities. Transportation Infrastructure Maintenance: In the first Transportation Bond Bill, the legislature established a new transportation maintenance fund. Pursuant to this capital investment plan, the Administration has dedicated more than 20% of all of its bond-funded transportation spending (excluding funding for the acquisition of CSX rail property) for transfer to the new transportation maintenance fund to pay capital costs of maintaining the Commonwealth’s transportation infrastructure. By dedicating more and more funding to these transportation maintenance projects, the state will defer less of its capital investment needs and avoid larger, more expensive capital project needs in the future. Personnel Off of Capital Budget: The Governor has made two proposals to reduce the amount of bond proceeds used to fund personnel expenses in the capital budget. First, the Governor included about $10 million in his FY08 operating budget proposal to fund the transfer of employees off of the capital budget. The Governor’s most recent proposal included in his FY09 budget proposal and again in this FY10 budget proposal would authorize the Administration to shift approximately $50 million of capital equipment acquisition costs funded from the state’s operating budget to the capital budget and approximately $50 million of personnel expenses from the capital budget to the operating budget. Neither of the Governor’s proposals were previously enacted by the Legislature. While the current challenging fiscal environment makes it unlikely that the operating budget will be able to absorb the cost of personnel currently funded on the capital budget, the Administration is committed to continuing to pursue creative ways to begin to shift employees off of the capital budget and is hopeful that the Legislature will adopt the proposal included in this FY10 budget described above. Energy Efficiency Requirements for State Building Projects: Last year, Governor Patrick issued Executive Order 484 which, among other things, established the Governor’s “Leading By Example Program” requiring that all state agencies reduce their environmental impact by promoting energy conservation and clean energy practices. Specifically, by FY12, all state building projects must contribute to a 25% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, a 20% reduction in overall energy consumption and procure 15% of annual electricity consumption from renewable sources. In addition to beginning to fund energy efficiency and renewable energy efficiency improvements to state facilities, the Administration has been working on a parallel track to develop a detailed plan that will identify the specific energy efficiency and renewable energy projects, and funding sources available for such projects, to meet the goals established by the Governor in Executive Order 484. The Administration has also set high minimum “green building” standards for all new state building projects and is striving to go above and beyond such standards wherever possible, including plans for certain buildings to be “energy neutral”. Financing Initiatives: The Administration has pursued various financing initiatives to more effectively leverage state resources to fund more capital project needs. These initiatives include: increased allocation of private activity bond volume cap to multi-family affordable housing projects to leverage related federal tax credits to fund millions of dollars of affordable housing projects, including improvements to our public housing supply; “I-Cubed” legislation to finance infrastructure improvements needed to support new private development with the new state tax revenues generated from the development; and the financing of the East-West Parkway project at the former South Weymouth Naval Air Base from new state tax revenues to be generated from private development at the base. Stronger Oversight and More Transparency through Finance Advisory Board: Through new gubernatorial appointments, staff support provided by the Executive Office for Administration and Finance, and greater oversight responsibilities included in recent legislation, the Administration has strengthened the role of this important Board in ensuring transparency, accountability and best practices among state entities that borrow, invest and manage public funds. For the first time in the Board’s history, the Administration assisted the Board in complying with its statutory obligation to gather information about and to report on outstanding debt of the Commonwealth and other debt-issuing state entities. This report also includes information about interest rate swap agreements related to debt issued by state entities. This report represents a first step in the Board’s efforts to improve transparency and public accountability with respect to debt, investments and other financial transactions involving public funds. The need for continued progress is even more important in the context of the recent turmoil in the financial markets. The issuance of bonds to fund the capital budget must be authorized by the Legislature. Pursuant to these legislative authorizations to borrow, the Governor determines the amount and timing of any authorized borrowing to fund capital investments. At the request of the Governor, the State Treasurer actually issues the bonds to borrow the funds. The Governor approves the use of the borrowed funds by agencies to pay for authorized capital projects. The Patrick-Murray Administration is the first to develop and publish a comprehensive, five-year plan for the funding of capital investments. There are certain capital investments that are not funded by the Commonwealth through its capital budget and consequently are not reflected in this capital investment plan. There are a number of independent state authorities responsible for maintaining certain public infrastructure from revenues generated from those infrastructure assets or from dedicated state tax or other revenues that are not available to the Commonwealth for general budgeting purposes. Examples of these entities include the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, Massport, the Turnpike Authority and the Massachusetts School Building Authority. Because these entities carry out their own capital projects and are solely responsible for financing them from their own funding sources, the capital investments made by these entities are not included in the state’s capital investment plan. In addition, small equipment purchases and information technology projects funded by state agencies through their operating budgets are not reflected in the capital investment plan. The Commonwealth’s capital budget for the last five fiscal years (FY04-FY08) totaled nearly $11 billion. The following tables show (a) capital spending over the last five fiscal years by the spending categories used by the prior administration and (b) the historical sources of funding for such spending. Building on the process it initiated last year, the Patrick-Murray Administration engaged in a diligent, fiscally responsible, and comprehensive process for developing its five-year capital investment plan. In order to establish the total amount of the bond-funded capital program within an affordable level, the Administration conducted a rigorous review of the Commonwealth’s debt capacity within its debt affordability policy. The debt affordability analysis underlies the FY09-13 capital investment plan. As indicated in that analysis, the Administration has set the bond cap for fiscal year 2009 and the projected bond caps for future fiscal years at lower levels than it had previously planned in order to ensure that the amount of debt issued to fund the capital program is kept within affordable levels consistent with the Administration’s debt affordability policy. The amount of debt authorized to fund capital projects pursuant to the recently enacted, multi-year bond bills described above far exceeds the amount of debt the Commonwealth can afford to borrow in fiscal year 2009 or even during the next five fiscal years. The Administration had to prioritize among the many authorized projects in order to develop a capital investment plan that is within the affordability limits described above. Consequently, there are many worthy authorized capital projects that will not be funded in fiscal year 2009 and, in many cases, will not be funded over the next few years. To inform its development of the FY09-13 capital investment plan, the Administration broadly solicited information about capital spending needs and engaged in a diligent process to evaluate and prioritize those funding needs. State agencies provided a significant amount of detailed information regarding their capital investment needs, their priorities and the programmatic impacts of requested projects. A&F held more than 30 diligence sessions with agencies regarding their capital project requests. In addition, the Administration carefully reviewed the legislative authorizations for capital investments in the recently enacted bond bills, evaluated many written requests for capital project funding from legislators, municipalities and other interested parties, and Administration officials attended numerous meetings with legislators, municipalities and other interested parties regarding requests for capital funding. A significant portion of the bond-funded fiscal year 2009 capital budget is needed to fund costs of multi-year capital projects that were commenced in prior fiscal years. The Administration has allocated remaining funds to authorized projects and programs based on the evaluation of project funding needs conducted through the diligence process described above and guided by the Governor’s capital investment priorities. The highlights of the FY09-13 capital investment plan are described by investment category below. The capital markets have been experiencing a severe dislocation over the last twelve months, which has impacted, and will continue to impact, the Commonwealth’s issuance of bonds to fund its capital program and the issuance of bonds and notes by governmental entities throughout the country. This market turmoil stems primarily from over-leveraged real estate-related assets during the first half of this decade when interest rates were held at extremely low levels and investors sought ever-increasing returns. Global financial institutions have been forced to record massive losses of mortgage-related derivative assets, causing several firms to merge, be bailed out by the federal government, or, in the case of Lehman Brothers, to file for bankruptcy. Excessive investment in these assets directly caused the credit deterioration and downgrades of once-triple-A rated bond insurers of municipal bonds. This in turn caused the collapse of the auction rate securities market and, to a more limited degree, the variable rate demand bond market, which have been largely dependent upon bond insurers triple-A ratings. In addition, there has been an unprecedented contraction of the world-wide credit markets, which continues to limit market access and increase the cost of borrowing for governmental entities. Attempts by the US Treasury and Federal Reserve Bank to craft government-assisted solutions have achieved limited results to date. The Commonwealth has taken steps to refinance certain of the auction rate and variable rate demand bond debt that was adversely impacted by the market turmoil. In addition, the Commonwealth has been successful in accessing the market during the last few months to finance its capital program and to finance its cash flow needs, all at relatively favorable rates in light of current market conditions. In today’s market, in particular, the Commonwealth benefits from its strong credit rating. The Commonwealth is currently rated Aa2/AA/AA by Moody’s, Standard and Poor’s and Fitch, respectively. The ratings, which have been confirmed as recently as December 2008, have been unchanged for the past ten years with the exception of an upgrade to double-A by Standard & Poor’s in 2005. The ratings are based on each rating agency’s assessment of the capacity and willingness of the Commonwealth to repay general obligation debt. Although current market conditions make selling bonds more difficult and more costly than was previously the case, the Administration expects that the State Treasurer will be able to continue to access the bond market to finance the Commonwealth’s capital program. The Administration will continue to work with the State Treasurer to determine the most cost-effective approaches to issuing debt to finance the capital program in light of changing market conditions. Because the capital program is funded primarily through bond proceeds, the total size of the capital program is determined to a large extent by the amount of debt the Commonwealth can afford to issue. Since fiscal year 1991, A&F has established what is known as the “bond cap” to limit annual bond issuance in support of the capital program to affordable levels. For the second consecutive year, the Patrick-Murray Administration engaged in a rigorous analysis of the state’s outstanding debt obligations and of the state’s capacity to issue additional debt within affordable levels. Based on this analysis, the Administration has established the FY09 bond cap at $1.575 billion and it has projected a $25 million increase in the bond cap in FY10 and a $100 million increase in the bond cap in each succeeding fiscal year through FY13. These bond cap levels are lower in each fiscal year than was previously planned by the Administration in order to ensure that Commonwealth debt is kept to affordable levels within the constraints of the Administration’s debt affordability policy. In addition to the bond cap, $341 million of unused bond cap from FY08 will be carried forward and budgeted to support capital investments in subsequent fiscal years, as follows: $152.3 million in FY09; $126.1 million in FY10; and $62.6 million in FY11. In summary, the Administration takes a fiscally responsible approach to setting the annual bond cap, analyzing the Commonwealth’s capacity for debt issuance from the point-of-view of affordability. Specifically, A&F sets annual constraints on both the size of the bond cap and its future rate of growth by keeping combined debt service and payment of debt-like obligations for existing and new debt within 8% of budgeted revenues and by keeping future annual growth in the bond cap to not more than $125 million. As indicated in the updated affordability analysis, this latter constraint was not a factor in setting the bond caps for purposes of this five-year plan as the 8% limit was the overriding constraint. For purposes of its analysis of existing payment obligations, A&F takes into account not only debt service on general obligation bonds, but also debt service on certain special obligations, contract assistance obligations and certain capital lease payments. Although the recently authorized accelerated structurally-deficient bridge program is being carried out in addition to the regular capital program in order to achieve savings from avoided cost inflation and deferred maintenance and to achieve the other objectives of the program, the debt service resulting from the bridge program is also taken into account within the 8% limit under the debt affordability analysis. A&F also takes a conservative approach to projecting future budgeted revenues, basing its growth estimate on the lesser of 3% or the actual compound annual growth rate of the Commonwealth’s revenues from the last ten years – which included both economic booms and downturns. A&F models future debt issuance using fiscally conservative assumptions about interest rates, maturities, dates of issuance and payment schedules. In light of the extraordinary current economic and market conditions, however, the Administration’s updated debt affordability analysis upon which the capital plan is based includes a “Modified Analysis” with even more conservative assumptions regarding budgeted revenues and interest rates on Commonwealth borrowing. Based on this analytic approach and the Modified Analysis assumptions referenced above, A&F has projected that the Commonwealth will have the capacity to accommodate steady increases in the bond cap over the next four years while maintaining the percentage of the Commonwealth’s budgeted revenues needed to pay debt service during that period below 8%. The projected increases in the bond cap are, however, lower than previously planned by the Administration, reflecting the impact of current economic conditions. The Patrick-Murray Administration’s FY09-13 capital investment plan strategically allocates resources to invest in the Commonwealth’s public facilities and programs and represents a strong step forward toward the Administration’s vision for public infrastructure described above. The full five-year capital investment plan by major investment categories is presented below. It should be noted that many of the projects funded in FY09, some of which are highlighted below, are multi-year projects with expenses that will be incurred in subsequent fiscal years; these projected future expenses have been taken into account in making investment category reservations for future years. It is also important to note that projects will evolve and change, and A&F intends to adjust the capital plan during the fiscal year as circumstances dictate. Before the start of each new fiscal year, A&F will also undertake a formal reassessment of capital investment needs to develop an annual update to the five-year capital plan. The following tables show (a) the allocation of bond cap spending by major investment category for FY09-13, and (b) the allocation of total capital spending from all sources of funding by major investment category for FY09-13. The first table below shows a comparison of FY08 actual bond cap spending to FY09 budgeted bond cap spending by major investment category. The second table shows a comparison of the total capital spending from all funding sources between FY08 actual results and the FY09 budget. It should be noted that this presentation of bond cap spending by major investment categories was new last year – to the extent capital spending information was publicly presented prior to last year, it was typically categorized by the state agency authorized to carry out the spending. The Administration believes that the presentation by major investment category provides a more helpful and accurate portrayal of the purposes and priorities for which capital resources are being allocated. The $2.532 billion FY10 capital budget is based on the Five-Year Capital Investment Plan published in December 2008 and is consistent with the significant shift in capital investment priorities that began in FY08 by the Patrick-Murray Administration. At this point in the five-year budget cycle, amounts are allocated among investment categories for FY10, but not to specific projects for FY10. The Administration intends to update the five-year plan for FY10-14 and with updated information and needs identified, FY10 allocations will be made for specific projects and programs. The operating budget impact of these investments is considered in evaluating projects for funding, and those expenses – or savings – are reflected in agency operating budgets as needed. In addition, the Administration places a high priority on projects which will have a significant non-financial impact, such as those projects that will result in a cleaner environment, improved response time by public safety employees and access to public buildings and public transportation by all citizens, as more fully described in the investment categories below. The following table summarizes the total budgeted spending by investment category. The following highlights the Administration’s capital investment priorities for FY10 by each investment category. For more information about each investment category and projects and programs included in the capital budget, see mass.gov/capital for the complete Commonwealth of Massachusetts FY2009-2013 Five-Year Capital Investment Plan. The quality of municipally-owned infrastructure has an enormous impact on our daily lives and provides the necessary foundation for business to grow and flourish. The Patrick-Murray Administration is committed to partnering with cities and towns to improve infrastructure, promote economic growth, invest in public safety, affordable housing, smart growth development strategies, and energy efficiency. The Parkland Acquisitions and Renovations for Communities (PARC) program is representative of the of the Administration’s commitment to public spaces. In FY09, $8 million is budgeted for the PARC program which assists cities and town with the acquisition and development of land for park and recreational facilities. Investment in local public safety facilities. In order to carry out justice and to protect the citizens of the Commonwealth, it is important that we have secure and safe jails and correctional facilities for individuals charged with and convicted of crimes. It is also in the interest of society as a whole that those convicted of crimes come out of correctional facilities after serving their terms with the skills and mind-set needed to become productive members of society rather than repeat offenders. Underinvestment in our facilities has resulted in prison overcrowding, inadequate facilities for female inmates, an inability to adequately address an increasing number of mental health needs and the medical care required of an aging prisoner population. In addition to these important needs, our correctional facilities face significant ongoing capital maintenance needs. The Administration has proposed spending a total of $450 million of bond authorization for improvements to correctional facilities over the next ten years. Investment amounts for specific projects will be guided by the comprehensive 10-year master plan for capital investments in correctional facilities that is currently being developed. $1.2 million was invested in this master plan in FY09. FY10 spending will be targeted to certain critical repair projects, projects recommended in the master plan and improvements at correctional facilities aimed at preventing prisoner suicides, including the capital improvements recommended by the Hayes report. The Commonwealth operates 61 court facilities in 39 communities across the state. The Massachusetts Trial Court system also includes 25 county-owned courts and 28 other facilities. Significant capital spending on court facilities has occurred over the past five years yet continued investment is necessary not only for the effectiveness of court operations, but also for the health and safety of court staff and members of the public who participate in the judicial system. General repairs and renovations at courts across the state. Recognizing that an important way in which the Commonwealth can create and support job growth is through its investment in infrastructure, the FY10 capital investment plan makes targeted investments in economic development projects to help achieve this goal and to make Massachusetts more attractive and open to a wider range and greater number of businesses. Note that the investments included in the Economic Development investment category are those that are designed first and foremost for the purpose of supporting economic development. There are, however, hundreds of millions of dollars more in planned investments reflected in the Transportation, Community Investment and other investment categories in the capital investment plan that will support economic development and the creation of jobs in the Commonwealth. Continued funding for the Massachusetts Opportunity Relocation and Expansion (MORE) Jobs capital program which provides grants for public infrastructure improvements that support business expansion and relocation. Laying the groundwork for significant FY10 investment in the Massachusetts Broadband Initiative to provide affordable, accessible internet access to unserved and underserved areas of the state, was the $1.5 million spent in FY09. The capital component of Governor Patrick’s Life Sciences Initiative, which will support the building of new public research centers designed to attract academic and industry leaders to Massachusetts. Investment in the Growth Districts Infrastructure Investment Program as a means to expediting commercial and residential development within designated areas in the Commonwealth. Support the innovative financing tool known as I-Cubed to leverage new state revenue generated as a result of the Commonwealth’s investment in public infrastructure improvements necessary to support significant new private development to finance those improvements. The Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs stewards an incredible diversity of natural resources and infrastructure for the Commonwealth and managing these resources requires significant capital investment. In particular, capital funds pay for important infrastructure projects, such as flood control measures, dam rehabilitation, improvements to recreations facilities, wildlife habitat protection, environmental hazard remediation, park and trail maintenance, and open space acquisition. Other capital investments are made to projects and programs that contribute to clean water, clean air, clean energy, natural resources, agricultural resources and more. Clean and renewable energy investments, including energy efficiencies in state buildings and facilities, as consistent with the Governor’s Leading By Example – Clean Energy and Efficient Buildings Program. The provision of health care and other social services to those most in need has long been an important function of government, and in Massachusetts the provision of these services accounts for nearly half of the Commonwealth’s annual operating budget. The Health and Human Services facilities are numerous, including hospitals, clinic, long and short-term care facilities, power plants and garages. The average age of the HHS facilities was recently estimated to be 75 years since original construction and few facilities have undergone major upgrades in the recent past. The immense capital needs include investment in repair and maintenance to maintain service and care quality as well as basic public safety and the demolition of obsolete and unsafe structures. FY10 capital spending will continue to concentrate on the construction phase of a new state psychiatric hospital in Worcester that will replace two obsolete psychiatric hospitals and critical repairs and other improvements several facilities across the state. $45 million has been budgeted for the construction of this hospital in FY09. In addition, the Executive Office of Health and Human Services will complete a master plan in FY10 which will provide a complete current assessment of all HHS facilities and program needs. Future capital investment will be guided by the results of the master plan. The Administration believes strongly that our public colleges and universities should have the infrastructure necessary to ensure student access and affordability and be well-equipped to support academic achievement and learning for all students. They should also be responsive to the demand for a talented workforce ready and able to participate in a growing and increasingly global economy. Capital investments are critical to the mission. In fact, the Administration has planned for the most significant growth in bond-cap funded spending in this category. Investment will grow from 3% of the total bond-funded capital investment in 2007 to 10% by 2013. Focus on enhancing workforce training and development programs. The accessibility of desirable, affordable housing is a critical factor for the success of our economy, as new jobs will only be created if the workers needed to fill them can obtain desirable, affordable housing in close enough proximity to their places of employment. This accessibility is also an objective we should have as a caring, civilized society. There is much government does and can do in this area. State spending for housing in Massachusetts includes both state-supported public housing and private affordable housing development. The state’s public housing portfolio supports some of our most vulnerable citizens, including the elderly, veterans and clients of the state’s human services agencies. The public housing stock is in desperate need of maintenance and improvements. Private housing in Massachusetts has become increasingly expensive, with most Massachusetts residents citing housing costs as more of a concern than education and health care. The Patrick-Murray Administration is committed to making significant investments in affordable housing through the capital budget. For example, in FY09, $3.5 million was invested in housing near public transit as consistent with the Administration’s sustainable development principles. Continuing Governor Patrick’s commitment to public housing. Targeted spending for various private affordable housing development programs, including investment in the Affordable Housing Trust Fund, Housing Stabilization Fund and other programs supporting affordable home ownership. Information technology spans all areas of government. IT enables customer-facing functions such as transaction processing, license and permit applications and renewals, and public information access and alert; it also supports internal processes such as cross-agency information sharing, management efficiencies, and date security. While some agencies pay for certain small-scale IT projects from their operating budgets, most major IT installations are paid for by the capital budget. The 5-year capital plan makes strategic investments in IT, leveraging federal and other funds wherever possible. In FY09, for example, $6.8 million is budgeted to fund the final component of implementation of the statewide state-of-the-art digital wireless public safety radio network in western Massachusetts. Of particular focus in the FY10 capital budget will be the modernization of certain critical state IT systems to support the provision of more efficient, responsive and transparent government services, including beginning to replace and upgrade the outdated and overburdened systems at the Department of Revenue and the Registry of Motor Vehicles that support the administration and enforcement of state tax collections and motor vehicle fees. The Commonwealth’s capital spending supports important public safety projects and programs that ensure the safety of our citizens and communities. The capital needs range from crime prevention to disaster preparedness and response. For example, the FY09 budget includes $15 million for continuation of the expansion of the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy at Stow, the state’s primary training center for fire fighters. Significant public safety-related investments are also included in the Information Technology and Correctional Facilities categories. Investment in new fire training facilities. Safe, convenient and accessible state office buildings and facilities are necessary for the efficient and effective functioning of government. There exists a significant backlog of deferred maintenance in the state’s facilities and many require structural improvements, elevator replacements and improvements to comply with changing building codes and accessibility requirements. In the FY09 capital budget this issue was addressed by a $30 million investment in desperately needed maintenance and repair projects state-wide. Investment in energy efficiencies through conservation retrofits and renewable energy projects. Our network of transportation infrastructure is a critical factor affecting the strength of our economy, the quality of our environment and the quality of our lives. Our roads, bridges, mass transit and other modes of transportation provide us with access to work, school, and goods and services; they provide businesses with the ability to move their goods and services to meet demand; they impact our environment in different ways; and they provide us with the mobility and freedom to get where we want to go when we want to get there. High-quality, strategically developed transportation infrastructure is an essential component of a thriving economy, clean environment, and stable society. The FY09 capital budget included a $38 million investment in parkways and bridges in the metropolitan Boston area, including major repairs to the Storrow Drive tunnel. Perform critical repair needs on the Department of Conservation and Recreation roads and bridges. The five-year plan and the FY10 budget make the most of the limited resources available and make progress in addressing the tremendous needs of our transportation system. Transportation-related capital spending in FY09 is 33% greater than in FY08, and, by FY13, transportation-related capital spending is expected to be 122% more than FY08. As of October 1, 2008, there were 511 structurally-deficient MassHighway and municipal bridges in the state, plus an additional 57 structurally-deficient bridges owned and managed by entities such as the MBTA, the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority, the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) and others. Without significant new investment, the number of structurally-deficient bridges is expected to rise to nearly 700 over the next eight years. Following on a pledge to repair the Commonwealth’s most neglected bridges, on August 4, 2008 Governor Patrick signed into law a $3 billion bond bill, known as the Accelerated Bridge Program bond bill. The Accelerated Bridge Program will repair bridges across the Commonwealth that are currently structurally deficient or would otherwise become structurally deficient during that time period. Instead of seeing the number of structurally deficient bridges increase by approximately 30% over the next eight years, the number will be reduced by approximately 15% during that time. Major bridge repair projects across the state will be accelerated, including the Longfellow Bridge over the Charles River, the Fore River Bridge in Quincy, the Whittier Bridge in Amesbury and the Route 9 Bridge over Lake Quinsigamond in Shrewsbury and Worcester, as part of the program. Complete projects on time and on budget and with minimum disruption to people and commerce. Innovative means of contracting techniques will be employed. Approximately $2.1 billion is allocated to MassHighway for bridges under its control or owned by cities and towns, and approximately $900 million is allocated to the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) for bridges under its control. Expenditures will occur over a period of eight years.
2019-04-26T15:59:03Z
https://budget.digital.mass.gov/bb/h1/fy10h1/cap10/hdefault.htm
At first glance there does not seem to be anything philosophically problematic about human enhancement. Activities such as physical fitness routines, wearing eyeglasses, taking music lessons and prayer are routinely utilized for the goal of enhancing human capacities. This entry is not concerned with every activity and intervention that might improve people’s embodied lives. The focus of this entry is a cluster of debates in practical ethics that is conventionally labeled as “the ethics of human enhancement”. These debates include clinicians’ concerns about the limits of legitimate health care, parents’ worries about their reproductive and rearing obligations, and the efforts of competitive institutions like sports to combat cheating, as well as more general questions about distributive justice, science policy, and the public regulation of medical technologies. As usual in practical ethics, an adequate discussion of any specific debate under this heading quickly requires orientation to the science underlying particular enhancement interventions and an appreciation of the social and political contexts in which it unfolds. At each turn in these discussions, wide vistas of background philosophical topics also appear for exploration. Rather than providing a detailed account of this whole landscape, this entry hikes a narrow ridge between the different dimensions of the topic, pointing out the side trails but not following them into their respective thickets. Instead, it traces a path of core concerns that winds through all the current debates on the ethics of human enhancement, as guide for those interested in exploring further. To look ahead, our claim is that three sets of philosophical considerations are key to navigating this literature: first, conceptual concerns about the limits of legitimate health care, then moral worries about fairness, authenticity and human nature, and finally political questions about governance and policy. 2. What are the Proper Limits of Health Care? 3. Is it Cheating to Use Enhancements? 4. Do Enhancements Compromise Authenticity? As our preface suggests, the ordinary use of the phrase “human enhancement” covers a wide range of practices, most of which are not explored in the enhancement ethics literature. To orient our tour, both “human” and “enhancement” merit some initial clarification, even before we pursue the ways they are interpreted and debated in the literature. For example, as section 2.3 below shows, equivocations between biological and evaluative senses of the term “human” are rich sources of many superficial disagreements in these debates. Is there anything special about being a member of the biological species homo sapiens that enhancements could threaten, or are those who criticize enhancement as “dehumanizing” really thinking about the loss of other markers of the moral status we confer on persons? To look ahead, we think it will become clear in the sections below that the ethical issues at the heart of the debate about human enhancement are not about policing the biological boundaries of the species homo sapiens. At this point, however, it is enough to note that we are foreclosing neither sense of “human” from the start, but will stay alert to both until it becomes important to distinguish and relate them. With “enhancement”, on the other hand, it is helpful to specify a working definition from the start. We understand the practices that are being debated in the enhancement ethics literature to be biomedical interventions that are used to improve human form or functioning beyond what is necessary to restore or sustain health. This broad definition flows from and reflects the foundational literature in this area (Parens 1998), but it also has several implications that are sometimes forgotten. First, it means that simple line-drawing exercises aimed at isolating “enhancement technologies” from other biomedical interventions for special precautionary regulation or oversight are destined to be ineffective (pace Anderson 1989). There are no “enhancement technologies” per se. Whether a given biomedical intervention counts as an enhancement depends on how it is used. When ankle-strengthening surgery is used to improve a bicyclist’s competitive edge, it might raise enhancement concerns, but as a treatment for a bicyclist’s ankle injury, it does not. This means that the developers of even the most outré enhancement interventions will almost always be able to appeal to some correlative therapeutic uses to justify their research, testing, and release into the market (Mehlman 1999). On the other hand, simply pointing out that biomedical technologies can have both therapeutic and enhancement uses does nothing to collapse the logical distinction between those uses, or to defeat the claim that those distinguishable uses might warrant different ethical responses (Buchanan 2011). (almost entirely hypothetical) genetic and neurological manipulations to increase the human life span, acquire new sensory-motor abilities, and, through “moral enhancement”, live together in more peaceable, generous, and just ways (cf. Savulescu, ter Meulen and Kahane 2011). Of course, the line between biomedical and other enhancements is often blurry. Caffeine is a drug that can heighten alertness, but coffee drinking is a social practice outside the biomedical sphere. Meditation and prayer can have the same physiological effects as drugs. The “cyborgs” of science fiction blend human bodies with electronic and mechanical tools. The prospect of uploading minds into computers to create bodiless human life is sometimes characterized as “radical enhancement” (Agar 2013). But as important and intriguing as these mixed cases are from ethical and conceptual perspectives (Hogle 2005), this essay will only engage them in two ways. The first is when they help advance our understanding of core issues raised by the enhancement uses of the emerging biomedical technologies. The second is when, inevitably, our discussion of biomedical enhancements uncovers insights that reflect back upon the ethical dimensions of these other practices. Finally, our definition implies that enhancement interventions attempt to improve specific human capacities and traits, rather than whole persons. Unlike such comprehensive personal-improvement strategies such as prayer, psychoanalysis, or “the power of positive thinking”, biomedical enhancements are, at best, a piecemeal approach to human perfectibility. As a result, most biomedical enhancements involve trade-offs. If extended life span comes with prolonged frailty, or if enhanced altruism compromises survival skills, the overall value of the enhancement can be called into question (Shickle 2000). An important part of the orientation for those new to thinking about enhancement ethics is the ways in which current debates are shaped by the history of earlier efforts at perfecting people. At one level, perfectionist and meliorist impulses have deep roots in Western philosophical and religious thinking, which both modern science and medicine have inherited (Keenan 1999; Comfort 2012). Most advocates and critics of biomedical enhancement share these cultural commitments, but have disagreeing visions of the ideal (Roduit, Baumann, and Heilinger 2013; Parens, 2005). Other scholars, recalling the historical imposition of hegemonic religious and political visions of salvation and citizenship, fear the elevation of any canonical account of existing human virtues, in favor of visions that prize people’s capacity to shape their own ideals through reason, autonomy, and democratic deliberation (Sparrow, 2014; Buchanan 2011). Others, pointing to the consequences of modern individualism for the common good (Persson and Savelescu 2012), feel confident about being able to name the constellation of existing human traits that should either be preserved (Kass 1997; Annas 1998; Agar, 2013) or enhanced (Bostrom, 2003). However, almost no one in this literature eschews the development and use of new medical tools for healing purposes (Kamm 2005; Kass 2003). Because of this, a first step in our discussion is to scrutinize the distinction between treatment and enhancement, to see if it can help demarcate where different melioristic ideals diverge. Another, perhaps more visible, backdrop for the enhancement ethics literature is the history of the 20th century eugenics movement, which attempted to “breed better people” and “improve the human gene pool” through socially biased reproductive controls and inducements (Wikler 1999). This background prompts questions about the cultural authority of science and the social values it can perpetuate, and raises fears of slippery slopes that can lead to egregious forms of oppression, by providing a vivid recent counter-narrative to endorsements of enhancement as a way to fulfill our obligations to future generations (Sparrow 2011; Selgelid, 2013). The eugenics backdrop tends to skew the burden of proof the other way in the debate, towards a more “precautionary” stance that gives advocates of enhancement the burden of distinguishing their proposals from old style eugenics in order to defend the parts of that ideology that they share (Kitcher 1997; Harris, 2007; Agar 2004). Finally, in the historical foreground for enhancement ethics are contemporary critiques of the commercialization (and homogenization) of beauty through “aesthetic medicine” (Bordo 1993), the evolving history of pharmaceutical performance enhancement in sports (Hoberman 1992), and the scientific career of human gene transfer and ‘genetic engineering’ (Friedman 1998). Each of these stories supports a literature of its own, which has contributed important insights to the broader discussion of enhancement ethics. From feminist and disability studies come critiques of the medicalization of human beauty, focusing on complicity with unjust social norms that can turn ordinary welfare meliorism on its head to prioritize the enhancement uses of biomedicine over standard therapeutic applications (Silvers 1998). Meanwhile, discussions of “doping” in sport have illuminated the ways in which enhancement interventions can undermine communal social practices that depend on presumptions of equality, lifting the discussion above the level of individual choices and transactions (Murray, 1987; 2009). Similarly the checkered career of human gene therapy has kept on the table the need to anticipate the physical risks of putative improvements, and how daunting they would make the foreseeable prospect of any intergenerational “germ line” enhancement intervention (Walters and Palmer, 1997; Kimmelman, 2009). All of these contextual “back-stories” to the contemporary enhancement debates are worth exploring further. They have shaped contemporary thinking about and reactions to enhancement proposals and provide important cautionary tales to keep in mind when evaluating those proposals. At the same time, these back-stories bring their own assumptions and biases into the discussion, and can thereby complicate a fresh philosophical assessment. While much of the enhancement ethics literature leans towards thought experiments set in the future, it is grounded in a set of important debates about how health care should be defined today. In these debates, the claim is often made that the distinction between using biomedical tools to combat human disease and attempting to use them to enhance human traits can provide practical guidance on a range of issues, including the limits of health professionals’ obligations (Miller, Brody and Chung 2000), the scope of health care payment plans (Daniels and Sabin 1994), and the prioritization of biomedical research protocols (Mehlman, Berg, Juengst and Kodish 2011). In each of these cases, the line between treatment and enhancement is drawn to mark an upper boundary of professional and social obligations. Just as the concept of futile treatment is used to indicate the limits of a doctor’s obligations when further intervention no longer can achieve therapeutic goals, enhancement interventions are thought to fall outside health care’s proper domain of practice by going “beyond therapy” in pursuit of other non-medical goals. This means that patients have no role-related right to demand such services from health professionals, fair insurance coverage plans may exclude them, and those who do provide them bear a burden of justification for doing so that does not apply to “medically necessary” interventions. As a biomedical boundary marker, the distinction between treatment and enhancement has been enshrined in policies at both professional and governmental levels, and continues to inform much of the public discussion of new biomedical advances. However, this distinction is explicated in several different ways, which have different merits as boundary markers for biomedical research and practice. In fact, with philosophical scrutiny, the distinction often seems in danger of collapsing entirely under conceptual critiques even before the question of its moral merits is entertained. When it is used as a medical boundary concept, enhancement, like futility, plays both descriptive and normative roles. To use these concepts, we need to be able to identify our efforts as either futile or enhancing and we need to know what the boundary means for going further. Part of the practical challenge for policy-makers is that for enhancement interventions, these descriptive and normative implications seem to be at cross-purposes. While futile treatments do no good, enhancements are by definition and description improvements in personal welfare. Yet, the boundary function of calling them “enhancements” in health policy settings is to place them outside of sanctioned interventions. For a field dedicated to pursuing improved welfare for its patients, the fact that enhancements often look just like all the other improvements that health care strives to achieve makes it difficult to discern when an intervention transgresses the normative boundary that the concept purports to mark. This has provoked three major ways of operationalizing the enhancement concept, each of which seeks to redress the weaknesses of its predecessor, which are covered in the next three subsections. The first approach to defining the line between treatment and enhancement appeals to the health professions’ conventional vision of their proper domain. Accordingly, “treatments” are any interventions that the professional standards of care endorse, while “enhancements” are any interventions that the professions declare to be beyond their purview. Attempts by professional societies to police their own frontiers by discouraging particular practices as “enhancement” rather than “treatment” reflect this approach, as do appeals to “community standards” by health care payers seeking to distinguish “elective” from “medically necessary” interventions for payment. For those committed to a particular account of the goals of health care, this approach can offer normative guidance for internal criticism of suspect professional practices (Kass 1985). But of course, there are numerous competing philosophies of health care, none of which command universal allegiance within the health professions. In fact, this approach also resonates well with those who argue that the health professions have no intrinsic domain of practice, beyond that which they can negotiate with patients (Good 1994). For those influenced by this libertarian view of professional autonomy, the normative lesson for professionals concerned about their obligations in specific cases can be simple: whatever interventions their patients will accept can be considered “treatments”, while “enhancements” are simply those interventions which individual health professionals refuse to provide (Engelhardt 1990). Unfortunately, medical historians and sociologists point out that the health professions have always been adept at adapting to the cultural beliefs and social values of the institutions and communities they serve. This is done by ‘medicalizing’ new problems so that they come to be seen as a legitimate part of medicine’s jurisdiction (Conrad 2007). Given the health professions’ philosophical pluralism and political autonomy, their own conventions seem to provide no principled way to exclude new interventions from their domain. To the extent that useful “upper-boundary” concepts are required at the policy level (e.g., for societies making health care allocation decisions) this impotence is an important failing for this approach to drawing the distinction. There is another approach to interpreting the treatment/enhancement distinction that seeks to provide a firmer theoretical foundation for delimiting legitimate health care needs. On this approach, to be healthy is to be able to do all that appropriately matched members of one’s own species can do, in our case what human beings of similar age and gender can do. Legitimate health care needs or “health problems” or “diseases” or “maladies” are all characterized by a fall from that level of functional capacity. All proper health care services, therefore, should be aimed at getting people back to “normal”, e.g., restoring an individual’s functional capability to the species-typical range for their reference class, and within that range to the particular capability level which was the patient’s genetic birthright. Interventions which take people to the top of their personal potential (like athletic training) or beyond their own birth range (like growth hormone), or to the top of the range of their reference class, or to the top of the species-typical range, or beyond (!), are all to be counted as enhancements and fall successively further beyond the responsibility of medicine or health care. The advantage of the normal function account is that it provides a single (relatively) unified goal for health care, towards which the burdens and benefits of various interventions can be relatively objectively titrated, balanced, and integrated. Normal functionalists can use physiology to determine when they’ve achieved the species typical range and clinical histories to determine when they’ve brought a patient up to the baseline of his or her personal capability range. Some critics of the normal function approach take issue with its focus on the “species-typical range”, arguing that it is insensitive to the diversity of ways in which human beings can flourish in life. They point out that those born with disabilities may be wary of biomedicine’s “fatal attraction to normalizing”.( Silvers, 1998; Asch and Block, 2011) Moreover, even when no amount of treatment can give someone “species typical” functioning, there may be compensatory technologies that can actually expand their range of opportunities beyond the norm (Silvers 1998). Should powered wheelchairs be designed to slow and stop at the same distance that walking humans would succumb to fatigue, in order to keep them from “enhancing” their users’ abilities? By the same token, the naturally gifted may find that they have no claim to treatment for injuries or accidents that merely bring them down into the “normal range”. If our champion thinkers, athletes and saints can legitimately claim treatment for problems that impair their species-optimal functioning, bringing the rest of us up to their levels should count as proper health care as well. But that leaves only the most extreme improvements on the other side of the “enhancement” boundary: if our species champions are the benchmark, only interventions that create capacities no human has had before would fall beyond medicine’s proper domain. Individualizing the optimal functional range to individual genomic potentials will not resolve this problem, of course, to the extent that our genomes themselves become biomedically malleable. Establishing the “species-typical norm” for a particular human function is a difficult enough task, even where descriptive statistics can help. But when the boundary is “optimal” not “normal” functioning, the evidentiary foundations of the approach begin to come apart (Sculley and Rehman-Sutter 2008). The second serious problem for the normal function approach is the challenge of prevention. While some efforts at health promotion, such as exercise, straddle the border of medical responsibility, many preventive interventions (i.e., vaccines) are widely accepted as legitimate parts of medicine’s mission and are located squarely on the treatment side of the enhancement boundary. One of the ways to prevent disease is to strengthen the body’s ability to resist pathological changes before any diagnosable problem appears. But to the extent that prevention attempts to elevate bodily functions above the normal range for the individual (and, in some cases, even the species typical range), it seems to slide into what the normal function approach would call enhancement. If the normal function account is taken seriously as a biomedical boundary marker, how does one defend this kind of prevention? Conversely, if preventive interventions like these are acceptable in medicine, what can it mean to claim that researchers and clinicians should be “drawing the line” at enhancement? Probably the most common rejoinder to the problem of prevention is to distinguish the problems to which they respond. Treatments are interventions that address the health problems created by diagnosable diseases and disabilities—“maladies” in the helpful language of Gert, Culver and Clouser (2006). Enhancements, on the other hand, are interventions aimed at healthy systems and traits. Thus, prescribing biosynthetic growth hormone to rectify a diagnosable growth hormone deficiency is legitimate treatment, while prescribing it for patients with normal growth hormone levels would be an attempt at “positive genetic engineering” or enhancement (Berger and Gert 1991). On this account, to justify an intervention as appropriate medicine means to be able to identify a malady in the patient. If no medically recognizable malady can be diagnosed, the intervention cannot be “medically necessary” and is thus suspect as an enhancement. This would clear the way for safe and effective genetic “vaccines” against predictable muscle damage (even if they provided better than normal damage resistance) but would screen out as “enhancements” efforts to improve traits that were at no diagnosable risk of deterioration (Juengst 1997). These accounts have the advantage of being simple, intuitively appealing, and consistent with a lot of biomedical behavior. Maladies are objectively observable phenomena and the traditional target of medical intervention. We can know maladies through diagnosis, and we can tell that we have gone beyond medicine when no pathology can be identified. Thus, pediatric endocrinologists discourage enhancement uses of biosynthetic growth hormone by citing the old adage “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. This interpretation is also at work in the efforts of professionals working at the boundary, like cosmetic surgeons, to justify their services. They claim to be relieving “diagnosable” psychological suffering (“mental maladies”) rather than satisfying the aesthetic tastes of their clients, and insurance companies insist on being provided with that diagnosis before providing coverage for such surgeries. On the other hand, disease-based accounts also face at least two major difficulties. The first is one they share with the Professional Domain account: the problem of biomedicine’s infamous nosological elasticity. It is not hard to coin new maladies for the purposes of justifying the use of enhancement interventions (Carey, Melvin and Ranney 2008). Unless some specific (and usually contentious) theory of disease is employed to give this approach its teeth, it puts the power for drawing the boundary back into the profession’s hands, and raises the same worries about the social consequences of medicalization (Parens 2013). The more important practical problem is that no matter how the line is drawn, most biotechnological interventions that could be seen as problematic if used as enhancements will not need to be justified as enhancements in order to be developed and approved for clinical use. This is because most such interventions will also have legitimate therapeutic applications. Indeed, most biomedical tools with potential for enhancement uses will first emerge as therapeutic agents. For example, general cognitive enhancement interventions are likely to be approved for use only in patients with neurological diseases. However, to the extent that they are in high demand by individuals suffering the effects of normal aging, the risk of unapproved or “off-label” uses will be high (Whitehouse, et. al, 1997). This last point is critical for policy purposes, because it suggests that, in countries like the USA, the real challenge may not be regulation of the development of enhancement interventions, but rather the regulation of downstream “off-label” uses of therapeutic interventions for non-medical, enhancement purposes. The policy problems then become problems about controlling access and use of certain interventions, rather than their development. Of course, the fact that a certain type of intervention is declared illegal for physicians to dispense, does not immediately imply that it should be immoral for everyone to pursue or other competent professionals to provide. These realities have pressed those who would use the treatment/enhancement distinction for policy purposes to articulate the moral dangers of biomedical enhancement more clearly. Even if doctors eschew such use on professional ethical grounds, are there independent moral reasons why individual athletes, parents, students or other “consumers” of enhancement interventions, should turn away from their availability? One of the kinds of human enhancement that has received extensive philosophical attention in recent years is the use of biomedical interventions to improve the physical performance of athletes in the context of sports (Miah 2004; Murray 2009; Tolleneer 2013). One reason athletic performance enhancement garners so much attention is because of its currency, given the epidemic of “doping” scandals in contemporary sport. Another reason, however, is that it seems to serve as a paradigm case for teasing out important dimensions of the problem: it involves measurable improvements in biological capacities in a social context that is both well outside health care and defined by clear rules of engagement. At first impression, the ethical problem with performance enhancement in sport would seem to be simply a problem of cheating (Schermer, 2008a). If the rules of sport forbid the use of performance enhancements, then their illicit use confers an advantage to users against other athletes (who either accept the rules of the game or do not have access to the enhancement interventions). That advantage, in turn, can create pressure for more athletes to cheat in the same way, undermining the basis for the competitions at stake and exacerbating the gap between those who can afford enhancements and those who cannot (Murray 1987). Extrapolating from sports to a competitive view of society at large, critics argue that the social acceptance of enhancement interventions in other spheres would also create unfair advantages for those with access to them, and perhaps lead to the development of new social divides between classes of “genobility” and the “genpoor”, raising fundamental justice and human rights concerns (Mehlman 2003, 2009; Buchanan, Brock, Wickler and Daniels 2000; Sparrow 2011). Much of the rhetoric about “doping” assumes the very claim that needs to be established by argument: that the rules of sport (or the norms of social advancement) ought to ban the use of biomedical enhancement. The rules of a game can be changed. In sports, novel forms of performance enhancing equipment and training are routinely introduced as athletic technology and expertise evolve. Where issues of athletes’ equitable access arise, they can be dealt with in one of two ways. Sometimes it is possible to ensure fair distribution, as for example, when the International Olympic Committee negotiated an agreement with the manufacturer of the new “FastSkin” swimming suit to provide suits to all the teams at the Sydney Olympics. In other cases, inequalities may simply come to be accepted as unfortunate but not unfair. This is, for example, how many people would view a story about an equatorial country that could not afford year-round artificial snow for its ski team, and so could not compete evenly with the ski teams of northern countries. If enhancement interventions can either be distributed fairly or the inequities they create can be written into the rules of the social game in question as part of the given advantages of the more fortunate, then individual users no longer face a fairness problem. For those who can afford it, for example, what would be ethically suspect about mounting a mirror image of the “Special Olympics” for athletes with disabilities: a “Super Olympics”, featuring athletes universally equipped with the latest modifications and enhancements? (Munthe 2000) For answers to that challenge, the critics of biomedical enhancement have to dig beyond concerns about the fair governance of games to a deeper and broader sense of “cheating”, in terms of the corrosive effects of enhancement on the integrity of admirable human practices (Loland 2002; Schermer 2008a). On this view, to the extent that biomedical shortcuts allow specific accomplishments to be divorced from the admirable practices they were designed to reflect, the social value of those accomplishments will be undermined. If one’s good grades are gained by drug fueled “cramming” rather than disciplined study, their value as evidence of learning diminish. This means that for institutions interested in continuing to foster the social values for which they have traditionally been the guardians, choices will have to be made. Either they must redesign their games to find new ways to evaluate excellence in the admirable practices that are not affected by available enhancements, or they must prohibit the use of the enhancing shortcuts. However, knowing which way to go suggests that one has a theory of the social practice at risk and of the values that animate it. The case of sport again leads the way down this path in the literature, perhaps because, unlike most important social practices that might be susceptible to enhancement shortcuts (like child-rearing, education, love, politics, and spiritual growth), the stakes are low enough to allow for some deliberate policy-making at the international level. For example, one prominent theory that has influenced the work of The World Anti-Doping Association (WADA), the international organization committed to policing performance enhancement in elite sport, is the view that just as healing is the point or goal or end of surgery, so the virtuous perfection of natural talents is the point or goal or end of sport (Murray 2009). This statement has several important features for the enhancement debate. Sport is concerned with celebrating differences in natural talents and the virtues that can be displayed in attempts to differentiate one’s own talents even further. The virtues that sport celebrates are socially admirable habits and traits in and of themselves, and their promotion is what gives sport social value as a practice. However, within the practice, the virtues are instrumental (as either side-constraints or facilitators) to the perfection of the athlete’s natural talents—i.e., to their differentiation from other people’s talents. Although the key role of hierarchical ranking in sport is often ignored in the rhetoric of sports organizations, philosophers of sport acknowledge that fixation with hierarchical ranking—with competition, contest, score-keeping, record-breaking, championship, victory and defeat—is pervasive in the everyday practice of sport (Coakley 1998) and that comparing and ranking two or more competitors…defines sports characteristic social structure (Loland 2002, 10). Sport creates a system of values, virtues, and practices that are designed to hierarchically grade people in terms of their (virtuously perfected) inherited traits and glorifies the best specimens as champions. What is unfair about enhancement, on this view, is that enhancement interventions undermine the ability of sport to distinguish those who passively inherited their talents from their progenitors from those who actively acquired them from their physicians (Sandel 2004). But this outcome seems to display the very problem that the fairness critique of enhancement was meant to combat: the danger of fomenting distributive injustice by creating social hierarchies of advantage on arbitrary grounds (Tännsjö 2000; Tännsjö 2005). On one hand, of the many ways humans use inherited traits to create interpersonal hierarchies, athletic competition is amongst the most benign. When it is “just a game”, comparative interpersonal ranking in terms of genetic identity in sports is a welcome substitute for blood feuds, racism, and genocide. But when sport becomes a matter of national pride and a source of economic opportunity, athletic losers risk more than simply admiration and social status: like insurance applicants with genetic susceptibilities, less naturally talented athletes risk access to important social benefits and potential life plans. In this regard, the challenge that performance enhancement poses to sport is its indictment of the accepted social practice itself rather than its threat to undermine it. The availability of biomedical abilities to undermine competition simply raises the question: are there ways to enjoy, appreciate and even show off our bodies and abilities without requiring someone else to lose social standing on genetic grounds? For the case of sports, it seems like this line of fairness arguments ultimately backfires on the critics of enhancement. It opens the door to thinking about enhancements as means to render the practice more rather than less fair. Whether or not fairness arguments would have a similar effect in debates about enhancement in the realm of other social practices, like parenting or diplomacy, is still an open question. But the theme of “cheating” has also been taken in another direction by the enhancement ethics literature, into concerns about the authenticity of accomplishments achieved with the help of enhancements and the integrity of the enhanced individuals that claim their rewards. The intuitive worry of authors who take this question seriously is that biomedical enhancements might not only create corrosive short-cuts within valuable social practices, but also rob those who use them of things they otherwise cherish about themselves—endurance, determination, growth, faith, even luck—by substituting “hollow victories” for authentic achievements. Losing the experience of authentic achievements, in turn, diminishes the character of the user (Sandel 2007), alienating them from themselves and those around them (Agar 2013), and diminishing bonds of solidarity with non-users (Sparrow 2014). Unpacking this intuitive concern into arguments can take multiple paths. It matters, for example, whether the actors are parents enhancing their children or adults enhancing themselves (Habermas 2003), and whether accepted therapeutic uses of the same tools should face the same critique (Elliott 2011). In order to decide whether particular enhancements compromise authenticity in the ways that these authors suggest, it is important to be clear about what kinds of things are the appropriate targets of attributions of authenticity. Do enhancements undermine the authenticity of one’s self, agency, achievements or actions? Authenticity is widely understood to be a matter of being “true to oneself”. Many authors in these debates do not take the time to carefully explicate their assumptions about “the self” and what it takes to be “true to” it. It is, of course, a challenge to characterize the self to which authentic individuals are true (Trilling, 1971; Taylor 1991; Guignon 2004). If there is a self, then there are difficult synchronic identification questions (i.e., at a given time, what features are constitutive of an agent?) and diachronic identification questions (i.e., across time, what features must persist in order for the self to survive?) that must be resolved. Derek Parfit, working in a tradition of “bundle theories of the self”, articulated the influential position that a person is nothing over and above a series of person-stages that are linked across time by certain psychological continuity relations (Parfit 1984). Given the controversy surrounding these debates about the nature of persons and personal identity, it is no surprise that there is little consensus about whether enhancements undermine authenticity of the self. One style of argument for the claim that enhancements undermine authenticity is to contend that we could claim no personal credit for accomplishments that are the result of biomedical enhancements, because the biomedical interventions that caused improvements in our capacities would supersede our own agency in authoring the achievement (Sandel 2007). Defenders of this perspective argue that while, for example, education, training, and practice proceed through “speech and deeds” that are comprehensible by those who are learning a new skill, when biomedical enhancements are used they have “their effects on a subject who is not merely passive but who plays no role at all. In addition, he can at best feel their effects without understanding their meaning in human terms” (Kass 2003, 22). One reply to this argument is that if one has freely chosen to use an enhancement on the basis of “speech and deeds”, it is unclear how those enhancements are passive or less authentic than traditional methods of improving one’s capacities (Kamm 2005). Moreover, just as we hold those with enhanced abilities to higher standards of responsibility for negligence and harm (Mehlman 2003), our expectations for enhanced achievements may be correspondingly high. But in both situations neither the enhanced actors’ agency in improving themselves nor their authorship of the results seems to be in question (Cole-Turner 1998). Other critics of biomedical enhancements that appeal to considerations of authenticity acknowledge that enhanced individuals do author their accomplishments, but question whether those successes carry the same value as “authentic” unenhanced achievements (Habermas, 2003; Sandel, 2007; Bublitz and Merkel, 2009). They maintain that when a marathon runner gains endurance chemically rather than through training, or when a mystic gains Nirvana through psychosurgery rather than meditation, each misses the point of these types of accomplishments. In the cases of marathon running and meditation, the outcomes of the activity cannot be separated from the activity itself: the value of the accomplishment lies in the personal activities they reward as well as the benefits they bring (Schermer, 2008a). However, even if these criticisms show that authentic, unenhanced achievements are valuable for reasons that do not apply to the enhanced achievement, they do not show that the unenhanced approach is, overall, better. Such criticisms merely establish that the two are valued differently. It is still possible that the enhanced achievement may have its own distinctive type of value. As the history shows, the character-building struggles that we admire seem adept at keeping pace with our tools. Legend has it that Celtic warriors eschewed body armor (and even clothing!) in battle because they thought it diminished the glory of a true victory. Some authors used to insist that keyboards corrupt the writing process. According to this historical narrative, biomedical enhancements have provided humans with important tools for self-creation that should be embraced (DeGrazia 2000; Agar 2004). Another set of authenticity concerns arises in arguments that focus on enhancement interventions performed by parents in conceiving and raising their children (Habermas 2003). Here, the claim is that offspring who have no agency in deciding whether or not to be enhanced are (existentially) cheated of their authentic identities and the autonomy to create themselves as others normally do. Taken literally, this argument runs into the logical problems of identity that plague “wrongful birth” suits in the law (these children have no prior identity to lose), and depends on too extreme a version of genetic or biological determinism to be credible, given the plausible causal efficacy of any of the possible enhanced interventions under discussion (these children’s futures are no more restricted than any other participant in the natural genetic lottery) (Buchanan 2011). As a result, a more common approach is to use such claims to draw attention to parental or social attitudes about procreation and parenting that seem morally problematic, whether or not their offspring are directly harmed or wronged by being enhanced (Davis, 2010) Evaluating these arguments also requires one to get clear about the nature and scope of the moral right to be a parent and the duties of parents to their children. In the background of the debates over both the boundaries of medicine and the ethics of self-improvement looms a third important set of philosophical concerns, which are about the implications of new biomedical enhancement interventions for our common understanding of human nature and the future of our species. Critics emphasize “dystopian nightmares” and worry that enhancement interventions may rob us of central normative features of our identity as human beings (Mehlman 2012). Enhancement enthusiasts, on the other hand, embrace the possibility that biomedicine might change human nature for the better, and some even look forward to the emergence of the trans-humans or post-persons as the next step in (intentionally directed) human evolution (Harris 2007). At stake in these debates is whether, or how much, normative weight to assign features of the human condition that have traditionally been taken as given (e.g., the families into which we are born and our natural talents and abilities) or inevitable (such as, pain and ageing). Moral philosophy has a long history of making normative appeals to human nature. There are thorny philosophical issues about whether such appeals are ever legitimate. Even since David Hume warned us not to derive an “ought” from an “is”, philosophers have been wary of making strong inferences about what ought to be done directly from claims about human nature. However, the tradition of virtue ethics is much more comfortable with adopting a naturalistic approach that holds that human nature is the basis for what constitutes human well-being and the virtues (for human beings) (Fitzgerald, 2008; Keenan, 1999). Explaining what is worth cherishing about being human is an intuitive starting point for making sense of ourselves, our relationships with other human beings, and the world around us. The task of getting clear about what we do and should value about being human has important implications for the ethics of biomedical enhancements. Three features of human nature are at the center of many debates about the ethics of biomedical enhancement. The first feature is human vulnerability. According to one prominent view, human beings are creatures that suffer, age and die, and our struggle to deal with this vulnerability is a central aspect of what makes human life valuable (Parens 1995). There are several sub-groups within the group of theorists that emphasize the value of vulnerability in understanding the value of being human. The first group consists of “life cycle traditionalists” who criticize ambitions to control the human ageing process and extend the human life span (Callahan 1995). The second group consists of the “personalists”, who valorize the way in which human limitations are humbling and encourage modesty (Fitzgerald 2008). The third group consists of “psychopharmaceutical Calvinists” who discourage easy fixes to melancholy and sadness (Elliot 1998). The second feature of human nature that is emphasized in these debates is discussed by species preservationists and environmentalists who stress our embodiment and place in nature alongside other organisms: “by nature”, we are biological creatures of a particular family, defined by painfully evolved “species barriers”, and enhancements that blur or bend those boundaries by “directing evolution” do so at our peril (McKibben 2004). The third feature of human nature that is often discussed in these debates is our sociality. According to these theorists, human beings are social creatures that relate to one another through a complex nexus of interpersonal commitments and hierarchical structures (Liao 2006a; Liao 2006b). Many sports theorists see the “virtuous perfection of natural talents” as the goal of athletic competitions. If one accepts this view, then victories fueled by biomedical enhancements that subvert the natural interpersonal hierarchies that genetic disparities in talent create can literally “dehumanize” sport (Tolleneer, Steryck and Bonte 2013). Each family of theories described above that emphasizes a feature of human nature as the basis for its position in the enhancement debate utilizes a tool that is double-edged. As defenders of trans-humanism point out, each feature of human nature that can produce positive value for humans can just as easily be a source of human misery, which the history of technological progress has been legitimately concerned with alleviating (Juengst 2004). In fact, the enthusiasts argue, there are no static features of the human condition: human vulnerabilities to our environment have steadily decreased over history, our moral kinship communities have expanded, and our tolerance for oppressive forms of social organization has dwindled (Bostrom, 2003). Accordingly, to appeal to these features of human nature in abstraction cannot be helpful in deciding which vulnerabilities to honor, which family loyalties to respect, and which social arrangements to defend and develop. Where a biomedical intervention alters one of these dimensions of human nature, this is a signal that the moral stakes are high. But those stakes are not always about what might be lost from the human experience. There are also moral dangers in what might be perpetuated, if we allow the preservation of these hallmarks of human nature to overshadow our other values. One popular response to the enthusiasm of the trans-humanists is to draw a line against interventions that might take their recipients out of our biological species altogether. This is usually framed as a minimal proposal to ban the clearest possible cases of immoral manipulation, on which everyone could agree. From proponents of “responsible genetics” (Council for Responsible Genetics 1993) to defenders of our “genetic patrimony” as the “common heritage of all humanity” (Knoppers 1991), to the “anti-post-humanist” life cycle traditionalists, the prospect of “species altering experiments” which might “direct” human evolution is provoking resistance (Mehlman, 2012). A classic example of this resistance is the appeal for a UN convention on genetic technologies framed in terms of “the preservation of the human species” (Annas, Andrews, and Isasi 2002). Its advocates claim that any intervention that would “alter the essence of humanity itself by taking human evolution into our own hands and directing it toward the development of a new species sometimes termed the “post-human” should be considered a “crime against humanity” because it would undermine the “foundation of human rights” and set the stage for human extinction. Of course, species are not static collections of organisms that can be “preserved” against change like a can of fruit; they wax and wane with every birth and death and their genetic complexions shift across time and space (Robert and Bayliss 2003). In our case, almost everything we do as humans has ramifications on that process. To argue that everyone has the right to inherit “an untampered genome” only makes sense if we are willing to take a snap-shot of the human gene pool at some given instant, and reify it as the sacred “genetic patrimony of humankind”—which some come close to doing (cf. Mauron and Thevoz 1991). There is a risk here of confusing the biological sense of “human” as an taxonomic term (like “canine” or “simian”) and the word’s normative use, as in “human rights”. In the biological sense, ‘human’ refers to the biological species homo sapiens and to be human is to be a member of this biological species. In the evaluative sense, ‘human’ refers to a property that is the basis for having certain moral rights and a particular kind of moral value. Obviously it is not enough to be biologically human to enjoy human rights: human tissue cultures and human cadavers show us that. Is it even necessary to be biologically human to enjoy what we call human rights? There are many candidates for the natural qualities that are the basis for moral rights, but none hinge on a biological designation. So why is it that interventions that “alter the species” “might cause the affected children to be deprived of their human rights”? Other opponents of directed evolution extend the argument further. They acknowledge that post-humans may be capable of claiming the same natural rights as humans by virtue of their capacities, but argue that creating such a species would challenge the notion that being human is sufficient for claiming those rights, in the same ways that discovering rational extraterrestrials would. This, in turn, would potentially disenfranchise the humans, like infants or the mentally disabled, who cannot show adequate functional capacities to qualify for equivalent species-neutral moral status. At the same time, they argue, if the post-humans actually have expanded capacities, they may claim natural rights to a proportionately expanded range of opportunities and freedoms, beyond those to which normal humans are entitled. This runs the risk of creating the kinds of oppressive hierarchical society against which human rights are supposed to be the antidote, and, potentially, to the return of coercive eugenic programs aimed at the eventual extinction of the human species (Fukuyama, 2002; Mehlman, 2012). Others point out that while the conceit that our human species could be preserved forever is as absurd as the hope of individual immortality, those facts provide no reason to accelerate either senescence or evolution (Robert and Baylis, 2003; Agar 2013). Even in the face of the inevitability of a post-human species, they argue, we are justified in protecting our (admittedly) “species-relativist” values by rejecting enhancements that would serve to alienate their recipients from their former selves, their families, and their communities. Normal evolutionary processes provide the luxury of time for human populations to “negotiate” their adaptations with the environments that provoke them. Leaving evolution to these normal processes can thus ensure that our evolution is both as deliberate and as tentative as our species’ technological history—and also that it is like technological history in that key “threshold” changes can only be seen retrospectively. From this perspective, the danger is the abrupt provocation of biological speciation which radical enhancements might provoke, if they created reproductive barriers between the enhanced and the unenhanced. However, given that almost none of the single capacity enhancement interventions under discussion—cognitive, physical, moral, etc. —are likely to immediately produce biological reproductive barriers in otherwise species-typical enhanced humans, it is not clear whether the introduction of even the most “alienating” enhancements would create this risk. Finally, just as it is metaphysically impossible to “preserve” our species from further evolution, it is impossible for us to control the process “from the inside out”, because the genetic constitution of our species is shaped by environmental forces of selection beyond human abilities to control or even, as the phenomenon of emerging epidemics continues to illustrate, anticipate. Moreover, as disability studies scholars point out, humanity is in no better place to decide which human traits deserve promotion today than during the heyday of the Eugenics movement, even if society could tolerate the kinds of reproductive policies it would require to manage just the human part of the evolutionary equation. The striking correspondence between the aspirations of old style Eugenicists and some proposals of contemporary Transhumanists, unfortunately, provides some evidence to back up this claim (Sparrow 2011). Such proposals assume that some genotypes represent “jewels in the genome” (Sikela 2006) while others constitute a form of expensive “toxic waste” that could and should be cleansed from the gene pool (Buchanan, Brock, Wikler, and Daniels 2000). According to critics of transhumanism, this way of thinking reduces the identities of people to their genotypes, and undermines our commitment to the moral equality of people despite their biological diversity (Asch and Block 2011). As hard as they are to rationally reconstruct, it is important to listen to concerns that some form of biomedicine violates human nature, even in public discussions of policy within a pluralistic society. Whether the concern is the distortion of some constant of the human condition, like senescence, or a “species altering” threat to our collective gene pool, or the corruption of practices designed to celebrate the inherited human traits we value most, these appeals all signal that the intervention in question has deep implications for who we want to be, given who we have been. However, respecting what we have (or have not) inherited from our parents does not in itself fulfill the need to decide which promises we would like to make to our children. Invocations of particular vulnerabilities, loyalties, or forms of sociality from the past can provide fodder for arguing over the positive visions of human nature that should guide those promises. But in communities that accept the possibility of a pluralism of promises, such invocations should also trigger another policy-making response: the need for policy-makers to protect the interests of those excluded from their visions, even while we discuss their merits. The natural human gene pool has no top, bottom, edges or direction: it cannot be “used up”, “diverted”, “purified” or “polluted”. The reservoir of human mutual respect, good will and tolerance for difference, however, seems perennially in danger of running dry. That is our human nature’s truly fragile heritage that we should seek to preserve—and some say even enhance—in monitoring biomedical research on behalf of the future. Nothing in the current debates over the ethics of human enhancement convincingly supports the conclusion that the impulse that drives interest in biomedical enhancement is inauthentically human or morally evil. To the extent that all technology is construed as an effort to extend and improve our inherited human capacities, the impulse to enhance ourselves is a hallmark of our species, as legitimate to celebrate as to disparage. On the other hand, just as specific technologies are never “value neutral” in their design or use, specific applications of biomedical human enhancement can be dangerous, unfair, or vicious. Thus, it is reasonable to endorse the generic claim that biomedical enhancement is morally acceptable as a human practice, and still argue that specific biomedical enhancements would be unethical to pursue. As with other potent technologies, at some level the potential harms of unethical enhancements will also justify social efforts to formally control their development and use through regulation, law and public policy. Even though this topic moves quickly beyond the biomedical domain to fundamental tensions in political and social philosophy, it does preoccupy enough of the practical ethics literature on biomedical enhancement to warrant a brief concluding discussion here. Some argue that firm lines should be drawn in public policy and professional practice, against particular degrees of enhancement, like “species-altering interventions” (Annas, Andrews and Isasi, 2002) or “radical enhancements” (Agar, 2013). The assumption here is that the moral problems raised by enhancement intensify as the enhanced move away from the human norm, and that a threshold can be identified beyond which prohibition would be merited. Since drawing the line at all enhancement uses of medical technologies would founder against too many contentious borderline and benign cases, this threshold is usually set at the boundary of our species identity, between the human and the post-human. As we have seen, this leaves many problematic enhancements in particular settings—like “gene doping” in sports—unaddressed, and it is still not clear what moral salience sheer taxonomy can have, apart from other ethical considerations—especially when one recalls the pernicious policies other human taxonomies have supported in the past. In practice, such an approach would face all the classic line-drawing problems, and the classic challenges of policing and enforcing prohibitions in a pluralistic and globalized society. Most importantly, however, if it is only those alterations that literally produce new biological species that are of concern the vast bulk of potentially problematic enhancement modifications would not fall within the jurisdiction of this approach. At the other extreme are those who support a libertarian position, eschewing any blanket public regulation of enhancement in favor of free markets involving those who would develop enhancement interventions and individuals who would use them. (Engelhardt, 1990). But this extreme position suffers the familiar drawbacks of unregulated market economies: a toleration of severely harmful transactions (e.g., purchasing tickets to a match of gladiatorial combat), the exacerbation of economic inequalities, and a permissive stance to transactions with long-term adverse consequences, which lead to “tragedies of the commons” and environmental devastation. As a result, even the more permissive authors qualify their “utopian eugenics” proposals with the sorts of regulatory protections that surround other consumer products in free-market societies, in terms of safety, fraud, fair pricing and environmental protection, (Bostrom 2003) and argue that the political justifications for those policies should support equivalent social controls for enhancement interventions. (Kitcher 1997). Even with minimal legal regulations in place to ensure that markets for biomedical enhancement technologies will be “free”, the libertarian emphasis on the legal permissibility of these transactions is a blunt instrument for dealing with the subtle ethical complexities involved in deciding whether to use a particular enhancement technology. First, policy will need to focus on governing the uses of technology rather than preventing its development in the first place. This is because of the conceptual flexibility of the boundary between enhancement and treatment. Almost all potential enhancement interventions will be developed first as interventions to treat or prevent human health problems, pursuing goals that will easily offset their potential unethical applications. Beyond that, even to assess the potential harms of enhancement applications of approved medical interventions will require research, even if it also helps pave the way for their use. This means that interventions capable of being used for enhancements will be inevitably invented and perfected as by-products of biomedical scientific progress, and their social control will have to focus on governing their dangerous, unjust or vicious uses (Mehlman 1999). Second, there are at least two possible responses to harmful interventions, and policy-makers should keep both in mind. If one won’t work, the other approach may. On the one hand, one can try to police and punish unauthorized uses of technology, or alternatively one can focus on protecting the interests of those disadvantaged by those uses. Thus, in sports, authorities screen for and punish “doping” athletes, because they cannot fix the essential genetic injustice of the spirit of sport. In the workplace and in higher education, on the other hand, there may be more concern to reduce the competitive stresses that would tempt people to rely on stimulants rather than their native talents. In families and schools, moreover, allowances are often made for those less capable in some domains, like sports or music, in order to compensate for their disadvantages there by enabling them to flourish in others. Affirmative Action campaigns, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and other civil rights policies also attempt to “level the playing field” in ways that compensate for disadvantaging biological differences rather than attempting to regulate the differences themselves. If we are not interested in policing the enhancement uses of biomedical technology, we may want to explore whether strategies like these might work to undercut the incentives to enhance in unethical ways. One trap that some authors have fallen into in pursuing this compensatory course is to try to use the enhancement shovel to dig out of the enhancement hole. Worried that an unregulated surge in biomedical enhancement might open the door to injustice and social harm, some are now arguing that the prerequisite for widespread access to enhancement should be the widespread enhancement of our moral faculties. Improved moral discernment and reasoning, keener senses of empathy and fairness, and deeper sense of solidarity, it is argued, will help mitigate the potential social harms by insuring that the users of enhancement are equipped to do so responsibly (Tennison, 2012; Persson and Savulescu 2012). The irony of this argument, of course, is that accomplishing these prerequisite moral upgrades would require a social gate-keeping system as intrusive and draconian as any attempts to police the use of particular enhancements themselves. It would also open to debate the criteria by which such moral upgrades would be made (Joyce 2013). Would we still allow the enhanced to follow normal views of when the obligatory becomes supererogatory, or expect more of them? Presumably, we need not aspire to require superhuman virtues, such as angels might possess. But should they at least be saints? Against whose account of sainthood? Once again, the panorama of alternative philosophical traditions opens up for exploration down this road, offering no quick resolution for policy. However, it is worth remembering at this point that particular biomedical enhancements will never yield comprehensive improvements in moral character, if only because moral character is not reducible to its biological substrates in people’s brains and genes. Instead, enhancement will at best be able to change specific biological functions in ways that improve the chances that a person will act in a particular manner, like telling the truth, at the expense of reducing the chances of some other reaction, like lying, which, in particular circumstances, may actually be the more virtuous thing to do. This piecemeal, double-edged feature of biomedical enhancement means that every morally enhancing intervention runs the risk of being a morally disabling intervention at the same time. This point suggests a third observation from our review: despite the claims of its defenders, biomedical enhancement is not a practice that is not always especially well-suited to a melioristic ethic aimed at improving human welfare. Often a step forward for some purposes is also a step back in other contexts. Many enhanced people are correspondingly disabled, and so by extension are their teams, families, communities, etc. Consider, for example, an enhancement that makes our reflexes faster. Such an enhancement might increase the risk of making mistakes in ways that would be considered an acceptable trade-off for military pilots on solo combat missions, but not for commercial pilots ferrying hundreds of passengers. If our policies were to focus on reminding us that most enhancements come with trade-offs, we might be able to orient our public policy away from either regulatory or compensatory approaches keyed to “enhancement” in the abstract, and towards the specific social and institutional contexts in which particular enhancement interventions might be considered too risky or unfair. Should, for example, the Air Force consider the post-service consequences of a hyper-reflex enhancement for pilots in deciding whether to adopt such an intervention? Should enhanced veterans be able to claim accommodation from employers for their service-induced hyper-responsiveness? Focusing on trade-offs does not imply that no change is the best policy; there is nothing sacred about the biology we inherit. Some enhancements may well be worth attendant deficits in particular situations for particular individuals. But just as our inherited biology provides no definitive criteria for “human nature” that can be used to curtail enhancement, enhancement cannot take our future biology down any path that offers unequivocal improvement in the human condition. But would a pluralistic and piecemeal approach to governing the enhancement uses of medical technologies serve the broader needs of distributive justice with respect to enhancement interventions that are deemed acceptable in particular settings? As the enhanced use their improved capacities to gain power, wealth and status, justice might require that access to those enhancements be afforded more broadly, at least for those willing to bear the corresponding deficits. Some authors have argued that a fair system of allocating enhancement opportunities will require a centralized, global agency akin to the World Trade Organization or the International Monetary Fund, capable of adjudicating all the interests involved (Buchanan 2011). But the assumption behind such proposals remains that “enhancements” will always give people fungible advantages over others, like wealth does. It remains to be seen how true this is. Understanding that enhancements are specific, often double-edged changes—beneficial in some settings for some purposes but not in others—suggests that a better analogy here may be the governance of health care itself. Good health care on the one hand and power, wealth and status on the other are positively correlated, through the expanded opportunity range that meeting specific health needs can provide. That correlation helps support the case for equitable access to health care. But not all health care needs are equally “profitable” in leveraging other social goods, and it is not the goal of a needs-based health care system to address that disparity. 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Sincerity and Authenticity, Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Walters, L. and Palmer, J. G., 1997. The Ethics of Human Gene Therapy, New York: Oxford University Press. White, G., 1993. “Human Growth Hormone: The Dilemma of Expanded Use in Children”, Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, 3(4): 401–409. Whitehouse, P. J., Juengst, E., Mehlman, M., and Murray, T. H., 1997. “Enhancing Cognition in the Intellectually Intact”, The Hastings Center Report, 27(3): 14–22. Wikler, D., 1999. “Can We Learn from Eugenics?” Journal of Medical Ethics, 25(2): 183–194. Zak, P. J., 2011. “The Physiology of Moral Sentiments”, Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 77: 53–65. Thanks to Allen Buchanan, Jennifer Hawkins, Jonathan Shear and Michael Tennison for helpful suggestions, and to Warren Whipple for valuable research assistance. Moseley would like to acknowledge funding from grant number 2T32NR008856 (Director, Barbara Mark) from the National Institute of Nursing Research at the National Institutes of Health.
2019-04-25T13:48:30Z
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/enhancement/
A projection display apparatus which display a projected image and may be free from connection with a computer. The projection display apparatus carries out processing with information stored in a portable memory and includes a memory controller that reads out the information stored in the portable memory; an image processing section that prepares display image data. The display image data represents an image to be displayed from the image data stored in the portable memory according to an instruction of a processing program that is read from the portable memory and represents a series of processing steps to be executed by the projection display apparatus. An electro-optic device then forms image light in response to the display image data, and an optical system projects the image light to display the image. This application is a continuation of PCT/JP00/01619, filed Mar. 16, 2000. The present invention relates to a technique of a projection display apparatus that displays a projected image. The projection display apparatus enables an image supplied from a personal computer to be displayed as an enlarged image on a projection screen and is therefore often used for presentations. In the course of a presentation, a plurality of presentation sheets (hereinafter may be referred to as “slides”) are sequentially changed for display on the projection screen. With a prior art projection display apparatus a user changes over the presentation sheets. More specifically, the presentation sheets are changed over according to the user's instruction input through the key operation into the computer. Connection of the computer is thus essential for the prior art projection display apparatus. The object of the present invention is thus to solve the disadvantage of the prior art discussed above and to provide a technique that enables a projection display apparatus, which may be free from connection with a computer, to display a projected image. At least part of the above and the other related objects is attained by a projection display apparatus that carries out processing with information stored in a portable memory. The projection display apparatus includes: a memory controller that reads out the information stored in the portable memory; an image processing section that prepares display image data, which represents an image to be displayed, using at least one out of a plurality of image data stored in the portable memory according to an instruction of a processing program that is read from the portable memory and represents a series of processing to be executed by the projection display apparatus; an electro-optic device that forms image light in response to the display image data; and an optical system that projects the image light to display the image. This projection display apparatus displays an image using the image data stored in the memory according to the instruction of the processing program stored in the memory. This arrangement enables the projection display apparatus, which may not be connected with a computer, to automatically execute the series of processing and thereby to project and display the image. In the projection display apparatus described above, it is preferable that the image processing section carries out control of the projection display apparatus according to an instruction of the processing program. This arrangement enables the image processing section to carry out a diversity of control operations of the projection display apparatus according to the processing program. For example, the image processing section controls a sleep state and a standby state of a hardware circuit. In the projection display apparatus of the above arrangement, the control of the projection display apparatus may include control of an electric power supply circuit. This application controls the electric power supply circuit to control a sleep state and a standby state of the projection display apparatus. In accordance with one preferable embodiment of the present invention, the projection display apparatus reproduces sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. This arrangement enables dialogues of people and sound effects to be reproduced, based on sound data stored in the portable memory. In accordance with another preferable application of the projection display apparatus, the image processing section selects either one of image data supplied externally and image data read from the portable memory according to an instruction of selection included in the processing program, and prepares the display image data using the selected image data. This arrangement enables the image processing section to use not only the image data stored in the memory but image data supplied externally, for example, from an external image supply apparatus. The image processing section selects the desired image data to be displayed according to the instruction of the processing program. In accordance with another preferable embodiment of the present invention, the projection display apparatus further has an embellishment image memory that stores at least one embellishment image data. The image processing section combines either one of the image data read from the portable memory and the image data supplied externally with the embellishment image data according to an instruction of composition included in the processing program, so as to prepare the display image data. This arrangement enables embellishment effects to be given to an image expressed by the image data read from the portable memory or the externally supplied image data. In accordance with yet another preferable application of the projection display apparatus, the image processing section has a processing program editor that edits the processing program, and the memory controller has a function of writing the processing program edited by the processing program editor into the portable memory. These arrangement enables the processing program stored in the memory to be edited in the projection display apparatus. This is convenient when some modification of the processing program is required. The present invention is also directed to a method of displaying an image with a projection display apparatus that includes an electro-optic device and carries out-processing with information stored in a portable memory. The method includes the steps of: reading out the information stored in the portable memory; preparing display image data, which represents an image to be displayed, using at least one out of a plurality of image data stored in the portable memory according to an instruction of a processing program that is read from the portable memory and represents a series of processing to be executed by the projection display apparatus; causing the electro-optic device to form image light in response to the display image data; and projecting the image light to display the image. This method has the same functions and advantages as those of the projection display apparatus discussed above. Namely this method enables the projection display apparatus, which may not be connected with a computer, to automatically execute the series of processing and thereby to project and display the image. FIG. 11 shows another image expressed by the superimposed image data SDV1 output from the image superimposing circuit 12 (FIG. 8). Referring now tot he drawings wherein like reference numerals designate identical or corresponding parts throughout the drawings, a projection displays apparatus and method of display is shown. An embodiment of this invention is shown in FIG. 1 which illustrates a high level diagram of a projection display system. In FIG. 1, a projection display apparatus 1 includes a connection terminal 2 that is connectable with an image supply apparatus, such as a personal computer or a video recorder, and a memory slot 3 that receives a memory card 42 inserted therein. The memory card 42 includes a processing program that records a series of processing steps to be executed by the projection display apparatus 1. On insertion of the memory card 42, the projection display apparatus reads the processing program recorded in the memory card 42 and executes the series of processing steps according to the processing program to project and display an image on a screen 104. It is to be understood that a variety of rewritable and portable recording media, such as flexible disks and magneto-optic discs etc., may be used to record the processing program, in place of the memory card 42 shown in FIG. 1. FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the general structure of the projection display apparatus 1 of the first embodiment. The projection display apparatus of this embodiment includes an image processing circuit 10, a liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14, a liquid-crystal panel 16, a CPU 20, a frame memory 22, a remote control regulator 30, a memory controller 40, a speaker 50, an illumination optical system 100 including a lamp 101, and a projection optical system 102. The image processing circuit 10, the CPU 20, the remote control regulator 30, and the memory controller 40 are mutually connected via a bus 20 a The liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14 is also connected to the bus 20 a, although the connection is not shown in the illustration of FIG. 2. The liquid-crystal panel 16 is substantially uniformly illuminated by the illumination optical system 100. Image light formed by the liquid-crystal panel 16 is projected onto the screen 104 by the projection optical system 102. The optical systems 100 and 102 are simplified in the illustration of FIG. 2. The image processing circuit 10, the liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14, the CPU 20, the frame memory 22, and the remote control regulator 30 of the embodiment of FIG. 2 correspond to the image processing section of the present invention. The liquid-crystal panel 16 corresponds to the electro-optic device of the present invention. The image processing circuit 10 has a function of preparing image data to be displayed on the screen 104 in response to an instruction from the CPU 20. FIG. 3 schematically illustrates the internal structure of the image processing circuit 10 which includes a video signal conversion circuit 200, a selector 210, a write-read controller 220, and a menu window display controller 230. In the case where an image supply apparatus is connected to the connection terminal 2 shown in FIG. 1, an analog video signal AV1 is supplied to the video signal conversion circuit 200 via the connection terminal 2. The video signal conversion circuit 200 carries out analog-to-digital conversion of the given analog video signal AV1 and outputs AD-converted image data ED (hereinafter referred to as the “external image data”). The analog video signal AV1 may be, for example, an RGB signal output from a personal computer, the RGB signal representing a computer monitor screen, or a composite video signal output from a video recorder or a television, the composite video signal representing a motion image. The external image data ED output from the video signal conversion circuit 200, and image data MD (hereinafter referred to as the “memory image data”) supplied from the memory card 42 (FIG. 2) via the bus 20 a are supplied to the selector 210. The memory image data MD recorded in the memory card 42 is read by the memory controller 40 in response to an instruction from the CPU 20. The selector 210 selects either one of the external image data ED and the memory image data MD in response to a selection signal SEL supplied from the CPU 20 via the bus 20 a, and outputs the selected image data as digital image data SD1. In the case where an image supply apparatus is not connected to the connection terminal 2 and the memory card 42 is attached to the memory controller 40, the memory image data MD is selected automatically. The write-read controller 220 has a function of writing the digital image data SD1 output from the selector 210 into the frame memory 22 and reading out the image data written in the frame memory 22. The processes of writing and reading image data executed in the write-read controller 220 is carried out based on control signals generated in the write-read controller 220. The image data read from the frame memory 22 is output as digital image data DV1. The menu window display controller 230 has a function of outputting menu window display data MND representing a menu window. The menu window display controller 230 receives the digital image data DV1 output from the read-write controller 220 and outputs either the given digital image data DV1 or the menu window display data MND. Using the menu window expressed by the menu window display data MND enables a variety of settings, for example, display conditions (including the image quality) of images in the projection display apparatus. In the structure of the embodiment of FIG. 3, the processing program recorded in the memory card 42 can be edited through the menu window as will be discussed below. The menu window display controller 230 is controlled by the CPU 20 via the bus 20 a. The menu window display controller 230 and the CPU 20 correspond to the processing program editor of the present invention. The liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14 shown in FIG. 2 outputs a driving signal DS suitable to drive the liquid-crystal panel 16 in response to the digital image data DV1 or the menu window display data MND supplied from the image processing circuit 10. The liquid-crystal panel 16 drives respective pixels based on the given driving signal DS, so as to modulate illumination light emitted from the illumination optical system 100 at respective pixels. The light transmitted through the liquid-crystal panel 16 forms image light on the panel surface. The image light formed by the liquid-crystal panel 16 is projected by the projection optical system 102 on the screen 104, so that an image is displayed on the screen 104. In the projection display apparatus of the first embodiment, user's instructions, for example, an instruction to display the menu screen, are mainly given through operations of a remote control 32. The remote control regulator 30 (FIG. 2) receives the instructions from the remote control 32 and transfers the instructions to the CPU 20. Another input section having, for example, buttons may be provided on the main body of the projection display apparatus 2, in place of the remote control 32 or in addition to the remote control FIG. 4 shows a variety of data recorded in the memory card 42 of FIG. 2. The data stored in the memory card 42 is prepared in advance with a personal computer, for example. The memory card 42 shown in FIG. 4 stores a processing program PRI, which represents a series of processing to be executed by the projection display apparatus, as well as a variety of data DD including image data (Picture 1, Picture 2, Picture 3, . . . ), sound data (Wave 1, Wave 2, Wave 3, . . . ) and patterned image data (Pattern 1, Pattern 2, Pattern 3, . . . ). Data representing images of, for example, the presentation sheets are stored as the image data (Picture 1, Picture 2, Picture 3, . . . ). Data representing, for example, black “solid” images and images of company logos are stored as the patterned image data Detailed records of the presentation are stored, for example, as the sound data (Wave 1, Wave 2, Wave 3, . . . ). The variety of data DD may include any appropriate data other than the above data, for example, motion image data. The image data (Picture 1, Picture 2, Picture 3, . . . ), the patterned image data (Pattern 1, Pattern 2, Pattern 3, . . . ), and other data representing images out of the variety of data DD stored in the memory card 42 correspond to the memory image data MD discussed above. FIG. 5 shows the contents of the processing program PR1 shown in FIG. 4. A script file of a text format as shown in FIG. 5 is used as the processing program PR1 in this embodiment. Symbols such as “L1” given to the right side of FIG. 5 are tentatively allocated to represent line numbers and are not included in the actual script file. “Begin” on a line number L1 and “End” on a line number L15 respectively represent the start and the end of the processing program PR1. In the actual procedure, the processing is executed with regard to line numbers L2 through L14 between the line number L1 “Begin” and the line number L15 “End”. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a processing routine executed by the projection display apparatus according to the processing program PR1 shown in FIG. 5. The processing of steps S101 and S102, however, do not follow the processing program PR1. The processing routine shown in FIG. 6 is executed in the case where at least part of the projection display apparatus is in a sleep state prior to the processing of step S101. Under such conditions, no images are displayed on the screen 104. When the user attaches the memory card 42 to the memory controller 40 (FIG. 2), the processing of step S101 detects an attachment of the memory card 42 to the memory controller 40. In one applicable arrangement to detect the memory card 42, a non-illustrated mechanical switch, which is provided inside the memory controller 40, is set in an ON position in response to the attachment of the memory card 42. In another arrangement, a sensor, which is provided inside the memory controller 40, determines whether or not the memory card 42 is attached. When the attachment of the memory card 42 is detected at step S101, the process proceeds to step S102. At step S102, the CPU 20 (FIG. 2) transfers the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) stored in the memory card 42 to a non-illustrated RAM and starts the execution of the processing program. As clearly understood from the above description, at least the memory card detection function in the memory controller 40 is not in the sleep state. At this moment, however, the image processing circuit 10, the liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14, the liquid-crystal panel 16, and the lamp 101 are set in the Sleep State. As used herein, the term “sleep state” represents that the hardware circuit is not in the normal working state. In the structure of the first embodiment, the image processing circuit 10, the liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14, and the liquid-crystal panel 16 are set in the sleep state by regulating a clock signal or another control signal, or more specifically by ceasing the supply of the clock signal. The lamp 101 is set in the sleep state by ceasing the supply of electric power. Some hardware circuits are set in the sleep state by lowering the frequency of the clock signal. Another possible application regulates the electric power supplied to the lamp 101 as the light source to lower the luminance of the displayed image or regulates a cooling fan provided in the projection display apparatus. At step S103, the processing of the line number L2 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. The “Power ON” command on the line number L2 causes the whole projection display apparatus to be on standby. A concrete procedure gives the control signal and the power supply to the respective constituents in the sleep state, so as to set the respective constituents in the normal working state, that is, in the standby state. The projection display apparatus set in the standby state enables an image to be displayed on the screen 104. At step S104, the processing of the line number L3 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. The “Set Source” command on the line number L3 causes the image processing circuit 10 (FIG. 3) to set the source of the image data, which is to be written into the frame memory 22. As described previously with respect to FIG. 3, the image processing circuit 10 sets either the external image data ED based on the analog video signal AV1, or the memory image data MD read from the memory card 42 as the input source. On the line number L3, “CARD” representing the memory card 42 is specified after the “Set Source” command. The memory image data MD stored in the memory card 42 is thus set as the input source in this example. At step S105, the processing of the line number L4 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. The “Display” command on the line number L4 displays the memory image data in the memory card 42 (FIG. 4), which is the input source set at step S104. On the line number L4, “Picture 1” is specified after the “Display” command, so that the memory image data Picture 1 in the memory card 42 (FIG. 4) is displayed. In accordance with a concrete procedure, the CPU 20 reads the memory image data Picture 1 from the memory card 42 (FIG. 4), and the image processing circuit 10 writes the memory image data Picture 1 into the frame memory 22. The image processing circuit 10 outputs the memory image data Picture 1 as the digital image data DV1. These causes an image expressed by the memory image data Picture 1 to be displayed on the screen 104. At step S105, the processing of the line number L5 in the processing program PR1 is also carried out. The “Wait” command on line number L5 keeps the state of execution of the previous process (in the example of FIG. 5, the processing of the line number L4) for a predetermined period of time. In this embodiment, the previous processing is kept by the specified unit of “1000 msec”. Thus, the processing of step S105 causes the display of the memory image data Picture 1 executed by the processing of the line number L4 to be kept or 10000 msec specified on the line number L5. The use of the Wait command sets the time in which each image is displayed. This arrangement enables the presentation sheets to be automatically fed at preset time intervals. At step S106, the processing of the line number L6 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. The “Play” command on the line number L6 reproduces the sound data in the memory card 42 (FIG. 4), which is the input source set at step S104 (the line number L3). On line number L6, “Wave 2” is specified after the “Play” command, so that the sound data Wave 2 in the memory card 42 (FIG. 4) is reproduced. In accordance with a concrete procedure, the CPU 20 reads the sound data Wave 2 from the memory card 42 (FIG. 4) and causes the sound data Wave 2 to be reproduced by the speaker 50 (FIG. 2). At step S107, the processing of the line number L7 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. On line number L7, “Picture 3” is specified after the “Display” command. In the same manner as the processing of step S105 (line number L4), the memory image data Picture 3 in the memory card 42 (FIG. 4) is displayed on the screen 104. At step S108, the processing of the line number L8 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. The “Pause” command on line number L8 keeps the state of execution of the previous process (in the example of FIG. 5, the processing of line number L7) until a user's input is given. At this moment, the CPU 20 pauses the execution of the processing program PR1. When the user gives some input through an operation of the remote control 32 (FIG. 2), the pause is cancelled. After the cancellation of the pause, the process proceeds to step S109. At step S109, the processing of the line number L9 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. On line number L9, “VIDEO” representing the external image data ED based on the analog video signal AV1 is specified after the “Set Source” command. At this moment, the CPU 20 sets the external image data ED supplied to the image processing circuit 10 as the input source. Namely the input source “CARD” set at step S104 (line number L3) is changed over to VIDEO. The image processing circuit 10 writes the external image data ED into the frame memory 22, so that an image expressed by the external image data ED is displayed on the screen 104. The external image data may be, for example, samples of commerce shot with a video camera. At step S110, the processing of the line number L10 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. In the same manner as the processing of step S108 (line number L8), the “Pause” command on line number L10 pauses the execution of the processing program PR1. The pause is cancelled in response to an input, for example, through an operation of the remote control 32, and the process proceeds to step S111. At step S111, the processing of the line number L11 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. On the line number L11, “CARD” representing the memory card 42 is specified after the “Set Source” command. The image processing circuit 10 thus again selects the memory image data MD supplied from the memory card 42 as the input source. At step S112, the processing of the line number L12 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. On line number L12, “Picture 2” is specified after the “Display” command. In the same manner as the processing of step S105 (line number L4) described above, an image expressed by the memory image data Picture 2 is displayed on the screen 104. Also, at step S112, the processing of the line number L13 in the processing program PR1 is carried out. On line number L13, “10000 msec” is specified after the “Wait” command. In the same manner as the processing of step S105 (line number L5), the image expressed by the memory image data Picture 2 is displayed on the screen 104 for 10000 msec. At step S113, the processing of the line number L14 in the processing program PR1 (FIG. 5) is carried out. The “Power OFF” command on line number L14 causes at least part of the projection display apparatus to be set in the sleep state. In the structure of the first embodiment, as described previously, the functions of the image processing circuit 10, the liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14, the liquid-crystal panel 16, and the lamp 101 fall into the sleep state. In the sleep state, no images are displayed on the screen 104. The contents of the processing program shown in FIG. 5 are executed in this manner. Commands other than those in FIG. 5 (“Power ON”, “Power OFF”, “Set Source”, “Display”, “Play”, “Pause”, and “Wait”) may also be used. For example, the “Repeat” command may be used to repeatedly execute all or part of the series of the processing of the line numbers L2 through L14 described above. Other available commands include the “Stop” command to stop the execution of the processing program and the “Restart” command to resume the execution of the processing program. The processing of FIG. 6 regards the case where at least part of the projection display apparatus is set in the sleep state prior to the processing of step S101. The processing program PR1 of FIG. 5 may also be used in the case where the whole projection display apparatus is set in the standby state. When the projection display apparatus is on standby, the processing of the line number L2 (step S103) in the processing program PR1 is not required and is accordingly neglected. As described above, the projection display apparatus of the embodiment controls the operations of the hardware circuits according to the instructions described in the processing program. Control of the operations of the hardware circuits includes regulation of the clock signal and other control signals supplied to the hardware circuits. The control regulates the control signals to set the hardware circuits in the sleep state or in the standby state, as well as regulates the control signals to change over the input source. The control of the operations of the hardware circuits also includes the control of the electric power supply circuit to set the hardware circuits in the sleep state or in the standby state. Controlling the operations of the hardware circuits according to the instructions of the processing program advantageously enables the projection display apparatus to be automatically activated and stopped. In the arrangement of the embodiment as described above, the hardware circuits in the projection display apparatus are set in the sleep state or in the standby state through both the control of the electric power supply and the regulation of the control signals. Possible modification may attain the sleep state or the standby state through only the control of the electric power supply or through only the regulation of the control signals. FIG. 7 shows a menu window to edit the processing program. The processing program editing window PEM shown in FIG. 7 is an image displayed on the screen 104 in response to the menu window display data MND output from the menu window display controller 230 shown in FIG. 3. The processing program editing window PEM includes a script display area SW1 to display the contents of the processing program. In the example of FIG. 7, the processing program PR1 identical with that of FIG. 5 is displayed in the script display area SW1 of FIG. 7. In the processing program editing window PEM, a variety of images Pa, Pb, Pc, . . . , that are available in the projection display apparatus are previewed. In this embodiment, the image data given to the selector 210 shown in FIG. 3 are available image data. The images expressed by the memory image data MD and the external image data ED are thus previewed in the processing program editing window PEM. The images expressed by the image data (Picture 1, Picture 2, Picture 3, . . . ) and the patterned image data (Pattern 1, Pattern 2, Pattern 3, . . . ) included in the memory card 42 shown in FIG. 4 are previewed as the memory image data MD. The images expressed by the analog video signals AV1 (VIDEO) are previewed as the external image data ED. The respective images Pa, Pb, Pc, . . . shown in FIG. 7 are displayed, based on a set of image data collected by the cooperation of the menu window display controller 230 (FIG. 3) and the CPU 20. In the processing program editing window PEM, the processing program displayed in the script display area SW1 is edited by specifying any of the various images Pa, Pb, Pc, . . . displayed in the window through operations of the remote control 32. In accordance with a concrete procedure, the user first specifies a desired line to be edited in the processing program PR1 displayed in the script display area SW1 with the remote control 32. In the example of FIG. 7, the line number L7 (filled with slant lines) is specified. When the image (Picture 3) to be displayed by the processing of the line number L7 is changed to the previewed image Pd (image data Picture 4), the user selects a non-illustrated “Change Button” on the remote control 32 and then specifies the previewed image Pd with the remote control 32. These changes the image data Picture 3 to the image data Picture 4 on the line number L7. In a similar manner, the image data to be displayed in the processing program PR1 may arbitrarily be added and deleted. This arrangement enables the processing program to be edited readily only through the operations of the remote control 32. The available images are previewed in the processing program editing window PEM. This advantageously enables the user to edit the processing programs while visually checking the editing process. The processing program thus edited is written into the memory card 42 by means of the memory controller 40 and subsequent processing is carried out according to the edited processing program. As described above, the projection-display apparatus of the present invention enables images to be displayed using the memory image data stored in the memory card 42 according to the instructions of the processing program stored in the memory card 42. This arrangement enables the projection display apparatus, which may not be connected with the computer, to automatically execute the series of processing steps and display projected images. FIG. 8 is a block diagram illustrating the general structure of another projection display apparatus according to a second embodiment of the present invention. The apparatus of the second embodiment includes an image superimposing circuit 12, an embellishment image memory 24, and an embellishment image expansion memory 26, in addition to the configuration shown in FIG. 2. The functions of the constituents of this apparatus other than the additional elements, the image superimposing circuit 12, the embellishment image memory 24, and the embellishment image expansion memory 26, are substantially identical with the functions of the respective constituents shown in FIG. 2, and are thus not specifically described here. The image processing circuit 10, the liquid-crystal panel driving circuit 14, the CPU 20, the frame memory 22, the remote control regulator 30, the image superimposing circuit 12, the embellishment image memory 24, and the embellishment image expansion memory 26 of this embodiment correspond to the image processing section of the present invention. The embellishment image memory 24 stores embellishment image data, which is to be superimposed on the digital image data DV1 output from the image processing circuit 10. The embellishment image data is used to modify the image expressed by the digital 20 image data DV1, and include a variety of image data representing marker images, pointing images, and ring-shaped images. In this embodiment, the embellishment image data is stored in the embellishment image memory 24 in a compressed manner. The embellishment image data in the embellishment image memory 24 is expanded in a bit-map format and stored in the embellishment image expansion memory 26 as embellishment image expanded data SP. The embellishment image expanded data SP is supplied to the image superimposing circuit 12 to be superimposed on the digital image data DV1. The CPU 20 executes the expansion of the embellishment image data and the supply of the embellishment image data to the image superimposing circuit 12. In the structure of this embodiment, the embellishment image data stored in the embellishment image memory 24 is expanded in the embellishment image expansion memory 26. The embellishment image data may alternatively be expanded in the embellishment image memory 24. In this case, the embellishment image expansion memory 26 may be omitted. The embellishment image data stored in the embellishment image memory 24 may not be compressed. The compression, however, advantageously reduces the data capacity required for the embellishment image memory 24. The digital image data DV1 supplied from the image processing circuit 10 and the embellishment image expanded data SP supplied from the embellishment image expansion memory 26 are input into the image superimposing circuit 12. The image superimposing circuit 12 has a function of superimposing the embellishment image expanded data SP upon the digital image data DV1. The image superimposing circuit 12 includes a non-illustrated selector, which is switched over to implement the superimposing process. The switchover operations of the selector are carried out in response to a switchover signal supplied from the CPU 20 via the bus 20 a. In accordance with a concrete procedure, a switchover operation of the selector carried out at a preset position in the image expressed by the digital image data DV1 triggers the superimposition of the image expressed by the embellishment image expanded data SP. This arrangement gives superimposed image data SDV1 that is superimposed by the embellishment image expanded data SP. FIG. 9 shows an exemplified processing program PR2 that carries out a process of superimposing an embellishment image. The processing program PR2 includes the processing of line numbers L9 through L11, in place of the line number L9 (Set Source “VIDEO”) in the processing program PR1 shown in FIG. 5. The processing of the line numbers L9 through L11 in the processing program PR2 is carried out to superimpose the embellishment image expanded data SP upon the digital image data DV1 supplied to the image superimposing circuit 12 and to display the superimposed image. The line number L9 in the processing program PR2 has the “Superimpose Source” command to set the source of the embellishment image data used for the superimposing process. This command is followed by “MEM” representing the embellishment image memory 24. Namely the embellishment image memory 24 is set as the input source of the embellishment image. The line number L10 has the “Coordinate” command to specify a superimposing position (area) of the embellishment image. This command is followed by coordinate values “400, 160, 600, 200” to set the superimposing position of the embellishment image. The coordinate values in this embodiment are specified in the case where the display area of the liquid-crystal panel is 800×600. The coordinate values 400, 160, 600, 200 specify a first set of coordinates (400, 160) as a starting point of the superimposing area and a second set of coordinates (600, 200) as a terminal point thereof. The subsequent line number L10 has a data name “Dec1” to specify the embellishment image data after the “Display” command. This arrangement enables the embellishment image data Dec1 to be superimposed in the superimposing position specified by the processing of the line number L10, so as to display a superimposed image on the screen 104. On conclusion of the processing up to the line number L11, the image expressed by the superimposed image data SDV1 output from the image superimposing circuit 12 is a superimposed image including the image of the embellishment image data Dec1 superimposed upon the image of the image data Picture 3 on the line number L7. FIG. 10 shows an image expressed by the superimposed image data SDV1 output from the image superimposing circuit 12 (FIG. 8) after execution of the processing of the line number L11 in the processing program PR2 shown in FIG. 9. When the processing of the line number L11 in the processing program PR2 shown in FIG. 9 is carried out, a superimposed image is displayed, where the image expressed by the embellishment image data Dec1 is superimposed upon the image expressed by the image data Picture 3 on the line number L7. In the example of FIG. 10, a document image of “A, B, C, . . . ” corresponds to the image expressed by the image data Picture 3, and a marker image (filled with the slant lines) corresponds to the image expressed by the embellishment image data Dec1. As shown in FIG. 10, the embellishment image is superimposed in the position specified by the processing program of FIG. 9. More specifically the embellishment image is superimposed in the area defined by the first set of coordinates (400, 160) and the second set of coordinates (600, 200) specified by the processing of the line number L10. FIG. 11 shows another image expressed by the superimposed image data SDV1 output from the image superimposing circuit 12 (FIG. 8). In the example of FIG. 11, an image of a bar graph corresponds to the image expressed by the digital image data DV1 given to the image superimposing circuit 12, and a pointing image corresponds to the image expressed by the embellishment image data supplied from the embellishment image memory 24. The image expressed by the digital image data DV1 is displayed in the vicinity of the pointing image, which is filled with the slant lines. Namely the embellishment image is not restricted to a rectangular image as shown in FIG. 10 but may have any arbitrary shape. This is attained by providing predetermined pixel information as pixel data of the area filled with the slant lines, which is included in the rectangular embellishment image expanded data SP. Pixel data that is generally not used (for example, the pixel data having ‘0’ for all the bits) or a flag is given as the specific pixel information with regard to the area filled with the slant lines. The superimposing process is not carried out for the pixels having such pixel information. This arrangement enables the superimposition of the embellishment image having an arbitrary shape. As described above, the image having the embellishment effects is superimposed upon the image expressed by the digital image data DV1 output from the image processing circuit 10. This ensures the effective display of the presentation sheets. The present invention is not restricted to the above embodiments or their modifications, but there may be many other modifications, changes, and alterations without departing from the scope or spirit of the main characteristics of the present invention. Some possible modifications are given below. (1) In the embodiments discussed above, the projection display apparatus 1 has only one memory slot 3 as shown in FIG. 1. The projection display apparatus 1 may, however, include a plurality of memory slots. This configuration allows the use of a plurality of memories and thereby enables the projection display apparatus to project and display a large number of image data. In this case, the processing program may be recorded in only one of the plural memories, and any one of the other memories is selected as the input source to use the memory image data stored in the selected memory. In the embodiments discussed above, only the external image data ED based on the analog video signals AV1 are the image data externally supplied to the projection display apparatus. Other image data may, however, be supplied to the projection display apparatus. (2) In the first and the second embodiments discussed above, the image processing circuit 10 selects either one of the external image data ED based on the analog video signal AV1 and the memory image data MD supplied from the memory card 42 and writes the selected image data into the frame memory 22. The image data written into the frame memory 22 may be composite image data obtained by combining the both. In this case, the superimposing process is carried out with the “Superimpose” command as shown in the line numbers L9 through L11 of FIG. 9. The image processing circuit 10 carries out this superimposing process. In the second embodiment, the superimposed image data SDV1 are generated by the non-illustrated selector included in the image superimposing circuit 12 (FIG. 8). Multipliers and an adder may be used in place of the selector. In this structure, the adder combines the digital image data DV1 in one multiplier with the embellishment image expanded data SP in the other multiplier. A coefficient “1” is allocated to one of the two multipliers, and another coefficient “0” to the other. This arrangement ensures the superimposing process similar to that implemented by the selector. Alternatively a coefficient “½” may be allocated to both of the two multipliers. In this case, a resulting superimposed image includes the image of the embellishment image expanded data SP superimposed upon the image of the digital image data DV1 in a translucent manner. (3) In the embodiments discussed above, for example, the lamp 101 (FIG. 2) is switched on by the processing of the line number L2 included in the processing program PR1 shown in FIG. 5 to set the whole projection display apparatus on standby. One possible modification switches the lamp 101 on after elapse of a preset time period. Such modified arrangement effectively prevents a potential situation, in which image data to be displayed have not yet been supplied to the liquid-crystal panel 16 when the lamp 101 is switched on. Another possible modification causes a black solid image to be forcibly displayed as an initial image immediately after the lamp 101 is switched on. (4) In the embodiments discussed above, the liquid-crystal panel 16 is used as the electro-optic device of the projection display apparatus. The electro-optic device is, however, not restricted to the liquid-crystal panel, but may be a micromirror-type light modulator or a CRT. One example of the micromirror-type light modulator is a DMD (digital micromirror device) (trade mark by T1 Corporation). (5) In the above embodiments, part of the hardware configuration may be replaced by the software. Part of the arrangement attained by the software may, on the other hand, be replaced by the hardware configuration. This document claims priority from and contains subject matter related to Japanese patent application number 11-71737 and PCT/JP00/01619, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference. wherein the image processing section is configured to combine at least one of the image data read from the portable memory and image data supplied externally with the embellishment image data according to an instruction of composition included in the processing program, so as to prepare the display image data. 2. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 1, wherein the image processing section is configured to control the projection display apparatus according to an instruction of the processing program. 3. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 1, wherein the projection display apparatus is configured to reproduce sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. 4. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 3, wherein the image processing section is configured to select at least one of image data supplied externally and image data read from the portable memory according to an instruction of selection included in the processing program, and to prepare the display image data using the selected image data. the memory controller is configured to write the processing program edited by the processing program editor into the portable memory. 6. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 1, wherein the image processing section is configured to select at least one of image data supplied externally and image data read from the portable memory according to an instruction of selection included in the processing program, and to prepare the display image data using the selected image data. 10. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 2, wherein the control of the projection display apparatus includes control of an electric power supply circuit. 11. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 2, wherein the projection display apparatus is configured to reproduce sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. 12. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 2, wherein the image processing section is configured to select at least one of image data supplied externally and image data read from the portable memory according to an instruction of selection included in the processing program, and to prepare the display image data using the selected image data. 14. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 10, wherein the projection display apparatus is configured to reproduce sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. 15. A projection display apparatus in accordance with claim 10, wherein the image processing section is configured to select at least one of image data supplied externally and image data read from the portable memory according to an instruction of selection included in the processing program, and to prepare the display image data using the selected image data. combining at least one of the image data read from the portable memory and image data supplied externally with the embellishment image data according to an instruction of composition included in the processing program, so as to prepare the display image data. 18. The method of claim 17, further comprising controlling the projection display apparatus according to an instruction of the processing program. 19. The method of claim 17, further comprising reproducing sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. preparing the display image data using the selected image data. writing the processing program edited by the processing program editor into the portable memory. 26. The method of claim 18, wherein the step of controlling the projection display apparatus comprises controlling an electric power supply circuit. 27. The method of claim 18, further comprising reproducing sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. 30. The method of claim 26, further comprising reproducing sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. means for projecting said image light on a projection screen to thereby display the presentation sheet. 34. The apparatus of claim 33, further comprising means for controlling the projection display apparatus according to an instruction of the processing program. 35. The apparatus of claim 33, further comprising means for reproducing sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. means for preparing the display image data using the selected image data. means for writing the processing program edited by the processing program editor into the portable memory. 42. The apparatus of claim 34, wherein the means for controlling the projection display apparatus comprises means for controlling an electric power supply circuit. 43. The apparatus of claim 34, further comprising means for reproducing sound based on the information stored in the portable memory. 46. The apparatus of claim 42, further comprising means for reproducing sound based on the information stored in the portable memory.
2019-04-25T03:29:21Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/US6712476B1/en
· It describes how we collect, use and process your personal data, and how, in doing so, we comply with our legal obligations to you. Your privacy is important to us, and we are committed to protecting and safeguarding your data privacy rights. · For the purpose of applicable data protection legislation (including but not limited to the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679) (the “GDPR” the company responsible for your personal data (“Aap3” or “us”) can be found here. CLIENT DATA: If you are an aap3 customer, we need to collect and use information about you, or individuals at your organisation, in the course of providing you services such as: (i) finding Candidates who are the right fit for you or your organisation; (ii) providing you with a Managed Service Provider (“MSP”) programme or assisting another organisation to do so); (iii) providing you with Recruitment Process Outsourcing (“RPO”) services (or assisting another organisation to do so); and/or (iv) notifying you of content published by aap3s which is likely to be relevant and useful to you (for example our Global Skills Index). By referring a friend or colleague to aap3 using the link shown within our webpage you are confirming that you have gained the consent of that individual for the submission of their personal details. Should you not have valid consent for the submission of the details aap3 may not be able to process them and they will be deleted from our records. WEBSITE USERS: We collect a limited amount of data from our Website-Users which we use to help us to improve your experience when using our website and to help us manage the services we provide. This includes information such as how you use our website, the frequency with which you access our website, and the times that our website is most popular. A number of elements of the personal data we collect from you are required to enable us to fulfil our contractual duties to you or to others. Where appropriate, some, for example Candidates social security number and, religious affiliation, are required by statute or other laws. Other items may simply be needed to ensure that our relationship can run smoothly. We approach referees under legitimate interest and have applied the 3 party Purpose, Necessity and Balance test as a basis for processing. For more details on how we use your personal data, please click here. We use your data to help us to improve your experience of using our website, for example by analysing your recent job search criteria to help us to present jobs to you that we think you’ll be interested in. If you are also a Candidate or Client of aap3s’, we may use data from your use of our websites to enhance other aspects of our communications with, or service to, you. Please note that communications to and from aap3s’ Staff including emails may be reviewed as part of internal or external investigations or litigation. · We care about protecting your information. That’s why we put in place appropriate measures that are designed to prevent unauthorised access to, and misuse of, your personal data. · For more information on the procedures we put in place, please click here. · We consider the retention of candidate to be relevant and of legitimate interest to both parties and therefore such data will be retained on file until such time consent is withdrawn. aap3 will undertake necessary steps to ensure that the data remains accurate and will contact you to verify the validity of the data we hold. · For more information on our policy for the retention of personal data, please click here. · Even if we already hold your personal data, you still have various rights in relation to it. To get in touch about these, please contact us. We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event in accordance with the requirements of any applicable laws. 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We will help with this – either by directly transferring your data for you, or by providing you with a copy in a commonly used machine-readable format. · Right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: You also have the right to lodge a complaint with your local supervisory authority, details of which can be found here. · If your interests or requirements change, you can unsubscribe from part or all of our marketing content (for example job role emails or aap3s newsletters) by clicking the unsubscribe link in the email, or by updating your preferences through our preference centre on the aap3s website (by signing into your account or entering your email address). Aap3s is a global organisation – this is what enables us to offer the level of services that we do. In order for us to continue operating in this way, we may have to transfer or store your data internationally. Who is responsible for processing your personal data on the aap3s website? · Aap3s’ controls the processing of personal data on its website(s). · If you’ve got any further questions, or want further details, please click here. · If you want to check or change what types of cookies you accept, this can usually be altered within your browser settings. We also provide information about this in our Marketing preferences page on the Aap3s website. · Most web browsers will accept cookies but if you would rather we didn’t collect data in this way you can choose to accept all or some or reject cookies in your browser’s privacy settings. However, rejecting all cookies means that you may not be able to take full advantage of all our website’s features. Each browser is different, so check the “Help” menu of your browser to learn how to change your cookie preferences. · For more information generally on cookies, including how to disable them, please refer to aboutcookies.org. You will also find details on how to delete cookies from your computer. So, you’re looking for a bit more insight into what data we collect about you? Here’s a more detailed look at the information we may collect. The information described below is, of course, in addition to any personal data we are required by law to process in any given situation. · Please note that the above list of categories of personal data we may collect is not exhaustive. · To the extent that you access our website we will also collect certain data from you. If you would like more information about this, please click here. CLIENT DATA: The data we collect about Clients is actually very limited. We generally only need to have your contact details or the details of individual contacts at your organisation (such as their names, telephone numbers and email addresses) to enable us to ensure that our relationship runs smoothly. We also hold information relating to your online engagement with Candidate profiles and other material published by aap3s, which we use to ensure that our marketing communications to you are relevant and timely. SUPPLIER DATA: We don’t collect much data about Suppliers – we simply need to make sure that our relationship runs smoothly. We’ll collect the details for our contacts within your organisation, such as names, telephone numbers and email addresses. We’ll also collect bank details, so that we can pay you. We may also hold extra information that someone in your organisation has chosen to tell us. In certain circumstances, such as when you engage with our Finance and Debt Recovery teams, our calls with you may be recorded, depending on the applicable local laws and requirements. · aap3s needs to know certain information about you in order to provide a tailored service. This will enable us to provide you with the best opportunities and should save you time in not having to trawl through information about jobs and services that are not relevant to you. – Entering a competition through a social media channel such as Facebook or Twitter. – If you were referred to us through an RPO or an MSP supplier, they may share personal information about you with us. · To the extent that you access our website or read or click on an email from us, where appropriate and in accordance with any local laws and requirements, we may also collect your data automatically or through you providing it to us. For more information please click here. · We collect your data automatically via cookies, in line with cookie settings in your browser. If you are also a Candidate or Client of aap3s, we may use data from your use of our websites to enhance other aspects of our communications with or service to you. If you would like to find out more about cookies, including how we use them and what choices are available to you, please click here. – In appropriate circumstances in the future, we may also use Candidate data for Profiling. Recruitment Activities: Obviously, our main area of work is recruitment – connecting the right Candidates with the right jobs. We’ve listed below various ways in which we may use and process your personal data for this purpose, where appropriate and in accordance with any local laws and requirements. Please note that this list is not exhaustive. · We may use your personal data for the above purposes if we deem it necessary to do so for our legitimate interests. If you want to know more about what this means, please click here. If you are not happy about this, in certain circumstances you have the right to object and can find out more about how and when to do this here. · Please note that in certain of the jurisdictions in which we operate, we comply with additional local law requirements. For more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. – provide you with information about certain discounts and offers that you are eligible for by virtue of your relationship with aap3s. · We need your consent for some aspects of these activities which are not covered by our legitimate interests (in particular, the collection of data via cookies, and the delivery of direct marketing to you through digital channels) and, depending on the situation, we’ll ask for this via an opt-in or soft-opt-in (which we explain further below). Please note that in certain of the jurisdictions in which we operate, we comply with additional local law requirements. For more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. more about how to do so here. Nobody’s perfect, even though we try to be. We want to let you know that even if you have opted out from our marketing communications through our preference centre, it is possible that your details may be recaptured through public sources in an unconnected marketing campaign. We will try to make sure this doesn’t happen, but if it does, we’re sorry. We’d just ask that in those circumstances you opt out again. · All our marketing is based on what we think will serve our Clients and Candidates best, but we know we won’t always get it right for everyone. We may use your data to show you aap3s adverts and other content on other websites, for example Facebook. If you do not want us to use your data in this way, please turn off the “Advertising Cookies” option (please refer to our Cookies Policy). Even where you have turned off advertising cookies, it is still possible that you may see a Aap3s advert, but in this case, it won’t have been targeted at you personally, but rather at an anonymous audience. Equal opportunities monitoring and other sensitive personal data: We are committed to ensuring that our recruitment processes are aligned with our approach to equal opportunities. Some of the data we may (in appropriate circumstances and in accordance with local law and requirements) collect about you comes under the umbrella of “diversity information”. This could be information about your ethnic background, gender, disability, age, sexual orientation, religion or other similar beliefs, and/or social-economic background. Where appropriate and in accordance with local laws and requirements, we’ll use this information on an anonymised basis to monitor our compliance with our equal opportunities policy. We may also disclose this (suitably anonymised where relevant) data to Clients where this is contractually required, or the Client specifically requests such information to enable them to comply with their own employment processes. · This information is what is called ‘sensitive’ personal information and slightly stricter data protection rules apply to it. We therefore need to obtain your explicit consent before we can use it. We’ll ask for your consent by offering you an opt-in. This means that you have to explicitly and clearly tell us that you agree to us collecting and using this information. · We may collect other sensitive personal data about you, such as health-related information, religious affiliation, or details of any criminal convictions if this is appropriate in accordance with local laws and is required for a role that you are interested in applying for. We will never do this without your explicit consent. · If you would like to find out more about consent, please click here. Please note that in certain areas of the jurisdictions in which we operate, different rules apply to this sensitive data. For more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. · If you are not happy about this, you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time and you can find out how to do so here. · In more unusual circumstances, we may use your personal data to help us to establish, exercise or defend legal claims. · Where appropriate, we will seek your consent to carry out some or all of these activities. If you do not provide consent to profiling, your application will continue to be reviewed manually for opportunities you apply for, but your profile will not be automatically considered for alternative roles. This is likely to decrease the likelihood of us successfully finding you a new job. · You have the right to withdraw that consent at any time and can find out more about how to do so here. Recruitment Activities: Obviously, our main area of work is recruitment, through: (i) providing you with Candidates; (ii) RPO services; and (iii) MSP programmes. We’ve listed below the various ways in which we use your data in order to facilitate this. · We may use your personal data for these purposes if we deem this to be necessary for our legitimate interests. If you would like to know more about what this means, please click here. · If you are not happy about this, in certain circumstances you have the right to object and can find out more about how and when to do this here. Marketing Activities: Subject to any applicable local laws and requirements, we will not, as a matter of course, seek your consent when sending marketing materials such as our Global Skills Index to a corporate postal or email address. · If you are not happy about this, you have the right to opt out of receiving marketing materials from us and can find out more about how to do so here. · Please note that in certain areas of the jurisdictions in which we operate, we comply with additional local law requirements regarding marketing activities. For more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. · We may use your personal data for these purposes if we deem this to be necessary for our legitimate interests. If you want to know more about what this means, please click here. · We will not, as a matter of course, seek your consent when sending marketing messages to a corporate postal or email address. · If you are not happy about this, in certain circumstances you have the right to object and can find out more about how to do so here. Please note that in certain areas of the jurisdictions in which we operate, we comply with additional local law requirements for more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. – If you were put down by our Candidate or a prospective member of Staff as a referee, we will contact you in order to take up a reference. This is an important part of our Candidate quality assurance process and could be the difference between the individual getting a job or not. – If you were put down by our Candidate or a prospective member of Staff as a referee, we may sometimes use your details to contact you in relation to recruitment activities that we think may be of interest to you, in which case we will use your data for the same purposes for which we use the data of Clients. If you would like to find out more about what this means, please click here. · We may use your personal data for these purposes if we deem this to be necessary for our legitimate interests. If you would like to find out more about what this means, please click here. Website Users: We use your data to help us to improve your experience of using our website, for example by analysing your recent job search criteria to help us to present jobs or Candidates to you that we think you’ll be interested in. – If Aap3s merges with or is acquired by another business or company in the future, (or is in meaningful discussions about such a possibility) we may share your personal data with the (prospective) new owners of the business or company. · We are committed to taking all reasonable and appropriate steps to protect the personal information that we hold from misuse, loss, or unauthorised access. We do this by having in place a range of appropriate technical and organisational measures. These include measures to deal with any suspected data breach. · aap3 are developing their Information Security Management System (ISMS) in accordance with ISO27001 and will be gaining certification to this international standard during 2018. At such time certification is gained the details of the external verification of our information security controls shall be listed within this policy. · If you suspect any misuse or loss of or unauthorised access to your personal information, please let us know immediately. Details of how to contact us can be found here. · We will Delete your personal data from our systems if we have not had any meaningful contact with you (or, where appropriate, the company you are working for or with) for two years (or for such longer period as we believe in good faith that the law or relevant regulators require us to preserve your data). After this period, it is likely your data will no longer be relevant for the purposes for which it was collected. · For those Candidates whose services are provided via a third-party company or other entity, “meaningful contact” with you means meaningful contact with the company or entity which supplies your services. Where we are notified by such company or entity that it no longer has that relationship with you, we will retain your data for no longer than two years from that point or, if later, for the period of two years from the point we subsequently have meaningful contact directly with you. · When we refer to “meaningful contact”, we mean, for example, communication between us (either verbal or written), or where you are actively engaging with our online services. If you are a Candidate, we will consider there to be meaningful contact with you if you submit your updated CV onto our website or take part in any of our online training. We will also consider it meaningful contact if you communicate with us about potential roles, either by verbal or written communication or click through from any of our marketing communications. Your receipt, opening or reading of an email or other digital message from us will not count as meaningful contact – this will only occur in cases where you click-through or reply directly. · One of the GDPR’s main objectives is to protect and clarify the rights of EU citizens and individuals in the EU with regards to data privacy. This means that you retain various rights in respect of your data, even once you have given it to us. These are described in more detail below. · To get in touch about these rights, please contact us. We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event within one month (subject to any extensions to which we are lawfully entitled). Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues which you raise. · Right to object: this right enables you to object to us processing your personal data where we do so for one of the following four reasons: (i) our legitimate interests; (ii) to enable us to perform a task in the public interest or exercise official authority; (iii) to send you direct marketing materials; and (iv) for scientific, historical, research, or statistical purposes. · Right to withdraw consent: Where we have obtained your consent to process your personal data for certain activities (for example, for our marketing arrangements or automatic profiling), you may withdraw this consent at any time and we will cease to carry out the particular activity that you previously consented to unless we consider that there is an alternative reason to justify our continued processing of your data for this purpose in which case we will inform you of this condition. · Data Subject Access Requests (DSAR): You may ask us to confirm what information we hold about you at any time, and request us to modify, update or Delete such information. We may ask you to verify your identity and for more information about your request. If we provide you with access to the information we hold about you, we will not charge you for this unless your request is “manifestly unfounded or excessive”. If you request further copies of this information from us, we may charge you a reasonable administrative cost where legally permissible. Where we are legally permitted to do so, we may refuse your request. If we refuse your request, we will always tell you the reasons for doing so. · Please note that in certain areas of the jurisdictions in which we operate, we comply with additional local law requirements regarding data subject access requests and may refuse your request in accordance with such laws. For more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. · Please note that in certain areas of the jurisdictions in which we operate, we comply with additional local law requirements regarding data subject right to erasure and may refuse your request in accordance with local laws. For more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. · When complying with a valid request for the erasure of data we will take all reasonably practicable steps to Delete the relevant data. – where we have no further need to process your personal data, but you require the data to establish, exercise, or defend legal claims. · If we have shared your personal data with third parties, we will notify them about the restricted processing unless this is impossible or involves disproportionate effort. We will, of course, notify you before lifting any restriction on processing your personal data. Right of data portability: If you wish, you have the right to transfer your personal data between data controllers. In effect, this means that you are able to transfer your aap3s’ account details to another online platform. To allow you to do so, we will provide you with your data in a commonly used machine-readable format that is password-protected so that you can transfer the data to another online platform. Alternatively, we may directly transfer the data for you. This right of data portability applies to: (i) personal data that we process automatically (i.e. without any human intervention); (ii) personal data provided by you; and (iii) personal data that we process based on your consent or in order to fulfil a contract. · Right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: You also have the right to lodge a complaint with your local supervisory authority. Details of how to contact them can be found here. · If you would like to exercise any of these rights or withdraw your consent to the processing of your personal data (where consent is our legal basis for processing your personal data), details of how to contact us can be found here. Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues which you raise. · You may ask to unsubscribe from job alerts at any time. Details of how to do so can be found here. · It is important that the personal information we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal information changes during the period for which we hold your data. Who is responsible for processing your personal data on the aap3’s website? · You can find out which aap3’s entity is responsible for processing your personal data and where it is located by following this link. – to other third parties, as referred to here. · To ensure that your personal information receives an adequate level of protection, we have put in place appropriate procedures with the third parties we share your personal data with to ensure that your personal information is treated by those third parties in a way that is consistent with and which respects the law on data protection. Cookies are used by nearly all websites and do not harm your system. If you want to check or change what types of cookies you accept, this can usually be altered within your browser settings. We also provide information about this in our Marketing preferences page on the aap3 website. – to help us advertise jobs to you that we think you’ll be interested in. Hopefully this means less time for you trawling through endless pages and will get you into the employment you want more quickly. – Persistent cookies: a persistent cookie is stored as a file on your computer and it remains there when you close your web browser. The cookie can be read by the website that created it when you visit that website again. We use persistent cookies for Google Analytics and for personalisation (see below). – Strictly necessary cookies: These cookies are essential to enable you to use the website effectively, such as when applying for a job, and therefore cannot be turned off. Without these cookies, the services available to you on our website cannot be provided. These cookies do not gather information about you that could be used for marketing or remembering where you have been on the internet. – Personalisation cookies: These cookies help us to advertise details of potential job opportunities that we think may be of interest. These cookies are persistent (for as long as you are registered with us) and mean that when you log in or return to the website, you may see advertising for jobs that are similar to jobs that you have previously browsed. · We don’t think that any of the following activities prejudice individuals in any way – in fact, they help us to offer you a more tailored, efficient service, so everyone’s a winner! However, you do have the right to object to us processing your personal data on this basis. If you would like to know more about how to do so, please click here. · Please note that in certain areas of the jurisdictions in which we operate, a different legal basis for data processing might apply in certain cases. For more information in relation to your jurisdiction, please click here. · We apply the 3-part test methodology to the holding and processing of personal data and subject it to the Purpose, Necessity and Balancing test to support our continued processing of the data and to prevent unnecessary processing that may override your individual interests and freedoms. · We think it’s reasonable to expect that if you are looking for employment or have posted your professional CV information on a job board or professional networking site, you are happy for us to collect and otherwise use your personal data to offer or provide our recruitment services to you, share that information with prospective employers and assess your skills against our bank of vacancies. Once it’s looking like you may get the job, your prospective employer may also want to double check any information you’ve given us (such as the results from psychometric evaluations or skills tests) or to confirm your references, qualifications and criminal record, to the extent that this is appropriate and in accordance with local laws. We need to do these things so that we can function as a profit-making business, and to help you and other Candidates get the jobs you deserve. · We want to provide you with tailored job recommendations and relevant articles to read to help you on your job hunt. We therefore think it’s reasonable for us to process your data to make sure that we send you the most appropriate content. · We also think that it might help with your job search if you take part in our specialist online training or some of our more interactive services, if you have the time. These are part of our service offering as a business, and help differentiate us in a competitive marketplace, so it is in our legitimate interests to use your data for this reason. · We have to make sure our business runs smoothly, so that we can carry on providing services to Candidates like you. We therefore also need to use your data for our internal administrative activities, like payroll and invoicing where relevant. · We have our own obligations under the law, which it is a legitimate interest of ours to insist on meeting! If we believe in good faith that it is necessary, we may therefore share your data in connection with crime detection, tax collection or actual or anticipated litigation. · To ensure that we provide you with the best service possible, we store your personal data and/or the personal data of individual contacts at your organisation as well as keeping records of our conversations, meetings, registered jobs and placements. From time to time, we may also ask you to undertake a customer satisfaction survey. We think this is reasonable – we deem these uses of your data to be necessary for our legitimate interests as an organisation providing various recruitment services to you. · We use and store the personal data of individuals within your organisation in order to facilitate the receipt of services from you as one of our Suppliers. We also hold your financial details, so that we can pay you for your services. We deem all such activities to be necessary within the range of our legitimate interests as a recipient of your services. · If you have been put down by a Candidate or a prospective member of Staff as one of their referees, we use your personal data in order to contact you for a reference. 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2019-04-22T16:22:33Z
https://uk.aap3.com/privacy-policy/
The technique to access purified drinking water as per the environment efficiency and cost effective term. In Hong Kong, the government has received many queries regarding waste water treatment, waste disposal, quality of drinking water. A committee has been set up to solve those queries with civil engineers by the government. In this assignment, the ground drainage system, treatment of domestic sewage, disposal of solid domestic waste, purification and storage of drinking water are going to be discussed. Drainage systems of the underground drains or sewers from the buildings or wastewater treatments have been discussed in the particular segment. The different procedures under which the foul water would need to be used in Hong Kong would be illustrated in the project. The particular project would show the different ways from which the remedial systems would be provided. Outlets: The particular sections provides the guidelines on the different ways to construct the underground drains and sewers form the buildings to the exact point of the existing sewer or a wastewater treatment system and also includes drains which may be outside the exact sewage point (Astuti et al. 2017). A fitting routine about a legitimate availability between foul drainage and the fundamental channels is found in the waste arrangement of Hong Kong islands. The association for little improvements is made to an open sewer that is 30m profound and is the development of the waste is allowed by the owning establishment. Under a few basins and showers, uncommon traps are put which don't have these shapes however their inward workings are intended to satisfy a similar goal. This goal is to prevent foul gasses from the deplete runs and sewer vents, going into the room. Under the following points, the different ways to dispose the wastewaters would be mentioned below in an effective way (Valipour, 2014). Different kinds of outlets contains different ways to evaluate the drainage systems under which it needs to be possible that the ways under which the drains are made the same way of disposing the waste in the drains would need to be used. Surcharging of drains: Some combined rainwater sewers have been designed to surcharge during heavy rainfall. There are foul sewers that also receive rainwater and therefore surcharge it. In some low-lying sites, some special decisions are being taken to provide it with some effective remedies to decrease the rate of flood during rainfall. The sewerage that has been taken into consideration would need to be surcharged effectively. In case of risk, some valves have been installed effectively to prevent it from the risk of flooding. Necessary care would need to be taken to ensure the sewage has not increased in the risk of flooding. The favored hostile to flooding valves are twofold valve sort, and reasonable for foul water having a manual conclusion gadget. The valves are as per the determinations of prEN 13564. A single valve cannot take the pressure of working effectively and it may not be kept for more than one building (Christensen et al. 2016). This may be because a single valve would not be able to take up the pressure if load is given to it. So, in that case a notice would need to be given in order to make the residents realize about the capacity of the drains and the ways in which it needs to be used effectively. Layouts: Layout drainage system would need to be kept simple. If the place of the drains are being kept at the same position year after year then it may be necessary to overflow sometime or the other. Changes would need to be done slowly or would need to be minimised. Connections of private to public drains or public to private drains would need to be made accordingly. Some through points may be provided if blockage can not be cleared effectively. Connections would need to be made with fabricated pipes which may be beneficial for the building as these pipes may be useful at the time of flow of waters and guiding it effectively to its place (Jadhav, 2016). These access points would need to be provided at every point of the sewage point. The frameworks are ventilated by a stream of air. A ventilating channel is given close or, on the other hand at the leader of the fundamental channels. The open ventilating funnels that are set up without an air permission valve is given on any deplete fitted with a blocking trap and on any deplete, which is subjected to additional charge. The sewage drains that connect with the kitchens or commercial foods are being connected with separate drains that comply with BS EN 1825-1:2004 and the design would need to be BS EN 1825-2:2002. Protection of the Drainage: Drains would need to be sealed effectively to make the supply of the flooded water pass away in a nice way. This may be helpful in continuing the flow of the water effectively. A drain would need to be made almost 100mm from the building and flexible in filling up the provided pipes (Li et al. 2017). Drains would need to be inspected regularly and checked effectively and see whether the drains are in a good condition or not. Effectively made pipes system: The pipes that would may be made would need to be done effectively and the construction of the pipes would need to be checked effectively. The pipes would need to have the effective drainage systems and have the surcharging of the drains effectively made. Rodent Barrier: The things are being used for trapping of the rodents would need to be maintained and made effectively. This may be beneficial for the building to to have a specific trapping system. Metal cages and trapping systems may be helpful in using it against the rodents. The following above calculations had been done to determine the gradient of the pipe through which the water would flow. Through the following calculations, the size of the pipes can be determined. Water Tightness: The strategy for water tightness is executed subsequent to laying, and counting the essential concrete or other haunching encompassing or inlaying, gravity channels and private sewers (Sharma et al. 2017). It is done to obtain a thought regarding the weight of water that the whole seepage framework may bear. b. Air Test: The channels that have a distance across up to 300mm are pressurized with a weight of 110mm water gage and held for 5 minutes before testing. The pipe holding an underlying weight of 100 mm with a most extreme misfortune head on a manometer of 25mm out of a time of 7 minutes takes after this. c.Water Test: The channels that has measurement of 300mm are filled in with water upto a profundity of 5m over the most minimal alter in the test segment with a base profundity of 1m that is measured at a most astounding alter in the test segment. The pipe is then left for a cooling time of 60 minutes. The test weight is kept up for a time of 30 minutes, by garnish up the water at important levels so it is found inside 100mm of the required levels all through the tests. The losses that brought about per square meter of the surface range does not surpass 1.15liters for test lengths with the main pipelines or 0.20 liters for test lengths including the pipelines and sewer vents, or 0.40 liters for tests with just sewer vents and examination chambers alone. d.Connectivity: Connecting the uses of the pipes in a effective manner the different ways under which the works that are being done would need to be done in an effective way (Billington et al. 2017). The connections would need to be appropriate, this is because if the connections are not upto the point then it may be harmful for the society who would be using it. Transfer of surface water in the city has been a noteworthy concern making the waste framework to be troublesome now and again. In any case, there are sure methods utilized by the administration with the goal that the underground seepage frameworks could be successfully used to clean up the surface water. Nonetheless, there are sure territories that should be centered on while considering transfer of surface water. A noteworthy segment of the surface water is started as water from the yearly or occasional precipitation. Consequently, it can be seen clearly from a discourse these surface water must be depleted underneath the ground to liberated the surface from dormancy. Henceforth, the current arrangement of transfer of the surface water comprises of certain sub-parts (Skousen et al. 2017). The main technique connected for the same is to structure outlets to give the water a chance to deplete to the underground aquifers. However, because of interruption of this framework, there is the utilization of the consolidated framework that may attract the water to the underground arrangement of sewerage. From there on, there are kept couple of reinforcement frameworks that are exceedingly proficient to evacuate the dormant water and penetrate it in the underground sewer framework. In any case, such sort of framework is well relevant to the seepage securing little catchments comprising of impenetrable zones of around two hectares. This sort of framework is additionally pertinent to territories bigger than this. Outlets: The outlets are composed in a way that is at risk to send or deplete the water in an underground soakaway. This is the principal type of outlet that has been wanted to evacuate the surface water. On the off chance that there is the inaccessibility of soakaway the water must be sent to some other invasion framework according to practicability. Nonetheless, there are few concerns while completing such an arrangement of ground water release. There is a prerequisite of assent from the Environment Agency that chooses or puts a farthest point to the rate at which the release must be finished. Most extreme stream of water can be allowed as per the arrangement of detainment basins (Whittle et al. 2017). Be that as it may, on account of inaccessibility of this sort of release framework, the water must be released into the underground sewer framework. Combined: On the note of the consolidated framework, it is to be portrayed that it comprises of sewers that conveys both the surface water and the foul water from the household waste. These waters are sent in a similar pipe basically to the underground sewerage framework. There is another limitation of the framework as far as natural ramifications. Consolidated framework must be utilized when there is sufficient limit of the sewerage channels to convey the two waters all the while (Meegoda et al. 2017). With regards to sewerage funeral director, if the sewerage does not contain that much ability to convey the aggregate stream of both foul and crisp water, the surface water is go through a different waste framework. Septic tank: Septic tanks are generally constructed underground and used to collect sewage. That sewage will be decomposed by bacterial activity before draining. The primary treated effluent has been produced by septic tanks. Primary treated effluent consists own foul smell and it is toxic to aquatic worms and life. Primary treated effluent can only be discharged to a drainage field (Withers, Jordan, May, Jarvie & Deal, 2014). Location: The septic tanks need to be situated beyond 18 meter of any stream of water, spring or well. That is because, water from those sources can be used for drinking, preparation of foods or drinks, cleaning of vessels for manufacturing purpose etc. Apart from this, every septic tanks needs to be situated in way so that removal of sludge and periodic inspection are easy. Design: The design of septic tank needs to be in a way so that it enables to collect all the sewage from household or apartment and easy to treat. The depth of the tank needs to be minimum 1.2 meter to 1.8 meter from the invert of the inlet to the floor. The length of the septic tank needs to be more than three times but less than four times of its width. A tank must contain two chambers those needs to access easily for inspection and cleansing purpose. The floor of every septic tank needs to be constructed by concrete. The thickness of that concrete made floor needs to be more than 150 mm. The sides of every septic tank need to be more than 215 mm thick and constructed by brickwork in cement mortar. The thickness of concrete has to more than 125 mm thick. Apart from this, a septic tank needs to be constructed with approved material to avoid any dispute (Richards, Withers, Paterson, McRoberts & Stutter, 2017). All the internal faces that include floor of any septic tanks need to be rendered in cement mortar or faced with other approved material. This helps to deliver impervious and smooth surface. Method of operation: The sewage in septic tanks generally treated by break its organic contents. In a septic tank, there are generally three layers of sewage. The Scum layer exists on top, liquid effluent layer exists in middle and sludge layer exists at the bottom. In order to reduce odour and sludge quantity, anaerobic bacteria needs to be added to a septic tank. This type of bacteria needs no oxygen to grow and break down organic materials in the septic tank. The whole process can run upto two months or more (Almomani, & Khraisheh, 2016). Methane gas can be produced from large plants that used for power generation or heating purpose. Sizing based on population: The size of septic tank generally produced by the number of population use it regularly. The capacity of septic tank for small population includes 16-48 hours flow and 3.5 cubic meter. The content in a septic tank should not disturbed by any entering flows. 0.8 liters per person per day should be the accumulated sludge volume. Disposal of sludge: The sludge can be used for various purpose such as agricultural, producing energy, landfilling etc. The content from the septic tank generally pumped out and put it into the soakaway pit of a tanker lorry. A specialist contractor needs to complete this procedure. Disposal of water after treatment: the remaining water, which has been treated in the septic tank, disposed in septic drainfield for further treatment. A building owner who is going to install a septic tank needs to submit methods of disposal of sewage to the building authority to get approved. Vehicle access: A septic tank needs to be constructed in a place where vehicles can access it easily. The vehicles include lorry to pump out sewage from the septic tank. The inlet level needs to be more than 3 meters of septic tank and within the 30 meters of vehicle access point (Sun, Liu, Tan, Tang & Kida, 2017). 2. Sewage treatment plant (STP): A sewage treatment plant generally works as the same way of septic tank. However, its mechanical components help to break solids to produce more cleaner and environmentally friendly effluent. The secondary treated effluent can be produced by sewage treatment plant. This type of effluent is cleaner than primary treated effluent. The secondary treated effluent needs to be colourless and odourless. Apart from this, it can be discharged to the surface water such as rivers, streams and to the ground such as drainage field. Location: Sewage treatment plant generally used to treat a huge amount of sewage water from household and apartments. Therefore, in order to make a STP, outskirt of city or a less populated area of a city is preferred (Xu et al. 2015). The procedures of STP are open to view for all to better maintenance and operational purpose. Design: The components of STP include submersible pump, general headroom, access walkways, artificial ventilation, staircases, open mesh flooring etc. The submersible pump allows flexibility to operate the STP. The pump used to recycle effluent of the plant while the incoming flow is less. It helps to maintain the working condition of whole STP. General headroom of 3 meters needs to be constructed for underground or closed STP, which consists artificial ventilation. The measurement of general headroom can be reduced to 2.5 meters at localized point such as under any beam. Minimum air volume of enclosed STP needs to be 14 cubic meter. 10 air changes per hour should be provided to the artificial ventilation. The exhaust pipes of ventilation need to be constructed more than 1 meter above the roof of STP. The width of access walkways needs to be minimum 0.75 meter in order to access all areas of STP to operation and maintenance purpose. The walkways should contain toe boards and safety rails made with stainless steel preferably. To restrict ponding, the walkways need to be laid to a 1:25 crossfall. The staircases need to be provided to go up and down whenever required. The tanks should contain step irons or ladders of stainless steel in order to access those. Mild steel needs to be restricted. The space maintained in step iron have to be 250 mm c/c vertically and 300 mm c/c horizontally. A tank needs to be covered with open mesh flooring if required (Schaubroeck et al. 2015). The mesh flooring should be constructed with aluminum alloy or stainless steel. It has to be designed for 5kPA uniformly distributed load. The fresh water taps need to be provided to any suitable place for hand washing. The control panel and distribution board of electricity need to be placed in a position, which can not be flooded with water. Dehumidifying heater needs to be added with control panels. The diagrams and instructions need to be place with the control panels in Chinese and English. The valves, pumps and penstocks need to be labelled accurately. Method of operation: Sedimentation tanks can be two types such as circular/square upward flow tank and rectangular horizontal flow tank. The length to width ratio of sedimentation tank could not be less than 2. The length to width ratio between 1 and 2 needs to be avoided. In order to collect and remove sledges easily, minimum 60-degree hopper wall slops needs to be provided to upward flow sedimentation. A mechanical scraper system can be provided with horizontal sedimentation tanks on a nominal floor slope, which helps to discharge sludge hopper. Twin tanks are preferable to use but single tank can be allowed with proper scraper that allows maintaining underwater parts. The fine leveling can be done by using adjustable weirs in sedimentation tanks. V-notch weirs preferably use for the variation of wide flow. To prevent the sludge overflow, the sidewalls need to be minimum of 1 meter of height (Yang, Li, Zou, Fang & Zhang, 2014). A chamber needs to be included with the final sedimentation tank outlet after installation of recirculation pump’s weir. The actual flow is always lesser than designed flow. The feed pump needs to there to prevent flow more than 3 DWF. A tank with 60 days sludge volume storage. Vehicle access for cleansing purpose. Disposal of water after treatment: a solution of sodium hypochlorite needs to be added to the effluent after final sedimentation in order to discharge it (van Loosdrecht & Brdjanovic, 2014). Vehicle access: vehicles should access the whole STP easily. The treatment of sewage water can be done by two methods. Septic tank: Effluent produced by septic tank is primarily treated and contains foul odor. The effluent is toxic for aquatic life and worms. Therefore, the treatment of effluent needs to be good so that it can not affect environment. In a gravel field, a network of pipeline called drain field needs to be produced. The wastewater with solid waste gravitates towards a absorption field. However, other types of gravity based wastewater equally distributed in the drain field. At the final stage, the liquid wastewater runs through gravel layer after leak out of pipes. Then it moves through soil layer and filtered by soil. The microbes of soil help to treat the wastewater. After that the water moves to groundwater. The dry soil is more effective for the whole process. Regular inspection and cleaning is needed to maintain the septic tank. Water needs to be used efficiently and extra usage of water can be caused of system failure (Siegrist, 2017). Dumping of non-decomposable wastes needs to be avoided. The pesticides, acids, paints and other chemicals need to be avoided to dump in septic tank. Those can create harmful environment for microbes in the septic tank. Sewage treatment plant: Without any discharge, high amount of impoundments are involved in treatment plants. If the precipitation exceeds, the evaporation of impoundments have to be high. In order to treat liquid wastewater, the storage requirements, groundwater pollution and other things need to be considered. The effluents can be discharged in natural water bodies. Those effluents can be used to cool industrial machines. That water also can be used for public usage. The wastewater can also be used for irrigation and agricultural purpose and for watering golf course, parks etc (Mahapatra, Chanakya, & Ramachandra, 2013). The harmful mixtures and toxins need to be separated from the water before releasing it. The technology needs to be improved in order to remove chemical materials from the wastewater. Composite and landfills are the other alternative method for safety. Hence, in order to carry out the process of disposal of household solid wastes the government has taken special initiatives. Landfill- Tonnes of trash from the business, industry and residences are disposed of f at key sites of Hong Kong. THe major advantage of these landfills is that they provide the maximum space or capacity requires for the disposal of the solid wastes. The major landfill sites of Hong Kong are West New Territories (WENT) Landfills, South East New Territories (SENT) Landfills and lastly the North East New Territories (NENT) Landfill. Refuse Chutes- In order to pass the refuse from the each floor to the central ground floor of a building an inclined channel called as refuse chute is used. Before the year 2000 the refuse chute was named as a Refuse Storage. However those built after that year were named as Material Recovery Chamber (Garcia-Lodeiro, Carcelen-Taboada, Fernández-Jiménez & Palomo, 2016). Sorting- Based on the nature of source material a process of sorting is followed. The process involves wide range of labour intensive hand picking activities that carries on over to a very technical complex processes. The accumulation of wastes is essentially being done in separate containers initiating the process of sorting. Another method used in this kind is to sort the solid wastes after collection in the recycling centre (Chen et al. 2015). However, this process is quite complicated when compared to the process of segregation at the centre of generation. Requirements and constraints of solid waste management is an important agenda of government. In order to deal with the above-mentioned criteria, some internal and external factor needs to keep in concern to run the system in smooth manner. Legal Requirements: According to the act of the Waste Disposal Ordinance (1980), all the soil wastage is managed to the final disposal of that material, this procedure is going through a systematic framework. The internal process is going through environment friendly procedures. Disposal of that wastage, in one part utilize the wastage materials and in another part, it creates some benefits for large quantity of people by managing different kind of disposal technique. This initiative was done by many times in various times to improve all its strategy structure the solid waste management technique. Different things like Livestock string, wasting chemical, dumping illegal waste things and the process of import and export technique is important matter. In order to enlist those thing for the amendment procedure, aiming to improve the condition of waste management procedure. In 2006, all the rules and regulation are amended again to set up some rules according to the International Basel Ban to control the clinical waste also after use those materials. Solid waste is necessary for the overall benefit of creature community; due to different reason like quality of solid, and concentration level and physical and chemical reaction of solid waste it creates some side effects on human health safety and harmful for the environment also. Waste Disposal Regulation is already gives some threatening alarm for managing the solid waste in a particular framework. Climate change is the result of the improper solid waste management in details any manufacturing product from its production to waste is such a phase that produce harmful gases. Product manufacturing going through some specific procedure that may creates a large amount of greenhouse gas. These gases are the leading reason for the global warming situation facing by the human civilization in today's world. The green house gas are, majorly impact the earth climate. Population increasing is the prime factor for the solid waste management. Different countries like Asia, Africa and Latin America are the most Victim country of climate change in negative perspective. Landfills by government or the public is a systematic procedure for burning those materials or underground the solid waste. The simple thing is that by collecting those materials government can collect a huge number of money approximately $435 annually. The problem is lying in the psychology of the people that they produce wastage rather than recycle those products. Hong-Kong government set up a plan for mange all the waste materials in a modern technique about 400 hectares of land till 2030. Purification of Water is a key part in guaranteeing access to safe drinking water. Safe drinking water emphatically affects the strength of the whole group. Frameworks are set up to guarantee to progress water quality, including water quality testing. The testing guarantees the water treatment prepare brings about an item that meets government’s water quality rules. Water examination includes searching for a few sorts of contaminants, including perilous levels of natural, microbial, inorganic and additionally radioactive contaminants. Precipitation is one of the wellsprings of water in the earth (Ruiz-Aguirre, Polo-López, Fernández-Ibáñez & Zaragoza, 2017). The availability of fresh water in river was very limited till 1960s. The government of Hong Kong took steps regarding importing raw water from Guangdong province to improve the condition. Now they have 70-80 percent of fresh water imported from Dongjiang. Small streams flow throughout the country that adds a major part of the country’s water. Shallow wells are regularly the methods for getting to groundwater of shallow profundities (Pramanik, Thangavadivel, Shu & Jegatheesan, 2016). The water supply framework, talented individuals dive into the delicate ground developments until the point when they have to strike the water table. The idea of profound wells is like the shallow wells just contrast lies in the profundity of water gathering. Specific penetrating of soil and shake is completed for making bore wells. The gap is of 100-150 mm breadth in the event of drill gaps. A supply that is appropriate to utilized for the capacity of water from stream or waterways stream actually and the water volume that is put away administers the store estimate. This can influence by the fluctuation of the inflow accessible for the store. Screening: Screening removes many big obstacles from water. This water can come from lakes, streams or the ground goes through a screen as it enters the water treatment plant (Kravchenko, Chernova, Panchenko, Kosygina & Yakupova 2016). At the point when the water source is a lake or stream, the screen serves an essential capacity, keeping out substantial common contaminants, for example, plants and wood, or fish. In the event that groundwater is utilized, screening may not be important since the water has gone through layers of the earth in what is a characteristic screening capacity. Coagulation: It is a process of removing nutrients and other remaining solids present in the water by adding chemicals to it. The chemicals create which is called floc, a type of sticky particles that attracts dirt making it heavier to sink down to the bottom of the storage tank. Sedimentation: As the dirt, sits in the bottom of the water tank thereby forming a sedimentation basin. The dirt-free water flows at the top. It takes lot of time in settling down of the sedimentation. Filtration: In this stage, water passes through different layers of sand, gravel and other substances. All these layers act as a filtration process to filter any remaining substances. These layers are made deep to get the filtration process as best as possible. In filtration stage, anything swimming in the water will be removed. Disinfection: This is the final stage where disinfection process is applied to get the purest form of water. By adding chlorine, this water is made truly drinkable by discarding all the toxins, killing all the bacteria, viruses and parasites. Finally the chlorine is counteracted by adding sodium bisulphate (ghigh, Alizadeh, Wong, Islam, Amin, et al. 2015). Water further can be classified into parts: hard water and soft water. The portability of water is determined by the hardness of water. Hard water is made up of many dissolved minerals such as magnesium and calcium. Soft water contains only one ion, which is sodium. Soft water is basically a water. As the rainfall happens, the water falls on the ground in form of soft water. As it start settling in the ground, it gets mixed with different components such as calcium, magnesium and chalk and turns the water into hard water. The percentage of mineral content is found high in hard water, which is sometimes considered as potable water suited for drinking. Sometimes temporary hardness is found in the water, which cannot be removed after boiling also. Any liquid substance has two types of nature: acidic in nature and alkaline in nature. This nature can be measured by dipping a pH strip into the substance. If the pH strip is divided into parts 1-6 that shows acidic meter and 8-12 shows alkaline meter. 7 is the neutral value of the substance. If the pH strip turns red then it is acidic in nature and if pH strip turns blue then it is alkaline in nature. A reservoir is a water-stockpiling compartment that holds clean water after it has been dealt with in a water plant and before it is channeled to the end clients. These compartments are secured and are intended to guard the water against contamination. Their primary intention is to give a cradle inside the water supply framework with the goal that water supplies can be kept up crosswise over times of changing interest (Peng, Jin, Li, Li, Srinivasan, et al.2016). River: The government mainly collects the water source from its neigjhbpoiuringf copunteries like Dogging that is situated in the east part of the country. Small streams, which are not flow every time during a year is mainly, contribute the most part of the water Hong Kong city. Government annually collects 70 to 80% of water in the small streams. Shallow water Shallow wells are one of the major sources of water in Hong Kong. Shallow wells water supply is the source of water in Hong Kong city. The small part of river or any kind of water reservation is the providing the drinking water in Hong Kong. Purified water is managing through applying a basic method of water purification. Deep wells holes: Not only the small part but also the deep well provide the large amount of drinking water in Hong Kong. In order to collect the drinking water a specific procedure is made to collect a drinking water from deep wells. Desalination impounding reservoirs: different reservoir also supplies the crisis of water. The basic process is same as the deep well technique. This procedure is cost effective and environmentally friendly. Environment efficiency and cost effective procedure of water purification is a basic thing for storing the natural water resource. Rainfall storing is a huge matter for the water storing there has some specific procedure that can produce a clear and healthy water. That procedure is called the hydrological cycle. Evaporation cycling means evaporation, condensation and precipitation. These steps are associated with the different kind of human made technique. The main thing is that evaporation occurs when the level of water of is transforming in evaporation from the liquid state. The main function is the storing of rainfall. Condensation of rainfall is a procedure of changing the state of liquid form due to the climate procedure. Fresh water is sufficient in Hong-Kong that is faced from 1960. This procedure is made from accumulate the water from neighboring state. Streams from different region are the main source of water. The main function is dependent on the efficiency skills by the staff that are responsible to the job they have to take proper prevention to supply fresh and safe drinking water to the people of Hong Kong. The basic procedure was made through proper application of the standard procedure. Drinking water should be safe in order to not spreading germ via consumption of water, the water is the main source which operate the human body but the main thing is that the water supply is basically done through the government in specific time period. The basic purpose to do this activity is to provide a fresh water trough to the public of Hong Kong ( Hering et al. 2015). All the procedure which are adopted is that they first accumulate there the water from different sources then after they use the technique of specified technique of water purify from those collected water. Then supply the purified water to the Hong Kong resides people. All the process is very cost and environmental free to deliver the cost free water to the citizen. All necessary part is done in a systematic procedure under basic surveillance. The water reservation technique should be done through a specific measurement, which is not harmful for the human health. The main thing is that the people who were responding to that thing take some measurement to provide safe water. Water pollution is causing through the wastage of solids and factory wastage so the place where the water pollution is done must have to reside from the distant place of those place. All the necessary part is some within a specific time. Main thing is that they have to deal with that product in very systematic way by how no other inevitable process is going through a proper surveillance. All the process is systemic in order to supply fresh and harmless water to the public of Hong Kong government. The procedure is very critical f but it has to be done by the Hong -Kong government supply the water to the public mainly they have to think about that specially for the children., they are very sensitive in order to tolerate the germ negative effect. They have less immunization power to tackle all those unpleasant factors of polluted water. Financial context in the domestic sewage and availability of fresh water is mainly high concerning matter of the Hong-Kong government. They sometimes have to make MOU with other countries to get the sufficient amount of water (Salimi et al. 2017). Domestic Sewage system of Hong-Kong government is, mainly concerned for providing safe and healthy water, they can not violate rules by cross the boundary of any country or break the MOU on bilateral treaty (Rozin,Haddad, Nemeroff, & Slovic, 2015). Some financial activity done by the government is to provide in this particular context. The main purpose of the doing this term is to satisfy the public of Hong Kong. Some perspective is attached through the financial terms. Some implication also associates in the financial aspect. They have to take some definite procedure to collect the water and run the system accurately in domestic sewage process. Environmental factor is one of the major factor for controlling the drainage and water supply to the people of Hong Kong public. The Main perspective is to provide drinking water in a sustainable process manse the processto adopt by the practitioner by how people can gain the profit simultaneously store for the fort the future generation(Guerrero, Maas,Hogland, 2013). Environmental factor is a major factor, which are associated with the environmental system is the major part for the government of Hong-Kong. Ecological factors have to concern is the basic thing means the accumulator has to store the water and provide that to the citizen o f the people in healthy state. In order to do that they can't violate the rule or destroy the ecological rule by how the creature of water will harm and the lifesystem of water is destroyed. Not only that the sewage system, some time loosen the basic element of soil, which leads improper farming in the countries who are dependent on the farming. Health and safety matter is mainly concern of both the government and the public of Hong Kong. Water should be in that situation by how people will not became seriously ill due to consumption of those water supplied in their or use for drinking purpose. The main agenda in this sector is that process is to take the necessary elements to reduce the harmful ingredient from the water. All the process, which is associated, this procedure is highly concerned about the health and safety matter of people health. People should also gather some information about how they can get the sufficient amount of water and sewage system of domestic purpose has to take consideration about the safety and healthy manner. Proper knowledge of healthy water and its pros concert will enlighten the people about their health. They did not realise that how much they are effective in order to consume the healthy water supplied by the government but the main perspective is to deliver a germless water buy how they are able to understand the positive impact over the health. In order to makeimproper system of drainagesystem is causing the germ production which leads several diseases in all aged people. Not only has that it created a trouble in the daily life of the people of Hong Kong. In order to remove the obstacle government have to take necessary action (Terzi,Gedik,Verep, & Yandi, 2015). In overall, the perspective is to maintain a good and healthy lifestyle by the citizen of people. In international forum there are mainly countries who are serving for the best procedure for the citizen of their own country, In that perspective they are also have to concern about their health by the citizen also. It is a two way process. The citizen also has to take care and gather proper knowledge about the safety measurement. A country which have standard rate of healthy people, and reduce their mortality rate by providing the proper infrastructure facility they are ranked in the higher position after assessing by the international territory (Maxwell,2014).The Hong Kong government always try to focus their activity and continuously make improvement of that. Now that country is in better situation; if they follow all the measurement for providing healthy water and property drainage system they will also can be achieved the best tagline in perspective of proper health condition and the domestic sewage system. The following assignment has focused on the portraying an appropriate comprehension about the ground seepage framework. The seepage state of Hong Kong Island is considered in this examination. The topic of this task depends on reviewing the questions that are raised by a portion of the nationals living in the Hong Kong Island. The representing bodies expected to answer the questions raised and it has been managed in this task. The task has endeavored to portray a reasonable outline of the strategies that are utilized for treating household sewage and the procedure of subterranean waste framework.
2019-04-24T19:46:33Z
https://www.abcassignmenthelp.com/understanding-the-ground-drainage-systems-and-the-methods-to-treat-domestic-sewage-hong-kong
Monday 31st July 2017 – 9.13am – Murray MacGregor. Three people, including a young girl, have been taken to major trauma centres after a serious two car crash. It happened near to the A46 Bishopton Island just to the north of Stratford Upon Avon at about 5.25pm on Sunday afternoon. Two ambulances, a paramedic officer and the Midlands Air Ambulances from Strensham and Cosford were sent to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman, said: “On arrival, crews found a BMW estate that had ended up in a hedge and a white Ford Fiesta with significant front-end damage. “The 18-year-old woman driving the Fiesta had to be cut free from the wreckage. She had fractures to both legs and her left arm; she was not fully conscious. She was immobilised had splints applied and was then airlifted to the major trauma centre at University Hospital Coventry & Warwickshire by the Cosford aircraft. “The front seat passenger in the BMW was a 34-year-old woman. She had facial, leg and wrist injuries. She was immobilised and taken on blue lights to the same major trauma centre by land ambulance. “A seven-year-old girl in the back of the car had neck and abdominal pain and facial injuries. She was also immobilised, given pain relief and taken on blue lights to Birmingham Children’s Hospital. A critical care paramedic from the Strensham aircraft travelled with the ambulance crew. Two men needed treatment for serious flash burns after the fuel tank of a van exploded in Warwickshire last night. A local volunteer Community First Responder (CFR) was approached by the two injured men in Gerrards Road, Shipston-on-Stour shortly after 8.00pm last night (Friday). The two men had made their way from where the incident had happened nearby; the van consequently caught fire. Whilst the CFR provided initial burns care to the two men, the Trust’s control room responded two ambulances, a community paramedic and the critical care car from The Air Ambulance Service. Friday 28th July 2017 – 8.50am – Claire Brown. Excellent and rapid teamwork between the emergency services meant that all residents from a four-storey block of flats escaped injury following a flat fire in Tipton last night. West Midlands Ambulance Service received a call from West Midlands Fire Service shortly before 10.00pm last night to reports of a flat fire in St Marks Road in Tipton. Two ambulances, a paramedic officer, the Trust’s Hazardous Area Response Team paramedics and a senior paramedic officer attended the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokeswoman said: “When ambulance staff arrived, a large number of residents were in the street after they had evacuated from the block of flats. Firefighters were using ladders to rescue the remaining eight residents from windows of their properties whilst also working to quickly extinguish the fire. Notes to Editor – Picture and video credit ‘West Midlands Ambulance Service’. Thursday 27th July 2017 – 9.30am – Jamie Arrowsmith. A car driver was alerted in to one of the region’s major trauma centres with serious injuries following a collision with a lorry last night that left his vehicle with significant damage. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to Lodge Lane in Cheslyn Hay, Cannock at 7.51pm and sent two ambulances, a paramedic officer and a MERIT trauma doctor to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “Crews arrived to find a lorry that overturned and a car with substantial front end damage. “The driver of the car, a man in his 20s, was assisted out of the car and treated for a fractured leg, hip and pelvic injuries as well as cuts to his arms. “The man, who was suffering from a slightly reduced level of consciousness, was immobilised with the use of a scoop stretcher and given pain relief before being taken to Royal Stoke University Hospital on blue lights and sirens. “Ambulance staff found the lorry driver, a man in his 40s, sitting at the roadside having managed to get himself out. Tuesday 25th July 2017 – 5.30pm – Murray MacGregor. A motorcyclist has been anaesthetised at the scene of an incident in Coventry. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to the junction of Radford Road and Bede Road at about 2.50pm on Tuesday afternoon. An ambulance, a paramedic officer initially responded but they requested the Warwickshire and Northamptonshire Air Ambulance due to the severity of the rider’s injuries. The man, who was estimated to be in his 20s had suffered very serious chest and facial injuries. Ambulance staff and the doctor from the aircraft carried out a number of procedures at the scene to stabilise his condition. “He was then anaesthetised, immobilised and had a pelvic binder put in place before being taken on blue lights by land ambulance to the major trauma centre at University Hospital Coventry & Warwickshire; the doctor travelled with the ambulance. Tuesday 25th July 2017 – 2.50pm – Murray MacGregor. A young cyclist has been injured after a collision with a car. It happened near to the junction of Langbank Avenue and Willenhall Lane in Coventry at just after 1.00pm this afternoon. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, crews found an off-duty nurse and the crew of a WMAS non-emergency patient transport service vehicle at the scene providing aid to the girl. “The initial calls suggested that the girl had been knocked out briefly but she was fully conscious when ambulance crews assessed her. “The 10-year-old had suffered abrasions on her head, arms and legs but appeared not to have suffered any serious injuries. Her bike had not been so lucky with the saddle no longer attached to the bike. “As a precaution, the girl was taken on blue lights to University Hospital Coventry & Warwickshire. Tuesday 25th July 2017 – 2.06pm – Murray MacGregor. An elderly woman has suffered very serious leg injuries after a collision with a car in a car park. It happened at the back of the Co-op, off Market Street, in Kingswinford at about 10.05am this morning. Two ambulances, a paramedic officer and the Midlands Air Ambulance from Cosford with two doctors and a critical care paramedic on board were sent to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, ambulance staff found an 88-year-old woman who had suffered very serious leg and pelvic injuries. “Ambulance staff and the doctors worked on her at the scene to stabilise her condition. She received pain relief and had her legs splinted before she was taken by land ambulance on blue lights to the major trauma centre at Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham; the doctors travelled with the ambulance crew. Tuesday 25th July 2017 – 8.53am – Murray MacGregor. A teenage girl has suffered very serious leg injuries after a collision with a car. It happened outside Boots the Chemist in Mytton Oak Road in Shrewsbury at about 5.00pm yesterday afternoon. West Midlands Ambulance Service received numerous calls to the incident. An ambulance that was taking a patient into hospital came across the crash shortly after it had happened. Two further ambulances and a paramedic manager were sent to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, ambulance staff found a 14-year-old girl with very severe injuries to both legs and her pelvis. “Nearby a car had come to rest against a green BT phone exchange box. Nearby a set of traffic lights and a bollard had been knocked over. “Due to the proximity to Royal Shrewsbury Hospital, the crew spent only 12 minutes on scene before leaving for the hospital with the girl. “The Midlands Air Ambulance from Cosford with a MERIT doctor and critical care paramedic on board had also been sent to the incident and went straight to the hospital. “The girl’s condition was stabilised in A&E before she was airlifted to Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool for specialist care. “The elderly woman car driver was assessed at the scene and was treated for a possible heart attack and taken to Royal Shrewsbury Hospital. Monday 24th July 2017 – 4.30pm – Jamie Arrowsmith. The Trust’s Patient Transport Service (PTS) is an integral part of West Midlands Ambulance Service and plays a vital role in ensuring that patients from all over the region get to their hospital appointments each year. Alongside PTS crews that are employed by West Midland Ambulance Service, the Trust also utilises the help of volunteer car drivers. West Midlands Ambulance Service is currently appealing to anyone who is interested in becoming a volunteer car driver in Herefordshire and Tenbury Wells to help get patients to their appointments at local renal dialysis centres or to hospital appointments further afield. At present the Trust has around 40 volunteer car drivers who come from all walks of life and help to convey a wide range of patients to physiotherapy, renal and general outpatient appointments to a number of hospitals throughout the region. Michelle Brotherton, Non-Emergency Services Operations Delivery Director, said: “Volunteer car drivers are extremely helpful to the service. There are no set hours and volunteers can do as much or as little as they wish, enabling them to fit their volunteering around their own lifestyle. All applicants must be prepared to have a Criminal Records Bureau check. Applicants are required to be medically and physically fit and to have a mature and caring attitude. The Trust pays a set mileage rate to cover fuel costs as well as other out-of-pocket expenses e.g. cost of parking, cost of work phone calls etc. For more information please contact Ros Wale via rosalind.wale@wmas.nhs.uk. Monday 24th July 2017 – 2.15pm – Jamie Arrowsmith. A motorcyclist has died following a collision with a lorry this morning. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to the A464 in Cosford at 10.49am. The Midlands Air Ambulance crew from Cosford was sent to the scene in a rapid response vehicle. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival at the scene, crews discovered a motorcyclist with multiple serious injuries. “Unfortunately, it immediately became apparent that nothing could be done to save the patient who was confirmed deceased at the scene. We do not know the gender of the motorcyclist. Monday 24th July 2017 – 10.30am – Jamie Arrowsmith. A van driver has had a lucky escape and avoided serious injury despite his vehicle overturning and landing on its roof on the M6 Toll this morning. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to the northbound carriage, between junctions 5 and 6, at 7.55am and sent an ambulance, two paramedic officers and the Warwickshire and Northamptonshire Air Ambulance to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival at the scene, crews were told that the van had rolled numerous times before coming to rest on its roof. “The driver, a man in his 50s, was out of the vehicle and fully conscious. “He was assessed by ambulance crews and treated for minor neck and knee injuries before being taken to Walsall Manor Hospital by land ambulance. Monday 24th July 2017 – 9.10am – Jamie Arrowsmith. A woman was airlifted to hospital in a serious condition following an RTC yesterday evening that resulted in nine patients for ambulance crews to assess. The three-car collision took place on the A49 in Leominster, near to the OK Diner Island, just before 6.20pm and resulted in four people in total needing transporting to hospital after receiving treatment from ambulance crews at the scene. West Midlands Ambulance Service received several 999 calls to the incident and sent three ambulances, a paramedic officer and the Midlands Air Ambulances from Cosford and Strensham to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival at the scene, it became immediately apparent to crews that the most seriously injured patient was a passenger in one of the cars. “The woman, believed to be in her 40s, had suffered multiple serious injuries and was found to be in cardiac arrest. “She was rapidly freed from the car by ambulance crews who began performing CPR and advanced life support. “They successfully managed to restart her heart before emergency treatment continued as the woman was airlifted to Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, in a critical condition. “From the same car, a man in his 60s, managed to free himself before being treated for a chest injury as well as minor head and back injuries. He was immobilised and given pain relief before being airlifted to the same hospital. “A young boy and a young girl from the same car were treated for chest pain and a leg injury respectively before being transported to Hereford Hospital by land ambulance. “Travelling in a second car, a man in his 40s was treated for minor head and back injuries. A woman in her 30s escaped uninjured and a young girl was assessed for a minor shoulder injury. All three were discharged at the scene. A group of teenagers were a great help to ambulance staff last night by directing crews to their injured friend in a wooded area in Wolverhampton. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to a wooded area behind Tiger Wok on the Bridgnorth Road in Compton, Wolverhampton shortly after 6.00pm (Wednesday). A responder paramedic, an ambulance, a paramedic officer and the Trust’s Hazardous Area Response Team (HART) were sent to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokeswoman said: “When the responder paramedic and ambulance crew arrived they were greeted by the teenager’s friends who directed them to the patient; a 10-minute walk from the Bridgnorth Road across fields and into a wooded area of land. Due to their being no phone signal in the wooded area, his friends had raced to the main road in order to call 999. Once with the patient, a 13-year-old boy, ambulance staff were told by his friends that he had initially been knocked unconscious after coming off his pushbike. Thankfully, the boy had regained consciousness but upon assessment was found to have sustained a nasty facial injury, a suspected serious pelvic injury as well as pain in his back and neck. “Whilst the initial team of ambulance staff began treating the teenage boy with pain relief and wrapping him in a blanket to keep him warm, his friends were asked to go back to the ambulance on Bridgnorth Road to wait for and direct HART and the paramedic officer. “Once the full team of ambulance staff were with the teenager he was carefully immobilised using a neck collar, pelvic splint and specialist multi-integrated body splint (MIBS). The boy was then carried by the team across the rough terrain back to the awaiting ambulance. The teenager was then taken to New Cross Hospital for further assessment and treatment. Wednesday 19th July 2017 – 8.30am – Murray MacGregor. A woman has been anaesthetised at the scene of a serious RTC. The crash happened on Shenley Lane in the Weoley area of Birmingham. An ambulance was on scene within seven minutes and was backed up by a second ambulance, a paramedic officer and the MERIT trauma doctor and critical care paramedic. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, ambulance staff found a small blue car with substantial damage to the driver’s side and a Jaguar car with front nearside damage. “The driver of the blue car, a 20-year-old woman, was initially unconscious. She was being helped by an off-duty GP and a police officer who was holding her neck still. “Ambulance staff worked with firefighters to extricate the woman. After assessment, she was anaesthetised by the doctor and taken on blue lights to the major trauma centre at Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham with a suspected head injury. The 54-year-old man driving the Jaguar had managed to get out of the vehicle himself. He was complaining of muscular chest and right arm pain. After assessment, he chose not to go to hospital and was discharged at the scene. Monday 17th July 2017 – 8.35am – Jamie Arrowsmith. Three people have died and one has been taken to hospital following a collision between a car and a tree yesterday afternoon (Sunday). West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to Coleshill Road in Atherstone at 4.35pm and sent three ambulances, a rapid response paramedic a paramedic officer and the Warwickshire and Northamptonshire Air Ambulance to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, crews discovered a car that had collided with a tree and four patients. “Unfortunately, it became apparent that nothing could be done to save three of the patients, two men and a woman, and they were confirmed dead at the scene. Want to find out more about your local ambulance service? Come along to our annual meeting and find out more about working for an ‘Outstanding’ Ambulance Service. West Midlands Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust boasts the highest paramedic skill mix in the country. 2016-17 saw the service continuing to strive to ever better this skill mix by recruiting a large number of graduate and student paramedics. The Trust also introduced a new fleet of vehicles and completed the roll out of an electronic patient records system, alongside trialling other initiatives to ensure we get to patients as quickly as possible. 2016-17 was also an extremely successful year for our patient transport services, who were awarded two new brand new contacts. The meeting will take place at The Academy, Dudley Road, Brierley Hill, DY5 1LQ. Doors will open for the careers event at 5.30pm with the main meeting commencing at 6.30pm. The event provides an opportunity for members of the public to meet with the Board of Directors, representatives from Council of Governors and Trust staff. Presentations will be delivered, providing an insight into how the organisation performed in 2016-17, including the Quality Account and financial statements. The meeting will also highlight the focus and challenges the service are facing for the current year. WMAS Chief Executive, Anthony Marsh, said: “During 2016-17 West Midlands Ambulance Service was the only ambulance trust to be rated ‘Outstanding’ by the Care Quality Commission (CQC). I am incredibly proud of my staff and the volunteers who support us, for providing the best possible care to patients across the West Midlands. Helping others is at the heart of everything we do and I am hugely pleased that the CQC saw a positive, patient centred culture within the Trust with hard working staff proud to work here and making a real difference to patients’ lives. WMAS Chairman, Sir Graham Meldrum, added: “Despite the challenges faced by the NHS and the heavy demands placed upon the ambulance service, the Trust continues to focus on patient care. It is an inevitable fact that, every single day, people will call 999 for help in their hour of need. These patients are receiving the highest standard of care and compassion from our staff as well as being provided with appropriate care in the right place and at the right time. I am very proud of all of our staff who provide such an excellent standard of service. Anyone wishing to attend should email: foundationtrust@wmas.nhs.uk by Friday 21st July. Please title your email ‘Annual Meeting’. * The careers event will host staff from emergency operations centre, paramedics, Trust Tweeters – Lucy Parrott and Sam Grimson, Ambulance Fleet Assistant information, Ambulance Service Fit Test, The recruitment team, Community First Responders – FastAid, Organisational Development and information about health and well-being volunteering opportunities. The introduction of the Ambulance Response Programme will mean that more patients will be seen more quickly than ever before. Here, some of the experts behind the scheme explain more about why it is good news for patients. Do you want to find out more about what ARP means for you? To view the University of Sheffield report that evaluates the new ambulance service standards please click the link below. Thursday 13th July 2017 – 12.20pm – Murray MacGregor. West Midlands Ambulance Service is welcoming a new system of response standards which will ensure that patients in the most need get an even quicker response. The Government has today announced approval for the Ambulance Response Programme (ARP) which has been developed by clinicians over the last 18 months and is the most rigorously tested programme of its kind anywhere in the world. Under the new system, call handlers in the 999 control rooms ask additional questions that can very quickly identify those patients who will be the highest priority; this allows an ambulance to be dispatched without delay. For other types of call, ambulance staff are given additional time to assess the needs of the patient more fully so that the right response can be sent to meet their needs. Because this means a more efficient tasking of ambulance resources, callers actually get a quicker response than they do at present. West Midlands Ambulance Service has been one of three ambulance trusts piloting the new scheme and the figures show patients and staff alike benefit from the new system. Trust Chief Executive, Anthony Marsh, said: “Since we introduced the Ambulance Response Programme last summer we have been able to get to more patients, more quickly, than ever before, particularly those with the most serious conditions; this has undoubtedly led to lives being saved. “ARP gives us a chance to send the correct response to each patient, not just the closest. For example, in the case of a stroke patient, under the old system, we might have sent a rapid response vehicle and then an ambulance so that we could stop the clock. However, what that patient actually needed was to get an ambulance to the patient and get them to a hyperacute stroke unit. ARP means the patient gets life-saving treatment more quickly allowing a faster and more complete recovery to take place. “For this type of call, we can show that on average we get a conveying ambulance to that patient over a minute more quickly than we used to; 12:42 as opposed to 13:48. However, for the most serious case – category 1 – we are also getting to patients more quickly because the system is much more efficient. “Whereas we might have sent multiple vehicles to other cases just to stop the clock, we now just send the right one. This means that the number of times that an ambulance vehicle has been dispatched and then stood down has dropped dramatically. “The system has freed up ambulances which were previously heading to incidents and then being stood down, which are now utilised to get to lower categories of calls that might previously have waited longer for a response. “We already had some of the toughest targets in the world; in many respects, these new ones are tougher still. For example, the number of patients in the most serious category has been doubled from three to six percent. This means that those patients who are truly life-threatened will get a faster response and get the treatment they need even more quickly. “Despite this, the figures speak for themselves: previously we used to get to Red 1 calls in an average of 7mins 30seconds. Now we get there in 7mins 5secs even with the bigger number of patients. “Not only is the system popular with road staff, it is also popular with control room staff because they know that they have the time to get to the right decision rather than having to react without necessarily having the full information of what a patient really needs. ARP was developed with significant input from senior ambulance clinicians. It has been rigorously tested using over 10 million 999 calls, with no safety incident or concerns. It has been independently evaluated by Sheffield University in what has been the largest study of its kind ever completed anywhere in the world. Thursday 13th July 2017 – 9.00am – Claire Brown. There’s still time to apply to help save lives in your local community in your spare time. We’re looking for keen and willing potential recruits to become volunteer Community First Responders (CFRs) in Shropshire, particularly South East Shropshire. To find out more and to apply, please visit NHS Jobs via www.jobs.nhs.uk and search for ‘Community First Responder’. The closing date for application has been extended until Sunday 23rd July. Wednesday 12th July 2017 – 2.40pm – Murray MacGregor. A collision between a motorbike and a pedestrian has left a woman with a potentially serious head injury. The crash happened on Birmingham Road, in the Sutton Trinity area of Sutton Coldfield at about 11.50am this morning (Wednesday). An ambulance was on scene in six minutes and was backed up by a paramedic officer and the Warwickshire and Northamptonshire Air Ambulance. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman, said: “When ambulance crews arrived, they found a woman pedestrian who was estimated to be in her 50s, but there was no motorcycle. “The woman had a reduced level of consciousness and had suffered a potentially serious head injury as well as cuts and bruises. Wednesday 12th July 2017 – 9.25am – Jamie Arrowsmith. Two people have been injured and taken to hospital after a car collided with a stationary car and a house last night (Tuesday). West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to Field Road in Bloxwich shortly before 11.40pm and sent two ambulances, a paramedic officer, a MERIT trauma doctor and the Trust’s Hazardous Area Response Team to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, crews discovered two patients, both of whom were travelling in the car. “The rear seat passenger, a man in his 20s, had managed to get himself out of the vehicle. “Following assessment from ambulance staff, he was treated for serious chest injuries as well as cuts to his arm. “He was given pain relief and taken on alert to Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham where a trauma team were awaiting his arrival. The MERIT doctor travelled with the patient to continue treatment en-route. “The driver, a man in his 20s, was found to be unresponsive by emergency services colleagues who had freed him from the vehicle and rapidly started treating him. “The man was still unresponsive on arrival of ambulance staff who treated him for a head injury. Wednesday 12th July 2017 – 9.02am – Murray MacGregor. Four people have been assessed by ambulance staff after a severe fire. The incident happened at about 12.15am on Shepherds Green Road in the Gravelly Hill area of Birmingham. Two ambulances, a paramedic officer and the Hazardous Area Response Team (HART) were sent to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, ambulance staff found firefighters using breathing apparatus dealing with a serious house fire with lots of smoke. “Four people has been in the property at the time of the fire. “While HART provided medical cover for the fire service while they made the building safe, the other ambulance staff assessed the four patients. “Two men, aged 52 and 43 were treated for smoke inhalation. After being given oxygen and being nebulised, they were taken to Good Hope Hospital for further assessment. “Two other men believed to be 31 and 66 years old were also assessed but did not require any further treatment and were discharged. Monday 10th July 2017 – 5pm – Jamie Arrowsmith. A Shropshire Paramedic is hoping to avoid creating his own real-life emergency, despite preparing to drive halfway across the world in a car that he describes as ‘dreadful’. To raise money for the Midlands Air Ambulance Charity, Ed Hullah is attempting to travel from Salop to Saigon in his own 2004 Volkswagen Polo – but admits he is not sure how far it will get. The adventure is to be completed in two parts with Ed setting the wheels in motion on Saturday (15th July) when he will begin a journey that will see him drive through Eastern Europe and Russia before arriving in Mongolia. He will then drive home again before having the car shipped out next year to continue the journey through China, Laos and Cambodia before arriving in Vietnam. That is the plan anyway. How smoothly things will run, and how far the car will get him awaits to be seen. Looking ahead to the trip, Ed, from Bucknell, said: “I have zero mechanical knowledge or experience, which I hope will give me the opportunity to interact with local people of foreign nations. “Along the way, I will rely on human goodwill to get myself out of any mishaps I have, such as break downs or getting the car stuck in the desert. I’m sure there will be other mishaps that I haven’t planned for, too. Ed and has funded the entire trip himself, in order to ensure that every penny raised as part of the fund-raising drive goes to the Midlands Air Ambulance. As part of the fund-raising, a raffle is being held with a £500 prize on offer. Each ticket requires the entrant to guess how many miles the car will go before he cannot travel any further in it. To buy a ticket, please visit www.raffle2saigon.com. In order for people to follow Ed’s progress, live satellite tracking is to be installed on the car which can be viewed by visiting www.salop2saigon.com. You can also keep up to date with all of the latest news by searching for Salop2saigon on Instagram and Facebook. Monday 10th July 2016 – 2.15pm – Jamie Arrowsmith. It was a very different learning experience for a group of students from throughout the region last this week as they discovered what it is like to work for the ambulance service. A total of 12 youngsters spent the week at Dudley Hub as part of the Trust’s work experience programme, during which time they met a range of operational staff, including paramedics from the Trust’s Hazardous Area Response Team (HART), to find out more about their roles and responsibilities. This included how 999 calls are handled, basic life support, how to use a defibrillator, what causes a cardiac arrest and the work of community first responders amongst much more. They also got to explore the back of an ambulance and sample some of the various equipment staff use daily to treat patients. Not only that, but they were also given a first-hand account of what the week’s work experience can lead to, as recently qualified paramedic Laura Barnett spoke to the group about how she carried out the same work experience four years ago and how her career path led to a job with West Midlands Ambulance Service. Diane Pittom, the Trust’s Organisational Development Officer, said: “It has been a pleasure to hose a group of very keen students who have hopefully learnt a lot in their time with us. One of the students, Sam Simpson, has already secured a place at the University of Wolverhampton – where he will study Paramedic Science from January – and said the week has been beneficial to him. “It has been really good to see lots of different aspects of the ambulance service such as the HART team and the MERIT doctors. I had done plenty of research prior to coming this week and it has been good to see that first hand. Chelsea Evitts, who attends the Health Futures College in West Brom, said: “It has been a really good week and interesting to find out about all of the different roles in the ambulance service. Dudley-based paramedic Laura, said: “The work experience programme is still the same one as I did four years ago, and look where it has allowed me to end up. “It is a good opportunity for those students who get to do it. It allows them to learn a lot about the service and hopefully gives them a good understanding of the work that we do. Picture 1 – (left to right) Chelsea Evitts (Health Futures UTC, West Bromwich), Riham Osman (King Edward VI, Stourbridge), Diane Pittom (WMAS), Reem Osman (King Edward VI, Stourbridge), Harry Bartleton (Pool Hayes Academy, Willenhall); Abbie Bubb (Health Futures UTC, West Bromwich), Georgia Smith (Health Futures UTC, West Bromwich); Nirvana Lakha (King Edward VI Camp Hill School, Kings Heath), Leah Timmis (Summerhill Secondary School, Kingswinford), Rebecca Attewell (Ormiston Forge Academy, Cradley Heath), Georgia Bentley-Green (Summerhill Secondary School, Kingswinford), Sam Simpson (Dudley College), Jude Evans (Redhill School, Stourbridge). Picture 2 – Sam Simpson and Chelsea Evitts. Picture 3 – Laura Barnett (WMAS Paramedic based at Dudley). Monday 10th July 2017 – 9.10am – Jamie Arrowsmith. One person has died and three others required hospital treatment following a serious collision on the M42 last night. Four cars and a lorry were involved in a collision which resulted in three of the cars setting fire and eight patients in total for ambulance staff to assist. West Midlands Ambulance Service received a 999 call to the M42 southbound between junctions 2 and 1 at 8.55pm and sent two ambulances and two paramedic officers to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “Three of the cars were well alight when crews arrived. “The fire service worked quickly to extinguish the fires but upon doing so, a patient was discovered in one of the cars. “Unfortunately, it immediately became apparent nothing could be done to save them and they were confirmed deceased. “An off-duty technician, who was in traffic just behind the accident, immediately went to assist upon seeing the collision and with the help of bystanders, managed to pull a woman from one of the burning cars. “She was treated for minor burns and am arm injury and taken to Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham. The quick-thinking actions of those who rescued the woman undoubtedly saved her from suffering far more significant injuries. “From the same car, the driver, a man believed to be in his 50s, managed to get himself out of the vehicle. He was treated for minor injuries and taken to the same hospital. “A driver of another car, a man, was treated for a knee injury and taken to the Alexandra Hospital in Redditch for further treatment. We do not know the gender of the deceased patient. Friday 7th July 2017 – 1pm – Jamie Arrowsmith. A teenage girl has died in a collision between a minibus and a lorry that resulted in 26 patients this morning. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to Kingsbury Road in Castle Vale, Birmingham at 9am and sent two ambulances, three paramedic officers, a senior paramedic officer, the Trust’s Hazardous Area Response team and the Midlands Air Ambulance Crew from Cosford in a rapid response car to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “Crews arrived on scene to discover a collision between a minibus and a lorry. “There were 25 patients, from the minibus. One of whom, a teenage girl, had suffered serious injuries in the collision and unfortunately it immediately became apparent that nothing could be done to save her and she was confirmed dead at the scene. “A second teenage girl received treatment at the scene for minor injuries and was transported to Heartlands Hospital for further assessment. “A further 19 children were discharged at the scene together with four adults, which included the minibus driver. Friday 7th July 2017 – 12.05pm – Jamie Arrowsmith. West Midlands Ambulance Service received a call at 9am to a road traffic collision between a lorry and a minibus on Kingsbury Road in Castle Vale, Birmingham this morning. Two ambulances, three paramedic officers, a senior paramedic officer, the Trust’s Hazardous Area Response team and the Midlands Air Ambulance Crew from Cosford in a rapid response car to the scene. Friday 7th July 2017 – 8.50am – Jamie Arrowsmith. A pedestrian has died following a collision with a car last night (Thursday). West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to the A38 near to Branston in Burton on Trent, shortly before 8.20pm and sent two ambulances, a paramedic officer and a MERIT trauma doctor to the scene. The Derbyshire, Leicestershire and Rutland Air Ambulance was also in attendance. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival crews discovered a woman who was in cardiac arrest following the collision having suffered serious injuries in the incident. “Ambulance staff began CPR and administered advanced life support and successfully managed to restart the woman’s heart at the scene. Emergency medical treatment continued as the woman was airlifted to University Hospital Coventry and Warwickshire. Thursday 6th July 2017 – 8.48am – Murray MacGregor. A man has died despite all of the efforts of ambulance and police staff. Emergency services were called to the eastbound M45 at Dunchurch at 4.30am this morning (Thursday). An ambulance and a rapid response vehicle were sent to the crash. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “When ambulance staff got to the scene they found a car that had struck the central reservation. “Police officers, who had arrived just before the ambulance, were getting the driver out of the car. “He was taken onto the ambulance where ambulance staff immediately started advanced life support. The man was taken on blue lights to University Hospital Coventry & Warwickshire where medics were on standby. Monday 3rd July 2017 – 9.14am – Murray MacGregor. Three men have escaped with what appear to be remarkably minor injuries despite a crash that left three vehicles with massive damage. The collision happened a the junction of Church Road and Lea Hall Road in the Yardley area of Birmingham at 10.15pm last night. Two ambulances and two paramedic officers were sent to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival crews were faced with three cars, where the vehicles had suffered a huge level of damage. “Astonishingly, given the level of damage, the injuries sustained appeared not to be too serious. “A 20 year old man from a white car had managed to get out of the vehicle and was lying on the ground. He was complaining of back pain. He was immobilised before being taken to Heartlands Hospital. “A man in his 40s from a second car had suffered leg injuries and was taken to the same hospital, while a man estimated to be in his 60s from the third car was discharged at scene after an assessment by ambulance staff. Monday 3rd July 2017 – 8.30am – Murray MacGregor. Ambulance staff say a youngster is lucky to be alive after falling through the roof of a derelict building last night. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to a location Opp Minworth Car Sales on Kingsbury Road in the Castle Vale area of Birmingham at about 7.15pm last night. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “Ambulance staff were told that the nine-year-old was with friends when he went through the roof and landed on the concrete floor. “He was helped out of the building before ambulance staff were called. “It is estimated he fell 25 – 30 feet. He had suffered a fracture to his left forearm and was complaining of back and neck pain. He had his arm splinted and was immobilised before being taken on blue lights to Birmingham Children’s Hospital, the region’s paediatric major trauma centre. Tuesday 4th July 2017 – 5.20pm – Jamie Arrowsmith. A teenage boy has been treated for serious injuries and taken on blue lights and sirens to hospital following a collision with a car this afternoon. West Midlands Ambulance Service was called to Eastern Avenue in Lichfield at 3.50pm and sent an ambulance and the Midlands Air Ambulance from Staffordshire to the scene. A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: “On arrival, crews discovered a teenage boy who had been seriously injured in the collision. “He was assessed and treated for a head injury as well as arm and leg fractures. He was also suffering from a slightly reduced level of consciousness. “Ambulance staff immobilised and him and administered pain relief before transporting the patient to Birmingham Children’s Hospital. The doctor from the air ambulance travelled with the patient to continue treatment en-route to hospital. It’s hard to believe that, on average, one of our staff is physically attacked every single day. According to the figures for 2016-17, there were 362 physical assaults. On top of that, staff reported a further 525 cases where they were verbally abused. Often it was in a threatening manner, on other occasions it was racially motivated. This morning, Steve Elliker, our Security Manager and Jordan Rowley one of operational staff in Stafford spoke to Liz Ellis on BBC Radio Stoke. Monday 3rd July 2017 – 4.52pm – Murray MacGregor. A man who was left hanging upside down by his seatbelt for 30 minutes has suffered remarkably minor injuries considering. He was one of the three people hurt in a two car crash near Wolvey in Warwickshire. Three ambulances, a paramedic officer and the Warwickshire and Northamptonshire Air Ambulance were sent to the scene after a call at 1.26pm on Monday lunchtime. “The 21 year old lady in the Citroen had to be freed due to the door being stuck. Ambulance staff worked with firefighters to extricate her onto a long board to immobilise her. She was complaining of pain in her head, neck, back, shoulder, chest, thigh and shin. She was given pain relief before being taken to University Hospital Coventry & Warwickshire by ambulance. “The 48 year old man in the BMW who was left upside down was carefully helped out of the vehicle and was assessed by ambulance staff. He was taken to the same hospital for further assessment.
2019-04-22T22:14:40Z
https://wmas.nhs.uk/2017/07/
One of the things Adam and I love about living in the Washington, DC area is it’s almost impossible to be bored here. DC has emerged as a culinary hotspot, there are awe-inspiring monuments at every turn, and there are dozens of DC museums covering everything from air travel to zoology. In fact, if you were to visit every exhibit at the Smithsonian museums alone, it would take several years to do—and that would just be for the permanent exhibits! If your vacation plans will bring you to the USA’s capital, there’s a good chance you’ll visit a couple of DC museums. This guide will introduce you to 40 of the best: from art to history to culture, we have information, tips, and ideas to help you select and make the most of your visit to the DC museums! Why you should go: If you have never visited the DC museums before, the Smithsonian museums make an excellent starting point, and the Smithsonian Institution Building—known as the Smithsonian Castle—should be your very first stop. The Castle has played host to several museums (including the zoo!) during it’s almost 200-year history, and today it is home to the Smithsonian visitors center. Your visit will orient you to what’s new and exciting at the Smithsonian museums, and volunteers are on hand to answer questions and help you make the most of your visit. The Castle has several interactive maps to help you plot your course, and you can buy coffee and snacks from the café. You’ll also find free Wi-Fi available for guests. Highlights: Although it is primarily a visitor’s center, the Castle offers an exhibition about its own history that is worth seeing. It’s a great way to learn more about the Smithsonian’s namesake, James Smithson, and how his gift to the USA founded the remarkable DC museums complex we enjoy today. You’ll also see a crypt with his remains on the first floor of the building by the north exit. Talk to the volunteers! If you want some great insider tips on how to enjoy your time, ask about their favorite exhibits and put their ideas to use. Why you should go: The Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian is home to almost one million items that tell 12,000 years of history about the continent’s native people. Learn about the tribes, culture, and lives of the remarkable people who have called the USA, Canada, and other central and South American countries home for many centuries. Highlights: The exhibit on Native Americans and their relationship with the universe is well-regarded and really interesting. You’ll see quite a bit of artwork, and the Patriot Nations exhibit that discusses the role of the American Indian during various wars is really eye-opening and educational. How much time do you need? 1-2 hours would provide enough time for a solid visit. The Mitsitam Café in the Museum of the American Indian is regarded as the best one on the National Mall. The prices are a bit high, but you’ll have your choice of bison burgers, chili with fry bread, salmon chowder, and ceviche. Options are broken up by geographic area, so you can try a nice sampling of food depending on your budget and how hungry you are. Why you should go: If you want to learn about the natural world, this is one of the can’t-miss Washington DC museums. You’ll find exhibits on everything from human evolution to dinosaurs to gemstones, and you can discover creatures who dwell at the bottom of the ocean and those who take to the sky. The Natural History Museum is one of the most popular in the city, and it’s a great choice for families, animal lovers, and jewelry aficionados. Highlights: You’ll want to brave the crowds on the second floor to see the Hope Diamond, a 45-carat blue diamond revered for its size and claimed to be cursed. The mummies exhibit is fascinating, and you won’t want to miss the Ocean Hall and mammals exhibits on the first floor. How much time do you need? 2-3 hours should be plenty for most people. On the ground floor by the exit you’ll find two items of note: a Tyrannosaurus rex skull and a Moai statue. The T-rex skull is one of the coolest fossils you’ll see, and we have a special affection for the Moai, which is one of just a few removed from Easter Island and displayed in museums around the world. We visited Easter Island in 2015 and learned about how rare it is for Moai to leave the island, so it’s a great way to see one without making the long journey. Why you should go: If you want to experience America through art, this is the perfect place to get started. The museum’s collections include mediums that cover the colonial era through modern day, and each piece contributes to the museum’s mission of reflecting the American experience and global connections. Several DC museums focus on art, but this one specializes in works produced by American artists. Highlights: The 19th century works that capture America’s landscape are some of our favorites, especially Thomas Moran’s The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. Nam June Paik’s Electronic Superhighway piece is an electronic representation of the USA and is part of the contemporary collection. I’m a big fan of photographer Ansel Adams, and the museum often has a few of his works on view. How much time do you need? 2-3 hours should be plenty of time, although coupling a visit to the American Art Museum with the National Portrait Gallery (which shares the building) may require a bit longer. Why you should go: For everyone who dreamed of being an astronaut as a kid, the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum reminds us of the mystery the universe still holds. You’ll have a chance to see aircraft and spacecraft and enjoy exhibitions about the origins of flight. There are plenty of hands-on demonstrations, and an onsite IMAX theater and planetarium are a lot of fun to include in your visit. This museum is particularly family-friendly, and it’s enormously popular. Highlights: Check out the Apollo 11 command module from the first moon landing and the original Wright brothers plane from 1903. You’ll also be able to see actual rocks brought back from the moon! If motion sickness doesn’t impact you, the flight simulator is a lot of fun. How much time do you need? 2-3 hours should be enough to see the main exhibits, but plan on more time if you want to watch a show or take part in the interactive activities. Although it’s outside of Washington, DC, the Air and Space Museum’s Udvar-Hazy location close to Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD) is absolutely worth a visit if you can get there. You’ll see more spacecraft, and it’s often less crowded than other DC museums due to its location. Why you should go: An extension of the American Art Museum, the Renwick Gallery is focused on contemporary crafts and decorative art. Some pieces are eclectic, and many of them are distinctly different than what you might find at other galleries. Highlights: I love Karen LaMonte’s Glass Dress, a dress constructed of glass that looks to be reclining on its own. Sebastian Martorana’s “Impressions,” a marble pillow, is another interesting work to view. How much time do you need? The Renwick Gallery isn’t very big, so you likely won’t need much more than an hour or so. Why you should go: As one of the newest DC museums, the National Museum of African American History and Culture celebrates the impact the African American community has made on the USA’s history and culture. Focusing on everything from sports to music to slavery to civil rights, the museum beautifully captures the spirit, struggles, and successes of African Americans throughout the country. Highlights: A shawl belonging to Harriett Tubman, who famously saved dozens of slaves through the Underground Railroad, is a must-see artifact. You’ll also see a jersey worn by Michael Jordan and a great exhibit dedicated to musical contributions. How much time do you need? 2-3 hours should be enough to see quite a bit of the museum. The Museum of African American History and Culture has been enormously popular since it opened in 2016, and a timed pass is required for entry. Timed passes can be reserved online; however, they are only released periodically, and they are claimed very quickly. Same day passes are available beginning at 6:30 AM ET (again, they are claimed quickly), and walk up passes may be available on weekdays after 1 PM. Visiting the museum can take months of preparation, so if this is high on your list be sure to reserve your passes as soon as possible! Why you should go: The National Postal Museum does a great job of making postal history relevant and compelling. You’ll see some rare and historic stamps and learn about how mail is moved and delivered throughout the country. Highlights: Amelia Earhart was a stamp collector, and mail that she carried aboard her flights as well as one of her flight suits is on display. A beautiful stagecoach, a Pony Express-era mochila, and a dogsled—all used to transport mail—are worth checking out. The stamp collection is impressive, and you’ll have a chance to see the rarest stamp in the world: the 1856 British Guiana One-Cent Magenta. How much time do you need? You can spend as little as 20 minutes and see quite a bit, but 30-60 minutes will provide a richer experience. Why you should go: The Museum of American History is the best of the DC museums when it comes to bringing your history books to life. You’ll learn about some of the events that shaped the USA, and you’ll also be treated some very special Americana artifacts from popular culture and TV. Highlights: An entire exhibit dedicated the dresses worn by the First Ladies always draws a crowd. The original flag that inspired our national anthem the Star Spangled Banner is also on display, as is famed chef Julia Child’s kitchen. If you’re looking for the ruby slippers Dorothy wore in The Wizard of Oz, though, you’ll be disappointed: the shoes are currently undergoing restorative procedures and, as of April 2018, are not expected to go back on display for some time. How much time do you need? 2-3 hours should be fine for most visitors. Why you should go: Washington, DC’s zoo is part of the Smithsonian museums, and it’s one of the best zoos in the country. With hundreds of animals and plenty of great educational programming, it’s a favorite for families and even makes for a great evening walk. There are plenty of benches and resting spots available if you want to spend more time at exhibits of specific interest to you. Highlights: I’m a huge fan of the small animal exhibit, where you can find degus, prairie dogs, and mole rats, but most visitors want to see the lions, monkeys, and (of course) the famous giant pandas. How much time do you need? Plan on at least a half day; the zoo is expansive, and it will take some time to explore the highlights—and much longer if you want to see more exhibits than just the popular ones. Onsite parking is available, but it’s $25 per car. Still, it may be a bargain depending on how many people are traveling in your group. Consider how much a roundtrip ride on Metro might cost per person; for families traveling with small children and strollers, the extra money might be worth it. Why you should go: The Hirschhorn Museum is DC’s beloved contemporary art museum, and it’s a great place to discover new works and concepts. You’ll find much more than paintings on a wall: video, digital, performance, and technological pieces are regularly on view. Not to be missed is the outdoor sculpture garden, where more than 60 works are on display year-round. Highlights: Just outside the museum’s entrance is Jimmie Durham’s Still Life with Spirit and Xitle, a giant boulder crushing a car. Rodin’s “The Burghers of Calais” is also an important work to see. How much time do you need? If you’re not into contemporary art, a walk through the sculpture garden can take just 20 minutes and provide a beautiful retreat from busy Washington, DC. If you want to visit the museum proper, one or two hours would be enough to see quite a bit. If your visit takes place on a Friday during the summer, check out the Hirschhorn’s Jazz in the Garden series, where you can enjoy a free concert between 5:00-8:30 PM. Food and beverages are available to purchase, and it’s a fun way to spend a DC evening. Why you should go: The Freer and Sackler Galleries, located next door to each other, house some of the best examples of Asian art in the world. Between the two galleries you will find more than 25,000 objects from 6,000 years of human creativity. Silk paintings, sculptures, ceramics, and bronzes are just some of the works you will have the chance to enjoy. Highlights: The Peacock Room in the Freer Gallery is far and away one of my favorite spaces in any of the DC museums. The room is painted in blue and gold and features ceramics from throughout Asia, and it’s stunning in how so many pieces can come together from so many places to create a finished space. How much time do you need? I always spend 2-3 hours during my visits, and that usually gives me enough time to really explore all of the exhibits of interest between the two buildings. Why you should go: The National Portrait Gallery provides an amazing collection of the faces of some of America’s most impactful citizens. Collections include historic figures, 20th Century leaders and entertainers, and a wonderful gallery featuring US presidents. It’s one of the most interesting of the DC museums you will visit, and it’s equally popular with tourists and locals. Highlights: Without question the current highlights are the portraits of President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama; crowds gather daily to get a glimpse of their newly unveiled portraits in person. Portraits of Pocahontas, Rosa Parks, and Bill and Melinda Gates are just some of the faces you will see. How much time do you need? You can see the presidential gallery in as little as 30 minutes, but if you have 2-3 hours you can see most of the collections quite easily. Why you should go: This is a wonderful museum to explore African art, and for anyone who can’t get into the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture it’s a good alternative. You’ll be treated to a nice-sized collection of artwork that can be traced to almost every African country. Of the DC museums we have visited, it’s one that always impresses our friends from out of town. Highlights: If you only have time for one exhibit, the African Mosaic exhibit is a great one to check out. It encompasses pieces from throughout the collection as it celebrates 50 years of the museum’s existence. How much time do you need? 1-2 hours would be plenty to see a few parts of the collection. Why you should go: The National Gallery of Art is one of the best, most well-rounded art collections in the world. It’s here that you’ll find the artists you know and love: Monet, da Vinci, Raphael, and Renoir all have pieces in the permanent collection. If you are looking for a beautiful gallery where you can spend a morning or an afternoon, this is the perfect choice. Highlights: Several of my all-time favorites pieces call the National Gallery of Art home: Monet’s The Japanese Footbridge, Rubens’ Marchesa Brigida Spinola Doria, and Van Gogh’s Self Portrait. Don’t miss the Degas sculpture Little Dancer Aged Fourteen, another incredible work of art. How much time do you need? You can make a dash to the highlights in an hour or so, but give yourself a couple of hours to enjoy the museum at a leisurely pace. The DC Metro can take you almost anywhere you want to go. Visit wmata.com for maps and schedules. Why you should go: This is a great opportunity to check out some artwork you won’t find in the major galleries or other DC museums. This private home-turned-museum provides a much more intimate viewing experience away from the crowds in the downtown DC museums. The collection, personally acquired by the Kreegers, represents pieces they truly loved. Highlights: You’ll get up close and personal with Monets, Picassos, Renoirs, Cezannes, and Mirós—to name a few. The property also has a sculpture garden where you can enjoy some time outside when the weather is nice. How much time do you need? An hour or two should be enough, especially if your visit is during a quiet time. Why you should go: The Phillips Collection is a dedicated modern art museum, and if you enjoy modern art you’ll find plenty to appreciate during your visit. It’s a great place to spot some Renoirs, Matisses, and Picassos. Highlights: Renoir’s “Luncheon of the Boating Party” is perhaps the most famous of the pieces that are part of the collection, but my favorite is Monet’s the Road to Vétheuil, which won’t be back on display until after the museum’s renovations are complete. How much time do you need? The Phillips Collection is a smaller museum, but two hours should provide you with enough time to make the most of your trip. Why you should go: This is a must-see for history lovers! The museum is home to the USA’s Bill of Rights, Declaration of Independence, and Constitution, and no trip to the country’s capital city is complete without a stop at the museum that houses all three of them! For US citizens especially a visit to the National Archives is a powerful moment and a reminder of our roots and national ideals. Highlights: In addition to the three most famous documents in USA history, the Archives also has one of only four copies of the Magna Carta. How much time do you need? You likely won’t need much more than an 30-60 minutes once you get inside (waiting in line will add some time). Prepare for some dim lighting. In order to preserve the documents the lighting is lower than you may desire, so it can be a bit difficult to see when you are inside. Why you should go: It can be difficult to get a tour of the White House itself, but the White House Visitor’s Center gives you a look at what America’s most famous address is like on the inside. With lots of great information and a nice video to orient you, it’s a great stop to make if you are looking for more on presidential history. Highlights: There is a nice video that features presidents and first ladies sharing their impressions of life in the White House. Photos and historic displays provide some nice perspective and history. How much time do you need? If you stay for the film and look around a bit, 30-45 minutes will be all it takes to make the most of your visit. The view from the top of the Washington Monument. The Holocaust Memorial Museum is just steps away from the Washington Monument. Why you should go: It is critically important that we learn about and remember some of the most horrible events in our history so they are never repeated. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum educates the public about a horrific, tragic event in a sensitive yet honest manner. This museum is not likely to be your “favorite,” but it is likely to be the most memorable and impactful of the DC museums you visit. How much time do you need? A couple of hours at least. This museum is emotional, so take your time. The museum is often at capacity in the spring and summer, so advance tickets are required. They are free (although it is $1 to reserve online). Why you should go: Frederick Douglass was one of the most influential African Americans of the 19th century, and his dedication to fighting for justice and equality for all people has secured his place in history. He lived his final years in Washington, DC, and his home is now a museum that offers a nice tour and overview of his life, work, and achievements. Highlights: The house tour is the main attraction, and it’s worthwhile because it’s the only way to see the inside of the Douglass home. It’s also one of the DC museums with a great view of the city, which you’ll notice from the property. How much time do you need? The tour is only 30 minutes, so you won’t need more than 45-60 minutes to explore the grounds before or after seeing the house. The Anacostia neighborhood is not one which we would recommend walking through if you are not familiar with DC. Free parking is available at the museum, or consider taking an Uber if you don’t have access to a car. Why you should go: You will get a great overview of the Library of Congress’s art and architecture during your visit. In addition, the Library of Congress provides access to reading rooms for visitors looking to conduct research. If you have the time, consider taking a free docent-led tour (offered multiple times each day). The tours are a great way to learn about the building’s history and highlights. Highlights: In addition to the stunning architecture, the books alone are worth stopping in to see. Some of them date back four centuries to the 1600s! Even older is the library’s copy of the Gutenberg Bible, which was printed in the 1400s. How much time do you need? At least an hour for a tour (guided or self-guided), and more time if you want to look at the books or check something out to peruse in a reading room. Why you should go: The Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) Museum is dedicated to preserving, exhibiting, and interpreting pre-industrial America’s history and culture. A visit to the museum will introduce you to some incredible artifacts including antique furniture and children’s toys. Highlights: The period rooms are absolutely worth seeing! 31 rooms showcase different interior design styles spanning several centuries, and it’s a very different look into American history than you might find at other museums. How much time do you need? Anywhere from 90 minutes to three hours depending on how much time you would like to spend exploring. Why you should go: The Interior Museum pays homage to the US national parks. If you are interested in the national parks, this museum provides insight into the development and management of our natural resources and public lands. Highlights: The museum offers a nice video presentation, and there is a great collection of more than 800 Native American hand baskets on display. You’ll also see some artwork that belongs to the Office of the Secretary. How much time do you need? The Interior Museum is not very big, so 20-30 minutes is all you might want, even if you intend to see everything available. Why you should go: The Capitol Building is well-worth a visit—even if you don’t have a prearranged tour. The Capitol is indeed where laws are made in the USA, and being in that environment—the seat of representative democracy—is an amazing experience to have. The visitor’s center has exhibits and information available, even if you just stop in to take a look. Highlights: Tours are recommended, and scheduling most often should be done in advance through your representative or through the Capitol Building’s online scheduling system. Walk-in tours are sometimes accommodated, but it’s best to let them know to expect you. The Exhibition Hall provides great, interactive displays about how the US government operates. How much time do you need? Plan on spending at least 90 minutes at the visitor’s center if possible; less time may work, and more time will give you a more complete experience—especially if you will join a tour. Why you should visit: Architecture plays an important role in US history, and the Octagon Museum brings it to life by encouraging visitors to learn about the people who built the structure and the city beyond it. It is managed by the American Institute of Architects, and self-guided tours are available to the public. Highlights: This museum welcomes people to engage with it. Where most DC museums won’t let guests sit on the furniture or touch the exhibits, the Octagon Museum encourages people to lay on the beds and walk around to experience the house. It is one of the few DC museums to allow that kind of interactivity. How much time do you need? 30 minutes should be enough, as the museum is not that big. Why you should go: The U.S. National Arboretum is quite a way from most of the other DC museums, but it’s still worth a visit. In addition to providing a quiet walk through lovely gardens and wooded spots, its home to the Capitol Columns, the original columns that once were part of the US Capitol Building. Set along a reflecting pool they are especially pretty in the summer and the fall. Highlights: The Capitol Columns are our favorite part of the arboretum, but the Friendship Garden, bonsai museum, and Asian Collection are a few others spots you should save some time to see. How much time do you need? A couple of hours would provide a great, relaxing visit. The arboretum offers free parking, and driving is much easier than taking the metro-bus combination required if public transportation is your preferred method. Why you should go: The Old Stone House in Georgetown is the oldest existing structure in Washington, DC. Built in 1765, it’s an example of pre-revolutionary architecture and is unlike many of the other historic buildings you might visit in DC. The interior is currently closed for renovations, but it’s still possible to see the outside of the building. Highlights: When open, the interior reflects the common décor of the time. The exterior of the building is equally impressive, though; it’s unlike any of the other DC museums. How much time do you need? Just a few minutes to photograph it until it reopens in late 2018. Why you should go: The US Botanic Garden is designed to educate visitors about our ecosystem by sharing the importance and value of plant life. By showcasing everything from flowers to plants often found in the rainforest, a visit to the Botanic Gardens makes a gorgeous escape from the city streets and will provide a restful place to unwind before checking out another of the DC museums. Highlights: You’ll more than likely find your favorite plants and flowers, but most visitors hope for a glimpse of the corpse flower. The corpse flower usually blooms without warning and, when it does, emits a horrible smell that can be equated to garbage or rotting flesh. It may not sound like a treat, but when it blooms thousands of people line up to see it because you never know when it might bloom again! How much time do you need? An hour or two would be enough, but plan on more time if you really want to relax. Why you should go: The National Building Museum connects you to the history of architecture, engineering, and design in the USA. The building itself is beautiful and worth exploring on its own, but a good number of educational and hands-on exhibits make for an interesting visit that is particularly good for kids who like to build. Highlights: The rotating exhibits are always the best reason to go. We visited in the summer of 2017 to see Hive, an interactive installation that turned 2,700 paper tubes into a 60-foot tall structure. Past installations have explored Washington, DC’s structures, icebergs, gardens, mazes, and even constructed a beach in the museum’s Great Hall. How much time do you need? We felt satisfied after a 90 minutes visit that included watching a student group perform for 30 minutes; plan on at least an hour to walk through the building and explore the permanent exhibitions. Why you should go: If you want to explore the world in a single museum, the National Geographic Museum is a great place to try. Full of unbelievable photographs and regularly rotating exhibits, it’s often a favorite for families. Highlights: The vast majority of the space is dedicated to current exhibitions. If you’re planning to visit, take a look at what’s currently on display before committing to paying the ticket price. Because so much changes so regularly, highlights for your visit will change as well. How much time do you need? The museum isn’t very big, so it may not require more than 30-60 minutes of your time. It will depend on how interested you are in each of the exhibits on view. Why you should go: For anyone who has ever watched a spy movie and wondered what it would be like to live that experience, this is your museum. You’ll learn about the role of spies and espionage throughout history and gain access to details about famous historical events that will get you thinking about the people who live double lives. Highlights: The museum is really well done and very interactive, but our favorite was the Spies Among Us exhibition that features some great information on code breaking. Many of the ingenious tools and strategies used over the years are fascinating as well. How much time do you need? A couple of hours at least; you’ll want to explore every part of this museum, and you may find yourself so engaged by the interactive exhibits that time flies by. Why you should go: Explore some of the most impressive artwork by female artists. More than six centuries of female-created art is on view throughout the gallery. You’ll see everything from paintings to sculptures to photography, and there are often visiting exhibits to compliment the permanent collection. Highlights: Art by Frieda Kahlo and Georgia O’Keefe are definite highlights, but don’t overlook the incredible talents of lesser-known and contemporary artists who are changing the way art is created and shared. How much time do you need? An hour or two would be enough to explore a few exhibits and see some expected and unexpected artwork. A three-story guard tower from the Berlin Wall. Why you should go: The Newseum is a very well-designed and informative museum that will give you a fun, interactive look at the importance of the free press and the first amendment. You’ll see exhibits on some of the most memorable and newsworthy events of the past decades presented through video clips and exerpts. Highlights: The wall of newspaper front pages from around the world is always a favorite! Take some time to look at the piece of the Berlin Wall on display, and don’t miss the 9/11 exhibit that many people find to be emotional and well-created. How much time do you need? Plan on several hours to see everything, especially if you want to watch video clips—most are a few minutes long, and those minutes will add up! Because this museum has a higher price tag than most you’ll get the most value for your money if you enjoy a longer visit. Save on your admission by asking about discounts, which are available to AAA members, military, and students with ID. It’s also possible to save money by booking a ticket in advance online, so if you can preplan your visit you’ll pay a bit less! Why you should go: The O Street Mansion is a building unlike many others: it’s actually a series of five townhouses interconnected by 70 secret doors with 100 rooms to explore! Rooms showcase various types of design techniques from numerous periods, and most rooms have lots of fun artifacts to investigate. Almost everything you see is available for purchase, which adds to the fun! Highlights: The museum offers multiple tours, each taking you through the museum and showcasing some of the interesting relics and art pieces kept in house. The basic tour is the Magical History Tour, which provides a nice introduction to the museum. It’s also fun to look for the secret doors—they can be exceptionally hard to find! How much time do you need? Some tours last about an hour, and some last half a day. Why you should go: It’s a beer museum (of sorts)! Christian Heurich ran Washington, DC’s longest-operating brewery, and the museum celebrates his legacy and educates visitors about his life through a tour of his home. Highlights: The tour itself is a great way to see what a state-of-the-art home looked like in the mid-1800s, but many visitors will appreciate the Brewmaster Tour, which provides pours of local beers to sip while learning about the home. It’s not a true beer tour, but it’s beer to drink as part of a tour—and that could make for a fun Friday night! How much time do you need? An hour or so will be all you need for the tour; if on a Brewmaster Tour you might want to stick around a little longer. Ford’s Theater still has many popular shows- including A Christmas Carol which is performed every December. Why you should go: On April 14, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln was shot inside Ford’s Theater, and it has stood in infamy ever since. Taking a tour of Ford’s Theater, neighboring Petersen House (where President Lincoln died), and the museum are a great way to learn more about the impact this event had on the USA. Highlights: A tour that includes a visit to the theater itself will let you see the actual seat President Lincoln occupied when he was shot. Petersen House (closed until summer 2018 for preservation work) served as the place where he took his last breath. The museum and Aftermath Exhibits are self-guided opportunities to put the historic sites into context. How much time do you need? Plan on 2-3 hours if you are going to tour the theater, Petersen House, and all associated exhibits. When reserving your tickets online, pay attention to the different tour configurations available. Some tours exclude stops at the theater or the museum, and there are different prices to reflect that. Be sure you understand what tour you are purchasing to get the experience you want! Why you should go: Have you ever wanted your picture taken with Thomas Jefferson? Beyonce? Stephen Colbert? Madam Tussaud’s Wax Museum has popular locations around the world, and Washington, DC is home to a collection of wax celebrities so lifelike you’ll wonder if they just might start moving! Highlights: You can have your picture taken with all 45 US presidents and a whole host of celebrities from music, Hollywood, and sports fame. How much time do you need? 90 minutes to two hours should be just enough. Why you should go: Tucked away in northwest Washington, DC sits President Lincoln’s Cottage, the home he lived in that now serves as a museum to educate vistors about his life and ideals. In addition to a guided tour, exhibits are offered and can be enjoyed as a secondary self-guided tour. Highlights: The tour is thought-proviking and designed to promote conversation; it’s not a typical tour where you might get to ask a few questions at the end before moving on to your next DC museum. Prepare to engage, think, and discuss with the docent and fellow visitors. How much time do you need? 1-2 hours should be enough to enjoy the tour and explore the grounds and exhibits on your own. Washington, DC tourist attractions have security that is similar to what you might experience at airports. Know that peak tourist times will result in longer than usual lines to get into most museums, especially the larger ones. Lines can extend more than an hour, but they do go faster if you don’t carry a large bag. In warmer months some sunscreen and sunglasses or a hat will go a long way toward keeping you comfortable, as will a bottle of water (which you can take through security in most museums!). Washington, DC museums are popular with tourists and locals alike, and there are plenty of times when they might feel crowded to you. From our experience, we don’t think there is a specific time of day, week, month, or year when you can be guaranteed to see shorter lines, so our best advice is to prepare for crowds and be pleasantly surprised if you don’t encounter them. Traditionally quiet times are weekday afternoons, and Sunday mornings before noon are often a good time to visit. School breaks, summer vacations, and holidays mean more people have paid time off—and that means the DC museums are going to be crowded. You’ll also find crowds when Washington, DC hosts special events like the springtime Cherry Blossom Festival and the 4th of July. You might still be able to have a wonderful time visiting museums, but you’ll certainly have company. Peak tourist times are a great opportunity to visit the smaller, off-the-beaten path selections we’ve shared here! The Washington, DC museums are scattered all over the city, so pay attention to which museums are close to a single Metro stop when plotting your itinerary. That will help you to determine the best route to follow. We put together a Google Map to help you visualize each museum’s location; we hope it helps you to identify which museums you’ll group together to maximize your visit! Visiting the DC museums is a wonderful way to experience Washington, DC, and we hope this massive guide to some of our favorites gives you some perspective and helps you decide which museums will give you the experience you want. Let us know if there is information that helps you out—or if we left your favorite museum off the list! Have a fantastic visit to the capital city of the United States! Planning a visit to the capital city of America? Here are a few more articles to inspire you! * Hours and Prices for the DC museums mentioned in this post are accurate as of April 2018.
2019-04-25T17:51:11Z
https://www.roadunraveled.com/blog/washington-dc-museums/
Acouple of weeks ago we revisited the OCNC debate. This is a useful exercise to turn to periodically, for I have noticed how, with the passage of time, new aspects have become clear as new information emerges, or some ridiculous claim is made and then debunked. In those circumstances, we are given the opportunity to reassess what we already know using the new known knowns, or finding significance in something previously overlooked, but now shed in a new light. Or put another way, the Beauty of Hindsight! In introducing his notion that both ‘sides’ are merely putting their opinion, SFM contributor MarkC recently brought me to see that one side must be correct and factual, while the other will merely be left expressing an opinion. In the same way that one side must be right, because TRFC is either a new club, or it’s not, one argument must be the one that is factually correct and leaving the other as just opinion (at best). Once a factual argument is put forward, it can only be countered with fact, for anything else is just opinion. Armed with facts, there would be no need to prove that TRFC is a new club, for first it would be necessary for those who claim ‘same club’ to show, using documentary evidence and facts, that ‘Rangers Football Club’ isn’t currently in liquidation. So, factual evidence; what facts do we have? Well, it is a fact that Rangers Football Club availed itself of the advantages of incorporation in 1899, and it’s a fact that Rangers Football Club Plc entered the terminal state of liquidation in 2012. It is also a fact that at no time since this incorporation took place has anyone been aware of any other Rangers Football Club ensconced within Ibrox, no one has written or spoken about it; or not, at least, until a snake oil salesman used it to push his off the shelf company as ‘The Rangers Football Club Limited’. What’s more, no other failed incorporated football club has ever availed itself of this new notion of the ‘eternal club’. The SFA was apparently unaware of it either, for they never offered up the salvation of its use to the likes of Airdrieonians, or Gretna, or dear old Third Lanark. In fact it seems to have miraculously appeared only as a result of the failed CVA attempt of Rangers FC Plc, and the words of one of the spivs who surrounded Ibrox at that time (and for some time before, and after). The only ‘fact’ put forward to support the ‘same club’ argument is that the SPL say, in their rules, that they are the same club. But the rules don’t actually make them the ‘same club’, for it’s not the SPL’s place to say what is and isn’t a club, and they only explain how they would treat the situation under their rules, and as Easyjambo and Hirsutepursuit (see appendices I, II and III) brought to our attention, the football authorities had reasons to introduce this to their rules that had nothing to do with establishing a separate club that lives on eternally. It does, though, as Easyjambo’s post describes, show a willingness by football’s governors to change the rules to support their desired outcome. As Hirsutepursuit (Appendix II) points out, the change to the SPL’s rules that enable this ‘interpretation’ of continuance after liquidation, only came about in 2005. So, have we to believe/accept that the split between club and Club has only existed since 2005 and is the preserve of the SPL? And that brings me to look again at what Lord Nimmo Smith said of how the SPL rules view the continuation of a ‘Rangers’ (see appendix IV for reference). In short, a lot of words that confuse rather than clarify, and give no legal basis, or justification, for what he, or the SPL rules, say. Basically, the rules say ‘Rangers’ continues as the same club because the SPL rules say it does. “In terms of the question about old club, new club, that was settled very much by the Lord Nimmo Smith commission that was put together by the SPL to look at EBT payments at that time. What Doncaster seems to be saying here is that TRFC are RFC because LNS said so. It’s a bit like me telling Big Pink (who is an acknowledged expert in the field of colours) that SFM treat black as white, BP tells the world that SFM treat black as white, and a couple of years down the road I announce that black is white, because Big Pink said so! Now here’s a fact for us all to consider. At some point Rangers FC ceased to be a member of the SPL. With the help of Neil Doncaster, Sevco (Scotland) Ltd tried to gain entry to the SPL and to participate as The Rangers FC. They failed. Whatever entity was trying to gain entry into Scottish football, it was at that time not a member of the SPL, and so never had been under the jurisdiction of the SPL. Therefore whatever the SPL rules or Doncaster said, or what conclusion LNS reached over the matter when it was based solely on what the SPL rules said, it madeno difference to the new club, since the SPL or Doncaster had no locus in the matter. Sevco were in limbo, and everything then depended on Sevco, as The Rangers FC, getting entry into the SFL. Now, the ‘same club’ argument’s only factual ‘evidence’ is the SPL’s rules, and if they hadn’t included the recent amendment highlighted in Easyjambo and Hirsutepursuit’s posts, then there would be no ‘factual’ evidence, at all, however flimsy it might be. So let’s take a look at what the SFL’s Constitution and Rules say on the matter, and I will quote the relevant parts! In fact, there is absolutely no mention of liquidated clubs in the SFL’s Constitution and Rules, because the notion that a club could live on after liquidation is just that, a notion invented by a spiv! And because liquidation means the end of a football club, there is absolutely no reason for rules covering such an eventuality to be considered within the rules of football. ‘…the change to the SPL’s rules that enable this ‘interpretation’ of continuance after liquidation, only came about in 2005. What is now obvious is that there was nothing in the rules of Scottish football that gives succour to the notion that TRFC is one and the same football club as RFC. When the SPL clubs voted against Sevco, to be called The Rangers FC, from entering the SPL, they made the SPL rules on the ‘same club’ matter irrelevant. When Sevco, to be called The Rangers FC, entered the SFL, they were, according to the SFL’s own rules, a new club, for there is nothing in the rules that says otherwise, or can be interpreted as saying so! Of course, by the time Doncaster made his nonsense statement, the SFL had been disbanded, and it’s clubs were now part of the SPFL, with rules tailored to suit those who bought into the ‘same club’ notion. Handy, huh? WAS IT ALL ABOUT ARMAGEDDON? We all laughed at the time it was spewed forth, but perhaps Armageddon was a real possibility, but not in the way we were encouraged to believe. We know that RFC owed a significant amount of money (football debts) to clubs outside of Scotland, and so outside of the SFA’s influence. We also know, with some certainty, that the SFA turned a blind eye to, or were incompetent in policing, some of RFC’s wrongdoings (the EBTs and European Licence) and the last thing the SFA, and SPL, would want would be non-Scottish clubs kicking up the inevitable stink and getting UEFA/FIFA involved, and investigating the SFA. So how to prevent it? Create a scenario where TRFC must pay these debts, is the answer! How to do that? Well there’s that rule in the SPL Rule book! Right! but we must ensure Rangers stay in the SPL! Easy, we’ll frighten the other clubs into voting them into the SPL, and so TRFC will have to pay ‘Rangers’ football debts… Oops, the vote went against us! OK, we can stall the other leagues for a year, let’s get them into the Championship, promotion’s a certainty… Oops, we did it again… Let’s create a new set up, all under the (effective) SPL umbrella, with rules to suit, before anyone notices! Could it be that all that help wasn’t so much because, or not only because, it was ‘Rangers’, but because of what no Rangers, to pay the non-Scottish football debt, might mean for the SFA and SPL, and so for the whole of Scottish football? Was that the real Armageddon? While putting this blog piece together I found it very difficult to write whenever I had to include the ‘what do you call it’ newly discovered ‘club’ thingy. I find the ‘big C/little c’ method of describing it to be a nonsense, and at best a poor effort to create whatever it was they (whoever they are) wanted to create. Even Lord Nimmo Smith, a much more learned man than I, failed to come up with a word, phrase or expression to adequately describe it. In short, a club with a capital ‘C’ is exactly the same as a club with a small ‘c’ – and only a fool could imagine it creates a difference! Is a game of Football somehow different from a game of football? But, of course, what can you call something that you can’t see, you can’t feel, can’t hear, can’t smell, something that has never been heard of or spoken of before? Clearly, LNS could find nothing within the millions of words previously written within the myriad of cases dealt with under Scots Law, UK Law and EU Law, and clubs and associations, both corporate and incorporate, will have been the subject of a fair number of legal cases in the past for him to draw on, yet there was no answer to this conundrum to be found there. And if Lord Nimmo Smith was unable to draw on his legal knowledge or research, he was merely expressing a layman’s opinion on how the SPL viewed a ‘????????’ club! In such circumstances, his opinion is no more valid than any other reasonable person’s might be! Easyjambo and Hirsutepursuit for the posts I have used in the appendices and my thanks in particular to EJ for kindly providing me with some documents I was unable to find on the internet by myself. I’d also like to acknowledge the part MarkC played in bringing the debate back to SFM’s attention, it can’t be easy, constantly arguing against the accepted wisdom in any debate, but it always seems to bring out the best in us and something new. Deviously, both the SPL (around 10 years ago coinciding with Rangers (In Liquidation) entering very choppy waters) and the SFA more recently, changed their rules to adopt this distinct “Club” (capital ‘C’) type definition, distinguishing it from the “owner and operator” company. It could have been said at the time to be a licence for unscrupulous, badly run “Clubs” to dump debts and shaft creditors, and so it proved with Sevco’s exploitation of these rules. In 2005 the SPL changed its articles to create the definition of Club (with a capital C) – which actually INCLUDES the ‘owner and operator’. Whether the ‘owner and operator’ should be EXCLUDED depends on the context of the article in which it is used and to WHICH Club (with a capital C) it is referring. The SFA did not add the ‘owner and operator’ tag until 2013. It is interesting because the original SPL articles referred to the clubs (with a lower case c) as its members. Its members each held shares in the SPL. The clubs were listed by their full company names – rather than their trading names. The Club (with a capital C) definition came about because the SPL were trying to launch SPL2 and one of the clubs (with a lower case c) that could have been included was Brechin. Brechin is not a company, so could not as a club (with a lower case c) become a member/shareholder in the SPL. To cover this eventuality, a form of words was created that would allow the club (with a lower case c) to play in the SPL even if the share was not actually held by the club (with a lower case c). If a club (with a lower case c) has not been incorporated, the club (with a lower case c) cannot own anything. In such cases, the assets are held by its members (usually a committee member or members). Since the original articles defined the member/shareholder as a club (with a lower case c), it would have resulted in the committee member who took ownership of the SPL share being defined as the club (with a lower case c). The reference to ‘undertaking of a football club’ in the definition of Club (with a capital C) meant that it could refer to both an incorporated body and an unincorporated body of persons. So the context of when the ‘owner and operator’ should be EXCLUDED from the definition of a Club (with a capital C) is only when that owner and operator is not a club (with a lower case c). What is even more interesting is that three non-corporate clubs (with a lower case c) have each been listed as members/shareholders of the current SPFL – even though none have the legal personality to own anything. I should add that LNS found The Rangers Football Club PLC (the owner and operator) guilty of offences that predate the creation, in 2005, of the definition of Clubs (with a capital C). Even if you accept that Rangers FC (the Club with a capital C) can be separated from The Rangers Football Club PLC/RFC 2012 (the owner and operator) – which, to be clear, I do not – that distinction only came about in 2005. So if there is guilt prior to 2005, that guilt lay with the club (with a lower case c). LNS didn’t seem to spot the distinction. My recollection of the change in the SPL and SFA rules on “Owner and Operator” was implemented in early 2006, as the SFA wished to sanction Vladimir Romanov for his comments, but couldn’t do so because he held no official post at the club (small “c”). It was Vlad’s son Roman who was Hearts chairman at the time, although Vlad was the major shareholder. So feel free to blame Vlad for the change in the rules. Hearts were fined £10,000 by the SFA for Vlad’s comments about referees in October 2006. The DR article below, suggests that the SFA rule change came into effect in May that year. (46) It will be recalled that in Article 2 “Club” is defined in terms of “the undertaking of an association football club”, and in Rule 11 it is defined in terms of an association football club which is, for the time being, eligible to participate in the League, and includes the owner and operator of such Club. Taking these definitions together, the SPL and its members have provided, by contract, that a Club is an undertaking which is capable of being owned and operated. While it no doubt depends on individual circumstances what exactly is comprised in the undertaking of any particular Club, it would at the least comprise its name, the contracts with its players, its manager and other staff, and its ground, even though these may change from time to time. In common speech a Club is treated as a recognisable entity which is capable of being owned and operated, and which continues in existence despite its transfer to another owner and operator. In legal terms, it appears to us to be no different from any other undertaking which is capable of being carried on, bought and sold. This is not to say that a Club has legal personality, separate from and additional to the legal personality of its owner and operator. We are satisfied that it does not, and Mr McKenzie did not seek to argue otherwise. So a Club cannot, lacking legal personality, enter into a contract by itself. But it can be affected by the contractual obligations of its owner and operator. It is the Club, not its owner and operator, which plays in the League. Under Rule A7.1.1 the Club is bound to comply with all relevant rules. The Rules clearly contemplate the imposition of sanctions upon a Club, in distinction to a sanction imposed upon the owner or operator. That power must continue to apply even if the owner and operator at the time of breach of the Rules has ceased to be a member of the SPL and its undertaking has been transferred to another owner and operator. While there can be no Question of subjecting the new owner and operator to sanctions, there are sanctions Which could be imposed in terms of the Rules which are capable of affecting the Club as a continuing entity (even though not an entity with legal personality), and which thus might affect the interest of the new owner and operator in it. For these reasons we reject the arguments advanced in paragraphs 2 and 9 of the list of preliminary issues. One thing we have learned about the CW court case over the last week or so is that the witnesses “Don’t Recall” much. or, as they say in the trade, doing an Ogilvie. My niece has peen picked to be an audience member on Question Time this week from Edinburgh. I think it’s on Friday night. Anyway she asked us through a family group on Whats App suggestions for two questions. I ignored it for a day since I hate politics nowadays. But she pestered me so I said ask them when Scottish politicians are going to address the sectarian and racist singing at Ibrox? Or at least direct the SFA & SPFL towards dealing with it. She gave me a thumbs up for it but my older sisters came on “see you football!! as usual. There are more important things in the world”. No doubt poverty & the NHS & education will be brought up, quite rightly so,but sectarianism and racism is important too! I don’t think she will have the nerve to ask anyhow. Regarding the losses vs income question, my attempt at an Accounting 101 follows. There are three principle statements in a set of accounts. 1. A Profit and Loss account. This is where revenue (ticket sales, sponsorship, TV money) and it’s related costs (wages, maintenance, etc) are shown. Revenue less cost = profit if revenue is bigger or loss if costs are. What can be included as revenue or costs are defined by accounting standards. 2. A Balance Sheet. This shows on one side your assets (stadium, player registrations, debtors, stock in the shop, cash and bank) less your liabilities (creditors, loans, overdrafts). This has to balance with Equity (i.e how much shareholders paid to buy their shares in th einitial allocation) plus retained profits. 3. Cash Flow. Not every item on the Proft and Loss perfectly represents a cash movement e.g. when you buy a player cash might go out the door Day one but in the profit and Loss you would allocate this over the length of th contract aka amortisation. The cash flow statement adjusts for the non cash stuff in the profit and Loss and shows the change in a company’s net cash position over the year and explains it. Essentially this would show how losses have been met by an increase in overdraft or loans. So in short loans cannot be counted as income. They are liabilities in the balance sheet and an increase in loans will be shown to offset losses in the cash flow statement i.e. losses deplete your bank balance, loans restore it whilst creating a liability. I was David’s senior partner in the funding,and he would come to me from time to time. Did Mr Murray not say Mr king was a few doors away and never dropped by to ask questions or something like that when he was a witness last week. I see that Señor James in his latest blog is claiming that ‘Hallowe’en Houston’ has attended court everyday thus far and is to be found in the public gallery. I can only comment on last Friday when I spent the day in court 4 and can state categorically that he most certainly was NOT there at ANY time. Perhaps JC can comment later about his presence, or lack of it, today. IIRC, there was a report that he was spoken to at the beginning in the vicinity of the court following a complaint about his behaviour. Perhaps he decided to stay away after this. In my opinion, as they say. Having read Mr D’s excellent tweets today re Mr Withy’s evidence in chief, I’m sure The Donald will be eager to cross examine once the AD has finished his line of questioning. He was certainly there most of the time during the first week of the trial. perhaps that was before Police Scotland had a word outside. As I said, he wasnt in court when I was there. No doubt JC will enlighten us about today. I am sure my fellow Essex boy EBC can steer me right on this. No live tweeting of Craig Whyte trial today. I am pleased to report that a well-known sporting organisation is apparently no longer several months behind on a smallish monthly invoice. Maybe it had some kind of windfall recently. Yes, mungoboy, your man was there during the time I was in court yesterday. 10.10am to 12.30. I have written the following, as an honest summary account of what I heard. I did not take written notes, not wishing to be embarrassed by being approached by a big polis, so I am relying on memory-which ,of course, is fallible. There were times I couldn’t quite hear clearly , and it’s clearly possible that the running order of question/response might not be accurate. But, in substance, I believe what I have written to be the gist of what the jury heard, with no add-ons. As for the proceedings , essentially the witness was asked to say who he was, what age he was ( he seemed to have difficulty with that one!) , did he know CW and could he see him present in court, and what exactly his ( the witness’s) occupation is. Winess gave the answers to the basic questions, and then described himself as a corporate lawyer, whose business lay chiefly in helping companies buy/sell other companies. He had occasionally dealt with football clubs, notoriously difficult and complicated businesses. Further questioning (stumblingly put, I thought) established that witness had never heard of CW until he was asked by a Peter Shakeshaft whether he knew this wealthy individual. He said he had not, but kind of made the assumption that he would be connected to Whyte and McKay ( he pronounced it, not as ‘McEye’ but as McKay as in OK), and Shakeshaft suggested that CW might be worth getting to know. He got a later phone call from Shakeshaft asking whether he knew that CW was contemplating buying RFC, and that it might be useful to witness to think about getting involved. Witness ( a partner in Collyer Bristow) invited CW and nine other prospective clients as his guests at a ‘Plus’ market do. Subsequent to that, witness said, nothing much happened : he was kind of left up in the air as to whether CW was going to use his services. At some point though, he wrote to Dundas and Wilson ( acting for ‘Murray’) informing them that Liberty Capital would be using a ‘newco’ if it were to go ahead with any purchase. Liberty Capital had the resources available ,from a reliable financial backer. Witness was asked to describe what that letter was intended to portray. It was a ‘letter of comfort’ only, simply an indication that no one was wasting RFC’s time . Advocate Depute produced a later letter, signed by Witness, on CB headed notepaper, repeating the information and saying that the ‘newco’ would Wavetower, the directors of which would be Ellis, Akers and CW, and giving the proportionate levels o fthe shareholdings of eack. The letter went on to say that Wavetower would have the necessary £33 + million- £25=m for debt repayment and £5 .?m for purchase of majority 85% shareholding. Asked what the purport of that letter was, witness again said it was no more than a ‘letter of comfort’as from a him as a corporate lawyer ascting for a client, and NOT as from an appointed (under the Blue Book rules)financial adviser whose function it would be to issue any ‘proof of funds’. would act for Ellis and Akers, while he was, loosely, acting for CW. Witness confirmed that in, wriiting those letters, he had taken instructions from CW-who was sole shareholder in Liberty Capital. I left the Court at that point, to keep another appointment. (At one point Donald Findlay raised a point of law , the jury was sent out, and the point was quickly discussed. No ruling on the point was required to be made as the AD agreed the point. Tea-break followed immediately, and then, with the jury back, proceedings recommenced). Just a general observation, about life in general. I am thinking that a duped person can actually be the ‘duper’ ? And that mibbees, sometimes, the wrong person can appear in a dock? However, the SFA website does manage to include details of the upcoming England match. Add in pies, Bovril, programme…a conservative £200 ? To watch the latest disappointing Scotland team, [and typically including several players I just don’t recognise] ? …and to contribute to the overblown salaries of blatantly corrupt blazers at Hampden ?! Could it be that Daryll Broadfoot is no longer actively defending the SFA and as a consequence their PR is non-existent. It does seem rather strange that the SFA have not issued even a vaguely worded condemnation of all bad things etc. Some problems with the site tonight. DNS servers at our domain reg company are all over the place so making some changes. Use those in laptop. It’s the nameservers causing the problem. @alextomo It seems the Scottish FA say Rangers will not be stripped of titles whatever Supreme Court’s Big Tax Case verdict might be. I’m not sure if Tomo is referring to anything fresh UTH, but perhaps may be referring to something historical. He doesn’t so much appear to be implying to a direct quote or statement made recently from anybody. It may be the case that something relating to this blog by ecojon has crossed his bows. Well we know he is a Rangers* lackey, running things by them prior to release. Daveboy Unseen was pulling no punches telling him what was required and reminding him who’s boss. Someone else is now celebrating ‘6iar’ then ?! Keef has retained his ‘Sports Journalist of the Year Award’ for an incredible 6th time. He’s rubbish at his sports job, but he must be bl00dy brilliant at giving…something I couldn’t possibly mention here! The Tweet by Alex Thomson about titles not being stripped prompted a post on KDS that ended. LNS was a report commissioned the SFA, not legally binding, but the outcome was based only on the evidence provided, so they got the report they wanted. They’ve got a bit smarter since Farry. This elicited my response below that addresses the evidence not provided and why. Whilst that is true, what Rangers were asked to provide SPL lawyers with was all documentation relating to ebts since 1998 when SPL began that had side letters. Not all that documentation was provided by Duff and Phelps including the De Boer side letter of 30 Aug 2000 and the HMRC letters provided in court last week setting out the HMRC case as well was the irregular nature of the DOS ebts. What is unclear is why that documentation was not provided by Duff and Phelps because they were aware of its contents and used them in 2012 in pursuit of the £2.8m set aside under the SPA before LNS ended in 2013. The point is that there is a case that vital information was deliberately kept from the SPL lawyer much as the fact that wtc liability had crystalised before the 31st March was deliberately avoided by Grant Thornton auditors/ RFC Chairman A Johnson and later by SFA CEO S Regan when questions started being asked after Sherriff Officers called at Ibrox in 2011. Deceit has clearly played it’s part in achieving the LNS result it has and no decision based on deliberately misleading the regulatory authority can be allowed to stand. When it was pointed out to SPL lawyers in 2014 by SFM that information had been witheld no attempt was made by the SPL to establish if it was deliberate. The argument was it didn’t matter. Time has proven for that not to be the case so not only should LNS be set aside, the circumstances under which requested information was not provided should be part of a new enquiry. SPL lawyers said that the exclusion of the De Boer letter of 30 Aug 2000 made no difference but that stance no longer stands scrutiny. The failure to supply it and the associated HMRC correspondence describing the irregular nature of the De Boer ebt materially affected the decision reached by LNS, so to say LNS and it’s conclusion is final tramples all over natural justice. When you add SDM’S testimony to the FTT about the motivation for using ebts it is risible to think LNS Decision should stand on both a truthful and natural justice basis. In simple terms Doncaster was lied to, knowingly or unknowingly, and much as he and the SPL would wish it all to go away, they cannot use deceit to perpetuate deceit. More power to you and the other Requisitioners. I hope you win your fight at Celtic and Celtic move positively on your mandate to clean up our game top down with some dismissals for corruption and or incompetence. We are all in your dugout. Once Jim Traynor retired it left the way open for Keith to go for 10 in a row. There is now no competition and the awards ceremony is devalued because of it. I miss Jim and his fine journalistic output and his Football Phone in where when he was in full Goebbels mode (which coincided with Rangers going out of business) Cosgrove was drafted in to babysit him. Is anyone able to post a link to Jim’s last piece for the Record as it was a brilliant summatoin of the internet Bampots and their conspiracy filled outpourings. There you go BD, …. The man is a disgrace to himself and to journalism, even the kind of journalism practised by the sports people at the DR. Some good stuff in there about the tax case and how we are all biased. Not a single word or apology about how he lied to the BBC licence payer for all those years when he said he was an Airdire supporter. The lies to the licence payers continue. This is my favourite Jim Traynor thing. Mr Traynor issuing propaganda to the loyal via the club website in January 2013, whilst threatening the other clubs and people in the media. I love the bit where he calls people semi-literate, when starting a sentence with “And”. Propaganda and threats ended off with “Tolerance and sanity. That’s what Rangers will demonstrate and maintain, especially when back at the summit.” It’s quality stuff. Well actually it’s just another example of an official from the club indulging in “rabble rousing” but that’s hardly a rarity. If the owners, directors and managers can do it why not the media team. It isn’t that long ago clubs, particularly those in the top flight, were solemnly insisting that ignoring the views of fans would be akin to financial suicide. Remember? It was when the game was wrestling with the problem of what to do with Rangers. All the clubs were squealing that the wishes of fans had to be granted. If you swallowed any of that bilge you probably also believed in sporting integrity. Of course it was all nonsense. Sporting Integrity was a cloak of convenience, albeit a rather thin, practically transparent one, behind which club leaders huddled together to come up with sanctions. Rangers had to be punished, they deserved to be punished but it seemed as if additional penalties were being randomly introduced depending on who was in which meeting. Many Rangers fans like to think the frenzy to cause the club as much additional pain as possible was driven by one club but that wasn’t strictly the case. Many fans of many clubs waded in but this is not to say Celtic fans or their club didn’t attempt to influence the outcome of debates on Rangers and possible sanctions. Of course they did. And they are still at it on social media sites and on blogs clattered out by individuals who are no better than semi-literate. The sheer hypocrisy of what is happening within Hampden’s corridors of power right now will be lost on them but let’s not pretend sporting integrity or the wishes of supporters really are important to all those clubs pushing for this change. If they were listening to fans they wouldn’t be sticking with a top division of 12 , and if there was any integrity there would be no rush to bring in changes for the start of next season. If, as seems likely, the structure is altered for 2013-14 supporters won’t get what they’ve already paid for, especially those following teams striving for promotion. Actually this entire season will be rendered meaningless. Sporting integrity won’t merely be compromised, it’ll be crushed but this is what happens when desperation slips in and throttles reason. This belief won’t sit well with the few who are more or less running the SPL and influencing thinking within that desperate organisation but they can’t complain. After all, they’ve dismissed Rangers’ views completely. This club, the biggest one in the country, were not invited to take part in talks which will shape the game’s future. We are then entitled to conclude that this club are not important, which is strange indeed when so many fans of other clubs continue to be obsessed by Rangers, who are simply getting on with their own affairs asking no favour from anyone. We do, however, expect commonsense to be applied, along with fair play. Look, Rangers will return to the top flight, which will of course have to be rebranded. Rangers will take a seat at the head of the table where, despite the latest insult of being shut out of reconstruction talks, we will act with the good of Scottish football in mind. We’ll work through the divisions and we will return stronger and better than ever before. This club accepted their sanctions and moved on but too many others have been unable to do the same. They continue their assaults and while the deranged, who are using social media sites as conduits for their twisted agendas, should be ignored there are more than a few in the mainstream still maligning the club at every opportunity. In a BBC radio debate last Saturday night one pundit, in a matter-of-fact manner, said Charles Green speaks with ‘forked tongue.’ No attempt to explain or justify the statement, just as no explanation was offered when another radio voice claimed there was a dishonesty about Walter Smith when he went public with a late bid for the club. Word of advice gentlemen. From now on be very careful when talking or writing about this club. To paraphrase something said about another club, Rangers will not be treated less than others. And although there is no desire to pick fights, be assured that no one will attack Rangers with impunity. Tolerance and sanity. That’s what Rangers will demonstrate and maintain, especially when back at the summit. Can anyone who was in attendence in court expand on the basic numbers presented (within the confines of what can be said obviously) (I’ll also credit johnjames here for having a stab at it too earlier this week). As I understand it Whyte (Wavetower) were required via the SPA to provide 18m for Lloyds repayment, 5m for immediate player investment, 5m for working capital (was the HSE debt within this figure?) and circa 3m for the wee tax case. It is alleged that he mortgaged STs from season 11/12, 12/13, 13/14 and 14/15 to do this. However it is now apparent from court that Murrays oldco Rangers were potentially in debt to Ticketus for up to £6m. But surely these were also mortgaged on the same 11/12 set of STs? im not too concerned about the legality issue, the law is the law after all, I’m just struggling to get my head round the base arithmetic. One cake, how many slices sort of thing! It is unlikely that Rangers were “in debt” to Ticketus per se, as that is not how Ticketus operated. They did not provide loans. They bought season tickets in advance at a discount and sold them at face value via the club, their profit was the discount. As far as the supporter knew they were simply buying the ticket from the club. If there was “debt” it was just the same as any other season ticket holder. They pay up front, and their debt is reduced as games are played, whether they attend or not. Every season ticket holder at a club is a creditor until the last game they have paid for is played. The difference with Ticketus was that they were no longer a creditor once their last ticket was sold on to a supporter. I imagine the “debt” was the fact that the games had not been played and their tickets had not been sold at that time. Once those tickets were sold and Ticketus received the money then there was no debt. The fact that Rangers were using them prior to the sale to Whyte is indicative of, at the very least, cash flow problems. The SPA commitments were £18m debt to Lloyds, £2.8m for the WTC, £1.7m for the H&S issue, £5m working capital and £5M per year investment in the playing squad for four years, for a total of £47.5m. I’m not sure whether or not JJ has the £8m RFC Ticketus liability correct, as I don’t know if the £8m borrowing occurred during season 2009/10, 2010/11 or both. There was mention of an £8m advance by the Advocate Depute during McGill’s evidence on 9th May, although I wasn’t in court that day. A day or two earlier an unspecified RFC Ticketus liability, which sounded as if it related to season 2010/11, was also mentioned in court while I was present. However, I wasn’t 100% certain that I had picked up the information correctly, and the point wasn’t followed up so I didn’t get confirmation one way or another. Letter from Bank of Scotland to Rangers from 2009, mentions £34m credit facility agreed in 2004. It’s probably not widely known, but Whyte actually made two payments back to Ticketus during his brief tenure. From the D&P creditors report of 5 April 2012, it notes that Whyte repaid £3m in June 2011 and £5m in September 2011. However, he also borrowed a further £5m in September 2011 (probably the same £5m he repaid), by mortgaging a fourth season’s STs. It is not clear whether or not the £8m repaid related to earlier borrowing by RFC, or was in fact the amount due to be repaid from STs from 2011/12 for Whyte’s first year of his initial three year deal. From other documents that I’ve kept, Ticketus provided circa £20.3m in May 2011 and £5m in September 2011. In the civil action Ticketus v Whyte, the claim was for £18.2m and the amount awarded was £17.7m, being the net exposure of Ticketus without interest or the expected profit. The above figures suggest to me that the repayments made by Whyte were in respect of the first year of his deal rather than any previous borrowing by RFC. I also note that Ticketus’ creditor claim against RFC (2012) was £26.7m, which may be the total amount outstanding that Ticketus would have expected to receive from RFC over the remainder of the Whyte deal. From Lord Hodge, way back when. It is probably worth noting it was Rangers doing the deals with Ticketus, even after Whyte took over. I believe it is false to think of Rangers / Ticketus and Whyte / Ticketus deals. They were the same thing. Ticketus operates a business of buying and selling tickets for, among others, sporting events. The two contracts with Ticketus, which I discuss below, in summary involve the sale by Rangers to Ticketus of season tickets and an agency arrangement by which Ticketus is to receive the income flow from the sale of the season tickets. On or about 9 May 2011 Ticketus paid £20,300,912 for the first tranche of the season tickets which covered the seasons 2011-2012, 2012-2013 and 2013-2014. On or about 21 September 2011 Ticketus paid a further £5,075,213 for the second tranche of season tickets, which covered the seasons 2013-2014 and 2014-2015. I am informed that the expected income flow from the sale of the season tickets is likely to represent about 60% of the cash flow of Rangers in those seasons. My post of 02.06 this morning is in moderation. Homunculus’ later post is a far better example of the kind of ‘journalist’ that I believe JT to be, i.e one whom it is scarcely worth the effort of despising. I should have waited a wee bit longer to see if my first post would be released from ‘moderation’! Sorry about the ‘repeat’ post. Rangers had to be punished, they deserved to be punished. Celtic fans or their club didn’t attempt to influence the outcome of debates on Rangers and possible sanctions. This club accepted their sanctions and moved on. Thanks EJ. As I said, there is only one ST cake. It doesn’t matter how you slice it up (and despite your best efforts and patience I confess to still being a little confuddled but that’s nothing new) it’s the same cake. Im off to a dark room with my slide rule and abacus! EJ my reading of it is that Whyte was negotiating to do the deal from late 2010. It was completed in early May 2011. The first load of Ticketus money was paid on 9th May 2011, after Whyte had taken over. That deal was with Rangers. It included the money already negotiated prior to Whyte buying the shares, and the money Whyte used to partly fund the deal. The entire deal was with Rangers, because that was who was selling the tickets, whether Murray owned the shares or Whyte doesn’t really matter. It was basically a roll up of the season ticket sales already agreed (with Murray) plus the additional ones being sold (agreed with Whyte). It was basically all the same deal, between Ticketus and Rangers. It’s really surprising how little Rangers knew about it. Why would the SFA or SPFL not want to strip titles if the HMRC appeal is upheld. It then is a matter of fact that players were playing/registered illegally. I have heard in court evidence that proves factually that the wtc crystallized before the end on March deadline which means that RFC got a license to play in CL illegally. Also that De Boar, Moore and Flo were registered illegally and every game they played in should have resulted in RFC losing 3 0. Will all this be ignored by the SFA? Why do the SFA/SPFL not want to address this what reasons can they give. This is a serious question, why can this liquidated club not be held to account in the history books for what they have done. I wrote to my club in the past concerning the BTC and was informed that it was still an ongoing process. I will write again if HMRC appeal is upheld as this is at present all I can do. Nothing said in court proves anything factually. That’s for the court to decide. We may well hear other ‘facts’ that contradict those ones you refer to. It’s a mistake to draw conclusions too soon. Still 9 weeks of this trial to go. From that video, can I just point something out. The club doesn’t pay VAT or PAYE, it hands it over. VAT and PAYE are collected from customers and employees. So what he is actually saying is that he spent money that wasn’t his, to finance a football club. That is not the same as being unable to pay tax. Received this link is in an email this morning from my bro-in-law. He highlighted the fact that TRFC are not listed and suggested that this might mean no license to play in uefa competitions ? It is more likely that the 5 year cycle of Oldco’s coefficient points (the last ones earned on their day trips to Malmo and Maribor in 2011/12) have just dropped off the list. The newco will just get Scotland’s basic coefficient figure for teams that haven’t featured in Europe for the previous five seasons. Dundee united who were on the exact same points as Rangers (original) last season are still on the list for this year,Rangers (original) are gone all together. Is it possible for a club to lose nearly 5 co-efficent points after 1 season?,united only dropped 0.2 points from last season.This could be about the license issue or it could be UEFA removing them from the list as they no longer exist. Thanks for the replies. I think it most likely that EJ has called it. That Euro list only lists clubs who have played in euro competitions in the last five seasons. Neither new club or old club have done so, so are not included. My interest turned to the European Clubs Association. RFC was, of course, a founder member of the Association.But they lost full membership when they ceased, through being put into Liquidation, to be able to participate in professional football. The breath-taking inconsistency is, well, breath-taking! How do the minds of these people actually work? I have sent a message to the ECA ‘contact us’ email address to point out that TRFC is not commercially, legally or in football terms, the RFC that was a founder member of ECA, and is in no entitled to be regarded as such. Much good it may do, but I feel better for having sent a message. I thought the point was that, prior to the Billionaire buy out, Murray owned the club and £6m of the cake was already sliced up and legally spoken for. And when the cake required further slicing, to enable Whyte et al to acquire the company, it would not have been possible to do so without Murrays knowledge as Ticketus would have had to deal with him as he was the owner at the time. My favourite cake is Carrot cake BTW. Just listening to a programme on R. Scotland about women who worked in the Mills in Paisley. I have worked all over Scotland in my time and Paisley has to be one of my favourite places, closely followed by Lanark. I became close friends with a lady and her hubby who was a big Buddies fan. Took me to Love St. on a few occasions. Happy days. I got a St. Mirren tammy and wore it for years in my home town without a mention, I think everyone just thought it was a black & white tammy . I just wish that leader in N. Korea would concentrate on football and not nuclear weapons. Regardless of your feelings about Britain’s nuclear detterent at least it is defensive. He wants to be aggressive. When you think of Spain, Italy, Germany etc. in the modern era you think of football. (apart from holidays) . Why can’t he aspire to that?
2019-04-26T04:01:25Z
https://archive.sfm.scot/that-debate-and-the-beauty-of-hindsight/
In 1996 my sister Sharon was about to undergo her first brain surgery to remove several tumors. Though we had lost our father five years before, I had never questioned that Sharon would always be a part of my life. She was my older sister. Now I had to face the unimaginable possibility of being without her. Sharon and I had been raised Catholic, but had both long ago abandoned the Church and often joked about being “recovering Catholics.” Now Sharon’s illness raised questions for me, and on the advice of a friend I attended a retreat led by a former priest: Irish poet and philosopher John O’Donohue. The retreat was a great help to me, and I was impressed and soothed by O’Donohue’s deep kindness. He had no aura of Catholic guilt — something I had worked hard to get rid of myself. His words and presence left me feeling lighter and freer. I bought his book Anam Cara (Harper Perennial). Anam is the Gaelic word for “soul,” and cara the word for “friend.” In the early Celtic church, an anam cara acted as a teacher, companion, or spiritual guide, someone with whom you could share your innermost thoughts. In the coming years, as I watched my sister slowly slip away, I turned again and again to O’Donohue’s Anam Cara and his other books. They addressed my grief and also my questions about how to live a meaningful life, how to cultivate wonder, and how to be more gentle with myself. Since my sister’s death, I have attended two more retreats with O’Donohue and have discovered that underneath his gentle and kind manner lies a brilliant mind capable of addressing the most complex questions of our times. O’Donohue has a PhD in philosophical theology from the University of Tübingen in Germany and has written several books, including Beauty: The Invisible Embrace and Eternal Echoes: Celtic Reflections on Our Yearning to Belong (both Harper Perennial), and two volumes of poetry, Echoes of Memory (Dufour Editions) and Conamara Blues (Harper Perennial). To Bless the Space between Us: A Book of Blessings is due out from Random House in the fall, and he is currently working on a book about the teachings of fourteenth-century mystic Meister Eckhart. More information can be found on his website: www.johnodonohue.com. O’Donohue lives in a cottage in the west of Ireland — an unspoiled, rustic region of the country — and lectures and teaches around the world. He holds two annual retreats: one in Ireland in May, and one in the U.S., on the Oregon coast, in late October. This interview is composed of two conversations that took place at those retreats. Maybe it’s a characteristic of O’Donohue’s Celtic background — he speaks fluent Gaelic — but he injected a lightness and a sprinkling of laughter into our conversation. Covington: Do you think there is a spiritual hunger in the U.S. today? O’Donohue: There is a fierce hunger for spirit at the heart of an American culture that has lost all belief in the old language about God. That language no longer resonates for most Americans, nor leads them to wells of nourishment. Ironically, in other areas of American culture, there is a fundamentalist obsession with God. But inevitably this God tends to be a monolith and an emperor of the blandest singularity. Attention to the living God, who incorporates the beauty of the senses and spirit, and is the deepest source of the imagination and the highest calling of intellect, seems very scarce. New Age spirituality is rising up to try to fill the gap. I do not wish to criticize any system that can nourish people’s spirits, but I find that a lot of New Age writing cherry-picks the attractive bits from the ancient traditions and makes collages of them; it usually excises the ascetic dimension. In general it is not rigorously thought out, but is what I would call “soft” thinking. Granted, it is difficult to write well about spirit: namely, to bring the lyrical and the philosophical into a true tension. In my writing, I endeavor to excavate the Celtic and the Judeo-Christian philosophical and literary traditions and to bring them into conversation with our modern hunger and questioning. Covington: There has been so much conflict in the name of religion down through the ages — so much war and killing and hatred. What do you, as a deeply religious person, say about that to people who aren’t religious? O’Donohue: I think it’s true that religion has been used to funnel political hostility, racial hatred, and all kinds of awful violence. But I would suggest that this is not the fault of religion but of the people who use it this way. In Northern Ireland we had a conflict said to be between Protestant and Catholic, but that conflict had nothing to do with the heart of Protestantism or the heart of Catholicism. Similarly with Islam nowadays, we in the West are often working with a mere caricature of that faith. But there is a beautiful and mystical theology at the heart of Islam. It’s ironic that one of the most widely read poets in the U.S. today is Rumi, who comes out of the thirteenth-century Islamic tradition. One of the great problems in postmodern culture is the lack of true conversation. What we have is more a series of intersecting monologues. There has been no real conversation between the West and Islam. We need one badly, for it is conversation that breaks down caricature and allows bridges to be built. The tragedy of the West at the moment is that all interaction seems to take place across one bridge: economics. China is the next big superpower, and if we look at it only through economic lenses, as a field for profitable investments, the consequences will be disastrous. I was in China for six weeks and talked to a lot of people there. Even though they use Western tools for economic development, their mentality and sensibility are so different from ours. Whereas our starting point is the individual, theirs is the group. Their perception and language have such a different subtlety and structuring; economic bridges will never help us reach toward each other. Without a true cultural conversation, no real relationship will occur. The conflict in Northern Ireland has proven beyond a doubt that, sooner or later, you come to the table. And it is wiser to come to the table sooner, rather than after thirty years of murder, grief, and personal tragedy. Covington: You are writing a book on fourteenth-century Christian mystic Meister Eckhart. How are his teachings relevant to Americans in the twenty-first century? O’Donohue: The U.S. is a great country. You can live the way you want there; you can be a self-made person. But sometimes, when all our energy goes into progress, acquisition, and productivity, it leaves a huge emptiness in the heart. I think the teachings of Meister Eckhart can address that emptiness, can show us how to be patient with it, and in fact bring us deeper into it. At the heart of our emptiness, we can actually discover nourishment in the secret landscapes of imagination and spirit. Covington: You’ve said that each Catholic can create his or her own “niche” in the faith. Is that really Catholicism? O’Donohue: The term a la carte Catholicism has been used to denigrate those who pick and choose from the tradition, selecting only what nourishes, challenges, and heals them. On the other hand, nobody goes into a restaurant and chooses everything on the menu. One of the difficulties in Western religion in general is that we are inclined to take current manifestations of the tradition as the whole truth about the religion. I don’t think that is a responsible or honorable way to engage with a tradition. Tradition is to a community what memory is to the individual: a huge archive of knowledge that is tested over time. The questions of the human spirit are perennial, but they come in different forms at different moments in history; we shouldn’t equate contemporary, and often banal or inferior, manifestations of the tradition with the depth of the tradition itself. Sometimes the people who represent a religious tradition at a particular moment will masquerade as the absolute owners of the tradition, but they are not. They are only good or bad servants of the tradition. Although we might reject the faith’s current representatives, I don’t believe we can simply jump from one tradition to another. I can do Buddhist practice, but I cannot be a Buddhist. Nor can a Tibetan Buddhist come to Ireland and turn into a Catholic. It saddens me to see so many spiritually starved people in the West passing the great granaries of the Christian traditions on their way to some New Age or fundamentalist church, and not even looking in the doorways. When the grain is tested, as it is in the great traditions, you get true nourishment, not fast food. Covington: Why did you leave the priesthood? O’Donohue: It was a difficult decision, and it did take years to make. I suppose the oxygen had become too scarce. I also found myself diverging from quite a few of the teachings. The final straw was acquiring a new bishop who exhibited and exercised a strong chemical hesitancy to my theological viewpoint. Once made, the decision brought me great peace of heart. Covington: You’ve said the Catholic Church has a “pathological fear of the feminine.” Why do you think that is? O’Donohue: First, before I criticize it, let me say what I love about the Catholic Church. I think the seven sacraments are the most beautiful liturgical rituals. The Christian mystical tradition is populated by such giants as Meister Eckhart, John of the Cross, Hildegard von Bingen, and Julian of Norwich. The dogmas of the Catholic Church are sophisticated, poetic, speculative doctrines; they invite imagination, not dogmatism. I love the Church’s teaching on the communion of saints. I love the theology of the Trinity, which is not often preached because it is such a complex thing, yet it remains one of the most exciting discoveries of the nature of the divine. On the other side, I do not trust the Catholic Church with Eros. I never did, even when I was a priest. The Church does have a pathological fear of the feminine. It would sooner allow priests to marry than it would allow women to become priests. This awful mistrust of the feminine goes all the way back to Genesis, where Eve is blamed for offering the apple to Adam. And the doctrine that a woman, after giving birth to a child — the most beautiful thing a human being can do — has to go to the Church to be cleansed: this is a demonization of women that I cannot understand. All extremes create a mirror of themselves. So when you have the demonization of the feminine, you also have the creation of the ideal feminine type: Mary as the perfect woman, on whom no stain of mortality — or complexity — was allowed to fall. None of the awkward, subtle, different, or dark faces of the feminine were allowed near her image. I think it’s a shame, and it has consequences. I think the Church is in danger of losing women. As I’ve said for the last twenty years: if tomorrow all the women in the Catholic Church decided to walk, the Church wouldn’t last three months. Covington: From your perspective, what intellectual and theological contributions does the U.S. make? Covington: It’s ironic that the U.S. is supposed to be setting up a democracy in Iraq, while our own democratic principles are threatened. O’Donohue: Yes, the country seems divided into two extremes. In the absence of a strong middle ground, the political pendulum will always swing too far to either side. By “middle ground” I don’t mean the status quo. I mean a true balance that is autonomous and authentic. That’s why we need responsible media and good conversation and universities that are open-minded and not already loyal to one side or the other. Plato said that to practice philosophy is to follow the question wherever it leads. Loyalty to the voyage of the question will create a wise middle ground and protect us from extremism. Covington: In Anam Cara you write that the phrase “do not be afraid” appears 366 times in the Bible. I find that profound. O’Donohue: Fear is the greatest source of falsification in life. It makes the real seem unreal, and the unreal appear real. In The Courage to Be, the theologian Paul Tillich draws a distinction between fear and anxiety. Anxiety, for him, is this diffuse worry that has no object or point of reference. This is the atmosphere right now in the U.S., the land of the free and the home of the brave. There is a huge anxiety just under the surface. Fear, as distinct from anxiety, has an object and a point of reference. Tillich says that in order to handle anxiety, you have to translate it into a fear that has a definite object. Then you can engage with it. Part of the intention of growth is to overcome one’s fears. Covington: Anam cara means “soul friend.” Underneath, is your book about being a friend to yourself? O’Donohue: Yes, most things that are true and lasting have a symmetry between inside and out. Your outward relationship toward your beloved, if it is not mirrored internally by a loving relationship with yourself, is reduced and limited. You end up scraping from him or her what you are not giving yourself. But if you are nourished at your own table, you do not need so desperately to be fed by someone else; consequently, you can be free and open with that person. This is true of our relationship to the world as well. When you approach even the simplest object, the depth that you see in that object will be proportionate to the depth you bring to it. One of the most interesting philosophical movements of the mid-twentieth century was hermeneutics: the science of interpretation. The key question in hermeneutics is always “How do you approach a text?” — and philosophers use the word text broadly. It could be restated as “Through what lenses and apparatus do you look at something?” You should be constantly aware of your own act of approaching anything. When you know what you are putting into it, and what you are taking from it, the text — or object, or person — has a better chance to meet you as itself. Covington: Solitude seems central to your work. Why is it so necessary? O’Donohue: Solitude is the sense of space as nourishing. What usually happens with solitude is that people equate it with loneliness, which frightens them. But I don’t know anyone who has a good friendship or love relationship in which there are not long periods of solitude. There is a way in which we treat our relationships almost like a colonial expedition: we want to colonize the space, all the territory in between, until there is no wilderness left. Most couples who have deadened in each other’s presence have colonized their space this way. They have domesticated each other beyond recognition. Sometimes you see a beautiful woman who quickens your heart. Then you meet her again years later, and she has become a domesticated relic of who she once was, and you think, Where is the dangerous vision that I saw in her? The same happens to men. I think it is more interesting to be with somebody who still has his or her wilderness territory — and by that I don’t mean bleak, burned-out, damaged areas where wounding has occurred; rather, I mean genuine wilderness. Upon seeing that in the other person, you promise yourself: One thing I will never do is try to domesticate her wilderness. Because the authenticity of her difference and the purity of her danger and the depth of her affection are all being secretly nourished by that wilderness, as all of my spirit is being nourished by my own wilderness. There is a great tradition in the U.S., even more so than in other countries, of the solitary person going out into the wild. It’s a shame that this model is not now being revived for the voyage into our inner wilderness. Covington: Stillness and silence are natural companions to solitude. O’Donohue: Yes, all three are necessary for a mystical life, a harmonious life. Stillness is just being still. There is no great mystery about it. Your body is an object in space — not an inanimate object, but an object nonetheless. I will be putting my body-object into a tin machine on Tuesday and flying over the ocean. My body will emerge all shaky on the other end, and it will take time for it to recover its native tranquillity. Spending time being still is a simple and modest requirement that we face each day, not just when traveling. If you could sit still for twenty minutes every day — just sit in your chair and look at a place on the rug — your body would love you for it. Your body loves the simple relief of stillness. And it’s great for your health. The third thing is silence. When someone is talking, try to listen to the silence between the words. This is what a good therapist does. She is listening for what your words are saying, and she is also listening between the words for the things that your unconscious wants to say, but which your conscious mind does not know about or is not yet ready to make heard. To be a great listener is to be a listener on that level. Silence depends on stillness and solitude. If you do not have solitude and know what wilderness is, and you do not have stillness and know what tranquillity is, then you are not able to listen with that sort of refinement and subtlety. Bring a rhythm to your life that has a share of solitude, stillness, and silence in it, and you will gradually come home. That is what spirituality is: the art of homecoming. What usually happens with solitude is that people equate it with loneliness, which frightens them. But I don’t know anyone who has a good friendship or love relationship in which there are not long periods of solitude. Covington: In Anam Cara you write about embracing our negativity: “The negative is one of the closest friends of your destiny.” This idea seems foreign in American culture, where we’re supposed to pretend we don’t have any negative traits or thoughts. O’Donohue: Negativity is a precious force. No movement of consciousness goes forward on its journey without the motor of the negative driving it. Most of us live in cultures that have become soft; we have unlearned the wisdom that hardship brings. But in Ireland we were raised to see difficulties, obstacles, and barriers as precious. We were taught that the thing you pushed against helped to define you. I remember when I was studying German in Berlin, I used to smuggle books over to East Berlin, to a lovely girl there who was eager to read. I’d be walking along with novels by Thomas Mann, Günther Grass, and Hermann Hesse, and maybe some poems by Sarah Kirsch concealed inside my overcoat, feeling as if I were an international criminal. One day, while I was waiting for the girl in a pub, an East German man asked me to pass the ashtray. He knew immediately by the way I answered that I was not German, so he asked me where I was from and what I did. I said I was an Irish priest. He told me he didn’t believe a word of my religion, but he’d raised his six children as Catholics. “What would you do that for?” I asked. And he said it was because he wanted them to develop their spiritual awareness through interaction with a great tradition; to shape their questions against the push of that tradition. When they were seventeen or eighteen, he said, they could leave it behind forever, but at least they would be well schooled in the ultimate questions through engagement with a great tradition. Frequently the most fecund time in a relationship is when you run into the “otherness” of your beloved, an otherness that you cannot calm or accommodate by means of your affection, love, or understanding. This otherness is actually set against you. But when you exercise patience and develop a hospitality toward this otherness, something deeper gradually emerges between you. The challenge is similar in the writing life. I believe that a writer has to develop skill and craft first, then go to the biggest barrel of darkness or silence he or she can find and wait for something to come up. You must have craft so the quality of your writing will be proportionate to the importance of what will arrive on your table. But craft alone isn’t enough. You can develop a great ability as a writer, but if you write about insignificant matters, your work will interest nobody. Sadly, many people view darkness as the enemy rather than the threshold, the invitation to become something more. In Beauty I write about sculpting a block of stone being akin to shaping yourself: your calling in the world is to keep refining yourself until you find the secret form inside you. We should consider life primarily as an invitation to become who we are. Most of the time, when we think of becoming something, we have a plan to better ourselves: “I want to lose this sense of inferiority” or “I want to make my life easier” or “I want to call off my inner Dobermans, who are chewing up my insides.” We all have these problems we want to get over, but that is so bloody limited. So what if your childhood has its quota of damage? Wouldn’t it be healthier to say, “OK, my wounds deserve to be recognized and healed, but they also need to be placed in a more dignified context”? We should ask for the strength to push forward into deeper graciousness and sophistication. One way to do that is to recognize respectfully the places where your negativity appears. They are great clues to the location of the treasure troves in the deep inner caves. The imagination is not interested in two-dimensional reductionism or naively pitting one side against another, dark against light. It is interested in the place where the two sides meet, and what they give birth to when they cross-fertilize each other. That is the heart of creativity. Covington: What exactly do you mean when you say a writer should go to “the biggest barrel of darkness or silence” and “wait for something to come up”? O’Donohue: In the creative world, true brightness is seldom found. Sometimes you get a perfect poem that comes all at once and you do not have to work on it, but such visitations are incredibly rare, a form of grace. Brightness in a poem or a painting or a piece of music usually has to sweat its way to the top through caverns of darkness. And when it comes to the surface, you can still see in it the beautiful shadow of the dark journey it has made. The imagination is not interested in two-dimensional reductionism or naively pitting one side against another, dark against light. It is interested in the place where the two sides meet, and what they give birth to when they cross-fertilize each other. That is the heart of creativity: it is not fantasy, not invention. Creativity is listening in on the places where the opposites are dancing with each other. Covington: What do you say to people who don’t consider themselves creative? O’Donohue: I don’t agree with the idea that there are those who are creative and those who are not. I feel everyone is creative, sometimes even in spite of themselves. I am always disappointed when I see middle-aged women who finally have the time to do something creative, and they engage in the most boring, disastrously unoriginal enterprises, ones that have vacancy written all over them. Now and again, however, you meet someone who has been busy raising children but has always had a deeper longing inside and somehow has remained faithful to her originality. And she will take up her new freedom and engage with herself in a way she never has before. She is willing to take risks and bring patience to learning the skill of painting, music, photography, writing, or sculpture. When you meet a person like that, you realize that the creative instinct you felt as a child remains within you at forty-seven, or fifty-seven, or sixty-seven. It is heartening to discover that the dream you’ve never paid attention to hasn’t died, but rather, in the fermenting period of waiting, has become a powerful presence. Creativity is about opening up to your own originality and allowing it to come forward. As the French poet Rimbaud said, “I have no ancestors.” You will never write a poem that someone else has already written. We are all such strange worlds. We are more than human. Each individual is an opening where the eternal is breaking through, a portal where things go out and come in. Covington: In his book On Writing, Stephen King says that when we write, we are excavating something, trying to bring it up whole. Would you agree with that? O’Donohue: I would partly agree with it. It is excavation, but I don’t think what we are excavating is already fully formed, and we’re just taking away the cover and bringing it up. What happens for me is that there is this search for bits, pieces, fragments, shards. But in the process of digging them up, complementary shapes are drawn to each other and become something more. So it is actually during the emergence that form establishes itself. It is like sculpting: you have a block of stone and a chisel, and bit by bit, according to your vision and the grain of the stone, a shape eventually emerges. But it is a collusion between the object itself and the skill of the artist. Covington: Some would say it’s overly romantic to believe that everyone is creative. O’Donohue: Maybe it is, but I have several reasons for believing it. One is that every one of us dreams, and a dream is a most sophisticated artistic vision. It is said that when the Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky slept, he hung a notice on his door that read, “Poet at work.” You people your dreams with characters, settings, images, plot, and you present it to yourself. You are both the creator and the audience for it. As the Talmud says, “A dream that has not been interpreted is like a letter that has not been opened.” So if you can dream, I believe you can create. Second, we were all children once, and when you were a child, you lived in an imaginative world. That childlike side of us never dies. It is always there. Third, the nature of creation is that it is constantly growing and becoming and emerging. And we are the stuff of creation. So, in a sense, it is in our nature to be creative. Fourth, the act of knowing is a function of the imagination. All knowing has an imaginative element in it. We don’t see the world as it is at all. Our consciousness always co-creates everything we see. So what you are seeing is not just out there, on its own. You are always seeing it through the lens of your own thinking. Therefore, you are co-creating the world, whether you like it or not. Covington: You believe strongly in each person’s individuality. O’Donohue: One of the amazing things about creation is its plenitude and diversity. No two stones are the same. No two fields are the same. No two waves or stars or faces are the same. No two thoughts are the same. It is amazing, really, that we manage to find any similarity at all. It is there, of course, because without it we couldn’t achieve continuity. But the true calling of everything is to be itself. There would be huge problems in creation if things decided not to be themselves — if leaves, for example, decided that they were really feathers, or streets decided they were rivers. Covington: I haven’t heard much about the concept of “providence,” except in your books. I found this quote on your website: “There is an unseen life that dreams us; it knows our true direction and destiny. We can trust ourselves more than we realize, and we need have no fear of change.” Would you say that providence is the “unseen life that dreams us”? O’Donohue: Yes, I would. Actually, I think the idea of a single human being is an illusion. Behind each of us, way back in the unrippled beforeness, there is a stack of forms that dream us into being. And behind and around every person is a formal elegance that is secretly structuring that person’s actual experiences. I understand providence as that supreme, all-embracing knowing that is always obliquely there, accompanying us. I had a friend who lived for a while in India, and I asked him what it was like. He said it was the strangest thing to live in a country that did not believe in death. There was also this concept of fate that relieved so much spiritual angst. The idea of fate is too predetermined for me. I prefer destiny. I think when we arrive here in this world, we begin unfolding from within ourselves that which is already latent within us. Experience is the semipublic theater in which our inner content unfolds. Providence is perhaps the other side of the spectrum, where we are free to shape our lives. And in the middle is the meeting of destiny and freedom. Our significant acts are perhaps approaches to something that is already approaching us; this subtle coming together is what eventually yields experience. The secret middle is where the actual narrative of life is shaped. But something infinitely greater than ego is happening, and that seems to be what the spiritual traditions are all about. It seems to be what the imagination is interested in too. The imagination has a huge capacity for trust. It knows that if it goes toward the disheveled chaos, eventually, out of that fragmentation, a cohesive form will surface to bring the fragments together in such a way as to release their secret music. Covington: How exactly are providence and destiny different? O’Donohue: I see destiny as engaging with your own freedom to shape your life. And if you abuse your freedom and fail to engage your destiny, if you build false bridges and burn ones that you shouldn’t, there still remains a secret, eternal something that will provide for you regardless of your poor decisions. Providence is that something. It will insure that you don’t totally destroy your place in the larger script. The script is working through you. But how providence and destiny work is a huge question, and the answers are unknown. Imagine somebody is in a car crash: was that destiny or providence? It’s difficult to say. Most models work fairly well until you push them to the extremes, where they become ever more tenuous. Ultimately it is almost impossible to tell what is fortune or misfortune. Covington: The Irish believe a lot in luck. Everyone would think, Jesus, what a good deal. Covington: Sometimes in your books you talk about something “minding” us. Is that like something looking out for you? Covington: In one of your books you say, “We need . . . to treat ourselves with great tenderness.” In the U.S. we don’t talk a lot about “tenderness.” Does that come from your Irish background, or your background as a priest? The Bible says, “Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth.” I love the New Testament and the wisdom for daily living that it contains: the Beatitudes, the Sermon on the Mount. Even if you don’t believe in Jesus as the Son of God, there is still so much you can learn from the New Testament. There is a quality of gentleness and tenderness to it that allows you to open internally to your own spiritual inheritance. The opposite of gentleness and tenderness is force. Many people in postmodern spirituality and psychotherapy try to force themselves to improve. The thing about the spiritual world is: if you push, it does not work. It’s like the sexual world: you have to be in rhythm, be in the flow, and be gentle, and then the whole thing takes off and unfolds with a sublime spontaneity of its own. Covington: You’ve said that Meister Eckhart asked the one great question: “How should I be?” How do we begin to answer that? O’Donohue: There are many ways of coming at it. Self-examination in the U.S. seems to involve lengthy visitations to the laboratory of feelings. Feelings are analyzed backwards and forwards, upwards and downwards. I would not start there at all. I would look at thinking. A simple thing to do is to realize, as I said earlier, that everything we see, understand, know, and feel is filtered through the lens of thought. Picture it as a pair of glasses: if you put on spectacles with little squares all over them, then everything you see will have squares on it. A simple exercise is to ask yourself, “What are the seven thoughts that guide my being and frame what I call ‘meaning’ in my life?” Once you’ve identified them, leave them alone for a while. And then, at some later date, say, “What are some other ways in which I could think but, through my constant attention to these seven ways of thinking, I never do?” Soon you will be on an adventure at the heart of your being. True thought is full of feeling, and refined feeling is luminous with thought. True creative, critical thought cuts away the undergrowth, helps you recognize being, and lets you realize how magical and strange and mysterious and full of potential life is. Being is the mystery and the adventure.
2019-04-26T12:05:46Z
http://cdn.thesunmagazine.org/issues/376/the-unseen-life-that-dreams-us
Interested in buying over 100 units in two years’ time? Today’s guest did just that! Collin Schwartz shares the amazing story of how he built an impressive portfolio on the foundation of direct mail and networking through meetups. You’ll learn how Collin utilized a clever twist on the BRRRR method to avoiding paying cash for properties (but still get back his down payment), how he uses balloon notes to do this, and how his highly targeted direct mail strategy led to it all being possible. Collin also shares how he runs meetups to find deals, what his criteria are for buying properties, and how he partners/leverages with others to make this incredible success possible over such a short period of time. Collin also earns income managing properties—and even leverages that business to find deals too! If you want a solid game plan that will lead to impressive growth, this is an episode you don’t want to miss! This is the BiggerPockets podcast show 318. Brandon: What is going on everyone? This is Brandon Turner, host of the BiggerPockets podcast. Here with my co-host, the man of the hour, the man of the year, David Greene. What is up, buddy? David: Thank you, thank you, Brandon. I appreciate that. I am doing wonderful. I am actually looking to hire new intern for the David Greene team so I have been going over resumes and getting people to email me and then trying to systematize everything that we are doing. We have got someone who is running my rental portfolio. I am looking to step up my flip business and looking for an analyst to help with multifamily stuff. I am stepping up my game in 2019 and looking to bring people in to teach. How is things over there on your end? Brandon: Not too bad. Speaking of hiring, I was thinking the other day, I was talking to some buddies of mine, we basically had this conversation about at the end of the day like one of the most important skills a person could have and all of like real estate or business or in anything really that you want to grow larger than yourself. Like knowing how to hire a good employee, like bringing good team members, like finding talent is the most important skill you can really have. Because at the end of the day, if you want to grow bigger than yourself, you have to find talent and talent is hard to find. Anyway, in that conversation one of the guys asked me and they are like, ‘Did you ever like read a book on hiring? I am like, no. I have read a million books on real estate but I have never read one on hiring. Why not? Anyway, I just read one called ‘Who’ and it was pretty good about. Like here is a system for hiring. Weird like we have a problem and there is a bit just some guys got to figure it out, some guys got to figure it out. Anyway, I am big on hiring but actually it leads to today’s Quick Tip. I mentioned this last week, I will say it again this week. BiggerPockets is hiring for a couple of different roles in the marketing team. Last time I talked about retention, a person that is going to be working on pro retention which is like working with our pro members to deliver value. We are also hiring a pro or BIggerPockets Plus Pro sales, marketing consultant person, whatever. I do not know if there is official role title yet for it. Anyway, go to BiggerPockets.com/jobs if you are in Denver or willing to move to Denver and you want to work very closely with the marketing team, including myself because I am the head of the BiggerPockets Pro Team. Anyway, if that is you, go to biggerpockets.com/jobs and do what it says. David: Equal opportunity to work in what you love, right? Brandon: Yes, very very cool and it is really fun. BiggerPockets is a cool place. Their office in Denver is amazing, like it is amazing. It is probably the coolest office I have ever seen anywhere ever. Other than that, let us hear from today’s show sponsor. Here is the topic that comes up a lot when I talk with BiggerPockets members. Real estate Crowdfunding. Maybe you live in a crazy hot market and you want invest out of state or maybe you just liked the idea of investing passively and sharing the profits. If this is you, listen up because you will want to learn more about share states. Share states is a platform that connects everyday investors with carefully vetted real estate developers, residential, mixed use, commercial land, you name it. Sharestates offers a range of deals from new construction to fix and flips. It is a great way to diversify your portfolio. Returns are eight to 12% on average. To date, no Sharestates investors have lost their principal. You probably need $1 million to do this, right? No, you can get started with just a thousand bucks. What are you waiting for it? Check out Sharestates today at BiggerPockets.com/share states that is BiggerPockets.com/share states. Brandon: Alright. Big thanks for our sponsors as always. Now, it is time to get to today’s show. Today’s show is a ton of fun. We are interviewing a guy named Collin Schwartz. Collin has an amazing story. I mean two years ago he was listening to the BiggerPockets podcast just like you are listening to right now, right? He went to learn stuff from the podcast and from others and started meeting people, networking, reading. Two years later now, he has over a hundred units and including he bought like six of like on his first DirectMail campaign. You are going to be blown away by his numbers, very very cool story. He talks a lot about bad tax, all about what it takes to be really successful, how we ran out of money around the 20 unit mark and how he got through that. As well as a deal flow property management and like so much more. You all are going to love this stuff, just tons of gold in here. Take some notes, you are going to love it. Without further ado, let us get to today’s show with Collin Schwartz. Welcome to the BiggerPockets podcast. Collin, how are you doing? Collin: Great. How are you, buddy? Brandon: Man, I am doing good. This is going to be fun talking about your story, real estate, all that good stuff. Why do not we start at the beginning. How did you get into real estate? Collin: Yes, just kind of some background on me. I am 34 years old, living in Omaha, Nebraska. Married, got two young kids. The moment that I knew I was going to be a real estate investor was kind of one of those pivotal moments and like lots of people, I picked up the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad. This was January 1st, 2017. I remember exactly where I was. Last day of vacation, kind of dreading going back to my cubicle and I picked that book up and immediately I had this mind shift. I finished the book within two days and I knew that I had to start making a change. Otherwise, I was going to be that individual at 64 years old staring at his Vanguard account, praying that the market does not crash and that I can retire next year. It really hit me like a ton of bricks. My wife was pregnant with her second child so I knew my 10 days of vacation off a year. Was not going to cut it anymore. Collin: Anyways, started educating, started reading pretty much as much as possible, Millionaire Real Estate Investor, all those types of books. When you start reading those kind of some of the big takeaways are to network to go out, meet people. I started doing that, started reaching out to numerous agents, these agents turned me out to BiggerPockets which then occupied my mornings. Every single morning with a professor Turner and Professor Dorkin on my drive to the gym. Brandon: First and only time I think anyone referred to me as professor. Brandon: I heard the other day, pro forma is Latin for lie. Collin: That that might be a true. But anyways, I guess I did what any sane person does. I pulled a list from list source and I told my wife, ‘Hey, honey. This weekend we were going to handwrite 191 letters and stuff them and send them out to these owners.’ Yes, I did that. This was about a month later after reading those books and I am kind of one of those ready, fire, aim people where I was not possibly being patient enough but I was not getting the results from agents. Some of them would laugh at me, some of them are like yes, everybody is looking for a nice 10 cap property, 15 to 20% cash on cash returns. Anyways, sent those letters out and I was able to get six deals off of those letters. Collin: Yes, yes. Really, that was one of the biggest catalyst for both confidence but yes, just to actually get me started in investing. That is kind of where my journey began. Since then, started a meet up group, a networking group. Actually, Mindy has been out to one of them as well when she was down for the Berkshire event, Mindy Jensen. Yes, that is kind of how it started. Brandon: Alright. I want to dig in on the six deals. I mean I know people who have sent thousands of letters and not get a deal. I mean, I sent… A couple years ago, I was telling the story of how I built my daughter’s fourplex. I sent out 300 letters and got back like 40 phone calls, got one deal. 191 letters and six deals, what did you do right or what did you do wrong? Collin: That is funny. I get that question a lot. What is in the letter? I would be happy to go over and tell everybody what it is. It is no real secret sauce. I found some properties in specific areas that I liked. They need to be located next to my work so that I could go service them on my lunch break, before work, after work. I was running errands over my lunch breaks, that was kind of what I had to do. But anyways, I identified the certain zip codes. I identified that the individuals had owned the property for more than five years. That would hopefully increase the likelihood of them wanting to sell and then I filtered down to multifamily. From there, I actually… What I wanted to do was I know a lot of people do sendoff letters, I know a lot of people send postcards. I know every single postcard I get, I throw in the trash. Every piece of junk mail I get, I throw in the trash. I figured if I am actually handwriting, the sender’s address, I actually put my real home address on there. I figured I am kind of intersecting myself into these people’s lives and saying, ‘Hey, I know you. I want this, I want to buy it.’ Some people take a lot of offense to that which is okay but I know anybody that has done DirectMail has got kind of those hate calls, ‘Why are you sending me this?’ But I just put in kind of a sincere saying, ‘Hey, I am an investor. I am looking to purchase your property. I am not a real estate agent. I did not put anything about being able to buy in cash because that was not my intent. My intent was to go through bank financing and I think that really set the conversation up a little bit better than if I would have just done the typical postcard route. Brandon: Yes. I feel like… I mean there is a lot of people who are just doing the, I do not know what you call it, like the shotgun approach. You just like blast out hundreds and hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of letters and that obviously works. We have had people on the show before who are doing that. Well, you took a much different approach. He said, ‘How can I send a smaller amount of letters and really just get these to agree. Like how do I really make myself a real person, stand out, appear different. A five years owned multifamily, you were looking at multifamily straight off the bat, right? Collin: Straight off the bat. I think listening to your podcast and everything, I know lots of individuals would think more units, more risk. In my mindset, more units, less risk. You can have 10 units, one vacant versus the single family home route where if you have one vacant, you are basically paying the mortgage that month. Brandon: Yes, okay. That makes sense. Alright, sent these letters, what kind of multifamily were they? Single, duplexes, triplexes, or larger? Collin: They were primarily duplexes, fourplexes. I was able to get a sevenplex out of it. But yes, basically anything that I could see that had value add opportunity, rents way too low and that I knew that I could go in and maybe make some changes and increase those rents. Brandon: Wow, that is awesome. Okay. A lot of people ask this question, well, what if I make multiple offers and get more than one deal accepted? Now, I am screwed because now I got two good options, right? You had six options out of that first deal, how did you put that together? Collin: Ready, fire, aim, I guess. I ended up meeting a gentleman through networking. He had owned and managed 50 units. I started talking with him. He really helped guide me through the process and said, hey, if you find these things and their deals, we are going to figure them out. Yes, I did have… The process to get those six deals probably took five months or so, back and forth with some of them. But three of them were immediately. I just realized that they were good opportunities and I guess my mind was fully into this, that this is what I wanted to do, that that is what I had to do. But yes, he really helped guide me through. I could call him, I probably sent him, I do not know, 5,000 text messages in the first two months asking every single question about being a landlord, the type of lease to use, what do you think of these people? What do you think of this contractors, all those recommendations. But yes, I guess it, it never really occurred to me. I mean I definitely got overwhelmed and probably still do as I am constantly getting properties under contract. Always wonder how am I going to make this one work especially when you are closing on one. But what I have realized, if the property really is a deal, that there is usually a way to figure it out. Of those six deals, I actually did wholesale one and flip another. That was able to bring in some additional income to kind of offset what might’ve been the additional responsibilities for me because I was, and still am, managing the properties. Brandon: Okay. Yes, that makes sense. Alright, let us talk about financing these properties and I know we will move on to that to your portfolio but it is just a cool story, these first six. When you got that, did you just go run to a bank right away when they started coming in and you started getting these deals accepted it or how did you work financing? Collin: The first deal did not close until about May, going through due diligence back and forth and everything. One of the first things I did after the education was realized what the finances, what is my finances? What is my gunpowder, what can I actually do? I reached out to four different banks, two of them being local, one of which I banked with and one just kind of big name bank. I wanted to get the gambit of what I can actually do. Now, I actually had the pre-approvals, I was ready to go with those. Yes, that that was kind of… It was a lot of preparation on the front end because I think, I could not go and buy a $5 million property at that time, there is no finances for that. I wanted to know actually what I could buy with the bank’s risk tolerance was, what would they would think of a person who is never invested in real estate before, whose family does not invest in real estate, who sits in a cubicle and doing IT work, what they were comfortable giving me and what types of terms. Brandon: Okay. I think that is smart. You know there is that famous quote from I think it was Abe Lincoln though. Everything is subscribed to a blink of an internet, right? But like it basically it says if I had six hours to chop down a tree, I would spend the first four sharpening my ax, right? It is about preparation, right? I think that is so key. It is like getting prepared before you get into real estate. Like getting the pre-approval lined up, getting your financing kind of figured out, getting the education front loaded. But on the other side of that equation is people who just prepare all day long and they spend nine hours sharpening an ax and then realize the tree is still standing. Like how do you balance between the two and what would you tell a newbie listening to the about getting prepared versus being too prepared? Collin: You know what is funny is I am sitting down and I have been doing scrambling over taxes and a meeting with my bookkeeper and everything and looking back I probably would have changed a hundred different things. Just setting up of everything. You do not realize what scale you are going to go to, you do not realize any of that. But what I can say is that if you put yourself out there and you actually do go through the deal and you have the mindset that you want to do this, you will be able to figure it out. You are just going to have to continue to reach out to people but putting yourself in those uncomfortable positions, you will typically be able to find your way out. Now, you are going to make mistakes. Obviously, you could prepare for two years but if I had sat there and I mean I think about it, it is about two years since I started, if I had prepared this whole time and got everything perfect by structures, everything like that, I might have lost the desire to do it and might not have done it. I really think you have to go ahead, you have to do it. It is okay to prepare but instead of going out talking to the attorney, getting your LLC, setting up your software, making sure that you have all these different every single piece in place, it is really important just to get out there and have some fundamentals and be willing to put the extra effort in. David: Well, that is how growth happens. We always, I would not say we always, but oftentimes we want everything to be all our ducks lined up in a row before we take the first step. But the reality is things are built in phases. It is kind of messy the way it goes. You often will not know who your contractor is going to be until you have got a couple of deals to look at. You have to go through bids and then the contractor you first used will not be the guy you ended up with. It is not until you do a couple of deals then you get credibility and you start a meet up and now you meet people at the meet up to have better contractors and the whole thing builds that way. You send out some mailers, you got some houses under contract, and you started this meet up. Can you tell us, Collin, where you are you at right now? How many units do you own? Collin: I have a 110 units. David: Okay. That is a lot. In two years, how many properties is that spread out over? Collin: Yes, in two years. It is about 20 properties. I do not own them all myself. Typically, it is a 50/50 partnership. About I think 14, I just closed on two duplexes on Friday, 14 of the units I own solely, but the rest of them are in partnerships, 50/50 partnerships. David: Now, this is an odd question but are you happy with owning 110 units or do you feel like you would have done it differently if you could go back and do it again? David: Yes, maybe better performing units or different kinds of units. Like are you happy with having a whole lot of houses or do you feel like that was an inefficient way to do it? Just for the people who are like, wow, I want to go do that, do you think that is the best way to do it? Collin: For me, it was. The reason being is I really wanted to get out of my job. My job was not terrible by any means. It was a good job, everybody would look on it. It paid well, it was a good job. But for me to get out, I needed to supplement my income and the way in which I have done that is become the property manager for these properties, take a property management fee in which I partner with. That is allowed my income to grow to that level. To say I would have done it differently, I really do not think so. I think I am pretty happy with how I have done it. David: What about how did you start finding properties after the DirectMail campaign? Has it been word of mouth through the networking stuff you talked about? Collin: It absolutely has. The next property, one of my partners he actually brought it to me. It was an 11 unit. Another partner brought me a 24 unit which we partnered on. Really, I have had lots of wholesalers reach out to me. It is kind of that exponential curve where at first you are literally grinding, grinding, grinding, and you do not think you are going to get any deals. Nobody is giving you the time of day, you really have no credibility. Once you start doing those deals, the deals do find you. Collin: Yes. The partnership is really just a 50/50 structure. We share in all the cashflow, everything, it is very much equal partnerships. I do the management yet we are both responsible for overseeing the property, getting the property too close, whether setting up insurance, whether we are meeting with vendors, whether we are just challenging each other to look at the property. My partners, we talk all the time and like well why is this expense this? Or maybe we should change our snow removal company, maybe we should use this lawn care company, maybe we should institute this RUBS program. Really, it is a partnership. The individuals I am partnered with, they are working a full time job, at least two of them are, but they are very much a 100% vested and invested and wanting to real estate investors full time. David: Can you define RUBS for us? David: It is like using an algorithm to figure out who pays how much as opposed to putting in a meter where you just get a number basically. Collin: Exactly, exactly. It is usually done in a arrears so you spend $2,000 a month on water, gas, sewer. The next month you bill back the 20 units a 100 bucks each. Collin: That is also a really good way for individuals. If they are underwriting properties and they are like, well, I cannot increase the rents, everything is kind of stagnant. Look at what the landlord is paying for. If the landlord is paying, and lots of these older landlords are just paying for water, gas, and sewer just because that is the way they have always done it, they do not know these systems exist but that that can significantly increase your income. That can be the value add right there. Brandon: Yes. Typically, when I look at a rental property there, there are actually very few things you can control. I mean like you cannot really control the taxes, they are what they are, I mean before you buy it of course. But once you buy it, there is not a lot you can do except for utilities. Like they are often the largest lever and vacancy. If you could fix those two things, typically, I mean you are not going to jack the rent up 500 a month and hope that people will pay it. They just will not, it is market dependent. But yes, utilities can be a great way. But you cannot always RUBS, right, and shift the payment? First of all, what area are you buying in? You probably said that earlier, but if not, what area are you buying in and then like have you always been able to do that? Collin: Typically, the units that I buy, the meters are already split out but for example, this one, one of our most recent purchases, the 24 unit. That was really where the value add came. We were able to increase their rents 5% or 6% or 7% but to be able to reduce our expenses by $1,500 a month and bill those back to the tenants, that was huge. We actually used a company and what they do is they will send off the invoices and people can just mail in their checks or pay online. Brandon: That is cool. Do you know what they are called at the top of your head? Brandon: Okay. We will give them a shout out. That is cool. Alright, so that is awesome. Again, yes, great way to increase your income by reducing expenses that way. Hey, I want to take a quick break from today’s podcast episode to invite you to this week’s Webinar which is how to evaluate an offer on rental properties. Look, everyone knows rental properties can add to your net worth and provide consistent cashflow, but how do you ensure that property, that portfolio is filled with solid properties that actually gets you closer to your goal? Well, that is what we are talking about it. On this free Webinar, I am going to be walking you through the exact step by step process to evaluate one of the webinars on evaluation, running the numbers, that even if you are brand new can use and then how to offer. I am going to go through seven sneaky tricks that I use to get more of my offers accepted. Again, it is going to be awesome. Make sure you show up, but you got to register for it by going to BiggerPockets.com/eowebinar. That is eo, like evaluate offer, eowebinar. I will see you there. Brandon: I want to go back real quick to the partnership thing. I am curious, are you guys each equally putting in like both partners with the money or they just doing the money and you are doing other parts or how do you break that out? Collin: I guess that varies on the front end. Not necessarily that there has been some deals where I have shown up with $0 but we do a promissory note and I pay that money back or at the refinance. Collin: Or, I mean, but typically the amount of equity invested is equal. There are some instances that really helped me because I basically ran out of money at maybe the 15 or 20 unit mark. Collin: Capital goes really quick in this business. I would find these additional off market properties and I would add acquisition fees. At closing, if I am acting as I do not want to say the realtor, but if I am acting as the agent between myself, my partner and the seller, that I would throw in a 2% or 3% acquisition fee and that would help me finance the properties as well. Brandon: That is correct, that is cool. I mean I hear that with indicators from time… I mean all the time, right? If you will syndicate a 200 unit apartment complex, there is a 1% to 2% to 3% fee on there almost always. I mean I do not think I have ever seen a deal that did not have that, right? Why not if that is what you work with your partner and that is part of your value you are bringing to the table, why not do it? I think that is an awesome idea. Collin: Yes. It would almost be similar to what I did recently rather than wholesaling the property, the individual one to get in, we partnered on it. But at closing, I still took a $5,000 assignment fee for that, for running the deal, working with it for six to seven months, kind of putting all the pieces together, working with the banks and all that. Brandon: Cool. How do you find your partners? Collin: It is really networking and we have to build. Partners, it is definitely a lot like a relationship. You want to make sure that you guys are on the same wavelengths, but that you also bring strengths to each other. Typically, I mean just sharing things in common. One of whom I met actually through BiggerPockets. We were competing, we kept competing on deals together, we kept showing up at showings together and we kept competing and we had talked for probably a year before that and we are just like how about we just think about partnering and sit down and really figure this out. Yes, that is kind of just networking. Brandon: That is actually fascinating. The idea of like find your biggest competitor like in your area. Find somebody who is just doing a really good job and partner with them because two people should be able to, if they are both good, two people should be able to do the work of 10 if there was not. Collin: Yes. I could just tell, for instance, he was just a hustler. He was out there. I mean, we were on phone conversations. I mean we would spend hours on the phone just talking about real estate and we just kept showing up at these deals together, we kept talking about these other deals and finally we were just like what are we doing here? He is working his full time job, I am doing the management, we both got along really well. We both had some opposing but very good strengths and very open with each other. We were like let us just partner on one of these and see how it goes and yes, it has been great. David: It is funny you say that because I am in a very similar situation with another realtor, a good friend of mine. He sells an insane amount of houses. He is really really good at being a realtor. He has incredible systems in place, pretty much all the things that me as a guy two years in is trying to build, right? Eventually, I will get that foundation laid and like any skyscraper, when there is a foundation laid, you shoot up really fast, right? But he does not want to shoot up, he does not want to have to like throw gas on the fire and recruit new agents and train people and get new leads coming in. He just works his old referral business that he has had and he is got this really good system in place that he does not want to go faster. I want to go faster but I do not have a system in place that can support that speed. Like my car would fall apart on the track. We are talking about the exact same thing. It is so funny you say that, rather than seeing him as competition, we are fighting over the same listings. It is if we put this together and build this super team, it gives every other realtor a place to go where they are going to get better training and systems and they can succeed better and you have turned an enemy into a friend. I am sure there is some Chinese proverb that says that really cool but I am not funny right now but that is what you want to do. One of the things that he likes about me, and this is a good segue, is that I host these meetups in the bay area where I teach people how to invest in real estate. It is all free, I get quite a big following, probably like 120 people that come. I am starting to do one a week in different locations throughout the bay. These meetups are growing really quickly and it gives people a chance to meet me. It gives me a chance to get to know people. It is good for business and it is good for them. I know you are doing the same thing, can you tell us for the people who are listening that either want to go to a meetup or maybe want to start a meetup, what is some things they should know about how to do it and how has that positively impacted your investing business? Collin: Yes, when people think of meetups, I think this also goes to how people can hesitate to start because they think they need to have all the pieces in place. How I started the meetup is I was on this Facebook Group and I saw people kept talking about real estate investing. Well, at the time I was rehabbing a fourplex so I just posted on the group, ‘Guys, I am going to be at this fourplex Thursday night, want to bring a six pack and come check it out?’ Twelve people showed up, it was a good turnout. From there, we did it at a buddy’s house who just rehabbed the house. From there, it really does not have to be a super formal thing, just showing, just providing some value and I do not know, having something interesting really really helps. From there, we actually started doing it at a bar. We do have meetups in town. They are more of the High School Gymnasium PowerPoint type meetups. I wanted a place where I could go out on a Wednesday night and go have a beer and talk real estate with a bunch of guys, bunch of guys and gals. Yes, I really designed it kind of around what I wanted and it turned out that a lot of other people wanted that as well. Brandon: That is cool. I am a huge proponent of everyone who listens to the show notes of these meetups, right? We do them out here in Maui, I did one in Washington, David has got his almost every week now, right? Like getting… Sometimes, it can be a professional PowerPoint type of thing if that is the purpose of the meetup and sometimes like it is just get together for drinks on the beach or whatever. Like I mean it is getting together networking. Like if you want to get in shape, if you want to be fit, go hang around with a bunch of really in shape fit people and you will just naturally become more like them. If you want to be a good real estate investor, get a round a bunch of really good real estate investors or others who are passionate about it and you are naturally going to find yourself climbing there as well. Of course, we have a place, everyone listen to this, if you have not checked it out yet, biggerpockets.com/events. You can actually create an event and host. Find a bar in your area, a beach or a park or a restaurant or whatever. Go to Red Robin, gets some good burgers and just like, ‘Hey, I am going to be here at this time,’ or go to one of your properties like you did. That is cool. I love when meetups do that, meet at properties, because you get to talk to people and it is a good way to potentially find partners, to find lenders, to find people to work with the share contract information. There is so much good about meetups. Yes, go to BiggerPockets.com/events. Look there, if there is an event in your area, go to it. If there is not an event in your area or it is lame, start your own. Like be the hub. Collin: Yes. A couple of things I did not touch on, the other meetups in town do charge. I did not want to start one and charge. It was just I just wanted to network with other people and what I found is that people want to just start speaking at these meetups whether it is promoting their business or just giving back, being that center person. They had put a presentation together, they were working on their business, say come and present for half hour, 45 minutes. That really helped the following as well. As far as structure, it is typically an hour of networking, no more than an hour of presentation and slash questions and then networking for the rest of the night. We have email groups and we post on BiggerPockets and all that. But yes, it has been a lot of word of mouth. Also, I was able to find a buddy who was part owner of a bar so I was able to use their space rather than paying the $250 to $500 bucks. I said, hey, I am going to bring these many people. Sure enough, I did and it became one of their biggest, largest nights that they would have, just from the group. They were happy to accommodate us so that we did not have to pay them anything so that we could still keep the event for free. David: I know you have got a lot of deals out of your meetup, right, Collin? Can you give us some idea of what do you look for in a deal? What is your quick analysis that makes you say, hey, this is something I might want to look into? Collin: Yes, the location of the property is paramount. Do not invest in D areas, higher crime, higher issue areas. Specifically, I am looking in B, B-, C+ areas. Typically more on the B areas and I am looking for properties that are probably more in C the sea level as far as condition that I know that I can bring up. Also, I want them to be, they do not have to be, but typically this is where you find the good deal grossly mismanaged, rents way below. I like to see that I am going to be able to at least hopefully BRRRR out of the property, buy, rehab, rent, refinance, repeat. Basically, go through that process to pull my cash back out and that it is still going to cash flow after that I do refinance it. David: Now, you do the BRRRR method with money though, you do not use cash. You go in with financing, you buy it with a down payment and then you refinance after, is that correct? David: Tell us how you are able to add enough value through a property that used financing to get your cash back out? Collin: Yes, one of them was super interesting that we just did. It was a fourplex. Trying to think, we purchased it about seven months ago. It was rents were 50% under what they should have been. I went in when we purchased the property, as I said we did use bank financing, we went in and increased the rents. Everybody left, nobody was going to pay the new rents. They had been there for 20 years and were paying half the amount. Super popular area of town. We went in, we did a little bit of repairs, we made the unit is a bit nicer, updated some electrical, some ACs. Got new residents in nearly immediately and were able to pull all of our money back out and in about three and a half months. Collin: That is typically what I am doing is using the bank financing though. David: Are these loans that you are using like typical Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac? I mean if we are doing it in three months, you are probably not getting typical financing or these portfolio lenders? Collin: These are local gift portfolio commercial lenders. They typically balloon after five years, the total amounts due or you get a re-price and that they are amortized over 20 years. Typically, rates are higher than residential Fannie Freddie, but the speed and the agility and the flexibility of them, it has really allowed me to do a lot of things, like an effective faction. David: Any tips for finding lenders like that? Collin: Well, first off, I mean reach out to your network. See if anybody has any recommendations. I really liked the local banks but I think I have talked to probably seven or eight banks total. I think it really is make sure that you are comfortable with them. Also, knowing if somebody else has done business with those individuals. Some bankers will tell you, promise you the world and then kind of in the final hour, the 11th hour they will say, oh sorry, we cannot get this done for you. Your debt to incomes a little out of whack. I think, I mean, just as like finding a partner or anything, it is just really building trust. It is building trust with those individuals. Brandon: Does it worry you at all? Like having the shorter, the balloon payments? Like if you got to pay this thing off in five years, does that worry you and what do you do to hedge your risk against that? Collin: Yes, of course it does. I would say it worried me a bit more at first. Most importantly, I try to factor in an additional buffer of both the value add even after I refinanced but also the ability to have rents decreased as well. That I am kind of in that middle range. I am not high end A class, I am not in the D level. I am kind of in that comfortable area where you can get people that may have to move down from A class to move into this property. There is some obviously inherent risk but I try to have enough value into the properties and plus I am not spending the cash flow typically. I am saving the cashflow whether it is to reinvest and then these properties are continuing to rent and bring in more rental income. Obviously there is a lot of leverage but I always keep a large Cap X on hand for each property just in case a roof goes or when a roof goes, when a furnace goes. But yes, there is obviously some inherent risk and we have kind of at that level in the cycle where everybody is kind of tiptoeing and waiting for when it is going to fall. But for me, if I did not do this, I was going to be doing the same thing for the next 30 years. The risk is there but it is not as bad as sitting behind the desk for the next 30 years, wishing I had done something. Brandon: Yes. People often will look at real estate investors and say, ‘Is not that risky?’ We look at people with jobs, is not that risky? Collin: It is like every one of my co-workers I think are like that is so risky. You are jumping in and honestly, I mean the amount of income streams from these properties and everything is just… You see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Brandon: Yes, that is fantastic. I really really really enjoy that story. I love that you started with Rich Dad, Poor Dad like a lot of us do and jumped in and started listening to the podcast. Just did what other people are doing. Hey, DirectMail seems to work. I am going to do that. I am going to try and do it the best I can. Got a bunch of properties built up the system and then you just figure things out on the way. I mean, it is just like the perfect story. Where do you see yourself headed down the future? Collin: That is kind of a good question. If I look back two years, I would never guess that I would be talking to you guys or have 110 units. That is just not… It is really cool and I think we sometimes underestimate what we can do. What do they say? You underestimate what you can do in five years, overestimate what you can do in a year. But looking to still acquire more but really build up a solid property management company for my portfolio and for my partners. I want to have the best customer service at the level that I do. I want to have the best properties for the best value. I think, especially when you are buying some of these properties from the old landlords, they see cash come in every month, they put it in their pocket and that is kind of it. It is finding a tenant and forgetting about it. For me, I really want this to be a successful business and a reflection of kind of my 12 years working in different industries and coming to this point. Yes, it is really just building the portfolio, continuing to grow, having it be more systematized. I have hired a few people this year such as a bookkeeper, accountant, she is awesome. Obviously, you probably know better than I do, but paperwork gets awful. That was the first thing I needed to get off my list. But yes, just continuing to build and really getting things systematized and feeling better about all of it. Brandon: It is fantastic. Yes, I mean that there is like different phases in people’s investing, right? At the beginning, you are just like acquire what you can, build your portfolio, gets some stuff, quit your job, and then it is like okay now I have got to manage all this. My wife and I went through the same thing. Now, we got to systematize this. Let us hire some people, let us make this a well-run business. The cool thing about property management, you know that you are managing these properties and you said you want to be the best customer service, the bar is really low. Like it is really low, right? It is like a contractor that if you answer your phone, you are in the top 10%. Likewise with a property manager, if you answer your phone with a smile, you are in the top 10%. Instead of like what do you want? Brandon: The bar is low. David: That is like Quick Tip. Look for something in life to be good at where the bar is super low. I love that because it is. I mean I think that is why I have done so good as a realtor to be honest with the first two years. But that is it man, I am like the cleanest shirt in the dirty laundry. It is not hard to be really good. But to Brandon’s point about how like you start off one way and it becomes something else, that is true for all business, right? We really see it in real estate investing and I think that investors get discouraged because they think like how could I ever do what that guy is doing? But if you are just thinking about a human body, how it starts as like an embryo and then it slowly becomes more complex until it becomes a fully developed human being that then continues to grow and get bigger, that is how businesses are. It starts with one cell that is doing everything and its very first split into two cells would be like your first partnership, you hire out some stuff and then each of those cell splits into two more. With every one of those splits, each cell becomes more specified and defined and highly trained in one little area and eventually it splits off into so many pieces that you are only doing that part that you really like and enjoy doing and that is where you get a guy like Collin who is like happy about real estate investing and they are not frustrated and worked up. Brandon, like you said, we have had to really systematize and make it a business. Well, you kind of turned into a human being as opposed to just one big messy thing in the beginning. Be encouraged, it will start off like rough but with every step of growth, right, you get out of a little more of the stuff you dislike and you get better at the stuff you do and eventually you get this really cool complex machine and it all works together and you are in Hawaii, like Brandon, hanging out and getting a tan and showing off your blue eyes that everybody likes about you. Brandon: I do not tan. David: Then you become a snow angel like Collin. Collin: Looking to get to Hawaii. You bring us a good point but definitely, and maybe all smiles about it, but it is a ton of sacrifice and really fun. I think what you said, finding where the bar is low because that is where nobody wants to go. Nobody wants to be a property manager. Everybody here, I want to invest passively. They think of real estate as an event, not a process. They are going to buy 10 properties, it is going to cash flow $250 bucks a month, they are going to have $250 but there is a lot of processes to it. Kind of what you said, the whole analogy with the embryo and cells of it is ever evolving, it does not stop. That is really good point. Brandon: Cool. Hey, let us shift gears and dive a little deeper into your life with the Deal Deep Dive. Alright, you guys hear me talk about SimpliSafe a lot but do not take it just from me. Investors are singing their praises in the BiggerPockets forums. Jim, a contractor from Pittsburgh, says he secures his vacant properties using SimpliSafe. He likes how he can set it up at one property then easily take it down and move it to the next and for 24/7 professional monitoring, you pay just $15 bucks a month. Try SimpliSafe today. It feels good to fear less about your property. Plus, there is a 60 day risk free trial and free shipping free returns if you are not 100% satisfied. You got nothing to lose. Visit SimpliSafe.com/pockets today so they know that we sent you. That is SimpliSafe.com/pockets. Save today. Alright, let us get into the deal deep dive. This is the part of the show where we dive deep into one particular deal that you have done. Let us do that today. Number one, we will do that with David. Alright, number one, what kind of property are we talking about today? Collin: I am going to continue with the Ds, duplex. Brandon: I like it, man. Collin: Alright. David, how did you find it? Brandon: David, you just ruined a perfectly good opportunity. How did you discover it? Brandon: This is really good. How many dollars was it? David: How did you drive the seller to give it to you? Collin: This was about six or seven back and forth phone calls. This was an owner occupied duplex. The guy owned it for 20 years. Basically, he said he was not in a hurry but he was going to sell it to me at a good price. I kept calling him every weekend when I said I would. Went and met him at his doorstep and yes, we signed a contract right then. Brandon: Okay, that is awesome. Alright, now this is going off the rails. How did you develop funding? Collin: I have got nothing. This is a bank finance deal, 20% down. David: Was that your deposit? Collin: Yes, the $20,000 was the deposit going to the duplex. Brandon: That was your down payment. David: Even better. Good job, Brandon. That is why you are the host and I am the co-host. What did you do with it? Collin: Basically, I had to turn all the units. One of the tenants, the owner who occupied it left right away. The other side was trashed, people have lived there for 20 years. They are paying $500 a month in rent for four bed, one bath. Went in, rehab that, put about $20,000 total throughout the process. This is also a real Quick Tip. When somebody shows up that wants to move into your properties, has cash and is ready to move in that day, run because those were the first tenants I took. About six months later, I think, thankfully I signed a six month lease and numerous cop calls, drug overdoses, they were out of there. I was about to sell that property for $140,000 and just be done with real estate investing. Anyways, I kept with it. I have got great residents in there and actually just refinanced it and then appraised at $205,000. I was able to pull out $66,000. Brandon: That is a nice deal there. Alright, David wants me to ask you what was the disposition but we already know that now. I am just going to end it with David, I am stealing yours David, what lesson did you discover from this deal? Brandon: We are never doing this again. Collin: That is terrible. Do not give up. I guess you can make a lot of mistakes in real estate, but do not give up. If I would have given up, that could have been the end. I could have just thrown it all, thrown in my bag of keys and just quit. But just keep working towards it and learn from your mistakes. I make mistakes every single day, every single day, and sometimes I make ten mistakes, ask My wife. I would probably make more than that but really just stick with it and there is a silver lining but it is just not easy. It does take work but you can also make some mistakes in real estate and I have found and I think you say this, Brandon, that real estate is forgiving. Collin: As long as you buy, right? Brandon: As long as you buy right. But even if you do not… Like I bought bad deals but they end up over time, if you hold them long enough, they ended up okay. It is forgiven. I mean I am not saying go buy bad deals but it is forgiving. The whole thing is long enough, you are going to be probably okay over time. Well, that was definitely a delight Deal Deep Dive. Alright, well, that was the Deal Deep Dive of the day, David. A question for you though before we move on, how is tax season going for you buddy? Brandon: Look, tax season is here. We got to do it. My least favorite time of the entire year is tax season. I just absolutely just despise it. There was a huge tax reform this past year and there is a lot of changes, a lot of good changes especially for real estate investors. The question is are you, David, getting all your deductions you should? Are you optimizing for the new tax laws? Are you doing it? Well, listen here, David. Right now, I am looking at the ultimate rental property tax guide from our sponsor Stessa and I know that they are a sponsor on the show but like I legitimately think this guide is amazing. This might be the coolest thing I have seen in a long time about like taxes. It is like here is how you can deduct travel expenses and here is how to pick the right entities. Should you have an LLC? Here is what capital improvements are versus repairs and here is how depreciation can help you. I know those are big words, but listen guys, understanding what those concepts are can make you millions of dollars or save you millions of dollars over your career, right? Get this guide, it is totally free. Besides the fact that Stessa is just a really, really awesome tool that you can track, manage, communicate your performance of your real estate investments. It is going to save you a bunch of time, all that cool stuff, right? But just go get the tax guide right now. Go over to stessa.com/biggerreturns. Again, stessa.com/biggerreturns. Stessa.com/biggerreturns and check out this amazing ultimate rental property tax guide. You are going to do it, David? Did I convinced you? David: Oh, why would I not do it? I mean that is going to pay for itself many times over. Brandon: There you go. It should if it is free. Alright, with that, let us get to the next segment of the show. This is the Fire Round. Brandon: Alright, let us get to today’s Fire Round. These questions come directly out of the BiggerPockets forums and we are going to fire them at you right now, Collin. Are you prepared for this? Collin: I guess I would ask if they have been to the city and the area that they want to go to. You know you want to look up crime stats, you want to pull up Zillow and look at average rents. You want to see if properties are selling, are they single family homes that you are looking at or are they multifamily properties? Call some property management companies, call some agents, but for me especially if it is your first property, I would probably want to fly out there and see the neighborhood and judge for myself. Collin: I guess I am not sure if he is looking to do it as a third party because mine is for properties in which I own. There is incredible demand for good property managers so it should be pretty easy to find somebody that is looking for a property manager. You just want to have some good systems in place. It also helps if you understand the investment aspect because you are going to be working with investors. Read as much as you can, get yourself into the investing community and if you have it maybe go work for a property management company for just a little bit. Shadow and see what their systems are and then see how you can improve it because likely you can. Brandon: Yes, that is a great suggestion. I mean, why reinvent the wheel when a six month investment and getting paid could maybe… six months to a year getting paid to learn somebody else’s system. Yes, that is cool. David: Is not that how Ryan Murdoch got started? Become an assassin? Brandon: Yes, pretty much. Yes, Ryan Murdoch started with a… I mean he started buying his own properties then he became a property manager of his own deals. Then he started on the property managing company and then he ended up becoming working for another property management company . Now, he is a BiggerPockets… Yes, he is actually a, for those who do not know, Ryan Murdoch is now the newest BiggerPockets team member. Ryan, you all heard him before, he has been on the podcast. David: He is like your old puzzle basically is what he is. David: You are talking Kingpin and he is like your goon. Brandon: Murdochenary. You all are going to probably hear from Ryan in the future actually because Ryan is going to start interacting, especially with our pro members. If you are BiggerPockets pro member, you will probably hear a lot from Ryan. He is going be involved and having conversations with pros, finding out ways to help pros even better. Hey, by the way, we are also hiring for another role, a couple of roles at BiggerPockets right now. I think I mentioned it during the Quick Tip, but if not, I do not remember what today’s Quick Tip was but basically we are hiring for a couple of roles in the marketing/pro teams. If that is you, go to BiggerPockets.com/jobs. Alright, number three of the fire round. ‘I am currently looking to purchase my first rental and my agent sent me a list of tenant occupied homes for sale. I am wondering what people think about tenant unoccupied homes. Would it be smart for a newbie to buy one or should I only buy a vacant one? Collin: Yes and no. I mean what I always ask if I am buying a property that has a current tenant in it is how long is the lease? If the lease is two years and you walk into the property and they are paying half of what they should be and the property is trashed, you probably want to pass on that because it is going to be hard to recover those costs in those first two years. But yes, I mean, I have some great inherited tenants. You know that I have gone in, I have slightly increased their rent, they have been on month to month and it is worked out well. It is very situational. David: Alright. Let us jump into the next segment of our show. The Famous Four. But before we do, let us hear from Mindy about who is going to be on the BiggerPockets podcast on Monday. Mindy: Hey, Brandon. Hi, David. On Monday’s episode of the BiggerPockets Money podcast, Scott and I talked to Reshawn and Rob, a couple from Texas who nine years ago got married and discovered the Dave Ramsey book, The Total Money Makeover. They implemented a modified version of Dave’s baby steps program and paid off $20,000 in student loans, both cars and their $300,000 mortgage. But what is so interesting about their story is that it is not unique. It is totally repeatable for just about anyone if they adhere to the basic principles of spend less, save more, and invest wisely. Okay, thanks guys. Now, it is time for the Famous Four. Brandon: Alright. Thank you, Mindy, as always. Hey, you all want to do something kind of cool? Go leave a raving review for Mindy’s show, from Mindy and Scott’s show, The Money Podcasts. They need some love. I mean they are really good. They are actually growing faster than we grew, the BiggerPockets podcast, but they could always use some love over on the ratings and review sites. Check them out, rate and review them. Let them know you love them. Let us get to the Famous Four. Number one, Collin, what is your favorite real estate related book? Collin: Dave Lindahl’s Multifamily Millionaire. David: A very good one. Brandon: I liked that book. David: His book Emerging Market is not bad either. Next question, what is your favorite business book? Collin: This one, I just read and I have re-read it twice. It is Shoe Dog by Phil Knight. It is phenomenal. David: Brandon, have you heard that yet? Brandon: I am three quarters way through the Audible. It is good, it is long but I have not finished it, yes. But you know what I love about that book? I think that show because I am listening to it, what I love about it is it shows like what entrepreneurship really takes, right? Like there is like this dream of entrepreneurship and this applies to a real estate or anything. Like at the end of the day, like Phil Knight, that is his name right? Phil Knight? Brandon: I was thinking Phil Collins because your name is Collin. Anyway, okay, like the guy was obsessed. Like he was obsessed and everything he did is push push push push push for years to build up Nike. It is kind of like almost every successful person I have ever known has done. Like they get obsessed about their entrepreneurial venture and it is not just post them on Instagram that you are an entrepreneur, Hashtag entrepreneur and suddenly you are, right? Like Brandon Turner and Josh Dorkin with BiggerPockets perhaps? Brandon: Like Josh and then me later, we obsessed. Obsessed, yes. Anyway, right Collin? Collin: No, it is super encouraging though when you see all the struggles that he went through like two years and I am two years and I am like, okay, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Yes, I will not ruin how the book ends, but Nike is still around. David: Okay, Colin, what are some of your hobbies? Collin: I like to work out, I do crossfit, love to travel although I have not been traveling new nearly as much as I would like. But yes, we took the kid to Hawaii last year. We got some more, we are going to going to head over to Hong Kong in April. Yes, hang out with the kids. Those guys are demanding. You know Paw Patrol? The Zoo? Those are some of my hobbies. Brandon: Nice. Yes, those are good hobbies. We watch a lot of what is a show called? Doc McStuffins. That is my hobby these days. It is doc McStuffins, amazing. Anyway, number four, what do you believe sets apart successful real estate investors from those who give up, fail or never get started? Collin: I think you have to be willing to sacrifice. If you really want to jump in this, I gave up basically watching TV for two years. I did not catch a football game. My daughter was just born when I started and I can honestly say that I was not around too much for her first year. It was the sacrifice that I had to make to get to where I am. I was able to quit my job a year later. Collin: But it takes a lot of sacrifice. You have to be willing to make those and it also helps to have a great support partner. Like I could not have done it without my wife. Being able to put up with me constantly on my phone, running around working weekends, 16 hours a day. Surrounding yourself with the right people and be willing to sacrifice. Brandon: You know, I had a conversation the other day on that note with a buddy of mine. He was saying he has a little kid at home, I mean like a year old and a another one on the way. He wants to build a real estate business, he wants to be a real estate agent. He wants to somebody else work in a full time job. Like I talked to him week after week after week we talked and he has not made any progress at all towards his real estate investing. He said, ‘I feel bad leaving the kid and not being around.’ I am like I get that, I mean I totally do, right? We are in real estate business. But you have a choice, you can sacrifice a year or two and have the next 18 when they are going to remember you. Like I am not saying do not around for your kid. Be around with your kid as much as possible, but I mean you better not be watching. If that is your excuse, you better watch no Netflix at all. You better not even have a phone that you are using for anything other than texting business contacts, right? I mean there is a lot of hours in a week that we are not working. Brandon: Yes, drives me a little bit nutty. You can tell like it is just like if you really want something, you will find a way. If not, you will find an excuse, right? Collin: Everything is possible. Get rid of Facebook on your phone. Get rid of Netflix. If you are a Broncos fan, do not watch the Broncos. Sorry, what do you want more? Ending, what do you want more? Something people do not talk about a lot is like, yes, I want to be there with my kid. I want to be there for other stuff. But if you are there as like a grumpy, unhappy person who is not satisfied with how life is going, no kid wants that right around, right? You would rather have a little bit less time and a happier dad or happier mom then yes, they were at everything and they were irritated the whole time and on their phone trying to, right? Just keep that in mind. Like if you can work really hard and then gives them a really good life and be happy yourself, your kid would much rather have that. Collin: Yes, if you just keep pushing, I mean now I can take off a random Wednesday and say hey we are going to go do this. We are going to go get breakfast. We are going to go… It is that silver lining at the end of the tunnel. But you got to suffer a little bit in the beginning and make those sacrifices. David: Rosie is not going mind all these pictures of her three years old playing with uncle David on a beach with a sunset in the background of Hawaii because Brandon hustled where he was at. It is a cool story. It is definitely something people should look forward to because real estate will pay you back for everything that you put into it and a lot of things in life do not. Alright, Collin, final question for me. Tell us where can people find out more about you? Collin: At BiggerPockets. Definitely message me on there. I am on Facebook, Instagram, kind of, Colin_c_Scwartz. I have a LinkedIn account too but BiggerPockets is great. Brandon: We will put links to all of that in the show notes. The show notes of course are at biggerpockets.com/show318. If you want to jump in there, they can find links to all your social media and all that good stuff. Of course, they can comment there on the show notes and talk to you and ask questions there as well. Thank you, Collin. This has been fantastic. Unbelievably good, like really like. I love your story, I love where you came from, I love where you are going. Keep it up and you have to come back in the show some time and tell us kind of when you get to the next level how you got there. Collin: Awesome. Would love it guys, thank you. Brandon: Alright, thanks. Alright, that was our show with Collin. Thank you very much, Collin and thank you David for being an amazing analogist today here on the show again. David: Like I used alliteration to call me an amazing analogist. That seemed to be a thing of this show. Brandon: I know, right? That was kind of a theme in today’s show. It was definitely a delightful show. That was fun. Yes, that is really good. David: He is just an awesome guy. That dude put together a plan and execute at a very high level. What I love about it is it is not something that requires an MBA to do. He is like I am going to send out some mailers and I am going to do some meetups and I am just going to network and be a fun nice guy that everybody likes and he just was like, Oh, I happened to stumble my way to a 110 units in two years. I mean, that is like such a cool story that anybody can follow. Brandon: It is so true. So good, so awesome. Alright, you all, thank you for listening to the show today. If you are enjoying the show, make sure as always, leave us a rating review if you have not yet on iTunes. I know we have like 4,000 or 5,000 but there is like a quarter million people who listen to the show. That means there is a lot of people who have not yet done that. I am looking at you, yes you, driving in your car? Yes, I see you. Yes, right there. When you get home today, leave me and rate and review, I appreciate it. Thank you. David: Please do. If you guys liked this kind of stuff, I started putting Instagram stories of me in my car much like what you are doing, thoughts that I had been having. If you guys want to hear more of that type of stuff, it is kind of like an extension of what we talked about today, a lot of it. Follow me at DavidGreene24, follow Brandon at BeardyBrandon. Get more of the stuff that you love because we love these stuff. Go apply to work at BiggerPockets. That is something that you are thinking about. You should absolutely do it. You do not want to look back in 10 years and say, why did not I? David: That being said, this is David Greene for Brandon “Bearded Blue Eyes” Turner, signing off. Sharestates is America’s private lender. We fund fix-and-flip, ground-up, term, and refinance projects nationwide across all asset classes: residential, multifamily, mixed-use, commercial and land. Sharestates offers high loan-to-value funding at competitive rates and quick closings. Broker and correspondent lending programs are offered as well. Way to represent Omaha dude! Great show. I have been to a couple of Collin’s meetups and they were great. Much better than the Omaha REIA. Collin is a great guy for putting this kind of thing together. Great episode. I have to admit that he has me beat in terms of growth and ambition.
2019-04-23T01:23:55Z
https://www.biggerpockets.com/blog/biggerpockets-podcast-100-units-in-the-first-2-years-collin-schwartz/
This study investigated the interrelationship that holds between co-workers’ impression management, LMX and their interpersonal deviance as observed by fellow employees and the moderating effect fellow employee’s LMX have on the relationship between co-workers’ LMX and their interpersonal deviance towards fellow employees. Data were collected using a survey research design. Respondents included 202 employees who work in the service industry in Surabaya, Indonesia. Hypotheses were tested using SEM and multi-group analysis. This study found that coworkers’ impression management had a positive impact on their LMX and the relationship between coworkers’ LMX and their interpersonal deviance depended on their fellow employees’ LMX. This study focused on the relation among employees and provided a model that relate coworkers' behaviors-impression management and interpersonal deviance, as antecedents and consequences of their LMX, with how the similarity or difference of fellow employees’ LMX contributes to the coworkers' involvement in deviant behavior, as seen by fellow employees and in the context of a country with high power distance which is usually more receptive to impression management behavior. Impression Management, LMX, Interpersonal Deviance. The organization as a workplace comprised of individual employees who work together to achieve certain goals. In the regular activities of the organization, individual employees must interact and complete the task together, either directly or indirectly, with their co-workers. Support from co-workers is important to create positive working conditions. However, in reality, co-workers’ behaviours can worsen the working environment and result in some negative impacts for individual employees (Chiaburu & Harrison, 2008). Employees’ perception towards co-workers’ behaviour can be influenced by employment situations. One of these situations is the quality of the relationship between superior and subordinates or Leader-Member Exchange (LMX). The LMX theory explains how superiors use their power to develop different exchange relationships with their subordinates (Yukl, 1989). According to this theory, leaders will divide their subordinates as in-group (employees who have high quality LMX) and out-group (employees with low quality LMX). However, one can be a member of the in-group because he/she uses impression management behaviour towards his/her supervisor (Engle & Lord, 1997). Employees with low LMX may use influential tactics on their supervisors for securing valuable resources. This is because they in comparison with employees of high LMX have less access to those resources, such as support from supervisor and careers (Epitropaki & Martin, 2013). Individuals may expect that their impression management tactics can make their supervisor like them and such attitude determines the quality of their LMX (Engle & Lord, 1997). Maslyn & Uhl-Bien (2005) found that out-group members perceive the success of their co-workers’ (i.e., the in-group members) impression management behaviour more than they perceive their own. They perceive that their co-workers become in-group members because they use impression management behaviour. This finding is interesting because employees do not perceive their own impression management behaviour but that of their co-workers and these behaviours make them succeed. However, most of the previous studies that investigated the relationship between impression management and LMX focused more on the assessment of the relationship between individual employees and their superior. Those studies requested employees to report their own impression management as well as their LMX (Colella & Varma, 2001; Lian, Ferris & Brown, 2012), asked employees to assess their own impression management, while the quality of LMX was reported by their supervisor (Deluga & Perry, 1994; Carlson, Carlson & Ferguson, 2011); or requested employees to measure their own LMX but impression management was measured by the supervisor’s rating (Weng & Chang, 2015). Koopman, Matta, Scott & Conlon (2015) examined the relationship between ingratiation and LMX, but they focused on how supervisors could maintain their high quality relationship with in-group members. Even though co-workers also have an important role in the relationship between supervisor-fellow employees and how individuals perceive their marketplace (Omilion-Hodges & Baker, 2013), there were very few research studies of LMX which focused on the relationship between fellow employees and their co-workers (Omilion-Hodges & Baker, 2013) or between LMX and impression management. The previous studies focused more on investigating the positive consequences of being in-group members (Naseer, Raja, Syed, Donia & Darr, 2016). For example, in-group members will engage more in safety behaviour (Zhou & Jiang, 2015), Organizational Citizenship Behaviour (OCB) (Sun, Chow, Chiu & Pan, 2013) and creativity (Olsson, Hemlin & Pousette, 2012). These results are in line with the social exchange theory, i.e., if one party receives benefits from another party, he/she must reciprocate it with good things (Cropanzano & Mitchell, 2005). According to Zhou & Jiang (2015), in-group members who have obtained good things from their supervisors such as support, respect and trust, will feel obliged to respond with positive behaviour. However, Lian et al. (2012) found that an employee with high LMX, who experienced abusive supervision, would be more engaged in interpersonal deviance. On the other hand Naseer et al. (2016) found that in-group members, who have a despotic leader, will engage less in Organizational Citizenship Behaviour-Organization (OCBO), Organizational Citizenship Behaviour-Individual (OCBI) and creativity. In addition, Naseer et al. (2016) also found that interactions between politics and LMX and a despotic leader result in negative work behaviour, precisely for employees with high LMX. Moreover, supervisors who show their subordinates lack of trust and respect (Shu & Lazatkhan, 2017) and perform arbitrary behaviour on a group of subordinates, such as abusive behaviour (Lian et al., 2012; Xu, Loi & Lam, 2015) can be a model of negative behaviour for a group of subordinates. One form of negative behaviour among individual employees has been investigated in terms of interpersonal deviance (Bennett & Robinson, 2000). Therefore, it is possible that in-group members may engage in deviant behaviour towards other people such as their co-workers. Despite this reality, there is a lack of studies that investigate the negative behaviour of in-group members (Chiaburu & Harrison, 2008). Summarizing the discussion, we find some important issues: First, whether employees with high-quality LMX will act negatively to their counterparts. Second, whether co-workers who are perceived to be successful in their impression management-those who have become in-group members-will try to maintain and strengthen the quality of their relationship with their supervisor by engaging in deviant behaviour and third, whether the quality of fellow employees' LMX is important to differentiate the effect of co-workers' LMX on their deviant behaviour against fellow employees. Although these issues are interesting, there have been very few studies that investigated the issue of co-workers' behaviour, of those who became in-group members as a result of their impression management behaviour-especially, as it are seen through the eyes of their fellow employees. In this current study, we focused on the relationship among employees i.e., what fellow employees perceive about their co-workers' behaviour as well as their co-workers' LMX quality with their supervisor. Specifically, we looked into co-workers' impression management and their deviant behaviour toward fellow employees as an antecedent and consequence of LMX. We argue that individuals who use impression management and become in-group members will try to maintain their position. It is possible that they will engage in deviant behaviour directed to other employees, to make others look bad. Moreover, we argue that individuals who are in a high quality relationship position will engage in deviant behaviour targeting individuals who are in a low quality relationship with the same superior. Contrary to Koopman et al. (2015) who focused on how supervisors maintain quality LMX, we propose that the high quality LMX condition of individual employees which was built by impression management tactics against their supervisor may have an impact on how the employees maintain the quality of their relationship. In contrast to previous studies, we asked the respondents to report their co-workers' impression management behaviour, LMX and interpersonal deviance against them. This current study investigated the effect of co-workers' impression management behaviour, which is directed to the supervisor, on their LMX, impact of co-workers' LMX on their interpersonal deviance, which is directed to fellow employees and the moderating effect of fellow employees' LMX on the relationship between co-workers' LMX and their interpersonal deviance. Furthermore, we investigated whether co-workers with high quality LMX will engage in deviant behaviour towards fellow employees with the same or different LMX quality. Respondents of this study were employees who work in a variety of service industries in Surabaya. Surabaya is one of the greatest trading cities in Indonesia. Indonesia is a country where society has a high cultural value of power distance (Hofstede, 2007). Impression management is considered as something normative within a specific cultural context such as in high power distance cultures (Zaidman & Drory, 2001). Specifically, the distinction of in-group and out-group and perception of organizational politics are more prevalent in countries with high power distance (Naseer et al., 2016). However, there were very few studies that discussed impression management behaviour in such cultural situations (Zaidman & Drory, 2001; Xin, 2004; Ward & Ravlin, 2017). Impressions management is defined as "the process by which individuals influences the impressions of others towards them" Rosenfeld, Giacalone & Riordan (1995); Kacmar, Carlson & Bratton (2004), by manipulating the information they impress (Kacmar et al., 2004). Impression management behaviour arises when people want to create and maintain a specific identity (Zaidman & Drory, 2001), to change people's perceptions of them and to construct the appropriate behaviour for a particular situation (Ward & Ravlin, 2017). To attain these objectives, individuals will demonstrate verbal and non-verbal behaviour, so that they will be seen as more pleasant (Bozeman & Kacmar, 1997). As mentioned by Dorry & Zaidman (2007), individuals tend to use impression management behaviour when they interact with other people who have higher status and power and valuable resources. Thus, individuals use impression management behaviour by manipulating their identity in order to look nice to target resources. Moreover, impression management behaviour can be done because of the influence of personal and situational factors (Leary & Kowalski, 1990). Related to the situational factors, when a person has a high dependence on another party for a valuable resource or limitations on the resources he/she wants, he/she will engage in impression management tactics (Zaidman & Drory, 2001). This is consistent with the power-dependence theory of Emerson (1972); Tepper et al. (2009), that the dependence of a person is inversely proportional to his/her power. In other words, the lower the person’s power, the more dependent he/she is on the other party who has higher power. Impression management behaviour is carried out by members of the organization and is directed to all those who interact with them in their daily work activities (Hewlin, 2009). According to the power-dependence theory, subordinates potentially engage in impression management behaviour to obtain valuable resources from their supervisors. Valuable resources could be a good relationship with supervisors or opportunity to get interesting assignments as well as important roles. Indeed, impression management tactics can be used to attain successful careers (Diekmann, Blickle, Hafner & Peters, 2015). Weng & Chang (2015) also mentioned that in-group members, rather than out-group, enjoy the benefit of career development opportunities. Those valuable resources can be accessed if employees have a good relationship quality or high-quality LMX with their supervisors. Impression management tactics can include self-focused tactics of self-promotion and other-focused tactics, other-enhancement, opinion conformity and favour rendering (Kacmar et al., 2004). Self-focused tactics provide benefits to increase others’ opinion of a perpetrator's competence. While other-focused tactics can increase the affection and attractiveness of the perpetrator (Kacmar et al., 2004; Weng & Chang, 2015). Self-promotion consists of some behaviour: Self-description-perpetrators describe themselves as being attractive, self-presentation-perpetrators give a statement about their attractiveness and self-enhancing-perpetrators communicate their qualities (Kacmar et al., 2004). Individuals perform other enhancement by flattering others and showing an interest in the target’s life. Individual make an opinion-conformity by giving approval to the target’s opinion. While favour rendering is the behaviour of individuals who offer helps or performs un-requested tasks for the target (Kacmar et al., 2004). As noted by Zaidman & Drory (2001), it is a natural thing if a subordinate tries to create a positive impression in front of his/her supervisors. This is because he/she wants to maximize the rewards he/she may receive Schlenker (1980); Zaidman & Drory (2001). One of the benefits is that of obtaining a high-quality relationship with his/her supervisors. Kacmar et al. (2004) state that one of the goals of using impression management behaviour is related to LMX. In the concept of LMX, leaders tend to select a group of subordinates and they will have a high-quality relationship with those subordinates. Furthermore, subordinates may focus impression management behaviour to their supervisor as a way of avoiding punishment and abusive supervision (Tepper, Duffy, Hoobler & Ensley, 2004). As a result, through high quality LMX with their supervisors, they receive more positive treatment from them. Social exchange theory is the basis for explaining LMX. LMX describes the relationship between superiors and subordinates and focuses on the exchange relations between the two sides (Dulebohn, Wu & Liao, 2017). According to the social exchange theory, reciprocity is one of the rules in exchange, that is, if one party gets benefits from others, he/she will respond with positive behaviours (Cropanzano & Mitchell, 2005). In LMX, supervisors may choose in-group members based on their liking, as they consider their subordinates as pleasant and competent individuals (Dulebohn, Wu & Liao, 2017). Nevertheless, some studies suggest that the superior can also choose subordinates based on their impression management behaviour (Othman, Foo & Ng, 2010). Therefore, employees who want to become in-group members can use this opportunity, being liked by supervisor as people who are competent and pleasant, by using impression management. In this case, there was bias towards appraisal performance done by the supervisor (Othman et al., 2010). Mayer, Keller, Leslie & Hanges (2008) noted that the process of relationship-forming between subordinates and superiors will be observed by other subordinates. Maslyn & Uhl-Bien (2005) also found that employees perceive co-workers’ ingratiation as a way to become in-group members. Chiaburu & Harrison (2008) suggested that the lateral relations between individual employees and co-workers may drive a conflict where one party can engage in behaviours that deviate from the norm or engage in deviant behaviour that is directed to other people in the same level of relationship. According to Bennett & Robinson (2000), deviant behaviour that is directed to another person, for example co-workers, is termed as interpersonal deviance. Some forms of interpersonal deviance are ridicule and treating other employees with negative manners (Bennett & Robinson, 2000). Moreover, individual employees will engage in deviant behaviour towards a target that is considered as having an inferior status or has the same status as theirs (Aquino, Tripp & Bies, 2001). However, according to the social learning theory, individuals will engage in interpersonal deviance because they take their supervisor’s behaviours as model (Aquino, Douglas & Martinko, 2004) and learn from their environment about what behaviours are acceptable (Aquino & Douglas, 2003). Likewise, Naseer et al. (2016) noted that in-group members will try to have the same behavioural identity with their superiors. In addition, according to the social identity theory, in-group members will attempt to confirm their identity to their superior including their behaviours (Naseer et al., 2016). Meanwhile out-group members may be perceived by their superior as undesirable persons (Naseer et al., 2016). It is possible that out-group members will perceive in-group members as people who behave as unpleasantly as their supervisor. In the context of LMX, the supervisor will use different behaviours for in-group and out-group members. Individual who have low quality relationship with their supervisor, may experience mistreatment from their supervisor (Penhaligon, Louis & Restubog, 2009). As a result in-group members may become disrespectful and act negatively towards out-group members. People with high hierarchical status are considered to have valuable resources desired by others, such as work conditions, authority, autonomy and recognition (Aguino & Douglas, 2003). In the context of high power distance culture, people will respect individuals with high status and privileges may indicate a person’s high status (Atwater, Wang, Smither & Fleenor, 2009). As in LMX’s concept, the leader provides some privileges to in-group members such as trust and support. Based on the results of the present study, we argue that in some cultural context such as in a high power distance culture, the close relationship individuals have with their superior may indicate a high status for them. In addition, Aquino, Grover, Bradfield & Allen (1999) found that the hierarchy status has an effect on the perception of the target of unpleasant behaviour. It is possible that fellow employees may perceive that their co-workers with high-quality LMX may engage in deviant behaviour toward them. Moreover, individuals who engage in impression management may continue to do this tactic over time to maintain their relationship with the target and receive benefit from him/her (Carlson et al., 2011). Therefore we argue that a fellow employee may perceive that his/her co-workers, who are in-group members due to their impression tactics, will try to maintain that position. Thus, for that reason, a fellow employee may perceive that those co-workers engage in negative behaviour against him/her so that he/she may look bad in the eyes of their superiors. According to Aquino & Douglas (2003), individuals who are in a higher hierarchical status will engage less in antisocial behaviour than those who are in low hierarchical status. It can be due to the fact that individuals who are in lower hierarchical status engage in antisocial behaviour as an effort to maintain respect from others (Aquino & Douglas, 2003). However, in the context of LMX, employees may feel dislike for their counterparts who have a different LMX quality (Tse, Lam, Lawrence & Xu, 2013). Thus, we argue that in-group members, who may engage in impression behaviour, also will engage in negative behaviour toward others in order to obtain respect. It is possible that others may see impression management actors, although they have high quality LMX with supervisor, as incompetent persons. As noted by Omilion-Hodges & Baker (2013), the behaviour of individuals toward their peers depends on the LMX quality of individual employees and their co-workers. We argue that fellow employees may perceive their co-workers, who are in-group members, as engaging in deviant behaviour toward them if the fellow employees are out-group members. As Aquino et al. (2001) noted that employees with higher status have more power, it can be inferred that individuals with higher status can have more negative impact on the welfare of individuals with lower status positions. Consistent with Aquino et al. (2001); Tse et al. (2013) argued that in-group members may try to remove out-group members from the social networks. Specifically, co-workers will perform unpleasant behaviour to fellow employees in an attempt to expel them from the working group (Hershcovis et al., 2007). However, if fellow employees and co-workers have the same LMX (whether high or low), they will maintain a good relationship between them (Omilion-Hodges & Baker, 2013). In this study, we argue that employees may perceive their co-workers becoming in-group members because of their impression management behaviour. In addition, co-workers who are in a higher position-those who have high-quality of LMX with their superiors-may attempt to make other employees look bad in the eyes of their superiors. Tepper et al. (2004) found that subordinates who do not use impression management behaviour will get negative treatment from their superiors. On the other hand their co-workers who engage in impression management do not experience the negative behaviour they receive from their supervisors. It is possible that in order to maintain their high quality relationship, co-workers may try to impress and show that they are better than others-they may engage in interpersonal deviance targeted to fellow employees. This behaviour may be directed to employees with lower status or the out-group members. Meanwhile employees who are in the same high quality position will perceive the co-worker's deviant behaviour less. H1: Co-worker’s impression management is positively related to his/her LMX. H2: Co-worker’ LMX is positively related to his/her interpersonal deviance. H3: A Fellow employee’s LMX has an effect on the relationship between a co-worker’s LMX and his/her interpersonal deviance targeted to a fellow employee. When fellow employee’s LMX is high, the relationship between a co-worker's LMX and his/her interpersonal deviance will be negative and positive when the fellow employee’s LMX is low. The population of this study consisted of the non-managerial employees working in various service industries in Surabaya, Indonesia. The sample of this study was determined based on convenience sampling. Employees who work in the service industry have a high tendency to meet and communicate directly with their costumer. This interaction plays an important role in the perception of costumers regarding the service quality. It is possible that the quality of their work will be affected by their work situation, such as their relationship with co-workers and supervisor. We distributed questionnaires to 225 respondents. There were 202 questionnaires (90% response rate) which can be used for hypothesis analysis. The respondent characteristics were as follows: Mostly women, i.e., as many as 115 of the sample (56.9%), aged less than 35 years (148 people, i.e., 72.8%), unmarried (117 people, i.e., 57.9%), finished university studies (S1) (117 people, i.e., 57.9%) and with tenure of less than 5 years (138 people, i.e., 68.3%). Impression management variable was measured using a short version-10 indicators of Wayne & Ferris (1990); Yun, Takeuchi & Liu (2007). This Wayne & Liden' indicators include self-focused tactic and other focused tactic behaviours. The Employee’s LMX and the co-worker’s LMX were measured by the seven indicators of Scandura & Graen (1984); Wayne, Shore & Liden (1997). The co-worker’s interpersonal deviance was measured using the 7 indicators of Bennett & Robinson (2000). Respondents were asked to respond using a seven-point scale ranging from “never” (1) to “every day” (7) to indicate the frequency with which co-workers perform deviant behaviours on them. We ask each respondent to perceive the behaviours of one of his/her co-worker (impression management and interpersonal deviance), as well as the quality of the relationship between him/herself and his/her co-worker with the same supervisor. Respondents used a 5-point scale ranging from 1=strongly disagree to 5=strongly agree to report their level of agreement to a series of statements about their own LMX, a co-worker’s LMX, a co-worker’s impression management targeted to their same supervisor and a co-worker’s interpersonal deviance targeted to them. Hypothesis testing is done by using path analysis and for analysing moderating hypothesis, we used multi-group analysis. Table 1 below shows means, standard deviations and correlations. The reliability test showed that all variables have Cronbach's Alpha value above 0.78. We used Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) to confirm that all measured constructs were independent. The measurement model consisted of three variables: Co-worker’s impression management and interpersonal deviance. Figure 1 shows that the three-factor model indicated a good fit to the data: CMIN/df=2.198, IFI=0.902, RMSEA=0.077 and CFI=0.901. We used Structural Equation Modelling to test our hypotheses. Specifically, we used a multi-group analysis to assess the effect of fellow employees' LMX as a moderating variable. The results showed that co-worker's impression management was positively related to their LMX quality (supported hypothesis 1) (β=0.477; p<0.01). But co-worker's LMX was unrelated to his/her interpersonal deviance targeted to a fellow employee (β=0.115; n.s); thus hypothesis 2 was unsupported. Hypothesis 3 proposed that fellow employee’s LMX has an effect on the relationship between co-worker’s LMX and his/her interpersonal deviance targeted to a fellow employee. When fellow employee's LMX is high, the relationship between a co-worker's LMX and his/her interpersonal deviance will be negative and positive when a fellow employee’s LMX is low. The results partially supported hypothesis 3. This study found that a fellow employee's LMX has an effect on the relationship between the co-worker's impression management and his/her LMX (Δχ2Δdf=1; p<0.05) =13.047). Moreover, this study found that when fellow employee's LMX is high, the relationship between co-worker's LMX and his/her interpersonal deviance will be negative (β= -0.408; p<0.01). However, when a fellow employee's LMX is low, there is no relationship between a co-worker's LMX and his/her interpersonal deviance (β=0.159; n.s.) (Table 2). According to Greenberg et al. (1987); Miller & Thomas (2005), co-workers can help show realities and have influence on employees’ behaviours in the workplace. This current study identified the role of co-workers’ behaviour as perceived and experienced by fellow employees. We argue that the co-workers' impression management was related to their LMX quality and that their LMX quality was related to their interpersonal deviance targeted to their fellow employees. This study found that, based on fellow employee’s perceptions, co-workers' impression management could increase their quality relationship with their superiors. This finding supported the first hypothesis and consistent with the arguments of Othman et al. (2010) and the study by Maslyn & Uhl-Bien (2005). Moreover, we found that co-workers’ LMX was not related to their interpersonal deviance targeted to fellow employees. This study found that the relationship between co-workers’ LMX and their deviant behaviour towards fellow employees depended on fellow employees’ LMX. This result showed when fellow employees' LMX was high: The higher the co-workers' LMX, the lower their deviant behaviour targeted to fellow employees. But when fellow employees' LMX was low, the positive relationship between co-workers' LMX and interpersonal deviance towards fellow employees was not significant. These results provided partial support for the third hypothesis. The results showed that employees may feel less dislike for their co-workers who have the same relationship quality (whether high or low) with the same supervisor. It is because they will try to get closer and have a harmonious relationship with their fellow employees (Tse et al., 2013). This argument is consistent with the findings of this study that co-workers who have the same high LMX quality with fellow employees will be less engaged in deviant behaviour against them. But co-workers who have low quality LMX may engage in deviant behaviour towards their fellow employees who have high LMX. As noted by Robinson & Greenberg (1998), individuals may engage in workplace deviance because they perceive unfair treatment from their supervisor. According to Tse et al. (2013), employees will feel more dislike for co-workers who have a different relationship quality with the same supervisor. Especially for employees who have low LMX, they may try to protect themselves better and reduce their sense of inferiority and then take some actions to balance their condition of quality LMX (Tse et al., 2013). In line with this, Bies & Tripp (2005); Hershcovis et al. (2007) stated that individuals who engage in aggressive behaviour attempt to repair the unjust situation. Tse et al. (2013) found that the individual's feeling of dislike for his/her co-workers will encourage hostile emotions and an unwillingness to help and support each other. This finding supports the finding of Mayer et al. (2008) that individuals with low LMX will engage in deviant behaviour when co-workers have high LMX. Thus, co-workers who have a different LMX quality compared to fellow employees will engage in deviant behaviour towards them. In addition, subordinates who want to respond to the supervisor who treated them unfairly might not want to target their deviant behaviour directly to their supervisor (Mitchell & Ambrose, 2007). The reason is that they fear their supervisor’s reprisal. They would direct their deviant behaviour towards others such as co-workers. Interestingly, the positive relationship between co-workers' LMX and interpersonal deviance targeting fellow employees was not significant, when fellow employees' LMX was low. It is possible that some employees who are in-group members indeed engage in deviant behaviour towards their counterparts, i.e., the out-group members, because they want to maintain their LMX quality. But some employees do not engage in deviant behaviour towards their counterpart in the low LMX. The possible explanation is that employees are friends with each other despite being on a different relationship quality with their superiors. This friendship can actually give benefit for out-group members because they can get information from their friends who have high quality relationship with the superior. In addition, impression management is directed towards a specific target, for example a supervisor, who is considered to have valuable and important resources (Kacmar et al., 2004; Weng & Chang, 2015) and the impression management actors usually build a good impression of the target over time (Carlson et al., 2011). Therefore, it is possible that the impression management actors are more focused on maintaining their position by building positive image of self-competence and being a pleasant person, only directed to their supervisors. Second, individuals who are perceived to have a high LMX will be less engaged in deviant behaviour directed to their counterparts with the same LMX quality. However, if the quality of LMX is different, co-workers who have low LMX will be more perceived to engage in deviant behaviour. Therefore, supervisors should recognize that different treatment of their employees will lead to the increasing of out-group members' perception of injustice. While it is possible that societies with high power distance culture do not respond negatively to the negative behaviours of their supervisor (Tepper, 2007), employees who experience injustice can direct their retaliation towards in-group members. However, organizations can minimize those risks by not choosing candidates who are inclined to engage in deviant behaviours, such as those with strong retaliation norms (Wu, Zhang, Chiu, Kwan & He, 2014). In addition, organizations can provide role-play training for supervisors about the impact of their differentiated treatments of subordinates. This study has a few limitations. First, the data of this study are cross-sectional and based on self-report data. This may result in biased finding. Thus causal relationships should be considered carefully (Xu et al., 2015). However, since the self-report data are collected anonymously, it can still be expected to reveal the negative behaviour experienced by respondents (Thau, Bennet, Mitchell & Marrs, 2009). The next studies can investigate those variables in the future. Second, this study was conducted in Indonesia and respondents were employees who work in the service industry. Therefore, in order to increase the external validity of the results, future studies may investigate those variables using different samples and countries, especially countries that share the same cultural values with Indonesia. In this study, we asked respondents to perceive their co-workers' impression management and their interpersonal deviance towards them and, to perceive their LMX quality and their co-workers' LMX quality with the same supervisor. Thus, this study can capture factual reality regarding the negative behaviours of co-workers, especially because people usually tend to cover their own negative behaviours. This study found that the profile of co-workers' LMX has negative consequence depending on their fellow employees' LMX. Hence, future research needs to investigate the role of other variables, such as co-workers' personality and fellow employees' performance and competence that might amplify or reduce the co-workers' deviant behaviour towards their fellow employees. In addition, it is necessary to investigate whether in-group members will imitate their supervisor's behaviours, especially the negative behaviour a supervisor would show when dealing with out-group members. This study showed that the LMX quality (in the formation of in-group and out-group) and the consequences of differences treatment by supervisor towards those groups can have an impact on negative employee behaviour, especially for out-group employees. However, it is possible that employees have been received the formation of in-group and out-group as a workplace phenomenon. In this regard, the future studies can identify variables that may strengthen or weaken the impact of LMX quality on their negative behaviour, for example, employee acceptance of different relationship qualities with superiors, organizational support and the closeness of relationships among employees. 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Oracle’s Profitability and Cost Management Cloud Service (PCMCS) provides a powerful service for allocating General Ledger profits and costs. Recently, we worked with a banking industry client to provide a model that calculates profitability at a Product/Channel level while maintaining Account level detail. We accomplished this through a framework we refer to as Micro-Costing where detailed profits and costs are calculated in a database using rates developed at the summary level in PCMCS. Alithya began development of this framework in 2016 to meet a functional gap in PCMCS and provide a common framework that can be used either on-premise or in the Cloud. Product – a loan or deposit offering. Examples of a loan are an auto loan or credit card; examples of a deposit are a savings account or a checking account. Origination Channel – where the account was originated. Service Channel – where the financial or transactional cost or profit is occurring or assigned to. Customer – a legal entity responsible for accounts; for example, a person with both a home loan and a savings account. Customer Account – a product that is assigned to a customer. Financial Costs and Profits – the cost or profit of servicing a loan or deposit for a customer; for example, interest paid on a savings account. Transactional Costs and Profits – the cost or profit of interacting with a customer; for example, the cost of an ATM transaction. This summarizes the data model deployed. STAGING – Contains transient data. OPERATIONAL DATA STORE (ODS) – Persists the operational data with minimal transformation. Dimensional integrity is not enforced, but validation jobs are available for validating stored data regarding rules and dimensional integrity. WAREHOUSE-STAR – Persists the drivers, the rates, and the calculated profits and costs at the Customer Account level. The Driver Lookup and Driven Value Lookup functions are used to define the drivers and driven values so that the addition of a driver or driven value is a configuration activity for an administrator rather than a coding activity. Data Integration uses interim flat files to maintain flexibility regarding the source data by establishing an API via the flat files without requiring knowledge of the source systems. This allows for the introduction of source data that comes from 3rd parties not available for automated extraction from the source. Some transactional drivers represent an activity that cannot be associated with a specific Customer Account; for example, a new loan application. Proxy Customer Accounts for each product are generated to provide a place for these activities. Additionally, although not graphically displayed in the above diagram, Branch level drivers are directly fed into the PCM Model, examples of which are Branch square footage and number of branch employees. These drivers were used for non-Customer Account PCM costs and profits. All Batch processing is built using SQL Server Integration Services. This is based upon an agreement with the client regarding the preferred tool sets with the database selected being SQL Server. Framework is transferable to other integration tools and databases including Hadoop framework, and in-house solutioning by Alithya was performed in preparation for use of the Micro-Costing framework with larger clients. The following design principles were focused on during development of the Micro-Costing framework. These principles facilitate an easy-to-use and easy-to-maintain solution as deployed for our client. All dimensional mapping must occur prior to the warehouse star schema. It is not possible to perform the Micro-Costing A*B calculations to derive profits and costs detail otherwise. This has an impact on any deployment that uses FDMEE or Cloud Data Manager as they cannot perform additional mappings during upload to the cube. Dimensional Synchronization includes a Point of View: Year, Period, Scenario, and Version to allow for loading multiple sets of drivers during a month, and for transfer of ‘what-if’ rates back to the Customer Account level, if desired. Validation kick-outs and checks occur as early in the data integration process as possible, with a “simple” validation during staging and a “complex” validation during generation of the fact information in the warehouse. This allows the administrator to catch quality issues with a minimum amount of overall process duration occurring. The data integration process is broken into a series of steps that allows for validation review and then re-running a step prior to moving on to the next step. This principle held up in deployment, ensuring that time wasn’t wasted running later processes with invalid data, the result being an improved overall process and a significant reduction in the number of days required to produce profit and cost analysis for a given month. A lesson learned during the initial roll-out was that our client had not previously required a rigorous validation of the drivers at the Customer Account level and had to develop new techniques for validating the source information to ensure accuracy. A key feature of Oracle’s PCM applications is configurability, and the Micro-Costing framework is built to provide an easy-to-maintain solution that allows for rapid addition of drivers and driven values without the administrator having to manually update the tables and views required to manage the transformation and persistence of data. This was accomplished by defining the drivers and driven values in tables and providing stored procedures for maintaining the tables and views. Backup the database and the PCM cube. Update the source feeds to include the new activity or fee. Update the activity to Driver Lookup and Driven Value Lookup tables with the new values. *Note: The driven value record references the driver for the A*B calculation. Execute the “Update Costing Tables and Views” stored procedure. *Note: removing a driver or driven value does not modify the tables. Update HPCM Account dimension for the new driver and driven value. Update HPCM rules to use the new driver and allocate expenses to the new driven value, and calculate the rate for the new driven value. Run the entire data integration process for the POV, and review results. An improved ability to provide Product/Channel level costs and profits. Reduced monthly cycle time and effort. The prior data integration process was disjointed and required a large amount of effort to produce results. Drill-through capability to Customer Account level drivers, profits, and costs allows for root cause analysis of Channel and Product Costs. Aggregation along other dimensional paths. Starting at the Customer Account level allows for aggregation along Customer attributes such as zip-code or credit score, providing new insights and enhanced executive decision making. A follow-on project to use the Customer Account level data in OAC is currently being assessed. Model flexibility. The configuration of an additional driver and driven value in Micro-Costing takes fewer than 15 minutes. Easy troubleshooting, validation, and auditing capabilities with PCM. Errors or mismatches in profit or cost at the Product/Channel level can be reduced to either rule definition mistakes or driver data entry mistakes. Finding out where the issue is and correcting it with a few clicks has a positive impact on the overall analysis and maintenance effort. Alithya has developed a Micro-Costing framework that allows an integrated view of profits and costs at both a summary and detailed level. This framework is successfully deployed at a banking industry client to provide a superior solution. …or anywhere the allocations occur at a summary level with drivers aggregated from a detail level. As an earlier blog mentioned, the 18.07 release of Enterprise Data Management Cloud Service (EDMCS) delivered one eagerly anticipated piece of functionality: Subscriptions! And do not fear – these subscriptions are useful and do not involve a 1-year subscription to the Fruit of the Month Club (not that there’s anything wrong with that). This blog post dives deeper into this new functionality, describes how it works, and highlights some lessons learned from utilizing Subscriptions with a current project involving multiple EDMCS Custom applications supporting multiple Profitability and Cost Management Cloud Service (PCMCS) applications. Subscriptions are a huge step towards true “mastering” of enterprise data assets within a single master data Cloud platform. With EDMCS, it is important to build deployment-specific applications configured to the dimensionality requirements of the target applications to most effectively use the packaged adapters, validations, and integration capabilities. But in many cases, you also need to share common hierarchies across applications and avoid duplicative (that’s my big word for today) maintenance. After all, why have a master data management tool if you still must perform maintenance in multiple places? That’s just silly. The answer to this dilemma is Subscriptions. By implementing Subscriptions, requests submitted to a primary viewpoint will automatically generate parallel subscription requests to subscribing viewpoints to automatically synchronize your hierarchy changes across EDMCS applications. This comment is important: “automatically generate parallel subscription requests.” EDMCS will not update a target, or subscribing, viewpoint behind the scenes with no visibility or audit trail to what has occurred. A parallel Subscription request will be generated along with the Interactive request that will be visible in the Requests window, along with the full audit trail and details that you find in an Interactive request. Even better, the Subscription request will generate an email and attach a Request File of the changes. The first thing to really think about is the View and Viewpoint design of your EDMCS applications. Subscriptions are defined at the Viewpoint level, so you need to identify the source and target viewpoint for your business situation. With my current project, I have multiple EDMCS applications supporting multiple PCMCS applications. While the dimensionality is similar across the applications, the hierarchies vary, especially with the alternate hierarchies. So, it has been important to isolate the “common” or shared structures that should be synchronized across applications into their own viewpoint so that a subscription mechanism can be created. You will likely need to create a node type converter. If the source and target viewpoints do not share a common node type, you must create a node type converter for subscriptions to work. In my situation, I had already created node type converters since I wanted to compare common structures across EDMCS applications, so the foundation was there to readily implement subscriptions. To create a Subscription, the creator must have (at a minimum) View Browser permission to the source view, View Owner permission to the target view, and Data Manager permission to the target application. The Subscription assignee (this is the user who will “submit” the subscription request) must have (at a minimum) View Browser permission to the source view and Data Manager permission to the target application. Once the foundation is in place in terms of viewpoints, node type converters, and permissions, the actual creation of a subscription is easy. Inspect the target viewpoint (the viewpoint that is to receive the changes from a source viewpoint via subscription), navigate to the Subscriptions tab, and click Edit. From there you can select the source viewpoint, the request assignee, and enable Auto Submit if needed. Save the subscription and you are all set. Currently, there is no capability to edit an existing subscription. You must delete and add a new subscription to effect a change. Any validation errors for your subscription will appear on this dialog as well. These are documented nicely in the Oracle EDMCS administration guide. Emails will be generated and sent to the Request Assignee, whether Auto-Submit is enabled or not. The email will include details such as the original request #, the subscription request #, and how many request items were processed or skipped. Remember, the subscription request will have a Request File attached to it. View the request file attachment to see details on why specific request items were skipped. The request file is not attached to the email itself, only to the request in EDMCS. The importance of dimension, view, and viewpoint design cannot be overstated. For each dimension, evaluate the primary and alternate hierarchy content and identify what will be shared across dimensions or applications and what will be unique to each dimension and application. As early as possible, identify the EDMCS user population along with permission levels for applications and views. This is important to identify the appropriate “Request Assignee” for your Subscriptions. I recommend creating a security matrix identifying each user and the permissions each will have. Without a clear and well thought out design, you will find yourself constantly re-doing your views and viewpoints which, in turn, will cause constant rework of your subscriptions. The “measure twice, cut once” adage certainly applies here! I am a big proponent of standard, consistent naming conventions to improve the usability and end user experience. The same holds true for Subscriptions. Consider using a standard naming convention for your viewpoints so it is clear which viewpoints have a subscription. It’s not obvious – unless you Inspect the viewpoint – that a subscription exists. One approach I’ve been using is to name my source and target viewpoints identically with a special tag or symbol at the end of the target viewpoint name to indicate a subscription is present. I’m sure there are other and probably better ideas, but I find the visual cue to be helpful. Perhaps in the future, Oracle will display subscription details when you hover over a viewpoint name (hint hint). Make sure your node type converters are mapping all required properties. I ran into an issue where updates to one property in my source viewpoint were not being applied to my target viewpoint via subscription requests, but all other property updates worked fine. The reason? I had recently modified my App Registration and added this property to a dimension’s node type. But my node type converter had already been created and wasn’t mapping or recognizing the new property. Once I updated my node type converter, the problem was solved. The request files attached to subscription requests are a valuable troubleshooting tool. Status codes and error messages are included in these Excel files that are extremely helpful to determine why your request was not auto-submitted. I have been looking forward to the subscription functionality in EDMCS and am pleased with it so far. Subscriptions are easy to configure, can be configured to auto-submit if desired, and generate emails to remind the requester a request has occurred and to act if the request was not submitted or request items were skipped. EDMCS Subscriptions are a big step forward to enabling true mastering of your enterprise data management assets! PCMCS…Yeah, FDMEE Can Do That! Has Edgewater Ranzal done that before? What “gotchas” have you encountered in your implementations and how have you addressed them? What unique offerings do you bring? These are all smart questions to ask your implementation partner because the answers provide insight into their relevant experience. Edgewater Ranzal is an Oracle PCMCS thought leader and collaborates with Oracle as a Platinum partner to enhance PCMCS with continued development. To date, we’ve completed nearly 20 PCMCS (Cloud) implementations, and almost 80 Oracle Hyperion Profitability and Cost Management (HPCM – on premise) implementations spanning multiple continents, time zones, and industries. Our clients gladly provide references for us which is a testament to our success and abilities. Additionally, we frequently have repeat clients and team up with numerous clients to present at various conferences to share their successes. As a thought leader in the industry and for PCMCS, we sponsor multiple initiatives that deliver implementation accelerators, test the latest product enhancements prior to their release, and work in tandem with Oracle to enhance the capabilities of PCMCS. Our Product Management team is comprised of several individuals. Specifically for PCMCS, Alecs Mlynarzek is the Product Manager and has published the following blog: The Oracle Profitability and Cost Management Solution: An Introduction and Differentiators. I am the Product Manager for Data Integration and FDMEE with several published blog posts related to FDMEE. Now let’s explore some of the data integration challenges one might unexpectedly encounter and the intellectual property (IP) Ranzal offers to mitigate these and other data integration challenges that lurk. What gotchas have you encountered in your implementations and how do you mitigate them? We could go into great depth when detailing the PROs for using FDMEE with PCMCS…but it is much more beneficial to instead share some of the other less obvious discoveries made. Note that we work directly and continuously with Oracle to improve the product offering. Extracting data via FDMEE data-sync is challenging. The size of the data cube and configuration settings of PCMCS has a threshold limit – 5,000,000 records and a 1GB file size – both of which are quite often reached. As a result, we have developed a custom solution for the data-sync routine. Large datasets directly into PCMCS via DM (Cloud-based Data Management) can exhibit performance problems due to the server resources available in the Cloud. Functionality in on-premise FDMEE (scripting, Group-By, etc.) helps reduce the number of records going into the Cloud and therefore provides a performance gain. Patching to the latest FDMEE patch set is crucial. Cloud applications (PCMCS, FCCS, E/PBCS) update monthly. As a result, we need to consistently check/monitor for FDMEE patches. These patches help ensure that canned integrations from Oracle are top-notch. Executing two or more jobs concurrently via EPMAutomate is quite troublesome due to the workflows needed and how EPMAutomate is designed. As a result, we have invested considerable time into cURL and RESTful routines. We discovered that the login/logout commands are tied to the machine, not the user-process, so any logout from another executing run logs out all sessions. The use of EPMAutomate is sometimes difficult. It requires a toolset on a PC – “JumpBox” – or on-premise EPM servers. It also requires the use of .BAT files or other scripted means. By using FDMEE, the natural ease of the GUI improves the end-user experience. Loading data in parallel via FDMEE or DM can cause Essbase Load Rule contention due to how the automatic Essbase load rules are generated by the system. Oracle has made every effort to resolve this before the next Cloud release. Stay tuned… this may be resolved in the next maintenance cycle of PCMCS (18.10) and then the on-premise update of patch-set update 230. We all know that folks (mainly consultants) are always looking to work around issues encountered and come up with creative ways to build/deliver new software solutions. But the real question that needs to be asked is: Should we? Since FDMEE has most of the solutions already packaged up, that would be the best tool for the job. The value that FDMEE can bring is scores better than any home-grown solution. We have redeveloped our Essbase Enhanced Validate to function with the PCMCS Cloud application. FDMEE on-premise can now validate all the mapped data prior to loading. This is great for making sure data is accurate before loading. The Edgewater Ranzal tool-kip for FDMEE includes the ability to connect to other Cloud offerings for data movements, including DBaaS and OAC. Can FDMEE do that…and should FDMEE do that? Yes, you should use FDMEE to load to PCMCS, and it is an out-of-the-box functionality! As you can see, unlike DM whose feature comparison to FDMEE will be discussed in a later blog and white-paper, there are a lot of added benefits. The current release of FDMEE v11.1.2.4.220 provides product functionality enhancements and has greater stability for integrations with most Cloud products. Suffice it to say, having python scripting available and server-side processing for large files will greatly enhance your performance experience. Contact us at info@ranzal.com with questions about this product or its capabilities. What is Oracle Profitability and Cost Management? Organizations with world class finance operations generally can close in a minimal number of days (2-3 in an ideal organization) and have frequent and efficient budget and forecast cycles while also visiting different ‘what if’ scenario analysis along the way. These organizations often deliver in-depth profitability and cost management analysis reports at fund, project, product, and/or customer level, completing the picture of an accurate close cycle. Oracle offers packaged options in support of all these finance processes, but the focus of this post will be Profitability and Cost Management (PCM). One of the most painful and time-consuming processes for any business entity is PCM analysis. The reasons why cost allocations processes are time consuming are too many to count – from model complexity to data granularity, driver metric availability, rigidity of allocation rules, delays with implementing allocation changes, and almost impossible-to-justify results. Instead of focusing on the negative aspect, let’s focus on what can be done to alleviate such pain and energize the cost accounting department by giving it access to meaningful and accurate data and empowering users through flexibility to perform virtually unlimited “what if” analysis. The initial Profitability and Cost Management product, like almost all Oracle EPM offerings, was released on-premise in July 2008 and is known as Oracle Hyperion Profitability and Cost Management (HPCM). 10 years later, HPCM continues to deliver an easier way to design, maintain, and enhance allocation processes with little to no IT involvement as it has since it was initially launched, but with a greater focus on flexibility and transparency. The intent for HPCM was to be a user-driven application where finance teams would be involved beginning with the definition of the methodology all the way to the steps needed to execute day-to-day processing. Any cost or revenue allocation methodology is supported via HPCM while graphical traceability and allocation balancing reports support any query from top-level analysis all the way down to the most granular detail available in the application. Simple allocations – Detailed Profitability (a.k.a. single-step allocations. Example: From Accounts and Departments, allocate data to same Accounts, new target Departments, and to granular Products/SKU based on driver metric data. This module allows for a very high degree of granularity with dimensions >100k members, but it does not cater to complex driver calculations or to allocations requiring more than 1 stage). Average to high complexity allocations – Standard Profitability (a.k.a. multi-step allocations of up to 9 iterations/stages, allowing for reciprocal allocations. Example: Allocations from accounts and departments to channels, funds, and other departments. Allocation of results from previous steps are redistributed onto Products, Customers etc. Driver metric complexity is achievable with this module; custom generated drivers are available as well, but there are limitations regarding driver data granularity, granularity of allocated data, and overall hierarchy sizing). High complexity allocations – Management Ledger (unlimited number of steps, high number of complex drivers, custom driver calculations, custom allocations, more granularity, and increased flexibility in terms of defining and expanding allocation methodology). This is the last module added to the HPCM family and the only one available as SaaS Cloud Offering. In 2016, Oracle introduced the Cloud version of HPCM: Profitability and Cost Management Cloud Service (PCMCS). PCMCS is a Software as a Service (SaaS) offering, and as with many of Oracle’s Cloud offerings, PCMCS includes key improvements that are not available in the on-premise version, and enhancements are made at a much faster pace. There is currently no indication that the two HPCM modules – Detailed and Standard Profitability – will make their way to the Cloud, since increased allocation complexity as well as increased hierarchy sizing supported by the Management Ledger module caters to most, if not all, potential requirements. The Management Ledger module included with the PCMCS SaaS subscription has a core strength in the ease of use and flexibility to change, enabling finance users to define and update allocation rules and methodologies via a point-and-click interface. While the initial setup is advisable to be performed with support from an experienced service provider, the maintenance and expansion of PCMCS (Management Ledger) models can be achieved by leveraging solely functional resources, in most cases. “What-if” scenario creation and analysis has never been easier. Users not only can copy data and allocation methodologies between scenarios, but they can also update the data sets and allocation steps independently from a standard scenario, generating as many simulation models as they need, gaining increased insight into decision making. Standard Profitability models perform allocations in Block Storage Databases (BSO). While BSO applications are great for complex calculations and reciprocal allocation methodologies, they have the disadvantage of being limited in terms of structure or hierarchy sizing. This hierarchy restriction is not as pressing in Aggregate Storage Option (ASO) type applications, which is the technology used by Management Ledger. The design considerations for a Standard Profitability model are also significantly more rigid when compared with the Management Ledger module, which has no limitations regarding allocation stages, allocation sequencing, or a maximum number of dimensions per each allocation step. Detailed Profitability models heavily leverage a database repository while any connected Essbase applications are used solely for reporting purposes. Initial setup and future changes, outside of the realm of simply adding new hierarchy members, will require specialized database management skills, and the usage of a single step allocation model is not as pervasive. Complex allocation methodologies may require the usage of Detailed Profitability models in conjunction with Management Ledger, but these situations represent the exception rather than the rule. Why Should You Choose Oracle Profitability and Cost Management? One of the key strengths for HPCM, available since it was released, and now included in PCMCS, is transparency – the ability to identify and explain any value resulting from the allocation process, with minimal effort. Each allocation rule or allocation step is uniquely identified, enabling users to easily navigate via the embedded/out-of-the-box balancing report to the desired member intersection opened through a point and click action in Excel (using Smart View) for further analysis and investigation. The out-of-the-box-program documentation reports identify the setup of each rule and can be leveraged for quick search by account, department, segment code, or any other dimension available in the application. The execution statistics reports delivered as part of the PCMCS offering enable users to quickly understand which allocation process is taking longer than expected and identify opportunities for overall process improvement or to simply monitor performance over time. These two out-of-the-box reports – execution statistics and program documentation – are the most heavily used reports during application development, troubleshooting, and particularly when new methodologies are developed. Users can quickly search through these documents, leverage them to keep track of methodology changes, and use them as documentation for training new team members. Performing mass updates to existing allocation rules has never been faster. PCMCS contains a menu that allows end users to find and replace specific member name references in their allocations for each individual data slice, allocation step, or an entire scenario. A quick turnaround of such maintenance tasks results in an increased number of iterations through different data sets, giving the cost accounting team more time to perform in-depth analysis rather than waiting for system updates. PCMCS-embedded analytics and dashboarding functionality is also a significant differentiator, enabling end users to create and share dashboards with the rest of the application users through the common web interface and without the need for IT support. Reports created in PCMCS are available immediately and without time consuming initial setup or migrations between environments followed by further security setup tasks. A comparison of On-Prem vs Cloud will be available in a future post, so please subscribe below to receive notifications for PCMCS-related blog updates. Last time, in the Wonderful World of Enterprise Data Management Cloud Service (EDMCS), we discussed initial impressions of this exciting new Oracle Cloud product and highlighted some early functionality enhancements. In this post, I’d like to highlight another feature that was recently added to EDMCS: enhanced request load files. In the initial release, EDMCS provides a mechanism to perform bulk updates to EDMCS hierarchies – the Excel request load file. While the feature immediately had some advantages over its distant cousin in Data Relationship Manager (DRM) (action scripts), there were limitations. Primarily, EDMCS would only recognize the first tab or worksheet in an Excel file. Well that has been fixed! Request load files can now contain multiple worksheets, and EDMCS will recognize all of them (provided the worksheet names match your viewpoint names of course). Additionally, EDMCS will automatically select all valid worksheets to load into EDMCS when loading a request file. This makes it very easy to download viewpoints to Excel and build a request file containing updates for multiple viewpoints to bulk upload at one time. This also means you need to be careful! Since EDMCS auto-selects any matching worksheet name, if you were not paying attention, you could accidentally load outdated requests from a worksheet. But you can still delete any unwanted request items prior to submitting the request, if you catch them first. While you could always load multiple request files in a single request since the initial release of EDMCS, this feature is a nice usability and productivity enhancement. It works great for situations such as adding a node to a primary hierarchy/viewpoint and inserting it into an alternate hierarchy/viewpoint, all from the same request. While EDMCS is the new kid on the block in the Oracle EPM cloud space, it’s exciting to see how it’s quickly closing the gap with new functionality being added regularly! REST API operations, enhanced request files, and the other enhancements mentioned above show how far EDMCS has come in just 6 months. The 18.07 release of EDMCS looks to be a HUGE release chock full of new features, including one I am especially excited for: subscriptions! Look for more blog posts coming soon to discuss the subscription functionality and utilizing EDMCS for a Profitability and Cost Management Cloud Service (PCMCS) implementation. Recently my team and I had the opportunity to implement Oracle’s newest offering – Enterprise Data Management Cloud Service (EDMCS). EDMCS for those of you who are not familiar provides a cloud-based solution for managing master data (also referred to as metadata) across the organization. Some like to refer to EDMCS as Data Relationship Manager (DRM) in the Cloud, but the truth is, EDMCS is not DRM in the Cloud. EDMCS is a completely new vision of what master data management can and should be. The architect of this new cloud offering is the same person who founded Razza Solutions which was the company that developed the product now known as DRM. That is important to know because it ensures that the best of what DRM has to offer is brought forward. But, more importantly, it ensures that the learnings and wish list of capabilities that DRM should have are in the forefront of the developers’ minds. As I highlighted in the previous post Troubleshooting Cloud Data Management Metadata Load Errors, I had developed an automation routine to upload EDMCS extracts to both PBCS and FCCS using FDMEE and Cloud Data Management. We had been eagerly awaiting the REST API for EDMCS to finalize this automation routine and provide a true end-to-end process that can be scheduled or initialized via a single action. Let’s take a quick look back at the automation routine developed for this customer. After the metadata has been exported to a flat file from EDMCS, the automation would upload a copy to the PBCS and FCCS pods, launch Cloud Data Management data load rules which would process the EDMCS metadata extracts, run a restructure of the database after all dimensions had been loaded, and then send a status email alerting the administrator of the result. While elegant, I considered this to be incomplete. Automation, in my view, is a process that can be executed without user interaction. While an automation routine certainly has parameters that must be generally maintained, once those parameters are set/updated, the automation cycle should not be dependent on user input or action. In the aforementioned solution, we were beholden to the fact that EDMCS exports had to be run interactively; however, with the introduction of the publicly exposed REST API in the 18.05 EDMCS patch, we are now able to automate the extract of metadata from EDMCS. That means we can finally complete our fully automated, end-to-end solution for loading metadata. Let’s review the EDMCS REST API and how we did it. The REST API for EDMCS is structured similar to other Oracle EPM REST APIs. By this, I mean that multiple REST commands may need to be executed to achieve a functional result. For example, when executing a Cloud Data Management data load rule via the Data Management REST API, the actual execution of the data load rule is handled by a POST call to the jobs function with the required payload (e.g. DLR name, start period, etc.). This call is just one portion of a functional requirement. To achieve an actual data load, a file may need to be uploaded to the cloud, the data load rule initialized, and then the status of the data load rule be retrieved. To achieve this functional result, three unique REST API executions would need to occur. Let’s explore each of these in a little more detail. First, we need to get the dimension IDs for the application from which we will be downloading metadata. This is accessed from the applications function. When executing this function, the JSON object return includes all applications that exist in EDMCS (including those archived). So the JSON needs to be iterated to find the record that relates to the application from which metadata needs to be exported. In this case, the name of the application is unique and can be used to locate the appropriate record. Next, we need to query the JSON object to get the actual dimension id (circled in red). The dimension ID is used in subsequent calls to actually export the dimension. Great, now we have the dimension ID. Next, we need to execute the REST API call to export the dimension. The JSON object returned from this execution contains minimal information. It simply provides the URL to the next required REST API execution which will provide the status of the execution. The JSON object returned here provides us the status of the export invoked in the prior step (in yellow) as well as a URL to the actual file to download which is our last step in the process. Once the export job is complete, the files can be streamed using the URL provided by the REST execution in the prior step. And there you have it, a fully automated solution to download metadata to flat files from EDMCS. Those files are then provided to the existing automation routine and our end-to-end process is truly complete. And for my next trick…let’s explore some of the different REST API tools that are available to help you in your journey with the EPM REST APIs. In my last post, I highlighted a solution that was recently deployed for a customer that leveraged Enterprise Data Management Cloud Service (EDMCS), Financial Data Quality Management Enterprise Edition (FDMEE), and Cloud Data Management (CDM) to create an automated metadata integration process for both Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service (PBCS) and Financial Close and Consolidation Cloud Service (FCCS). In this post, I want to take a bit of a deeper dive into the technical build and share some important learnings. Cloud Data Management introduced the ability to load metadata from a flat file to the Oracle EPM Cloud Services in the 17.11 patch. This functionality provides customers the ability to leverage a common platform for loading both data and metadata within the Cloud. Equally important, CDM allows metadata to be transformed using its familiar mapping functionality. As noted, this customer deployed both PBCS and FCCS. Within the PBCS application, four plan types are active while FCCS has the default two plan types. A design decision was made for EDMCS to create a single custom application type that would store the metadata for both cloud applications. This decision was not reached without significant thought as well as counsel with Oracle development. While the pros and cons of the decision are outside the scope of this post, the choice to use a custom application registration in EDMCS ensured that metadata was input a single time but still fed to both cloud applications. As a result of the EDMCS design decision, a single metadata file (per dimension) was supplied with properties necessary to support each plan type. CDM leverages its 23 “dimensions” to store metadata information for processing. Exactly like data, metadata is imported using an import format into the CDM relational repository. Each field from a metadata file is aligned to a CDM dimension field. The CDM Account dimension always represents the target application member name and the CDM Entity dimension represents the parent of the member. All other fields can be aligned to any of the remaining 21 dimensions. CDM Attribute dimensions can be utilized in the import and mapping process but are not available for exporting to the cloud application. This becomes an important constraint especially in a multi-plan type deployment. These 21 fields can be used to store any of the properties required to successfully load metadata to the target plan type. Let’s consider this case study for a moment. The PBCS application has four plan types. If a process were to be built to load all plan types from a single CDM data load rule, then we would not be able to have more than five plan type specific attributes or properties because we would not have enough CDM fields/dimensions to store the relevant information. This leads to an important design approach. Instead of a single CDM data load rule to load all plan types, a data load rule was created for each plan type. This greatly increased the number of metadata properties and attributes that could be loaded by CDM and ensured that future growth could be accommodated without a redesign of the integration process. It is important to understand that CDM utilizes the Planning Outline Load Utility (OLU) to actually perform the metadata load to the cloud application. The OLU loads metadata using merge (yes Planning experts, I realize that I am not discovering fire) which is important to understand especially when processing multiple metadata loads for a single application. When loading metadata, there are certain properties that are Application level. I like to think of these as being global. Additionally, there are plan type specific attributes that can align (or not align) to the application level value/setting. I like to think of these as local. Why is this important? Well when loading a metadata file, if certain global properties are excluded from the metadata load file, the local properties (if specified) are utilized to default the global properties. Since metadata is loading using merge, this only becomes problematic when a new member is being added to the outline. A Base Member cannot be changed to a Shared Member. After much investigation (details to follow), I discovered that the global property should also be included in the metadata load. While CDM utilizes the OLU to load metadata, it does not provide as much verbosity in the error information as the PBCS web interface (which also uses OLU) when loading metadata. Below is an example of the error in the CDM process log. As a tangent, I’d love to check the logs without needing to open a Service Request. Maybe Oracle will build an enhancement that allows that in the future (hint, hint, wink, wink to my friends at Oracle). So where do I go from here? Well, what do we know about CDM loading metadata to the cloud application? We know that CDM uses the OLU to load a flat file generated by CDM. Bingo! The metadata file output by CDM is a good starting point. That file is in the Outbox of the CDM application and can be downloaded in several different ways – CDM Import process (get creative folks), CDM process details, or EPM Automate. Now we have the metadata file and can test to determine if the error is caused by CDM or the metadata itself. It’s all about ruling out variables. So, we take the metadata file and import it manually within the PBCS web interface and are able to replicate the error. But now we have an important new data point – the line number from the metadata file that is causing the error. Now that we have actionable information, we can review each property and start isolating and eliminating different variables. We determined that this error was only occurring for new alternate hierarchy parents being added to the outline. As a test, we added the global storage property and voila, the metadata load completed successfully. Face palm! Maybe this would have been obvious to folks with a lot of Planning experience, but there are plenty of folks learning the intricacies of Planning and Essbase (including our friends converting from HFM to FCCS), so I wanted to share a lesson learned in my journey of metadata integration using CDM. CDM functionality for metadata represents two of the three primary operations of ETL. In my next post, we’ll dive deeper into how the extract component of ETL was accomplished to provide a seamless end- to-end ETL solution for metadata. A friendly game of laser tag between out-of-shape technology consultants became a small gold mine of analytics simply by combining the power of Essbase and the built-in data visualization features of Oracle Analytics Cloud (OAC)! As a “team building activity,” a group of Edgewater Ranzal consultants recently decided to play a thrilling children’s game of laser tag one evening. At the finale of the four-game match, we were each handed a score card with individual match results and other details such as who we hit, who hit us, where we got hit, and hit percentage based on shots taken. Winners gained immediate bragging rights, but for the losers, it served as proof that age really isn’t just a number (my lungs, my poor collapsing lungs). BUT…we quickly decided that it would be fun to import this data into OAC to gain further insight about what just happened. This provides instant score results by player, by “Total” team, or by everybody. Combined with another dimension like Player Hit, it’s easy to examine details like number of times an individual player hit another player or another team in total. You can drill in to Red Team Player 1 shot Blue Team or Red Team Player 1 shot Blue Team Player 1 to see how many times a player shot an individual player. A simple Smart View retrieval along the Player dimension shows scores by player and team, but the data is a little raw. On a simple data set such as this, it’s easy to pick out details, but with OAC, there is another way! Dan from the Blue team immediately stands out as does Kevin and Wayne from the Red team! This points us in the right direction, but we can easily toggle to another visualization that might offer even more insight into what went on. Using a couple of sunburst type data visualizations, we can quickly tie who was shooting and who was getting hit – filtered by the same team and then weight by the score (and also color code it by team color). It appears that Wayne and Kevin from the Red Team are pretty good at hitting teammates, but it is also now easy to conclude that Wayne really has it out for Kevin while Kevin is an equal opportunity shoot-you-in-the-back kind of teammate! Reimagining the data as a scatter plot gives us a better look at the value of a player in relation to friendly fire. By dragging the “Score” Essbase metric into the size field of the chart, correlations are discovered between friendly fire and hits to the other team. While Wayne might have had the highest number of friendly fire incidents, he also had the second highest score for the Red team. The data shows visually that Kevin had quite a few friendly fire incidents, but he didn’t score as much (it also shows results that allow one to infer that Seema was probably hiding in a corner throughout the entire game, but that’s a different blog post). What Can You Imagine with the Data Driving Your Business? By combining the power of Essbase with the drag-and-drop analytic capabilities of Oracle Analytics Cloud, discovering trends and gaining insight is very easy and intuitive. Even in a simple and fun game of laser tag, results and trends are found that aren’t immediately obvious in Excel alone. Imagine what it can do with the data that is driving your business! With Oracle giving credits for a 30-day trial, getting started today with OAC is easy. Contact us for help! Continuing its momentum with Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) Cloud initiatives, Oracle recently released Enterprise Data Management Cloud Service (EDMCS). Here are some initial impressions of the application to provide fundamental information and spark discussion. First, some background: these observations are based on an actual project from working with a client who was 1 of 3 selected for the EDMCS Early Adopter Program. This client is essentially going all-in on Oracle EPM Cloud, with Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service (PBCS), Financial Consolidation and Close Cloud Service (FCCS), and Account Reconciliation Cloud Service (ARCS). One on-premise component, Financial Data Quality Management Enterprise Edition (FDMEE), is also in the mix. This client quickly realized its reporting structures between the Planning/Budgeting and Financial Close/Consolidation worlds, while not identical, were similar and contained a high degree of shared structures. The idea of maintaining these reporting structures in multiple tools did not make sense, leading the client to inquire about EDMCS. After an evaluation, Oracle selected them to participate in the early adopter program for EDMCS with Edgewater Ranzal as the implementation partner. EDMCS = DRM in the Cloud, Right? With EDMCS, you will immediately notice new functionality such as the capability to create an Enterprise Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service (EPBCS) or PBCS application in EDMCS, which provides the built-in connectors, properties, and validations for those target applications. Simply step through the Register Application wizard, specify your dimensions and plan types, and EDMCS will automatically build the rest for you. The built-in properties and validations enforce constraints and business rules to ensure no changes can be made that could break EPBCS/PBCS. For other use cases, EDMCS provides the ability to create a custom application along with custom properties. As EDMCS matures, the number of packaged connectors, applications, and validations will surely increase. So, the Data Model is Different? The EDMCS data model is quite different from DRM. Understanding the EDMCS data chain is crucial to effective administration, especially given new concepts such as Viewpoints, Hierarchy Sets, and Node Sets. The diagram below, taken from the Oracle EDMCS Administration Guide, is a useful reference as you start to build out your EDMCS applications. Future blog posts will explore these key constructs in more detail. Does EDMCS include Data Relationship Governance (DRG)? Not yet, but workflows, approvals, separation of duties, and other data governance goodness is on the roadmap for EDMCS. But fear not! EDMCS already provides a “request” mechanism. Modifications to master data can only be performed within the context of a request. Requests can include interactive changes through the UI or batch loading of changes through an Excel request file (think of request files like automator or action scripts, but easier to use and yes, in Excel!). Comments can be included with a request and, continuing with one of the strongest features of DRM, requests provide auditability by capturing the who/what/when/where of every change performed in EDMCS. How is the User Interface? One of my favorite features is the visual feedback EDMCS provides as you make changes within a request. As you add, insert, remove, delete, reorder, or modify a member, visual icons and highlights are displayed for that member in real-time to capture the action being performed on that member. You basically get a preview of the change before it’s committed. Changes to properties are visually highlighted and easy to spot. Validations are performed as the request is in Draft status and instantly flag any violations with error messages highlighting the problem node and issue. Overall, EDMCS is an exciting entry into the EPM Cloud market and a foundational tool critical to maximizing your EPM Cloud investment. While DRM administrators will experience an adjustment period as they learn EDMCS due to the data chain and new terminology, they will be pleasantly surprised with the available functionality such as pre-packaged connectors and properties for PBCS/EPBCS, the use of requests (and did I mention you can load Excel files?!), and the real-time visual feedback as you modify and validate your master data.
2019-04-22T14:36:06Z
https://ranzal.blog/tag/cloud-services/
Turkish fire on Kurdish YPG and ISIL positions in Syria. Turkey is experiencing clashes between Syrian border troops and ISIL militants. Turkey provides weapons to the Syrian Opposition, primarily to Syrian Turkmen Brigades. Turkey and Russia tensions strike as Turkey shoots a Russian fighter jet and Turkmen rebels down a Russian helicopter. Syrian government forces capture most of the Turkmen Mountain with Russian military aid. Turkey vows to protect the Syrian Turkmen and Syrian Turkmen dominated areas of Bayırbucak and Azaz-Aleppo-Jarabulus line. Turkey, whose relations with Syria had been friendly over the previous decade, condemned its President Bashar Assad over the violent crackdown on protests in 2011 and requested his departure from office. Previously, after 1999 when Bashar Assad's father Hafez al-Assad expelled Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan, the relationship between Syria and Turkey warmed. In the beginning of the Syrian Civil War, Turkey trained defectors of the Syrian Army on its territory, and in July 2011, a group of them announced the birth of the Free Syrian Army, under the supervision of Turkish intelligence. In October 2011, Turkey began sheltering the Free Syrian Army, offering the group a safe zone and a base of operations. Together with Saudi Arabia and Qatar, Turkey has also provided the rebels with arms and other military equipment. Tensions between Syria and Turkey significantly worsened after Syrian forces shot down a Turkish fighter jet in June 2012, and border clashes erupted in October 2012. Turkey also provided refuge for Syrian dissidents. Syrian opposition activists convened in Istanbul in May to discuss regime change, and Turkey hosts the head of the Free Syrian Army, Colonel Riad al-Asaad. Turkey has become increasingly hostile to the Assad government's policies and has encouraged reconciliation among dissident factions. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad." Beginning in May 2012, some Syrian opposition fighters began being armed and trained by the Turkish National Intelligence Organisation. Turkey maintains a small enclave within Syria itself, the Tomb of Suleyman Shah on the right bank of the Euphrates in Aleppo Province, near the village of Qarah Qawzak (Karakozak). The Tomb is guarded by a small permanent garrison of Turkish soldiers, who continue to rotate in from a battalion based at the Turkish border some 25 kilometres (16 mi) away, even as the civil war unfolded around them. Up until Syrian forces shot down a Turkish warplane in June 2012, the garrison numbered 15 men in total. Following the incident, the Turkish government doubled the number of soldiers stationed at the tomb to 30, while then-Prime Minister Erdoğan warned that "the tomb of Suleyman Shah and the land that surrounds it are Turkish territory. Any act of aggression against it would be an attack on our territory and NATO territory." Analysts have cited the tomb as a potential future flashpoint in Turkish-Syrian relations. Academics, journalists, and several heads of state have noted that Turkey actively works with ISIS through funding, supplying weapons, allowing fighters to freely move to and from Turkey, and providing healthcare to wounded ISIS fighters. It is also claimed that Turkey buys oil on the black market from ISIS and that Turkey smuggles weapons to ISIS fighters. Numerous incidents along the Syrian–Turkish border have taken place during the Syrian Civil War, straining the relations between the countries. Dozens were killed, both among civilians and military personnel. Following Syria's downing of a Turkish jet in 2012, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan changed the military's rules of engagement so that any Syrian element approaching the border would be deemed a threat and be treated as a military target. Turkey has bolstered its defenses and deployed additional troops on its border with Syria in mid to late September 2013, with convoys of military vehicles ferrying equipment and personnel and additional short range air defenses set up. During the 5 December 2011 night, about 35 armed fighters tried to cross the border of Syria from Turkey, but were engaged immediately by the Syrian border forces who inflicted several wounds to them and were able to repel them back to Turkey. Once they were back on Turkish soil, the Turkish army allegedly picked them up in trucks and took care of the injured fighters. A further attempt happened during the night of 12 December, when 15 infiltrators tried again to cross the border. They were unsuccessful and two of them were killed by Syrian border patrols. On 22 June 2012, Syrian air defenses shot down a Turkish F-4 Phantom fighter jet, and both pilots were killed. The incident significantly raised tensions between the two countries. Syria stated that it had shot the fighter down using anti-aircraft artillery near the village of Om al-Tuyour, while it was flying over Syrian territorial waters one kilometer away from land. Turkey's foreign minister stated the jet was shot down in international airspace after accidentally entering Syrian airspace, while it was on a training flight to test Turkey's radar capabilities. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan vowed retaliation, saying: "The rules of engagement of the Turkish Armed Forces have changed ... Turkey will support Syrian people in every way until they get rid of the bloody dictator and his gang." Ankara acknowledged that the jet had flown over Syria for a short time, but they said such temporary overflights were common, had not led to an attack before, and alleged that Syrian helicopters had violated Turkish airspace five times without being attacked and that a second, search-and-rescue jet had been fired at. Assad later expressed regret over the incident. In August 2012, reports appeared in some Turkish newspapers claiming that the Turkish General Staff had deliberately misinformed the Turkish government about the fighter's location when it was shot down. The reports said that a NATO command post at Izmir and a British base in Cyprus had confirmed that the fighter was shot down inside Syrian waters and that radar intelligence from U.S. forces had disproved any "accidentally entered Syrian waters" flightpath error. The General Staff denied the claims. Tensions were further raised later that year when Syrian mortar rounds began landing in Turkish territory. On 3 October, a Syrian mortar shell hit the Turkish town of Akçakale, killing 5 civilians. Turkey responded by shelling Syrian army positions along the border. Throughout October, Syrian mortar shells repeatedly landed in Turkish territory, and the Turkish military launched retaliatory artillery and mortar strikes, firing into Syria a total of 87 times. These attacks reportedly killed 12 Syrian soldiers and destroyed several tanks. In the early hours of 14 January 2013, a shell fired by unknown Syrian forces landed in an olive grove near the border village of Akçabağlar, causing no casualties. On January 30, Syrian El Muhaberat agents tried to cross the border between Turkey and Syria but were turned back under fire by Turkish forces. On 11 February 2013, a bomb exploded at the Turkısh-Syrian border crossing in Cilvegözü, killing 14. According to BBC, the deadly attack killed 17 people and injured 30 more. On April 30, 2013, according to Syrian opposition activists, the Syrian air force raided the headquarters of a rebel camp on Syrian-Turkish border, killing 5. Activists told Hurriyet Daily News that the air attack was made on headquarters of a Salafist group Ahrar al-Sham. A Turkish aid worker said the air strike also hit a warehouse on the Syrian side of the border used by aid groups. Another Syrian activist at Bab al-Hawa said people waiting to cross the Syrian-Turkish border were among those hit. He added that at least 15 wounded were taken to hospital near the crossing on the Syrian side and among the dead were a one-and-a-half-year-old child and two teenage girls. Some Syrian activists said some of the casualties were suffering breathing difficulties but said they did not know what type of munitions had been used in the attack. "We cannot confirm that there were any chemical weapons involved," Reyhanli mayor Huseyin Sanverdi told Reuters. On 2 May 2013, fighting occurred between Syrian anti-government insurgents and Turkish border guards at the Akçakale border crossing. One Turkish border guard was killed in the engagement, reportedly the first armed clashes between Turkish government agents and anti-Assad militants. On September 16, 2013, Turkish jets shot down a Syrian helicopter on the Syrian-Turkish border. According to Turkish official statement, Turkish warplanes made the intercept after a Syrian Mi-17 helicopter had crossed into Turkish airspace and the government warned it had taken all necessary measures to defend itself against any further such violations. Syrian army acknowledged the helicopter had strayed into Turkish airspace for a short time, while monitoring "terrorists" moving across the border into Syria, but said it was an accident and that the aircraft was on its way back when it was shot down. Five Syrian Kurds were killed while crossing borders into Turkey on January 20, 2014. Zahir Mulla and Muhammad Ahmad were killed along with other three men (whose identities couldn't be identified), when Turkish border guards opened fire. On 23 March 2014, Turkish fighter jets shot down a Syrian MiG-23. The Syrian Arab Republic claims that its aircraft was in Syrian airspace on a mission to attack rebel held areas in the city of Latakia when it was shot down by Turkey in an act of "blatant aggression." The Syrian pilot successfully ejected from the aircraft as the aircraft was being shot down. Turkish Prime Minister Erdoğan stated that Turkish F-16s shot down the aircraft for violating Turkish airspace and said that the Turkish "response will be heavy if you violate our airspace." In the night of 21–22 February 2015, a convoy of 572 Turkish troops in 39 tanks and 57 armoured vehicles entered Syria through Kobanî to evacuate the 38-man Turkish military garrison guarding the Suleyman Shah tomb and move the remains of Suleyman Shah to a different site because of a rumored attack threat of ISIL. The Turkish military did not seek permission from Syria to carry out the mission, the Syrian Foreign Ministry condemned the move, saying that Turkey "committed an act of flagrant aggression on Syrian land." On 16 May 2015, a Turkish Air Force F-16 shot down an Iranian made Mohajer 4 UAV that had violated Turkish airspace over Hatay province entering 11 km into Turkish airspace. Initial claims by the Turkish government mentioned an intruding helicopter was shot down, but later it was admitted that the downed aircraft was an UAV as claimed by the Syrian side. In May, there was a public scandal over video footage released by the newspaper Cumhuriyet purporting to show Turkish intelligence shipping arms to Syrian Islamist rebels. The editor-in-chief and more than thirty officers involved in the search and the attempted search of another truck of weapons some time earlier now face charges for breaking counter-terrorism laws, attempting to overthrow the government and military espionage. Turkey has, despite national and international criticism, largely refused to directly engage militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), despite continued threats from ISIL to pursue more operations on Turkish soil. The Turkish response to the ISIL-led Siege of Kobanî as well as a series of terrorist attacks on Turkish soil allegedly linked to ISIL perpetrators, was largely subdued apart from a series of incidents on the Turkish–Syrian border. On 24 July 2015, ISIL and Turkish soldiers actively engaged in the Turkish border town of Kilis, marking a dangerous new escalation in the ties between Turkey and ISIL. On August 25, 2015 Turkish newspaper Bugün ran a front-page story showing alleged transfer of weapon and explosives from Turkey to ISIL through Akcakale border post. A couple of days later offices of Koza İpek Media Group, the owner of the newspaper, were raided by Turkish police. In late November 2015, Turkey started tougher controls to stop ISIL militants crossing on a 60-mile stretch of the border with Syria where ISIL had control of the Syrian side. The crossing was used for smuggling and for arms transfers. This followed Russian President Putin directly accusing Turkey of aiding ISIL and al-Qaeda, and pressure from the U.S. With the Turkish government thinking that the declaration was enough, and with only a minimum of western airstrikes helping the defenders of Kobanî, ISIL troops edged closer to the city, eventually entering it from the south and east. Feeling betrayed by the Turkish government and hearing that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's previous vow not to let Kobanî fall was in fact a lie, refugees on the border and citizens in the cities of Istanbul, Ankara, Antakya, Antalya, Eskişehir, Denizli, Kocaeli, Diyarbakır, Siirt, Batman, and elsewhere began to protest. Turkish police responded with tear gas and water cannons, and live fire in the southern province of Adana, killing protestors. By 7 October, ISIL militants and Kurdish defenders were fighting in the streets of Kobanî, with many dead and scores wounded on both sides. American and Arab states conducted airstrikes in support of the defense of the town. However, US officials acknowledged that airstrikes would not likely be decisive in preventing the fall of Kobanî. They described the air campaign as a broad effort to undermine ISIL's ability to operate rather than an intervention that could turn the tide of a particular battle, such as the one at Kobanî. As the battle for Kobanî continued to rage, rioting continued in Turkey, and almost 40 people were killed in street clashes by mid-October. In late October, ISIL began shelling the border post near Kobanî. On 11 October, Turkish President Erdogan denounced the protests, claiming that they were attacking Turkey's "peace, stability, and environment of trust." He stated that the government was already caring for 200,000 Kurdish refugees from the Kobanî area and asked, "What does Kobanî have to do with Turkey?" By mid-October, fighting had also renewed between Turkish military forces and PKK elements in southeastern Turkey. On 29 November 2014, ISIL fighters began attacking YPG fighters in Kobanî from Turkish territory. Kurdish sources in Kobane said that on November 29 ISIL fighters attacked Kobane from Turkish territory, and that the assault began with a vehicle driven by a suicide bomber coming from Turkish territory. During the attack, a group of ISIL fighters were seen atop granary silos on the Turkish side of the border. According to the German news outlet 'Der Spiegel', ISIL fighters also attacked YPG positions near the border gate from Turkish soil. According to the SOHR, YPG fighters crossed the Turkish border and attacked ISIL positions on Turkish soil, before pulling back to Syria. Soon afterwards, the Turkish Army regained control of the border crossing and silos area. On 25 June 2015, fighters from ISIL launched an attack against Kobanî, detonating three car bombs. The ISIL fighters were reported to have disguised themselves as Kurdish security forces, before entering the town and shooting civilians with assault rifles and RPGs. Over 164 people are dead and 200 injured, making the attack one of the largest killings of civilians in the North of Syria. Kurdish forces and the Syrian government claimed the vehicles had entered the city from across the border, an action denied by Turkey. ISIS also committed a massacre in the village of Barkh Butan, about 20 kilometres south of Kobanî, executing at least 23 Syrian Kurds, among them women and children. On February 22, 2016, U.S.-Russia joint cease-fire deal announced to take effect in Syria on Feb. 27, but the “cessation of hostilities” does not include ISIL and the al-Nusra Front, the main jihadist factions. On Feb. 24, Turkish president, Erdoğan, during a speech said that “The PYD and the YPG need to be out of the scope of the cease-fire, just like Daesh (ISIL) is,”. On 27 March 2014 an audio tape recording of high-level Turkish officials discussing Turkey's Syria strategy was released on YouTube. The officials discussed a false flag operation that would lead to an invasion of Syria. YouTube was subsequently blocked in Turkey. A vote in the Turkish Parliament was scheduled for October 1, 2014 on whether or not to invade Syria as part of the war on ISIL. while preparations for a possible invasion were made. It was later delayed a day. The de facto "declaration of war" is to take the form of two separate motions—one on Iraq and one on Syria, which would authorize Turkish troops to invade those countries. the opposition said they hadn't been able to read either motion, as the exact text had been delayed. Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç said that the gist of the resolutions was to extend the current mandate for "hot pursuit" against the PKK and Syrian Army into Syria and Iraq, which was to end the second week in October, and to add ISIS to the list and set up a buffer zone on the Syrian side of the border. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan opened the parliamentary session by saying that Turkey would fight against so called Islamic State and other "terrorist" groups in the region but it would stick to its aim of seeing Bashar al-Assad removed from power. With the governing party losing its majority in the Turkish general election on 7 June 2015, rumors began to circulate that President Erdoğan would order an invasion of Syria to prevent the creation of a Kurdish state straddling northern Syria and Iraq. On June 26, Erdogan said he would "never allow the establishment of a Kurdish state in northern Syria". By the end of June, a number of Turkish newspapers reported that Ankara was considering a ground operation to establish a buffer zone in Northern Syria to prevent Syrian Kurds from declaring an independent state, a zone 110 km long and 33 km deep along the Turkish border. The military demanded legal backing for such a move, and on 29 June 2015, Erdoğan chaired a meeting of the National Security Council to provide just that. Leaked plans stated that, sometime during the first couple of weeks of July, up to 18 thousand troops would invade Syria via the Jarablus and Aazaz border crossings, areas in the hands of ISIL and the Free Syrian Army, respectively, and set up a buffer zone to which refugees could be repatriated. Limiting intervention to airstrikes has also been discussed. The idea of going into Syria proved extremely unpopular with most sections of Turkish society, dissuading the government from invading. On February 2016 Turkey and Saudi Arabia were pressing for ground operations in Syria, hoping for the involvement of the U.S. and the other allies. Hezbollah said Turkey and Saudi Arabia were using the Islamic State group as a "pretext" to launch a ground operation in Syria. On October 13, 2014 Turkey denied the United States to use Incirlik Air Base for attacking ISIS militants in Syria. The US has been frustrated that its efforts to build an international coalition to tackle Isis forces from the air have been partly hobbled by the difficulty of getting Turkey engaged. Later, on July 23, 2015 after long negotiations with USA, Turkey has agreed to allow U.S. planes to launch air strikes against Islamic State militants. The U.S. officials declined to give details of the agreement with Turkey. On February 25, 2016, Saudi Arabian war planes began arriving at the base as part of an anti-Isis build-up being deployed over Syria. The Saudi deployment added to US, German and British aircraft already using the base. on April 2 and 3, the families of U.S. troops and civilian personnel stationed at İncirlik Air Base left the base after an order by the Pentagon and the U.S. State Department to leave several areas of Turkey for their security. In July 2015, relations between ISIL and Turkey deteriorated, and people on the Turkish side of the border began to get killed, leading the Turkish government to pursue military action. On 7 July 2015, reports surfaced that Turkish security forces seized a truck bound for Syria loaded with 10,000 detonators and explosive primers with total length of 290,000 metres (950,000 feet) in Akcakale, Sanliurfa province, southeastern Turkey. Five people were arrested. The detainees admitted attempts of crossing the border from the village of Aegean into Tal Abyad city in the Al-Raqqah Province. On 20 July 2015, a cultural center in Suruç was bombed by a 20-year-old male Turkish ISIL member. 32 people were killed in the town of Suruç's municipal culture center in the southeastern province of Şanlıurfa, and at least 100 people were hospitalised. One Turkish sergeant was killed by fire from ISIL forces in Syria, and four Turkish tanks returned fire into ISIL held territory in Syria. At least one ISIL militant was killed and an unknown number wounded. Early on 24 July, three Turkish F-16 Fighting Falcons struck ISIL targets across the border from Kilis Province with smart bombs, the Turkish government announced. According to the Doğan news agency, as many as 35 ISIL militants were killed in this first air strike. The Turkish government claimed that this was to prevent an attempted invasion by ISIL troops. Government officials also announced that the US was allowed to use the İncirlik Airbase in southern Turkey, and the agreement by the Americans to allow Turkey to set up a no-fly zone fifty miles deep and several hundred miles wide within Syria, between Mare' and Jarabulus. YPG (Syrian Kurds) accused Turkey that, on July 26, Turkish tanks shelled in the Kurdish-held village of Zormikhar, west of Kobane and, also, one of its vehicles had come "under heavy fire from the Turkish military east of Kobane in the village of Til Findire". Turkey said it was investigating the claim but insisted that its forces were not targeting Syrian Kurds. On 24 and 25 October 2015, Kurds accused the Turkish military of opening fire at its forces in Tal Abyad after the majority Arab town was included into a Kurdish enclave. The Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu confirmed it and he said that Turkey had warned the PYD not to cross to the "west of the Euphrates and that we would hit it the moment it did. "We hit it twice,". There were no casualties in the shooting and the Kurdish forces didn't return fire. On October 25, Turkish forces also attacked the village of Buban. During the attack two civilians wounded. Turkish F-16s shoot down a Russian Su-24 operating in Northern Latakia. Both occupants ejected successfully. The pilot was shot and killed by Syrian Turkmen rebel ground fire while descending by parachute. The weapon systems officer was rescued two days later. A Russian naval infantryman from the search-and-rescue team launched to retrieve the two airmen was also killed when a rescue helicopter was shot down by the rebels. A Turkish survey has revealed that over half of Turkey’s population believe that Turkey was right in downing a Russian jet. Some 58.2 percent of respondents regard the act as a positive thing, while 41.8 percent said it was the wrong move. The majority of those who supported the move said that “it showed that Turkey was a big country,”. On December 2015, Turkey rejected to join the anti-ISIL quartet of Syria, Iran, Iraq and Russia. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he rejected it due to the presence of Syria's president Bashar al-Assad. On 1 February Syria accused the Turkish military of shelling a location in the country’s northern Latakia province. Because of the shelling civilians had been injured. Syrian government condemned the attack. Also, the Russian Defense Ministry presented a video which claims that shows Turkish military shelling Syrian territory using heavy artillery positioned close to the border. According to Syria’s General Staff, Syrian opposition groups have also provided video evidence of the Turkish military shelling Syrian territory. On 13 February 2016, Turkey began heavy artillery bombing of Kurds in North Aleppo and at Azaz as they advanced against opposition groups. The US urged Turkey to stop the shelling of the Kurds and focus on fighting the group Islamic State (IS), however, Turkey defied the US and French calls and continued the shelling the next day too. Also, in a telephone call with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Turkey will continue to strike back at Kurdish fighters in Syria. Kurdish officials said that at least three YPG fighters have died since the shelling started on Saturday. Syria called the Turkish strikes a violation of its territory, and urged UN Security Council action to "put an end to the crimes of the Turkish regime". It also accused Ankara of allowing some 100 gunmen to enter Syria, also, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said some 350 Islamist fighters had been allowed to travel through Turkish territory on Saturday 14 February 2016 to reinforce Islamist rebels in Azaz and Tal Rifaat. Turkish artillery also targeted Syrian forces on both days. On 15 February, Turkey hit again Kurdish forces in Syria. A Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman said the strikes came after a border security outpost in the Hatay area was attacked. In addition, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that Turkish troops were shelling, also, the road to the west of the town of Tal Rifaat and also the region to the west of the Syrian border town of Azaz, but failed to stop the advance of the Kurdish forces. On 16 February, Turkish forces continued to shell the positions of Syrian Kurds in northern Syria for the fourth day. Turkish military said that it was retaliating to fire coming from the region. Turkey urged its NATO allies to participate in a ground offensive in Syria to fight ISIS while continuing to shell YPG positions. On 17 February, Turkish forces continued to shell the positions of Syrian Kurds in northern Syria for fifth day in a row. Turkish artillery units deployed at the border in the Kilis Province shelled the positions of the PYD at around 4.45 p.m. within the rules of engagement. The Turkish military stating it was “retaliating” to fire coming from the region. Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Turkey would continue shelling Kurdish militants across the border in Syria, despite calls from Washington and other Western capitals to halt the attacks. Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said, after a suicide car bombing attack in Ankara, that Turkey would continue the shelling of YPG positions in northern Syria. Opposition groups reported that over the previous few days they had brought over 2,000 reinforcements with heavy equipment from the Idlib area, through Turkey assisted by Turkish forces, to fight against Kurdish militias north of Aleppo and to support rebels in Azaz. Turkish artillery units shelled again PYD targets in northern Syria. Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said that Turkey’s shelling of YPG forces in northern Syria would be an “ongoing topic of conversation” between USA and Turkey. On 16 February 2016 Turkey and Saudi Arabia were pressing for ground operations in Syria, hoping for the involvement of the U.S. and the other allies. On 17 February 2016, as Syrian Kurdish forces advance on the Turkish border, Ankara has called for a safe zone, "free from clashes", and No-fly zone inside Syria, in order to protect border and refugees. The proposal has not garner any real support from Washington or NATO allies who fear it would require an internationally patrolled no-fly zone and potentially put them in direct confrontation with Assad and his allies. Only, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said, that such a "safe zone" would be "helpful in the current situation." Russia with dominance over Syria's skies, come out against the idea and, also, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said: "This is not Merkel's initiative, this is a Turkish initiative." In addition, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov said that any decision to create a no-fly zone over Syria cannot be made without the approval of the government in Damascus as well as the UN Security Council. On 17 February 2016, in Ankara, a car bombing attack happened at night. The attack targeted a convoy of military vehicles. Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu blamed a Syrian Kurdish militia fighter working with Kurdish militants inside Turkey for a suicide car bombing, and he vowed retaliation in both Syria and Iraq. He also, said that Turkey's armed forces would continue their shelling of recent days of YPG positions in northern Syria. President Tayyip Erdogan also said initial findings suggested the Syrian Kurdish militia and the PKK were behind the bombing. On the other hand, the political arm of the YPG, denied involvement in the bombing, while a senior member of the PKK said he did not know who was responsible. Also, the head of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) said that Turkey is using this attack as a "pretext" to intervene in Syria. The leader of the main Syrian Kurdish group Salih Muslim Muhammad said that Turkey's accusations that the PYD was behind the bombing are made up and that Turkey was trying to escalate the situation in Syria. On February 25, Turkish prime minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said that Turkey would not comply with the truce: "This deal is not binding for us when a party is of threat to Turkey, when Turkey’s security is at stake". On 4 March, the YPG militia said that Turkey′s tanks had fired dozens of shells at its positions in the area of Afrin in northwest Syria. Russia’s Defense Ministry reported that Turkey continues to shell Kurdish forces in Syria, hampering their operations against Al-Nusra, and at the same time funneling supplies to the militant-controlled areas at the border. Furthermore, according to the head of the Russian ceasefire monitoring center Lt. Gen. Sergey Kuralenko, militants continue to freely cross the Turkish-Syrian border and, also, Turkish trucks crossed the Turkish-Syrian border, carrying supplies and arms exclusively to the territories controlled by Al-Nusra Front and Ahrar ash-Sham groups. In addition, he presented a reconnaissance video which he claimed that it confirmed his accusations. On 6 March, according to Lieutenant General Sergey Kuralenko, Head of the Center for Reconciliation, jihadist militants of Jabhat Al-Nusra in Syria shelled Turkish area in an attempt to provoke a response that could lead to Ankara sending troops into the neighboring country, a move which would inevitably lead to the disruption of the peace process. On 8 March, Mortar shells fired from Syria in Turkey and killed 2 civilians, the Turkish military returned fire into Syria. According to Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, Islamic State militants were responsible for the attack. On 13 March, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Russia has evidence of Turkey's "creeping expansion" in northern Syria. He accused Turkey of fortifying positions hundreds of metres from the border, inside Syria and also sending its military across the Syrian border for Operation Against Kurds and to prevent Kurdish groups there from consolidating their positions. Turkey denied the Russian claims. On 18 March, Russia's UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin sent a letter to the UN Security Council saying that three Turkish humanitarian organizations (NGOs) sent weapons and supplies to extremists in Syria on behalf of Turkey's MIT intelligence agency. The three NGOs were the Besar Foundation, the Iyilikder Foundation and the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms (IHH). On April, the U.S. has asked for Turkey’s support to the Manbij offensive, but Turkey had two demands in exchange for helping the U.S.-led anti-ISIL coalition. Turkey first demanded that the Syrian Arab tribes to be included in the Manbij operation should leave the Syrian Democratic Forces, which is under the control of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and also the U.S. must increase its air strikes for groups Turkey supports. On 4 April, according to a Turkish source, a group of U.S. military and intelligence staff traveled to Turkey to work on a plan for an operation to liberate Manbij. On May 1, a MQ-1 modelled drone belonging to the U.S.-led coalition hit a bomb factory belonging to the ISIL and destroyed it. The drone took off from the İncirlik Air Base. Two ISIL militants were killed as a result of the airstrike and many others were trapped in the building that was hit, according to Anadolu Agency. Meanwhile, the Turkish army fired howitzers at ISIL positions in Syria and nine militants were killed as a result, after ISIL fired three rockets from Syria at Turkey’s southern border province of Kilis. The Turkish Foreign Ministry has demanded raising awareness on the Kilis to the U.S. Department of State. Turkey also demanded the deployment of High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) rocket launchers at Turkey’s Syria border. According to Turkey, such moves would push ISIL militants southwards, leaving the border province of Kilis out of battery ranges. Two persons were killed when two Katyusha rockets fired from the ISIL in Syria hit the southeastern border town of Kilis. The Turkish military returned fire into Syria, hitting ISIL targets, according to military sources. Four MQ-1 drones took off from the İncirlik Air Base to strike ISIL targets under the campaign of the anti-ISIL coalition. Five weapon pits belonging to the jihadist group were destroyed and 29 militants were killed in the airstrikes, according to information and images obtained from the region. Two rocket projectiles hit the border province of Kilis. Turkish artillery units responded to the attack by shelling ISIL positions and firing multiple rocket launchers after unmanned aerial vehicles spotted where the rockets were fired. Six ISIL militants were killed and two Katyusha rocket positions were destroyed, according to the army. Two Katyusha rockets fired by ISIL hit the southeastern border town of Kilis. The Turkish army responded by firing howitzers toward ISIL targets, reportedly destroying two ISIL Katyusha positions and killed three ISIL militants. Nine Katyusha rockets hit Kilis. The Turkish army said that four ISIL militants were killed and the weapon launching sites that the attack was carried out from was destroyed. The governor’s office in Kilis released an official statement declared the province a “special security area,” effective for 15 days until 5:00 p.m. on May 20. Four rockets fired from northern Syria by ISIL hit Kilis. A group of 20 Turkish special forces teams reportedly conducted operations in ISIL-held areas in northern Syria at around 1.30 a.m. to scout the region to help destroy missile launchers, after a 10-day intelligence and preparation process. U.S. and Russian military officials were also reportedly informed of the operation. Also, in the morning hours, the Turkish military carried out four separate air strikes against ISIL positions in northern Syria, as part of a joint effort and intelligence with the U.S.-led coalition forces. Two Katyusha rockets were fired from ISIL positions in Syria on the southeastern province of Kilis following the air strikes. Turkish armed forces responded to the attack by shelling ISIL targets with howitzers from the border. In the evening hours, reconnaissance and surveillance vehicles spotted ISIL positions in the Suran region north of Aleppo and the Baragidah and Kuşacık regions northeast of Tal el Hişn. Army shelled them. A total of 55 ISIL militants were killed in the shellings, while three vehicles and three rocket launchers belonging to the jihadist group were also destroyed. A total of 28 ISIL militants were killed by Turkey and U.S.-led coalition in operations targeting positions belonging to the jihadist group in Syria, security sources have said. Some 27 ISIL militants were killed and five defense positions and two weapon pits used by the jihadist group were also destroyed in shelling by the Turkish army and air operations by the U.S.-led coalition forces in northern Syria. During an International Syria Support Group (ISSG) meeting in Vienna, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu told his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov that if Moscow has any evidence that shows Turkey helping the ISIL then he would resign. Russian General Staff Lt. Gen. Sergey Rudskoy told journalists that Al-Nusra Front is receiving daily arms shipments across the border from Turkey and that Al-Nusra Front remains a major destabilizing factor in Syria. He also added that Al-Nusra Front often attack the Syrian Government forces despite the cease-fire and that the attacks are confirmed by other nations as well. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu was very angry because of some photos which showed US special forces in Syria wearing insignia of Kurdish militia (patch of the YPJ), during joint operations against Islamic State (IS). He called the US "two-faced" and said the practice was "unacceptable". Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook said it is common for US soldiers to attempt to blend in with local partners. Five people were injured when rockets fired from ISIL-controlled territory in northern Syria hit Turkey’s border province of Kilis. Two rockets were fired at Turkish territory from ISIL-controlled territory in Syria. No injuries were reported. Turkish military hit ISIL positions in northern Syria as a retaliation for the rocket attack. According to Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, Turkey has proposed to USA a detailed plan for joint military operation against jihadists inside Syria with the Americans and other allied troops. But U.S. officials denied it and said that Turkey had not offered a detailed plan but only a few basic concepts which involved joint efforts only to support non-Kurdish forces. Satellite images confirmed that the first Syrian camps appeared in Turkey in July 2011, shortly after the towns of Deraa, Homs and Hama were besieged. By June 2013, Turkey has accepted 400,000 Syrian refugees, half of whom are spread around a dozen camps placed under the direct authority of the Turkish Government. In 2014, the number swelled over a million, as some 200-300,000 Syrian Kurds streamed into Turkey in September alone, upon the Siege of Kobane. The population of Syrian refugees in Turkey has 30 percent in 22 government-run camps near the Syrian-Turkish border. The rest do their best to make ends meet in communities across the country. Turkey has accepted over 1.5 million Syrian refugees since the beginning of the Syrian Civil War. Turkey has accommodated most of its Syrian refugees in tent cities administered by the country's emergency management agency. According to Amnesty International, Turkish guards routinely shoot at Syrian refugees stranded at the border, also, Turkey has forcibly returned thousands of Syrian refugees to war zone since mid-January 2016. On May 10, 2016, Human Rights Watch said Turkish border guards were shooting and beating Syrian refugees trying to reach Turkey, resulting in deaths and serious injuries. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan denied it. On May 18, 2016, lawmakers from the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights (DROI) have said that Turkey should not use Syrian refugees as a bribe for the process of visa liberalization for Turkish citizens inside the European Union. Turkey has been accused of supporting or colluding with ISIL, especially by Syrian Kurds. Syrian Kurds and the Turkey's main Kurdish party, HDP, accused Turkey of allowing ISIL soldiers to cross its border and attack the Kurdish town of Kobanî. They also claimed that Islamic State snipers were hiding among grain depots on the Turkish side of the border and firing on the town. In addition. the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that the vehicle which is used in a car bombing attack at Kobanî had come from Turkey. According to journalist Patrick Cockburn, there is "strong evidence for a degree of collaboration" between the Turkish intelligence services and ISIL, although the "exact nature of the relationship ... remains cloudy". David L. Phillips of Columbia University's Institute for the Study of Human Rights, who compiled a list of allegations and claims accusing Turkey of assisting ISIL, writes that these allegations "range from military cooperation and weapons transfers to logistical support, financial assistance, and the provision of medical services". Several ISIL fighters and commanders have claimed Turkey supports ISIL. A former ISIS member mentioned that the ISIS groups were essentially given free rein by Turkey's army. He said: "ISIS commanders told us to fear nothing at all because there was full cooperation with the Turks,". "ISIS saw the Turkish army as its ally especially when it came to attacking the Kurds in Syria." Within Turkey itself, ISIL is believed to have caused increasing political polarisation between secularists and Islamists. A video taken in October 2014 shows Turkish soldiers fraternising with Isis fighters near Kobane. Turkish security forces dispersed Kurds who had gathered at the Turkish border with Syria to cross into Syria and fight with Kurdish militants against ISIS. Oliver North tweeted a photograph which he claimed that it shows a Turkish soldier talking friendly with an ISIS anti-aircraft unit. In addition, Kurds accuse Turkey of using the US-led coalition against IS as a cover to attack the Kurdish PKK in both Turkey and Iraq, and now against the YPG in northern Syria. The Kurds say that Turkey 's bombardment of their positions is helping IS to attack Kurdish-held frontline areas in Syria and Iraq. IS militants attacked Syrian Kurdish villages south of Kobane a day after Turkey began shelling the YPG. Also, authorities in Turkey have confirmed social media reports that an injured ISIL commander is being treated in a Denizli hospital, saying the militant has every right to receive medical care as he is a Turkish citizen. Turkey has been further criticized for allowing individuals from outside the region to enter its territory and join ISIL in Syria. With many Islamist fighters passing through Turkey to fight in Syria, Turkey has been accused of becoming a transit country for such fighters and has been labeled the "Gateway to Jihad". Turkish border patrol officers are reported to have deliberately overlooked those entering Syria upon the payment of a small bribe. A report by Sky News exposed documents showing that passports of foreign Islamists wanting to join ISIL by crossing into Syria had been stamped by the Turkish government. American website Al-Monitor stated in June 2014 that Turkey, during the Syrian Civil War, by "ignoring its own border security", had allowed its Syrian border to become a "jihadist highway" for ISIL to let thousands of international jihadists, and other supplies, reach Syria. British newspaper The Guardian stated that Turkey late 2014 "for many months did little to stop foreign recruits crossing its border to Isis". An ISIL commander stated that "most of the fighters who joined us in the beginning of the war came via Turkey, and so did our equipment and supplies", adding that ISIL fighters received treatment in Turkish hospitals. After the 2015 attacks at Paris, President Barack Obama administration told the Turkish government to close its borders to ISIS fighters. A USA senior official said in the Wall Street Journal "The game has changed. Enough is enough. The border needs to be sealed,” “This is an international threat, and it’s coming out of Syria and it’s coming through Turkish territory.”. Turkey has openly supported jihadi groups, such as Ahrar ash-Sham, which espouses much of al-Qaida’s ideology, and Jabhat al-Nusra, which is proscribed as a terror organisation by much of the US and Europe. Turkey reported that between 1957 and 1998, Turkish forces laid 615,419 antipersonnel mines along the Syrian border “to prevent illegal border crossings,” These mines are killing Syrians stuck on the border or trying to cross near Kobani. Turkey is required under the Mine Ban Treaty, to destroy all antipersonnel mines, but has missed deadlines. Human Rights Watch claims in its report that as of November 18 over 2,000 civilians were still in the Tel Shair corridor section of the mine belt due to the fact that Turkey had been refusing entry for cars or livestock, and the refugees did not want to leave behind their belongings. Russia told that for a long time has been aware of oil going from Syria under the control of terrorists to Turkey. The money finances terrorist groups. Vladimir Putin said that “IS has big money, hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars, from selling oil. In addition they are protected by the military of an entire nation. One can understand why they are acting so boldly and blatantly. Why they kill people in such atrocious ways. Why they commit terrorist acts across the world, including in the heart of Europe,”. Also, Western intelligence officials said that they can track the ISIS oil shipments as they move across Iraq and into Turkey’s southern border regions. The Obama administration was struggling to cut off the millions of dollars in oil revenue that has made the ISIS, but they were unable to persuade Turkey. In addition, the former Iraqi member of Parliament Mowaffak al-Rubaie has accused Turkey of turning a blind eye to the black market ISIS oil trade. He said that there is “no shadow of a doubt” that the Turkish government knows about the oil smuggling operations. “The merchants, the businessmen [are buying oil] in the black market in Turkey under the noses – under the auspices if you like – of the Turkish intelligence agency and the Turkish security apparatus.” In June 2014, a member of Turkey's parliamentary opposition, Ali Edibogluan, claimed that IS had smuggled $800 million worth of oil into Turkey from Syria and Iraq. Sadik Al Hiseni, the head of the security committee in the city of Diyala in Iraq, says they have arrested several Turkish tankers trying to take ISIS oil out of the province of Salahuddin. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said that most of the oil produced in Islamic State-held territory in Iraq and Syria was being smuggled through Turkey. He also mentioned that he sees no evidence that Turkey wants to fight ISIS. In addition he told that Turkey wants to revive the Ottoman Empire. Sadi Pria, a top Iraqi Kurdish official in Irbil said: "Turkey shamelessly and openly backs IS and al-Qaeda terrorists against Kurdish freedom fighters,". Israel's defence minister, Moshe Ya'alon, has accused Turkey of buying oil from the ISIS and funds ISIS militants. He, also, said that Turkey had "permitted jihadists to move from Europe to Syria and Iraq and back". The Director of National Intelligence, James R. Clapper, said that he was not optimistic that Turkey would do more in the fight against the Islamic State. “I think Turkey has other priorities and other interests.” He also cited public opinion polls in Turkey that show Turks do not see the Islamic State as a primary threat. Vice President of USA, Joe Biden, during a speech at Harvard accused Turkey and the Gulf countries of funding, supplying and supporting ISIL. Donald Trump accused Turkey of being at the side of ISIS. A senior Jordanian security official accused Turkey of training ISIS fighters. The King of Jordan, Abdullah, said that the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, “believes in a radical Islamic solution to the problems in the region” and the “fact that terrorists are going to Europe is part of Turkish policy, and Turkey keeps getting a slap on the hand, but they get off the hook”. Egypt has accused Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of being a supporter of terrorists who seek to "provoke chaos" in the Middle East. Also, an Egyptian security official said that Turkey is providing direct support to ISIS and that Turkish intelligence is passing satellite imagery and other data to ISIS. Egypt, also, claimed that Turkey provided more than 10,000 passports to ISIS members to facilitate travel of its fighters across the region. Egypt official further charged that Istanbul is serving as the “headquarters” for ISIS planning. The Minister of Defense of Armenia, Seyran Ohanyan, accused Turkey of supporting ISIS. Cypriot Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulidis, questioned Turkey’s determination to fight ISIS. Eren Erdem, member of the main opposition at Turkey, CHP, accused the Turkish Government that it failed to investigate Turkish supply routes used to provide ISIL with toxic Sarin gas ingredients. Because of this statement, he faces treason charges at Turkey. Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, warned the Turkish government not to provide money and training to terror groups. He said, "It isn't right for armed groups to be trained on Turkish soil. You bring foreign fighters to Turkey, put money in their pockets, guns in their hands, and you ask them to kill Muslims in Syria. We told them to stop helping ISIS." He, also, said after the 2015 Ankara bombings that the Turkish Government is "protecting" the ISIL and that "the police department knows all", “the only reason for not having security measures taken or for not having them [suspects] detained is the absence of an instruction from the political authority to fulfill whatever was required. That’s to say, its [the political authority’s] protection of ISIL. This is not an observation, I’m saying this very openly and clearly,”. At 16 February 2016, Kılıçdaroğlu has repeated accusations that the Turkish government has sent arms to jihadist groups in Syria and built jihadist training camp in Turkey. Russian anti-drug chief mentioned that ISIS is using Turkey for trafficking heroin to Europe. He, also, believes that ISIS makes about $1 billion from Afghan heroin trade. Turkey's state intelligence agency, MIT, has been accused that it helped deliver arms to parts of Syria under Islamist rebel control. Turkish journalists who exposed it have charged with spying and “divulging state secrets” from the Turkish court. One of the journalists claimed:"Those who sent the convoy from Turkey knew that the weapons were “heading to end [up] in ISIS hands". Also, Turkish officers, who intercepted some of the intelligence agency’s weapons-filled trucks have faced spying charges. In addition, Turkish newspaper, Cumhuriyet, published a video footage which it said showed security forces discovering weapons parts being sent to Syria on trucks belonging to the MIT state intelligence agency. Syria's president Bashar al-Assad during an interview at 2015 mentioned that military and logistic support from Turkey was the key factor in ISIL takeover of Idlib (2015 Idlib offensive), he also blamed Turkey for the failure of a humanitarian ceasefire plan in Aleppo. He told that: "The Turks told the factions - the terrorists that they support and they supervise - to refuse to cooperate with de Mistura". Syria's antiquities chief has accused Turkey of refusing to return looted objects from ancient heritage sites in Syria or to provide information about them. Also, Turkey have been accused that she lets ISIL smuggles Syrian antiquities through her. In an official letter to UN, the Russian envoy Vitaly Churkin stated that antiquities from Syria and Iraq are exported to Turkey. The main center for the smuggling of cultural heritage items is the Turkish city of Gaziantep, where the stolen goods are sold at illegal auctions. According to the envoy, new smuggling hubs are popping up on the Turkish-Syrian border, with the “bulky goods” being delivered by the Turkish transport companies. Smuggled artifacts then arrive in the Turkish cities of Izmir, Mersin and Antalya, where representatives of international criminal groups produce fake documents on the origin of the antiquities. According to Gatestone Institute, Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) and Südwestrundfunk (SWR) ISIS was selling women and children in Turkey. Also, Consortium of Public Broadcasters in Germany (ARD) produced a footage documenting the slave trade being conducted by the Islamic State (ISIS) in Turkey. After these reports the Gaziantep Bar Association filed a criminal complaint against "Turkey's National Intelligence Organization (MIT) and law-enforcement officers that have committed neglect of duty and misconduct by not taking required measures, and not carrying out preventive and required intelligence activities before the media covered the said incidents.". Iran accused Turkey that she is the main culprits in supporting the terrorist movements of ISIL. Katrin Kunert, a German Parliamentarian from the Green Party leaked a classified document which showed that Turkey was delivering arms to Syrian rebel groups. Hezbollah Chief, Hassan Nasrallah, accused Turkey and Qatar for supporting ISIS. Serena Shim, a journalist of Press TV was killed at a car crash with a heavy vehicle in Turkey in what are claimed, by her employer and her parents, to be suspicious circumstances. The car crash happened just days after she claimed that the Turkey's state intelligence agency, MIT, had threatened her and accused her of spying, due to some of the stories she had covered about Turkey’s stance on ISIL militants in Kobane. She also claimed that she had received images of ISIL militants crossing the Turkish border into Syria in World Food Organization and other NGOs trucks. At December 2015, Turkey rejected to join the anti-ISIL quartet of Syria, Iran, Iraq and Russia. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he rejected it due to the presence of Syria's president Bashar al-Assad. At January 2016, The Guardian obtained documents which show that ISIL ran a sophisticated immigration operation through the Syrian border town of Tell Abyad with Turkey until its defeat by Kurds. The border crossing remained open until Kurdish forces took control of the town (Tell Abyad offensive), at which point Turkey promptly sealed it. David Phillips, an academic at Columbia University and author of two recent research papers into links between Turkey and ISIS, alleges that the country “knows the movements of all persons and can control the flow across the border if it chooses”. He said there was “a steady stream of vehicles, individuals, weapons, financing, oil going back and forth”, adding: “It’s not like people are putting on their hiking boots and crossing over rough terrain. There’s an extensive surface transport network which is highly regulated and controlled ... on both sides of the border.”. Academic researcher Aymenn al-Tamimi, an expert on examining Isis documents, said he had no doubt about the authenticity of the manifests. “The documents ... coincide with other documents illustrating daily bus routes within Islamic State territory. Though private companies provide the actual transportation, the Islamic State bureaucracy is responsible for authorising and overseeing the routes,” he said. A senior Turkish government official, in response to the Guardian’s claims, said that Turkey was doing everything it could to stop the influx of foreign fighters, including cracking down on recruitment and logistic networks such as travel agents mentioned in the documents. Anonymous launched Cyber-attacks on Turkey after accusing it of supporting ISIS by buying oil from them and treating their wounded in hospital. They have also told that they will continue the attacks as long as Turkey is supporting ISIS. Columbia University assigned a team of researchers in the United States, Europe, and Turkey to examine Turkish and international media assessing the credibility of allegations and published a research paper entitled "ISIS-Turkey Links". The report draws on a variety of international sources and present many allegations that appeared in the media. In an email to The Guardian, Noam Chomsky accused Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of hypocrisy. He said: “Turkey blamed Isis (for the attack on Istanbul at 2016), which Erdoğan has been aiding in many ways, while also supporting the al-Nusra Front, which is hardly different." Jacques Behnan Hindo, the Syrian Catholic Archbishop of Hasakeh-Nisibi, accused Turkey of preventing Christians from fleeing Syria while allowing jihadists to cross its border unchecked. He said on the Vatican Radio, "In the north, Turkey allows through lorries, Daesh (ISIS) fighters, oil stolen from Syria, wheat and cotton: all of these can cross the border but nobody (from the Christian community) can pass over.". He claimed it a day after ISIL abducted more than 90 Assyrian Christians from villages. Transcripts of telephone calls between IS jihadists and Turkish officers has been revealed. Members of the Democratic Union Party (Kurds) accused the Turkish military of opening fire at its forces in Tal Abyad after the majority Arab town was included into a Kurdish enclave after fights with ISIS soldiers. The Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu confirmed it and he said that Turkey had warned the PYD not to cross to the "west of the Euphrates and that we would hit it the moment it did. "We hit it twice,". Turkey, at January 2016, didn't allow Kurdish groups from northern Syria to take part in peace talks in Geneva. Turkish PM said that the participation of YPG represents a 'direct threat' to his country. On February 2016, US urged Turkey to stop the shelling of the Kurds and focus on fighting the ISIL. On February 2016, Syria and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights accused Turkey of allowing Islamist fighters to travel through Turkish territory to reinforce Islamist rebels in Azaz and Tal Rifaat. On February 2016, Hezbollah said Turkey and Saudi Arabia were using the Islamic State group as a "pretext" to launch a ground operation in Syria, after Turkey's suggestion to the U.S. and other allies in an international coalition against the Islamic State group for ground operations in Syria. On 10 February 2016, Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin sent a letter to the UN Security Council. He said in the letter that recruiters from ISIL had reportedly established a network in the Turkish city of Antalya for foreign fighters from the former Soviet Union. He also said in the letter that, in September, a group of 1,000 IS fighters from Europe and Central Asia were taken from Turkey to Syria through the border crossing at Gaziantep. In addition, he claimed that in early 2015, Turkish intelligence services reportedly helped move ethnic Tatars who were fighting for the Al-Qaeda aligned Nusra Front from Antalya to Eskişehir and, also, that it was helping to fly ISIL militants from Syria through Turkey to Yemen using Turkish military air transport, or by sea to Yemen's port of Aden. On 17 February 2016, at least 500 armed fighters crossed the Turkish border heading for the Syrian town of Azaz to fight against the Kurdish forces according to the head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. After the February 2016 Ankara bombing the head of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) denied any involvement and said that Turkey is using this attack as a "pretext" to intervene in Syria. According to Human Rights Watch, Turkish border guards were shooting and beating Syrian refugees trying to reach Turkey, resulting in deaths and serious injuries. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan denied it. Journalist Arzu Yildiz was sentenced to 20 months in jail and lost her parental rights after exposing a video related to a weapons-smuggling scandal denied by the Turkish government, in what her lawyer said was “an act of revenge” by Recep Tayyip Erdogan. ↑ One dead, 26 wounded as rockets hit Turkish town. Reuters. ↑ Hurriyet Daily News, 11–12 August 2012, page 5, "No Misinformation on Downed Jet: Army". This page was last modified on 31 May 2016, at 19:33.
2019-04-24T14:44:44Z
https://infogalactic.com/info/Turkish_involvement_in_the_Syrian_Civil_War
Adorable remodeled Craftsman-style bungalow with large level backyard within walking distance to UO, shopping, restaurants, and the bike path. Updated large, sunny kitchen, spacious front porch for gatherings with friends or family, hardwood floors in living and dining areas, 2 baths on the main floor, and 3+ bedrooms! Remodeled vintage bungalow close to downtown and the Whiteaker! It offers classic features such as gorgeous hardwood floors, period built-ins and a covered front porch. The spacious living room opens to a formal dining room. Master suite boasts skylights and exposed beams, plus adjacent den/office space with built-ins and bath with jetted tub. Deck overlooks tranquil, private yard. Separate shop space, gas furnace plus AC, and more. Lovely four-bedroom contemporary located in the heart of Regency Estates! New carpet can be found in the bedrooms, plus the living and family rooms. Open kitchen features granite counters and cooking island. Master suite offers sizable walk-in closet and jetted tub. Charming patio, beautifully landscaped yard. Formal and informal dining, heat pump, three-car garage, and more. Lovely contemporary situated on a quiet South Eugene cul-de-sac! Light-filled entry with skylight leads to living room with cozy fireplace and deck access. Spacious family room offers wet-bar, high ceilings and large windows with filtered views. Roomy master suite provides walk-in closet and updated bath. Newly rebuilt wraparound deck, newer siding, windows and gutters. Two-car garage, heat pump, custom landscaping w/cherry trees and sprinklers. MARVELOUS WESTERN VIEWS boasting pride of ownership through-out this move in ready home.this is worth seeing inside. Refinished Hardwood floors on main level w/ cozy gas fireplace and updated kitchen including a fantastic bonus area and large yard. Incredible convenient University location. w/ a separate legal 1 bedroom apt.(rents for $575 a month), property zoned duplex. Spectacular views from this gorgeous home on private, beautifully landscaped lot. Open and light entry, spacious kitchen with stainless appliances, granite counters. Adjoining family room w/gas insert, vaulted ceilings, and views. Formal dining area, fabulous Master suite with large walk-in closet and dressing area, plus luxurious bath with jetted tub. Your own private retreat! A rare, stunning 1-level in a park-like setting at the end of the road, private sanctuary. Designed by Dan Hill of Arbor Southwith incredible attention to detail and beauty. Gourmet kitchen,open floor plan, cherrywood cabinetry, hand crafted glass doors,gorgeous master suite w/fireplace, beautiful landscaping, trulya treasure! Exceptional custom home in Street of Dreams culdesac. Vaulted ceilings, wood floors and crown mouldings. Live on the water overlooking the pond and landscaped, spacious yard. Kitchen has Dacor gas range, granite counters and abundant built-ins. Light and open main level master suite with bay window, french doors to patio. Built with the highest level of craftsmanship. A rare gem! Stunning custom contemporary w/magnificent views of the city! Situated on .76 acre parcel, this amazing 4 bedroom, 3 bath home offers soaring 2 story entry, high ceilings, travertine tile flooring, 2 fireplaces, a wonderful loft style 2nd story, built-ins and a fantastic media room w/home theatre. A Rare Find! Situated close to Hendricks Park and the University, this gorgeous contemporary offers fantastic views of the city and Coast Range. Wonderful wraparound deck leads from covered front porch to lovely backyard with terraced landscaping. Spacious living room features wood floors, large windows, and deck access. Open, remodeled kitchen and adjoining family room overlook private patio. Amazing remodeled contemporary in a quiet, established South neighborhood surrounded by nature, yet offers light and bright sun filled rooms throughout. Impressive open floor plan, hardwood floors, granite counters and cherry cabinetry. Great room opens to a sparkling gourmet kitchen w/eating bar and breakfast nook. 2 master suites, 3 car garage and views of the outdoors. Beauty and quality are hallmarks of this custom contemporary! Great attention to detail, light filled open floor plan, spacious foyer, eye-catching gourmet kitchen offers many custom amenities, hardwood floors and fabulous unique master suite boasting soak tub w/privacy glass, separate shower, walk-in closet and patio access. Plus 7X17 shop w/cabinetry. Neat as a pin and move in ready! Wonderful one level custom in desirable North Gilham neighborhood. Quality abounds, spacious formal and informal living areas, fabulous remodeled kitchen, granite, cherry cabinets opens to great rm, fireplace, views of outdoors. Master suite, walk-in closet and patio access. Beautifully landscaped - private backyard, covered patio, pond, oversize GA and abundant storage. A must see! Impressive custom designed home offers style and comfort. Stunning views! Soaring ceilings, open floor plan, expansive window presentation, hardwood floors, plus beautiful remodeled kitchen, high end SS appliances, Sub Zero refrigerator, Wolf gas cooktop and beautiful cabinetry. Spacious deck w/views, plus lush greenery, surrounding this outstanding home. South Eugene schools. Wonderful contemporary in desirable University neighborhood. Walk to University Park located across the street. Nice picture windows, wood floors, two gas fireplaces, built-ins and spacious rooms. Both formal and informal living areas, potential for separate living qtrs, plus beautiful private, fenced yard, water feature, decking and patio. Located in a prime East Eugene neighborhood! Discover this charming treasure w/wood floors, high ceilings, cozy fireplace, spacious kitchen and dining area, family room w/french doors leading to the private back patio, lovely yard, savory fruit trees, garden area, hot tub, wrought iron fence, and classic covered porch. Great home in desired location! Enjoy this one level, 4 bedroom, 3002 sq ft classic w/close in convenience, cul-de-sac location situated on .40 acre lot backing up to the golf course. Beautiful established yard, patios, views of the greens, built-ins, 3 fireplaces and 3 full baths. New exterior paint, roof in 08. This lovely home is waiting for your own personal touch! EXCELLENT LOCATION! Close to U of O, Hendricks Park and Laurelwood Golf Course situated on a generous one-third acre lot. Open floor plan, large rooms, wood floors, spacious kitchen offers dining area and center island, 3 fireplaces, guest bedroom w/bath, lovely landscaped yard, garden space, patio and oversized garage w/workshop. A great home for comfortable living and entertaining! Close to U of O! 1920s vintage offers a great opportunity. Built to last, featuring wood floors, french doors, built-ins, bright sun room, spacious kitchen, formal dining room/family room. Nice covered front portico w/fully fenced back yard and patio. Generous size basement w/laundry area, 2 office spaces, plenty of storage. Zoned R-4 on a nice corner lot. Unique, character-filled home close to the University on nice corner lot. Charming touches such as bay windows and spiral staircase. Spacious living room with wood floors, exposed brick wall and woodstove, plus large windows overlooking private fenced patio and garden. Open kitchen features tile counters and floor, vaulted ceiling, and skylights. Great rental potential. Fabulous contemporary situated on quiet and private lane near Laurelwood Golf Course. Beautiful views and sunny rooms from the south facing wall of windows, high ceilings, skylights and cozy fireplace, plus a convenient elevator. Newer trex decking, lovely pond and landscaping. Potential separate living quarters. Enjoy stunning views from this beautiful home in SW Hills. Easy entertaining on multilevel decking. Spacious kitchen w/ island, double ovens, and built-in pantry opens to living room w/ custom cabinetry, high ceilings. Master features large windows and double walk-in closet. Possible separate living area w/ patio and garden. Includes add#8217;l 1.5 lots; side lot believed to be buildable. Marvelous bungalow-style home featuring great separation of space, hardwood floors, bay windows plus updated kitchen w/cherry cabinets and skylight. Garden style front and backyard w/brick courtyard, flag stone pathways, decking and full fencing.Fabulous gardens. A rare find! NEW PRICE! Tastefully updated gem in desirable neighborhood - Open floor plan, vaulted ceilings, skylights, formal and informal living spaces, custom entertainment center, gas fp w/granite tiled hearth, custom backsplashes, Brazilian floors, walk-in pantry, newer appliances, double ovens, utility rm w/sink, private fenced yard and RV parking. Rare Opportunity! Gorgeous views from this private 3.65 acre parcel! Located within the gated Summit PUD of upscale premier estates. Build on top of the mountain, level building site ready for your dream home. Your plan or builders! Amazing views from the Cascades, city lights, to the coast range - Fabulous opportunity! Please reference MLS# 10076731 for lot w/ build plans. Beautiful classic one level - remodeled and located in desirable SE neighborhood close to Tugman Park and Rexius running trail. Tastefully designed master suite, barrel ceiling, marble tiles, wood floors, spacious shower and soak tub, skylights, built-ins and a lovely landscaped easy care yard with privacy and garden beds for organic gardening, fruit trees and more! Charming vintage bungalow in great central location close to shopping, dining, and nightlife! Wonderfully maintained owner occupied, features spacious rooms, wood floors, and numerous classic touches, plus modern updates such as tankless hot water, skylights, and gas insert fireplace. Relaxing covered front porch, cozy courtyard with brick patio. A unique, character-filled home! Rare single-level condo in convenient Ferry Street Bridge location close to shopping and dining. Large windows fill this immaculate home with light, high ceilings accentuate open feel. Fantastic kitchen features granite counters, stainless appliances, and ample storage, and opens to living room with gas fireplace, wood floors, private balcony and elevator. Enjoy the easy life! SE Hills contemporary home surrounded by nature. Enjoy the views from two decks and numerous windows. Master bedroom and living room both feature deck access and vaulted ceilings. Quiet, peaceful back yard backs up to green space with abundant trees and wildlife. Great opportunity! Charming home in quiet Friendly Street neighborhood. Nicely landscaped yard featuring fenced garden with raised beds. Great separation of space. Large living room ready for movie night or the big game with built-in surround sound and cozy fireplace. Maple floors, plus new interior and exterior paint. A great find! Stunning tour home by DC Fine Homes offers sublime blend of classic style and modern amenities. Dramatic entry, great room w/double-sided fireplace. Fabulous kitchen w/gas cooking island, butlers pantry, and built-in appliances. Master suite w/marble shower, heated bath floors, and sunny Saturday room. Vaulted entertainment room w/wet bar, theater room w/stadium seating. Spacious covered patio w/gas fireplace. Office w/hidden gym. Stunning craftsman close to Hendricks Park and University. Extensively remodeled throughout with exceptional finishes. Gourmet kitchen with two sub-zero fridges, gas range, and custom cabinets. Spacious living room features fireplace, built-ins, and French doors to balcony. Main-level master suite offers luxurious bath and private deck. Beautifully manicured, private grounds. Spectacular newly constructed custom home on 5 acres offering stunning views, 2-story grand entrance, solid cherry staircase, formal living area w/balcony access, cherry floors, private main level guest suite, gourmet kitchen and great room, 3 fireplaces, office w/built-ins, intercom system, and a 3-car garage. Also finished lower level features high ceilings and pool room/wet bar. Gorgeous close-in riverfront property! Lovely contemporary, plus lovely separate guest house of 800 sq ft on almost five acres. A gorgeous gem close to the University and Hendricks Park! This beautiful four-bedroom contemporary boasts spacious, comfortable living spaces with stylish appeal. Family room with gas fireplace opens to kitchen with sub-zero fridge and gas range. Main-level master suite features two walk-in closets and office space. Second family room on the upper level. Private, brick courtyard, covered front porch, formal/informal dining, and more. Fabulous custom home on 95 acres with close-in convenience! Gourmet kitchen w/cooking island and built-in double ovens. Large master suite w/fireplace and jetted tub. Spacious living room, office w/French doors, sunroom, formal/informal dining, coffered ceilings. 4J schools. Large patio overlooks grounds. Lovely views of surrounding valley and hills. Possible extended living. 4-car garage, barn, raised garden beds, fenced pastures, more! Unbelievable opportunity! This quietly understated and exceptionally beautiful custom home is located on a 4.32 acre superbly private parcel that was originally divided into a total of 9 dedicated tax lots! A rare opportunity with interesting options! Minutes from RiverBend, in a highly desired neighborhood, it was artfully designed to encompass ever changing far away views and the natural beauty of its surroundings. Private SW Estate nestled on 10.26 AC, newly remodeled, amazing open floor plan, hardwood floors, vaulted ceilings, gourmet kitchen w/granite counters, crafted decking, 4J schools, meadows, walking trails + 1200 sq ft fully contained guest house, oversized 3 car garage and barn. Rare find! Magnificent, custom built, SW Estate, open floor plan, hickory floors, den/office, gourmet kitchen w/cherry cabinetry and cook island, huge bonus/media room, elevator, 3 car garage plus additional detached 2900 sq ft garage/shop/office. Backyard backs up to 100 acres of common area. Lovingly renovated with period fidelity to reflect its European style elegance. Detailed woodwork, built-ins, hardwood floors, leaded glass windows, high ceilings, custom window treatments, kitch w/dacor gas range and pull out baking ctr, 2-car garage + addl garage/storage, patio, large and lush lawn, garden, basketball and bocce ball courts, sweeping city views and so much more! Spectacular views and Private! Beautiful custom Anslow and DeGeneault 4,390 sq ft, 4 bedroom contemporary, open floor plan, 11ft high ceilings, crafted built-ins, den/office, formal living and dining, 2 family rooms plus gourmet kitchen w/granite countertops, cherry cabinetry and eating bar. Master suite w/fireplace and Jacuzzi tub. Marvelous main level studio with bay window. Stunning home situated on 2.68 private acres! This exceptional custom four-bedroom home offers cathedral ceilings, crown molding and other fine amenities. Gourmet kitchen features Dacor gas range, Sub-Zero fridge, and granite counters. Luxurious master bedroom suite is conveniently located on the main level. Relax on the spacious patio and enjoy the tranquil surroundings. Your own private oasis in town! Wow, huge custom home on 10 private acres at the end of Green Bluff Estates. Top quality, this home has it all! Sub-0 fridge, custom cabinets, huge MB suite w/walk-in shower and jetted tub. Great for large family! 4 beds up have jack and jill connecting baths. 3 car garage, too much more! Tastefully remodeled, architecturally-designed home! Its vaulted ceilings, skylights and windows cultivate an open, spacious feel. Open living and dining rooms feature gorgeous wood floors; adjacent kitchen provides granite counters and stainless appliances, including built-in double oven. Main-level master suite offers a jetted tub, walk-in closet and office nook. Immaculately landscaped grounds boast water feature, garden beds, patios. Experience gorgeous valley and sunset views, along with peaceful country living in heart of wine country! This unique property offers two homes. Updated main home features fantastic master suite with deck access. Large living room with vaulted ceiling and skylight. Gorgeous kitchen offers cooking island and stainless appliances. 2nd home provides 2 bd/2 bth, plus attached 3-car garage w/shop space. Pastures, pond, RV parking, timber, more! Classic University area home on an idyllic tree-lined street! Tastefully updates and vintage appeal, with oak floors, crown molding, and coved archways. Remodeled kitchen offers granite counters and stainless appliances, plus formal and informal dining. Master bedroom suite with walk-in closet and built-ins. Beautifully landscaped, private back yard with patio. Amazing unique views of U of O,city and valley,quality custom blt hme,tastefully remodeled,hdwd flrs,walls of windows,2nd level balcony,island kitchen w solid surfaces,slate flooring,red oak cabinets,stainless appliances,family rm w cork floors,kitchenette, and FP,2 car garage w views,a detached 15 x 20 shop w wood stove,level yard,cobblestone patio,fully landscaped, and much more. Awe-inspiring sunsets, and spectacular city and mountain views! Fabulous contemporary situated on 3 private acres. Extensively remodeled with highest level of craftsmanship; beautiful built-in cabinetry, stylish light fixtures, and gorgeous hardwood floors. Breathtaking kitchen with stainless appliances and granite counters. Master bedroom with luxurious bath. A truly exceptional home! Magnificent close-in 10 acre estate, perfect for horses in tranquil Pleasant Hill location. This stunning custom 3436 sq ft 4 bedroom home offers hickory floors, formal living and dining, family room and office. Gracious main level master suite, boasts bay window, fireplace and bath w/whirlpool tub. Barn has 6 stalls, tack room and paddocks. Call for your personal showing. A rare find! Fantastic single-level, mid-century modern home on .46 acres that backs to Hendricks Park! All the classic mid-century style with exposed beams, vaulted ceilings and large windows connecting you to the lovely grounds. Spacious living room with fireplace, generously-sized master bedroom suite, and large kitchen with island. Family room has slider leading to patio courtyard. Covered front patio with views. A rare opportunity! Introducing a truly exquisite example of mid-modern design coupled with style & sophistication. Re-Crafted in 2017 & situated w/privacy on nearly 1/2 an acre. Entertain in style w/ the open floor plan, exposed beams & expansive windows. Stunning premium chefs kitchen, heated concrete floors & 2nd floor vaulted ceilings. Enjoy luscious gardens & pond complete w/expansive screened porch & over-sized 3 car garage. Private, custom one-level contemporary featuring light-filled open floor plan, vaulted/high ceilings, hardwood floors, large windows, gourmet kitchen w/granite counters, great room, den/office, huge master suite w/coffered ceiling and eye-catching master bath w/jet tub plus more amenities including 3 car, deep bay garage and RV parking w/hook-ups. 4J schools. Magnificent custom home on rare two acres! True chefs kitchen w/Wolf stove and walk-in refrigerator. Main-level master suite, large walk-in closet and custom jetted tub. Library and family room grace the second level. Indoor pool has beautiful wall of windows with views of lovely patio. Beautiful grounds with pond and outdoor fireplace. Property includes second home w/great room, two bedrooms, and large shop. Property may be subdividable. Incredible forested retreat just minutes from town. Same owner almost 50 years. 3 legal lots. Very secluded. Panoramic valley views. Winding trails throughout the gently sloped property. Merchantible timber / open meadow. Cute, rustic cabin. Rare opportunity to own a special property. Enjoy sunset & Coast Range views from your own private retreat on 1.73 close-in acres! Spacious living room features fireplace with custom mantle, refinished wood floors, & window seat. Gourmet kitchen boasts Wolf gas range & custom granite counters. Main-level master suite offers jetted tub & access to lovely grounds. Covered front porch, hiking trails, two guest cottages, water feature, koi pond, garden beds & more! Gorgeous newer custom home on 1.43 acres in Applegate Meadows! Floor plan provides a great room concept with high ceilings and gas fireplace. Adjacent kitchen offers granite counters, built-in double oven and a large island. Main-level master bedroom suite features a fireplace, walk-in closet and soaking tub. Theater/family room, pool/game room, formal/informal dining, covered patio with built-in bbq, fire pit, four-car garage and more! Beautifully remodeled University-area home! Gorgeous wood floors and crown moulding can be found throughout much of the main level, including a spacious living room with fireplace. Updated kitchen features gourmet gas range and granite counters. Large master suite offers walk-in closet and soaking tub. Formal/informal dining, family room, and sunny backyard with patio and raised garden beds. Detached apartments provide separate living space. Immaculate, like-new home in a prime campus-area location! Spacious, light-filled living room features gorgeous wood floors and gas fireplace. Kitchen boasts stainless appliances and adjacent dining area. Floor plan offers the convenience of a main-level master suite. Upper level includes two bedroom suites, plus balcony overlooking backyard with raised beds, fruit trees, deck and patio. Finished basement with additional living/storage space. Beautiful vaulted living room/dining room ceilings with huge fir beams. Oak hardwood floors, flower gardens, berries and fruit trees under huge oaks and maples. 2 rock fireplaces. Wrap around deck w/views of the river. 3 car carports plus garage/shop and large shop building. Huge windows! Extraordinary close-in country estate on 1.7 level acres. Experience this magnificent 4 bedroom newer contemporary offering 2 master bedroom suites on the main level, light-filled open floor plan, great separation of space, gourmet kitchen w/granite counters, beautiful landscaping w/koi pond and mature fruit trees. A truly special find! Lovely contemporary with Cascade views! Formal living room with fireplace off entry. Updated kitchen with granite counters and stainless appliances. Main-level master suite with large walk-in closet and French doors to deck. Formal and informal dining areas, spacious family room with deck access. Expansive deck with built-in hot tub overlooks landscaped yard and offers great views. Magnificent custom home in Ashley Estates! Stunning great room features floor-to-ceiling windows and stone hearth fireplace. Gourmet kitchen offers Dacor gas range, Sub-zero fridge, granite counters and Travertine tile. Main-level master suite provides gas fireplace, heated tile floors and jetted tub. Vaulted family room with wet bar and French doors to covered balcony. Main-level den/office, remote control blinds, golf course views and more! Tastefully-updated mid-century modern in desirable Hendricks Park area. Vaulted living room with skylights opens to gourmet kitchen with gas cooktop & stainless appliances. Master bedroom features two en-suite baths & generous walk-in closet. Spacious family room with access to covered patio. 4th bedroom could be extended living or Airbnb. Patio room, vaulted sun room, abundant storage, water feature & more. Includes two tax lots. Quality and excellence abound in this close-in country craftsman on 4.58 acres capturing southern exposure and sunset views! Beautiful woodland surrounds, light filled and spacious, Brazilian cherry floors, gourmet kitchen, and master suite. 4th bedroom located over garage could be family room or separate living quarters. Great view of Spencer Butte! Gourmet kitchen w/storage galore. Gaggenau stove top, Traulsen side by side fridge, dbl Thermador ovens. Sweeping staircase and freestanding floor to ceiling fireplace are show stoppers. Built for entertaining, has private back yard, hot tub, sun room, dance studio. Wine cellar. Newer custom home on nearly five acres provides both privacy and close-in convenience. Spacious living room offers fireplace, hardwood floors and deck access. Gorgeous gourmet kitchen with granite counters, stainless appliances and cooking island. Master bedroom suite features remodeled bath with soaking tub and separate shower. Large family room/office above two-car garage. Greenhouse, raised garden beds, much more! Executive High end home perfect for day to day living or entertaining at its best.Tile floors, Granite counters, SS Gas appliances with Builtin Refrigerator.Gourmet kitchen opens to fmly rm w/ Wetbar offering granite, sink and bar seating. 2 Mstr SUITES and additional bedroom with builtins. Covered Patio with Builtin POOL and HOT TUB, FIRE PIT. Backyard boasts of views of City, Mntns and Valley. 3 car garage with storage above. Gorgeous custom home on two acres in a neighborhood of newer homes! Great room concept features vaulted living room & lovely kitchen with granite counters & cherry cabinets. Spacious master suite offers jetted tub & ample walk-in closet. Fabulous theater room with wet bar is perfect for movies or big games. Three-car attached garage, plus 36'x48' detached shop/two-bay RV garage. Charming covered porch, large patio, garden shed & more. An elegant Meltebeke custom contemporary! This spacious, light-filled home features a gorgeous kitchen and great room with high ceilings and gas fireplace. Floor plan provides two master suites, including one on main with jetted tub. Large bonus room with wet bar. Gracious formal living room, heated tile floors, formal and informal dining, built-in vacuum, koi pond and much more. Mid-Century Modern in the heart of Bridlemile/SW Hills and wonderfully designed by builder/owner. So many possibilities for living with main-level master suite and 5 bedrooms opening into fabulous family room. Modern updates with pristine features create a setting of beauty with views of nature and the valley. Floor plan offers formal living and dining, new wood floors and carpet, 3 family rooms, den, lovely decks. Beautiful country property features wraparound decks, sunroom, fabulous master suite with balcony, and views of the Sisters. Outdoor amenities include a pool with solar heat, hot tub, and a flower and vegetable garden. Super Good Sense home. Llama can be included if you wish. Gorgeous contemporary next to Hendricks Park features extensive updating throughout. Gourmet kitchen offers sub-zero fridge, stainless appliances, and custom cherry cabinets. Master suite features vaulted ceilings, jetted tub, and two offices. Separate guest suite on lower level. Lovely yard with two decks, patio, garden beds, and shop/storage. Gorgeous craftsman on over a half acre in a quiet south Eugene neighborhood! Its fantastic kitchen features granite counters, gas cooking island and stainless appliances. An adjacent family room provides a gas fireplace, lovely built-in cabinetry, and deck access. Vaulted master suite offers a jetted tub, balcony and ample walk-in closet. Deck overlooks fenced back yard with raised garden beds. South Eugene schools. Great farm minutes to Eugene. Remodeled farmhouse and multiple barns, shop. New Zealand fencing, abundant water for domestic and livestock, nicely landscaped with UG sprinkler system. Creek. Immaculate country property. Additional acreage available. Contact Broker for details and brochure. Fabulous view property on 10 private,close-in acres. Beautiful,custom home built in 2003 w quality materials taking full advantage of the amazing views from floor to ceiling windows.Great room living w/access to a large,partially covered deck.32X36 detached garage/shop plus attached garage w/bonus room.Lovely grounds offering lush garden areas along w/ forested stands.Truly a rare opportunity for close in country comfort and privacy. One-of-a-kind contemporary on quiet cul-de-sac! Unique home with spacious living areas and lots of windows to connect you to tranquil natural surroundings. The living room boasts high ceilings with exposed beams, wet bar and fireplace. Master bedroom suite offers jetted tub, fireplace and private balcony. Multiple decks with views and patio for outdoor entertaining. Possible separate living/currently Airbnb with own entrance. Unique home in desirable location near Ridgeline Trail & Hendricks Park designed for comfortable living, entertaining & aging in place. Open concept includes spacious living room, dining room & updated kitchen. Versatile floor plan with main-level master suite & great separation of space. Large windows for light-filled rooms & connection to the outdoors. Great for gardeners-terraced beds, mature fruit trees & lovely perimeter garden. PICTURE-PERFECT COLLEGE HILL. Living is easy in this 1930 Tudor-style showpiece with main level master suite, spectacular living room, formal and informal dining, well-appointed kitchen, family room/den, lower level family/play room, exquisite yard, and attached garage. Fully remodeled/upgraded with no cost spared. A chance to own the best! Single-level living & superb views in a prime College Hill location! Enjoy sunset & Coast Range views from the front deck or the comfort of your living room. Open concept design incorporates spacious living room, dining room & updated kitchen. Numerous windows & skylights create light-filled rooms throughout. Generously-sized master suite features remodeled bath. Terraced backyard with level lawns & raised beds. Newer solar panels. Immaculate Ashley Estates Home boasts 3+Beds +Bonus +Media room. Gourmet kitchen with Thermador 6 burner Gas range,double convection ovens,granite counters,custom cabinets. Main level master suite with Private bath,WI Closets with built ins. Formal and Informal Dining and Office. Media room with wet bar. Wired for sound throughout. Indoor utilities, Covered Patio, RV Parking. Hurry this one wont last. Light filled custom designed retreat using beautiful woods, chinquapin floors, crafted timber framing and marvelous window presentation framing natures beauty. Spacious 2 story great room, fireplace, stained glass window accent, formal dining, gourmet kitchen w/granite counters and maple cabinets. High speed DSL. Truly a stunning home! Beautiful close-in country, light filled, 14 acres with great separation of space, vaulted ceilings, skylights, great room plus huge shop building w/2 shop areas, office, apartments, wonderful barn w/stalls, 50x50 arena, auto water, fencing, great horse property, pastures and much more! Exceptional custom craftsman with end of road privacy! This gorgeous home offers open concept floor plan on main level. Living room and adjacent dining room have lovely wood floors and share slate fireplace. Gourmet kitchen features Dacor gas range, Sub-Zero fridge and large island with granite counters. Spacious master bedroom suite boasts barrel ceiling and bath with soaking tub. Deck for relaxing/entertaining, water feature, two-car garage. Gables View Estate, a lovely property with two houses and a studio on 1.57 acres. Main house features spacious living room with wood floors; updated kitchen offers stainless appliances. The East Wing features open floor plan and two bedroom suites. Studio with kitchen and full bath. Fenced, landscaped grounds with greenhouse, garden beds, and fruit trees, plus a gazebo and large patio. Lovely custom contemporary in Braewood West! Its open floor plan includes a kitchen with stainless appliances, granite counters and wine fridge. Dining and living rooms share double-sided fireplace and gorgeous hardwood floors. Main-level master suite features two walk-in closets and bath with heated tile floors and jetted tub. Covered patio, and custom water feature with two waterfalls. Oversized three-car garage, gated RV parking. This lovely contemporary is designed to maximize the superb city and Coast Range views. A light-filled entry and formal living room welcome you. Kitchen with stainless appliances, gas cooktop and large pantry opens to spacious great room with high ceilings. Master bedroom suite features sitting room, gas fireplace and double walk-in closets. Formal/informal dining, built-in vacuum, sound system, deck and patio for outdoor entertaining. Tastefully and artistically remodeled contemporary on a double lot! Spacious living room offers wood floors and built-ins. Gourmet kitchen features built-in fridge, double-oven and cooking island. Large master suite provides private balcony, walk-in closet and jetted tub. Lovely grounds with deck, patio, trails and water feature. Family room with skylight, office nook with custom desk, laundry room with high-end washer/dryer and drying cabinet. Immaculate custom craftsman in Braewood West! Its enormous great room features coffered ceilings, gas fireplace with custom mantle, & deck access. Adjacent kitchen provides stainless appliances, & island with granite counters. Vaulted main-level master suite offers two walk-in closets & gorgeous bath. Nicely-landscaped yard includes patio, raised garden beds & filtered southern views. Den/office, gas furnace & AC. Custom built in 1965, this home sits on large corner lot on a quiet street tucked into heart of Bridlemile. Ample space for family fun and a creative life. Master suite on main. 2nd flr w 5 beds, large communal area and view. Sunken living room and den each w fireplace. Daylight bment w bar--bring your own pool table! 2-car garage w breezeway. Plenty of private space for work and play. There can only be one second-owner of this modern dwelling. Exceptional single-level, one-owner home on over an acre S. Eugene! Lovely Mid-Century is designed for both indoor and outdoor entertaining with formal and informal dining, spacious living room with built-ins and wet bar, and large deck overlooking pool and patio. Two master bedroom suites, including one with deck access and ample walk-in closet. Expansive kitchen offers cooking island and built-in double oven. A rare gem! Extraordinary panoramic views of valley and mountains on 9.72 ac! Amazing open floor plan, high ceilings, huge windows and decking Poss separate living. 1/3 mi path around property. Built in 2003 this home has all of the top of the line amenities. Marvin wood windows, hardwood floors, gourmet kitchen with stainless steel appliances, master suite,Bay windows, family room with a kitchen, outdoor kitchen, Hot tub, Gas fireplace, wrap around porch, Finished garage with built in storage. Enjoy peaceful country living, plus close-in convenience! Updated single-level on 10 acres just minutes from town. Spacious living room offers vaulted ceilings and fireplace. Master suite provides walk-in closet, vaulted ceilings and lovely bathroom with jetted tub. Roomy kitchen with granite counters and built-in double oven. Formal/informal dining, three-car garage, three-stall barn, pool, patio courtyard, 4J schools, garden shed and more. Spectacular and private South Eugene estate. Completely remodeled and updated with high end amenities. Granite counters, travertine and hardwood flooring, elevator, indoor pool, oversized master suite and gourmet kitchen with high end stainless appl. Home is ideal for wheelchair access. with 36 wide doors and dropped counter heights of 35. See virtual tour, PRICE REDUCED $125K! Classic University home, owned by the same family for 35 years. Walk to UO, pubs, etc. The painted front porch welcomes all! Wood floors, original french doors, taller ceilings and bonus spaces. 4-5 bedrooms/3.5 baths in the main house. Bedrooms have angled ceilings, sleep spaces. Bathrooms are uniquely divided and designed for a busy lifestyle. Detached studio (not permitted)provides space for artists etc. Small backyard tennis court. Charming home in a prime campus location. Also includes two separate apartments. Stunning custom contemporary w/views of the Mohawk Valley on 5 acres featuring maple floors w/Brazilian cherry accents, high ceilings, formal living and dining rooms, gourmet kitchen w/granite counters, island and maple cabinetry. Cozy family room,large bonus room over garage; master suite w/fireplace, soak tub and separate granite counter vanities. See extra amenities list. Lovely College Hill home! The spacious living room offers a gas fireplace and gorgeous views of the Coburg Hills. Light-filled kitchen features stainless appliances and skylight. Main-level master bedroom suite with hardwood floors and updated bath. Two large family rooms, office space, abundant storage and shop area. Private backyard features deck, hot tub, separate studio and more. One of a kind on two tax lots! This light-filled gem features skylights & high ceilings throughout. The floor plan has great separation of space. Large family room with gas fireplace & access to deck. Kitchen amenities include a stainless gas range. Nicely landscaped grounds offer a water feature, covered patio, deck & garden beds. Large art studio/shop on 2nd lot, garden shed & attached rented studio. A rare gem! Stunning custom contemporary with magnificent city views! Situated on .76 acre parcel, this amazing home offers a soaring, dramatic story entry, high ceilings, kitchen with granite slab counters and cherry cabinets, travertine tile and bamboo flooring, two fireplaces, master bedroom suite with jetted tub, built-in security and sound systems, fantastic media room with 7 screen, wine cellar and much more. A rare find!
2019-04-20T22:22:14Z
http://www.barbarawest.com/listings/my-sold-listings?page=32
PalmSource is *not* cramming a desktop/server OS into a handheld. They're using the Linux *kernal* with the Cobalt UI. Kent is smart enough to know they're not cramming KDE or GNOME into a handheld, so I don't see his point, unless it's just to find something, anything, to complain about. The fact is that the Linux kernal isn't much bigger than the kernal already used by Cobalt. PalmOS for Linux will look identical to Cobalt (they use the exact same graphics system), but should be more "cross-platform" and have better device driver support. Essentially, the key difference between the Cobalt and Linux versions of PalmOS is that in theory, I *could* run the Linux version on x86 hardware, or any of the other 31 platforms that support Linux. All versions of PalmOS will run just fine on a handheld or smartphone. Don't you have something better to do...like play Duke Nukem on your Zodiac? And this coming from a guy who said Bluetooth has killed WiFi! Bwahahahahahaahah!!! > PalmSource is *not* cramming a desktop/server OS into a handheld. Ah, but they are. Sure, they'll reduce it down to the core functionality that is needed, but Linux was designed as a desktop/server OS. There are much better designed operating system and kernels for mobile/embedded devices, including BeOS. They are betting on the advanatages of using a more popular operating system with more developers who are familiar with its internals and the availability of more drivers for chipsets (often handled by the chip developers themselves). Oh, and it's free. I think PalmSource is probably right with this decision, but don't let yourself believe that there are not better operating systems out there for this task. >> "The fact is that the Linux kernal isn't much bigger than the kernal already used by Cobalt" Sort of off-topic, but do you have any evidence to back that up? Just because the upper level software is not present doesn't make the Linux kernal any less than what it is. It is purpose built for servers and workstations. Sure you can strip it down to bare bones, but truck is still a truck even with shiny red paint over it. And frankly if PalmOS will run on Linux as well (*sarcasm*) as QT Linux does, then this will be the last curtain call for PalmSource. They're both about 4MB, IIRC. "Don't you have something better to do...like play Duke Nukem on your Zodiac?" Too busy getting actual work done on my Zod. "And this coming from a guy who said Bluetooth has killed WiFi! Bwahahahahahaahah!!!" Never said that. I said Bluetooth *and 3G cell data* would kill WiFi. A friend of mine is ditching his Tungsten C this weekend for a Bluetooth-enabled T5. He's tired of me being able to check my email and RSS where he can't. There are linux distributions that will run on systems with as little as 2 MB of RAM plus 1 floppy drive. The original PalmOS 1.0 Kadak kernal was smaller, running in only a 32KB system heap + some ROM, IIRC, but was a lot more limited. I still have a fully working Pilot 1000. It is a timeless device, remarkable even today. Stick to "Writing on your (hairy) Palm" I have a nearly fully working Pilot 1000 that unfortunately has a faulty digitizer. I have a PalmPilot Pro that is flawless and has the 2mb OS 3 upgrade card in it. In theory, it could still handle all of my basic PIM needs with room for an e-book or two. An absolutely classic design but still a few rungs down from the timeless V/m500s. As far as article comments go, I'd like to hear from some ex-Palm Inc/PalmOne/Handspring staffers. Are they predicting doom & gloom like the rest of the PIC faithful? Going back to the previous comments about the "Zen" of the older units. The other day I met with a guy who still kept a HS Edge in his briefcase. I briefly played with it. That could have been a phenomenal unit had it just had a bit more oomph under the hood and an SD slot instead of that stupid mini-Springboard. In fact, P1 should have immediately tried to shoehorn a 320*320 color screen, SD & BT into that fellow as soon as the Handspring acquisition became official. Now THAT'D be a proper T|E2! "Sure, they'll reduce it down to the core functionality that is needed, but Linux was designed as a desktop/server OS. There are much better designed operating system and kernels for mobile/embedded devices, including BeOS" It is BeOS that was designed, from the ground up, as a desktop operating system. Its tightly integrated design also meant that targeting it at a different device type was going to be a lot of work. Linux, on the other hand, is widely used in embedded devices, cell phones, and handheld devices already. Linux implements the most widely used standards for embedded operating systems. Linux and its predecessors run on machines with a few hundred kilobytes of RAM. And Linux cleanly separates the GUI from the kernel, allowing Palm to do just what Palm wants to do. "They are betting on the advanatages of using a more popular operating system with more developers who are familiar with its internals and the availability of more drivers for chipsets (often handled by the chip developers themselves)." Yes, that's the point: Linux is already widely used in handheld and embedded applications, so it is already supported. "I think PalmSource is probably right with this decision, but don't let yourself believe that there are not better operating systems out there for this task." Maybe there are, but BeOS isn't one of them. BeOS was a bad design even for desktop use, and it made absolutely no sense to port it to handhelds. >> "BeOS was a bad design even for desktop use, and it made absolutely no sense to port it to handhelds." From a technical standpoint maybe, but it had...by far..the best GUI. If developers could have layered the BeOS graphical interface over Linux, it would have made the perfect desktop solution, rather than KDE and Gnome..which frankly aren't very appealing. BeOS was the first non-Apple/Microsoft desktop OS I used that I actually found compelling and a pleasure to use. Sadly Linux does not offer the same user friendly experience. tompi, I responded to these comments in the "An open letter to the Palm OS community from PalmSource" thread. I'm not going to re-state them here, ... but I might blabber on for a bit. Windows is "widely used" on desktop systems. That does not make it a "better" OS for those systems. Just so you're clear on this, BeOS was never designed to be a traditional desktop OS. When it was designed, desktop systems had the power of today's PDAs. It has a microkernel design and was specifically geared toward handling multimedia. The BeOS folks did years of work on using it for non-desktop systems. Targeting BeOS to other device types was not a lot of work. Getting Linux to even be a reasonable possibility for embedded systems was. Go back and look at the history of it. The big difference was that BeOS was closed source and done by a handful of developers in a short period of time. Linux efforts are open and have far more effort and time behind them. I don't specifically want to argue for BeOS here. I'm glad that we have Linux as an alternative to Windows, because it is clearly the winner there. The simple fact of the matter is that Linux won out with PalmSource because of cost and support, not because it was the best software solution (and that is not saying it is a bad solution) for the task. It was the best decision for a company that wants to make money. Listen, Jeff, your newfound enthusiasm over this PalmNix is rather difficult for me to swallow. According to you, Cobalt was to the a "mini BeOS." Maybe that's why they've all but killed it? Embedded Linux kernel with limited functionality can take as little as 300KB of space. Same with CE.Net. Not sure about PalmOS. You can run Linux on an m68k device (read: an old 68K Mac) in 16MB of RAM. It also runs already on the Zaurus, etc. etc. The Linux kernel is designed to scale both up and down. Anybody saying that it's server/workstation only is spreading FUD. The more you cut down the OS, the less compatible you will be with the rest of the linux software offerings. The value of the move can not be in all the brilliant handheld optimised linux software available, can it? Didn't people complain long and hard about win ce being a cut down windows system, and therefore a resource hog with little optimisation for handhelds? Who's playing the same game now? "Anybody saying that it's server/workstation only is spreading FUD." Anybody who says it's universal is only spreading Linux fanboyism. Like it or not, it was designed first and foremost for servers, and it translates very poorly into a desktop environment for the average user. I wish this whole thing sounded like good news for the Palm OS, but it doesn't. At best, it means that Cobalt was so unusable that they had to completely throw it out and start over after two or three years of wasted effort. At worst, it's PalmSource's death throes, blindly grasping at straws to hold on in the face of a downward spiral. Anyone else remember how the PC market began? Apple had a large majority of the user base, including a very passionate core group of users, and was argued to be superior to PC-Compatible computers because it was so much easier to use. Slowly, Apple's lead began eroding in the face of more, more powerful, and cheaper PC-Compatibles. Eventually, despite the Apple loyalists' protests that Macs were infinitely better in every way, more customers chose PCs, and it's been that way ever since. Apple got hit by a death spiral because they didn't diversify and compete, so they lost the market leadership position. Sound familiar? pmjoe, you made two claims. First, you claimed that Linux was "designed as a desktop/server OS". That's simply wrong. Linux was designed to be a work-alike of UNIX, nothing more and nothing less. UNIX derivatives have been used for decades in embedded applications and have requirements that are a fraction of those for BeOS. Also, Linux is one of the most popular embedded operating systems and already powers a huge number of mobile and embedded devices; claiming that it's a "desktop/server OS" is just unreal. Second, you claimed that BeOS is a "much better designed operating system for mobile/embedded devices". One will never be able to settle that argument definitively, but just because there is a zealous and vocal group of BeOS advocates out there doesn't make that true. To me, BeOS is a textbook example of poor engineering: it does what it does fairly well, but it does completely the wrong things. I hope we will eventually get something better than Linux. I also hope its successor will look nothing like BeOS because BeOS got just about everything wrong. The value, as far as Palm is concerned, is probably primarily in drivers and chipset support. . The value of the move can not be in all the brilliant handheld optimised linux software available, can it? Actually, that is also a benefit. There is a lot of Linux code that is useful for application writers and requires no adaptation to handheld use (libraries, scripting languages, etc.). And there is actually a sizeable amount of very useful handheld software out there, including ports of the Mozilla and Konqueror web browsers, real ssh implementations, etc. Yes, but Linux isn't WinCE. WinCE is cut down in places that cause real problems: resource limits, string handling, file handling, networking, etc. You can't just recompile a Windows program for WinCE, even if your WinCE has the memory to run it. Embedded Linux has the same core libraries and kernel functionality as any other version of Linux; it is "cut down" in areas like command line programs, and libraries that are included by default. But if your application needs something that isn't preinstalled, you can just include it--no code changes required. Since Linux is already used on so many embedded devices, we don't have to guess about how useful this is. My Linksys access point runs Linux, and people take advantage of that for creating all sorts of very useful add-on software. The relationship between Linux and desktop software is no different from the relationship between Windows XP and the Windows GUI and between Macintosh and the Macintosh GUI: it's a kernel with a separate user-mode GUI environment, composed of a window server and lots of dynamically loaded toolkit libraries. UNIX/Linux has had that architecture from the start, while Windows (3.1->NT) and Macintosh (OS9->OSX) basically had to start over to get there because there previous systems were architected so poorly. and it translates very poorly into a desktop environment for the average user. There is no basis for that claim; Linux desktop usability is comparable to that of Macintosh or Windows. Cheaper, yes, more powerful - arguable. PCs starting pulling ahead of Macs in the power stakes towards the late 90s. Prior to that it was neck and neck. Whether it's back to neck and neck now is debateable but I don't want to turn this (yet another) PC vs Mac argument - especially in a Palm OS forum! Ya, ya ya. I think it's more a case of PC market grew much faster than Mac market and Apple NEARLY went into death spiral as a result of their mismanagement in the mid 90s. Yes, Apple has small slice of computer market BUT, unlike PalmOne and PalmSource, it's a PROFITABLE slice and APPLE has US$4 billion in the bank - that's what counts whatever business you're in. Compare with what's happened to IBM, the inventor of the PC. It's PC division has been offloaded unto a Chinese company; it can be said that the PC business hasn't worked out for them. Unlike Apple, many PC compatible companies have come and gone. The only company which has CONSISTENTLY gained the greatest benefit from the PC compatible market since its creation (both of market and company) is MICROSOFT. Relating all of this back to PalmOS, it appears that PalmSource has struggled with OS 6, in the same way Apple struggled with Copland in the 90s and Microsoft seems to be struggling with Longhorn now. It also infers that Palm's BeOS aquisition was a bad move, why didn't they make the move to Linux then instead, now they're having to throw stuff out and start anew - just as Apple did when it threw out Copland, went for NextStep/Rhapsody and transformed it into OS X. It also suggests this is a last chance move by PalmSource in it's battle to stay alive - I ask rhetorically just how many major licensees of the PalmOS remain now? Hey, here's an idea. Let's pretend Cobalt never happened and skip straight to OS 7. Add true multitasking, remove limitations that plague the system, but still include PACE, and find out based on well-spent R&D polling data what people like in a PDA and what they don't. Then use that data to build an operating system with the versatility to run on a smartphone or a mini-laptop. PalmSource, I can understand you want to flee from the PDA market as soon as possible. But it appears to be stagnant because nobody is making anything desirable. Let me repeat that. Nobody is making anything desirable. I'm a gadget enthusiast and I haven't bought a new PDA in over a year and a half. That's unprecedented for me. There is nothing fresh, and that's a fault of your licensees. But you can cure that, and the solution is to build a more compelling and more convincing OS to get those unsure PPC licensees to jump ship. There was a nice slot for Toshiba in the high-end here, while in the WinMob market it was crammed. Now they're gone, never to return again. We already scared off Sony, but what about Sony Ericsson? Hell, get Henry Kissinger to convince them your OS has more support than Symbian, which is controlled by Nokia. There are a disgusting amount of ways to spread your reach, PalmSource, but the ways you are choosing truly are .. well .. disgusting. In summary, Cobalt and Linux won't get you back your marketshare. Resting on your laurels won't get you back your marketshare. Beating Microsoft to the punch will. More than 4MB?!? I had no problem finding a Linux kernel that was below 400k. 1MB would probably fit the Linux kernel, TCP/IP networking, a web server... and you'd still have half the space free for web pages. "The more you cut down the OS, the less compatible you will be with the rest of the linux software offerings. The value of the move can not be in all the brilliant handheld optimised linux software available, can it?" I'm sure the last thing that PalmSource is thinking about is getting PalmOS smartphones to run existing linux software. They want people to develop to their OS layer--not everyone elses. Actually, if we look at the history of Unix (not Linux), it was designed for a spare DEC PDP that was lying around (Ken Thompson wrote it to run a game in which he was interested). The Unix V6 code fit into 64K (I've got the Lyons book). Linus wrote Linux because he wanted an OS that he could tinker around. That it has evolved into workstations and servers is just one market path. I've had a Sharp Zaurus for several years and the startup time and battery life are real pain points (and QTopia isn't so hot an environment, either, IMHO). If mLinux has solve those problems as they claim then they have a good jump on the Linux/Palm OS experience (well, at least the old Palm OS experience, maybe ;) ). Cramming an inefficent, buggy desktop/server OS design into a handheld *is* a flawed, inferior design decision. The problem with CE is that MS used Win32 along with its shared-DLL, registry, and memory-management nightmares as well as its general temperamental nature. Using a more modular, stable, efficient desktop/server OS as the foundation still has some disadvantages over designing an OS from the ground-up to run on a handheld. But with mobile hardware as advanced as it is, that's no longer the issue it used to be. > and have requirements that are a fraction of those for BeOS. LMAO! You're kidding right? If you said over the past decade, you'd be pushing it. Decades??? Hilarious! Yeah, you might of seen some "embedded" systems running Unix derivatives in the 1990's, but they were running on relatively high-end hardware for the time. Maybe even in the 80's but once again, it would've been on very high end hardware for the time. Hardly what I'd call an embedded system, and most Unix derivatives at the time didn't have much support for real-time stuff either. Requirements-smirements ... who cares about requirements. Any decent OS today from a company other than Microsoft should be able to run circles on today's 100-400MHz PDA processors. I'm talking about pluggable micro-kernel achitectures, consideration in the design for low power requirements, real-time support, etc. Things you want for mobile/embedded devices. I can't think of one Unix-related OS that goes (or at least had its origins) in those directions. Sure Linux, with A LOT OF EFFORT, has gone in those directions, but just imagine that kind of effort behind an OS that was designed that way from the start. > out there doesn't make that true. Well, I'm actually NOT one, but you probably think I am. I'd just like to see a mobile device with an OS that was designed for the task, and Linux isn't it. I hadn't had a chance to take a look at Cobalt yet, but I had been hoping PalmSource would use that opportunity to put together an OS designed right for handheld devices. > what it does fairly well, but it does completely the wrong things. Well, get your textbook out and educate us about what's wrong with BeOS (or Cobalt for that matter). When you keep telling me that Linux is better because everyone else is using it, your argument doesn't hold much weight. One correction to abosco's posting: Palm OS Cobalt does have "true multitasking" at the OS level, and the API's are exposed to third-party developers. There is still a single main application, but that's a UI decision, based on the Zen of Palm design philosophy, not an OS limitation. We don't expect this to change in PalmNix/Palm OS on the Linux Kernel/Palm OS for Linux/whatever our marketing department decides to call it. Disclaimer: I'm a PalmSource employee (the QA lead for the Cobalt Arm Native C/C++ Compiler), but you can check this out yourself by downloading PODS from our developer site. On the broader issues, I'll defer to hackbod's posts; but on this issue, she argued strongly that we should expose our multitasking to developers. I argued against it at the time, on testing grounds, but I'm glad she won. I know Cobalt has the capability to multitask. The problem is, developers need to recode their apps to be able to do so! What if I wish to run an old 68K version of AIM 1.1 for Palm OS and multitask it with Blazer Web Browser since I'm using a cell phone and the page trimming features of Blazer are ideal for minimal downloads? I'll be stuck doing it the same way I've been doing it for years - task switching. Cobalt should have an option to inefficiently multitask two applications with notification of activity in a background process, so long as the user desires. This issue can be addressed by allowing the people to turn on and off multitasking in Preferences for individual applications. That would kill two birds with one stone - it would allow true (inefficient) multitasking to those of us who demand it, and turn the feature off for those of us who lack the system resources on their device. This, in my opinion, should be the types of things PalmSource should be investing R&D into - how to give customers what they demand. >> and have requirements that are a fraction of those for BeOS. >LMAO! You're kidding right? If you said over the past decade, you'd be pushing it. Decades??? Hilarious! QNX was originally created by Dan Dodge and Gordon Bell in 1980 and ran on prototype, wire-wrapped 8088 and 6809 machines. The QNX community benefits tremendously from the fact that Dan and Gord still play an active role in the development and coding of the QNX operating system. The OS was originally called Qunix, "Quick UNIX", until they received a polite letter from AT&T's lawyers asking that they change the name" "UNIX derivatives have been used for decades in embedded applications and have requirements that are a fraction of those for BeOS." UNIX has been used as an embedded OS for communication switches, network switches, high-end printers and copiers, industrial devices, and high-end machinery for more than 20 years. POSIX arrive in 1988 and was quickly adopted by embedded OS vendors. "Well, get your textbook out and educate us about what's wrong with BeOS" Do you drive a Lamborghini or some more sensible car? I assume, like most people, you drive a more sensible car. Likewise, most people only care about seeing one video at a time; the fact that BeOS thirty meant that they had optimized the wrong thing. And that's why companies like Lamborghini and BeOS are always near bankruptcy. "(or Cobalt for that matter)." Pretty much the same thing, only worse. BeOS might have been led a quirky side-line existence, but Palm is a mainstream business and they can't afford to mess around with that sort of nonsense. Palm needed a mainstream, industry standard kernel. Yes, and if you looked any further into it, QNX isn't a "UNIX derivative" despite the name. > and high-end machinery for more than 20 years. Well if you want to call what was essentially a computer with the latest and greatest CPUs stuck in a $10,000+ switch or printer an "embedded device", that's up to you. And if you looked even a little further, you'd see that both QNX and Linux implement the UNIX APIs. "Despite its decidedly non-UNIX architecture, QNX Neutrino implements the standard POSIX API." So, out of all of you "experts" who are so sure of what Linux can and can't do and what memory footprint a kernel can and can't fit into, how many of you have actually ever done any Linux system programming, esp. at the kernel level? " you'd see that both QNX and Linux implement the UNIX APIs [LINK] "Despite its decidedly non-UNIX architecture, QNX Neutrino implements the standard POSIX API." POSIX = standard defining UNIX APIs. So, yes, you proved it yourself: QNX implements the UNIX APIs. But, in any case, you don't have to in order to see how well Linux runs on embedded devices: lots of devices already use them. It's the OS for many MP3 players, access points, webcams, etc., usually created by companies with far fewer resources than PalmSource to run on devices with far less power than a PDA. Almost all of you are deluded and misinformed, and sadly, so are most of the people who were quoted in the above story. This is much ado about nothing. I guess that's what you get when you ask a bunch of webmasters and amateur journalists to comment on technical issues. All that's changing is the kernel, and that pretty much only affects the people who have to design the rest of the OS and the hardware manufacturers, and that's it. The only reason this would affect the user at all is if developers start writing software that takes direct advantage of the Linux API's, and this will probably have to be limited to only power tools. Does anyone here know anything about the current kernel? For those of you with networking routers at home, do you know what kernel the OS of your router runs on? I thought not. The reason is because it doesn't matter to the user. All of the subsystems on top of the kernel are going to remain the same, i.e. the UI, the multimedia framework that Be designed, etc. Other PDA's have used Linux and made it the central part of their platform with much lower quality home-built userland utilities, but Palm plans to continue to make their already-highly-developed OS still the main piece of the puzzle, so the analogy simply isn't there. For all of you running your mouth about Linux not working well on the desktop, that has Nothing to do with the kernel, and everything to do with what's on top of it. Palm already has the winning UI and applications, so it's going to be a non-issue. After some pondering, Ive come to realise palm has long ago stopped competing against just pocketpc's. Windows CE is now turning up in all kinds of devices, such as media players, DVD players, gas fill-up terminals, mobile phones, pay points and (on slashdot today) in a radio transmitter for r/c devices. It is turning into a device platform just like embedded Linux. The funny part is it is the pocketpc gui which is usually left out. This whole story smacks of riding the Linux wave, as if it is 1999. Unfortunately the stock-market is not buying it this time, and Palmsource is a whole 2 dollars down in the last 5 days. In fact the stock appears to be nose diving. I paid about $40 for my first copy of Microsoft OS in the 1980's. Today, I pay $200 for a copy of Microsoft Windows XP Pro. We need more choices and competitions in the mobile OS space, not less. Oh God..not the Copland issue again. It's from 1995 and it pertains to Apple's failed Copland project. Translation = HISTORY. If you're arguing that Nagel isn't the best captain to stear PalmSource..you'll get no argument from me. Is history repeating itself? Perhaps, but lets concentrate on the matter at hand, not some ancient Businessweek article about Apple from 1995. In fact Nagel's Copland experience has motivated some of the PalmSource execution. Palm OS 5 was released to get them quickly to the ARM platform instead of plan of action before Nagel came on board. While we might have gotten a new OS with multitasking and more goodies it would have also pushed out the move to the ARM base by a year or more. According to people I know Nagel pushed the PACE-centric model specifically because he could see history repeating itself. I have to give him credit there. What's the old saying, those who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it? I think Gekko is quite right in bringing up the Newsweek article. Again, like Copland, something must have gone wrong somewhere with PalmOS 6 - why haven't we seen ANY OS 6 devices after one year of waiting? Anyone want to instruct me how to filter out comments by certain users? Sometimes you just realize how useless a whole forum can be with so much noise and so little signal put out from those people. The very big difference between Copland and Cobalt: Cobalt exists, today, and you can download it and run it and see for yourself. Go to www.palmsource.com and download the simulator if you don't believe me. Yes I realize, it is not yet shipping on any devices, and that really needs to change. There are a lot of factors feeding into this situation, including us not being the ones doing hardware, a mobile OS like PalmOS being much more tied to specific hardware rather than us being able to release updates for existing hardware, etc. However one factor not causing this is Cobalt being in the same situation as Copland was, and you can be sure when we sat down and started working on Cobalt we were aware of the lessons learned from the failure of Copland (as well as the success of MacOS X, and the struggle Microsoft is having with Longhorn). The situation isn't that much different. Copland did exist and was running on Mac hardware. It made it to a "limited beta" release before Gil Amelio canned it. No-one disagrees that Cobalt exists, the problem is, that just like Copland, no-one seems keen to release anything that uses it. Now if you can't even get PalmOne to use it, then it can't be really a surprise when folk start saying that Cobalt is stillborn. 2/. APIs and the GUI running on top of a Linux kernel. Let's call it PalmBox. So, you are going to continue development of TWO operating systems? I don't see it myself; you are obviously following Apple's MacOSX plan to the letter, which doesn't include developing two OSs now and forever, for a single class of device. > "Again, like Copland, something must have gone wrong somewhere with PalmOS 6 - why haven't we seen ANY OS 6 devices after one year of waiting?" Because no one wants it, plain and simple. And judging from my experience with the Cobalt 6.1 Simulator I'm running on my desktop right now, it's not hard to see why. In a word this OS is a DISAPPOINTMENT; or at least that's the impression it gives. Very little has changed from an end user perspective (which has its pros and cons), and even the "new" interface is just a basic topical change from what we have now in Garnet..which dates back to 1997. The only real innovation I've seen in Cobalt so far is the new Date Book app, which is really nice. Kind of makes you wonder if this CMS acquisition wasn't a bailout strategy, or Plan B if you will. Imagine the reaction if Microsoft unveiled Longhorn...and none of the major PC makers licensed it. It would be huge PR disaster. The only reason why that isn't the case with PalmSource is because the situation is being kept quiet behind closed doors. If only those walls could talk. First new Cobalt device announced!!! BeVilla. 2) the current PalmOS GUI is already pretty good. I think a LauncherX style tabbed environment with sidebar shortcuts to a "Today" screen, pop-up analog clock (like the UX50), etc would be more functional, but that's splitting hairs and can easily be added later by end users. I'm probably PalmSource's most vocal critic here, but I'll be the first to admit they have (had?) a lot of good ideas forming the foundation of PalmOS 6. Cobalt may be late, buggy and DOA, but don't pretend it's not a good attempt at a PDA OS given what they (unrealistically) tried to accomplish in the time frame. Cool - but what about improvements in PIM functionality? It'd be great to have unix under the hood. Fun to play with, etc. PIM happens to be what I got a PDA for - and Palm is so lacking here that I'm considering a PPC/Blackberry. Yes, the Treo looks great. But, why the hell doesn't it show appointments & due to dos on the default screen, just like a XDA does? This is not about innovation, it's about just thinking a bit.. Photographer, using Palm M515 and can't decide on what next.. RE: Cool - but what about improvements in PIM functionality? The PalmSource answer to this questions seems to have become "buy third-party apps". Are there incredible PIM applications for the PalmOS? You betcha. DateBk3, Beyond Contacts, the Chapura suite, etc, etc. most users just use the built in stuff. No surprise there, considering how difficult it is to install applications. Why PalmSource has not bought all these litle companies is beyond me, as they are the only thing keeping the OS alive. I understand there are apps for windows outlook users that provide all the sync/functionality.. That's of no use to me. Anybody have any experience with blackberry/pocketmac conduit/entourage? Ditto for ppc? 2) Large 1640 mAh battery. 1) It can take your CF or SD card, to review your pictures on a larger screen. 2) You can connect it to a USB hard drive (like the ipod or iriver drives, or dedicated photography portable hard drives) and review their contents, and show them to clients in the field. 3) By using a combination of the CF slot and a USB 40 Gb ipod, you could dump all your pictures from the card to the hard drive and reuse your card. 4) You could use wifi to upload selected pictures to your office, for print out while you are in the field, If there is no wifi available you could do the same using bluetooth and a 3G mobile phone. 5) You could use a bluetooth GPS unit and software to guide you to your next engagement, and it could warn you of speed-traps along the way. Tomtom also included real time traffic warnings over GPRS in the UK, so you can avoid delays. There is plenty of excellent photo viewers available on the pocketpc platform, and one included in the OS. All of the scenarios outlines above are very practical, and are used in one form or another by professional photographers. It could easily replace a laptop if you were already carrying one, and do it slightly cheaper. You will certainly be more mobile. Press photographers are already using solutions similar to this. Please reply to this thread if you have any questions or criticisms. Screen quality comparison, including the loox 720. Posts which show that you can connect the Loox to an iriver 40Gb mp3 player, and another which shows you can connect it to Olympus cameras directly. A fast and friendly photo viewer. Maybe this seems a bit crazy to peeps, but the biggest reason I'm sticking with the Palm OS after a long ride (Palm III in 1998 -> Vx -> m505 -> T1 -> T3, sticking with that:unimpressed with the E2/T5) is that, whatever the PDA OS, synching with desktop MS Outlook is *not* where I want to go today, or any day. I freaking *hate* Outlook, as well as the rest of the crappy MS Office suite, especially MS Turd. I'm an early adapter attorney who's used computers since my first CP/M machine in 1982, and am quite happy with the Palm Desktop side of things, which integrates very well with other desktop programs (using 3rd party apps like AddressGrabber, the Shoreline VOIP control panel, etc.). I hate the Outlook UI and find its integration even with MS apps laughable, with the klunky Active-X or VB of *.net templates being called and filled out...half of which break and don't work. So...if I have to go to the dark side to get a handheld which suits my needs on a hardware/software platform which is still developing rather than stagnant, can I find a desktop host side that interfaces with a more robust PIM like ACT (or does the Mobile Windows OS or whatever they call it have a Palm Desktop NON OUTLOOK simple desktop component? > "As a photographer the choice should really be very simple. You need a Loox 720 pocketpc." It fits in your front pocket, back pocket, shirt pocket, and sock if you're afraid of getting mugged. This is one serious advantage. I will say this in Surur's defense: photographers have been completely neglected by software developers on the palm platform for 9+ years! There is NO IMAGE EDITOR SOFTWARE at all on the POS. I found one for my clie - Clie Photo Editor - that lets you adjust brightness/contrast. But that's it. DO YOU HEAR THAT SOFTWARE PEOPLE? Yes, size does matter and I'm after PIM functionality first and foremost. And I think I'd like to have a phone built-in as well. Thus, if there was a complete Entourage (BTW, it's nicer than Outlook I believe) - PPC syncing solution, I'd be going for the X(M)DA II. I really love the standby screen that shows.. well..everything at a glance. Finally, only one screen to check/look at during the day. Entourage is actually a pretty good program if one does a lot of email. Very flexible and scriptable. It's by far not the best time management program, but useable. Again, the problem is to get the desktop PIM sync with the PDA PIMs. I wrote above and just realized that there probably are integrated PIM/PDA solutions on the Windows platform.. So you might want to stay after all. It sure is refreshing to get a summary of the reactions from actual experts in the field. This provides a good thumbnail sketch of this recent PalmSource move from people with an actual informed opinion, and provides a nice counterbalance to the rantings of the small band of yayhoos who bring little more to the table than an internet connection, lots of free time, and random, misguided, and ill-informed indignance. Please do this again, PIC!
2019-04-20T14:17:46Z
http://www.palminfocenter.com/comments/7392/
PIG. Human beings eat more meat of the pig than any other domesticated livestock on earth, even with pig being a food forbidden to more than one billion followers of Islam or Judaism. This lowly beast, whose intelligence and cleanliness has been underestimated for centuries, is a prolific animal that quickly converts a variety of feeds to a mild-flavored meat. One of the first domesticated animals, the pig appears in oriental and Greco-Roman mythology as well as in the Torah, the Bible, and the Qurʾan. Despite its utility as a source of food, leather, and pharmaceuticals, the word, pig, is an insult or gentle rebuke in many cultures. While the pig itself may not have grown more controversial, its modern, industrialized husbandry draws criticism from an array of opponents. The pig, Sus scrofa domestica, is a subspecies of Sus scrofa, the Eurasian wild boar. It is in the order of mammals, Artiodactyla, which means even-toed and hoofed. That order includes ruminant livestock such as cattle. Bacteria in the rumen help these animals digest cellulose in grasses. Sus scrofa is a member of the Family Suidae, or swine. These animals do not ruminate and cannot digest grasses. They are omnivores. In the wild, their diet is fungi, leaves, roots, bulbs, tubers, fruit, snails, earthworms, small vertebrates, eggs, and carrion. The Suidae family includes African bush pigs and African warthogs. In common usage, most people make no distinction between a pig and swine, but the precise meaning of pig is "a young swine." The experienced swine breeder Kelly Klober notes that "what really separates the pros from the tenderfeet is how the word 'pig' is used. To be country correct, it is the term for a very young pig. A hog is a swine that weighs over 120 pounds" (Klober, p. 24). A mature female swine is a sow. A mature male is a boar. Barrows are castrated male pigs raised for slaughter. Gilts are immature females. Both are sold as "market hogs" at five to seven months of age and at weights of between 220 to 260 pounds. Mature hogs can grow much larger. Boars have topped one ton. Use of the meat of the pig, known as pork, is also not without controversy. Until the early twentieth century, the hog was bred for fat, or lard, just as much as for meat. Later in that century, the saturated fats found in many types of meat were targeted as contributors to coronary heart disease. Breeding and changes in the way hogs are fed has made modern swine 30 to 50 percent leaner than in 1950. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the lard-type hog, nicknamed "cob rollers," was so fat that its stubby legs were barely visible. For all of modern pork's improved qualities, the pig is still a source of less desirable calories. As much as two-thirds of each slaughtered hog is used for processed meats—hams, sausages, and bacon. These meat products can be much higher in fat and salt than the amounts considered healthy by the medical profession. The Center for Science in the Public Interest in the United States characterizes bacon, hot dogs, and sausage, all of which can contain pork, as among the most unhealthy foods available, recommending that consumers buy bacon and sausage that has no more than 45 percent of its calories from fat and no more than 480 milligrams of sodium per serving. In a recent survey of products sold in grocery stores, typical pork bacon (which comes from a pig's belly) had a whopping 9 percent of its calories in the form of fat. Only certain brands of turkey bacon were truly "low fat." The pork bacon was lower than turkey bacon in sodium, however, with only 170 milligrams. The pig is one of the first domesticated animals: its remains in some archeological excavations have been found to date earlier than the bones of cattle. Agricultural settlements raised pigs in the Middle East at least nine to ten thousand years ago. In Jericho, one of the world's most ancient cities, archeologists unearthed domesticated pig bones in soil layers predating 7000 b.c.e. Archeological excavations in the East Indies and Southeastern Asia show evidence of domesticated swine at about the same time. The East Asian pig arrived in China around 5000 b.c.e. Some of the first written recipes for pork are from China, where the pig has been an integral part of agriculture for thousands of years, feeding on garden waste and table scraps in pens next to farm huts. Recent archeological evidence suggests that Neolithic farmers rapidly spread agriculture, and pigs, along the Mediterranean shore of Europe before 5500 b.c.e. The pig appears again in the writing and art of first recorded history. Pork was a popular food in early dynasties of Egypt. The ancient Greeks ate pigs. The Romans were masters of smoking and salting pork. From the time of medieval Europe through colonial North America, pigs were allowed to forage for acorns, nuts, and other foods in the forest in a semi-wild state. In the fall, they would be rounded up, slaughtered, butchered, and preserved by smoking, salting, and curing. In the United States, the pig was the most popular source of meat through the nineteenth century. The westward migration of American settlers into what would become the Corn Belt in America's Midwestern states was the perfect marriage of an Old World livestock with the grain of native Americans. The diet of swine shifted ever more from woodland forage and scraps to corn. Not until the 1950s did beef surpass pork as the most popular meat in America. Increased beef consumption coincided with the rise of industrialized cattle feedlots and post-World War II affluence. With suburbanization came the popularity of backyard grilling of steaks and hamburgers. Until the late twentieth century, pigs were weaned from their sow from about thirty-five to fifty-six days after they were born. From a birth weight of about three pounds, they would reach a weaning weight of about forty to fifty pounds by fifty-six days. After a short period of receiving a rich "starter feed" of grains, milk products, and perhaps medication, the pigs were ready to sell to another farmer who specialized in "finishing," or feeding hogs to market weights. Sometimes the farmer whose sows produced the pigs would keep the pigs and move them to another barn or pen to feed them to market weight in a method of production called "farrow to finish." (Farrowing refers to the action of a sow giving birth.) Farrow-to-finish production was typical of small-and medium-size "family farms" in North America. On some farms, farrowing took place in small huts big enough for one sow, placed in a pasture of alfalfa or other digestible forage. After 1950, farrowing more commonly took place in specialized buildings or modified barns. In large commercial farms, swine production is even more complex, having moved beyond the traditional one-site or two-site production system. On these farms, pigs are weaned at much earlier ages, sometimes when only ten to fourteen days old. This technique, called medicated early weaning, was developed in Britain in the 1980s by veterinary medicine professor Tom Alexander at the University of Cambridge. Alexander discovered that very early weaning could prevent a sow from passing certain swine diseases to the next generation of piglets. Weaned pigs are moved to separate nursery buildings, at enough distance to lessen the chance of infection by wind-born disease agents. The pigs are usually held in the nursery for seven weeks. before they are moved to another set of buildings for the "finisher-production" stage, where they reach slaughter weights. This multisite system of production has existed along with the more traditional ones, in which farmers raised only a few hundred or a few thousand pigs for slaughter. But at the start of the new millennium, multisite production was rapidly taking over the industry. In Corn Belt hog-producing states, individual families that ran grain farms still fed hogs, but only in the second and third stages of multisite production. The families no longer owned the pigs. Instead, they raised them for large companies, much as local entrepreneurs run franchise outlets for fast-food chains. The pigs were owned, from birth through slaughter, by large companies, including packers. The parent animals in this system are complex proprietary mixtures of breeds owned by a handful of multinational companies. By the late 1990s, more than half of U.S. production was in some stage of this "vertical integration," meaning that each step in hog raising is owned or controlled by one company. The multisite pig production system was becoming global, existing not only in the United States and Britain, but also in Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Spain, Germany, Poland, Italy, China, and France. Many of these countries are also the top producers and consumers of pigs. China is the leader, producing 43.2 million metric tons of pork in 2002, more than half of the global production of 85.2 million tons. The European Union was a distant second, with 17.8 million tons. The United States ranked third, producing 8.7 million metric tons of pork. China's livestock practices supply the main reason the world eats much more pork than other meats. Of the world annual beef production of about fifty million tons, China raises only 5.8 million tons of beef. In the United States, one company, Niman Ranch of San Francisco, California, hires farmers to raise pigs without antibiotics or growth hormones for sale to natural foods stores and upscale restaurants. These farmers raise pigs in pastures or on straw bedding in barns and sheds and periodically submit samples of meat to a taste panel to make sure that it is not too lean to be palatable. They use swine breeds that are not quite as lean as the crossbred hogs in large multisite hog businesses. After tasting this type of pork, New York Times food writer Marian Burros reviewed it as "so delicious it needed no seasoning beyond salt and pepper. . . . [The] meat was superior heirloom pork, suffused with a bright clean flavor, with none of the unpleasant aftertaste that pork often has" (September 1999). As beloved as pork is in many cultures, the pig is despised in the traditions of others. Many theories exist to explain why Islam and Judaism consider the meat of pigs unclean. To some followers of these faiths, the abhorrent nature of pigs is obvious. The animals often wallow in mud and look dirty. But pigs, unable to sweat, wallow in mud as an efficient way to stay cool. Nevertheless, their breeding conditions may have created a social stigma. Animal scientists M. Eugene Ensminger and R. O. Parker point out that because "close confinement was invariably accompanied by the foul odors of the pig sty . . . early keepers of swine were often regarded with contempt" (Ensminger and Parker, p. 1 ). Anthropologist Marvin argues that the pig's downfall in the Middle East was economic. Pigs are costly to raise in the climate of the Middle East. They are more difficult to herd than the sheep and goats favored by the desert nomads who quickly adopted Islam. And there is evidence that over the past ten thousand years, the environment in the Middle East grew less hospitable for animals originally adapted to foraging in forests. Harris contends that for Jews, "the food laws of Leviticus were mostly codifications of traditional food prejudices and avoidances" (Harris, 1985, p. 79). A book of the Torah, Leviticus was written in 450 b.c.e., long after swine herding and consumption had lost prestige in many other ancient near eastern cultures as well as in ancient Israel. He finds even more support for his theory in China, where pork-disdaining Islam failed to penetrate far. There, the pig complemented an agrarian ecology, eating stems, leaves and scraps from many vegetable crops, and in turn, being eaten. Archeological digs in the Middle East give evidence that the pig was once worshipped as well as eaten. In early stages of Phoenician, Egyptian, and Babylonian civilizations, people freely ate pork. But as those civilizations matured, pork fell from favor. When the Greek historian Herodotus visited Egypt before 430 B.C.E., he saw that "the pig is regarded among them as an unclean animal so much so that if a man in passing accidentally touches a pig, he instantly hurries into the river and plunges in with all his clothes on" (quoted in Harris, 1985, p. 83). In the future, the economic relationship to cultural and religious taboos may be tested if pigs become more than a source of meat and go on to save more lives. Besides providing pigskin leather and byproducts with industrial uses, pigs are already a source of pharmaceuticals, such as insulin. Since 1971, pig heart valves have been used to replace damaged human heart valves. Pig valves are treated and contain no living cells, preventing rejection by the human immune system. Soon, genetic manipulation may allow transplants of whole, living organs from pigs to humans. Pigs offer an advantage over other animalsby closely matching those of humans. In China, the pig is one of twelve animals symbolizing a year in a twelve-year lunar calendar. According to Chinese mythology, all animals were invited to race for this honor. A year was assigned to the first twelve winners, as each one finished. The pig came in twelfth. Just as westerners who believe in astrology tie personality traits to signs of the Zodiac, the Chinese attribute personality traits to the year in which they were born. Those born in the Year of the Pig (also called Year of the Boar) are said to be easygoing, sincere, tolerant, and honest. They are also considered naïve. Naïveté was linked to pigs in Homer's Odyssey, when Ulysses' men were turned to pigs by the sorceress Circe. While the men themselves were naïve, their behavior even before their conversion was almost piglike. They were attracted by Circe's sweet voice and lulled to complacency by her rich meal. Homer seems to use this tale to impart a sensuality to pigs, as well as a pig-likeness to the mariners. The pig was sacred to Aphrodite and an important image in Celtic mythology. Modern confinement appears clean compared to hogs wallowing in outdoor pens. The use of metal crates to restrict sow movement is humane, say the system's defenders, because it prevents newborn pigs from accidentally being crushed by a heavy sow. The U.S. National Pork Board's position on animal welfare is that "because the welfare of their animals directly affects their livelihood, pork producers work to ensure their animals are treated humanely. Anything else would be self-defeating." Some farmers are, in fact, beginning to revise their methods. Straw bedding must periodically be moved onto farm fields to keep pig buildings clean. This requires labor that larger intensive farms may not have. Large farms flush manure with water into lagoons or tanks. That manure is also spread onto farmland as fertilizer. But critics charge that current environmental standards in the United States do not require the manure to be spread over a wide enough area and allow it to eventually build up excessive amounts of nutrients in soils that can wash into streams or contaminate groundwater. Spills of manure have already caused fish kills and stream pollution in Midwestern states. In 1999 a large hog-producing company in Missouri, Premium Standard Farms, agreed to pay $25 million to settle a lawsuit accusing it of violating the state's Clean Water Act. See also Cattle ; China ; Folklore, Food in ; Food Safety ; Goat ; Judaism ; Livestock Production ; Mammals ; Meat ; Middle East ; Packaging and Canning ; Sheep . Brennan, Jennifer. The Cuisines of Asia. New York: St. Martins/Marek, 1984. Dohner, Janet Vorwald. The Encyclopedia of Historic and Endangered Livestock Breeds. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2002. Ensminger, M. Eugene, and R. O. Parker. Swine Science. 5th ed. Danville, Ill.: Interstate Printers, 1984. Harris, D. L. Multi-site Pig Production. Ames: Iowa State University Press, 2000. Klober, Kelly. A Guide to Raising Pigs. Pownal, Vt.: Storey Publishing, 1997. Rath, Sara. The Complete Pig: An Entertaining History of Pigs. Stillwater, Minn.: Voyageur Press, 2000. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultual Research Service. 2001. USDA Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, Release 14. Nutrient Data Laboratory Home Page, available at http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp. Perhaps nowhere on earth is the pig so honored and well treated as in the highlands of Papua New Guinea—at least until it is eaten. The great anthropologist Margaret Mead visited the Stone Age tribes of New Guinea and noticed that pigs there acted like dogs. "They assume all of the characteristics of dogs—hang their heads under rebuke, snuggle up to regain favor, and so on," she wrote in Letters from the Field: 1925–1972. In this still primitive island nation south of the equator and north of Australia, the women of highland tribes rear pigs and treat them as well as their own children. They will even nurse a pig if it is orphaned. Women, children—and pigs—eat and sleep in huts that are separate from those of the men. The pigs are named, handfed, groomed, and fussed over if they become sick. Not until they are large are the pigs kept in a separate pen in the hut. Eventually, though, the men slaughter some of these pigs in a ritualized sacrifice. Then the pigs become a feast for the tribal village. Pork and sweet potatoes cooked on hot stones add flavor to weddings, funerals, festivals, and other special events. To Westerners, this may seem like bizarre, almost schizophrenic behavior. But within the context of New Guinea's tribal cultures, it is a bit more logical. Pigs have great economic, political, and even mystical importance in New Guinea. They are symbols of wealth. They are used to buy a bride, for example. Pigs are sacrificed to appease ancestral spirits. Some tribes consider them humanlike—and humans, piglike. Eating one's best friend does not seem so strange in New Guinea, where only a few decades ago cannibalism was practiced. And breast-feeding pigs is just a low-tech version of U.S. sheep ranchers bottle-feeding orphaned lambs. Valuable animals often receive loving care in many livestock-rearing cultures. Even today, decades after Margaret Mead lived in New Guinea in the 1930s, the tribes there prize their pigs. At the turn of the twenty-first century, Jeff Tyler traveled to New Guinea for The Savvy Traveler, a public radio travel program and Web site in the United States. Tyler joined a group of American and Australian tourists who visited a mountain village where a sow was ritually slaughtered. Village men, covered with black and ceremonial paint, clubbed the sow and cooked her for their guests. Tribal warfare still continues in New Guinea. A local guide tells Tyler, "There is a reason for tribal warfares. The main reason is we fight for land. We fight for woman. And we fight for pigs." Spam might be described as the Woody Allen of the meat world. Like the American film actor, this small 12-ounce can of pork is a commercial success thriving on self-deprecation. In enticement, the rectangular block of pink processed meat sliding from the can onto a platter cannot contend with a juicy steak or a real ham. Consumer advocates cite it as an example of a high-fat food. The Oxford English Dictionary defines the adjective, spammy, as "consisting or tasting chiefly of 'bland' luncheon meat. . . mediocre, unexciting." Spam drew widespread ridicule in the 1970s in a comedy skit on British television's Monty Python's Flying Circus when a Spam-pushing waitress was drowned out by a group of Vikings singing "Spam, spam, spam, spam. Lovely Spam! Wonderful Spam!" More recently, this trademarked brand of canned meat received a dubious tribute in the adoption of the term "spam" to denote unwanted e-mail, or unsolicited electronic mail messages. The association of the term with a food product may, in fact, have been overwhelmed by its new slang definition. Even so, Hormel Foods Corporation, the maker and inventor of the original Spam, has profited on the sale of some five billion cans of the stuff, marketed in roughly one hundred countries, since its introduction in 1937 as "Hormel Spiced Ham." The Austin, Minnesota–based food company, founded in 1891 as Geo. A. Hormel & Company, pioneered the production and sale of canned hams in the 1920s. A New York actor, Kenneth Daigneau, won a naming contest by calling it Spam. Spam is made from ham, pork shoulder meat, and a secret mix of spices. World War II turned this depression-era canned luncheon meat into a global product. Spam helped keep Russian troops from starving. It cheered the British palate. And it drew ribbing from U.S. forces in the South Pacific, where they named one encampment "Spamville." After the war, U.S. president Dwight Eisenhower admitted that he, too, ate his "share of Spam along with millions of other soldiers" (Hormel website). In recent years, Hormel reports selling one hundred million cans of Spam annually in the United States, and another forty-two million overseas. Hawaiians are the top per capita consumers of Spam in the United States, at more than four cans per consumer a year. South Korea and the United Kingdom are the top overseas buyers of Spam. In 2001 Hormel opened a 16,500 square-foot SPAM Museum in Austin, Minn. The following summer, it planned a media event with television stars; Barbara Billingsley, who played June Cleaver on the series Leave It to Beaver, was invited to present her favorite Spam recipe, "Overnight SPAM & Broccoli Cheese Strata." Spam's notoriety has achieved recognition. An original Spam can is in the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Spam inspired a book of haiku poetry, Spam-Ku: Tranquil Reflections on Luncheon Loaf. Meanwhile, the company valiantly fights misuse of the word "spam" for what it calls "unsolicited commercial email (UCE)." Hormel's "official SPAM Home page. The one in good taste," gives company policy: "We do not object to use of this slang term to describe UCE, although we do object to the use of our product image in association with that term." Hormel also prefers that the name of its trademarked food be capitalized as SPAM, while "spam" as junk e-mail should be lowercase. The company seems to recognize that its original Spam is high in fat. With 140 of a serving's 170 calories coming from fat, those eating half of a can would have nearly exceeded the recommended daily intake for saturated fat and sodium. In response to these concerns, Hormel began offering SPAM Oven Roasted Turkey, SPAM Smoke Flavored, SPAM Lite, and SPAM Less Sodium with "the same great taste." Cho, John Nagamichi, comp. SPAM-Ku: Tranquil Reflections on Luncheon Loaf. New York: HarperPerennial, 1998. Hormel website. "The Role of SPAM in World War II." Available at http://www.hormel.com. Wyman, Carolyn. SPAM: A Biography. San Diego, Calif.: Harcourt Brace, 1999. "Pig." Encyclopedia of Food and Culture. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. pig / pig/ • n. 1. an omnivorous domesticated hoofed mammal (numerous varieties of Sus domesticus) with sparse bristly hair and a flat snout for rooting in the soil, kept for its meat. The pig family (Suidae) also includes the warthog and babirusa. ∎ a wild animal of this family. ∎ a young pig; a piglet. ∎ the flesh of a pig, esp. a young one, as food. ∎ inf. derog. a greedy, dirty, or unpleasant person. ∎ inf. derog. a police officer. 2. an oblong mass of iron or lead from a smelting furnace. See also pig iron. ∎ a device that fits snugly inside an oil or gas pipeline and is sent through it to clean or test the inside, or to act as a barrier. • v. (pigged , pigging ) [intr.] 1. inf. gorge oneself with food: don’t pig out on chips. 2. inf. crowd together with other people in disorderly or dirty conditions. 3. (of a sow) give birth to piglets; farrow. 4. operate a pig within an oil or gas pipeline. PHRASES: bleed like a pig bleed copiously. in a pig's eye inf. expressing scornful disbelief at a statement. a pig in a poke something that is bought or accepted without knowing its value or seeing it first. "pig." The Oxford Pocket Dictionary of Current English. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. pig the pig is proverbial as a type of obstinacy and greed. A pig is the emblem of St Anthony of Egypt (see also tantony pig). pig in a poke something that is bought or accepted without knowing its value or seeing it first (a poke here is a bag). Pig Latin an invented language formed by systematic distortion of a source language; a secret language formed from English by transferring the initial consonant or consonant cluster of each word to the end of the word and adding a vocalic syllable (usually -ay): so igpay atinlay. squeal like a stuck pig squeal or yell loudly and shrilly; a stuck pig is one that is being butchered by having its throat cut. "pig." The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. pig Any of numerous species and varieties of domestic and wild swine of the family Suidae. The male is generally called a boar; the female, a sow. A castrated boar is usually known as a hog. It is generally a massive, short-legged omnivore with a thick skin. Wild pigs include the warthog, wild boar, bush pig and babirusa. The domestic pig (Sus scrofa) is reared for human consumption. For pork they are slaughtered at 70–90kg (155–200lb) and for bacon at 80–100kg (175–220kg). "pig." World Encyclopedia. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. pig young of swine XIII; swine of any age; oblong piece of metal, ingot XVI. ME. pigge :- OE. *picga, *pigga, of unkn. orig.; for the formation cf. DOG. Hence pigtail twist of tobacco XVII; plait of hair XVIII. "pig." The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. "pig." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. "pig." A Dictionary of Zoology. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. "pig." Oxford Dictionary of Rhymes. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. PIG (Heb. חֲזִיר, ḥazir). Included in the Pentateuch among the unclean animals prohibited as food is the pig which, although cloven-footed, is a nonruminant (Lev. 11:7; Deut. 16:8). It is the sole unclean animal mentioned as possessing these characteristics. There are archaeological evidences (figurines and relics of bones) that the pig was eaten by the inhabitants of Canaan before the Israelite conquest. It was also offered as a sacrifice in idolatrous worship, provoking a protest from Isaiah (66:3), while those "eating swine's flesh, and the detestable thing, and the mouse" (66:17) apparently did so in a cultic ceremony. The pig symbolized something repulsive, and hence "as a ring of gold in a swine's snout, so is a fair woman that turneth aside from discretion" (Prov. 11:22). Other peoples, too, such as the Egyptians and the Sidonians, refrained from eating pig, which was also later prohibited to the Muslims. Abhorrence of the pig entered so deeply into the consciousness of the Jews that the expression davar aḥer ("another thing," i.e., something not to be mentioned by name) was used for it, at least as early as talmudic times (Ber. 43b; Shab. 129a) and in Aramaic as "that species." As early as *Antiochus Epiphanes it was decreed that the eating of swine's flesh was to be a test of the Jews' loyalty to Judaism (ii Macc. 6:18). Following the incident in the days of Hyrcanus ii when, instead of an animal fit for sacrifice, a pig was sent up the walls of Jerusalem during a siege, it was decreed: "Cursed be he who breeds pigs" (Sot. 49b; tj, Ta'an. 4:8, 68c), and this prohibition was incorporated into the Mishnah (bk 7:7). Since the pig eats everything and finds its food everywhere, there arose the saying: "None is richer than a pig" (Shab. 155b). The pig suffers from various maladies: "Ten measures of diseases descended to the world, of which the swine took nine" (Kid. 49b). During a plague that afflicted pigs, R. Judah decreed a fast in Babylonia since "their intestines are like those of human beings," the fear being entertained that the plague would spread to people (Ta'an. 21b). The domesticated pig, Sus scropha domestica, is descended from the wild boar, Sus scropha. Its domestication was a lengthy process, going back to ancient times. The pig formerly found in Ereẓ Israel differed from the present-day one whose various breeds were developed from strains brought from China about the middle of the 18th century. The wild boar (ḥazir ha-bar), which is found in Israel especially in Upper and western Galilee, damages plants and vegetables, and uproots the bulbs and tubers of wild flora. It is the "boar out of the wood" in Psalms (80:9–14), where reference is made to the ravages it causes to vines. The Tosefta (Kil. 1:8) states that "although the pig and the wild boar resemble each other, they are heterogeneous." In a baraita mentioned three times in the Babylonian Talmud (Sot. 49b; bk 82b; Men. 64b), the prohibition against rearing pig is joined with the prohibition against studying "Greek wisdom," and some scholars have queried the trustworthiness of this tradition and tend to the opinion that the incident referred to there – when the besiegers of Jerusalem sent up a pig to the besieged in place of the two lambs for the daily sacrifices – occurred during the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, when the subsequent prohibition against rearing pigs was decreed (cf. tj, Ber. 4:1, 7b, where a similar story occurs about sending up a pig at "the time of the wicked kingdom"). It seems, however, that the prohibition against rearing pigs was already known in the days of the early Hasmoneans; it is possible that its source is to be found in a reaction to the decrees of Antiochus Epiphanes, who ordered a pig to be offered as a sacrifice (i Macc. 1:47) and pig's flesh to be eaten (ii Macc. 6:18–7:42) and that the incident in the time of the Hasmonean brothers caused the prohibition to be stressed with greater emphasis. The phrase "Cursed be the man who rears" is worthy of attention. It would appear that, with the increase of the non-Jewish population, Jews in Ereẓ Israel apparently engaged in the business of pig rearing. Of interest is the combination "pig-breeders and usurers" (Ber. 55a, and Rashi, ad loc.) both of which were regarded as providing an easy means of livelihood. Although there are many references in the aggadah to a feeling of revulsion and disgust toward swine flesh, the rabbis refrained from connecting the prohibition with this feeling. Eleazar b. Azariah expounded, "Whence do we know that a man should not say, 'I have no desire to eat swine's flesh,' but rather should he say 'I would like to eat it, but what can I do seeing that my Father in Heaven has decreed against it'" (Sifra, Kedoshim, Perek 11:22). A substitute was even given in a fish called shibuta "which resembles the pig" in taste (Ḥul. 109b; Tanh. Shemini, 12). In the Midrash the Roman kingdom is called ḥazir ("pig"). It is possible that the name originated in the fact that the symbol of the Roman legion in Ereẓ Israel was the boar (see arn1, 34:100: "'The… boar out of the wood doth ravage it' [Ps. 80:14], refers to the Roman kingdom"; and cf. Mid. Ps. to 80:6). The Midrashim explain the name with reference to the characteristics common to Rome and to the pig: "and the swine because he parteth the hoof ' – why is [Rome] compared to a swine? – To teach that just as a swine when it lies down puts out its hooves as if to say, 'see, I am clean,' so too the kingdom of Edom [Rome] acts arrogantly, and plunders and robs under the guise of establishing a judicial tribunal" (Lev. R. 13:5). Another "etymological" explanation states: "Why is [Rome] called ḥazir ['pig']… because it will eventually restore haḤazir ['the kingdom'] to its rightful owner" (Eccles. R. 1:9; Lev. R. 13:5). This statement was quoted in the Middle Ages by the people with the reading, "Why is it called a pig? – Because the Holy One will restore it to Israel" (i.e., declare it clean), and in this form it became a topic in Jewish-Christian polemics. The raising of pigs in the Holy Land was always regarded with abhorrence not only by Jewish religious circles but also by many outside the strictly religious camp. The Jewish National Fund's leases forbade pig raising on its land. The religious parties pressed for the prohibition of pig breeding by law, but in the early years of statehood it was left to local authorities to pass their own bylaws in this matter. When the Supreme Court, in a test case, ruled that such regulations were ultra vires, the religious parties pressed for, and secured, the passage of a special authorization law (5717/1956) to give the local authorities the necessary authority. There was still pressure for the prohibition of pig breeding on a national basis and in 1962 a law was passed forbidding the breeding, keeping, or slaughtering of pigs, except in Nazareth and in certain other named places with a sizable Christian population. In the early 2000s Kibbutz Lahav and Kibbutz Mizra were among the few Jewish pig breeders in the country. in the bible: Lewysohn, Zool, 146–8 (nos. 170–2); F. Blome, Die Opfermaterie in Babylonien und Israel, 1 (1934), 120–5, nos. 117–21; F.S. Bodenheimer, Animal and Man in Bible Lands (1960), 51, 103. in halakhah and aggadah: S. Kraus, in: rej, 53 (1907), 15–19; Ginzberg, Legends, 5 (1925), Y. Baer, in: Sefer Zikkaron le-Asher Gulak ve-li-Shemu'el Klein 294; idem, Perushim ve-Ḥiddushim ba-Yerushalmi, 3 (1941), 35–40; (1942), 40, note by J.N. Epstein: Ḥ. Al-beck, ibid., 49; E. Wiesenberg, in: huca, 27 (1956), 233–93. in israel: M. Elon, Ḥakikah Datit (1968), 20–23. add. bibliography: Feliks, Ha-Ẓome'aḥ, 228. "Pig." Encyclopaedia Judaica. . Encyclopedia.com. 9 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>.
2019-04-19T08:39:52Z
https://www.encyclopedia.com/plants-and-animals/animals/agriculture-animals/pig
Partial sciatic nerve ligation (pSNL) markedly increased glial fibrillary acidic protein immunoreactivity (GFAP-IR) 1 week after lesion in the L4–L5 spinal dorsal horn of wild-type, but not in dynorphin knock-out, mice lacking κ opioid receptors (KOR−/−) or in wild-type mice pretreated with the KOR antagonist nor-binaltorphimine (norBNI). A direct effect of KOR on glial cell proliferation was suggested by the findings that primary cultures of type II GFAP-immunoreactive astrocytes isolated from mouse spinal cord express KOR. Sustained treatment with the κ agonist U50,488 (trans-3,4-dichloro-N-methyl-N-[2-(1-pyrolytinil)-cyclohexyl]-benzeneacetamide methane sulfonate) significantly increased the proliferation rate of GFAP-immunoreactive astrocytes isolated from wild-type mice, and this effect was blocked by norBNI pretreatment. Proliferation of cultured type II astrocytes may have been stimulated by mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) activation by KOR because (1) U50,488 treatment increased phospho-p38 MAPK-immunoreactivity 247 ± 44% over untreated cells, (2) the increase in phospho-p38 induced by U50,488 was blocked by norBNI and not evident in KOR−/− cultures, and (3) GFAP-immunoreactive astrocyte proliferation induced by U50,488 was blocked by the p38 MAPK inhibitor SB 203580 [4-(4-fluorophenyl)-2-(4-methylsulfinylphenyl)-5-(4-pyridyl)-1H-imidazole]. Similar mechanisms of astrocyte activation may also be responsible in vivo because intrathecal injection of SB 203580 blocked the increased GFAP-IR in lumbar spinal cord induced by pSNL. Although the relationship between κ-stimulated astrocyte proliferation and neuropathic pain mechanisms was not directly established in these studies, the results support the hypothesis that KOR activation induces spinal astrocyte proliferation, which may contribute to cellular reorganization after sciatic nerve damage. Induction of painful peripheral neuropathy results in anatomical changes within the dorsal horn, including an increase in expression of glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), an indicator of reactive gliosis after CNS injury (Kajander et al., 1990; Ma and Quirion, 2002). Although studies suggest that reactive gliosis is a major impediment to reestablishing neuronal pathways, little is known about the cellular and molecular signals controlling this process (Murray et al., 1990; Ma and Quirion, 2002). We reported previously that chronic pain induced by partial sciatic nerve ligation (pSNL) caused sustained dynorphin release that resulted in prolonged κ opioid receptor (KOR) activation in astroglial cells in the mouse spinal cord (Xu et al., 2004). Wang et al. (2001) have shown that dynorphin released in the spinal cord contributes strongly to the neuropathic pain response; however, the role of astroglial KOR activation after nerve damage remains unclear. The type of glial cell responding to dynorphin release and subsequent KOR activation after pSNL was not established. Astrocytes and oligodendrocytes are the major classes of neuroglial cells in spinal cord and can be distinguished morphologically and antigenically (Hirano and Goldman, 1988; Misson et al., 1991; McMahon and McDermott, 2001). KOR is a member of the heptahelical, G-protein-coupled receptor opioid receptor family, and previous studies have shown that KOR is expressed by astroglial cells and can induce glial cell proliferation in vitro (Stiene-Martin and Hauser, 1991; Barg et al., 1993a; Eriksson et al., 1993; Ruzicka et al., 1995; Stiene-Martin et al., 1998). Accumulating evidence further suggests that KOR-selective agonists stimulate extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) and p38 phosphorylation, activate phospholipase C in C6 glioma cells (Bohn et al., 2000; Belcheva et al., 2005; Bruchas et al., 2006), and increase DNA synthesis in cultures of mixed glial cells derived from fetal rat brain or rat spinal–dorsal root ganglion cocultures (Barg et al., 1993b). Nerve injury is known to activate mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs), and this mechanism may mediate the response to opioids within the spinal cord during neuropathic pain (Jin et al., 2003). MAPKs are a family of evolutionarily conserved proteins that play a critical role in cell signaling by transducing extracellular stimuli into intracellular responses (Chen et al., 2001). They are involved in cell proliferation and differentiation during development, neuronal plasticity, and injury responses (Ji and Woolf, 2001). Peripheral nerve lesions result in activation of MAPKs in microglia and astrocytes in the spinal cord, leading to the production of inflammatory mediators that sensitize dorsal horn neurons (Ma and Quirion, 2002; Jin et al., 2003; Zhuang et al., 2005). The primary objective of our study was to determine the cellular consequences of endogenous κ opioid system activation in mouse spinal cord after partial sciatic nerve ligation. κ receptor activation after chronic nerve injury produces sustained antinociceptive effects (Xu et al., 2004), and understanding the underlying mechanisms may have therapeutic implications. Male C57BL/6 mice (Charles River Laboratories, Wilmington, MA) weighing 22–32 g were used in these experiments. Homozygous KOR, dynorphin, and G-protein-coupled receptor kinase 3 (GRK3) knock-out (−/−) mice were prepared by homologous recombination as described previously (Peppel et al., 1997; Hough et al., 2000; Sharifi et al., 2001) and provided for this study. Animals were backcrossed for >10 generations with C57BL/6 mice, and heterozygote breeding pairs were used to generate homozygotic “knock-out” mice of each type and paired wild-type (WT) littermate controls for this study. Individual mice were genotyped using DNA extracted from tail samples as a PCR template as described previously (Xu et al., 2004). The dynorphin, KOR, and GRK3 gene-disrupted animals show no discernible differences from WT littermates in growth, lifespan, or overt behavior. All mice were housed in groups of two to four in plastic cages (28 × 16 × 13 cm, length × width × height) using Bed-A-Cob for home bedding within the Animal Core Facility at the University of Washington and were maintained in pathogen-free housing units. Mice were transferred 1 week before training into a colony room adjacent to the testing room to acclimatize to the testing environment. The housing rooms were illuminated on a 12 h light/dark cycle with artificial lights on at 7:00 A.M. Lab chow and water were available ad libitum. All protocols with mice were approved by the institutional Animal Care and Use Committee in accordance with the 1996 National Institutes of Health Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals and guidelines for the International Association for the Study of Pain (Zimmermann, 1983). Mice were inspected regularly by veterinary staff to ensure compliance. The pSNL model of neuropathic pain used in this study has been described previously (Seltzer et al., 1990). The animals were anesthetized with pentobarbital sodium (80 mg/kg, i.p.). The right hindlegs were shaved, and the skin was sterilized with iodine. All surgical instruments were sterilized before surgery and then washed and heat treated (glass beads at 250°C) between animals. The right sciatic nerve was exposed, and approximately one-third to one-half the diameter of the nerve was tightly ligated with 7-0 silk suture (Surgical Specialties, Reading, PA). After checking hemostasis, the muscle and the adjacent fascia were closed with sutures, and the skin was closed with clips. The mice were killed by CO2 asphyxiation when experiments were completed. To minimize the inflammatory response triggered by intrathecal implantation of a polyethylene catheter (DeLeo et al., 1997), a spinal cord puncture was made with a 30 gauge needle between L5 and L6 level to deliver the drug and vehicle to the spinal space around lumbosacral spinal cord (Hylden and Wilcox, 1980). A brisk flick of the tail was considered to be an indicator of the accuracy of each injection. The injection volume was 5 μl for intrathecal injection. One or 3 μg SB 203580 [4-(4-fluorophenyl)-2-(4-methylsulfinylphenyl)-5-(4-pyridyl)-1H-imidazole] (specific inhibitor of p38 MAPK) or saline was given 30 min before pSNL surgery and then once per 12 h after surgery for 7 consecutive days. SB 203580 HCl is water soluble, and the doses were based on previous studies (Zhang et al., 2005; Cui et al., 2006). Behavioral tests for allodynia and hyperalgesia. The mice were habituated to handling and testing equipment at least 20–30 min before experiments. Threshold for tactile allodynia was measured with a series of von Frey filaments (Semmes-Weinstein monofilaments; Stoelting, Wood Dale, IL). The mice stood on a metal mesh covered with a plastic dome. The plantar surface of the hindpaws was touched with different von Frey filaments having bending force from 0.166 to 3.63 g until the threshold that induced paw withdrawal was found. According to the specifications of the manufacturer, a 1 g filament induces a force of ∼9.8 mN. Unresponsive mice received a maximal score of 3.63 g. To assess thermal sensitivity (hyperalgesia), paw-withdrawal latencies to a radiant heat stimulus were measured using the paw-flick test apparatus (IITC Life Science, Woodland Hills, CA). Paw-withdrawal latency was determined as the average of three measurements per paw. The stimulus intensity was adjusted to give 8–10 s withdrawal latency in the normal mouse (baseline). The cutoff time in the absence of response was 15 s to prevent tissue damage. Using sterile instruments and conditions, postnatal day 1–3 mice were decapitated, and spinal cords were rapidly dissected and placed in 2 ml culture medium (Neurobasal A supplemented with GlutaMAX, 2% B27, 50 U of penicillin, and 0.05 μg/ml streptomycin) (Invitrogen, Carlsbad, CA), at 4°C in a 35-mm-diameter dish. The spinal cord tissue was coarsely cut and transferred to sterile culture medium containing 40 U/ml active papain (Sigma, St. Louis, MO) at a volume of 1.5 ml/animal. The solution was then incubated at 30°C for 30 min on a platform rotating 120 rpm, keeping the segments suspended. The papain solution was then replaced with 2 ml of 30° culture medium and then triturated 15–20 times. After settling for 2 min, the supernatant was passed through a 70 μm nylon cell strainer (BD Biosciences, Bedford, MA). Twice more, the remaining sediment was suspended in 2 ml culture medium, triturated, and settled with the supernatant strained. Cells were plated in 0.5 ml culture medium at a density of 2.5 × 105 cells/ml on 12 mm glass coverslips (PGC Scientifics, Gaithersburg, MD) placed in 24 well plates (BD Biosciences). Coverslips were acid washed, soaked in ethanol, and rinsed in sterile distilled water before a 24 h treatment with 50 μg/ml poly-d-lysine (135 kDa; Sigma). One hour after plating and incubation (5% CO2/95% air, 37°C; Forma Scientific, Marietta, OH), unattached cells and debris were aspirated and new culture medium was added. Cultures were initially shaken at 200 rpm overnight (VWR-OS-500 orbital shaker) to enrich for adherent cell types (e.g., astrocytes) and against neurons and microglia. Three days after plating and every 3 days thereafter, medium was replaced with complete medium containing 10% fetal bovine serum (Gemini Bio-Products, Woodland, CA). Coverslips were used for immunohistochemistry or immunoblotting 1–2 weeks after plating. Mice were injected intraperitoneally with bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) (Sigma) solution in saline (100 mg of BrdU per kilogram of body weight) once a day for 7 d starting from the day of sciatic nerve ligation. BrdU is a thymidine analog that is specifically incorporated into DNA during DNA synthesis that can be used as a marker for proliferation. Mice were then anesthetized with isoflurane (Sigma) and intracardially perfused with 4% paraformaldehyde in phosphate buffer (PB) (0.1 m sodium phosphate, pH 7.4). The lumbar spinal cords were dissected, cryoprotected with solution of 30% (w/v) sucrose in PB at 4°C overnight, cut into 40 μm sections with a microtome, and processed for BrdU and GFAP immunostaining. Briefly, sections were washed three times in PBS, treated with 2N HCl for 60 min at 37°C, followed by two 10 min washes in 0.1 m borate buffer, pH 8.5, washed again three times in PBS, and blocked in PBS containing 0.1% Triton X-100 and 4% normal goat serum. Sections were then incubated overnight with primary BrdU monoclonal antibody (6 μg/ml; Millipore, Bedford, MA) and each of the following primary antibodies for double labeling: astroglia marker guinea pig GFAP (1:1000; Millipore), neuronal-specific nuclear protein NeuN (1:1000; Millipore), stem cell marker nestin (1:500; Abcam, Cambridge, MA), oligodendrocytes precursor marker NG2 (1:500; Millipore), and microglial marker Iba1 (ionized calcium-binding adaptor molecule 1) (1:300; Wako Pure Chemicals, Osaka, Japan). For double labeling of phospho-p38 and different cell type markers, the primary antibodies were as follows: phospho-p38 (1:200; Cell Signaling Technology, Beverly, MA), astroglial marker GFAP (1:1000; Millipore), microglial marker CD11b (1:500; Serotec Oxford, UK), and neuronal marker NeuN (1:1000; Millipore). Sections were then washed with PBS and then incubated (1 h, 37°C) with the fluorescent secondary antibodies FITC and rhodamine conjugate (1:250; Jackson ImmunoResearch, West Grove, PA) diluted in PBS containing 0.1% Triton X-100 and 4% normal goat serum. The sections were rinsed in PBS for 30 min and then mounted on gelatin-coated slides with Vectashield mounting medium (Vector Laboratories, Burlingame, CA) and sealed with nail polish for microscopy. The sections were viewed with a Nikon (Tokyo, Japan) Eclipse E600 fluorescence microscope or a Leica (Nussloch, Germany) confocal microscope located in the W. M. Keck Imaging Facility at the University of Washington. The BrdU-labeled astrocytes were counted in at least three cross sections. Data were presented as the average numbers of BrdU-labeled astrocytes per section. Immunocytochemistry in spinal astrocyte cultures. Spinal astrocyte proliferation was assessed using 10 μm BrdU incorporation into cells continuously exposed to the κ agonist U50,488 (trans-3,4-dichloro-N-methyl-N-[2-(1-pyrolytinil)-cyclohexyl]-benzeneacetamide methane sulfonate) (1 μm), U50,488 with the κ antagonist nor-binaltorphimine (norBNI), or U50,488 with the p38 inhibitor SB 203580 (100 or 500 nm) for 3 or 6 d. Freshly prepared drug solutions (dissolved in water) were added when the medium was changed every 3 d, and norBNI was added 30 min before U50,488. Cells were fixed with 4% paraformaldehyde in PB for 20 min, washed three times in PBS, treated with 2N HCl for 30 min at 37°C, followed by three 3 min washes in 0.1 m borate buffer, pH 8.5, washed again three times in PBS, and blocked in PBS containing 0.25% Triton X-100 and 0.3% gelatin. Cells were incubated with a mouse anti-BrdU monoclonal antibody (6 μg/ml; Millipore) and astroglial marker guinea pig anti-GFAP antiserum (diluted 1:1000; Millipore) overnight at 4°C. Sections were then washed with PBS, and detection was performed using the fluorescent secondary antibody FITC anti-mouse IgG (1:250; Jackson ImmunoResearch) and donkey anti-guinea pig IgG rhodamine conjugate (1:250; Jackson ImmunoResearch). Four to six coverslips were chosen in each group. The BrdU-labeled GFAP-positive cells were counted in at least four randomly chosen fields on each coverslip. The mean value of these fields was taken as the number of BrdU-labeled GFAP-positive cells on each coverslip. Astrocytes express GFAP and can be divided into type I astrocytes, which are large, epithelioid cells, and type II, which have stellate processes and express a surface antigen (A2B5). Type II astrocytes and oligodendrocytes develop from O-2A progenitor cells (Raff et al., 1983); however, oligodendrocytes are not GFAP positive and can be identified by monoclonal antibody O1 (Sommer and Schachner, 1981). To identify type II astrocytes, we used primary antibodies directed against the cell surface marker A2B5 (5 μg/ml; Millipore) and the astrocyte marker GFAP. FITC anti-mouse IgG and donkey anti-guinea pig IgG rhodamine conjugate were used as secondary antibodies. To assess KOR activation in astrocytes, we used phosphoselective KOR antibody KOR-P (rabbit) (McLaughlin et al., 2003) and GFAP antibody (guinea pig) for double labeling, and FITC anti-rabbit IgG and donkey anti-guinea pig IgG rhodamine conjugate were used as secondary antibodies. Phospho-p38 labeling of astrocytes was detected using a 1:200 dilution of mouse phospho-p38 monoclonal antibody (Cell Signaling Technology) and a 1:1000 dilution of guinea pig anti-GFAP antibody (Millipore). The secondary antibodies were FITC anti-mouse IgG (1:250; Jackson ImmunoResearch) and donkey anti-guinea pig IgG rhodamine conjugate (1:250; Jackson ImmunoResearch). The staining intensity was measured with NIH ImageJ on four to six coverslips in each group. Three days after culture in serum-free neurobasal media supplemented with B27 (Invitrogen), primary cultures of postnatal day 1–3 mouse astrocytes were plated on 35 mm Falcon dishes (Becton Dickinson, Franklin, NJ) in 10% fetal bovine serum (Sigma) for an additional 7–10 d until plates reached near-confluence. Astrocytes were treated for at least 24 h hour in serum-free DMEM/F-12 media and then treated for 10 min in vehicle (DMEM/F-12 media) or U50,488 (1 μm) in DMEM/F-12. Lysis and immunoblots were performed as described previously (Belcheva et al., 2001). Cells were immediately placed on ice, and media was aspirated and lysed in 650 μl of ice-cold lysis buffer (20 mm HEPES, 10 mm EGTA, 40 mm β-glycerophosphate, 2.5 mm MgCl2, and 1% Nonidet P-40) with protease inhibitors [50 μg/ml PMSF, 1 μg/ml aprotinin, 1 μg/ml leupeptin, and 1 μg/ml pepstatin (Calbiochem, San Diego, CA)], a protein tyrosine phosphatase inhibitor (0.1 mg/ml, α-bromo-4-hydroxyacetophenone; Calbiochem), and a protein serine/threonine phosphatase inhibitor cocktail (Calbiochem) containing 2.5 mm (−)-p-bromotetramisole oxalate, 500 μm cantharidin, and 500 nm microcystin-LR. After 5 min on ice, lysates were scraped from each well by rubber policeman and then spun at 4°C for 20 min at 10,000 × g. Protein concentration was estimated using a bicinchoninic colorimetric assay kit (Pierce, Rockford, IL). Lysate concentration was estimated from a bovine serum albumin (BSA) standard curve generated by spectrophotometer at a visible absorbance of 562 nm. Lysates were diluted in lysis buffer to a final concentration of 15–20 μg/lane. Samples were boiled for 2 min in 20 μl of Laemmli sample buffer (100 mm Tris, pH 6.8, 2% SDS, 20% glycerol, 10% β-mercaptoethanol, and 0.1% bromophenol blue), resolved by SDS-PAGE using 10% bis-acrylamide nonreducing gels (Invitrogen) and transferred to nitrocellulose membranes. Blots were soaked in blocking buffer (5% BSA, 0.1% Tween 20, and TBS, pH 7.4) for 2 h at room temperature and incubated overnight at 4°C with a monoclonal primary antibody raised in rabbit recognizing phosphorylated p38 MAPK (Cell Signaling Technology) at a dilution of 1:500 in blocking buffer. Blots were washed, incubated for 1 h at room temperature in HRP-conjugated goat anti-rabbit secondary antibody (Bio-Rad, Hercules, CA) diluted 1:1000 in blocking buffer. Blots were washed, and then antibody labeling of proteins was visualized with an enhanced chemiluminescence detection kit (ECL; PerkinElmer, Boston, MA) on Eastman Kodak (Rochester, NY) BioMax XAR film. Blots were stripped by incubation for 60–90 min in erasure buffer (2% SDS, 62.5 mm Tris-HCl, pH 6.8 at 20°C, 100 mm β-mercaptoethanol) at 70°C, washed two times (10 min each) in TBS/0.1% Tween 20, blocked as described, and incubated overnight in total p38 MAPK (Cell Signaling Technology) diluted 1:1000 in dilution buffer. The secondary antibody used was HRP-conjugated goat anti-rabbit (Promega, Madison, WI) diluted 1:1000 in dilution buffer. Both primary p38 MAPK antibodies labeled a band of ∼50 kDa, consistent with a control cell lysate for phospho-p38 MAPK provided by Cell Signaling Technology. Microglial staining in rat spinal cord sections. As a positive control for p38 activation in microglia, peripheral nerve ligation was performed on two adult male rats (Sprague Dawley; Harlan, Livermore, CA), and spinal sections were double labeled with phospho-p38 and OX42 (microglia marker, purified mouse anti-rat antibody, 1:50 dilution; BD PharMingen, San Diego, CA). norBNI was obtained from the National Institute on Drug Abuse drug supply program (National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD). U50,488 and BrdU were from Sigma. SB 203580 HCl was from Calbiochem. In the immunohistochemical studies, cell numbers were counted and presented as the percentage of the control (e.g., contralateral side, sham, or vehicle treatment) for between-group differences. Similarly, the intensity of immunolabeling was compared for sections with the same optical parameters for the NIH Image or MetaMorph quantitation software (Molecular Devices, Palo Alto, CA). Significant results were demonstrated either by one-way ANOVA followed by Dunnett's test or Student's t test for significant pairwise comparisons. Response data are presented as means ± SEM of all groups, with significance set at p < 0.05. Consistent with previous results, GFAP immunoreactivity (IR) in lumbar spinal cord (L4–L5) was markedly increased in the lumbar spinal cord 7 d after pSNL (Fig. 1A,D) compared with sham-ligated mice (p < 0.05) (Fig. 1B,E) or untreated mice (data not shown). The GFAP-positive cells were located primarily in the lamina I–IV of the dorsal horn. Although an increase in GFAP-IR occurred bilaterally, staining appeared greater on the side of the spinal cord ipsilateral to the pSNL (right side). The GFAP-IR appeared to more fully fill the cells in the pSNL sections, suggesting that GFAP expression increased per cell (Fig. 1D). The increase in GFAP-IR in WT mice was blocked by pretreatment with the κ antagonist norBNI (10 mg/kg, i.p.) (Fig. 1C). In addition, mice lacking the dynorphin gene (DYN−/−) did not show increased GFAP-IR after pSNL (Fig. 1F) compared with sham-operated mice (Fig. 1B). Mice lacking κ opioid receptors (KOR−/−) also did not show increased GFAP-IR after pSNL (Fig. 1G). The consistent results from norBNI pretreatment and gene deletions of dynorphin or KOR suggest that the effect of pSNL on GFAP-IR induction was mediated by endogenous dynorphin peptide activation of the κ opioid receptor. GFAP-immunoreactive staining is increased in WT lumbar spinal cord 7 d after pSNL but not after sham ligation. The increase is blocked by norBNI and does not occur in Dyn−/− or KOR−/− mice. Transverse sections were taken of the lumbar spinal cord 7 d after pSNL. A–C,GFAP staining was significantly increased in WT pSNL mice compared with WT sham-operated mice (A, B), and this increase in GFAP-IR was blocked by the κ antagonist norBNI (10 mg/kg) (C). Mice lacking the dynorphin gene (Dyn−/−) did not show upregulated GFAP staining after pSNL (F). D and E are higher-magnification images of A and B, respectively. G, Graph showing mean ± SEM pixel intensity of GFAP staining in lamina I–IV of lumbar spinal sections. Image analysis of astrocytes expressing GFAP after pSNL, demonstrating approximately twofold higher signal intensity [114 ± 8.71 arbitrary units (AU); n = 4] than that of sham-ligated mice (57.9 ± 6.26 AU; n = 4) (*p < 0.001). In contrast, image analysis of sections from pSNL mice pretreated with norBNI (NBNI) did not show a significant increase over sham and were significantly lower than WT pSNL signal intensity (norBNI, 46.5 ± 0.85 AU; n = 4). Similarly, pSNL of Dyn−/− or KOR−/− mice did not result in significant increases in GFAP-immunoreactive pixel intensities over sham-ligated mice (Dyn−/−, 54.3 ± 0.84 AU, n = 4; KOR−/−, 48.0 ± 0.62 AU, n = 4). Scale bars: A–C, F, 400 μm; D, E, 100 μm. To determine whether the apparent increase in the number of GFAP-positive cells was caused solely by increased GFAP expression in existing cells or by astrocyte proliferation, mice were injected with BrdU (100 mg/kg, i.p.) once daily for 7 d after pSNL. Seven days after pSNL, the number of BrdU-positive cells was increased 4.4-fold in the ipsilateral side of the spinal cord compared with contralateral side (p < 0.05) (Fig. 2A,D). The results suggest that pSNL induced both astrocyte proliferation and increased GFAP expression. Approximately 15–20% of BrdU-positive cells were GFAP positive (Fig. 2C,F), suggesting that only a portion of the proliferative response after pSNL was attributable to GFAP-immunoreactive astrocyte proliferation. Although κ antagonism completely blocked the increase in GFAP-IR (Fig. 1G), the pSNL-induced increase in BrdU staining was not fully blocked by norBNI or KOR−/− (data not shown). The results suggest that KOR-independent mechanisms were simultaneously occurring in other cell types. The increase in GFAP-IR after pSNL is caused by astrocyte proliferation and hypertrophy. Transverse sections through the lumbar spinal cord segment were taken 7 d after pSNL. BrdU was administered 100 mg/kg intraperitoneally once daily for 7 d. Double-immunohistochemical labeling was viewed by laser-scanning confocal microscopy. A, BrdU-positive cells (green) were markedly increased on the ipsilateral side (right) of the spinal cord compared with the contralateral side (left). The immunoreactive cells were preferentially located in the lamina II–IV and VII. B, GFAP staining occurred on both sides, with a significant increase on the ipsilateral side. F, GFAP staining was more pronounced in astrocyte processes, whereas staining for BrdU was more pronounced in cell bodies (nucleus). D–F, Some of the dividing BrdU-labeled cells were GFAP-positive astrocytes (arrows), and others were not GFAP positive (arrowheads). The increased GFAP staining in astrocytes that were not BrdU positive suggested that these cells only increased their sizes (hypertrophy). G–I, Many BrdU-positive cells were obviously double labeled with nestin, a stem cell marker (arrows), but a small fraction of BrdU-positive cells were not nestin-positive stem cells (arrowheads). J–O, Similarly, a small fraction of BrdU-labeled cells were colabeled by antibodies against NG2, an oligodendrocyte precursor marker (J–L, arrows) or colabeled by antibodies against Iba 1, a microglial marker (M–O, arrows). Scale bars: A–C, 400 μm; D–O, 50 μm. To further characterize the BrdU-positive cells that did not express GFAP-IR, we performed dual-labeling of BrdU and nestin (stem cell marker), BrdU and NG2 (oligodendrocytes precur-sor marker), BrdU and Iba1 (microglia marker), or BrdU and NeuN (neuronal marker). The majority (∼70%) of the BrdU-positive cells were nestin-positive stem cells (Fig. 2G–I). Only a very small portion of BrdU-positive cells (<10%) were double-labeled microglia (Fig. 2M–O) or oligodendrocytes (Fig. 2J–L). We did not detect BrdU-positive cells that double labeled with NeuN (data not shown), suggesting that proliferation of neurons was not evident 7 d after pSNL. Primary astrocytes cultured from spinal cord were used to determine whether κ-opioid activation directly induced astrocyte proliferation. Previous studies showed that κ opioid receptors are expressed by brain and spinal cord astrocytes (Barg et al., 1993a; Ruzicka et al., 1995; Xu et al., 2004), and we found that primary astrocytes isolated from mouse spinal cord expressed functional κ opioid receptors. Treatment of primary astrocyte cultures using the κ agonist U50,488 (1 μm for 1 h at 37°C) significantly increased κ opioid receptor labeling detected by a phosphoselective antibody KOR-P compared with vehicle control (p < 0.05) (Fig. 3A,B). KOR-P is an affinity-purified antibody shown previously to detect KOR phosphorylated on serine 369 by GRK3 after agonist activation (McLaughlin et al., 2003; Xu et al., 2004). Coincubation with norBNI (10 μm) blocked the U50,488-induced increase in KOR-P labeling of astrocytes (Fig. 3C). Preabsorption of the KOR-P antibody with the corresponding cognate phospho-peptide prevented antibody labeling after 1 μm U50,488 treatment (data not shown). Treatment with norBNI alone had no effect on KOR-P labeling (data not shown). The results suggested that cultured spinal cord astrocytes express functional κ opioid receptors. KOR activation increases KOR-P staining in astrocyte culture. A–I, Astrocyte cultures were pretreated for 1 h at 37°C with vehicle (A, D, G), 1 μm U50,488 (B, E, H), or 10 μm norBNI with 1 μm U50,488 (C, F, I). Cells were fixed, double labeled with affinity-purified KOR-P antibody (10 μg/ml) and anti-GFAP antibody (1:1000), and then visualized with a confocal microscope. The KOR-P antibody did not label untreated cells (A), whereas incubation with U50,488 (1 μm) for 1 h produced an increase in KOR-P antibody labeling that colocalized with the GFAP labeling (B, H). Coincubation with the KOR-selective antagonist norBNI (10 μm) blocked the U50,488-induced increase of KOR-P labeling (C, I). GFAP staining did not change significantly after 1 h U50,588 treatment (D–F). J, Mean ± SEM pixel intensity of KOR-P staining in astrocyte cultures. Image analysis of the astrocytes expressing KOR-P treated with U50,488 demonstrated a 2.3-fold higher signal intensity (62.48 ± 4.52 AU; n = 4) than that of untreated cells (27.56 ± 1.2 AU; n = 4) (*p < 0.001). Image analysis of the astrocytes expressing KOR-P coincubated with both U50,488 and norBNI showed no significant difference in signal intensity (23.8 ± 2.04; n = 4) compared with untreated cells. K, Dual labeling of anti-A2B5 (green) and anti-GFAP (red) showed that these astrocytes were type II astrocytes. Scale bars: A–I, 100 μm; K, 50 μm. The cultured cells expressing κ opioid receptors were also immunolabeled by an antibody (anti-A2B5) specific for type II astrocytes. These type II astrocytes showed a stellate process-bearing morphology in culture (Fig. 3K) and closely resembled radial glia in the spinal cord (McMahon and McDermott, 2001). Incubation with 1 μm U50,488 for 3 or 6 d caused a robust increase in BrdU labeling of type II astrocytes compared with untreated cultures (p < 0.01) (Fig. 4). This increase was blocked by the inclusion of norBNI (10 μm) in the culture medium (Fig. 4C,F), suggesting that exogenous κ agonists can activate KOR on type II astrocytes and induce proliferation. Treatment with norBNI alone had no effect on BrdU labeling (data not shown). KOR activation increases the rate of astrocyte proliferation in culture. Cells were pretreated with the drugs listed above each image. A, D, In cell culture with vehicle treatment, there was a greater increase in the number of BrdU-positive cells after 6 d culture than after 3 d culture (A, D), and some BrdU-positive cells were not GFAP-positive (D). B, E, When the cultures were incubated with U50,488 (U50) (1 μm) in media for 3 or 6 d, there was a significant increase in BrdU labeling in type II astrocytes at 6 d compared with that of 3 d. C, F, This increase was blocked by the addition of 10 μm norBNI (NBNI). G, Graph showing mean ± SEM BrdU labeling of type II astrocytes per square millimeter in the astrocyte culture. BrdU labeling of type II astrocytes after 6 d of U50,488 treatment (16.64 ± 2.6; n = 4) was 1.6-fold at >3 d of treatment (11 ± 2.45; n = 4) (*p < 0.05). The U50,488-induced type II astrocyte proliferation was also blocked with cotreatment of the p38 inhibitor SB 203580. Scale bars: A–F, 100 μm; K, 50 μm. The U50,488-induced type II astrocyte proliferation was blocked by cotreatment with the p38 inhibitor SB 203580 (100 or 500 nm) (Fig. 4G), suggesting that KOR activation induced astrocyte proliferation through the p38 MAPK pathway. Consistent with previous reports, Western blotting experiments demonstrated that both 100 and 500 nm of the selective p38 inhibitor SB 203580 (Gallagher et al., 1997; Young et al., 1997; Bhat et al., 1998) were sufficient to block anisomycin (50 μm, 15 min) induced p38 activation in primary spinal cord astrocytes (data not shown). To test whether KOR mediates p38 activation in spinal cord astrocytes, we assessed the effects of U50,488 treatment on phospho-p38 MAPK levels in primary astrocyte cultures. A low basal level of phospho-p38 MAPK-IR was evident in the absence of agonist (Fig. 5A), and phospho-p38-IR was markedly increased after 1 μm U50,488 for 10 min (Fig. 5B,D). The U50,488-induced increase in phospho-p38 staining was blocked by 10 μm norBNI (Fig. 5C). Treatment with norBNI alone had no effect on phospho-p38-immunoreactive labeling (data not shown). The cultured cells responding to U50,488 with an increase in phospho-p38-IR were also GFAP-IR as shown by the double labeling (Fig. 5D–F). Quantitation of phospho-p38 staining intensities showed that the significant increase in intensity caused by U50,488 was blocked by norBNI (Fig. 5G). The in vitro results suggest that the increase in GFAP-IR caused by pSNL may have also been mediated by a p38 MAPK mechanism. U50,488 activates phospho-p38 MAPK pathway in spinal astrocyte cultures. Cells were pretreated for 10 min at 37°C with the drugs listed above each image. A, B, In vehicle-treated cultures, some basal phospho-p38 staining was evident (A), and cells treated with 1 μm U50,488 (U50) showed a marked increased in the level of phospho-p38-IR (B). C, The increase in phospho-p38 staining was not evident in cultures incubated with both norBNI and U50,488. D–F, Double labeling with phospho-p38 and GFAP using laser-scanning confocal microscopy revealed that phospho-p38 MAPK staining was localized to the cytoplasm and nucleus of GFAP-immunoreactive astrocytes. F, Mean ± SEM pixel intensity of phospho-p38 staining in astrocyte cultures. Image analysis of the astrocytes treated with U50,488 demonstrated a 1.6-fold higher signal intensity of phospho-p38 (47.85 ± 3.16 AU; n = 4) than in untreated cell cultures (29.85 ± 1.94 AU; n = 4) (*p < 0.01). Image analysis of the astrocytes coincubated with U50,488 and norBNI showed no significant increase in phospho-p38 signal intensity (28.38 ± 2.98; n = 4). Scale bars: A–C, 100 μm; D–F, 30 μm. Although several studies have shown that p38 was activated in different pain models in rats and p38 is activated exclusively in microglia (Jin et al., 2003; Svensson et al., 2003), p38 MAPK activation in mice during neuropathic pain has not been demonstrated previously. In this study, we used phospho-p38 antibody staining in mice lumbar spinal sections 7 d after pSNL. Phospho-p38 antibody staining was increased in the ipsilateral dorsal horn compared with the contralateral dorsal horn (Fig. 6A, inset). Most of the p38 MAPK staining was in the nucleus of astrocytes (Fig. 6A–C) or neurons (Fig. 6K–L). There was no evidence of phospho-p38 staining in CD11b-positive microglia (Figs. 6D–F); a series of 80 sections obtained from five mice at 7 d after pSNL were scanned. As a positive control for microglial double labeling, we showed the phospho-p38 staining in microglia in rat spinal cord tissue after chronic nerve injury (Figs. 6G–I), suggesting that there may be important differences in the cellular responses of rats and mice. Nevertheless, the present study was focused on the role of κ receptors in GFAP-immunoreactive type II astrocyte activation and did not attempt to further resolve this apparent microglial discrepancy. p38 MAPK was activated in astrocytes after pSNL in lumbar spinal sections. Transverse sections through the lumbar spinal cord segment 7 d after pSNL were labeled with antibody against phospho-p38 (p-p38, red) and double labeled with GFAP, CD11b, OX42, or NeuN antibodies (green). Double-immunohistochemical labeling was viewed by laser-scanning confocal microscopy (Leica SL). A, Phospho-p38 staining was increased on the ipsilateral side dorsal horn (left) of the spinal cord compared with the contralateral side (right) (inset). A–L, The phospho-p38-immunoreactive staining was preferentially located in the nucleus of GFAP-positive (A–C) and NeuN-positive (J–L) cells. A–C, Some of the phospho-p38-labeled cells were GFAP-positive astrocytes (arrows), and others were not GFAP positive (arrowheads). J–L, Many phospho-p38-labeled cells were clearly double labeled with NeuN antisera, a neuronal marker (arrows), although some phospho-p38-labeled cells were not NeuN-positive neurons (arrowheads). D–I, No colocalization was detected for phospho-p38 and CD11b, a microglia marker (D–F, arrowheads) in mouse tissue, but, as a positive control, colocalization was detected for phospho-p38 and microglia marker OX42 in rat spinal cord sections (G–I, arrows). The insets for G–I show a two times enlargement of the double-labeled microglial cell indicated by the arrow. Scale bars: A–L, 50 μm. We intrathecally injected either saline or SB 203580 (1 or 3 μg) in a volume of 5 μl once per 12 h for 7 d after pSNL. Paw-flick latency and von Frey hair force sensitivity was measured 30 min before the intrathecal injections on days 1, 3, 5, and 7. On day 7, the mice were fixative perfused, and GFAP-IR was assessed in the spinal cord sections. Astrocyte proliferation within the lumbar spinal cord caused by pSNL was inhibited by 1 μg (Fig. 7A–F) and 3 μg (data not shown) of SB 203580. As evident from A and B, SB 230580 treatment substantially reduced the GFAP-IR in the lamina I–VI. There was no effect of SB 230580 on the GFAP-IR in the ventral white matter. Higher-magnification images show that the SB 230580-sensitive phospho-p38 staining was predominantly in the deeper lamina of the spinal cord (Fig. 7C–F). pSNL-induced GFAP proliferation was reduced by a specific p38 MAPK inhibitor, SB 203580. Mice were intrathecally injected with either saline or 1 μg of SB 203580 in 5 μl, 30 min before pSNL and twice per day after pSNL for 7 d. After perfusion with 4% paraformaldehyde, lumbar spinal sections were stained with GFAP antisera. A, B, The GFAP staining was significantly lower in the SB 203580-treated mice (B) compared with the saline-treated mice (A). A, C, There was a significant increase of GFAP staining in the deeper layers on the ipsilateral side (left) compared with contralateral side (right) in saline-injected mice. C, E and D, F are higher-magnification images of A and B, respectively. SB 203580 significantly reduced the increase in GFAP staining after pSNL in both ipsilateral and contralateral regions of the deeper layers of the spinal cord (B, D, F). Scale bars: A, B, 800 μm; C, D, 400 μm; E, F, 800 μm. On day 7 after pSNL, the saline-injected mice showed significantly increased sensitivity to thermal and mechanical stimulation in the ipsilateral hindpaw compared with the baseline values before lesion (Fig. 8A,C) (p < 0.05). The intrathecal administration of SB 203580 at either 1 or 3 μg/dose modestly reduced the allodynic effects of pSNL in both the ipsilateral (Fig. 8C) and contralateral (Fig. 8D) paws. The significantly increased threshold response to mechanical stimulation suggested that there were anti-allodynic effects of this compound (p < 0.05). The higher dose of SB 203580 (3 μg) increased paw-withdrawal latency in the thermal analgesia assay (an anti-hyperalgesic effect), whereas the 1 μg dose of SB 203580 did not significantly affect paw-withdrawal latencies (Fig. 8A). Similar to our previous findings (Xu et al., 2004), pSNL did not induce hyperalgesia in the contralateral paw (Fig. 8B), but robust allodynia developed that was significantly reduced by 1 and 3 μg of SB 203580 on day 7 (Fig. 8D). Intrathecal injection of SB 203580 partially blocked pSNL-induced hyperalgesia and mechanical allodynia. Paw-flick latency or von Frey hair force mechanical threshold were measured on days 1, 3, 5, and 7 after pSNL for mice injected with saline or 1 or 3 μg of SB 203580. A, On day 7 after pSNL, the saline-injected mice showed hyperalgesia in the ipsilateral hindpaw as evident from the significantly decreased thermal latencies compared with before pSNL; this hyperalgesia was not evident in mice injected with 3 μg of SB 203580. B, The contralateral hindpaw did not develop hyperalgesia, and SB 203580 did not affect the thermal sensitivity of the contralateral hindpaw. C, D, However, both ipsilateral and contralateral hindpaws developed mechanical allodynia after saline intrathecal injection, and this allodynia was significantly reduced by both 1 and 3 μg of SB 203580 (*p < 0.05; one-way ANOVA, followed by Dunnett's multiple comparisons test). Unlike the hyperalgesic response to pSNL, the allodynic response was not completely blocked by SB 203580 treatment. Western blotting experiments in primary mouse spinal cord astrocyte cultures were used to extend the immunohistochemistry analysis. Cell lysates prepared 10 min after 1 μm U50,488 addition in vitro showed increased phospho-p38 MAPK-IR (195 ± 32% of vehicle-treated cells). The increase in phospho-p38 induced by U50,488 was not evident in KOR−/− cultures (Fig. 9A,B). Because we showed previously that KOR activation induced phosphorylation of p38 MAPK in transfected cells and primary cultured mouse astrocytes by GRK3 and arrestin-dependent mechanism (Bruchas et al., 2006), we next asked whether pSNL of GRK3−/− mice would show increased GFAP-IR. Basal phospho-p38-IR in astrocytes from GRK3−/− mice was significantly lower than in astrocytes from wild-type mice (54 ± 20% of vehicle-treated controls) (Fig. 9B). Furthermore, U50,488 treatment of GRK3−/− astrocyte cultures did not increase phospho-p38-IR compared with vehicle-treated controls. Equal protein loading was confirmed by stripping each blot and reprobing with a monoclonal antibody raised in rabbit to total p38 MAPK protein (Fig. 9A). Consistent with the lack of U50,488-induced increase in phospho-p38 in cultured astrocytes from GRK3−/− mice, pSNL did not cause an increase in GFAP-IR in GRK3−/− mice (Fig. 9C). agonist activation enhances phospho-p38 MAPK-IR in primary astrocyte cultures by a mechanism requiring GRK3. A, Representative gels showing phospho-p38-IR after U50,488 (U50) treatment in cell lysates prepared from spinal cord astrocytes cultured from WT (+/+), KOR−/−, or GRK3−/− mice. Top, Phospho-p38-IR; bottom, loading control; Anis, anisomycin. B, U50,488 treatment of WT astrocytes (left bars) increased phospho-p38 MAPK-IR to 195 ± 32% of vehicle-treated controls. In contrast, phospho-p38-IR in KOR−/− astrocyte cultures did not change after 1 μm U50,488 treatment (middle bars). Basal phospho-p38-IR in GRK3−/− astrocyte cultures was significantly lower than in GRK3+/+ astrocytes (*p < 0.05), and phospho-p38-IR did not significantly increase in GRK3−/− cultures after U50,488 treatment [right bars, 54 ± 20% (black) and 43 ± 37% (gray) of WT (+/+) vehicle-treated controls, respectively] (*p < 0.05 compared with vehicle-treated WT (+/+) controls; n = 6–10 replicates). C, Consistent with the lack of U50,488-induced increase in phospho-p38 in astrocyte cultures, GRK3−/− mice did not increase GFAP-IR in lumbar spinal cord 7 d after pSNL. The principal finding of this study is that κ opioid receptor activation mediates a component of pSNL-induced reactive gliosis in mouse spinal cord. Proliferation of type II astrocytes after pSNL was blocked by pretreatment with the KOR antagonist norBNI and did not occur in mice genetically lacking either prodynorphin-derived peptides or κ opioid receptors. Numerous studies have established that the endogenous dynorphin opioid peptides are released by neuropathic pain and contribute to the pain response (Wang et al., 2001; Xu et al., 2004). In addition, considerable evidence supports the idea that enhanced expression of endogenous dynorphin within the spinal cord promotes morphine tolerance (Vanderah et al., 2000) and is pronociceptive (Wang et al., 2001). The dynorphins act as endogenous agonists at the opioid receptors (KORs) (Chavkin et al., 1982), and the increased dynorphin expression in neuropathic pain also leads to a sustained activation of KOR (Xu et al., 2004). Several studies have documented antinociceptive effects of κ agonists (Nakazawa et al., 1991). Thus, the endogenous dynorphin-derived opioids seem to have both antinociceptive and pronociceptive actions. In our previous report, we showed that neuropathic pain induced a sustained release of endogenous prodynorphin-derived opioid peptides and increased KOR phosphorylation in GABAergic neurons and astrocytes (Xu et al., 2004). These results suggested that pSNL activated the KOR system in mouse spinal cord and induced opioid receptor tolerance. Similar results in the μ opioid system have shown that μ opioid receptor (MOR) phosphorylation increased after induction of neuropathic pain (Narita et al., 2004b), and MOR tolerance caused an increase in GFAP-IR in the spinal cord of both rats and mice (Song and Zhao, 2001; Narita et al., 2004a). However, the consequences of κ receptor activation on astrocyte function and how astrocytes may mediate the effects of dynorphin in the neuropathic pain condition remained unclear. Among the hallmarks of reactive gliosis is an increase in GFAP-IR, hypertrophy of astrocytic cell bodies, and proliferation of astrocytes (Faulkner et al., 2004). Reactive gliosis is likely to play an important role in neuronal survival and functional recovery after central or peripheral injury (Murray et al., 1990; Liu et al., 1998). pSNL induced a proliferation of GFAP-immunoreactive cells in the dorsal and ventral spinal cord ipsilateral to the lesion. The ligation-induced proliferation was not restricted to type II astrocytes, and ∼80% of the BrdU-positive cells were not GFAP positive; these other dividing cells might be progenitors or microglia (Ishii et al., 2001; Tanga et al., 2004). In this study, we found that ∼70% of the BrdU-positive cells were stem cells (nestin staining positive), suggesting that these dividing cells were still in their early development stage. The ultimate differentiation states of these progenitors were not established in this study. The astrocyte activation observed is consistent with previous findings showing that astrocytes in the spinal cord become activated after spinal nerve injury. The novel observation was that endogenous κ opioid receptor activation played a key role. Other mediators have also been shown to be important, and previous reports demonstrated that interleukin release from both astrocytes and microglial cells results in reactive astrogliosis after spinal cord injury that can be blocked by interleukin-6 receptor antagonism (Okada et al., 2004). Although studies have suggested that the reactive gliosis in response to injury is important in reestablishing neuronal pathways, little is understood about the cellular and molecular signals that regulate this process. Primary spinal astrocyte cultures are potentially less complex, and in vitro studies allow clearer resolution of the underlying mechanisms; however, these cultures are still heterogeneous, and cells in culture derived from neonates may represent a less differentiated state. Nevertheless, in our in vitro preparation, we demonstrated that κ opioid receptor activation could directly stimulate proliferation of type II astrocytes expressing both KOR-IR and GFAP-IR. These results are consistent with previous studies showing κ receptors are expressed by astrocytes (Barg et al., 1993a; Eriksson et al., 1993) and are consistent with a previous study demonstrating that κ agonists increased thymidine incorporation in spinal cord–dorsal root ganglion cocultures (Barg et al., 1993b). κ opioid effects differ from μ opioid effects, which have been shown to inhibit type I astrocyte proliferation in cultures derived from rat brain (Hauser et al., 1996). The astrocyte proliferation caused by U50,488 treatment was blocked by cotreatment with SB 203580, suggesting that p38 MAPK activation was required. The three MAPK pathways identified to date include ERK (1 and 2), p38 (α, β, γ, and δ), and c-Jun N-terminal protein kinase (JNK) (encoded by three genes, JNK1, JNK2, and JNK3) (McDonald et al., 2000). All three pathways have been implicated in pain transmission and mechanisms of opioid analgesic tolerance in the spinal cord (Ji, 2004; Narita et al., 2004a, b; Obata and Noguchi, 2004). ERK is involved in both cell proliferation and differentiation during development and in neuronal plasticity. p38 and JNK are stress-activated protein kinases and participate in the injury responses (Ji and Woolf, 2001). ERK and p38 both have distinct roles in response to pain (Watkins et al., 2001). Ozaki et al. (2004) recently found that basally active p38 in the ventral tegmental area of the brain can be suppressed by sciatic nerve ligation. Other evidence has shown that p38 and ERK were activated within microglia and astrocytes after peripheral nerve injury (Jin et al., 2003; Zhuang et al., 2005). Results from the present study suggest that KOR activation of p38 contributes to the proliferative response of type II astrocytes after pSNL. Numerous publications have shown that intrathecal administration of SB 203580 significantly reduced neuropathic pain behavior, including hyperalgesia and allodynia (Obata et al., 2004; Zhang et al., 2005), which is similar to our finding. No previous anatomical studies have shown the effects of p38 inhibitors on astrocyte proliferation. In our study, we demonstrated that 1 μg of SB 203580 intrathecal administration twice a day for 7 d significantly inhibited the astrocyte proliferation induced by pSNL. These results suggest that p38 MAPK pathway may play an important role in pSNL-induced astrocyte proliferation. However, the effect of p38 MAPK activation on cell proliferation in vivo may also function indirectly through the activation of microglia. Studies have shown that p38 was activated on microglia after inflammatory pain (Svensson et al., 2003) and neuropathic pain (Jin et al., 2003), and it is possible that SB 203580 may have inhibited astrocyte proliferation indirectly. The results showing that GRK3 contributes to the phosphorylation of p38 in primary astrocyte cultures are intriguing. GRK and β-arrestin mediate receptor desensitization and resensitization (Liu and Anand, 2001). When KOR is activated by agonist, the receptor becomes a substrate for GRK that specifically phosphorylates the serine 369 residue in the C-terminal domain of the receptor and initiates arrestin-dependent receptor internalization and desensitization (Appleyard et al., 1999). There are currently seven known GRKs and four arrestins (Pitcher et al., 1998; Miller et al., 2003). Previous results from our laboratory suggest that GRK3 and β-arrestin mediate κ opioid receptor phosphorylation and subsequent homologous desensitization in response to sustained endogenous opioid release (McLaughlin et al., 2003; Xu et al., 2004). GRK is activated by opioid receptor stimulation and phosphorylates the agonist-occupied receptor, a process that further induces desensitization and tolerance (Pitcher et al., 1998). Evidence suggests that GRKs are targets for MAPK signaling. For example, GRK2 can be inactivated by ERK-dependent phosphorylation of serine 670 of GRK2 (Pitcher et al., 1999). GRK2 was also shown to be a target for the ERK MAPK cascade by studies demonstrating that ERK inhibition impairs phosphorylation and desensitization of A3 adenosine receptors, possibly by impairing translocation of GRK2 to the plasma membrane (Trincavelli et al., 2002). Conversely, GRKs can activate ERK1/2 MAPK, contributing to the development of opioid tolerance and withdrawal (Liu and Anand, 2001). β-Arrestin association with β2 adrenergic receptors after their phosphorylation by GRK resulted in c-src recruitment, thereby initiating ERK1/2 MAPK pathway activation (Luttrell et al., 1999), a result applicable to other G-protein-coupled receptors (Ahn et al., 1999). Thus, in addition to their traditionally acknowledged role in desensitization, GRKs and arrestins may also serve as adapters for the initiation of alternative signaling routes (Luttrell et al., 1999; Miller et al., 2003). For instance, angiotensin receptors use arrestin scaffolds to couple to MAPK family members, including ERK and JNK (McDonald et al., 2000). An association between p38 MAPK and GRK is also suggested by previous studies as well (Bruchas et al., 2006). The human cytomegalovirus receptor US28 is a Gq-coupled receptor that is hyperphosphorylated by GRK5, resulting in constitutive β-arrestin association at the plasma membrane and resulting in maximal p38 MAPK phosphorylation and activation (Miller et al., 2003). If a similar mechanism may be involved in the KOR activation of astrocytes observed in the present study, the GRK3 gene deletion might result in basally lower p38 MAPK phosphorylation and may prevent the KOR-mediated activation of p38 observed. A better understanding of the mechanisms underlying chronic neuropathic pain is likely to suggest therapeutic strategies that could benefit the many people with this condition. Results from the present study suggest that endogenous κ opioids induce the activation of astrocytes within the spinal cord. 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http://www.jneurosci.org/content/27/10/2570
The Building Urban Resilience in Southeast Asia project, funded by the European Commission’s Humanitarian Aid Department (ECHO), supports Red Cross Movement partners in Cambodia, Lao, Viet Nam and the Philippines to build the capacities of National Societies, government, school teachers and children, Red Cross youth and volunteers, and partners, through a coherent, regional strategy drawing on good practice and innovation. The action emphasizes gender equity and social inclusion of poor, vulnerable people, including people with disabilities and older people. The IFRC, in partnership with Finnish, German and Spanish Red Cross societies, brings to the project extensive experience in school safety, public awareness and public education, and risk mapping, with strength in peer support and learning. Knowledge, Attitude and Practice (KAP) Baseline Survey activity is aimed at determining baseline data to develop project activities and to be comparative with the endline survey at the end of project to measure an improvement of the knowledge/awareness and behaviors of people in the communities. Public awareness and public education for disaster reduction seeks to turn available human knowledge into specific local actions to reduce disaster risks. It mobilizes people through clear messages, supported with detailed information. Hazard awareness alone does not lead directly to people adopting risk-reduction measures. Documentation of the recommendations to build on DRR in Southeast Asia, which includes priority actions, advocacy messages and strategies to enhance the investment in DRR in the region. Around 50 participants from various agencies, governments and National Societies took part in the workshop. Three case studies on School Safety, PAPE and QGIS have been published and ready to be shared with participants attending the Regional Lessons Learned Workshop as well as national and local levels for cross learning. KAP consultant conducted interview and group discussion with BUR volunteers. Result 2- Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behaviour, improved preparedness and social change in five wards of Vientiane. The Knowledge, Attitude and Practice end-line survey was conducted in five target communities during November 2017. On the 4th and 5th November 2017, students from 2 schools (Nasaiythong school and Donnoun school) have been trained on data collection of the KAP survey in order to practice and review questionnaires before going to the field. The sample site was selected of every unit of village through the list of resident record totaling 348 households, which consists of 54 households from Chanthabuly, 36 households from Sikhodtabong, 50 households from Nasaiythong, 164 households from Donnoun and 32 households from Bo-Oh village. Volunteers and village office staff have been interviewed by KAP consultant in the field. The result of the KAP End-line Survey will be reported in November. During the last week of November, the Lao RC DM Team distributed some equipment to five schools to enable them to mitigate identified risks such as fire, mosquito borne diseases, flooding. The assistance consists of some tools for water clogging clearance, garbage cleaning and fire extinguishers. Result 2- Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behaviour, improved preparedness and social change in five wards of Quy Nhon City. End of October, the end line KAP survey was conducted in the five project wards and in November the first results were compiled. The results demonstrate that the Behavior Change Communication Campaign meet its objectives. 65% of the targeted population known/ have heard of the campaign. The results show that when the respondents were asked what they would do in case of fire, 37% have quoted five safer behaviors and stated they have started to adopt those behaviors or would adopt them in case of fire. The behaviors listed by the respondents are (i) staying calm in case of fire (37%), (ii) turning off electric devises (46%), (iii) alerting other (63%), (iv) evacuating safely (45%) and (v) extinguishing fire with available materials (44%). Moreover, almost 80% of the population know the correct number to call Fire fighters (they were only 50% at the beginning of the project) and they know the basic information to provide when calling them. The results also show that the population have adopted (or plan to adopt) the appropriate behaviours for providing first aid to persons affected by fire: for instance, 60% of the respondents answered that they have wrapped or will wrap a person who catch fire with clothe/ cover to kill off the fire, and 81% of the respondents answered that they have or will put the burned limbs of the person under water for 20 minutes. Result 3- Increased capacity of local government authorities and Red Cross for disaster preparedness and response in five wards of Quy Nhon City, Binh Dinh. The key achievement is the finalization of the QGIS Multi-Hazard risk Mapping Methodology based on the feedbacks gathered from the three piloting countries (Cambodia, Philippines and Vietnam). DANA Training: A Damage and Need Assessment training was organized in Quy Nhon city from 30 October to 2 November involving 33 persons from the Committees for Natural Disaster Prevention and Control and Search and Rescue (CNDPC&SR) from province, city and ward levels (21 persons, 6F,15M) and the VNRC Provincial Disaster Response Team (13 persons, 3F, 10M). The training was facilitated by two experienced VNRC experts in DANA and 01 staff from the provincial CNDPC&SR and 01 Technical support group at ward level trained in the new QGIS mapping methodology. The participants built their capacity in conducting a Damages and Needs assessment as per VNRC standard and have learned how QGIS risk mapping could contribute to the preparation and reporting phases of the assessment. PEER CADRE Training: Two PEER CADRE trainings (Program for Enhancement of Emergency Response -Community Action for Disaster Response) were organized in in Nhon Phu and Ghenh Rang wards from 11 to 13 and from 17 to 19 of November involving 2 persons from the city authority and 44 members (13F,31M) of the ward Emergency response Teams. The trainings provided the participants with technical knowledge, demonstrations and practical applications of 03 key skills for emergency response: (1) securing families and preparing for response, (2) Organizing and managing Incident Command System and Triage, (3) Search and Rescue. The trainings also highlighted the added value of QGIS maps for supporting efficient Emergency Response. Additional QGIS training: an additional training on the new QGIS Multi-Hazard risk Mapping Methodology was organized on the 16-18 Nov involving 32persons (5F,27M) from 16 wards and communes of Binh Dinh Province and 4 persons (2F,2M) from City CNDPC & SC. This additional training was requested by the Province CNDPC&SR in support to a Provincial programme which aims that by 2020 70% of the commune/wards will have develop their Disaster Response Plans. The training was facilitated by 01 staff from the provincial CNDPC&SR and 01 Technical Support Group (TSG) member from the targeted ward. At the end of the training 90% of the participants have increased their skills in QGIS mapping and have acquired the basic skills to develop multi-Hazard risk maps in their own ward/commune. A Lessons Learned Workshop was organized in Quy Nhon on the 21th of November. The main objectives were to share experiences on (i) the application of QGIS participatory multi-hazard risk mapping methodology for Disaster Prevention and Control planning in Urban Context and (ii) on effective behaviour change communication processes. More specifically, 21 Provincial level staffs (4F, 17M), 3 city level staffs (1F,2M) and 23 ward level authorities (8F,15M) have learned from the project experiences in using the new mapping methodology and have exchanged feedbacks and perspectives upon this new methodology. The workshop also explored how this new methodology will be scaled up at Provincial level. The maps of the five targeted wards were officially handed over to the Provincial standing committee of Natural Disaster Prevention and Control and Search and Rescue. The workshop was co-facilitated by the VNRC /GRC with the contribution of Quy Nhon wards authorities and TSGs who had used the new methodology. Official handing over of QGIS maps and methodology to Mr Phan Xuan Hai- Chief of office of Binh Dinh CNDPC & SC . Mr Phan will hold additional trainings to replicate QGIS methodology to 11 remaining districts of Binh Dinh Province with the purpose of developing a DRR map of the whole Binh Dinh province by end 2018. National Workshop on Urban DRR- 27th of November- Hanoi: On the 27th of Nov, 75 DRR practitioners from the provincial CNDPC&SR and VNRC chapters from 16 disaster prone provinces, the Disaster Management Policy and Technology Centre (DMPTC), the Vietnam Disaster Management Agency (VNDMA), PNS, IFRC, VNRC HQ, INGOs, mass organizations, UNDP, University, and national media (VTV1) attended this event. The morning sessions aimed at sharing the experiences on the application of QGIS participatory multi-hazard risk mapping methodology for Disaster Prevention and Control planning in Urban Context. The participants have learned from the experiences in using the new mapping methodology in Quy Nhon city and have exchanged feedbacks and perspectives upon this new methodology. The workshop also explored how this new methodology will contribute to the National CBDRM Programme and to its revision. The workshop was co-facilitated by the director of the DMPTC, VNRC and GRC with the contribution of Quy Nhon wards authorities and Technical Support Group who had used the new methodology. Madame An, vice President of the VNRC and Mr. Dang Quang Minh acting director of CBDRM department under VNDMA attended the morning sessions and expressed their interest in the replication and scaling up of the methodology. The methodology and the maps developed in the five wards were handed-over to the VMDMA and DMPTC and will be uploaded on the DMPTC’s VinAWARE data base. The afternoon session aimed at sharing experiences on effective behaviour change communication processes. The session was co-facilitated by the VNRC and GRC with the contribution of lecturer in Behavior Change Communication (BCC) from RMIT University.In October, the Disaster Preparedness Plan and the QGIS maps of each ward have been tested through drill exercises. Each ward organized its drill (5 in total) based on a flood and storm scenario and involving 200-250 persons from local community, authorities, volunteers and Red Cross. The fire brigades also participated as the scenario included a fire in an at-risk household. Thus, it was an opportunity to further promote the safer behaviours of the communication campaign. Throughout this month, a clear progress has been made towards the completion of key activities of the Project as the VCA reports, the cross visit to Valenzuela City and the PAPE campaign. At the same time, on November 9, ECHO visited Brgy Tatalon and Carlos L Albert High School. Particular emphasis has been placed in showing the main accomplishments of the project, by presenting a simulation table exercise together with the VCA Action Plans. Result 1: Children and youth are more resilient to disasters and have a safe and secure learning environment in 8 urban public schools in The Philippines, through improved Red Cross contributions to the ASEAN Safe School Initiative (ASSI). 1.3.4 Conduct endline survey in 8 schools. District IV had started implementing the endline survey using ODK. The aim of the endline survey was to assess the knowledge, attitude and behavior of school children in relation to Disaster Risk Reduction and Management taking into consideration the three pillars of the Comprehensive School Safety Framework and in line with the ASEAN Safe School Initiative (ASSI). Each school assigned 15 focal students who were previously oriented and supervised by 3 RCY and 1 staff. District II will start the endline survey by December 2017. 1.4.1 Conduct (or update) a comprehensive Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment through a participatory approach. Batasan Hills National HS is already finished with the VCA report, and is currently being supervised by Quezon city Chapter. KAP Endline Survey using ODK in Betty-go Belmonte Elementary School held last November 20, 2017. 1.5.2 Identifying and setting up school early warning system. Early Warning Systems are still under procurement process. 1.5.3 Provision of first aid kits and minor equipment for training, drills, and simulation exercises. The First Aid kits and the equipment were finally distributed last November 29, 2017 in Pres. Corazon C. Aquino ES, Batasan Hills Elementary School, Bagong Silangan HS and Bagong Silangan ES. The project has introduced a monitoring and control system that will be validated during the exit strategy workshop in December 2017. 1.2.8 Set-up School DRRM Teams and provide further specialized training such as DRR, CCA, health and hygiene promotion, child protection, gender and diversity. Throughout this month, specialized training was conducted at Bagong Silangan Elementary School on Nov 30 and Oct 3, attended by 108 teaching and non-teaching personnel (92 female and 16 male). Topics discussed were Disaster Management, Psychosocial Support and Fire Management. Speakers were invited from PRC and Bureau of Fire. Result 2 – Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behaviour, improved preparedness and social change in 15 at – risk urban and pre – urban areas in four countries. 2.2.2 Development, reproduction, and distribution of innovative and inclusive PAPE and IEC materials. In District II, Barangay Batasan Hills has finalized the video screening for youth while Barangay Bagong Silangan promoted DRR orientations and flyer handout at school and community level. 2.2.3 Conduct KAP end line survey using ODK. Conducted KAP end-line survey in District IV last November 27-30, 2017. The survey will be completed by the end of December 2017 in both districts. Result 3 – Increased capacity of local government authorities and Red Cross for disaster preparedness and response in 4 barangays in Quezon City, the Philippines. 3.2.1 Participatory development of risk maps involving representatives on local people, including vulnerable groups, government authorities, and PRC staff. Barangay Batasan Hills ´s risk map was already uploaded while Barangays Bagong Silangan is still on process. Some information related to infrastructures and capacities are pending. For Batasan Hills and Bagong Silangan data collection was finalized late this month. 3.5.1 Conduct (or update) a comprehensive Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment through a participatory approach. Bagong Silangan and Batasan Hills completed the VCA reports. Both are under revision of Philippines Red Cross (NHQ). 3.6.2 Carry out research study to select an area with a successful urban DRR model within the country and organize a study visit on November 10, 2017, to Valenzuela City, in order to share knowledge, experiences and good practices related to recovery facilities. 5 representatives of Barangays Doña Imelda, Tatalon, Batasan Hills and Bagong silangan attended together with 15 chapter staff and volunteers (total number of participants: 35 -24 male 11 female). Seek action on how to apply best practices in their own Barangays. 3.7.6 Provision of first aids and minor equipment for training, drills, and simulation exercises. The First Aid kits and the equipment were distributed last November 2, 2017 in Brgy. Tatalon and November 3, 2017 in Brgy. Doña Imelda. The Chapter Administrator of Quezon City Chapter, Ms. Amparo Perez, was present in the ceremony. Batasan Hills and Bagong Silangan will distribute the First Aid Kits by December 2017. Save the date for the workshop was sent out early October to relevant partners. For further details about the workshop refer to the link. Final draft of three case studies on School Safety, PAPE and QGIS have received significant contributions and inputs from partner national societies and ready to be shared with ECHO for feedback and comments. It is expected that all three case studies will be published late November before the regional lessons learned workshop. On 14-15 October 2017, Community Campaign was conducted in four communities including Nasaiythong village and Sidamduan village on 14 October 2017 Sithan neua village and Donnoun village stared on 15 October 2017. The campaign was led by trained students (Lao Red Cross volunteers), village staff, LRC staffs. The campaign was conducted through door to door visit, parade in some markets and group focus discussion supported by some awareness raising materials such as comics of 7 disasters, posters (hygiene, disaster and climate change), hand fan 6 disaster (flood, hygiene, road safety, drought, storm and climate change). It is estimated that the campaign has reached at least 1,963 people (1,088 female). In October, the campaign on four behaviours related to the risks of fire in households came to an end. The Facebook page which was setup in July by and for young people as the main mean to inform the young audience about the campaign has been very successful. At end of October, the Facebook page counted more than 100,000 reach posts (= number of people the Facebook posts were served to), and more than 38,000 persons have been directly reached from which 63% are from Binh Dinh Province, 36% from the rest of Vietnam (Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh), 1% from abroad. The contents of the page include key messages and illustrations on the four behaviors, short reports, interviews, and live broadcasts of all the campaign events. The large majority of the people reached are between 18 and 24 years old (85%), 43% are women and 57% men. The short movie contest launched in September also came to its end in October. A movie developed by youths from Quy Nhon was selected and uploaded on the Facebook page to showcase the four key behaviors that the campaign promoted. This is one of the illustration about the participatory approach used by this project to encourage peer to peer awareness building and promotion of safer behaviours. Mr Phan Dang Khoa – Chairman of Thi Nai ward People’s Committee and Head of the Natural Disaster Prevention Committee – coordinating a drill exercise using QGIS multi-hazard map (17 October 2017). Photo by German Red Cross. On the 25 and 26th of October 35 students and ward authorities staff have been trained in conducting a KAP survey. This training facilitated by GRC included practical sessions to test the questionnaire and the sampling methodology. Then the trained enumerators conducted the survey in the five project wards. More than 800 respondents were selected randomly through a strict methodology: about 400 women and 400 men from which about 50% are aged between 18 and 60 years old and 50% are over 60 years old. This will allow the comparison of answers in order to evaluate the campaign impacts for each gender and age group. The results of the KAP survey will be documented in November. In October, the Disaster Preparedness Plan and the QGIS maps of each ward have been tested through drill exercises. Each ward organized its drill (5 in total) based on a flood and storm scenario and involving 200-250 persons from local community, authorities, volunteers and Red Cross. The fire brigades also participated as the scenario included a fire in an at-risk household. Thus, it was an opportunity to further promote the safer behaviours of the communication campaign. 1.2.7 Conduct orientation sessions with teachers and students in Diosdado P. Macapagal ES (Barangay Tatalon) in YADAPT participated by 90 co-teachers (81 female and 9 male). 1.2.8 Set-up School DRRM Teams and provide further specialized training such as DRR, CCA, health and hygiene promotion, child protection, gender and diversity. This month, specialized training was conducted in one of the project schools: Bagong Silangan Elementary School on Nov 30 and Oct 3. Attendees: 108 teaching and non-teaching personnel (92 female and 16 male). Topics discussed were Disaster Management, Psychosocial Support and Fire Management. Speakers were invited from PRC and Bureau of Fire. 1.4.1 Conduct (or update) a comprehensive Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment through a participatory approach. This month, Bagong Silangan ES, Pres. Corazon C. Aquino ES and Bagong Silangan HS have completed the VCA reports, the documents are currently under revision of PRC (NHQ). Whereas, Batasan Hills National HS is in 1st revision at Chapter level while Carlos L. Albert High school submitted to Division Office. 1.6.1 Distribution of updated IEC materials. Second batch of IEC materials are waiting for delivery in Quezon City Chapter. Y-Adapt re-echo session at Diosdado Macapagal ES (barangay Tatalon) on October 28, 2017. Attendees: 91 participants (84 female ad 7 male). This activity was facilitated by one of the focal teachers. 1.7.1 Identify small mitigation based on SDRRM Plan and conduct technical assessment; Coordinate with stakeholders for support/co-funding. Proposals are being finalized by the schools. Procurement process is ongoing. 2.2.2 Development, reproduction, and distribution of innovative and inclusive PAPE and IEC materials. Barangay Batasan Hills has implemented some of the activities on PAPE campaign, which started early this month. Doña Imelda and Tatalon completed the tools for PAPE campaign in a form of video presentation to be conducted in 7 consecutive activities in the coming month. In Barangay Tatalon, only one activity was conducted on October 12 for elderly and people living with disability. The collected recommendations will be used for the coming activities. 3.2.1 Participatory development of risk maps involving representatives on local people, including vulnerable groups, government authorities, and PRC staff. Presently, 3 maps had been completed: Brgy Tatalon (Fire), Brgy Tatalon (Flood), Brgy Doña Imelda (Flood), with the last 2 maps tested through simulation last October 27. Brgy Tatalon and Doña Imelda final versions are ready for printing. Barangays Batasan Hills and Bagong Silangan are still in the process of plotting the collected information on their risk analysis, infrastructures and capacities. 3.3.1 Conduct simulation exercise (table-top or live drill) including participants from government authorities, PRC staff and volunteers, and target different vulnerable groups. Successfully completed the tablet-top simulation exercise of Flood Risk Maps of Brgy. Doña Imelda and Tatalon participated by different stakeholders with a total of 30 participants (22 males and 8 females). 3.6.2 Carry out research study to select an area with a successful urban DRR model within the country and organize a study visit. On October 27, a learning cross visit to Barangay Santo Cristo (Quezon City) and Barangay 176 Bagong Silang (Caloocan City) was conducted, as suggested by the Office Civil Defense (OCD) and Philippines Red Cross. The activity was attended by 24 participants from each barangay together with PRC. 3.7.6 Provision of first aids and minor equipment for training, drills, and simulation exercises. Later this month, First Aid kits were distributed to the District IV: Brgy. Doña Imelda on 28 October and Brgy. Tatalon on 30 October. A review of the project budget was finalized at the end of October 2017, as there was an extension of the project, and the full project team by 1 month. CCA Training for sub-branch officers. This training included the participation of CRC sub-branches from other districts in Bantey Meanchey (not only the capital district). This is seen as a means to contribute to the overall capacity of the CRC Bantey Meanchey Branch. Workshop to conclude the drafting of the the District Emergency Preparedness and Response Plan, together with local authorities: PCDM, DCDM, CRC Branch, etc. Preparation of school fire evacuation plans together with Bantey Meanchey Police Department (responsible for fire safety). The plans were finalized in 2 of the 3 schools; with the last one pending preparation. Continuation of dissemination of key DRR messages in schools and communities; focusing on flood awareness, drought, and first aid. Finalization of community risk maps in 6 communities/villages belong to the two target Sangkats. Continuation of implementation of small scale mitigation measures in schools; and preparation for implementation of community mitigation measures. Most of these measures relate to water and sanitation practices as a means for community resilience and preparedness for emergencies. A mock-up of the case study has been consulted with partner national societies and ECHO for inputs and feedback. In addition, two other case studies on innovative and participatory risk mapping and school safety have been drafted and shared among partners for further inputs. It is expected that all three case studies will be finalized early November for publication before the regional lessons learned workshop. Lao Red Cross received an ECHO auditor team who spent three days (20-22 September) in Laos to visit to three schools of Nasaiythong, Donnoun and Vientiane. The visit attended by the project targeted students and teachers who have been trained and part of the project since its onset. The auditors had chance to listen to student presentation sharing their knowledge on disaster and training they participated in. The students also shared their school disaster risk reduction plans and hazard/risk mapping to the visitors. The first PAPE campaign was conducted in Bo-Oh Village on 23 and 24 September with the aim to disseminate key messages of disaster (flood, storm and road safety) to over 100 households in the community level. The campaign was led by 17 students (LRC volunteers), 1 village staff, 1 IFRC staff and 2 DM staffs. The campaign was conducted through door to door visit and group focus discussion supported by some IEC materials such as comics of 7 disasters, posters (on hygiene, disaster and climate change), and hand fan of 6 disaster (flood, hygiene, road safety, drought, storm and climate change). It is estimated that the campaign has reached at least 525 people (274 female). On 29 September, a joint event was organized with the Lao RC Health department to celebrate the World First Aid day in Chanthabuly school, Chanthabuly district, Vientiane Capital city. During the event, approximately 200 students participated together with Lao RC staffs, school teachers and other partners. There were 24 students to support the First Aid booth and disaster risk reduction booth during the event in order to share knowledge and information that they have learnt from building urban resilience project through posters, handmade banners, comic and hand fans in the booth, also had a quiz activities on disaster booth to let participants learn and share knowledge on disaster. the Facebook page which was setup in July (https://www.facebook.com/dapluaantoan/) has reached around 80,000 people mainly from the Binh Dinh province. The Facebook page displays illustrations on four key behaviors: (i) being able to appropriately extinguish fire in households, (ii) being able to perform appropriately first aid for dealing with burned skins, (iii) calling the right number (and providing the fire brigade with right information when calling), and (iv) evacuating when there is fire. The contents of the Facebook page are developed by youth volunteers from the five target wards of Quy Nhon city with the support of one young representative from the VNRC chapter, and one student volunteer from the RMIT University from the Communication department in Hanoi. The content includes key messages on the four behaviours, short reports and interviews of all the campaign events taking place in Quy Nhon and live broadcasts of those events. In September, a short movie contest has also been launched on the Facebook page. Individuals and groups of youths are invited to develop short movie to illustrate the four key behaviors that the campaign promote. This is one of the illustration about the participatory approach used by this project to encourage peer to peer awareness building and promotion of safer behaviors. All the project wards have finished the communication events that they have planned. This included knowledge contests on Fire Safety and theatre plays. The fire brigade and the ward and hamlet authorities were actively involved in each event to judge the theatre performances and distribute prices to the contest participants (families and youth). In parallel, Key messages on Fire Safety were broadcast through wards’ loudspeakers radio programmes reaching potentially the entire population of the five wards. Moreover, as in Thị Nại ward in August, Hai Cang and Thi Nai have also set up mobile loudspeaker teams with 25 cyclists for each team including youngsters and elderly persons. The messages conveyed by those mobile teams are similar than those shared via loudspeakers and this aimed at ensuring that most of the population has been reached. The distribution in the five wards of 20,000 leaflets with illustrations of four behaviours, and the setting up of 8 billboards in key public spaces also ensured the campaign outreach. In September, the five wards have finalized their Disaster Preparedness and Response plans using the QGIS maps and database developed with the new DPR mapping methodology. Those plans have been approved by the ward authorities. Based on this achievement, the city and province authorities have expressed their willingness to replicate the approach in other city wards. Thus, the new mapping methodology has demonstrated its relevance for enhancing local government capacity in Disaster Preparedness and Response (DPR). Using a free software, the methodology is adapted to staffs with limited computer skills and the DPR maps provides georeferenced and easy to understand information to local authorities and people. Data base also list down the most vulnerable groups so this provides an excellent foundation for developing realistic and actionable DPR plan. In September, feedbacks on the methodology has also been gathered from the three implementing countries (Cambodia, Philippines, Vietnam). Those feedbacks will be used in October and November to finalize the DPR mapping methodology. Efforts have focused on the provision of further specialized trainings mainly related to disaster management, psychosocial support and fire management, together with two significant workshops on Participatory Approach for Safe Shelter Awareness (PASSA) Youth and Youth Action on Developing Plans for Tomorrow (Y-ADAPT). Furthermore, it has been taking the first steps towards the completion of the cross visits and exchange experiences within the Philippines, as six (6) different areas had been visited. 1.2.5 Red Cross Youth formation and orientation and Leadership Development Program (LDP): On September 23 & 24, 2017, another Leadership Development Program was conducted in Badging Silangan High School in coordination with the Red Cross Youth department. It was attended by 105 participants (28 male and 77 female). 1.2.7 Conduct re-echo sessions with other teachers and students: Later this month, the installation of DRR Corner Bulletin Boards for four schools were completed as well as distribution of materials to be used. 1.2.8 Set-up School DRRM Teams and provide further specialized training such as DRR, CCA, health and hygiene promotion, child protection, gender and diversity, etc. Bagong Silangan High School (on September 16 & 17, 2017) attended by 87 teaching and non-teaching personnel (26 male and 61 female). Batasan Hills National HS (on September 23 & 24, 2017) attended by 132 teaching and non-teaching personnel (25 male and 107 female). The main topics discussed were disaster management, psychosocial support and fire management. Speakers were invited from PRC and Bureau of Fire. 1.4.1 Conduct a comprehensive Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment (VCA): The VCA for Bagong Silangan ES (Brgy. Bagong Silangan), Pres. Corazon C. Aquino ES (Brgy. Batasan Hills), and Bagong Silangan HS (Brgy. Bagong Silangan) are currently being reviewed at NHQ (PRC) and all of them are at an advanced stage of revision. 1.5.2 Identifying and setting up school early warning system: The total amount for the implementation of the Early Warning System had been increased (from Php 40.000 to Php 80,000). Bagong Silangan ES w/ HS, Pax: total population of both schools have participated in the drill on September 13, 2017. Activity: Lifesaving exhibit through recycled materials, Pax: 400 people participated in the activity, on September 27, 2017. Activity: Y-ADAPT Training, Pax: 1 focal teacher and 1 focal student from different schools with a total of 32 participants (10 male and 22 female) had participated, on September 4 – 6, 2017. This YADAPT initiative aimed to increase awareness and sharing experiences among school population towards climate change by taking concrete actions. 1.7.1 Identify small mitigation based on SDRRM Plan and conduct technical assessment; Coordinate with stakeholders for support/co-funding: Proposals are being finalized by the schools. City Engineering is working on the Programs of Works of each project. 2.2.2 Development, reproduction, and distribution of innovative and inclusive PAPE and IEC materials: Different activities related to PAPE campaign had been implemented later this month. The latest activity was on September 23, 2017 in Barangay Batasan Hills, which saw the participation of more than 84 people. This activity was implemented in coordination with barangay personnel and volunteers. On September 19-21, 2017, the Participatory Approach for Safe Shelter Awareness (PASSA) Youth Training was held with 4 youth representatives from the 4 barangays. There was a total participation of 30 persons (14 males and 17 female). The goal of PASSA training is to develop local capacity to reduce shelter-related risk by raising awareness and developing skills in joint analysis, learning and decision-making at community level. Result 3 – Increased capacity of local government authorities and Red Cross for disaster preparedness and response in 4 Brgys in Quezon City. 3.2.1 Participatory development of risk maps involving representatives on local people, including vulnerable groups, government authorities, and PRC staff. The barangays Batasan Hills and Bagong Silangan are currently in the process of plotting the collected information regarding their risk analysis, infrastructures and capacities. Barangay Tatalon and Doña Imelda are ready for final revision of the table-top activity. 3.5.1 Conduct (or update) a comprehensive VCA through a participatory approach: The barangays Tatalon, Doña Imelda, Bagong Silangan and Batasan Hills are on the process of completing the step 5 (reporting). 3.6.2 Carry out research study to select an area with a successful urban DRR model within the country and organize a study visit: Later this month, a visit was conducted to potential barangays, suggested by the Office Civil Defense (the implementing arm of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council and Philippines Red Cross, to be considered for the cross visit and experience exchange in relation to DRR good practices that can been replicated to the project barangays. Implementation of PAPE campaign at community level (fire prevention) through radio messages/radio shows. At Regional Level: Regional Forum on “Demystifying of the Global Agenda Frameworks into Practice” took place from 29-30 August 2017 in Bangkok, Thailand. The 2-day Forum aims to identify the challenges, linkages, and potential key entry points for integrating the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, the Sustainable Development Goals, Paris Agreement on Climate Change Adaptation, and the World Humanitarian Summit towards achieving a common goal of making communities resilient to disaster and climate risks in the Asia-Pacific region. For further details, refer to the link. A mock-up of the case study has been prepared and consulted with partner national societies for inputs and feedback on the design, a fine-tune version will be available in September for further consultation with ECHO. In conjunction with the case study development, a Troika discussion was conducted among IFRC CCST, German RC and ADPC on the possibility of complementing and overlapping each other during the process. In Laos: Lao RC has conducted a 3-day Youth in School Safety (YSS) training of facilitators from 25-27 July to further enhance the student’s facilitation skills and VCA assessment to come up with needs based mitigation measures. The training attended by 36 participants (23 females) including 5 teachers, 20 students, and Lao Red Cross staff. The training consists of two parts (i) facilitation skills and (ii) demonstration and assessments at their schools to come up with risk informed mitigation planning. Eventually, five school based risk informed mitigation plans were drafted with strong participation of their parents and school teachers including their commitments to providing funding to address some identified risk reduction measures. Read more about the event here. Result 2: Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behavior, improved preparedness and social change in five wards of Quy Nhon City, Binh Dinh. In July & August, the GRC, the Binh Dinh chapter, the ward authorities and the volunteers have finalized the preparation of the campaign on the four behaviours related to the risks of fire in households: (i) Being able to appropriately kill fire in households, (ii) Being able to perform appropriately first aid for dealing with burned skins, (iii) calling the right number (and providing the fire brigade with right information when calling), and (iv) evacuating when there is fire. Thus, the design of the key visuals, symbols and icons has been finalized. They will be displayed on billboards, flyers, Tee-shirts and Facebook page. An agreement between the Binh Dinh Chapter and the Binh Dinh fire brigade has been signed to support the communication campaign. The fire brigade participated in the review of scenarios and scripts for theatre events and for key messages for radio programme at ward and hamlet levels. They also provided comments for the design of leaflets demonstrating the four behaviours. The ward authorities have agreed on the dates for their communication campaign activities ((1) Hamlet meetings, (2) broadcasting key messages through Ward’s radio programmes and through mobile loudspeakers, (3) distribution of flyers and display of billboards, (4) theatre performances). A monitoring team has been set up to follow the implementation of the campaign and to gather information (pictures, quotes…) for documenting the PAPE approach in the Urban context of Quy Nhon. A Flashmob in Quy Nhon city on the 20th of August with the participation of 52 young people from 5 wards. The aim was to attract the population interest on the campaign and to invite them to visit the Facebook page which has been setup in July (https://www.facebook.com/dapluaantoan/). The Facebook page displays illustrations on four key behaviors: (i) being able to appropriately extinguish fire in households, (ii) Being able to perform appropriately first aid for dealing with burned skins, (iii) calling the right number (and providing the fire brigade with right information when calling), and (iv) evacuating when there is fire. A video of the Flashmob has been posted on the page and has reached nearly 3000 people online since its upload on the 1st September and a total of nearly 6000 people have visited the Facebook page so far. Three project wards organized 15 hamlet’s events and 02 ward’s events (Thị Nại, Nhơn Bình and Ghềnh Ráng). All the events included a Knowledge contest on Fire Safety and theatre plays. The Hamlets‘events attracted a total of around 623 participants mainly families, and the event at ward level about 190 people. The fire brigade and the ward and hamlet authorities were actively involved in each event to judge the theatre performances and distribute prices to the contest participants. More events at ward level are planned in September and similar events in Hải Cảng and Nhơn Phú wards will take place also in September. In parallel, Key messages on Fire Safety were broadcasted through wards’ loudspeakers radio programmes during the whole month. Thị Nại ward also set up 01 mobile loudspeaker team with 25 cyclists including youngsters and elderly persons. Hải Cảng and Nhơn Phú wards will also convey Key messages on Fire Safety through wards’ loudspeakers radio programmes in September. Result 3: Increased capacity of local government authorities and Red Cross for disaster preparedness and response in five wards of Quy Nhon City, Binh Dinh. In the 5 targeted wards, by end of June the Technical Support Groups (TSG) have finalized their Disaster Preparedness and Response maps with the methodology developed by the project. In August, they developed the budget and plan for sharing those maps with all the relevant stakeholders from local to national levels. This includes uploading the DPR maps on the DMC’s VinAWARE data base and printing and displaying the maps on the Ward People’s Committee offices and other government and public buildings. The TSGs and the Binh Dinh chapter also prepared the agenda and budget for a Disaster Preparedness and Control planning workshop which took place the 8-9th August. Based on the DPR maps, ward level Disaster Prevention and Control Plans were developed by each ward using the DMC guidelines for planning (2014) and in line with the National CBDRM Programme. Recent work under this project has focused on strengthening the strategy of the project though the implementation of number of trainings related to leadership, disaster management, psychosocial support, fire management and participatory video. Furthermore, there had been clear advances in the completion of the VCA process at school level, as of now six (6) of them are at an advanced stage of revision. In addition, first steps have already been achieved with the identification and setting up of school EWS. Four (4) out of eight (8) proposals had been submitted and discussed with the project team. All in all, the project is progressing according to schedule and continue to be on track toward project completion in December 2017. 1.2.5 Red Cross Youth formation and orientation (for students) and Leadership Development Program (LDP): On August 19 & 20, 2017 another Leadership Development Program was conducted in Batasan Hills National HS. The training was closely coordinated with RCY department (at Chapter level), and was attended by 105 persons (28 male and 77 female). 1.2.7 Conduct re-echo sessions with other teachers and students: The procurement for the installation of DRR Corner Bulletin Boards still on process. 1.2.8 Set-up School DRRM Teams and provide further specialized training such as DRR, CCA, health and hygiene promotion, child protection, gender and diversity, etc.: On August 26 & 27, 2017 a specialized training was conducted at Pres. Corazon C. Aquino Elementary School (Brgy. Batasan Hills). It was attended by 76 teaching and non-teaching personnel (14 male and 62 female) and the main topics discussed were disaster management, psychosocial support and fire management. Speakers were invited from PRC and Bureau of Fire. The VCA reports were completed in Bagong Silangan Elementary School (Brgy. Bagong Silangan), Pres. Corazon C. Aquino Elementary School (Brgy. Batasan Hills), Batasan Hills National HS (Brgy. Batasan Hills) and Bagong Silangan (Brgy. Bagong Silangan HS. These reports are currently being reviewed at NHQ (PRC) and all of them are at an advanced stage of revision. Furthermore, Diosdado P Macapagal ES and Dr. Josefa Jara HS (Brgy. Tatalon) VCA reports are been reviewed at Chapter level. Betty-go Belmonte ES and Carlos L. Albert High School´s VCA reports (Brgy. Dona Imelda) are officially finalized and submitted to NHQ (PRC). 1.5.2 Identifying and setting up school early warning system. As for now, 4 out 8 proposals had been submitted to PRC. 1.6.1 Distribution of updated IEC materials: Procurement on process for second batch (new version) is still ongoing and once complete, the distribution will be expedited by September 2017. 2.2.2 Development, reproduction, and distribution of innovative and inclusive PAPE and IEC materials: Brgy. Batasan Hills´s PAPE Activity Plan was finalized by barangay officials and youth representative while the finalization of plan is still ongoing in Brgy. Bagong Silangan. As part of PAPE campaign, on August 16-18, 2017 was conducted a participatory video training in the 4 barangays that was attend by 24 participants. The main goal was to produce new materials for the target group at community level. 3.2.1 Participatory development of risk maps involving representatives on local people, including vulnerable groups, government authorities, and PRC staff. The barangays Batasan Hills and Bagong Silangan are currently in the process of plotting the collected information regarding their risk analysis, infrastructures and capacities. On August 8, 2017, a re- echo session about Quantum Geographic Information System was conducted at Barangay Doña Imelda, attended by 5 representative of Doña Imleda and Tatalon barangays. Continued revision of project outputs, i.e. School Risk Assessment Reports, Community Vulnerability Matrixes, School DRR Plans, Community DRR Plans, etc. Implementation of Dissemination Workshop on Cambodian Law on Disaster Management of DCDM and CCDM, including the districts of Poipet and Svay Chek of Bantaey Meanchey Province. At Regional Level: The 3rd Regional Coordination Meeting hosted by Lao Red Cross in Vientiane, Laos from 11-12 July. The meeting brought all partners of Lao RC, Finnish RC, Spanish RC, German RC and IFRC together to review the project progress and future planning as well as challenges faced vs. solutions. In addition, the meeting has agreed to work on three case studies which are in line with the following themes (i) School Safety; (ii) Public Awareness and Public Education (PAPE); (iii) Behavior Change Communication for DRR; and (iv) Innovative GIS-DPR mapping method. At the end of the meeting, a first draft of case study on PAPE was sketched and additional information as well as its impacts need to be captured during and after PAPE campaigns in all targeted communities. The meeting suggested that a request for extension of two months is needed to enable national societies as well as IFRC to complete all activities. As a result, the IFRC has submitted the request to ECHO and it has been approved for ONE month extension till the end of December 2017. Regional Forum on “Demystifying of the Global Agenda Frameworks into Practice” will take place from 29-30 August 2017 in Bangkok, Thailand. The 2-day Forum aims to identify the challenges, linkages, and potential key entry points for integrating the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, the Sustainable Development Goals, Paris Agreement on Climate Change Adaptation, and the World Humanitarian Summit towards achieving a common goal of making communities resilient to disaster and climate risks in the Asia-Pacific region. In Laos: Lao RC has conducted a 3-day Youth in School Safety (YSS) training of facilitators from 25-27 July to further enhance the student’s facilitation skills and VCA assessment to come up with needs based mitigation measures. The training attended by 20 participants attended the training. They had a two-day practice and conducted one-day programme in five targeted schools. For more information see the Lao Red Cross Youth in School Safety Facilitators Training. Students from Bagong Silangan ES demonstrating the proper handwashing techniques held last July 7, 2017 at the school. Photo by Philippine Red Cross. A Leadership Development Program was conducted in Pres. Corazon C. Aquino Elementary School (Batasan Hills) in coordination with the chapter Red Cross Youth, with 26 male and 30 female for total attendees of 56 attendees. Newly recruited School Batang Emergency Response team in Carlos L. Albert High School (Brgy Doña Imelda) conducted refresher course on Junior First Aid held last July 11-14 with 25 male and 47 female for a total of 72 attendees. Distribution of workbook and porsters in Carlos L. Albert High School as teaching IEC materials last July 13, 2017. Photo by Philippine Red Cross. During the month of July, 4 sessions of hygiene promotion and proper hand washing were conducted, and 1 session of hygiene Promotion and HIV Aids prevention education, and 1 session of hygiene promotion and DRR. The sessions were conducted in Brgy Bagong Silangan and Brgy Batasan Hills. VCA process was completed for Bagong Silangan Elementary School (Brgy. Bagong Silangan) and Pres. Corazon C. Aquino Elementary School (Brgy. Batasan Hills). Bagong Silangan ES presented the VCA result to their school teaching personnel. Bagong Silangan HS, Batasan Hills National High School, Betty-go Belmonte Elementary School, Carlos L. Albert HS, Dr, Josefa Jara HS and Diosdado P. Macapagal Elementary School completed the fifth step (reporting). An orientation on School DRRM Manual was conducted in coordination with the School Divisions Office of Quezon City at the Interactive Center, Quezon City Science HS. Two representatives from each target schools were invited as well as one representative from all elementary and high schools in Quezon City. In identifying and setting up school early warning system, discussions were held in each school and proposals were submitted to PRC. While for the provision of first aid kits and minor equipment for training, drills, and simulation exercises, the purchase order is ongoing, the distribution of which is expected by August 2017. Distribution of workbooks and poster was held in Betty-go Belmonte Elementary School, Carlos L. Albert High School, Dr. Josefa Jara High School and Diosdado Macapagal Elementary School. Result 2 – Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behavior, improved preparedness and social change in 15 at – risk urban and pre – urban areas in four countries. A consultation session regarding the PAPE workshop outcome was conducted in all Brgys to validate the results and come up with an action plan on the implementation of PAPE in each community. Participants were Brgy officials and representative from different sector such as Persons with Disability, elderly and youth. QGIS Re-Echo Workshop held last July 7, 2017. Brgy staff and volunteer are working on the identification of the critical infrastuctures in their Brgy prior plotting it in the application. Photo by Philippine Red Cross. Result 3 – Increased capacity of local government authorities and Red Cross for disaster preparedness and response in 4 Brgys in Quezon City, The Philippines. After the City Level QGIS Training last April, a re-echo workshop was conducted in Brgy. Batasan Hills and in Brgy. Bagong Silangan. At Regional Level: IFRC has worked with Lao Red Cross to prepare for the 3rd Regional Coordination Meeting which will be taken place in Vientiane, Laos from 11-12 July. The meeting expects to bring all partners (Lao RC, Finnish RC, Spanish RC, German RC and IFRC) together to review the project progress and future planning as well as challenges faced vs. solutions. In addition, the meeting will spend significant time on identification and development of case study based on four themes (i) School Safety; (ii) Public Awareness and Public Education (PAPE); (iii) Behavior Change Communication for DRR; and (iv) Innovative GIS-DPR mapping method. For the research of two decades of DIPECHO contributions to DRR in Southeast Asia, it has move to the third phase out of four phases including three country visits to Cambodia, Indonesia and the Philippines. The visits contained of one day workshop with selective ECHO partners; key informant interviews partners and NDMOs. In addition, several interviews were conducted in June with regional partners such as UNESCAP, UNISDR, ADPC and Oxfam. In Laos: Lao RC has conducted two technical knowledge trainings on DRR, Road Safety, Health and Care including Water and sanitation during the first and second week of June. The trainings aim to further equip participants with solid knowledge on various issue and it will be an add on PAPE campaign design skills to make better impact on campaigns to different groups of people. In addition, a Youth in School Safety (YSS) training of facilitators to be conducted from 24-28 July to further enhance the student’s facilitation skills and VCA assessment to come up with needs based mitigation measures. In Cambodia: the following activities and achievements have been made: ECHO conducted a monitoring visit to Serei Soaphoan, Banteay Meanchey province between 26 and 27 June. The visit was facilitated by Cambodian Red Cross and Finnish Red Cross. Installation of visibility and awareness raising (flood preparedness) signboards in communities and schools. Continued implementation of awareness raising activities in schools and communities by RCYs and RCVs. Sessions focusing on health and DRR (8-9 June). Result 2– Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behavior, improved preparedness and social change in five wards of Quy Nhon City, Binh Dinh. The behaviors selected for the campaign are directly related to the risks of fire in households. Each activity will be organized in a way to complement the others activities and in order to implement a comprehensive campaign from July to end of September. Thus, in June an activities timeline has been developed. Result 3 – Increased capacity of local government authorities and Red Cross for disaster preparedness and response in five wards of Quy Nhon City, Binh Dinh. In the 5 target wards, the Technical Support Groups (TSG) have finalized their Disaster Preparedness and Response maps with the methodology developed by the project. The maps were developed at hamlet and ward levels and they display information organized in different layers. Those information layers are built on databases which include (1) the capacities in disaster prevention and control, (2) the vulnerabilities and (3) the risks that the community can encounter. In total for the 5 wards (and 39 hamlets) about 660 persons (PwD, children, Hamlet and ward representatives) have been involved in the implementation of the phases 2 and 3 of the methodology. Basic training for Red Cross Volunteers (RCV) and Youth (RCY), and school teachers on DRR, first aid, and road safety in 8 targeted schools in Quezon City and repeat sessions with other teachers and students were conducted; School DRR and Management Teams (School DRRM Teams) were set up. Conduct, review or update comprehensive hazard, risk, vulnerability and capacity assessments for each of the 8 targeted urban schools (school risk assessments). School DRR Plan, a School DRRM Plan, and/or a Fire Evacuation Plan for 8 selected urban schools were drafted in Quezon City this includes setting up school early warning. Result 2 – Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behavior, improved preparedness and social change in 15 at – risk urban and pre – urban areas in four countries. City level training workshops were organized to share the results of the baseline KAP surveys with local government authorities, National Society NHQ and city staff, design and develop PAPE for DRR in the urban contexts, and train selected RCY and RCV on PAPE strategies and skills in the urban context. At Regional Level: A meeting between ECHO and IFRC has been conducted to provide progress updates of the project in various countries and discuss about the remaining activities toward the end of the project. The discussion resulted in an agreement that if extension is needed to complete all committed activities, notification to ECHO should be sent as soon as possible. On this note, IFRC will be thoroughly discussing with the partner national societies during the third coordination meeting which is scheduled during the second week of July in Vientiane, then final decision will be made. ECHO also articulated their expectations that the project interventions should be able to show tangible outcomes at the end of the project, something is different and unique in comparison to other “traditional” initiatives. In the meantime, ECHO expressed its willingness to conduct M&E visits to our project sites in conjunction with other partners, so it would be appreciated if we could propose something in Cambodia and Laos between mid-June to mid-July. In this connection, a project site visit to Bantey Meanchey, Cambodia has been under arrangement where three schools are to be visited on 26 June with the support of the Finnish RC and Cambodian RC. In relation to the case study identification and development, the IFRC has initially discussed and agreed with the partner national societies on the process by collating as much information as possible then to bring them to Vientiane during the third coordination meeting to further interrogate and shape them up from there. For the research of two decades of DIPECHO contributions to DRR in South-East Asia, it has move to the third phase out of four phases including three country visits to Cambodia, Indonesia and the Philippines. The visits contained of one day workshop with selective ECHO partners; key informant interviews partners and NDMOs. This process is crucial to identify good practices, key challenges, gaps and recommendations under each thematic area. There are six thematic areas identified including (i) Disaster preparedness and response; (ii) DRR in Education Sector; (iii) Innovation and appropriate technology; (iv) Institutional embedment/mainstreaming of DRR into policies; (v) Consortium Mechanism; and (vi) Advocacy and public awareness. In Laos: Lao RC has updated its workplan from May to October 2017 in which the focus will be on conducting technical knowledge trainings on DRR, Road Safety, Health and Care including Water and sanitation during the first and second week of June. The trainings aim to further equip participants with solid knowledge on various issue and it will be an add on PAPE campaign design skills to make better impact on campaigns to different groups of people. In addition, a Youth in School Safety (YSS) training of facilitators to be conducted in July to further enhance the student’s facilitation skills and VCA assessment to come up with needs-based mitigation measures. Result 1– Children and youth are more resilient to disasters and have a safe and secure learning environment in 8 urban public schools in the Philippines, through improved Red Cross contributions to the ASEAN Safe School Initiative (ASSI). 617 participants (437 female and 180 male) were provided with simultaneous orientation sessions during their In-Service Training (INSET). The training covers the following topics (i) Mass Casualty Incident; (ii) SBDRRM (Relief & PSP); (iii) Fire Prevention & Management; (iv) First Aid; (v) Early Warning System; and (vi) Evacuation. In addition, four out of eight schools have conducted VCA process to define common hazards, risk factor and capacity to inform the school leaders of school-based DRR plan in which recommendations toward risk reduction measures/interventions are highlighted. From the assessments and reports that fire evacuation plan and early warning enhancement are likely prioritized in urban context. In this connection, meetings were conducted with the focal teachers regarding the Early Warning System in the targeted schools with the aim to review the concept of early warning system, in order to prepare them to create/improve existing EWS in their schools. Result 2– Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group brings about positive, safer behaviour, improved preparedness and social change in four at-risk urban and pre-urban areas in the Philippines. A PAPE KAP Survey was carried out in four Barangays from 2-10 May with a total of 1,200 respondents (400 in each Barangay). The process was facilitated by ten 10 RCs’ 143 volunteers from each barangay. Two barangays from District II are in the process of completing VCA Process. In District IV, VCA reports are still for finalization. In addition, Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) for the inclusion of Vulnerable Groups in the Mapping process were conducted in Dona Imelda and Tatalon with participation of 50 elders (33 F and 17 M); 15 PWDs (8 F and 7 M) and 44 Youths (28 F and 16 M). In order to strengthen RC143 DM Teams and First Aid and Safety Teams, procurement of first aid kits and minor equipment is still ongoing. Delivery is estimated by July 2017. The youth group is working on the slogan for the target audience – the youth in the campaign. In Viet Nam: Between 13-14 May, an additional workshop in Quy Nhon to finalize the design of the PAPE campaign was conducted. The workshop was attended by 37 people (18 females and 19 males, including three GRC facilitators) and contributed to the design of the campaign). This includes staff of the People’s Committee, heads of hamlet, Ward Red Cross, Youth Union, inhabitants from the five wards and 2 members of the fire brigade. The workshop was supported by an expert in behavioral change communication (BCC) and also a teacher in RMIT University in Hanoi (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology). She provided advises on the design of the campaign. The cost of her involvements has been shouldered by another GRC project. The behaviors selected for the campaign are directly related to the risks of fire in households: (i) being able to appropriately kill fire in households, (ii) being able to perform appropriately first aid for dealing with burned skins, (iii) calling the right number (and providing the fire brigade with right information when calling), and (iv) evacuating when there is fire. – have understood the planning steps of a campaign and are able to create a communication plan for future communication campaigns. – have planned for the communication campaign for their wards and city in order to improve knowledge, attitudes and to change the behavior of the population for fire prevention. The campaign will focus on two main target audience: (i) the middle-aged (30-50 years old) and (ii) the youth (16-25 years old). For each target audience, based on their motivational characteristics for changing behaviors and on their preferred channels of communication, the workshop participants have developed slogan, key visuals and campaign activities plans. For the youth audience, the campaign activities will include (i) setting up a Facebook page, (ii) organizing a Flash mob to attract attention on the campaign, (iii) organizing a short movie contest, and (iv) organizing theatre performances. For the middle-aged audience, the activities will include (i) hamlet meetings, (ii) broadcasting key messages through Ward’s radio programmes (including songs), (iii) distribution of flyers and display of billboards, (iv) broadcasting key messages through mobile loudspeakers. Each activity will be organized in a way to complement the others activities and in order to implement a comprehensive campaign from June to September. For instance, the Facebook page will be the main mean to inform the youth of the flash mob, the movie contest and the theatre events. Moreover, the Facebook page will also be used for collecting and sharing the movies produced by local youth and for presenting to the young audience the information displayed on the flyers. For the middle-aged audience, while the hamlet meetings will be the opportunity to distribute flyers and quiz, and theatre performances will also be organized aiming at attracting a larger audience. Also during May, GRC and VNRC were collecting quotations from the designers to finalize the key visuals, symbols and icons which will be displayed on the billboards, flyers, t-shirts and Facebook page. As the Facebook page will have to be jointly managed by an administration team composed of five young people from five wards, one young representative from VNRC chapter, the GRC project officer, GRC/VNRC is also currently considering the opportunity to involve one to two student volunteers from the RMIT University Communication Department. Those students could provide technical and advisory support to the Facebook Administration team. In terms of progress under Result 3, in the five targeted wards, the Technical Support Groups (TSG) have carried out the initial phase and the second phase of the mapping methodology. The VNRC chapter has signed a volunteer agreement with five students of the University of Quy Nhon in Master’s Degree in QGIS. They have conducted the monitoring of the QGIS mapping phases using the monitoring form developed by the consultants (COMICs). The mapping is expected to finished by mid-June for all the five wards. GRC Project Officer has also conducted monitoring and gathered information for the development of a case study. Implementation of 3rd FRC monitoring visit from 23 April to 4 May; including visits to all target schools and communities; and facilitation of internal (FRC procedure) project risk management analysis. Result 2– Innovative PAPE for disaster risk reduction, targeting specific vulnerable group, brings about positive, safer behavior, improved preparedness and social change in two Sangkats in Serei Saophoan in Cambodia. Result 3 – Increased capacity of local government authorities and Red Cross for disaster preparedness and response in three Sangkets of Serei Saophoan in Cambodia. Due to the communal elections, activities in the project are reduced and implemented in a very low profile. However, it is not expected that the elections will seriously affect the project’s timeframe. At Regional Level: The regular Skype Meeting for all 4 countries was held on 20 April 2017 and the study plan of ECHO 20 years research has been finalized and agreed by the European Commission’s Humanitarian Aid Department (ECHO) and International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Society (IFRC) in Bangkok, including the data collection plan. The consultant will start to collect the primary data in 3 selected countries; Cambodia, Philippines and Indonesia during 1-20 May 2017. In Lao PDR: The national workshop on Public Awareness and Public Education (PAPE): a guide and key message in Vientiane Capital City was conducted for 5 target schools with 90 students and 5 teachers including Lao Red Cross’ staffs on 1 and 2 and 8 and 9 April 2017. The objective of this workshop was to train the students (Red Cross Volunteers) about the guide and tools and key messages of public awareness and public education for disaster risk reduction, health and hygiene promotion in terms of developing Information, Education and Communication (IEC) materials. In the Philippines: The training on multi-risk maps using QGIS (Quantum Geographical Information System) was conducted during 24-26 April 2017 in Quezon City, Manila. This training was facilitated by three Philippines Red Cross (PRC) staff and the Singapore Red Cross (SRC) Delegate, with a total of 17 participants from Barangay Batasan Hills, Barangay Bagong Silangan, Barangay Tatalon, and Barangay Dona Imelda. Besides, the Knowledge, Attitude and Practice (KAP) survey questionnaires for the communities were translated and encoded in Open Data Kit (ODK) program and a mock survey creation was organized on 20-21 April 2017 within the 4 Barangays of District 2 and 4, with 5 respondents each. Prior to the interviews, Purok leaders from the Barangays and PRC staff and volunteers were orientated about the survey. In Vietnam: The Public Awareness and Public Education (PAPE) workshop was held in Quy Nhon during 20 – 22 April 2017. It aimed at planning the communication campaign based on the results of the Knowledge Attitude and Practice (KAP) survey and on qualitative research (Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and in-depth interviews). The sessions of the workshop included (i) an introduction of project’s objective, project indicators and related activities, (ii) the presentation of the results from research on Knowledge-Attitude-Behavior and (iii) a detailed description of the Planning Process. The behaviours selected for the campaign are directly related to the risks of fire in households: (i) Being able to appropriately kill fire in households, (ii) being able to perform appropriately first aid for dealing with burned skin, (iii) calling the right number (and providing the fire brigade with the right information when calling), and (iv) evacuating when there is fire. At the regional level: The Regional Team Meeting for all four countries was held in Hanoi on 24 March 2017 and the key discussions were about the review and revision on the 6-month plan of action including the progress update and challenges on the project implementation. In the Philippines: As of March 2017, Philippine Red Cross (PRC) and the schools had conducted the Earthquake Drill last 3 March 2017 during the AM session of classes. Mr. Rick Castillo from Quezon City Disaster Risk Reduction Management Office (QCDRRMO) was the evaluator. 3,089 Female and 2,913 Male, totalling 7,002 students with 240 teaching personnel participated. Information, Education and Communication (IEC) Learning materials (board games, flipcharts, posters and workbooks) for the schools were already delivered to PRC. IEC materials were also distributed to the eight target schools: Five Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) flip charts and five board games for each school. In Vietnam: From 21 to 23 March in Hanoi took place the regional training on Quantitative Geographical Information System (QGIS) on the new QGIS methodology. 34 people participated to the event from which 18 were trainees and 16 observers and supporters. Seven trainees were from Viet Nam Red Cross Society (VNRC) headquarters (three males and four females) and nine were from Myanmar, Philippines, Lao PDR and Cambodia National Societies and from Partner National Societies (PNS) (Spanish and Finnish) (three males and six females), two were from PNSs from Viet Nam (American Red Cross and German Red Cross) (1 male and 1 female). Observers and supporters were from VNRC, local Technical Support Group (TSGs) from 2 wards of Quy Nhon, and from PNSs/IFRC based in Viet Nam and in South-East Asia (9 males and 7 females). The training included formal and practical sessions on laptop to learn the basic skills to develop base maps and to upload data using QGIS. In Lao PDR: The Knowledge, Attitude and Practices (KAP) survey final report was finalized and shared to the project team at the end of March. The project had been doing document preparation for the national workshop on Public Awareness and Public Education (PAPE): a guide and key message in Vientiane Capital City and there was a meeting with the project team on organizing the workshop. To design the PAPE workshop, the project team coordinated with the five target schools the project team had a meeting . The objective of this workshop was to train the students (Red Cross Volunteers – RCVs) about the guild and key message of public awareness and public education for disaster risk reduction in term of developing the IEC materials. At the regional level: The preparation meeting with the Partner National Societies (PNSs) and Lao Red Cross (LRC) on the quantitative geographical information system (QGIS) pre-workshop tasks was held on 17 February 2017 via Skype and all participants agreed to prepare the information as required. In the Philippines: As of February 2017, Information, Education, Communication (IEC) learning materials (board games, flipcharts, posters and workbooks) for the schools were being already delivered to Philippine Red Cross (PRC). Distribution in the schools started in the first week of March. A coordination meeting with Plan international (moved up project) was conducted last 7 February to plan out coordination on the same covered areas. A workshop was conducted on 28 February and was participated by all staff to share, and distinguish activities were conducted to complement and avoid duplications in terms of Redevelopment and Realignment Manual (BRRM), which is contingency and action plans of Barangay. PRC also attended Technical Working Group (TWG) meeting last 7 February, initiated by Quezon City’s Deployment of Pasay Disaster Risk Reduction Management Office (QCDRRMO) and other stakeholders, PRC shared the activity output of Public Awareness and Public Education (PAPE) workshop and asked for insight/ comment of the TWG. In Cambodia: The three school risk assessment exercises wereconducted with the active participation of Red Cross Youth (RCY) and RCY Advisors, with the support of Cambodian Red Cross (CRC) project staff. By the end of the reporting period, the risk assessment reports were in the process of being finalized. After the finalization, they will be presented and validated with the respective schools and authorities. In Vietnam: On 22 February to 3 March in Quy Nhon taken place the training on the new QGIS methodology. 25 wards authorities’ members of their Technical Support Group learned and put in practice the new methodology during this 8-day training. The training included formal and practical sessions on laptop to learn the basic skills to develop base maps and to upload data using QGIS. Practical sessions also provided the opportunity to learn the process to collect data from the population in a gender-sensitive and participatory way. In Lao PDR: The National workshop on Knowledge, Attitude and Practices (KAP) survey result sharing in Vientiane Capital City was conducted on 21 February 2017 in order to share the results of KAP survey to all stakeholders which consisted of government agencies and NGOs who work on disaster risk reduction. More than 40 people including teachers and students from five schools participated in this meeting to better understand the community knowledge in the target areas of the project and this KAP survey aimed to be determined as baseline data of the project and could create project activities. At Regional Level: The recruitment process of the regional consultant for the study on two decades of DIPECHO contributions in South East Asia was completed – The successful candidates from ADPC were on board in early of January. The consultation meeting among ECHO global DRR Coordinator, Regional Project Manager and the consultants team was held on 11 January 2017 in order to discuss the research methodology and expectations of this study. In the Philippines: As of January 2017, two schools have restructured their existing school DRR team (Pres. Corazon C. Aquino Elementary School and Carlos Albert High School), whereas Bagong Silangan High School, Betty-Go Belmonte Elementary School and Diosdado Macapagal Elementary School are still forming their DRR teams. In order to prepare for the Plan of Action for the Public Awareness and Public Education (PAPE) tool in the community, the team conducted a city-level PAPE workshop on 31 January 2017 in the Quezon City DRR Management Office premises. Representatives from the Communications Department, Quezon City DRRMO, Environmental and Sanitation Department participated in this activity. • In Cambodia: Progress in the implementation of PAPE Knowledge Attitude and Practices (KAP) survey centred on the development of the survey questionnaire. The definition of the survey’s target population and methodology, and the training of Cambodia Red Cross personnel in the development and implementation of PAPE-related initiatives were completed. The Cambodian Red Cross staffs were trained in PAPE and Behavioural Change Communication, while the survey questionnaire was prepared and transferred to MAGPI. • In Vietnam: The new QGIS mapping methodology was developed in a way it can supplement CBDRA and VCA and maximize the use of DPR mapping for DRM planning and for Damage and Need Assessment at ward level. Thus, GRC and VNRC following the recommendation of the DMC Deputy Director decided that it was relevant to organize a first training in Quy Nhon for Technical Support Group (TSG) members at ward level to refresh their knowledge on the CBDRA approach and the linkage between CBDRA and DRM planning. A 3-day training was held on 6-8 January 2017, and contributed to enhance the TSGs understanding about the principles for gender mainstreaming in CBDRA and DRM planning, and about the concepts of vulnerability and disability. In Lao: The National Orientation Workshop on KAP Baseline survey was held on 14 January 2017 for 85 students from 5 schools in Vientiane Capital City. It aimed to provide the common understanding on hazards and disasters in the local context and to understand the questionnaires and simulation exercise. The survey objective was to determine baseline data to develop project activities and also to use it to be comparative with the endline survey at the end of the project to measure improvement of the knowledge/awareness and behaviour of people in the communities. At the regional level: The recruitment process of the regional consultant for studying two decades of ECHO contribution in South East Asia has been completed. The successful candidate will be on board in the beginning of January. In the Philippines: ECHO regional coordinator for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) proposed the project site in Quezon City on 6-7 December. The teams are organizing the activity and inviting the primary key partners involved like the QCDRRMO, Barangays and Department of Education. Besides, the national PAPE Workshop was conducted among 143 Red Cross focal teachers on 6 December 2016 at Philippines Red Cross Social Hall and was attended by RC 143 focal teachers from district 2 and 5 in Barangay. It was a multi-sectoral approach. The focus of the said workshop is to have concrete and strong “key messages” which promote safety of children in schools and in their homes and the community. In Cambodia: The draft of the PAPE KAP survey, and Survey Implementation Plan (including identification of target population) was finalized. The final draft of the PAPE KAP survey was pending results from the community’s VCAs. There was implementation of the school risk assessment in three public high schools making use of the adapted VCA tools. The final draft of the project communication and visibility plan was presented to Cambodian RC Management for endorsement. The main general key messages were identified – to be shared with ECHO Bangkok. In Vietnam: The draft questionnaire for the KAP survey was shared with PAPE national consultant for consultation. She added and revised some questions to get the information related to communication issues. The training on PAPE was held in Quy Nhon from 16 to 18 December 2016.It was co-facilitated by the national consultant, and GRC and VNRC project officers who previously participated in the Regional PAPE training in Manila. In Laos: The project team coordinated with the Vientiane City branch in order to appoint the district coordinator for implementing the project activities. The target areas in five communities were identified and the team agreed to divided into two clusters including Risk and Hazard in urban and peri-urban, i.e. disaster, road safety, health and hygiene promotion. Besides, the team agreed to hire a KAP consultant to conduct KAP survey in Vientiane capital city. Refresher sessions on first aid already started in Batasan Hills National High School (BHNHS) last Oct. 25-26, 2016, with 500 participants. At Regional Level: KAP survey questionnaires for schools in Cambodia and the Philippines are being finalized, with a view to align the KAP survey questionnaires for communities in all four countries. the recruitment process of a regional consultant for the study on two decades of ECHO contributions in Southeast Asia is underway. In the Philippines: In District 2, refresher sessions on first aid already started in Batasan Hills National High School (BHNHS) last Oct. 25-26, 2016, with 500 participants. In District 4, a Focal Teacher’s workshop to plan-out the session activities for their co-teachers and students was conducted, with 17 attendees (12 females, 5 males). In Cambodia: Schools KAP survey in 3 targeted schools in Serei Soaphoan has been conducted. The total of 224 surveys were conducted by 21 Red Cross Volunteers (RCVs). However due to technical difficulties in the data transfer of incomplete questionnaires, only 189 questionnaires were processed by the mobile application (85% of target). Baseline analysis will be done on the basis of those results, as it is not possible to redo the 35 pending questionnaires because it is exam period in schools and both RCVs and respondents are not available. On 23 November, Finnish Red Cross and Philippine Red Cross presented in the Cities for All Conference in Phnom Penh. The conference was organized by People in Need (an ECHO partner in Cambodia). In Viet Nam: The PAPE training package has been adapted to the Vietnam context, which includes a draft package, agenda and training contents in Vietnamese, which have been shared with GRC and VNRC focal points. In November, several working meetings among partners staff trained in the PAPE Regional training in Manila. In addition, the consultant has adapted the IFRC PAPE guidelines and messages. 3 target groups have been identified for the awareness campaign which will focus on flood/storm and on fire risks: (i) the general population of the 5 wards, (ii) the households living in temporary shelters, and (iii) the small businesses. KAP questionnaires and sampling strategy have been designed by GRC and shared with implementing partners. In the Philippines: The activities for this month focused on strengthening and building capacity to the chapter based Red Cross Volunteers (RCV) and conducting training to the focal teachers and students, with the main purpose to increase the level of awareness, skill and knowledge of the volunteers and RC 143 focal teachers in terms of disaster preparedness, managing and retention of Red Cross Youth (RCY) volunteers in the schools and eventually response in any emergency cases when the need arises. In Cambodia: Second technical support visit was conducted by Finnish RC, Cambodian RC Head of Disaster Preparedness, and IFRC Project Coordinator. The visit was highlighted by discussions on technical implementation and financial management. On 7 October, a briefing was conducted to ECHO Bangkok Representatives visiting Cambodia. In Viet Nam: Launching Workshop of the “Building Urban Resilience” project was conducted in Quy Nhon City by Mr. Tran Sy Pha, Vice Director of the VNRC Disaster Management Department on the 15 -16th October 2016. The workshop was attended by 38 participants from Ward, City and Provincial authorities, schools and VNRC and German RC staff. Project staff and stakeholders have gained knowledge about the project objectives and indicators, and an implementation plan has been drafted. Finalization of contractual arrangements between GRC and VNRC: signature of the project agreement by VNRC leadership on the second week of October. Appointment of the VNRC Project Management Unit (PMU) at Headquarters and in Binh Dinh chapter. At regional level: The regional project profile including 4 targeted countries has been published and distributed to program countries (Cambodia, Philippines and Lao PDR). The project agreements among IFRC and Spanish, German, Finnish and Lao Red Cross have been signed and completed the first payment to all PNSs. A regional public awareness and public education workshop will be held on 18-20 Oct, 2016 in Manila. A consultant on Behavior Communication for Change has been recruited to facilitate and design, together with two co-facilitators from the Philippine Red Cross ,the appropriate tools and session for participants. In Lao PDR: The project team has developed the Details Implementation Plan (DIP) and prepared as well as coordinated with stakeholders to organize the Project Kick Off Meeting in country on 4 October 2016. In Cambodia: The team organized RCY and RCV groups in schools and communities, and conducted the initiation of activities in Schools – orientation and trainings for RCVs and RCYs (Red Cross Movement and First Aid), by coordinating with District and Provincial Authorities in Bantaey Meanchey and Serei Soaphoan. In Viet Nam: a consultant was hired to support GRC/VNRC in the development a training package about public awareness and public education adapted to Vietnam, and to design communication campaign. The selection of the five implementation wards in Quy Nhon City has been conducted. The selection involved a national consultant, GRC, VNRC chapter staffs and ward authorities’ representatives. A consultancy team for the development of the GIS Disaster Preparedness Mapping methodology has been recruited in August: the team consists in two experts in Community Based DRR and two experts in GIS mapping who previously supported the national DMC (Disaster Management Committee). The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, in partnership with Finish, German and Spanish Red Cross societies, brings to the project extensive experience in school safety, public awareness and public education and risk mapping, with strength in regional sharing and learning, and peer support. The workshop went well with 30 participants from the National Societies of Viet Nam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Philippines including the Red Cross Youth and Red Cross Volunteers in Quezon Chapter who implemented the project in the Philippines. The workshop was facilitated by team members from IFRC Bangkok CCST, IFRC Viet Nam Country Office, Spanish and Philippine Red Cross, and Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Center. In addition, the Philippine RC General Secretary delivered the opening remarks with the Chairman of Quezon Chapter to all participants and hoped that the participants can enhance their knowledge and skills on the public awareness and public education especially in urban context and share their experiences to each other as peer-to-peer approach. In Vientiane, Lao PDR, the national kick-off meeting of Building Urban Resilience Project was conducted on 4 October 2016. This meeting was started with the project overview at regional and national level. Participants came from the French Red Cross, Vientiane Capital Red Cross branch, Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare, Ministry of Education and Sport, Ministry of Human Resources and Environment, Care International and target schools. The project team shared the project implementation plans and opened session for discussions and comments from participants.
2019-04-21T12:28:01Z
http://www.rcrc-resilience-southeastasia.org/disaster-risk-reduction/urban-disaster-risk-reduction/building-urban-resilience-in-southeast-asia-project/
This week on the Truth for Teachers podcast: How to become an organized teacher with Organize 365’s Lisa Woodruff. I’m speaking today with Lisa Woodruff. She is a former classroom teacher who now owns her own business and teaches organizational skills for a living. I am a subscriber to her Organize 365 podcast, which I highly recommend if you enjoy learning about the mindset of organization, as well as practical tips. Most are focused on the home but she does also have episodes on classroom organization. Click here to learn more about Lisa’s Teacher Workbox. Lisa, tell us about what you’re really passionate about and what your mission is right now in your work. Angela, thank you so much for having me on! I am passionate about helping women get out from behind the laundry and the dishes so that they have more time to do whatever they were uniquely created to do, which is different for every single person. What is it about organization that you’re so passionate about? Why do you think that’s such a transformational thing for women to find their path with? I think that to live an organized life frees up your time. I often say that there’s both time and money and it’s kind of like yin or yang. Often, we will sacrifice our time to save money, when if you just spend a little bit of money you would get a lot more time back. I see organization the same way. I would find that if I was doing something repetitively, but I stopped and I really analyzed and thought about what I was doing, I could streamline it a bit and save myself 5 or 10 minutes, which over time, would gain me a lot more time. I knew that I was successful in a lot of the things I did because I was organized. Most specifically I saw it in the direct sales field. I’d been in a lot of direct sales companies, and the people who were organized and able to replicate what they were doing with their down line, always made like 10 times what everybody else made. It didn’t matter what they were selling. The fact that they were organized and able to create a system that other people could replicate, would boost their income. I knew that organization was a way to get more money and time. If I could teach people that organized way of thinking, then they could use that for whatever they wanted to get more time and money for. Everyone wants to be organized, but some people probably would describe themselves as not naturally organized people. Do you think that there’s such a thing as naturally organized? Yeah. I think we definitely have natural tendencies. Like I’m an analytical math person. I’m dyslexic — you could teach me spelling for the rest of my life. Spelling is just not automatic for me. I’m naturally organized, and I always thought you either are or you aren’t organized. What I found over time was that as a teacher, I was teaching them what I was doing as I went through it, and I would get these cancellations. I was like, why are they canceling? Their house is a hot mess. What happened was that they were learning and they didn’t need me to finish the house. If I did a couple of rooms with them, they could finish because they saw the process I went through — it was a systematic process. This was probably the middle of 2012 after I had started Organize 365 that I realized that this is teachable. I knew that I would professionally organize people because that’s how I was earning my money, but then I knew that the Organize 365 blog was going to work, because I just needed to figure out what I was teaching and how to do that over the internet so people could get their homes organized somewhere else. How much of what you teach is tactical and how much is based on mindset? In the beginning, it was all tactical because I was a teacher. I didn’t know how else to do it. Now I would say it’s 90% mindset. That to me is really interesting, and that’s where I really see the parallels between what you do and what I do. If teachers come to me somewhat for organization (more so for productivity, organization is a piece of that) I often find that there’s some sort of limiting belief of something else that is holding them back from creating change or from having the life that they want. If you want to get organized, there’s a gazillion articles out there about how to do it. If it were simple as just someone giving you a plan and then you just follow the plan, then everyone would be organized. If it was as simple as me just saying, “Here’s how to have more work/life balance, do these things, don’t do those things,” then every teacher would have a reasonable workload. There’s obviously more to it than that and it has something to do with that mindset or core beliefs they hold. Yes. Also, I want to say that there’s an order to organization. I have determined that the order is decluttering, organizing, productivity. Everyone wants productivity, but you cannot have productivity without organization, and you can’t have organization without decluttering. It has to go in that order. Even if you’re looking at your 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Club, the first thing you have to do is what can you get off of this list? What can you totally declutter 100%? After you figure out what you can declutter, then you look back at your 62 hours that are left and you go, “Okay, if I combine all the grading on Thursday night, I could take five hours of grading and turn it into three hours just by organizing it in a certain pod. Or I could take all of our copies and only go to the office on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, so that eliminates Tuesday, Thursday. On Monday, Wednesday, Friday, I not only go for copies, but I also go for supplies and anything that needs to be dropped off there.” Then you start to organize your tasks into batches, that’s the organizing part. I never quite thought about it in that frame, but you’re right. The first thing that I try to get teachers to do is to figure out what can I eliminate? If you have too many things on the list, it doesn’t matter how efficiently you get them done. You’re still not going to get them all done, and the truth is that a good third of them probably don’t even need to be done to begin with. They need to be eliminated — which is the word that I would use — but you’re saying declutter, which is the same thing. Declutter that to-do list, get rid of some stuff first, then organize it. Then focus on productivity. Yes, and if you follow anyone that focuses on only one of those three, it’s because they’ve figured out the other ones intuitively. If you’re going to follow a true productivity expert who’s not going to teach you the decluttering and organizing steps, you end up frustrated because you understand that they are productively using this checklist and to do this less in these operating systems, but you didn’t do the decluttering and organizing parts, you never get the result that they had. Likewise, if you only focus on decluttering and minimalism (that’s really popular right now, as in I’m just going to have less) it gives you an immediate reward because all of a sudden you see less because you’ve just gotten rid of a whole bunch of things. Decluttering is an immediate kind of a high, you can get really addicted to it. If you don’t then organize and increase productivity, then you just keep trying to declutter more to get that high back again. You don’t get it because what’s left really shouldn’t have been decluttered. Now you’re decluttering things that should not have been decluttered, trying to get more organized just from the act of decluttering alone as opposed to grouping like with like, and then productively figuring out where that best fits in your schedule and in your life. Let’s talk about some of these mindset shifts then. The first step is decluttering. What are some of the beliefs or the mindsets that a teacher would need to have in order to effectively declutter? First of all, as teachers, we can find a use for anything and we want to save it just in case. If it’s paper, we might as well laminate it so it will last forever. My husband would know, when we were dating, I was a preschool teacher. All I did was color, laminate, and cut out lamination for two years straight. I’d laminate stuff from home, and he would say, “Why does everything have to be laminated?” I was like, “Oh, because this lesson I’m doing now, I’m going to do for the next 20 years.” But, you’re not. I spent so much time coloring and laminating, I can’t even tell you. The number one thing I would say now being in my mid-40s as a teacher is that, I never taught the same grade twice. If you’re making everything permanent so it will last for three to five years, but you’re never going to teach the same year twice, some of that you might not need to do. Also, we would keep (and of course this was in the 90s) but we would have these teacher closets of literally everything. Bottle caps and toilet paper rolls and extra crayons and all of that stuff. Part of decluttering is realizing that today, Amazon Prime delivers. I know that costs money. But also, you can send an email out — all of your parents in your classroom have all of this stuff in their house, too. You can replenish your whole toilet paper roll stash in 24 hours. Don’t save any more toilet paper rolls until you actually know you have something coming up next week where you need those. The decluttering is, having more of a “just in time” inventory or what you have planned in the next month even. Not what you might need for the rest of your life. Yes. “Just in time” instead of “just in case.” That’s it. You know what, now I think back on my own teaching practice and I was exactly that teacher. I remember writing all the new state standards on chart strips because we had to display them. Laminating them all which cost the school probably 80 gazillion dollars and then they change the standards three years later. I think we all laminated them! I think about all the learning materials I made them, like this is going to be the best thing ever. I’m going to use this for years and then I wouldn’t, because even if I stayed in the same grade level in the same school and the curriculum all stayed the same–which are a whole lot of ifs–I wouldn’t want to do it the same way the next year. I would think of something better or some sort of twist on it. I spent a ton of time trying to make things perfect and make everything super durable and organized so it would last forever. The truth was, I just did not need to have that amount of stuff. I’m just thinking, if instead of all of the preparation we make for the week to go into teaching, where we make everything as new and bright and perfect as it could possibly be, what if we flipped it? We still did the lesson plans and all of that, and we had all of the materials and we taught it. Then at the end of the week we’re like, “Okay, of those 20 lessons I taught, these five were really good and these two were amazing. I am going to take an extra two hours and take the two that were amazing and collect all the samples and put them in a binder and know that that I’m going to replicate next year.” Versus, doing that with all 20 on the front end. I love that, really being intentional about what worked, what didn’t work, and being reflective. Just preserving the things that really deserve to be preserved, instead of starting off the planning process, assuming that everything should be kept and therefore needs to be amazing. That’s so good. Any other mindset shifts around decluttering that we need to think about? It doesn’t necessarily have to be in the classroom, just anything that you think that a teacher would need to know in order to move forward? Decluttering is easy, it’s fast. It should not take you a year and a half to declutter your classroom, your house, whatever. You can literally grab black trash bags, turn on really good high powered music and declutter any room in 30 minutes or less. The only question you’re asking yourself is, do I need this? Really you should be asking, donate or trash? See how much you can get out of that room, not how you’re going to use stuff, but is there anything in here that’s trash? Then is there anything in here that’s worth donating to give yourself that space before you get to the organizing stuff. What do you do if you are the type of person who looks around the room and panics and thinks, “I need all of these things”? What do you tell yourself then? In that case, I would only do one subject or one shelf or the master bathroom or the laundry room in your house. Like an area that isn’t as emotionally charged and much smaller, and then just do that one space. Okay, so start with decluttering in a place that’s easier. You just declutter this one area, so then you’re going to move into organizing that area that’s already been decluttered? You’re not going to ever do this out of order? Would you want to have all of your areas decluttered and then do all the organization or? You could definitely do that, like if you want to take a weekend and just power through and declutter everything. Or do one room at a time. Okay, so let’s say that you have decluttered this one area of your classroom and now you’re ready to move into the organization point, what are the mindset shifts that you would need to make here? Or maybe some of the limiting beliefs that you would need to watch out for? Okay, so the first thing with organizing, I’m just thinking of this gigantic middle school classroom closet that we had. We taught Montessori, so we had a bazillion, million, trillion manipulatives. My co-teacher was amazing, she was wicked smart and such a fun teacher, but not organized at all. I swear I got the job just to organize this closet. In this closet were all of these materials, but there was no rhyme or reason to it whatsoever. Now, there are a couple different ways you could do organizing. One would be to just do one bookshelf at a time. I would say this closet was the size of a really small bedroom. It was not a small closet at all. You only want to organize the space that you have the amount to actually organize and put it back. In this case, I started on a Saturday morning and I cleared out the closet, sorted everything “like with like” in the classroom, and then I built it back into the closet. I actually think I did it in the summer because it took me a week. I would put all the science stuff on one table and all the math stuff somewhere else. Then once we pulled it out of the closet, we then saw more things that were broken or could be donated. And then we designated bookshelves in the closet for each of the subjects or each of the levels and put them back in. That would be a huge organizing job that you would do in the summer or maybe you would do it over winter break. What about in terms of getting organized at home? You’re not going to have time right now to organize your house if you’re actively teaching, so don’t buy my program. Do not do my 100-day program right now. It’ll just leave you frustrated. The one thing I would say to do is the Sunday basket and we also have a teacher box. Those two things organize paper only. The Sunday basket was created in 2002 when I had two babies and I had paper everywhere and couldn’t get anything done. I’m a productive organized person, but I was paying my bills late because I couldn’t find the bills to pay them. I had this stack, 14 inches high of papers on the end of my kitchen counter, adoption paperwork, medical paperwork, direct sales paperwork, just all of it was mixed in there. I had no system whatsoever. One Sunday, I divided all my paper out on the floor and I had 40 distinct piles of things that needed action. I had slash pockets because I was a teacher, so I put them all in 40 different slash pockets. You know those plastic things that go in binders that have tabs on the end and they’re colored? I put those in a long rubber basket and then I started doing that every single Sunday night and I called it my Sunday basket. I would go through all of those, decide what had to get done this week, because here’s the thing, you always have more to do than you have time to do it. It doesn’t matter if it needs to be done. The only questions is, does it have to be done this week? If I don’t get it done this week, it’s late or we miss the registration or something bad happens, and I would keep those out. Then I would keep the rest in there, and as I got mail or notes or ideas, I would throw them in the Sunday basket because they could wait until Sunday. This Sunday basket system and the teacher box system is similar: Anything that comes at you, like you get a paper from your administrator and you have to make some change in your future lesson plans, where do you put that paper? You put it in the Friday teacher box and then on Friday, you go through all those random notes and assignments that have been handed to you. You go through them and you make decisions: Am I going to do this? Am I going to do it now? Or can it wait until next Friday? Often for us women, we are doing so many things especially during the school year that you need to delay everything as long as possible. Here’s the thing, you know this is true, you get a note from your administrator. They’re like, “You have got to make this change, you need to implement this change by this date.” What I would do is implement it immediately, because I’m a good girl and I want to get an A and I want to be obedient. By the time that day comes around, they change their mind. Sometimes when we take action right away so that we don’t forget, we end up doing work that we wouldn’t have to do if we waited until it was due. We would have known about that if it’s in a Sunday basket at home or the Friday box at school, it gives you a place to put all of those things instead of trying to remember them. I have nothing in my head anymore. I don’t have a to-do list because I have these boxes that I drop all my notes in and I set time every week that I go through them. No time to finish reading? Download and listen on the go! I really like what you’re saying here about delaying something, and that is going to be just music to people’s ears who already procrastinate. Yes, I’m doing something right. I think for people like you and me who want to get things done right away, it’s really imperative to learn that because I learned that the hard way. I think of it as doing double work. You do it right away and then you find out something changed and so you end up having to redo it later. Or it’s something that you also have to get involvement from others, so maybe your co-workers also have to do something, and now you’ve done your part and they haven’t done theirs, so you’re waiting around for them. Again, it ends up with double work. This idea of not necessarily doing it right away, but thinking about when is the optimal time for this? Then either writing a to-do list or putting it into that slash pocket so you can then deal with it at a better time. Or maybe all those things come on Sunday. Having this system where you’re not just reacting to things — that’s something that I hear a lot from teachers, is they had this great plan for the day and it’s constantly being thrown off because there are all these other things coming at them. While it seems everything is urgent and important, not everything really has to be done immediately. Sometimes we just do it immediately, because we’re afraid we’re going to forget. Right, and as you get those requests brought to you during the day, the reason why you’re doing it right away and interrupting your own plan is because you have your own plan written down. You know what you were going to do, but if you don’t act on this thing that was given to you, when are you going to do it and are you going to remember to do it? Where do you put it? On your desk? There’s no place to put it. If you have a place to put it, like a Friday box, then you go, “Can this wait until Friday?” If yes, that goes in the Friday box. If you do all of your grading on Thursday and all your planning on Thursday, then call it the Thursday box and then you could put all of your grading in there too. Everything that can wait until that night where you’re going to do the work before you go home is all in that box in one place. We know that if we sit down and we do all the grading at one time or go through all of the notes at one time or call all the parents at one time, we save so much time from task switching, which can cost up to 20 minutes of time. It may not take you 20 minutes because you have your lesson plan written in front of you. But in offices, it does take 20 minutes for people to come back around to what they were working on. It costs us so much time. Really having the system that allows you to delay things intentionally can keep you from feeling you have to try to remember everything or just take action right away. Yes, and I have index cards which you know as teachers we have everywhere. They are like basically a penny for a pack in August, I buy so many of them. I have them in my car, in my purse, in my kitchen, in my office. Whenever I have an idea I write it on an index card and I drop it in the appropriate box. My big thing is books, I’m sure many people love books. Anytime I hear a podcaster talk about a book, when I get to my Sunday basket they’re usually seven book titles in there. Before this what I would do is I would go on Audible and I would buy the book. Half the time, I didn’t actually want to read the book, but I didn’t know how else to remember the book. Now I look through it and then on Sundays I look at all of their reviews on Amazon. I’m like which one do I want to read now? I’m able to make a more thoughtful choice, but not forget about the book, and I didn’t put it on a to-do list anywhere. It’s just a note card in my Sunday basket. If reading is a big thing, which it is for me, then I just have a slash pocket called, “books I want to read someday.” If it’s one I don’t buy now, but I think I still might want it, it just goes in that pocket and stays there. I do something sort of similar, but I keep it in a list, and I do it digitally. I use the notes app which syncs across my computer and my phone. I have a note called “books to read.” When I hear about a book, and a friend’s recommending it, I just put the title there and then next time I know that I’m looking for a new book or I’m already on Audible or I know I’ve got my new Audible credit for the month, I can go to that list and it’s already there. I mean, there’s no one right way to do it, but I think experimenting to find something that works for you is really, really important. There’s just no way you can hold all this stuff in your head. Are there any other mindset shifts or core beliefs that teachers need to have in order to get them to get the results that they want with organization? Yeah, to believe that it’s progress over perfection. You’re not going to end up with a perfect system and then there’s no more work after this. Give yourself more grace and just realize that you’re doing the best you can and that organization is a lifelong skill. It’s a learnable skill and you’ll get more productive every day. I often tell people to take pictures before they start my program because they forget what it looked like, or because they’re striving for a magazine or a Pinterest image or perfection. They’re not realizing how much massive change they’re making in their functional organizing every day. Yeah. I notice that with club members too. They’re so busy focusing on what could be possible and what they’re working towards. They don’t realize how far they’ve come. And when you really take that step back (which we try to do at the end of every month and then do a deeper dive reflection every quarter) and they think about it …”What were the changes that I implemented? I realized I did a lot on top of running a household, being a parent, being a full-time teacher. I did a lot of stuff and so much of this is going to be done in baby steps.” It doesn’t have to be this gigantic overhaul that you do all at once. It really can be spread out over time. It’s always going to be a work in progress as you said. Yes. Definitely. Just giving yourself the credit that you give your kids in the classroom … like give yourself some of that. That’s so good. Anyone who’s joined the club is listening to this thinking, “Oh my gosh, Lisa and Angela say the exact same thing.” We totally do! I’m so glad someone introduced us because we really are just preaching the same gospel here and it’s so fun to watch people’s lives be changed because of this. I mean, this is something that comes naturally to me like it comes naturally to you. It took me a long time to even figure out that other people didn’t know this stuff. The things that you just sort of see as solutions, and I didn’t realize that not everyone sees it. That this was actually like a gift and a talent I had to help people in this way. It’s just really cool to be able to use that and to not make every single person reinvent the wheel from scratch for themselves. Let those of us who enjoy thinking about this stuff figure it out so that you don’t have to. You can think about all the stuff that you’re really good at. Yeah, and I think for teachers, sometimes it’s better because you can walk around the building and find another teacher and ask them how they’re doing it and learn from them. In another way, you want to have it all together so you don’t want to necessarily let anybody know that you don’t know what’s going on or you don’t have it as together as you think other people do, which by now you’ve probably figured out they don’t either. Then in diving into organizing the home like I do, all they see is the Instagram images that are put up or the Pinterest images or the magazine images, and they think that everyone else has it together and they don’t. It is a gift to reach women and help them realize that we’re all the same. Often my podcast listeners, as I’m sure yours do too, will say, “It’s like you have a camera in my house, and you’re watching me.” It’s just because we are teachers and so you are our students. We watch you as much as you watch the students in your classroom and you know where they are starting to struggle. Or when you’re teaching a certain lesson, the whole class tends to struggle at this time with this concept, and we get it. That’s right. Your podcast is really structured in that way. I’ve noticed that you do a lot of seasonal things like the topics that come up, which is exactly what people need. Tell us a little bit about the Organize 365 podcast, because I know that everyone listening to this is obviously an avid podcast fan and is looking for more great audio content. I get requests all the time for good audio podcast recommendations. If you are interested in organization, Lisa has some really great topics that she covers. Well, thanks! It is kind of like a classroom, and I am a big thinker and a questioner like you are, Angela, and also a teacher. I find that the best lessons or the best teachers that I loved to learn from were not the ones who were just like, “Okay, do X, Y, Z,” but the ones that really made you think about it a different way, struggle with something in your mind, and then help you come to a resolution on it. I help you with how to organize your home. You know the women’s movement is really big right now in women’s empowerment. What I think is holding us back is not men, but our homes. I know that’s kind of controversial to say that, but we have these expectations for ourselves and our homes that we will not let go of. We are trying to do all of those things and all of the work things and all of the personal things and all of the parenting things … We’re just trying to hold too tightly to all of these things. I help you think bigger about why are you organizing your house the way you are. If you live in your house a long time like I do — I’ve lived there 22 years, bought the house before kids, then babies, grade school, middle school, high school, and college, and soon to be empty nesters — you do not organize your house the same way in all those stages of life. What stage of life are you in? What size house do you have? What are your income requirements and the amount of money you can or can’t spend on organizing your house right now? Then along those 22 years, I’ve battled with infertility, depression, and family members with ADHD. I dive into all of those different topics as they relate to how our households run. That’s really fascinating and I’ve heard you say that before about how it’s really our households that are holding us back. Can you say more about that? It’s the expectations that we’re creating for ourselves? Yeah, here’s a great example. Growing up and I do think it is generational — I’m Gen X and 46 years old — my parents are the oldest of the baby boomers and my dad loved that you vacuum the whole entire house. At 5 PM every night, somebody in the family would vacuum the house that my dad would come home to a perfectly vacuumed house. So I got married and thought married equals perfectly vacuumed house, right? I vacuumed the house, three or four times a week and then we had one baby. Then we had two babies and I was working from home earning a full-time paycheck. Every day at 5 PM, I was trying to vacuum the whole house and have a beautiful meal on the kitchen table, which is hilarious because I can’t cook! We were probably seven years into our marriage, the kids were toddlers and Greg would come home and I’d be like, “Do you see I’ve vacuumed? Look what I did.” He said, “Yeah.” I was like, “You know I vacuum like three to four times a week for you.” He said, “Yeah, well you know it’s nice, but it’s not necessary.” I was like, “Nice, but not necessary?” For seven years, do you know how many hours of vacuuming that is? What are we doing because we think that it needs to be done? There is so much in our house that we are doing that completely does not need to be done, or we’re trying to please our parents or spouse, or we’re trying to prove we’re a good mother. I organized this lady who was divorced who had six children and was working full time when I was organizing for her. She had every single paper saved for every single child. Every math test, every spelling test, you guys know how much stuff this is right? It wasn’t the kids’ expectation or anybody’s expectation, but her own expectation on herself. Okay. That’s great. Any final parting words that you want to leave teachers with? Anything that they should really remember and think about in the week ahead to sort of digest all that we’ve talked about? What do you want to use your free time for? What’s uniquely you? What is the thing that you were uniquely gifted and created to do which is scary? Then what’s the first step you can take towards spending your time in that? It can be teaching — it doesn’t have to be something different — but maybe within teaching like creating your own curriculum, creating a blog, or coordinating an after work teacher activity once a month so that your school has better community together. It could be teaching related, but it is the burning desire you’ve always wanted to do or something you know you were created for, and then take the next step to do that. This episode is sponsored by Brains On. Ever listen to podcasts with your students? It’s a great way to engage their minds and spark their imagination without relying on screens. The kids’ history show Forever Ago dives into the fascinating backstory of everyday things like clocks, shoes, and skateboards to teach kids to think critically about the past. Forever Ago use games, skits, and real kids to keep kids engaged while teaching important lessons along the way. You can listen for free to Forever Ago as well as a kids science podcast called Brains On at brainson.org or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you for an awesome podcast! I love the Sunday basket idea. What notes app do you use? So glad this was helpful! I use the Notes app that comes standard on Apple products so it syncs across my phone and computer. I loved this podcast! Two great minds coming together. My life has been changed for the better because of the 40 Hour Workweek Club (I am so proud to say that in 5 months I went from working 60+ hours a week to 45 hours a week). I have also organized my home through Lisa’s program. I have so much more time in just 5 months. I have more time for myself and to connect with my family more often and with more intention. Lisa mentions that a teacher can’t do her 100 day home organization program. You can! Combined with the 40HTW club! It is life changing. You will declutter, get organzied and be so productive… you WILL have so much more time! That’s so awesome! I’m impressed with your discipline and stick-to-itiveness. Your success gives me hope! Congratulations on your success! I’m so glad that you and Lisa got together. I’ve been listening to her podcast off and on for a few years now. I’ve recently restarted my Sunday Basket, and I setup my Teacher Workbox yesterday. I already feel less stress knowing that I’ve got a plan!
2019-04-19T10:32:18Z
https://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/how-to-be-an-organized-teacher/
The first International Workshop on "Visual Interfaces to Digital Libraries" was held at the first ACM+IEEE Joint Conference on Digital Libraries in Roanoke, Virginia, USA, on June 28, 2001. This one-day workshop drew an international audience of 37 researchers, practitioners, and graduate students in the areas of information visualization, digital libraries, human-computer interaction, library and information science, computer science, and geography. The primary aim of the workshop was to raise the awareness of several interconnected fields of research related to the design and use of visual interfaces to digital libraries, especially in information visualization, human-computer interaction, and cognitive psychology. The workshop started with Katy B�rner's introduction and overview, followed by an invited talk from Stephen Eick of Visual Insights, entitled "Visualizing On-line Activity". Eich explained how their eBizInsights software provides a rich visual interactive workspace for analyzing user access to a given website and discovering browsing patterns. Eight papers were presented in two sessions. The topics ranged from literature visualization and spatial hypertext, to geographic information systems. Workshop attendees enjoy one of the workshop demonstrations. Time was provided for two interactive demonstration sessions. Demonstrations included one of VRCO's VGeo system and several others by workshop attendees. An expert panel discussed the future of research and development and started formulating top-ten research challenges for visual interfaces to digital libraries to help focus and guide research. In his concluding remark, Chaomei Chen outlined promising areas for future information visualization research: Visual Information Retrieval, Visual Information Exploration, Visual Information Organization, Accommodating Individual Differences, Supporting Collaborative Work, Information Visualization for Bibliometrics, Information Visualization for Scientometrics, Knowledge Tracking, Knowledge Discovery, Designing and Deploying Tangible and Meaningful Visual-Spatial Metaphors in Digital Libraries. The workshop achieved its goal of bringing people together across disciplines and stimulating interest in this multidisciplinary research. In response to the enthusiastic audience, the high-quality inputs, and many promising works in progress, we plan to hold the workshop again at the next JCDL Conference in Portland, Oregon, US, July 14 - 18, 2002. Papers, presentation slides, and other information are available from the workshop's homepage <http://vw.indiana.edu/visual01>. The workshop was sponsored by Virtual Reality Software & Consulting. Their homepage is <http://www.vrco.com>. The Distributed National Electronic Resource (DNER) for universities and colleges in the UK <http://www.jisc.ac.uk/pub99/dner_desc.html> has set ambitious targets for the development of online resources, in a way that will be co-ordinated and collaborative, but not centrally controlled. Project ANGEL (Authenticated, Networked, Guided Environment for Learning) is building essential infrastructure components to enable easier access to this wealth of learning resources. The project is led by the London School of Economics Library, in partnership with the University of Edinburgh, De Montfort University, South Bank University, Sheffield Hallam University and the EDINA data service. A tempting (but naive) approach that could have been taken to this task would have been to build "the ANGEL portal", and then waited for every university and college in Britain (...and tomorrow, the World?) to adopt and use it. However, this would simply have led to competition with leading commercial "Managed Learning Environment" products (which are being actively marketed as "primary portals" for students, and adopted as such by a number of institutions), and with the increasing number of in-house projects initiated by universities to develop their own institutional web portals (or "Interfaces To Everything", as ANGEL has broadly classified such developments). Instead, ANGEL will produce a layer of middleware services that can be used by such end-user portals to simplify and manage access by an increasingly diverse range of end-users, to an increasingly diverse range of online materials. Protocols supported by ANGEL services will range from the long-established Z39.50, to those just emerging such as SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol <http://www.w3.org/TR/SOAP>). The ANGEL project team will collate and develop unified or hybrid metadata standards and other methods of inter-operability for resource discovery and access, bridging the gap between the two domains of 'learning' (pedagogically guided) resources, and 'library' (unguided reference) resources to create a practical implementation of standards-mapping work such as that of Dan Brickley, Mikael Nilsson et al. < http://xml.coverpages.o rg/ni2001-03-30-a.html>. The most promising descriptive standard for the former is the IMS metadata proposal <http://www.imsproject.org/>, whilst RDF (Resource Description Framework) <http://www.w3.org/RDF> is now an accepted world standard for the latter, with the potential for further extension. ANGEL will also work with what has traditionally been thought of as 'management' information about participants in Further and Higher Education, extending the eduPerson < http://www.educause.edu/eduperson/ > LDAP specification so that portals using ANGEL services can offer a high level of personalisation and personal customisation to end-users. Many of the resource collections involved restrict access to users from licence-holding institutions, and the number of licensed, income-earning, access-protected resource collections is certain to increase as more opportunities to exploit a market in learning materials are discovered by commercial players (old and new), and by education institutions under increasing pressure from government to replace subsidies with other revenue sources. The UK JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) <http://www.jisc.ac.uk>, which is the main funder of Project ANGEL, has recognised this impending problem, and tasked ANGEL to deliver a working implementation of its Sparta specification < http://www.jisc.ac.uk/pu b00/sparta_disc.html> - a national access management infrastructure which will eventually replace the currently successful Athens <http://www.athens.ac.uk/> service. The Sparta implementation is likely to be based on the model developed by RedIRIS for PAPI < http://www.rediris.es/ap p/papi/index.en.html>, with the aim of also being inter-operable with resource vendors who adopt the Internet2 Shibboleth < http://middleware.interne t2.edu/shibboleth/> system. One particular problem that ANGEL faces is the speed of development and lack of coordination of all the commercial and public-sector initiatives that are exploiting these fields. We have dedicated project staff time to actively maintaining a technology-watch on standards and developments in the areas of Learning Resource Metadata, Education User Metadata, Authentication and Resource Access Authorisation. Of course, this is a problem shared with many fellow researchers so, rather than keeping this information to ourselves, in the spirit of Open Source development we will maintain it on the public side of our website and as a RSS news-feed. We would also appreciate email contact from those involved in relevant developments that we haven't yet found and listed. Full information about Project ANGEL, including our Technology-watch updates is published at <http://www.angel.ac.uk>. The City of Los Angeles has placed just over 600,000 images on the Internet. The 75 megapixel images are indexed using the City GIS (Geographic Information System). The images were scanned from 35 mm film at an optical resolution of 10,000 by 7,500 pixels. The project is scanning approximately 7,000 images per day and plans to reach the goal soon of putting 800,000 to 1,000,000 images on the Internet. In the scanning process, automatic index conversion is done using the existing integral metadata record in the aperture cards that hold the images. Most images are scanned at 1 bit per pixel, but the scanning system supports 8 bits per pixel and, in next month's planned ease-of-use site update, the storage and display system will support 24 and 36 bits per pixel as well as multispectral imaging. The system has an extensive relational database that can be used in conjunction with the GIS system of over 250 layers of vector information for over 900,000 parcels to locate the images. The images are of City maps and blueprints of the existing infrastructure. Examples of layers of GIS information include: Graffiti Zones, Geologic Faults (Earthquake Faults), Hillside Grading (Landslide and Mudslide areas), High Potential Methane, High Wind Area, Liquifaction/Subsidence, Potential Methane, Fire Brush Clearance, Street Resurfacing, Flood Plains, Storm Pipes (Drains), Storm Drain Inlets, and Truck Routes (High and Heavy Loads). There is a more detailed description at <http://www.ArchiveBuilders.com/whitepapers/22031p.pdf>. Archival and disaster availability issues are addressed at <http://www.ArchiveBuilders.com/whitepapers/22025p.pdf>. While the City GIS and the 600,000 images it indexes have evolved over time, and will continue to evolve, very substantial recent additions in both content and syndetic structure, as well as an expansion of the materials available on the Internet, establish a new qualitative level that provides a substantially complete expression of its final form. The City of Los Angeles GIS (Geographic Information System) is a highly integrated set of spatial (geographic) indices, including a composite and digitally rectified (the pixels are in the right place) digital orthophoto <http://mapping.USGS.gov/www/ndop> to represent images of things (such as buildings) in their true location. (The City is using a specially flown and processed image rather than the USGS image.) (City image: 50 gigapixel 8 bit image, 316,000 by 474,000 pixels optical resolution, irregular border, 6 inch pixels, 468 square miles, 2 foot contour lines, virtual reality pan and zoom). Like other forms of indexing, geographic indexing can be combined with other indices. For example, one might ask for all books of fiction that were written in the twentieth century, with stories that take place in upstate New York in the nineteenth century. USC has a project on the Internet in which archival records are indexed geographically: <http://www.USC.edu/isd/locations/cst/IDA/prospectus.html>. The website <http://navigatela.lacity.org/> gives everyone a chance to try out a fully developed spatial index. This index could be easily integrated with the USC project. For example, both systems use the same <http://www.ESRI.com> (Earth Sciences and Resources Institute 'esz-ree') software and cover approximately the same geographic area. Linking the two would be something like cataloging books by looking up the Library of Congress classification (that is, easy and deterministic, yielding the same results for almost anyone doing the process). Unlike traditional library cataloging, spatial indexing receives funding from sources such as real estate, civil engineering, environmental planning, disaster planning, and tax collection. Spatial indexing provides a method of synergistically extending the benefits of indexing expenditures, provided by various business activities, into other areas such as the humanities. The system catalog links extensive background information with interactive updates, creating a real-time library that can respond effectively to the information needs of emergency personnel, businesses, and the public during and after earthquakes, mudslides, floods, fires, and other urgent occurrences. Interactive redlining of stored documents and the GIS-based index allows field workers to input data, via the Internet, creating maps, descriptions, and catalogs of field incidents, events, and situation status that can be displayed on the Internet. Though not currently linked to the GIS system, similar real-time maps can be found at <http://www.lainsider.com/autos/traffic/latraffic.html?//x>, at <http://trafficinfo.lacity.org>, at <http://trafficinfo.lacity.org/html/4303880606.html> and at <http://www.scecdc.scec.org/recenteqs/Maps/Los_Angeles.html>. Because these maps are updated automatically, the maps respond to events in under one minute. The websites presented are: Internet GIS indexed documents and digital orthophoto: <http://NavigateLA.LACity.org> and interactive Internet permitting and plancheck redlining: <http://Eng.LACity.org/demos>. There is a planned ease-of-use site update in the next month, so if you have any problems, please try back in a few weeks. The City of Los Angeles has a monthly meeting to coordinate GIS and document management plans. If you would like to get the meeting announcements, topics, websites presented, and meeting recaps via email, please send your email address to <SteveGilheany@ArchiveBuilders.com>. Eric F. Van de Velde, PhD. CAV2001 is the conference proceedings of the Fourth International Symposium on Cavitation. This repository contains 110 scholarly papers. CaltechCSTR is a repository of technical reports of the Caltech Computer Science option. The repository currently contains 237 reports, but this is an ongoing effort, and we expect to continue adding reports as they become available. Both OAI-registered repositories can be found at <http://library.caltech.edu/digital>. Educated various library staff in a variety of electronic-publication skills. Identified faculty, options, and research groups willing to be pioneers in freeing the research literature. In addition to the two repositories just registered, we are currently preparing technical-report repositories for several other options. We are also well under way to make available our first batch of Electronic Theses. INSPIRAL (INveStigating Portals for Information Resources And Learning, (http://inspiral.cdlr.strath.ac.uk) is a six-month JISC / DNER funded project running from 1 May to 31 October 2001 to investigate the issues surrounding the linking of virtual learning environments (VLEs) / managed learning environments (MLEs) and digital libraries. The research is being carried out in collaboration with the Centre for Digital Library Research (http://cdlr.strath.ac.uk) and the Centre for Educational Systems (http://www.strath.ac.uk/ces/). INSPIRAL's focus is on institutional and end-user perspectives, with the aim of identifying priority areas for future JISC strategic planning and investment within the higher and further education sectors. INSPIRAL events are an integral part of the final analysis and consist of three half-day forums and two full-day workshops to be held at locations around the United Kingdom. On June 12, 2001, INSPIRAL held its first forum at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. A specific aim of the forum was to discuss, identify, and gather information on the problems and barriers to successful linkage of VLEs / MLEs and digital libraries. The topics discussed gave particular attention to the considerations of the learner and the institution. Attendees represented institutional departments that are likely to be involved with VLE / MLE and digital library linkage, providing library, academic, and technical perspectives in the identification of barriers, problem areas, and possible solutions. The forum began with a presentation by Sarah Currier (INSPIRAL Research Fellow) who gave an overview and update of INSPIRAL's research to date. Participants were then invited to introduce their own and their institution's involvement in VLEs / MLEs and digital library integration. These discussions provided important information on the current situation in various institutions around Scotland, including Caledonian, Edinburgh, Stirling and Strathclyde universities, regarding linkage, as well as identifying some of the more specific problems and barriers to linkage at the institutional level. The forum continued with group and general discussions on the chosen topic and also identified ideal situations that could solve the barriers to linking VLEs / MLEs and digital libraries within the higher and further education sectors. Issues raised at this forum have already proved valuable to INSPIRAL's research objectives, and have indicated three areas that require further and more detailed investigation, namely institutional, technological and social levels, within the teaching and learning environment. A full report on these findings is included on the INSPIRAL web site at <http://inspiral.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/documents/forumrep1.html>. The UK Collection Description Focus launched on 1 June 2001 (http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/cd-focus/) is a national post, jointly funded for a twelve-month period by the Joint Information Systems Committee/Distributed National Electronic Resource (JISC/DNER), the Research Support Libraries Program (RSLP) and the British Library. The Focus aims to improve co-ordination of work on collection description methods, schemas and tools, with the goal of ensuring consistency and compatibility of approaches across projects, disciplines, institutions and sectors. The Focus intends to provide support both for UK projects actively involved in collection description work and for those investigating or planning such work. The Focus is located within UKOLN, (The UK Office for Library and Information Networking) which is based at the University of Bath. The Focus will be run jointly by Pete Johnston and Bridget Robinson with support from their partners in the CD Focus initiative, the Archives Hub and the mda. The Focus will be informed by work carried out by other members of UKOLN, including the work of Andy Powell on the RSLP CLD schema, and the broader work on the effective exchange and reuse of information resources carried out by Paul Miller as Interoperability Focus. The Focus will also liase with the Collection Description Working Group within the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative. The Focus will look into the development of simple tools to facilitate the creation and management of collection descriptions including: tools to support transformations between different collection description schemas; enhancements to data creation interfaces; the use of a schema registry to publish and share CD schemas; and mechanisms for "harvesting" distributed descriptions. The CD Focus team will draft a questionnaire that will be sent out to relevant projects and stakeholders within the UK. The questionnaire will be used to gather information on project activity, standards and metadata schema adopted, implementation issues, software in use and areas where guidance is needed. The data gathered will inform subsequent visits, briefing papers, event agendas and other Focus activities. Three regional workshops will be held during the project. There will also be two briefing days. The first one will be held in the autumn and then a second briefing day will be held at the end of the project. The CD Focus website can be found at <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/cd-focus>. The UK Data Archive has recently released a number of major datasets that are available for browsing, exploring and downloading via a suite of Internet-based tools, known as NESSTAR. Many government departments, research institutes, companies, and other kinds of organisations collect social and economic data. Many of these data are available for re-use, particularly for research and education, typically via data archives and libraries. The UK Data Archive is a specialist national resource containing the largest collection of accessible computer readable data in the social sciences and humanities in the United Kingdom. The full UKDA catalogue can be searched at: <http://www.data-archive.ac.uk/findingData/ourDataHoldings.asp>. together with some other individual popular UK-based datasets such as the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey. This online service will be extended to other data collections within the UKDA on a continuous basis, with more datasets being mounted on the system over the coming months. Who can access these data? Anyone can search for and view full information about the survey and the data (metadata in the form of a catalogue record and codebook in XML). Non-commercial users registered with UK Data Archive can also explore, analyse and download the data. If you are interested in becoming a registered user, please see the UKDA Web pages at: <http://www.data-archive.ac.uk/orderingData/introduction.asp>. NESSTAR is a set of internet-based tools providing an enhanced online service for data providers and data users, that gives easier and quicker access to data and information about that data. A common scenario for a user of a data archive is identification of a dataset of possible interest through an Archive's online catalogue, through which the user can also read about the survey design and contents, and possibly view the codebook and associated user guides. However, at this stage the user does not usually have immediate access to the data or to any frequencies or percentages. She may then need to contact the archive to ascertain its suitability, order the data and then wait to receive it, for example on a CD. NESSTAR radically facilitates the data access process, allowing users immediate access to frequencies and percentages and allowing registered users to perform exploratory online analyses (at no cost) and then download the data for offline analysis immediately. The three screen shots below show that from browsing the metadata at the variable level (i.e., the questions asked in a survey) a user can quickly carry out a basic tabulation and then display this as a graph with only 4 clicks of a mouse. The table can be added to an existing list of favourites or bookmarks in the user's Web Browser, where the user can refer to it later or mail it to a colleague. Screenshots from NESSTAR. Copyright 2001 UKDA. Used with permission. The NESSTAR project was funded by the European Commission to the sum of �2 million under the 4th and 5th Framework IT Programmes. The three main partners collaborating in this innovative R&D project have been the UK Data Archive, the Norwegian Social Science Data Services (NSD), and the Danish Data Archive (DDA). NESSTAR Explorer also provides the option of simultaneous access to catalogues from the Danish and Norwegian data archives. It is planned that catalogues from other data archives will be available in the near future. Finally, NESSTAR is also being used by other data communities as a powerful Intranet service for accessing their own data sources. Further instructions on using NESSTAR to access datasets at the UK Data Archive can be found at: <http://www.data-archive.ac.uk/usingData/nesstar.asp>, and there is an online guide to using NESSTAR light at <http://www.nesstar.org/light/userguide/1-1.asp>. More about the R&D and technical developments of NESSTAR may be found at: <http://www.nesstar.org>. Specific enquiries are handled by the User Support team at <archive-userservices@essex.ac.uk>. Bethesda, Md., USA � (June 29, 2001) During the ALA 2001 Annual Convention, NISO, the National Standards Information Organization and BASIC, the Book and Serial Industry Communications, jointly presented a forum on the challenges of integrating electronic journals into library collections and the standards now in development that will enable publishers and librarians to deliver better access and more information about these resources. These presentations are now available on the NISO web site at <http://www.niso.org/Ejournal-web.html>. In a presentation entitled "Rights & Content: Full Text Databases", Deborah Loeding, VP Sales & Marketing for the H.W. Wilson Company provided an overview and introduction to the challenges and opportunities that electronic journals bring by allowing us to connect to content and a variety of supporting information about that content. The presentation by Brian Green, Managing Agent BIC/EDItEUR (Book Industry Communication) entitled "Developments in Metatdata: ONIX for Serials" reported on Onix for serials, an international standard for communicating a variety of metadata elements including comprehensive product description and bibliographic detail, reviews, author biographies, extracts pricing and availability in different markets and more as it relates to e-serials. Eric Van de Velde, Director of Library Information Technology, California Institute of Technology and Chair of NISO's OpenURL Standards Committee, explained how the OpenURL can connect information seekers to the appropriate copy of any chosen resource by passing along bibliographic or descriptive information about the resource in his presentation "Developments in Linking: OpenURL". NISO is the only U.S. group accredited by the American National Standards Institute to develop and promote technical standards for use in information delivery services providing voluntary standards for libraries, publishers and related information technology organizations. All NISO standards are developed by consensus under the guidance of experts and practitioners in the field to meet the needs of both the information user and the producer. For information about NISO's current standardization interests and membership possibilities, please visit the NISO website at <http://www.niso.org>. For additional information contact NISO Headquarters at (301) 654-2512. Email: <nisohq@niso.org>. Special Projects Associate Council on Library and Information Services Washington, DC USA. Pioneers who once experimented with solitary digital-access projects at the campus library's periphery are increasingly building systems for managing online information at its core. Increasing chunks of library budgets are spent on digitizing collections, acquiring such computer-accessible research materials as e-journals, and maintaining online public access catalogs. Moreover, campus librarians are applying electronic-information technologies to the management of their holdings in all formats -- books, manuscripts, and other traditional materials as well as digital collections. And by relating rather than separating traditional and electronic resources, they are developing more efficient and economical services for students and faculty. More on such changes is available in a report from the latest forum of the Digital Library Federation (DLF) at <http://www.clir.org/pubs/issues/issues22.html#digital>. Increasingly the Web is full of material of value for higher education and research that can be accessed for free. Why shouldn't campus libraries pull it into their own digital collections for use by scholars and students? No reason not to -- but don't imagine that there won't be costs. For one thing, staff investment is needed in identifying, evaluating, and selecting Web material of real worth for study. Origin, site integrity, ease of navigation, and rights restrictions also must be considered, and investments must be made in cataloging, data management, and search functions. How libraries can recognize and deal with the problems and opportunities in using "free" Web resources is explained in a new publication from the Digital Library Federation and the Council on Library and Information Resources, Building Sustainable Collections of Free Third-Party Web Resources, is available in print and at <http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub98/pub98.pdf>. Will all the scholarly journals now published electronically stay accessible electronically over time? Can the property rights of publishers, the long-term access responsibilities of libraries, and the reliability assurances that scholars need be reconciled in agreements to create archives of electronic journals? Seven major research libraries -- Cornell, Harvard, MIT, Penn, Stanford, Yale, and the New York Public -- have received grants from the Mellon Foundation to find out. The Digital Library Federation, which helped develop the program, is tracking progress at <http://www.clir.org/diglib/preserve/presjour.htm>. Building in part on work on imaging practices conducted with the Research Libraries Group (RLG), the Digital Library Federation is investigating methods for evaluating the quality of digital images. Such methods will help assess claims that are made about images by their producers or vendors. A report from a meeting convened to identify standard criteria for assessing the quality of digital images and digital imaging systems is available at <http://www.clir.org/diglib/standards.htm>. The DLF has initiated a process to identify standard structural, administrative, and technical metadata needed for the successful, consistent, and interoperable management of digital objects. The process builds upon and extends the work of the Making of America II project, which developed a documented set of metadata elements for a limited range of digital objects. The draft scheme is available from <http://www.clir.org/diglib/standards/mets.xsd>. A report on the meeting is at <http://www.clir.org/diglib/standards/metssum.pdf>. Universities are investing heavily in digitization to make information from and about their library collections available to scholars and students by Internet. But the limitations of commercial search engines, and the uneven quality of what they turn up, often make it difficult for researchers to find all the important material that's pertinent to their projects. The Digital Library Federation (DLF) is working with the Open Archives Initiative to make possible Internet gateway services through which scholars can find more material more readily in their specialties: <http://www.clir.org/diglib/architectures.htm>. Everyone knows that digital technologies are enabling scholars and students to find, evaluate, and use information in new ways, but what are they? A concerted effort to find out has been called for by a group of college and university library directors convened by the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) and the Digital Library Federation (DLF) to scrutinize changing patterns in the operations and use of campus libraries. The proposed study would cover all resources, not just those of libraries, consulted by students and faculty when they need information. For more information please see the May/June 2001 issue of CLIR's newsletter, CLIR Issues, in print or at <http://www.clir.org/pubs/issues/issues21.html>. While not directly related to digital libraries, two additional new books just published by the Council on Library and Information Resources will be useful to librarians: Folk Heritage Collections in Crisis, a report on a conference and a survey, and A Collaborative Approach to Collection Storage: The Five-College Library Depository, may be purchased in print through CLIR's Web site, <http://www.clir.org>, or located online through <http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/reports.html>. The University of Maryland, College Park, and Films for the Humanities & Sciences, Inc., (FFH&S) of Princeton, NJ, signed a far reaching agreement earlier this month (June 6, 2001) enabling the campus libraries to distribute approximately 1,000 selected titles from the FFH&S collection of educational videos over the university's state-of-the-art digital video-on-demand delivery system. Signing the agreement at a ceremony held in the new Performing Arts Library at the Clarice Smith Center for the Performing Arts were Charles Lowry, Dean of Libraries at the University of Maryland, and Betsy Sherer, President and CEO of FFH&S. Commenting on the significance of the agreement at the signing, Dean Lowry said: "Since I installed my first mainframe library system 20 years ago, we have been talking about how to build digital or virtual libraries. In that time the world of information technology has been transformed. As I look around the landscape of academic and research libraries today, I find that they too have been transformed. With the opportunity presented by our partnership with FFH&S, we take a giant step in 'multi-mediation' and the use of digitized audio and full motion video which is an integral part of our sense of content for teaching and research." In her remarks, FFH&S's Sherer said: "This is an age in which education's needs are increasingly diverse and specialized. Films for the Humanities & Sciences will continue to seek ways to provide quality programs in formats that are compatible with new learning environments. We are pleased and proud to participate with the University of Maryland in this pioneering and exciting effort." What this agreement means, according to Allan C. Rough, Manager of the University's Nonprint Media Services Department, is that students and faculty will soon be able to access a wide variety of video programming, much of it in the performing arts area, from almost any location on campus. This includes libraries, classrooms, offices and dormitory rooms. Rough explained that the goal is to allow users to instantly access a program directly from the Libraries' online catalog. He added: "Digital video-on-demand systems have been a reality for a number of years, but copyright and intellectual property constraints have made most academic institutions reluctant to purchase expensive video server technologies. Universities were faced with a classic dilemma: if we purchase a server, will we be able to find video programming we can legally put on the system? This agreement answers that question with a resounding �yes'!" Carleton Jackson, Nonprint Media Reference Librarian, noted that "until recently, universities were divided by buildings and campuses; collections were segregated by subject, discipline, format and walls. This agreement breaks down those walls to unleash the full potential of sound and image for teaching." A Primedia company, Films for the Humanities & Sciences is the leader in distributing high quality video and multimedia programs to colleges, schools and libraries. Their collection of more than 9,000 titles represents the best from the most prestigious producers from around the world, including the BBC, ABC News, the Discovery Channel, and many others. This agreement with the University of Maryland Libraries marks their first collaboration with a Higher Education institution. With many of the 1,000 selected titles related to theatre, dance and music, a sampling of the collection includes the following: "Shakespeare's Plays", performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company; "Glenn Gould on Gould"; "Georg Solti; Making of a Maestro"; "Edward Elgar: Hope & Glory"; "Art of Conducting" series; "Empire of Dreams: Bolshoi Ballet"; and "Great Arias" series. Bruce Wilson, Head of the Performing Arts Library, said that "thanks to this agreement, we now have access to some of the most relevant and exciting programming to go with one of the most technologically advanced Performing Arts libraries in the country." The FFH&S collection of documentaries secured by the UM Libraries also contains a number of titles related to world history, literature, education, computer science, art, communications, science, business, etc. The University of Maryland Libraries expect to launch a pilot project in the fall, enabling users to access a limited number of titles in the collection, according to Jeff Bridgers, Head of Digital Libraries. June 22, 2001, Library of Congress, Washington, DC: The Library of Congress and Alexa Internet announce the Election 2000 Collection, the first large-scale collection of date-searchable Web sites to be archived and made available online. The Election 2000 Collection <http://www.archive.alexa.com/collections/e2k.html> developed for the Library of Congress by the Internet Archive, Alexa Internet, and Compaq Computer, is an Internet library containing archived copies of more than 1,000 election-related Web sites. The collection, searchable by date, by Web site, and by category via Alexa's new "Wayback Machine" technology, contains more than 2 million megabytes of election-related information gathered between August 1, 2000, and January 14, 2001, including what was published on the candidates' Web sites, political party sites and major news sites. The Election 2000 Collection is important because it contributes to the historical record of the U.S. presidential election, capturing information that could otherwise have been lost. With the growing role of the Web as an influential medium, records of historical events such as the U.S. presidential election could be considered incomplete without materials that were "born digital" and never printed on paper. Because Internet content changes at a very rapid pace, especially on those sites related to an election, many important election sites have already disappeared from the Web. For the Election 2000 Collection, rapidly changing sites were archived daily, or even twice and three times in a day, in an attempt to capture the dynamic nature of Internet content. "This was the first presidential election in which the Web played an important role, and there would have been a gap in the historical record of this period without a collection such as this," said Winston Tabb, Associate Librarian for Library Services of the Library of Congress. "The Library of Congress worked with the Internet Archive, a nonprofit organization dedicated to building digital libraries, to create this digital collection for researchers, historians and the general public." Compaq Computer undertook the major task of collecting and archiving sites for the collection. "Compaq Research was able to "deep crawl" hundreds of Web sites each day to build an unprecedented record of the changing nature of the Web. It was tricky, because finding all the images, videos and computer scripts associated with each page required developing specialized technology," said Brewster Kahle, President of Alexa Internet. Alexa Internet created Wayback Machine technology, which allows users to browse this huge collection and other Internet libraries like it. "By enabling users to retrieve Web sites out of the past, Alexa's Wayback Machine technology adds a time dimension to the Internet and creates the first 'time browser' for the Web," said Mr. Kahle. The Library of Congress's mission is to make its resources available and useful to Congress and the American people and to sustain and preserve a universal collection of knowledge and creativity for future generations. Founded in 1800 to serve the reference needs of Congress, the Library of Congress is the world's largest library, containing nearly 121 million items in all formats on which information is recorded. It serves Congress and all Americans through its 21 reading rooms on Capitol Hill as well as through its popular Web site at <http://www.loc.gov>. Alexa Internet, the Web Information Company, gathers, stores, indexes and makes available multi-terabyte digital libraries, collections of Web sites and other Internet information. The company's Archive of the Web has been growing since 1996, and now contains more than 40 terabytes of data. Alexa also offers a free Web navigation service (available at <http://www.alexa.com>), which gives Internet users access to the Archive as they surf, as well as detailed information about Web sites such as related links, contact information, site statistics and reviews. The company donates a copy of its Archive of the Web on a continuing basis to the nonprofit Internet Archive, which is endowed to preserve the digital heritage for scholarly access. Alexa, a wholly owned subsidiary of Amazon.com, is located on the Web at <http://www.alexa.com>. The Internet Archive (<http://www.archive.org>) is a 501(c)(3) public nonprofit organization that was founded to build an "Internet library," with the purpose of offering permanent access for researchers, historians and scholars to historical collections that exist in digital format. Founded in 1996 and located in the Presidio of San Francisco, the Archive has been receiving data donations from Alexa Internet and others. British Library, June 13, 2001: "This week the British Library launches New Strategic Directions, which outlines our plans for the next five to seven years. The responses of staff, readers, customers, visitors and all those who use library services in the UK will be sampled to give us an insight into the balance of opinion among our user and stakeholder groups. There is a survey at the Library's website www.bl.uk, which we hope that our users (and potential users) will complete. All respondents will be entered in a draw to win �20 Amazon vouchers to spend on books and music." "The consultation survey is being widely promoted into all UK libraries by mail-shots, posters, information leaflets and e-mails to users. There will be a PC dedicated to the web survey in the Front Hall of our London building and PCs for access in the Reading Room at Boston Spa in Yorkshire." "One of the Library's core values is that access to knowledge and information empowers and enriches people. From that belief comes the Library's vision of 'making accessible the world's intellectual, scientific and cultural heritage. The collections of the BL and other great collections will be accessible on everyone's virtual bookshelf- at work, at school, at college, at home.'" "In order to realise the vision, the Library will concentrate on understanding the changing needs of users, creating opportunities to work in partnership with other libraries, and bringing the Web centre stage in our activities." Access strategy: making the collections more accessible to a wider audience, reshaping services where there are alternative sources of supply, and contributing to making library provision more effective in the UK." "The text of New Strategic Directions and the survey are available on the Library's website www.bl.uk. Users and stakeholders without their own PC can use one of the Open Access PCs in the Library's main buildings to complete the survey. If you would prefer print copies of either document, please email <survey@bl.uk>. "If you have further questions about New Strategic Directions, please e-mail <ann.clarke@bl.uk> or <jonathan.purday@bl.uk>. " The British Library, 2 July 2001: "The British Library has appointed its first e-Director as part of a wider restructuring of its top tier of management." "The appointment of Dr Herbert Van de Sompel as Director of e-Strategy and Programmes was announced today and he will join the Library on 1 September 2001 completing the BL's new streamlined senior management team." "Charged with extending access to resources, both for customers and members of the public, the team will implement strategy across a broad range of activities of the UK's national library. The post of e-Director in particular will be central in taking forward the British Library's vision of a digital future for its collections and services." "'Our e-Strategy will be at the core of the Library's work and will underpin many of our priority developments,' said the British Library's Chief Executive, Lynne Brindley. 'As Director of e-Strategy and programmes, Herbert will be the driving force behind the development of the British Library's e-strategy, pushing forward the role of electronic media and services in providing public access, opening up collections, creating productive partnerships with the library and scholarly network and developing new enterprises.'" "Lynne Brindley continued, 'Herbert Van de Sompel brings an international reputation in the digital library field, a deep understanding of what is technically possible, combined with a real sense of service mission. With his European and North American links he will ensure that the British Library plays a leading role internationally in creating our digital future.'" "Dr Van de Sompel joins the Library having spent the past year as Visiting Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University. For 17 years he was head of the library automation department at the University of Ghent, Belgium where he led an ambitious programme to create an outstanding electronic library and planned and implemented a range of innovative services." "More recently he worked at the renowned Research Library at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, on a PhD focusing on open reference linking (OpenURL and SFX) and the Open Archives Initiative. The Ph.D. was awarded in Spring 2000, following examination by two key figures in digital library developments: William Y. Arms (Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University) and Clifford Lynch (Director of the Coalition for Networked Information, USA)." "Dr Van de Sompel's work has received much recognition in both the digital library community and in the academic world. He has also acted as a consultant to many key information industry companies on strategy and on the conceptualisation or evaluation of new digital services." "As e-Director he will lead the BL's transformation to an e-centric organisation, pulling together historically discrete and disparate programmes, acting as champion and advocate for e-strategy and leading an integrated Digital Library development programme. Major transformational developments to be supervised and driven forward by the e-Director include the digitisation of many of the Library's collections as well as the archiving of materials that are 'born digital'. Working in close collaboration with the rest of the executive team, Dr Van de Sompel will ensure the implementation of a fully integrated e-programme across all Directorates � adding the essential e-ingredient to the British Library's strategies for progress." "Commenting on his appointment, Dr Van de Sompel said: 'Research libraries around the world are trying to define their identity in the digital domain. With its recently released New Strategic Directions document, the British Library has made a clear statement regarding the e-position it wants to be in; I am very excited about being able to play a role in the genuinely challenging process of getting there. Currently, www.bl.uk welcomes users to the website of the British Library. A few years from now, the same URL should welcome them to the whole British Library.'" "Offering Dr Van de Sompel warm congratulations on his appointment, Lynne Brindley added, 'This new role represents a more coherent and strategic approach towards the various strands of activity that comprise the British Library's programme of digitisation. It will also lead the way in the development of the Library's wider e-strategy. The e-Director will oversee the transformational changes to the Library's culture and working practices that are necessary in order for us to fully embrace the digital and wider e- revolution � adapting our collections and services to remain at the leading edge of research and reference worldwide.'" "For further information, please contact Ben Sanderson at the British Library Press Office on 01937 546126, or email <ben.sanderson@bl.ukp>." "DUBLIN, Ohio, June 19, 2001--The OCLC Users Council unanimously ratified changes to the OCLC Articles of Incorporation and Code of Regulations recommended by the OCLC Board of Trustees following a year-long study of strategic directions and governance." "Under new bylaws adopted May 21, Users Council changed its name to Members Council and added six new delegates from outside the United States to better define its role in strategic planning and extend global representation." "Action came May 20-22 during the third and final meeting of the 2000/01 Users Council with the dual themes of 'The Library as a Virtual Place' and 'OCLC Strategic Directions and Governance Study.'" "The OCLC Board of Trustees retained the Arthur D. Little consulting firm in January 2000 to conduct an independent study of OCLC's strategic directions and related issues of governance. An advisory council of distinguished librarians and other leaders in the information professions and academe interacted with the consultant and prepared recommendations. The Users Council spent a great deal of time during its 2000/01 meetings discussing these issues before the May vote." "In addition to changing its name, council bylaws were amended to read that the 'Members Council shall advise the Board of Trustees and OCLC management of emerging, critical issues that require OCLC tracking, planning, or other responses so that OCLC's own strategic planning is informed by this input.'" "Council voted to add delegates from the Netherlands, Japan, South Africa, France, Mexico and China to serve for the next three years while a group of representatives from council, the Board of Trustees, regional networks and service centers continue work on a new algorithm to help define new standards for membership and council representation..." For the full press release, see <http://www.oclc.org/oclc/press/20010615a.shtm>. "June 16, 2001 - Inwood, WV. TLC/CARL � a leader in library automation and personalized web portal services announced today that the company�s state-of-the-art interlibrary loan toolkit has been selected by Ex Libris." "The TLC software, named Library�Connect, is a middleware solution that powers ILL management functions. The product allows developers to build ISO standard ILL applications on heterogeneous platforms with hardware, operating system, network and protocol level independence. Library�Connect enables the fast and efficient development and deployment of ILL management, document delivery and resource sharing applications." "The Ex Libris group is a leading worldwide supplier of software solutions and related services for libraries and information centers. The company is known for using advanced technologies and innovative programming techniques to create a system that accommodates any language, script and directionality. Ex Libris� approach is flexible, scalable and based on open standards -- making it extensible to other systems." "Users of TLC�s ILL toolkit range from major libraries to other automation vendors, notably The National Library of Medicine, The National Library of Canada, CISTI, and Mankato State University (MNSUC-PALS), and automation vendors Pigasus and RLG." For the full press release, see <http://www.exlibris-usa.com/news1.asp?categoryId=118&admin>. "June 16, 2001 - Los Angeles, CA: Infotrieve, a global leader in commercial document delivery, today announced an arrangement with Ex Libris Inc. to provide access to Infotrieve's document delivery services through links from Ex Libris' SFX context-sensitive linking software. As Infotrieve's newest Platinum-level service partner, SFX users can request articles directly from Infotrieve's pay-per-view, complete-text delivery service." "SFX permits context-sensitive linking within a library's entire electronic collection, providing seamless integration of heterogeneous resources for management by the librarian. The librarian defines the conceptual relationships between different information resources to enable users to fully exploit the collection and link to appropriate services, such as Infotrieve." "Templates for creating links between SFX and Infotrieve are included with the SFX server software, making it easy for librarians to offer Infotrieve document delivery services across a wide range of the library's resources. These Infotrieve links can be selectively provided when an article is not available from the library's collection, for delivery either in electronic or print formats." For the full press release, see <http://www.exlibris-usa.com/news1.asp?categoryId=115&admin>.
2019-04-25T04:56:37Z
http://www.dlib.org/dlib/july01/07inbrief.html
Radio NZ ran a story last week with the startling admission that funding for two Whangarei based charter schools was about to fall as they converted into Designated Character State schools from 2019. The revelation will not be a surprise to opponents of the charter school initiative, as it has been clear from the outset that the original funding model was based on bold assumptions that have simply not come to pass. Unfortunately the piece did not clarify how much the funding was expected to fall by when they convert. He Puna Marama, as Sponsor of the two charter schools, will receive nearly $4 million this year for the two schools: $3,074,521 for the secondary school and $883,073 for the primary school. These figures are published on the Ministry of Education website and are based on the projected opening rolls. Actual quarterly payments could vary depending on the student rolls as the year progresses. Under the contracting out theory of the charter school initiative, the Sponsor may deal with the funding it receives in whatever way it feels is appropriate. So they can hire more teachers, more support staff, mentors etc. if they wish. Charter school supporters claim this bulk funding approach is one of the main features of the initiative. But the real issue has always been the quantum of funding they are receiving and not just how it is delivered. Charter school supporters have hidden behind the narrative that the Ministry tried to make the original charter school funding model produce a level of funding that was “broadly comparable” to that of a “similar” State school. But this modelling approach was flawed from the outset. First, making comparisons with State school funding is problematic, as State schools have many different sources of funding. The modelling had to try and reduce all of these to a simple approach that could be written into a commercial contract. Second, State schools’ property is provided by the Crown but charter schools need to rent (or buy) their premises. So how this component was cashed up has caused problems from the outset, especially if the charter school did not reach the maximum roll on which the property funding was based, or took a long to get there. Third, it also ignored the reality that the choices parents make are “local” and not “comparable”. So the problems with the original funding policy mean that the early charter schools have enjoyed far more funding than the local schools they were set up to compete against. Save Our Schools NZ analysed the 2015 financial statements of South Auckland Middle School and compared these to Manurewa Intermediate. What we saw was that SAMS received funding per student of $11,740 after paying the cost of the premises it rented from the Elim Church. In contrast, Manurewa Intermediate received $5,907 in Teachers Salaries and Operations Grants funding per student, with its premises provided by the Crown. This means the charter schools have been able to offer advantages such as hiring more teachers, which reduces class sizes, hiring more support staff, such as mentors and community liaison staff, or offering support to parents by way of free uniforms, free stationery and so on. The National government changed the charter school funding model in 2015 but the revised model applies only to charter schools which commenced operations in 2017 and 2018. The government is therefore locked in by contract to the original funding model for the early schools. Ensuring that the property funding flow is aligned with the current enrolment”. The impact of the change in funding model is clear when we look at the funding for the closed First Round school, Whangaruru, in 2015 (its second year of operation) compared to that for the new Third Round school, Te Aratika, in 2017. In 2015, Whangaruru received operational funding of $412,148 per quarter, or $41,215 per student p.a. based on 40 students. In the 4th quarter of 2017, Te Aratika received quarterly operational funding of$126,580, or $15,343 per student p.a. based on 33 students. So two “similar” schools – in this case small secondary schools – have received vastly different amounts of funding per student under the two funding models. The initial policy mistake of fully funding the cost of creating and operating small schools has meant the charter school initiative has cost the government more. This is why Bill English and Hekia Parata changed the funding model – over 3 years ago! Whether this additional cost has paid off is arguable, as the formal evaluation failed to draw any meaningful conclusions as to the impact of the initiative. But either way, one could just as easily assert that the Government should be prepared to invest more and help all students who need more support, not just those in an ideologically motivated experiment. National’s support for reinstating the American charter school model shows not only that the privatisation bias that Bill English pursued over recent years is alive and well, but also that they are struggling to develop sound Education policy. As far back as the 2008 general election, National committed to “increasing educational choices”. But everyone knows that the phrase “School Choice” was first coined by economist Milton Friedman and is the code used to drive the privatisation movement in the USA. The pure form of the privatised market model is vouchers, but in practice the charter school model has been adopted as the most practical privatisation route in most States. The irony is that there is a wide variety of choice already available in the New Zealand public education system. One leading American commentator, writing in the Washington Post, made the remark that “…the most aggressive school choice system in the world is probably New Zealand”. Surveys over many years by the NZ Council for Educational Research confirm that around 90% or more of New Zealand parents feel they send their child to the school of their choice. This high degree of satisfaction with choices available is underpinned by the variety of schooling options available, both within the State system and across the State-Integrated model. Every State and State-Integrated school is governed by a parent-elected Board of Trustees, under a charter, the defining document that sets out the school community’s Vision and Values. It is this inconvenient fact that requires “charter schools” to be called something different in New Zealand! The State system includes the set of schools operating as Kura Kaupapa, under s. 155, and the set of Designated Character schools under s. 156. These schools are complemented by over 330 State-Integrated schools, with religious character, such as Christian values or even Muslim values, as well as a variety of teaching philosophies, such as Montessori or Rudolf Steiner. Indeed, anyone who tries to claim that New Zealand has a “one-size-fits-all” public education system is either very poorly informed of the variety of options available or is being deliberately misleading. As a former Minister of Education, Nikki Kaye knows this only too well. So, we can conclude from this release that she has just nailed her colours to the mast of the privatisation movement. National hid behind the ACT Party first time around and needed the support of the Maori Party to get the initial charter model legislation through the House. The convenient marriage of the ideology of privatisation and the ideology of self-determination was therefore born. Given that the formal evaluation of the charter school model, carried out by Martin Jenkins, failed to draw any genuine conclusions as to the impact of the model to date, National is clutching at straws to claim that the model has already proven to be successful. And we know from the financial statements of the Sponsors that this has been a lucrative business for them to enter. Bill English rushed to change the funding model after only one year but the first and second round school Sponsors have scored well out of the policy and away from the watchful eye of the Auditor-General. No wonder they don’t want to let it go! Labour has launched several reviews across multiple fronts to try and get to grips with the challenges of reinvigorating the New Zealand public education system after 9 years of flawed policies, such as National Standards. It is early days yet but National’s knee-jerk reaction to bring back an American model that doesn’t even work there reveals how shallow National’s approach to developing Education policy is proving to be. The 3-part evaluation of charter schools has failed in key respects to deliver on what Banks promised. First, there is absolutely no attempt in the final report to evaluate the most important outcome, which is student achievement. So, if these schools had agreed objectives in their contracts from the outset, where is the rigorous analysis of how they have performed? And why would the Ministry of Education still be “defining and agreeing contracted outcomes” if the schools are in their 3rd or 4th year of operation? The real answer is simple: they have not performed as expected. The primary content of this expensive exercise was not a strong evaluation of impact and effectiveness but instead they turned to a weak gathering of “survey” data from students and whanau. But even this part was an embarrassment for charter school supporters. Five schools (out of eight) were included in the surveys of students, but the responses from three of them were so low that they were excluded. So, instead, they resorted to merely including the responses from the two Villa Education Trust middle schools as a “case study”. Wow! But the problems did not stop there. The comment about the attendance data was interesting, given David Seymour’s press release only last month that charter schools outperform state schools on attendance. There are numerous other problems and gaps with the MartinJenkins report and they can be discussed more fully in due course. Overall, it is clear that this exercise has simply not produced the thorough examination that was promised by John Banks, let alone enabling informed decisions before opening further such schools. It was clear from the outset that the charter school policy was driven solely by political ideology, and Mister of Education, Chris Hipkins, was right to dismiss the evaluation report as being of no real value to policy makers. Maybe the very poor survey response rates – even from those closely involved in these schools – send a clear message: it is time to move on. The charter school model is being closed down. The model. Not the actual schools currently operating as charter schools, necessarily. The charter schools currently running have opportunities to remain open, in that they will be able to negotiate to become state schools or special character schools. Some of the charter schools have got poor academic results. Some have not met their roll targets. Some are doing okay. Each school will be looked at individually. And if a charter school is doing okay, they surely can do the same job as a state school. will legally be schools as opposed to businesses and therefore open to exactly the same scrutiny as other state-funded schools, including the Official Information Act. Truly, if – as they assert – a charter school is doing a good job, has qualified teachers, can cope on the same funding as a state school, and has nothing to hide, why the fuss? Nikki Kaye calls for transparency on charter schools? Yeah Right! Nikki Kaye has taken the early lead in the “You must be joking” stakes with her ridiculous press release calling for transparency on charter schools. Nikki Kaye and her government played an active role in holding back information during her time in office. She is in danger of becoming the hypocrite of the year as she now calls for transparency. And, just for good measure, she is supposedly now worried about the cost to the taxpayer of dealing with the mess that she has left behind! • The charter school model does not have a proven track record as Ms Kaye claims. See our release on the poor School Leavers stats across the model as a whole, which shows charter schools underperforming the system-wide benchmarks used by the government. • In particular, the charter school sector results are below those of both Decile 3 schools and those for Māori students across the NZ school system. • Ms Kaye delayed the release of the second Martin Jenkins evaluation report from late 2016 until June 2017. Furthermore, the report could not discuss the true level of student achievement given the problems the Ministry of Education had uncovered in how the schools had incorrectly reported their School Leavers results. • Ms Kaye took until June 2017 to finally release her decisions on the performance-related funding for the 2015 school year. That’s right – it took 18 months to evaluate only 9 schools and then she fudged the decisions on 3 of those schools. • As for the new schools that were announced to open in 2018 and 2019, Nikki Kaye takes the cake with these. Not one single piece of official information on any of these 6 proposed schools has yet been released. When the Third Round schools were announced in August 2016, the supporting documentation, including the signed contracts, was released that afternoon. • The biggest concern we have is how much taxpayer money has already been paid to the Sponsors of the 6 proposed schools and is this recoverable? In the early rounds, the Sponsors received the one-off Establishment Payments within 20 days of signing their contracts. So, Nikki, how much taxpayer money have you wasted? Nikki Kaye has joined her colleague David Seymour in making misleading statements about charter schools. In a stuff.co.nz story, written by Jo Moir and published on Tuesday 7 November, she is quoted as saying that the six new charter schools were “publicly notified in February”, meaning the wheels had been in motion for many months for those schools. The public announcement of the two Fourth Round schools, due to open in February 2018, was made on Tuesday 11 July this year. The public announcement of the four Fifth Round schools, due to open in February 2019, was made on Thursday 7 September, only 16 days before the election. No documentation relating to either the Fourth or Fifth Round schools has yet been released. This is in contrast to the Third Round schools, when documentation such as the applications, evaluations and contracts was released publicly on the day of the announcement. Further scrutiny of the minutes of the Partnership Schools Authorisation Board confirm that at the meeting held on 11 April 2017, the Board agreed to delegate to the Chair and Deputy Chair the authority to make the final decisions on the outstanding due diligence matters for the Fourth Round applications. The Ministry of Education was to then confirm the communications plan ahead of the Round 4 contracts being signed. So, that implies that as at April, the final decisions had not even been made and the contracts had not yet been signed. But without any documentation, who knows? 22 June: Final recommendations meeting. According to that timetable, the Fifth Round recommendations were not even going to be finalised until late June! So, Nikki, where does the “publicly notified in February” comment come from? Not so, as least as far as the Wairakei community is concerned, where one of the Fourth Round schools is due to open next year. Two recent articles in stuff.co.nz have covered the anger and frustration that Wairakei residents have expressed about the proposed new school. In the second article, dated only 2 days before the election, Taupō Mayor David Trewavas called for a halt to plans for a partnership school at Wairakei Village, saying the complete lack of consultation is “unacceptable”. But the article also quoted David Seymour, who responded to a query from local MP Louise Upston, saying that while community consultation was not required to establish the school it was an “essential component” of a school’s preparation for opening. So, Mr Seymour, why do you now say that demonstrating community support for the school was required before the application was accepted? The appalling lack of transparency has been an unfortunate feature of the New Zealand charter school experiment from the outset. Save Our Schools NZ calls on the new government to instruct the Ministry of Education to release all documentation relating to the Fourth and Fifth Round applications with immediate effect. Only then can the false and misleading statements of opposition politicians be called out as they should be. This compares to a system-wide figure of 80.3% across all schools within the system in 2016. Looking more closely at specific groups, the system-level result for decile 3 schools was 74.3% and for Maori students, across all deciles, it was 66.5%. “There is to be no compromise on the system level benchmarks”. Worryingly, even this poor performance masks a weak set of results overall. The proportion of School Leavers attaining NCEA Level 3 or above was 23.4% compared to 53.9% for the system as a whole. UE attainment is low, with a mere 15 students, or only 12.1% of School Leavers, attaining University Entrance, compared to a system-wide figure of 40.7%. * Note: There were no contract performance standards set above NCEA Level 2. The contracts for primary and middle schools are based on performance standards using National Standards for years 1 to 8. 2. However, there are significant differences between vouchers, the pure market model usually promoted by ACT, and charter schools, which is privatisation by way of contracting with private sector providers. Treasury calls this “Contracting for Outcomes”. 7. This purely quantitative analysis is then subject to further criticisms of many aspects of US charter school practices, including: student selection, including the effect of “self-selection” amongst parents; the proportions of English language Learners and special needs students; student attrition; school discipline and behaviour management practices; the apparent lack of backfilling, i.e. the tendency to not replace students as they leave; and the drive for what is commonly called “test prep”, in contrast to a genuine focus on the quality of education. 12. The original funding model has already been changed, as it soon became clear how much operational funding these schools were receiving compared to their local state schools. Small schools are expensive and the government was fully funding the First and Second Round schools with no Sponsor capital input required. 14. The Third Round funding model now uses an approach more oriented to funding the student than funding the school, as the roll grows. But the government still provides the property and insurance funding for what is essentially a private sector organisation. 16. This promise has not been carried out. The roll-out of the model has proceeded well ahead of the release of any evaluation. At the time of writing, the Third Round schools have opened this year and applications are being processed for the Fourth and Fifth Rounds! 17. The first two reports from the Martin Jenkins Evaluation Programme are weak and do not rigorously examine school performance or the impact these schools have had. The Evaluation has also completely ignored the failure of the First Round school at Whangaruru. 18. Student achievement outcomes to date have been mixed but difficult to analyse thoroughly given the delays in the Ministry releasing accurate information. 19. By May 2017, the Minister has still not announced her decision on the release of the performance based funding for the 2015 school year! No operational reports for the entire 2016 year have yet been released, along with supporting documentation such as contract variations and Ministry advice to the Minister. 23. Some schools, including Vanguard and the two Villa middle schools, have failed to meet their Student Engagement contract standards relating to stand-downs, suspensions, exclusions and expulsions. This is of concern, given the US charter school practices noted above. 24. Charter schools are not more accountable than public schools, simply because they operate under a contract. Whangaruru was not closed for failure to achieve contract standards; it was dysfunctional from the start. 25. Public school accountability includes parent-elected Boards of Trustees, which must hold open meetings, maintain open records and be subject to the Official Information Act. Board finances are subject to audit under the supervision of the Auditor-General. 26. No such requirements apply to charter schools, which are organised under a commercial contract between the government and the private sector Sponsor. 27. Public funding must go hand in hand with public accountability. State and State-Integrated schools both abide by this principle but charter schools do not. The cover up of the true picture of student achievement in charter schools continued today with the belated release of the second Martin Jenkins Evaluation Report. The report, with a final publication date of 28 November 2016, was released on Friday 5 May 2017, a delay of over 5 months. However, even now, the report contains a massive caveat in the section discussing student achievement, which indicates there are still major problems behind the scenes. The ratings in the May 2016 advice were based on the best information available to the Ministry at that time (and are indicative of the reports that the Ministry had received from schools/kura by then). They reflect the most up-to-date information provided to the evaluation team at the time of writing this report, but are not the Ministry’s final assessments of schools’/kura performance for 2015. So, a formal policy evaluation signed off in November 2016, cannot go to print in May 2017 with a clear statement of exactly what represents the “Ministry’s final assessments of schools’/kura performance for 2015”? The same problem is holding back the Minister of Education’s decision on whether or not to release the retained operational funding that is performance related, in respect of the 2015 school year. And this is now May 2017! The major problem relates to the issue which surfaced last year, when the Ministry acknowledged that the interpretation of the secondary schools’ contract performance standards had been incorrect. As a consequence, the schools had also reported incorrectly against their contracts. These incorrect figures had been used to determine the Ministry’s ratings in its May 2016 advice, referred to in the footnote. While the Ministry has now acknowledged that these figures are incorrect, nothing further has since been released. The poor performance of the primary and middle schools is also evident in the Evaluation Report. Of the five primary and middle schools, which have contract targets set against National Standards, only one school, the Rise Up Academy, was assessed as having met its contract targets. And problems are also clearly evident in the assessment of performance against the Student Engagement standards. Vanguard Military School and Middle School West Auckland performed very poorly against the standards for Stand-downs, Suspensions, Exclusions and Expulsions. Overall, the main takeaway from the Evaluation Report is a fairly damning indictment of performance to date. But the continued cover up of the true picture should not be tolerated any longer. Where is the Charter School data? For a Minister so obsessed with data and, in particular, the sharing of data, it is interesting how little we know about charter schools. The game of delaying the release of a vast range of information on the charter schools continues. The Ministry has promised to release a lot of material, including the formal evaluation of 2015 student achievement, in “April” but has refused to state exactly when. They also need to release all of the 2016 quarterly reports, the 2016 contract variations and the second “annual” installment of the Martin Jenkins evaluation of the charter school initative. In short, lots of information is being withheld for no apparent reason. When it is finally released, we will go through it and post our thoughts on what it reveals. In the meantime, propaganda and marketing material fills the void. This is the second in a series of postings following up an op-ed written by Don Brash published in the NZ Herald. Our first response discussed what motives might lay behind what we feel is a concerted PR push by Villa Education Trust, the Sponsor of South Auckland Middle School. In this piece we will look at the statement made in the op-ed about funding, as this remains one of the real sticking points about the early charter schools. Ah yes, critics argue, but partnership schools get a lot more money from the taxpayer than other schools do. Absolute nonsense. Sorry, Dr Brash, but charter schools do get more OPERATIONAL FUNDING than the local schools get. Especially when their funding is compared to the larger schools in South Auckland, where SAMS is located. In a nutshell, SAMS received total operational funding of approx. $12,800 per student in 2015 compared to Manurewa Intermediate (the intermediate school used in the article) which received approx. $5,600 per student. To understand how this large discrepancy arises, we need to look at the original charter school funding model. The single biggest policy mistake it made was to try and work out the equivalent funding that a stand alone State school of the same size and type might receive. But, in practice, the charter schools are being created in places like South Auckland where there are larger, more established schools that receive much lower average per student funding. This means that the larger schools could not possibly recreate the conditions such as class sizes of 15 that the smaller charter schools can. One recent story on Radio NZ described the pressure on some South Auckland schools that saw many of them using their libraries and halls as teaching spaces. One school had plans to start teaching next year in the staffroom! So, is it any wonder that when given the option of class sizes of 15, free uniforms and free stationery, that parents may be choosing the charter school? Let’s look briefly at the original charter school funding model, noting that this model has already been changed for the third round schools that have just been announced. The original model had two essentially fixed components per school: Base Funding and Property & Insurance. The property component is fixed for the first 3 years (unless the school changes size or teaching year levels) and the base funding component varies by type of school (secondary, middle or primary) and is indexed each year. Variable Funding comes in two parts: a Per Student Grant and Centrally Funded Services. The two variable components are then multiplied by the number of students on the roll or the Guaranteed Minimum Roll (“GMR”) whichever is the greater. So, if the actual school roll is less than the GMR, the Sponsor gets paid for at least the GMR number of students. In 2015, SAMS operated at its Maximum Roll, which was originally 120 students. So, putting all the components together the SAMS financial statements show revenue from Government Grants of $1,536,016, or an average government funding figure of approx. $12,800 per student, in 2015. So let’s walk through the SAMS financial statements for 2015 and see what Villa does with its $1.5 million of funding. First, it pays the rent, which is $150,000 per annum. If we are generous, and include all Property expenses, including utilities, we find these amounted to $194,776 in the 2015 financial statements. This would then leave a total of $1,341,240, or $11,177 per student after we have acquired and maintained the school premises. What do we do next? We would look to hire the teachers necessary to deliver on the 1:15 class size ratio. For a school of 120 students, we would need 8 teachers, at a round number cost of $75,000 per annum each. That should cost us approx. $600,000 and we find that teacher salaries in the 2015 SAMS accounts came out at pretty much that amount: $584,883. Add in the other curriculum related costs, such as classroom resources – including those free school uniforms and stationery – and total Learning Resources amounted to $869,846. That leaves us with $471,394 to pay for the administration of a 120 student school. Plenty of money to pay for a full-time Community Liaison Manager – nice if you can afford it – pay for all the office and other admin costs and allow for depreciation and you spend a total of $263,906. And what does that leave room for? That’s right: the Management Fee payable to the Sponsor of $140,000. That’s the cost of hiring a full-time principal at a much larger school! For comparison, let’s see how Manurewa Intermediate is getting on. The Find A School application on the Education Counts website has summary financial information for State and State-Integrated schools. In 2015 Find A School showed Manurewa Intermediate’s Staffing Entitlement figure was $2,510,958 and its Operations Grant figure was shown as $1,431,808. So, let’s cash this all up and make an OPERATIONAL FUNDING total of $3,942,766. But straight away we have a problem. Manurewa Intermediate has 704 students. So we start our comparison with average per student government funding of only $5,600 per student. Its property is owned by the Crown, so it doesn’t pay rent in cash. So we can skip straight to the teacher costs. To engineer class sizes of 15, we would need to buy 47 teachers. At a cost of $75,000 each we would need $3,525,000. That would leave us with only $417,766 or $593 per student to pay for everything else necessary to run a school of 704 students which is nearly 6 times the size of SAMS! Out of that amount, we would need to pay for all classroom and curriculum resources, all the non-teaching staff, all the administration costs, the utilities and property maintenance costs and the depreciation to cover the replacement of all the furniture, equipment and ICT resources. Hopefully you can see from this comparison that it would be virtually impossible for Manurewa Intermediate to have class sizes of 15 with the level of government operational funding it receives. You could also arrive at the same conclusion with a simple rule of thumb calculation. Based on a teacher cost of $75,000, in a class size of 15 each student needs to contribute $5,000 to pay for their teacher. SAMS had $11,177 after paying for the premises; Manurewa Intermediate started with $5,600. In summary, what readers interested in understanding charter schools funding need to appreciate is the significant influence of the fixed cost components of their funding model. Even at its initial maximum roll of 120, the fixed components of SAMS’ funding comprise 57% of its total funding: base funding was $578,021 and the property component was $303,681. That is why the charter schools are proving to be more expensive than their local counterparts: they are small schools with high fixed cost funding. But they are being compared to larger, longer established schools where the fixed costs are spread over a much greater number of students. This is what economists call economies of scale. It is a major reason why direct comparisons between schools with significantly different funding streams should be treated with real caution. Research shows that the effects of smaller class sizes are positive and of real help, especially when dealing with students who need more intensive support. Smaller class sizes are an expensive policy to engineer; but wouldn’t it be great to see class sizes of 15 in all our low decile schools, not just those favoured by the flawed charter school funding model. The Education Ministry reported that some of last year’s new charter schools are not doing so well, but says there are good reasons for this. The reasons given include students arriving at school far behind age-appropriate levels, student transience, the high rate of referrals from Child Youth and Family and the Police and referrals of difficult students from other schools. Indeed, those are valid reasons for any school struggling to help students. What I would like the Education Minister and the Undersecretary for Education to explain is how these factors are considered sound reasons for charter schools to struggle to help students and yet are considered excuses for public schools. The two charter schools operated by Villa Education Trust have achieved only 3 of their 12 student achievement targets for the 2015 year, according to analysis by Save Our Schools NZ. According to the 2015 annual reports to the public released by the two schools, South Auckland Middle School achieved 2 of their 6 targets and Middle School West Auckland achieved only 1 of their 6 targets. Detailed results are set out below. Held to Account for Performance? Charter schools are supposedly going to be held to account for their performance against clearly specified performance standards set out in their contracts, including student achievement and student engagement. In its first year of operation, South Auckland Middle School failed to meet its student engagement performance standard when it missed the required standard for stand downs, suspensions and exclusions. But the Minister of Education still approved the release of the 1% performance retention funding retained under the contract, even though the contract wording required the school to reach all of its performance standards before such a payment could be made. The clear underperformance in 2015 of both schools in the most important contract area, which is student achievement, should make the Minister’s decision this year clear cut. But as charter schools are ultimately a political initiative anything can happen!
2019-04-25T18:28:58Z
https://saveourschoolsnz.com/tag/partnership-schools-2/
– in Westminster Hall at 9:30 am on 10th April 2019. has considered pension transfers and the British Steel pension scheme. For many of us, pensions are a distant, complex and opaque topic. Everyone hopes that their pension will provide financial security for their family’s future. It is often the single biggest pot of money that anyone will have, but that makes pension pots ideal targets for mis-selling. Unfortunately, in recent years pensions mis-selling has got worse. Since further pension freedoms were brought in four years ago, it is easier to transfer out of defined-benefit pension schemes. More than 200,000 people have done that, but as transfers have increased, so have the problems. The compensation paid out for poor transfer advice increased to £40 million last year. I called for this debate because of a specific mis-selling crisis that affected hundreds and potentially thousands of people across south Wales in particular. Two years ago, the British Steel pension scheme began to restructure its fund after a difficult period for the industry. Scheme members had a hard deadline to make a critical decision: they could go into a new scheme, be defaulted into a lifeboat fund or transfer out. They had to decide against a backdrop of serious uncertainty about the scheme and the industry. The scheme’s administrators were under enormous pressure, with 4,000 calls a day. Vital information about pension advisers from the Financial Conduct Authority was often highly technical. All that helped to create a perfect storm. I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate and commend the work that he is doing in this area. He has mentioned the Financial Conduct Authority. Does he agree that one issue here is regulation and that too often those who suffer a loss are pushed in the direction of a civil remedy when actually we need stronger enforcement and tougher criminal sanctions? I agree. I think that the FCA has the right teeth but is not using them and that the police need to intervene much earlier. I, too, congratulate the hon. Gentleman on initiating the debate. I do not have any people with steel pensions in my constituency, but I am here to support the hon. Gentleman and to do so on the record. He mentioned that 4,000-plus people a week were trying to get details and advice on how to move forward. Is not the onus on the FCA and, ultimately, the Government to ensure that the necessary advice is there and available? The volume of contacts being made clearly indicates that the system is unable to respond in the way it should. The advice is there. The difficulty is that for many people it is too technical and complicated; working through it is really very hard. Transfers were talked up, and pension sharks soon began circling around the key steelworking sites across south Wales and the rest of the UK. They were often facilitated by unregulated introducers, through word of mouth. For example, constituents of mine were approached by a rogue financial adviser at their caravan while they were on a family holiday. Wider possibilities were common currency: a place in the sun, a conservatory and a deposit for a son’s or daughter’s new home were all said to be within reach. The pension changes meant that it was easier to transfer from a stable fund into investments that were far riskier, on the promise of better returns. Unfortunately, it meant that a safe bet could turn into a bad bet, and a high fee was often part of the deal too. It was the case that 7,800 steelworkers transferred out altogether, of whom 872 had transfers arranged by firms that were eventually ordered—ordered—to stop advising by the FCA. One steelworker lost £200,000. Many others lost tens of thousands of pounds. Many suffered incredible stress and anxiety. I heard yesterday that £1.8 million has been paid out in compensation to steelworkers so far. I emphasise the words “so far”. Because that might not grasp the full scale of the issue, the FCA has now reviewed the files of 2% of the nearly 8,000 steelworkers who transferred out. It found that 58% of the advice was not suitable, which means that the tally of those who lost out could run to several thousands. To deal with that possibility, the FCA now needs to set out a clear programme of how it will identify the steelworkers affected, how it will let them know and what practical support it will provide to help to get them through this process. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for securing this debate and leading on this issue, as he has now for several years. On how the FCA now informs steelworkers, does he agree that part of the problem is that lots of steelworkers will simply not know that this has happened and will not understand that they have received bad advice? Given that these are complicated issues, as he has mentioned, that means that they will often just ignore the issue in the hope that it will somehow resolve itself. This could be yet another pension scandal waiting to happen, purely because people do not wish to face up to the realities of what is happening. My hon. Friend makes a really good point. The FCA is a large organisation based in London. I believe it does not have sufficient resources to help consumers on the ground in places such as Port Talbot or Shotton, or across the country, where pensioners need support at their homes. The concerns that my hon. Friend has raised are valid in north Wales among steelworkers who used to work at the Shotton plant, many of whom live in my constituency. A cursory look at the FCA website reveals that there are 17 firms that the FCA is currently examining. I did not know that until I looked at the site in preparation for this debate. How are steelworkers supposed to know who those 17 firms are? My right hon. Friend gets to the nub of the situation. Who does one trust when one has a pot of gold and people want access to it? He poses a really important question. The FCA has got to help our steelworker pensioners and their families. It can be argued that this was a unique situation, but many of the underlying problems that allowed it to happen are still there. Rogue financial advisers do not face sufficiently tough consequences from the regulators. The FCA’s register has been improved, but consumer information sometimes remains unclear. The support for people who might have been mis-sold pensions is insufficient. I recognise that some steps have been taken to improve co-ordination between regulators. That is welcome, but much more needs to be done. At the moment, the pension sharks have generally received administrative sanctions only, but I think they need to face serious penalties. Will the Minister scrutinise the effectiveness of the FCA’s enforcement regime? Steelworkers say the FCA needs to impose heavy financial penalties on bad financial advisers. I think it needs to employ its powers much more often, as it seems this has not been done sufficiently. I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate and pay tribute to him for his work for our constituents in this important area. At our recent meeting with the FCA, the issue of mandatory insurance wording came up. Those unscrupulous financial advisers are not taking out proper insurance—when they go bust, there is no source of compensation for the steelworkers who have been ripped off. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Minister needs to take urgent action to improve the regulatory framework, not least in the area of mandatory insurance wording? My hon. Friend makes an important point. Given reports that the FCA is investigating so-called introducers in connection with a major scam, the Government should now ensure that they, too, are regulated. The Treasury has to take action to ensure that financial advisers always have—this comes to my hon. Friend’s point—sufficient insurance to pay out, should they go into administration. Will the Minister ensure that the FCA updates the Treasury on how it is supporting the potentially several thousand steelworkers who might have received poor transfer advice in this instance? The Treasury needs to co-ordinate with the Department of Work and Pensions and other key bodies in order to help victims of mis-selling to access the support they need. Although BSPS members have been supported by a strong team in Port Talbot, including a financial adviser and a lawyer, there needs to be a single initiative, aimed specifically at people who may have been mis-sold in cases such as BSPS. I am very grateful to my good friend for giving way and congratulate him on securing the debate and on the powerful case that he is making. In the consultation on the changes, concerns were raised that the burden could fall too heavily on scheme members, and we worry that that is the case. Our mining and steel communities built this nation. Does my hon. Friend agree that they should be looked after in retirement? My hon. Friend is a champion for miners’ pensions, on which she has done some great work, and I think she is absolutely right. I press the Minister on the Treasury’s response to recommendations that others have made about the crisis. The Rookes review suggested that the FCA needs to look at how it handles advisers who have had regulatory issues in the past. Phoenixing, as it is called, has allowed some advisers to reinvent themselves to sell anew. There must be greater scrutiny to stop rogues re-emerging in the marketplace. The review also suggested that the FCA work with the Treasury and the DWP to use digital channels to help to communicate important information to pensioners and to help them. Finally, the review suggested that the Pensions Regulator work with BSPS, trustees and trade unions—Community and Unite have been particularly good in south Wales—to select a panel of reliable financial advisers that members can use. Those advisers must be able to deal with the scale of the problem with BSPS and with the insurance needed. Can the Minister explain how the Department is progressing those recommendations and when we can expect the changes to be fully implemented? In his valedictory speech, Mark Neale, the outgoing chief executive of the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, strongly advocated increasing the compensation limit in cases of poor transfer advice. They were powerful remarks, so let us listen to him. I ask the Treasury to actively support that proposal and to investigate how many people are currently suffering uncompensated financial losses because of poor advice. We need justice for steelworkers who are ripped off. If the FCA will not do that, local police forces in south Wales need to pursue what appear to be complicated cases of fraud. The crimes are committed locally; the losses are clear and often substantial; and those responsible are identifiable. I call on the police forces across south Wales to open files and thoroughly investigate whether those cases amount to fraud. Criminal investigations have to start. If they do not, I call on the forces to state publicly why not. The financial and emotional toll that this crisis has taken on my constituents and many others has been heavy. They worked hard for decades to earn their pensions, and they expected a secure pot to provide for them and their families. That was put at risk because of the wrongdoing of a few bad actors and a weak response from the regulators. Steelworkers and their families have been let down. The Government and the FCA must improve their act and support those people better. The rogues who ripped off steelworkers and their families must be held to account. If the regulators cannot do that, the police need to step in. We need to make sure that good people see their hard-earned money better protected in future. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth. I pay tribute once again to my hon. Friend Nick Smith for securing the debate and for all the work that he does. He and I have worked on the transfer of steelworker pensions out of BSPS since 2017, which was when all Tata Steel workers were forced to decide whether to move into the BSPS 2 or transfer out into another pension scheme. Given that trust between employees and employer at that point was fragile to say the least, it is not too surprising—completely understandable, in fact—that about 8,000 of the steelworkers decided against joining the BSPS 2. Little did they know that the vultures were circling. The behaviour of the unscrupulous financial advisers who ripped off these men and their families was completely inexcusable. The sheer size of the pension transfer exercise, the high level of publicity that the transfer received, and the workers’ deep-seated mistrust of the employer at that time, the trustees and Tata made for fertile territory for the parasites. The trade unions, steel MPs and the BSPS trustees all called on the Government to introduce a system of deemed consent regarding the transfer of BSPS 2. I was one of those MPs; I sent a letter to the then Pensions Minister, Mr Gauke. However, we were ignored and those hard-working, honest men were targeted, despite the fact that in only a very small number of cases was transferring out their best option. These unscrupulous advisers are not stupid; they have behaved in a manner that is cunning, morally bankrupt and in many cases criminal. These events have had a dreadful effect on steelworkers in my constituency and their families. One man transferred £560,000 out on the strength of a 40-minute phone call with an “adviser”, who convinced him that it was what everyone was doing —40 years of service reduced to 40 minutes on the telephone. He believes that he was charged £11,000 to transfer out and for a 40-minute consultation. A man’s entire life plan was ruined by one phone call. Another was advised by one of the local advisers to transfer £348,858 out. He is now paying in excess of £3,500 a year in various costs and charges, as well as exposing himself to the risk of shortfall and dying after his pension pot runs out. That adviser played on the fear that BSPS was going to go into administration. They did not present my constituent with the facts or evidence, but approached the situation from the starting point that he wanted to transfer out, and facilitated that transfer without checking that it was in his best interest to do so. Who were those unscrupulous financial advisers? The main culprits have been Active Wealth (UK) Ltd and a man named Darren Reynolds, who account for all but a couple of the 77 cases that have so far been taken up with the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. The FSCS has so far paid out £1.8 million to 61 of the 77 claimants, 16 of whom exceeded the £50,000 compensation limit—a limit that has since risen to £85,000. For those who have not been granted compensation, it is purely because they have not suffered a loss, not because they were not badly advised. I think I am right in saying that every single claimant was judged to have been badly advised. It has been clear for some time that Active Wealth was just the tip of the iceberg. Several other advisers have been acting inappropriately; one did a lot of work in concert with a financial adviser who did not have the required permissions. The transfers were going through in about one hour, and some steelworkers never even met with an adviser. In another part of the country, in west Wales, an adviser had the required permissions, but by the end of 2017 had had their permissions to do pensions transfers revoked. Scores of steelworkers were days away from the transfer cut-off when that adviser circled in. Other advisers saw the writing on the wall and went into voluntary liquidation a few months ago. Those two advisers took their clients with them, literally next door. Other sales tactics were entirely risible. In one case, steelworkers were turning up at an adviser’s office over the weekend because he had told them that on Monday the pension company would be stopping distribution in the UK. He was literally telling them to hurry up and buy; he spent 30 minutes talking to each steelworker about their pension. It is notable that those financial advisers are finding it easier to simply lock up shop, close their business down and walk away than to face up to what they have done. That, in effect, then limits the redress that steelworkers can receive to £50,000—now up to £85,000—under the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, and from £150,000 under the Financial Ombudsman Service. In effect, we have a deep structural problem in the system, with financial advisers able simply to lock up shop and walk away, rather than give redress to the people they have ripped off. That is a fundamental question for the regulator. These men were let down not just by rogue financial advisers, but by the authorities: the regulator, namely the Financial Conduct Authority, and the Government. The FCA was far too slow to see the obvious risks and act to protect steelworkers from these vultures. It knew from its investigation in 2017 that more than half of the transfer advice being given was not up to its own standards, but even that, apparently, did not raise any alarm bells or red flags. Most shockingly, certain financial advisers who were under investigation still appeared on the FCA website. The fact that that information was unavailable to the steelworkers feels utterly unjust. The focus now is to raise awareness among steelworkers who have not spoken up but are due compensation, and to ask them to come forward and seek advice. Something that we have all observed is the role of shame in that. Many steelworkers are deeply embarrassed and ashamed that they have been ripped off. They have found it extremely difficult to share that difficult information with their families and spouses—one of the reasons that more men have not come forward. I recognise that this is an emotionally sensitive matter for those involved, who may be reluctant to overturn the rock and look at what they might find underneath. However, it is right that we do everything that we can to get justice for these men. Investment companies and self-invested personal pension providers must no longer be able to look the other way and adopt a “see no evil, ask no questions, tell no lies” approach as long as the money continues to roll in. That approach is morally bankrupt. Since the end of 2017, I have been working with my hon. Friends the Members for Blaenau Gwent and for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi), lawyers and independent financial advisers in order to bang the drum and get these steelworkers the justice that they deserve. In November, 18 steelworkers came to Westminster to meet the regulators and the FSCS. We were pleased that the FSCS was able to revisit some of those adviser charges. We have also had very welcome promises from the FCA to run seminars in Port Talbot. Tata has also shown a willingness to facilitate meetings with the men—all in the cause of raising awareness. That means that we can at least be optimistic that getting these men some of the justice that they deserve may be possible. Looking forward, our main focus must be, first, to continue to raise awareness among the steelworkers who may be affected. All firms that gave advice to transfer should verifiably send out a letter written by the FCA, strongly advising them to get the advice looked at and reminding them that they may be entitled to a form of financial top-up if they come forward. We will keep pressing the FSCS and FCA to offer the level of compensation package that the men who have come forward deserve and are due. We will also focus relentlessly on ensuring that unscrupulous advisers are exposed for what they are, and that every bit of insurance that they owe is claimed. Secondly, we must do all we can to achieve legislative change. We need to ensure that individuals are automatically enrolled in new schemes, not left to be picked off mercilessly by rogue financial advisers in an environment that is characterised by uncertainty. Thirdly, we need to ensure that regulators do their jobs. Why the advisers that I mentioned were allowed to remain on the FCA website while under investigation seriously needs looking into. Finally, it is worth noting that this issue does not affect steelworkers alone, and that pension mis-selling pay-outs in 2018 hit a whopping £40 million—double the figure for 2017. This is a national issue across many sectors, and it is up to the FCA and the Government to stand up and stick by workers and pensioners who have been wrongly advised, and do all they can to improve regulation and legislation for future generations. I look forward to working with those in this room on all of those challenges, and I thank hon. Members for their attention. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth. I congratulate Nick Smith on securing this important debate. I should also declare that I have a steel plant in my own constituency, although it is not as badly affected as those in Port Talbot. About 40,000 members of the British Steel pension scheme, the Tata Steel retirement fund, had the choice to trade their guaranteed pensions for a cash lump sum and transfer to a riskier plan as the scheme was restructured. To date, there have been about 8,000 transfers worth about £2.8 billion. Last year, as transfers from the British Steel scheme ramped up, the Financial Conduct Authority intervened to halt the activities of advice firms because of concerns that dubious advisers, incentivised by commissions and high fees, were descending on steel towns, especially Port Talbot in Wales, and enticing BSPS members to transfer their pensions. It is clear that there was widespread mis-selling to members of the BSPS. The FCA found from a sample of those members that nearly half had been given unsuitable advice or advice that was unclear. In its findings, the review into those pensions transfers recommended that pension scheme trustees should compile a list of recommended advisers for pensions transfers. Indeed, it seems strange that that is not already the case. I know that unions such as Community and Unite have done their best, but it is a complicated set of circumstances in which people have been shamelessly robbed of their pension funds. It is right that scheme members should not be left out in the wilderness when it comes to advice on what to do with their retirement savings. There must be more clarity for scheme members, so that they are not lured in by dodgy and self-interested firms, as illustrated by Stephen Kinnock. The Scottish National party is keen to support steel communities across Scotland. First and foremost, workers must be put at the heart of solutions to put pension funds on a sustainable footing. The SNP Scottish Government took urgent action to ensure that steel plants were attractive to potential investors, to save workers from losing out. An investment of almost £200,000 was made by the Scottish Government to keep key workers on standby to safeguard full manufacturing capability, ensuring that plants could get back up and running as quickly as possible. The Dalzell works in my Motherwell and Wishaw constituency was the prime beneficiary of that policy, which also helped to safeguard Clydebridge works in the neighbouring constituency of Rutherglen and Hamilton West. When the UK Government were dealing with the matter of the British Steel pension scheme, my hon. Friend Neil Gray expressed concern to the then Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills that workplace pensions and incentives to save must not be undermined by any deal. In Parliament, my SNP colleagues and I have expressed solidarity with the workers at those plants, and I must thank the all-party parliamentary group on steel and metal related industries, which has done outstanding work in that regard as well. Hon. Members should rest assured that we will continue to press the UK Government to take meaningful action on issues that threaten the viability of industrial premises across the UK and their workers. This entire episode reaffirms the need for an independent pensions and savings commission to put the pensions landscape on a sustainable footing. People have a right to know and understand their pension savings. At the moment, the UK Government’s extremely complicated pensions and savings landscape—made all the more confusing through the introduction of pension freedoms and vehicles such as lifetime ISAs—is making it more likely that consumers will make the wrong choices for their circumstances. The BSPS members were in an extremely difficult and vulnerable situation that was exploited by greedy firms to the detriment of normal working people, who deserve the retirement that was promised to them. I can speak personally of the difficulties of realising that the pension being looked forward to will not materialise, because it happened in my husband’s case. We were not in anything like extreme circumstances, but it was still a shock to us that the future we had been promised and were looking forward to did not happen. The SNP has long called for the establishment of an independent pensions commission to ensure that employees’ savings are protected and a more progressive approach to fairer savings is considered as we move to a period where defined benefit schemes are becoming a thing of the past. Now that the UK Government are battling with the chaos caused by the Brexit vote, the need for such an independent commission is more important than ever. This also highlights that the Government’s initiatives to improve consumer support and pensions are playing catch-up. More action must be taken urgently. The Government have dragged their heels on the introduction of the pension dashboard, but there is absolutely no reason why this needs to be dragged out. It certainly should not be watered down. Consumers need a unified dashboard that includes their state and private pensions. The SNP was broadly supportive of the creation of a new single financial guidance and claims body that would merge independent financial and pensions advice bodies and the Minister should update the House on the progress of the establishment of this body. Is it up and running? How can it be used to ensure that people in vulnerable circumstances, such as BSPS members, can be armed with the facts to be able to make the right choices for their retirement? I again congratulate the hon. Members for Blaenau Gwent and for Aberavon on their outstanding work in this field. In the past, I have had dealings with the Financial Conduct Authority on pensions matters and with the financial ombudsman and have found them to be reactive, dilatory and unable and uncertain about how they can best help constituents who have been tricked and duped in terrible circumstances. The idea that a man, and it is nearly always men, who worked in a hard and sometimes dangerous job should end up being duped by financial advisers—to their complete detriment—and unable to look their families in the eye and say, “I made a mistake, I am sorry, but nothing can be done”, is unacceptable to everyone in this place. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth. First, I congratulate my hon. Friend Nick Smith on securing the debate. I praise my hon. Friend Stephen Kinnock, who has played a major role in the drive for justice for those who were cheated on their pensions, the work of the APPG and the co-operation of colleagues from the SNP. I also welcome to her first Westminster Hall debate the newly elected Member for Newport West, my hon. Friend Ruth Jones, who will, I know, be a strong champion of the people of Newport West. A good pension is about security and dignity in retirement. The people of Britain deserve nothing but security and dignity in retirement. People work hard, build our country and, when they come towards retirement, plan ahead for the holiday they had always dreamed of, or of helping their kids to be able to buy their own home. There can be nothing more painful than to be cheated out of what they have worked for all their lives. I sometimes say I have been around since Churchill was a boy. I remember the era back in the 1970s and 1980s, when half the population of Britain was in good final salary DB schemes. We have made some progress—for example, the battle on auto-enrolment that we fought and won when Labour was in power, and which I welcome being carried forward by this Government—but to be frank, there has been a depressing direction of travel for good final salary schemes. There have been too many scandals, but none more scandalous than that of British Steel, and that is emblematic of the problem we face with the regulation of DB pension schemes in the UK. As my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent stated, when a deal was struck to keep Tata afloat, members belonging to the £15 billion British Steel pension fund were given the option to shift their assured benefits to the pension protection fund, to join a new retirement scheme backed by Tata, or to transfer to personal pension funds. That led to what was called a “feeding frenzy” at the site in Port Talbot, as dodgy introducers preyed on workers who were more than likely confused about the position of their pension, and who may not have had the financial support or education needed to make such an important decision. Some advice was available, but often it was simply not good enough, or it was technical and unintelligible. Those rogues, those introducers, should be utterly ashamed of themselves. They bought meals for workers in local pubs, and convinced them to transfer their pensions into totally unsuitable schemes. Some people could have lost up to six figures from their pension total. The Financial Conduct Authority has been probing concerns that pension changes that involve 130,000 members of the Tata retirement fund appear to have been affected. A study of the 8,000 people who transferred their pension demonstrated that 58% received advice that was simply not suitable, and the Pensions Regulator calculated that in 2017, the average loss was £94,000. I will never forget the heartbreaking story that I was told by the chief executive of the Pensions Advisory Service during the passage of the Financial Guidance and Claims Bill that introduced the Single Financial Guidance Body. The Pensions Advisory Service set up an advice facility on site, and one of the first people to come in was a big burly steelworker and shift supervisor. He sat down and burst into tears. It turned out that he had been duped by one of those introducers, and it had cost him tens of thousands of pounds. The main reason for his grief, however, was not what he had suffered and would endure for the rest of his life, but the fact that the 20 guys on his shift had all followed his lead. He said to the Pensions Advisory Service, “I’ll never, ever be able to forgive myself, because the mistake that I made has had catastrophic consequences for the people I’ve worked with for 10, 20 or 30 years”. The British Steel case was central to our work during the Financial Guidance and Claims Bill, and I pay tribute to the work of my hon. Friends the Members for Blaenau Gwent and for Aberavon, and many other Members, particularly from Wales, who played a noble role in strengthening the legislation to crack down on the outrageous. Real progress was made. Cold calling more generally was central to the debate on the Bill, and the ban on pension cold calling was a significant step in the right direction. However, we must now go further and introduce a ban on all cold calling—there were constructive discussions about that, and it would helpful if the Minister would update us on the Government’s thinking—and we must also ban the work of introducers. From January this year there has been an end to pension cold calling, but more needs to be done. More generally, the introduction of the Single Financial Guidance Body is a welcome step towards greater financial education and security. It brings together the three previous bodies, which all did good work, into a new, more effective body for the next stages. Crucially, it needs to be adequately resourced, not least because of the role that it will play in the oversight of the dashboard process, but it is welcome that it has been established. That is a powerful indictment of what happened, and a call for further action to be taken. That is essential because—I say this with some sadness—British Steel is not the only outrageous case of pension mishandling. We have seen too many other scandals, most notably BHS and Philip Green, who ought to be utterly ashamed of the way he has conducted himself over the years, and what happened with the collapse of Carillion, which I will never forget. On the pensions issue, Carillion has been centre stage in our discussions, including with the Government, about the further steps that need to be taken. Some of the proposals in the DB White Paper are welcome, such as stronger criminal sanctions for directors neglecting pension schemes—although I will come on to the fact that the possibility of criminal action is there in the here and now—stronger powers for TPR, and clearer standards on scheme funding. On the issue of further action, particularly regarding legislation, is it not vital that the Government recognise the huge risk in divesting pensions? If people are not defaulted into the new scheme that is being set up, and it is left completely open to them, there is a real risk that they will be easy prey for unscrupulous financial advisers. Should the Government not bring forward a statutory instrument that makes it the default to go into a new scheme, rather than to go into the Pension Protection Fund? That is particularly important when all the actuarial advice is that it would be best for the vast majority of those pensioners to have gone into the new scheme and that they should have just been defaulted into it. That can be done by statutory instrument. My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. In the debate over the last 12 or 18 months, we have called that the progressive default option. There is no question but that it has enormous merits and it would be helpful if the Minister were to comment on it in his response. The experience with Carillion pointed to more general problems that started with the Government’s lamentable non-intervention. Despite the fact that the company was getting into greater and greater difficulty, and despite repeated profit warnings, they continued to let contracts to Carillion. The regulators were aware of the risks at a relatively early stage, but they did not use the full extent of their powers to avoid unnecessary burdens on business. I kid you not. I quote from what was said at the time. The board, which failed in its duties to workers and pension scheme members, continued to pay out large salaries, bonuses and dividends, but did not pay into the pension deficit. The trustees did not alert regulators to the extent of the problems early enough. Asset managers continued voting through large pay packages despite profit warnings, and the auditors did not spot the signs of trouble early enough. There is a raft of problems associated with the scandals that have befallen too many workers in our economy. The lessons from Carillion in terms of the need for action more generally are powerful indeed. At the next stage it is vital that the regulators act to make sure that such events never happen again. They need to become more people-focused, ensuring that workers’ pensions are protected at all costs. Rogues in the industry must be sought out and punished, ensuring that they never work in the industry again, and the law needs to be strengthened. To that end, there have been constructive discussions with the Government on presenting a Bill as soon as possible to introduce the stronger powers contained in the DB White Paper to go after rogues. Perhaps the Minister will comment on where that legislation is. It is important for two other reasons, including the introduction of the pensions dashboard—for example, the compulsion on providers to provide the necessary information to the dashboard—and the collective defined contribution pension scheme that has been agreed between Royal Mail and the Communication Workers Union. There are welcome measures on pensions that can and should be taken where there is a degree of consensus, even if we argue that the Government should go significantly further. The sooner they are introduced into legislation, the better. In conclusion, this is little comfort to the workers of British Steel or those in Carillion, but the tragedy that befell them was at the centre of the drive for changing and strengthening the law last year. It is at least something of a legacy, even if it is cold comfort to them. At the heart of it were MPs such as my hon. Friends the Members for Blaenau Gwent and for Aberavon, who played a major role in highlighting the scandal and demanding that action be taken. At the next stages, I stress again that it is important that lessons are learnt by all those I have referred to and that the law is strengthened. I will finish by referring to something that my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent said, and he was absolutely right. Is it necessary to change the law in the ways that I have argued for? Yes, without hesitation, but there are powers that exist now in criminal law, and those powers should be used. I know the workers of Port Talbot would say that those evil men and women who cheated them on their pensions need to be investigated, tracked down and put in the dock. An unmistakable message must be sent: if you rob workers of their pension scheme, you are an utter disgrace, will end up in the dock, and, in extreme cases, in prison. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning, Mr Howarth. I thank Nick Smith for securing this important debate. I know he has engaged extensively and constructively with the Financial Conduct Authority on these matters over the past year. I was pleased to meet him in February to discuss how we can avoid a repeat of the unfortunate circumstances that occurred in the British Steel pensions scheme case. I am aware of the extensive work he has undertaken with Stephen Kinnock and others from south Wales, and I know that the FCA has valued immensely that interaction to try to improve communications and other aspects raised in the debate this morning. Many issues have been raised in the debate, and I will seek to respond to them all—particularly the importance of a well-functioning financial advice market. I have listened carefully to all those who have made observations about the aspects of that that are not functioning well. I will refer to the lessons that have been learned specifically in the British Steel pensions case; the actions the FCA has taken to address unsuitable pensions transfer advice; the protections in place for consumers; and the issue of so-called phoenix firms—an outrageous situation where individuals seek to leave behind responsibility for a previous, failed enterprise, recreate a new enterprise and therefore absolve themselves of responsibility. I am here as the Minister responsible for financial services. I note the questions that have been raised by Jack Dromey concerning the status and other aspects of the pensions Bill. I was in front of the Work and Pensions Committee last week with my colleague, the Minister for Pensions, so I have some observations on that, but he has lead responsibility in that area, so I shall seek to secure a response from him. As the Minister responsible for financial services, I am committed to ensuring that a well-functioning financial advice market exists to support people to make the right decisions for them and their families. In 2015, as has been mentioned, the Treasury and the FCA launched the financial advice market review, with the goal of improving the accessibility and affordability of financial advice. The Government and the FCA have now implemented all 28 recommendations from that review and will be reviewing the advice market again over 2019 to monitor progress and report back next year. The Government have also made financial advice mandatory for people considering a defined-benefit pension transfer where the value of the pension is over £30,000. That threshold is purposely low, given the dire consequences of taking poor advice and making unwise decisions—as has been said in relation to a number of cases this morning. That is to ensure that people consider the fact that they may lose guaranteed income in retirement and are aware of all the options available before they make such a complex decision. Turning to British Steel, although most financial advisers offer sound advice, unfortunately there are cases where the advice people receive is not right for them. The British Steel case was one such instance and resulted from a unique set of complex circumstances. A minority of advisers were responsible for giving unsuitable advice, which resulted in losses for scheme members. The restructure of the British Steel pension scheme occurred at a time when there was considerable concern over the future of Tata Steel, and members were understandably worried about whether they were about to lose their jobs and pensions. Several public bodies were involved in supporting scheme members to decide what to do with their British Steel pension, and it would be helpful to outline their different roles, because that will bring clarity to where the issues lie and how we can address them. The Pensions Regulator is responsible for negotiating and agreeing arrangements where an employer is unable to continue to support a defined-benefit scheme, as was the case for Tata Steel and the British Steel pension scheme. That includes guidance and oversight of the trustees and scheme administrators. As such, the Pensions Regulator was also responsible for the options available to BSPS members, the communications sent by the trustees and the deadlines for decisions to be made. The FCA is responsible for the regulation of the financial advice market. Financial advice firms must be authorised by the FCA before they are permitted to provide advice, including on pension transfers, and advisers are required to provide financial advice that is suitable for the individual’s personal circumstances. The Pensions Advisory Service was an independent service offering free-to-consumer guidance on pension matters. As has been mentioned, it has recently been merged with Pension Wise and the Money Advice Service to create a new single financial guidance body, which is now known as the Money and Pensions Service. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington asked from the Opposition Front Bench about the status of that body. The chief executive is now in place, and work is going on in this financial year to set up the processes for bringing those three entities together. There will be a series of announcements over the coming months about their intentions, but the body will operationalise in the course of the coming financial year. As to the lessons learned from the experience in south Wales with the British Steel scheme, the independent Rookes review, which considered the communication exercise that supported members of British Steel to take decisions on their pension, reported in January. It noted that there are important lessons for organisations to learn to prevent such a case from happening again. There are, I think, 18 recommendations, and they include earlier intervention and intelligence sharing between the regulators and the Money and Pensions Service; improved support for members considering cash transfers out of defined-benefit schemes; improved guidance for trustees facing restructuring and other major changes; and improved message content clarity and channels. The Pensions Regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority and the Money and Pensions Service have publicly committed to addressing the review’s remaining recommendations. They have agreed a joint protocol to work together to ensure that consumers are appropriately protected. It includes ensuring that support and communications are in place for members of defined-benefit pension schemes, ahead of any restructures and consultations—something manifestly different from what happened in the regrettable case that we are considering. Another aim of the protocol is that there should be better co-ordination of the involvement of different public bodies through early intervention, expedited approval processes and improved information sharing. The bodies have also developed branded written materials for trustees, to ensure that there are better communications with pension scheme members, including letters to alert them to the risks of transferring out of DB pension schemes, and the giving of practical information. I will now talk about action on unsuitable pensions transfer advice, because the British Steel case has also raised many questions about quality. The Minister has set out some of the structural and institutional issues and the lessons to be learned, but does he agree that when 8,000 members transfer out there is clearly a problem that needs to be addressed at source? Flagging up risks is all very well, but this is a case of shutting the door after the horse has bolted. We need a system that prevents such mass migration out, because once those kinds of numbers are involved it is highly likely that people will be going against actuarial advice that is in their best interests. I have listened carefully to the hon. Gentleman’s interventions, and he is right to say that 6.6% of the 122,000 individuals who had those pensions did transfer out, and that, in general, the default option would not be to transfer out of a DB scheme. There is work going on to develop pathways. I am not clear, given that it is not my direct area of responsibility, about the status of that work. I think, however, that there is a challenge, in the context of the policy on freedoms that is now well under way, about how to reconcile that freedom with making the decisions in question. Perhaps I might pivot over to consider the DC schemes. I think what is happening is that many people decide to take the 25% tax-free lump sum and then do not necessarily make appropriate, or the best, decisions on the remainder of that pot of money. Work is being done on that, but with respect to the specificity of the default option, I cannot give the hon. Gentleman a definitive response now. I think we are moving to a point where there will be default pathways that people will need to be advised on when they take advice. I think that is probably a sensible compromise that deals with the fact that, in some instances, not coming out of the DB scheme would not be the right thing to do. The hon. Gentleman will agree about that, although he is also perfectly correct to say that, generally, not coming out would be the right thing to do. There is work to be done, but I think progress is being made, and I acknowledge the sensible point he has raised. I want to focus on what the Minister calls the 6%—perhaps nearly 8,000 people—who may have been badly advised in this case. What is he going to do to get the FCA to up its game, contact those people and help them, in case they have been badly advised? Following our meeting, I undertook to speak to Andrew Bailey, the chief executive. We are due to meet every few months, and our next meeting is imminent. I will speak to him about that. A number of live investigations are under way; I do not have investigative power myself, but I will take a close interest in those investigations. Individual companies—I will not name them—are being actively investigated now, and I expect the FCA to make announcements and recommendations consequent to those investigations imminently. I am not privy to the detail, but I am taking a close interest and will be speaking to the chief executive, because I realise that time is pressing on. This morning we have heard vivid accounts of individuals and families ruined by these decisions, and I take the matter seriously. To get back to my script, the FCA leads on financial advice and has considerable power to act against firms and individuals who provide negligent advice. To be clear: the FCA can impose a financial penalty on a firm, require the firm to pay redress to its customers, restrict the firm’s permissions, or prohibit individuals from operating in financial services. The FCA can bring criminal prosecutions. I hear the enthusiasm for that action being taken, and I think the FCA hears it too, but it works closely with other organisations to support criminal prosecutions. Both the Government and the FCA are targeting their attention on the effective regulation of financial services and wider work to tackle scams, including the recent implementation of a ban on pensions cold calling. That is helpful, but in the case of British Steel, I think it would send absolutely the right message to the workers concerned if the Minister said today that a sense of urgency is needed on the part of the FCA and the South Wales police about investigating potential criminal wrongdoing and taking action. The workers back at the plant would welcome that. I am happy to respond to that intervention by saying that it is absolutely imperative that the FCA works with all bodies to hold those individuals to account and to take the appropriate action in the light of the evidence presented to it. This is urgent; the individuals who have suffered this experience expect that of the FCA, and I believe the FCA is keenly aware of that. The hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent talked about the regional presence of the FCA. It has more than 3,000 employees and runs an annual programme of regional supervisory workshops under its “Live and local” banner, in which it educates firms and gathers intelligence from across the country. That has included recent workshops on DB pension transfers. Although the FCA does not have a series of regional offices, there is a clear expectation on the part of the Government and the FCA itself that it will go out into communities across the country, to ensure it has a presence among the 35,000 IFAs that operate. The regulator is also undertaking further work on the pensions transfer advice market. The FCA is analysing responses to a recent data request from firms that undertake pensions transfer advice and is planning a programme of work, which is likely to include further engagement with stakeholders, targeted education for firms involved in providing pension transfer advice, and assessment of those firms significantly involved in the provision of DB transfer advice. The FCA has already announced a requirement for all pension transfer specialists to obtain the same qualifications as fully regulated investment advisers, alongside their existing qualifications, by October 2020. In relation to the BSPS, the FCA intervened to stop 11 firms from providing pensions transfer advice, and several firms are still under investigation. It is important to ensure that consumers are protected from poor-quality and unsuitable advice, and there are proper mechanisms for redress when they receive poor advice. The first port of call for consumers to seek compensation is to approach the firm itself. If they cannot resolve the issue, consumers can take their complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service. The FOS is a free, independent service that provides an alternative to the courts. The maximum award it can recommend was increased at the beginning of this month from £150,000 to £350,000 per individual. If firms go into liquidation and cannot provide compensation to individuals, a second tier of protection is open through the financial services compensation scheme. The FSCS is mainly funded by an annual levy on the financial services industry. Since its founding, the FSCS has helped millions of people and paid billions of pounds in compensation. It is important to note that in the British Steel case, only a very small minority of former steelworkers who have taken their claims through the FOS and the FSCS have not been fully compensated. That group were all clients of one firm, and the Government’s decision to make financial advice mandatory for those seeking to transfer their DB pension has therefore guaranteed a crucial layer of consumer protection to those individuals. “Phoenixing”—firms or individuals seeking to avoid liabilities arising from poor investment advice by re-emerging as a different legal entity—can leave consumers and taxpayers out of pocket and tarnish the reputation of the industry. The FCA has a range of tools to identify and act against firms or individuals who try to avoid responsibility in that way. Those seeking to liquidate firms must provide information about outstanding complaints, and the assets of collapsed firms cannot be sold on or passed back to former directors without the prior consent of the regulator. The FCA has already used those powers to prevent several individuals and businesses from avoiding their liabilities, and other cases are under investigation. This has caused some individuals to withdraw their applications, knowing full well that they will not get through. Although I acknowledge that this will not give absolute comfort to those who have suffered, I believe that we now have in place a regime that will prevent the practice in future. On the issue of compensation, phoenixing and rogue financial advisers’ ability to just shut up shop and walk away, surely there is also a question of insurance. In our recent meeting with the FCA, which I found absolutely extraordinary, it was made clear to us that there appears to be no mandatory level of insurance that financial advisers must take out so that they can be held to account and insurance pay-outs can be made. My understanding is that, as soon as these advisers see the writing on the wall and know that people will come after them for compensation, they shut down, and there is no backstop—perhaps safety net is a better term—so that people who have been ripped off can go after them through an insurance process. Does not that extraordinary situation require a policy and legislative shift so that the FCA has a chance of doing its job in this area? I have been trying to find the note that one of my officials kindly sent me on the quantum of insurance. My understanding is that FCA authorised and regulated firms must have insurance in place; if they do not, the FCA has it in its armoury to de-authorise. I listened carefully to the hon. Gentleman, and his point seemed to be on the amount of that insurance. I am happy to take that matter away and consider it. On the practice of phoenixing, I am given to understand that the FCA has done a significant amount of work in that area. It launched a programme of work in April 2018 to strengthen authorisations, and I have given some of the details. I do not want to waffle further on this point, but I will give consideration to the amount and level of insurance required. The hon. Gentleman has discussed the matter with the FCA; I will do so as well and write to him. If it is not fit for purpose, it is not fit. I thank the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent for bringing to the House this debate on a very important topic. I was pleased to hear that he is committed to supporting the communications work with the FCA to raise awareness among former BSPS members of their rights to complain and to seek justice. The Government, regulators and other organisations are strongly committed to monitoring the market for financial advice and defined-benefit pension schemes, and to taking decisive action to ensure that these events cannot be repeated. I recognise that Ministers often say that at this point, but I have listened sincerely and carefully to the points that have been raised. A lot can be done as a consequence of the excellent work of the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues, and through my interaction with the FCA. I accept that there have been some differences of opinion in the Chamber this morning regarding the amount that can be done by regulatory intervention and legislative action. However, I will do all I can to ensure that we exhaust reasonable opportunities for the FCA to tighten up in all these areas. The example given by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington of an individual who inadvertently, unwittingly and tragically led his 20 colleagues to make certain decisions, and the multiplier effect of those, was heartbreaking, and one that the Government need to respond to. I thank Members for the opportunity to respond to this morning’s debate. Thank you, Mr Howarth for chairing what has been a productive debate on an important issue. There have been some strong contributions about some of the key problems that steel pensioners have had to work through in the last 18 months or so. In particular, my hon. Friend Stephen Kinnock spoke movingly about the human impact on his constituents, who were at the epicentre of these problems. I have seen the impact too, and it has been heartbreaking. My constituency neighbour, my hon. Friend Nick Thomas-Symonds, emphasised the importance of looking at the possibilities for criminal proceedings. I strongly endorse that point, which needs to be taken on urgently by the South Wales police or the FCA. Other contributors spoke clearly about these serious issues, and about what needs to be done to help in the future. It is clear that a lot of things went badly wrong, and hard-working people found their life savings put at risk. The problems that have been highlighted today need to be addressed as a matter of urgency so that we do everything we can to prevent this from happening again further down the line. I hope the Minister will see through the changes that are needed, given the problems that we have identified today. We will work with him to do that.
2019-04-24T08:08:16Z
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/whall/?id=2019-04-10a.89.0&p=24728
both of us, and please keep them up. BOO and RO --my prayers are with you and yours concerning this ebola thing in TX. Also, you mentioned antivert for the dizziness, would dramamine do the same? ASA, GF--what is a blow-down? October 09, 2014 - Msg 99325: I didnt think the porch looked that dirty, but I guess Floyd had other ideas! October 09, 2014 - Msg 99326: Well mercy me MDC. If I knew you could sweep up this good I'd a hired you at the bank years ago. That Mrs. McGruder ain't so dedicated in the corners. And her cousin who fills in for her is even worse. A blow down in our talk at least MDC is using screw air compressors for blowing water out of sprinkling systems. I imagine in your climate that isn't an issue, but here it's a yearly job to go around and do that to all our systems. Saves a ton of repairs come spring. Can I get an amen GF? Well I'm about ready to call it a day. Didn't sleep more than a few hours last night and I'm beat right down to my socks. Go home, take a shower, kick back in the La-Z-Boy and watch some tv. Hey, I forgot there is a game on tonight. Cool beans. Home, shower, watch football. Yep, that's the plan. October 09, 2014 - Msg 99327: MDC, It's what you call it when the wind would "blow-down" your tree haha...No, really it is what you do when you remove the water from pipes for the winter so they don't freeze. October 09, 2014 - Msg 99329: Asa, If you are resting in your "Wheeler" waiting on the football game, maybe if you caught the "Waltons"? Our "Skippy" is on a episode where John-Boy enters a dance contest. She is one of the contestants..(Guess she had a lot of practice at the Kit-Kat Club). October 09, 2014 - Msg 99330: Now you boys don't be blowing up any bees' nests. Our honeybees are becoming a threatened species, and they're vital for pollinating crops. When you find a beehive, call a professional to come and remove it. My brother had a huge beehive in a dead tree in his yard. He called this man who came out, all dressed up in beekeeper gear. He pumped smoke into the hive, all the bees got real quiet, and he just vacuumed them up. The vacuum was very gentle, and deposited them into a net container. He pulled out a lot of the honeycomb too, and said it would be put in the new hive he was moving them to, to sustain them until they got established. Very interesting. Takes more nerve than I possess, messing with those bees like that, but interesting nonetheless. You're right, Asa, we don't really have to clear out our sprinkler lines. Our ground doesn't freeze, and with the lines buried a few inches down, they're safe. There are advantages to being in the south, except in July and August. Then we pay. Well, guess I'll go rustle up some dinner. It's late, because I went out to feed the fish in the pond, and ended up replacing bulbs in several landscape lights, putting out critter feed, washing out birdbaths and refilling them and pulling a few weeds. Seems like there's always something to do. A slow friday on the porch. family we grew up with in the old neighborhood. patriarchs and matriarchs are all passing away. My dad is one of the last still standing, so to speak. It was a neat time tonight tho because the family members who talked, voiced their memories of those times when Phx was much smaller, and how we used to play outside so much together, etc. Well, I'm off to bed. Hope all is well in mayberry. October 11, 2014 - Msg 99333: MDC, I know what you mean, when my Mom passed a whole lot of "the old neighborhood" folks and my friends came by to pay their respects. We also talked of the neighborhood memories, wasn't it the best of times back then? Life was simpler and the rules were easy, when your whistle blew it was time to come home. Thanks for the memory blast! October 11, 2014 - Msg 99334: Good Saturday morning all. October 11, 2014 - Msg 99335: Good sermon Asa, would be a good topic for tomorrow, I'm sure your sermons arn't "dry as dust" ha! Hope you had a RELAXING time in your "Wheeler" the other day, sometimes when your socks are beat that IS the best thing to do.. Spot is off in his camper, but I'm not sure where everyone else is. a topic that was preached. Not so today! Well, I'm off to dad's. Have a good Saturday all. October 11, 2014 - Msg 99337: Good morning, everyone. It's a beautiful day here today! Very cloudy, light mist, looks like a good chance for some real rain. Yep, that's a beautiful day, for sure. I'd appreciate it if we don't get any more of that strong wind, but the rain would definitely be welcome. Yep, you fellers are so right. I think I'm the senior porchster (75 last July, can anyone beat that?) but I know some of you are just around ten years behind me, so we share a lot of memories. I remember having drills in school, when we would have to cover our heads with a book and duck under our desks! This was supposed to protect us in the event of a bombing raid. Can you imagine? I even had one teacher who encouraged us to wear white or light-colored clothing, because she had read somewhere that it would reflect the flash from A-bombs and provide some protection from burns. How naive we all were! MDC, your concerns and prayers are always appreciated, but honestly, we have far more to fear all over America than the Ebola virus. That man was under extremely strict isolation, all his known contacts are now sequestered, and (we would hope) more security measures have been taken at the airports to identify potential carriers. Meantime, according to the CDC, in 2012, there were 10,322 people killed in alcohol-related accidents on our highways. That's just the deaths, not to mention the injuries and ruined lives. We can jump on a suspected virus carrier like white on rice, and we should, but meantime, we slap the wrist of a drunk driver, and release him or her to go do it again, because so often, they do. Here in Dallas, a 16-yr old drives drunk and kills four people. Read it: http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/05/us/texas-affluenza-teen/ He will be on probation whenever he gets out of the rehab facility, and honeys and dears, you mark my words. He will do it again. He will drive drunk again, at some time in the future. Statistics will bear that out. Check out this link: http://duijusticelink.aaa.com/facts. It will tell you that: "Drivers with a BAC of .08 or higher involved in fatal crashes were seven times more likely to have a prior conviction for driving while impaired (DWI) than were drivers with no alcohol." That's pretty scary, and is a good predictor that this "affluenza" kid will do it again. It's a sad case, with many lives lost or ruined, and yet as a nation, we just do not learn. A sober person thinks "Just one drink, and I'll still be fine." After that drink, his judgment is a tiny bit impaired but he feels a bit more powerful, so one more won't hurt. This continues until he's badly impaired, but feels like Superman. The drunker he gets, the more invincible he feels. Oh, we used to get them in all the time at the hospital. Roaring drunk, had the snot beaten out of them in some bar, but still ready to fight. They'd inform us nurses that they were gonna whip us, and get out of there! That's when we'd call security, and they'd send Charles up. Charles was 6'7", weighed at least 300, and wasn't fat, either. All he had to do was walk into the room and stand there like a brick wall, and amazingly, the drunk had sense enough to know he couldn't whip Charles. Female nurses, yeah, but not Charles. It was so funny. Where has Possum been? it's not time to hibernate yet! October 11, 2014 - Msg 99339: Well-said, Romeena. Drunk and texting drivers are about the biggest threat in Texas. Boy, I wish people would wise up. I agree with you, Asa. Trying to stay positive but hard to do these days. October 12, 2014 - Msg 99340: Boo, I was never officially assigned to ER, but I did get floated there now and then from my home unit, and during the five years that my job was to float the house, it happened more often. Most of my experience with the drunks came on my home unit, though. When ER would fill up, we would start getting their patients long before they had been stabilized. For several years, our ER was far too small, and they just had no place to put them. So, they'd make sure they weren't bleeding to death, and then ship them to us. It wasn't an ideal situation, having a screaming, cursing drunk on the same floor with a bunch of sick and delusional elderly people, but it happened now and then. Usually, we'd have an order for some haloperidol, and we'd just put their lights out, so to speak. October 12, 2014 - Msg 99341: Good Sabbath porch pals. I hope you all have a wonderful and blessed Sabbath. Romeena, like you, I am not a drinker. But it seems most of my life I have lived next to heavy drinkers. When I was a kid, the father of the family that lived next door was an drunk. He never drunk anything but beer (as far as I could see) but he drank it by the gallon. And he got mean when he drank. Very mean. I still remember vividly how the entire family would kind of go into a very cautious mode when he came home blitzed. One memory I have is him getting in an argument with his wife one time. I was in the back yard playing with their kids and could hear them yelling. Well him yelling. She wasn't really saying much. I couldn't have been more than 7 or 8 and their kids said maybe I better go home now. But before I could leave, she came out of the house in tears, he, right on her heels. Then he hauled off and kicked her in the rear. And I mean hard. So hard it dropped her to the ground. I had never seen anything like that before, but it has stayed with me my entire life. I don't know, maybe that is part of why I have never been a drinker. That and my religion teaches the evils of drink. Today my neighbor to my east is a drunk. At least he doesn't get mean when he drinks. And our houses are far enough apart that I don't really interact with him to much. But he is suffering with a lot of serious health issues due to years of heavy drinking and I am pretty sure he will not be around to much longer. It's really sad because he is a very good guy, and a good neighbor in many respects. I have tried talking to him him frankly about it. I don't why, but I seem to be able to talk to him in a direct manner, and he at least listens. He is 10 years older than me, a retired Air Force Corp., kind of gruff and hard nosed to most folks. But to me at least, he sheds his rough exterior and we are able to talk. Maybe he respects my big sidearm and moldy bullets. lol. I am just glad I have never had the desire to drink. I have seen the misery and grief it usually brings to individuals and their families. So Boo, you all better. Erin? Sean? Sure hope so. Well best get ready for preachin. October 12, 2014 - Msg 99342: That's right Asa, it is too early for Possum to go into hibernation, we haven't even had Indian Summer yet. Yes, I agree when you experience all the heartaches that drinking brings, a wise man learns from that, I may not be rocket scientist, but I am a wise man not to have indulged in that either. I am making beef jerky today (Mrs. G-F hates it when I do) she says it "stinks up the house" so I do it early while she sleeps. I Might watch the Steelers-Browns game later today....Might not! October 12, 2014 - Msg 99344: GF, I saw Danica compete on an episode of Chopped and I believe she won it. She is a very competitive woman and I guess she can cook too. October 12, 2014 - Msg 99345: Oh, and congrats to Tom and GF for the Browns big win over the Steelers. Big ain't the word for it! October 12, 2014 - Msg 99346: Hi All. Now look here G F, I was going to overlook some thing but now thing has mess it up for you. 31 10 and one in Nov you will be out just for the day and all your family and friend that day. October 12, 2014 - Msg 99347: ...But TOM, I only cheered a little bit, does that knock a few days off? Otis is getting used to me being there, he wants ME to read him Jack the Giant killer now instead of Andy. Asa, I think you may be next, even tho TOM lived in Cleveland the Steelers are his team.... But don't worry, like Tom Bodet says: "I'll leave the light on for ya"! October 12, 2014 - Msg 99348: ...Looks like Barney may get his wish for the expansion plans for the jail. TOM is keeping them full. October 12, 2014 - Msg 99349: ASA 1 mont in jail for using a stick to poke possum out. Where your lice to hunt with? October 12, 2014 - Msg 99350: I wasnt' hunting possum Tom. Just poking holes. And sorry, I thought you were a Browns fan. So congrats to GF and sorry for you. Lefty (GF) you and me is busting out tonight! October 12, 2014 - Msg 99351: Thank you,Tom for sticking (bad pun!) up for me! Yeah,lock 'em up for possum hunting! I'm right here,just have a lot going on,as we're getting ready to move my mama into an Assisted Living Facility later this week.She's been in a Rehab facility since having her lower left leg amputated in June and it's time for her to leave. Most of y'all know I was married to an alcoholic and we'll just let "was" say it all. It's a terrible way of life & I am so glad I'm not living it anymore. Well,guess I'll go back to doing what I was doing,whatever that was-ha! Y'all take care,have a good evening & don't get in any more trouble with Officer Tom! I have tasted beer just one time. I might drink champagne or wine about once every five years. But I have never been drunk. Alcohol abuse has resulted in family hardships and breakups, and death and injury to the abuser as well as their victims. Why it is not as strictly controlled as other narcotics is beyond me. When my American Legion post asked me to work as a bartender, I refused. I did not want to be responsible for serving liquor to someone who would be driving home later. Now on a happier note; Happy Thanksgiving to all my fellow Canadians. Yes, Monday, October 13, is our Thanksgiving day here in Canada. The turkey has been cooked and will be reheated on Monday before our guests arrive. Too bad I can't visit the USA during the American Thanksgiving so I could eat more turkey. The Beverly Hillbillie's "Possum Day" episode aired on October 13, 1965. Does this make Monday, October 13, 2014, the anniversary of Possum Day as well? October 12, 2014 - Msg 99355: Good evening, porch. PH, I would ask that same question, about controlling alcohol, were it not for two facts. One - it was tried in the U.S. from 1920 through 1933, as I'm sure you know, and was a dismal failure. It failed because it had been legal for too long, and people were not about to give up their booze. By that time, it was too deeply entrenched in the fabric of daily life for the majority of the population. The second fact is - drugs are only barely controlled here, mostly just "on the surface" control, but we all know they're widely available and most school kids could tell you where to buy them. The only reason we have any control at all is because they've never been legal. Now, with the creeping legalization of drugs, starting with marijuana, we're going to have the same situation we had with alcohol. Once it's legal, there's no turning back. I probably shouldn't keep beating this drum, but I guess I started it, so might as well finish it. We will never really control alcohol abuse in this country, because too many members of our judicial system are abusers themselves, and are therefore reluctant to really crack down on anyone else. I've lived a long time, and in all those years, I can truthfully say I have never, ever, seen any situation, whether social, business, family, whatever - that was improved because alcohol was present. Admittedly, sometimes it's neutral, if everyone observes limits, but I've never seen any interaction that was better because someone was drinking. However, I've surely seen many, many situations that were made worse, from just uncomfortable to downright impossible, because of the presence of alcohol. There's really just not very much to recommend it, and a whole lot of reasons to avoid it. A year or so ago, my cardiologist just remarked that a small glass of red wine at bedtime might be good for my heart. I asked him just what the benefit might be, since I don't drink and never have. He said, "Never? Like never ever?" I said yes, and he said, "Then by all means, don't do it. Just drink a glass of grape juice, it will have the same benefit." Huh. How about that. Seems it's not so much the alcohol that's beneficial, but rather the anti-oxidant resveratrol that seems to be the good guy. Who knew? when one thinks about it. I admit that when I was first married, and had neighbors over, we'd make a "hi-ball" for them but over the years I just outgrew it so to speak. AZ Cards beat the Redskins today! October 13, 2014 - Msg 99358: Amusing thing when we talk about vices, some people think of it as a boring life, I don't drink,smoke,gamble,golf,bowl,run around, or most of the things that are not good for you and cost a lot of money. I guess my only vice is my collecting Mayberry stuff and going to the Mayberry events. I remind Mrs. G-F of that fact when I purchase something new for my collection. (Which I just did, I got one of the films that they would sent to the TV stations to air.) It is the "Darling's Fortune" episode. The case is signed by Charlene Darling, Doug & Rodney Dillard. Yep, it is my only "compelsion"..I could be doing far worse things.. Amen? October 13, 2014 - Msg 99360: Good morning, porch! We had a good rain during the night, and from the looks of the sky, it's not over yet. It can just rain all day, as far as I'm concerned. It's 63�, I'm loving the "sound of silence" as my a/c isn't running, and now the rain means my water bill will drop as well. God is good. Good observation about people's definition of "boring" lives, G-F.. Personally, I think waking up with a hangover, or wondering what I did or said last night, or living with the knowledge I had hurt someone would be worse than being "bored." Anyway, I'm not bored. My life is very full, and I enjoy every minute of it. What's more, I never have to wonder what I did or said last night. As for why TAGS had a "town drunk" - I actually think it was brilliant. It's true, they portrayed him as lovable and funny, and drunks rarely are, but they still showed some of the consequences. They played it lightly, but the consequences were there. Aunt Bee worried about him, and prayed for him. He got swindled when a man sold him what he thought was a horse, and it was a cow. He realized he couldn't drive a car safely. When Andy put him to bed in their guest room, he accidentally dumped a vase of water over himself. (My granddaughter reacted to that scene with "Oh, how sad.") He usually looked a bit seedy, and wasn't exactly considered trustworthy by most of the town folks. They liked him, but they didn't give him much responsibility. Even Andy got exasperated with him a couple of times. His wife looked tired and careworn. No, they made him lovable, because of the kind of show it was, but the consequences of his behavior showed through. October 13, 2014 - Msg 99361: Me again. Well, the home health office just called, and gave me a good assignment. I've evolved into a "PRN person" - for you non-medical types, PRN means "as needed", and that's what I've been doing. I'm not doing admissions and taking on the full responsibility of a patient. I've been seeing somebody else's patients when they can't, or want to take time off or whatever. I love it! Much less responsibility, but I'm still paid the same per visit. For example, this patient is an 84 yr old man in an assisted living facility, the same one my dad was in, just a few blocks from my house. He has a deep diabetic ulcer on his ankle, which requires daily dressing changes. He also goes to dialysis three days a week, so he can't be seen until about 6 pm. His primary nurse has small children and the late evening call is hard for her. So, I'm seeing him on his dialysis days, and will see him over the weekend as well, as she wants to go somewhere with her family. It works well for the other nurses, gives them a safety valve, and it works great for me. I'm not responsible for interfacing with the doctor, or jumping through all the Medicare hoops for recertification for care, or any of that stuff. I just go change the dressing, and chart my observations. Easy stuff, and this particular patient is a sweetheart. Sharp as a tack mentally, but his poor little body is just worn out. He's so patient, and so pleasant about it all. October 13, 2014 - Msg 99362: ...Bless her tiny little heart! Yep Romeena, pretty sad when a persons measure of a "good time" is the level of their hangover the next day...Just call me a bore, but just don't call me late for dinner! October 13, 2014 - Msg 99364: G- F, you'd better watch out sneakin' peeks at "my"link-Tom might lock ya up again! He is a good possum protector! Thanks for the kind words and the link, MDC. Sure miss John Denver. Well, "The Voice" just came on,so gonna go watch it-y'all have a good evening! Love to all! October 13, 2014 - Msg 99365: I sure could use Miss Edwards but I'll settle for anyone here to answer a gardening question. What exactly is the sort of chalky substance I'm seeing on my perennial and weed stems? Had a wet night, and I went to pull some thistles this morning and saw the stuff. White, chalky looking, almost pasty, never saw it before. Anyone? of your storms there and in RO's area too! Be careful you two. RO--hope your caddy has good wipers! Good sermon yesterday. Pastor touched on the ebola thing, isis, etc, and how a metal cover on a pocket Bible saved a WWII vet that he knows. He brought it all together with the whole idea of living each day for God, and how he'll take it from there. October 13, 2014 - Msg 99367: Good evening, porch. Billy Ray, my top-of-my-head answer to your question would be - it sounds like powdery mildew. Nasty stuff. Will get on roses, and just loves crape myrtle. Usually shows up after a rain, or overhead watering. That's why my rose island has a different watering system. Everything else just has standard spray heads, but for the roses, there's a little "bubbler" beside each bush, that just waters beneath the bush and doesn't wet the foliage. Even then, sometimes one of them will suddenly have the powdery stuff. There are good commercial sprays available for it, or you can soak horticultural cornmeal in a bucket of water, strain it through a piece of cloth, and spray the resulting "tea" on the affected plants. When I do that, I finish up by spreading the soggy cornmeal loosely on the ground around the plants. There is another kind of mold, but it's not powdery. It's kind of light tan colored, wet and nasty looking. It's slime mold, there are hundreds of varieties of it, and it's basically harmless. Ugly as sin, but really does no harm, and can even be helpful as it consumes viruses and bacteria along with decomposing mulch. You don't have to treat it, as it's self-limiting. It just dries up! However, it doesn't sound like that's what you saw. I would bet it's powdery mildew. Oh, another plant that's very prone to mildew is the zinnia. I've never been able to successfully grow zinnias, they always break out in powdery mildew and just faint and fall over, the sissies. Apparently we got about two inches of rain last night, but the clouds have moved out of the area, so I guess that's it for a while. Had a lot of high winds today again, more branches down in the yard, but they're small, and their leaves are dead. Apparently they're leftovers from the storm last week. They must have been hung up in the trees, and today's wind brought them down. There aren't very many, and they're all small enough that I can drag them out to the street myself. October 14, 2014 - Msg 99368: Hey Romeena, Better tell "Joe" to check the "T's" in the sprinkler line, seems to be where Asa was having all his problems this year. Funny you should bring up the flu shot thing, I have been pondering if I should get one or not. Every year when I did get one I ended up getting sick, and the years I did not, I did not get the flu. We always were offered them at work since we worked around so many "Seniors". I'm not saying the shots MADE me sick but it sure seemed like a coincidence. What's your take? October 14, 2014 - Msg 99369: Morning all. MDC, Is your Dad doing any better? Sure hope so. Well GF, Of all the vices you mentioned, the only one I have is golfing. I do enjoy that, although I have not done much of it this year with my gimpy back. But me and my buddy are going out on Thursday and play all day. We do that once a year before winter hits. Usually play 36 holes on two different courses. We have a blast. He's a good friend I've known for 30 years now, and we have always shared each others burdens and joys. A good friend is a rare gem. Well better get rolling. Tomorrow is my Friday so I have a ton to do. October 14, 2014 - Msg 99370: Good morning, porch. Thanks for the advice, guys, and I would definitely be following it, except in this case I know what the problem is. My lawnmower guy, Eddie, was digging out a nandina shrub that came up voluntarily alongside the garage, and it's not a good place for it. I forgot to warn him about the water line along there, and he just sliced that line in two with his shovel. It feeds the drip line alongside the garage, but right now, it's just shooting water straight up in a geyser. I've turned that zone off, of course. There's no rush, since we've had all that rain, and it's a good thing. Joe called, and his car's transmission has gone out, so he won't be coming today. I'm okay, but how frustrating for him! As for the flu shots, I got sick after taking one about twenty years ago, and avoided them after that, until the hospital started more or less requiring them. They couldn't legally force us to take them, but they found a way. First, the shots were free, didn't cost us anything. Second, we had to sign a waiver that if we didn't take the shot, and got sick with the flu, the time off would be unpaid. Not sure how legal that was, but they have a whole stable of lawyers, so I guess it was. Anyway, I started taking them, never got sick from any of them, and never got the flu. I wasn't very sick the time I did get it, and my doc said I was probably already taking it, too late for the shot to prevent it, but it may have lessened the impact. Made sense. Now, at my age, and with a cranky heart, I don't take any chances. I take the flu shot and the pneumonia shot, and furthermore, I'll be getting a tet@nus shot soon. Working outside like I do, in the yard, it's a good idea. I don't want anybody singing about digging my grave with a silver spade, or anything like that! RO, 20 years ago werent they still using the "live" shots? I think they did make a lot of people sick. Now they use a "dead" shot if I'm not mistaken. ASA- dad is doing OK, good days, bad days. then yesterday dad was as spry as could be, all smiles, etc., so I just say ""His will be done." One of these days I hope my wife and I can "hit the road" and visit some of you good folks! October 14, 2014 - Msg 99373: Ok,Ok, I guess you convinced me...Flu shot it is! Now if I get sick can I expect soup from ya'll? Tonight I have calling hrs. for the Boss who hired me way back when, I appreciated him taking a chance on hiring a "young punk" right out of school with little experience. He had told me several times over the years he made the right decision. Makes me feel good that I met his expectations and hopefully exceeded them too. October 14, 2014 - Msg 99374: GF, I'm not sure I know what you mean by "calling hours". Is that a viewing kind of thing? If so, sorry for the loss of a friend. October 14, 2014 - Msg 99375: just checking before bed. Been a busy week so far and will start my clinical work in the nursing home tomorrow. Hope I am ready for this..prayers appreciated. in the upper arm area, and their 5/8" needle dont "jab" so bad, as ole Rafe would say. BOO- all the best to you...prayers indeed. October 15, 2014 - Msg 99378: I never get flu shots. I have said this 1000 times, and feel like I'm tempting fate each time, but I've never had an illness with a fever, and I am pretty sure I can't. My normal temp is 96.8. If it ever got up to 98, I'd run to the ER. As for shots, I don't mind them at all, although I do have to look directly at the spot I'm about to get jabbed. I can't imagine looking away or closing my eyes. October 15, 2014 - Msg 99379: Asa, That is what we call it in these parts, it is sorta a time to meet and console with the family. In most cases it is the viewing, but not in this case it was a service of remembrance for him. I'm sure he did not want to be "viewed".. It is where I stand too, I don't want to be "viewed" but have folks just remember the "good times" we had. That was the case here, a lot of former co-workers friends & family got together to remember a good man's life....Sorta like the dash between birth----death. What we do between, that's our legacy. I think there is a country song that speaks on that. MDC, I think I'll go to Walgreens, I suppose since I'm "short" they'll use the short needle.. ha! Billy Ray, that low body temp probably come from being out in the rain,sleet,heat, and snow all the time. Postman have a built-in regulator, but they do get sore feet! October 15, 2014 - Msg 99381: Good morning, porch! Wow! It's 53� here in the Dallas area. That's cool, danged cool! Fall is in the air for sure, and it surely does feel good. The little wild things are just loving it! The squirrels are all fuzzed up, and running around acting all, well, squirrelly. One young female just arrived in the yard, carrying two big pecans in her mouth. She holds them by the common stem, so the pecans stick out on both sides of her face, like big swollen green cheeks. Their husk hasn't even dried yet, it's still green and closed. The nut inside would be quite bitter at this point, so she's burying them now, to wait for them to ripen. She just put one in a planter box, and is putting the other out in the middle of the yard. I've also seen her snooping around the peanut vines that grew in a flowerbed, where somebody planted some peanuts I had put out. She, or her buddies, will dig those peanuts up before long, but not yet, the vines are still green. It's so much fun to sit at this window and watch the critters, as they follow instinctive patterns for behavior. God is taking care of them. The most fun comes in watching them problem-solve, when something or someone (me) does something to thwart their natural patterns. They can all get very creative, even the birds. The birds are traveling in packs, and check my feeders regularly. Right now, I've mostly got doves, bluejays, sparrows, wrens and the occasional flicker. If I'm lucky, I'll be by the window when the goldfinches migrate through. They'll pass through in a big flock, looking more like canaries than wild birds, and they won't stay around but a few hour, and then will move on, but they're so beautiful, if I'm lucky enough to see them. Same with the cedar waxwings. They're so gorgeous, they almost don't look real, and they don't hang around either, but I usually get to see them as they pass through. There are still a few berries left on my American Beautyberry bush. If they discover them, they'll get every single berry before they leave. That's okay, that's why I planted the thing. I may plant a couple more. Well, I'd better get moving. Today is ESL class, and I like to get there early and get the room set up the way I want it. The custodian always sets it up like a classroom, with my table at the far front of the room, about fifteen feet away from the tables where the folks sit. Some of them are so timid, and their voices so soft, that I can't hear them, and it seems so formal. I like to drag my table closer to them, so we can just talk like friends. I had twelve last week, biggest class so far. They're trying so hard, and really doing quite well. Oh, welcome, Medwin Bill Medwin. Glad to have you visit, and we hope you'll come again. I sure hope they dont put ya in the cargo bay SPOT! have a fun trip. Say howdy to the linemen for me! Greetings to Medwin Bill Medwin. As a reminder to everyone, he was the bookie barber who took horse race bets instead of giving haircuts in Mayberry. So tell us why you chose that name as well a little about yourself including why the last name twice. A trivia question for everyone except our newcomer. Herb Virgan is the actor who played the bookie barber Bill Medwin. But he also had one other speaking role on The Andy Griffith Show. What character did he play and in what TAGS episode? Billy Ray the Postman, I hope you are satisfied with the answers given by MDC and Romeena about your gardening question. If you still need more information, I can research it for you. Don't hesitate to ask again. October 15, 2014 - Msg 99389: Good afternoon, porch. So, Medwin Bill Medwin, you have a new puppy? What kind? How old? Name? Most of us here on the porch are pet people, and like to know about the furkids. Mostly we seem to have dogs, but I'm sure there are some beloved cats as well. I like cats. I have a dog, but I like cats too. My daughter has a little mama kitty, sweetest little thing you ever could meet. She was feral, had kittens under my daughter's front steps, and didn't seem too concerned about people being around. So, they found homes for the kittens, got Mama Kitty spayed, and she waltzed into the house and settled in like she had been there forever. When they have company, she comes in the living room, sits her little self down, and just joins in the conversation. She looks at anyone who speaks, and will occasionally add a polite little "meow" to the conversation. She's a sweetheart. I've threatened to kidnap her. As PH indicated, some of us have been on the porch for a long time. I've been here almost from the first, since shortly after my husband passed, and that was in 1996. Some of us have met in person, which is always neat, but most of us haven't, and it doesn't matter. We've been together on the porch for long we feel like family. Poor Horatio, I believe Herb Vigran was the man at the studio gate when Andy and Aunt Bee and Opie went to Hollywood. Am I right? I saw my cardiologist this morning. He said everything looks great, and my pacer is barely being used. I can tell when it kicks in, and I very rarely feel it, so I guess that's a good thing. I've decided to live to be at least a hundred, and just drive my kids crazy. Well, this has been a busy day. ESL class this morning, then the doctor, then a home health visit, and I still have another visit to do, at 6. Sweet old fellow, 84 years old, and sharp as a tack. I enjoy my visits with him.
2019-04-26T04:56:48Z
http://tagsrwc.com/chitchat/archive/2014_10_15_99390.html
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2019-04-24T06:05:24Z
http://www.asmscience.org/content/book/10.1128/9781555816650.ch31
Discotech is an app that allows you to search, discover, and RSVP to the hottest clubs, lounges and live music events—it's the Kayak.com for nightlife. Before Discotech, the only way to get into the best clubs was through club promoters—middlemen who get paid on commission and take their large cut of fees. With Discotech, you can now browse through dozens of clubs, book your tickets, and enjoy the night seamlessly. Formerly in Private Equity at Bain and The Gores Group. Speaks fluent Mandarin with a degree from Berkeley in Business and Industrial Engineering. Founder of online lead gen company. Formerly at Zoosk. Alum of Univ. of Hong Kong and Berkeley. Formerly at image sensor architecture and design company Ambarella. Engineer at Zoran. Intern at NASA’s Ames research center. Berkeley alum. Ian and the team at Discotech have developed an innovative, revenue-positive business. The team has disrupted the large nightlife category and is poised for growth. They are great at UI and growth hacking. They have also pivoted well to include nightlife ticketing. Founded in 2012 by three UC Berkeley alumni who were tired of being exploited by club promoters, Discotech serves as a one-stop "virtual concierge" that helps users find events, buy tickets, book tables, and RSVP for guest lists. I've never met a team that hustles harder than Discotech. These guys know their problem, know their market, and are relentless in building the relationships and products that will solve a two-sided pain point. And as they gain scale, their two-sided platform only becomes more valuable and defensible. Discotech is so easy to work with. They provide quality general admission guests and table reservations on a consistent basis.Their technology is easy to integrate with and their back end is built to data-mine important customer information. On the consumer side, their app is fast, easy and reliable. The customer service they provide the nightclub goer is second to none, and is a great representation of our standards. We love working with Discotech! Normal guy looking to invest and be financially secure. The 65,000 clubs in the U.S. depend on club promoters: middlemen who take their cut of the pie and operate primarily through word-of-mouth. These 100,000+ individual promoters are difficult to manage, unreliable, and impossible to scale. We've grown our club partnerships over 50% in the last year and had 5,000 new registered users in June alone. And we've doubled our booking amount since 2015, of which we earn up to 20% on commission. We’ve partnered with the best clubs in the U.S. We have 7 of the top 10 clubs in the country. Just download Discotech and browse the most popular nightclubs in Las Vegas, Miami, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The nightlife space has long been plagued by inefficiency and non-transparent pricing. As avid nightlife customers, we here at Discotech have firsthand experience with the frustration and disappointment that comes with promoters and the traditional nightlife system. From these negative experiences, we realized there was an opportunity for a technology-driven company to streamline the process and bring transparency to nightlife. Over the last few years, our team has validated the concept and we have proven that the business is viable. By focusing on delighting our customers, we have grown past 65,000 registered users - primarily via word of mouth. In March of this year, we were able to achieve monthly break-even, and our revenues have continued to grow month over month since then. We have demonstrated that our model works, and now we are looking to scale the business by increasing our marketing and improving the platform via a larger engineering team. Going out with your friends is fun, however planning a night out is anything but. At Discotech, we believe that the nightlife industry is overdue for disruption and that a technological overhaul will solve the major problems in this space. We invite you to join us now as an investor and help us bring about the much needed change in this industry! We're taking nightlife from promoters and putting it back in the hands of club owners and their avid customers. It's a win-win scenario for both customers and clubs who are now finally able to track their guests and aren't losing money to dispersed middlemen. What Kayak.com did to travel agents, Discotech is doing to club promoters. We will be the mobile ticketing platform handling every entrance into the $26 billion U.S. club market and beyond. We are building the OpenTable for nightlife. Our mobile app allows users to discover events, purchase tickets, and sign up for VIP guest lists at nightlife venues in different cities. We are tackling the inefficiency and non-transparency that has been plaguing the nightlife space. People currently have to go through these nightclub promoters, traditional middlemen who are very hard to get in touch with and aren’t professional or very transparent when it comes to pricing. Our app makes it a lot easier for our customers to get the information they need, like accurate pricing, and ultimately, to make reservations very quickly without having to find these promoters, call them, text them, and go through a laborious process.Promoters get paid on commission. They’ll charge more if they know that the customer doesn’t know any better, just so that they can make more money out of it. Discotech is about working on a large scale and getting the lowest price possible for our customers. We save them money, make things easier, and we really just want to streamline this process, which we think is long overdue. Not only are we a good solution for the end customer, who’s ultimately the paying customer for the club, but we also make things a lot easier for the nightlife venue which is actually something we learned after we set out to do this. Clubs find promoters to be a pain point. There are a lot of them, they’re highly fragmented, there’s high turnover, and their loyalties are not steady. We make it easy and streamlined for the club to source them with customers. We’re nonbiased and at the end of the day, we’re much more professional to work with than different promoters calling and texting the club and serving as this inefficient middle man.Clubs leverage promoters as essentially their marketing team for the most part. Promoters are valuable because they’re the ones who have contact with the customers; they’re the ones who go out and do a lot of the marketing. Most clubs are mom and pop shops who don’t have a very sophisticated marketing teams so they develop this relationship with the promoters where they go out, bring in revenue, and make a commission on that.When promoters do rent out an entire club, these promoters still rely on other promoters to fill their venue because just like the club owners, they want to maximize the number of people in the venue so that the event is hot. They want make money on the people coming in because ultimately that’s what they’re getting paid out on. In these situations, Discotech maintains similar operations where our app helps them increase traffic to their venue through our end users.On the customer end, it’s a huge pain point for a customer without contacts to find out what’s going on, to know what’s hot in town and how to get access to those events. That’s magnified if you think internationally as well. We’re only focused domestically but imagine going to a foreign country where you don’t speak the language but you want to go out. Imagine how hard that process would be without something like this.Another problem that we’re solve for the clubs is that, in traditional methods, promoters go out and try to get people to come by putting them on a VIP list, but these people aren’t paying in advance. Clubs don’t know how many of those listed names are actually going to show up whereas with us, people are actually paying in advance. What do you have that traditional promoters don’t? There’s a lot that we do that traditional promoters cannot do. One of the main differences is access to data analytics that comes with our app. We’re able to see trends and analyze data based on which DJs are hot and which nights are good. We can do a lot more for the club in terms of these data analytics but we can also help them as a CRM system because we can reach out to our customers via push notifications which clubs cannot do themselves.We also work with clubs in Los Angeles to provide an exclusive loyalty platform where our customers are able to accrue loyalty points and, just like airline miles, exchange them for rewards. The clubs allow us to do this because they trust that we can keep accurate tabs on customer spending whereas a human promoter may not be the most trustworthy. How will you incentivize referrals? We don’t currently have a referral reward system but it’s something that is very high in our to do list. We really want to go the Uber and Dropbox route where customer can get rewards or get incentives for sharing Discotech with their friends and also for inviting people to the party and doing different actions on the app. The idea for Discotech really came to us as a team. We’re three guys from UC Berkeley, friends since college. None of us worked in the nightlife space so the idea came to us from the customer’s perspective. I think four or five years out of college, we were convening together in Las Vegas and we had spent a couple of hours tracking down different promoters and talking to them. We finally agreed on a price and then on the night of the event, we showed up as scheduled and we were told that our promoter had misquoted us. We don’t know this was an intentional bait and switch or if the promoter had just made a mistake.Either way, we were in a really tough spot. We actually ended up paying the extra amount that night but all the guys were just furious. We weren’t really having fun because we were bitter. While we were having drinks, we were just talking about how bad it tasted and it was really that experience that inspired us to search online to see if there was a company that was already solving this problem so that we as customers wouldn’t have to deal with this again.It was during that exploratory phase back in, I think 2013, that we saw there wasn’t anyone really solving this problem in a meaningful way by leveraging technology. We decided to do this as a side project at first. We built a demo for some of our friends and then got a lot of approval from the big nightlife players in Los Angeles where I was based at that time. It was from that point, we realized that this thing had legs and we quit our full time jobs and the team moved from San Francisco down to LA. We’ve been hustling ever since. Initially, when we started the app, we were focused on solving bottle service only so that target market was much smaller--typically wealthy males who spend a lot of money. We’ve since democratized the product, added on prefilled ticketing to our app, and also VIP guest lists. From there, we now target anyone who wants to go to a club at any point whether they want to get them for free, whether they want to pay for a ticket or whether they want to do the VIP bottle service which is the high-end package. We really make it accessible to everyone. Our demographics are split pretty evenly, slightly more men than women but it’s pretty close to 50:50 now. We see people of all sorts. From ages 21 to 35, I’d say is our target group but really people of all ages. The current market that we’re really focused on right now is nightclubs and lounges, however we also work with live music festivals such as Electric Daisy Carnival. If you look at some reports out there, I think the Nightlife Federation put out a report on the top hundred largest clubs and they’re doing about $1.5 billion in gross revenue. We estimate that our market in the United States is about $8 billion and around $25 billion globally. Of that $8 billion number, we estimate it’s about 80-85% due to alcohol sales, 60-65% of which is bottle service--the biggest segment. Then bar spend is probably around another 15-20%. The remaining difference comes from admission fees. Clubs are literally making more than half their revenue on bottle service. This percentage goes up for high end clubs.We’re already working with some bars, but not yet clubs or lounges. We’re also working with live music festivals like EDC, Ultra, Life Is Beautiful, Electric Zoo, some of the bigger EDM festivals that happen in America and so that’s a separate market all by itself and that’s somewhere we’re currently playing which impacts our adjustable market as well. How do venues use your app? To get on board the app is pretty straight forward. Once we give them the go-ahead, we simply need them to fill out a two-page Word document for us with all the information that we need. We then either work with the clubs or find pictures online ourselves to go live with the venue on our app and in regards to getting their events, we either scrape them directly from the event APIs, if they have them, or we have a scraper built that pulls them automatically from their website. I actually start the guest list because that’s much more simple for us to do it. Every club is slightly different but for the most part at a certain time, we provide the club with a list of names for the guest list and that list is literally printed out or the doorman will have it on an iPad and then as customers come in, they’ll get checked off the list and then they’ll be given free admission or discount admission--whatever that guest list perk should be. Bottle service works the same way. How does your app attract customers? We offer services that no other traditional promoter could. We have the most efficient, streamlined system out there and we give customers the experience of being treated like high status royalty. For example, in Vegas, because there are a lot of venues, we will actually provide the customer with a dedicated VIP host who will contact the customer and set up a time to greet them in front of the venue. The host will then walk them into the club so that they don’t have to wait in any line. They’re getting the highest VIP experience. At other clubs, we book tables for them. They’re in the system, and then when people show up at the door, they’ll check in with their first and last name and just pay at the venue. What can you do that traditional promoters can’t? One thing that we do that a traditional promoter can’t do is actually just sell tickets, pre-sell tickets. The incumbent way of buying tickets would be to go to different websites and checking out the prices and then purchasing them online. We make it very easy to buy tickets in a few clicks. The QR code is stored on the app so you don’t need to print anything out or find it in your email. This makes it very easy since there’s a scan at the venue that reads the tickets that you bought on our app. How did you guys start onboarding venues? We launched and started off in Los Angeles. From LA, we branched into Las Vegas which is the largest market in the United States. That was really done through the connections that we made here in LA. For Las Vegas, the team actually moved to a suburb of Las Vegas called Slumberland. We lived there for seven months. During that time, we on-boarded all the major players in Las Vegas onto our platform. The sale process initially was a lot more difficult. Getting the foot in the door wasn’t that easy when we didn’t really have traction in customers and customer referrals to back us up.Once we are able to get the foot in the door, the sales process is pretty straightforward. There’s really no risk for the club to be a part of our app because we don’t take an upfront subscription cost or a service fee. We only eat what we kill, the same way that traditional promoters do. For that reason, when we make the presentation to the clubs, they’re pretty receptive to us because they don’t really have anything to lose. I think we’re right now between 120 and 130 venues that are onboard the app. In addition to Vegas and LA, we’re also live in San Francisco, San Diego, Orange County, Miami and we’re starting to enter into other cities on the East Coast as well. In terms of number of venues, we’ve probably increased 50% over the last year. Adding venues onto the platform really isn’t our highest priority right now.We’re much more focused on getting users in the areas that we’re already in. In particular, we’re working on Los Angeles, which has really proven out to be a nice hub where we’ve achieved some kind of critical mass, and we’re starting to see a lot of organic downloads which is great. We’re really focused on gaining share rather than expanding without having the users that fall behind that.Month over month, we’re seeing more downloads. Last month, we, for the first time ever, broke 5,000 new registered users for June 2016. I believe our monthly active users is close to 16,000 off of a total install base of around 61-62,000 which we think is pretty solid.We also measure the unique number of visitors who come to our website so (www.Discotech.me). That number has also continued to grow every month as our SEO continues to improve. I believe those numbers are actually north of 34-35,000. We actually get more unique visitors to our website than we do to our app. Currently, we’re trying to funnel those people to our mobile app. Who acquires the user base? Historically, we’ve been doing all the grunt work. We started with digital marketing and guerilla tactics: going out to clubs and handing out cards. Once we had an initial feed of customers, they started talking and sharing it with their friends and now, all of our downloads at this moment and for the last number of months have been all organic. These are people searching for us on our website or just people spreading us through word of mouth because they like the product. Clubs today actually do offer us support when it comes to marketing so some of our good partners here in LA give us exclusive deals outside of the loyalty platform such as an exclusive guest list that’s only good for Discotech customers. One example would be Sound Nightclub which is a very prestigious and famous club in this country. On a number of nights, we’ll actually have a free one-hour open bar for our customers which, again, is exclusive to us. We provide them with Discotech wristbands to prove that they came in with Discotech and that helps us generate more buzz and more downloads. What’s the value per customer? Our lifetime value is definitely greater than our customer acquisition costs. For our paying customers, it’s a pretty high customer value because bottle service is such a high value item. Our average tables price costs around $1,500-1,600, of which we’re doing a little better than 10% blended margin so those customers are generating a lot of value per user. How much do you guys make? As far as we know, it’s pretty comparable to what promoters make. Right now, we are much more focused on growing users and building relationships with the clubs rather than maximizing our cash flow. We’ve kind of taken what was given to us, and we’re usually making between 10-15% commission on the traffic that we bring in.On the revenue side, growth has been great. Year over year, I think we’ve grown over 3x from where we were. I think around January of this year, we were probably doing around $100k in gross merchandise volume a month and now, we’re doing over $100k a month. We’ve definitively come a long way and we see that number continuing to grow especially as we gear up to launch our web app which we think will show an increase in our metrics. How do you plan to grow and expand? For us, we haven’t really been leveraging digital and paid marketing just because we’ve been very conservative and lean as a startup. We’ve been bootstrapping it. Where we really see the growth coming in is as follows:Continue to invest in the product, building out social features because nightlife is ultimately a social activity. You never do it by yourself; it’s something you do with your friends and the ability to see where your friends are going, invite your friends to events or parties--these are all part of the experience. Building in a referral program is something that we think would supercharge this organic growth that’s really been taking off for us.We want to get back involved in digital marketing and paid advertising. One of my co-founder’s backgrounds was doing that for five years at Zeus which is the online dating site. We think that we can do it in a very calculated and efficient manner. Lastly, we think that hiring the right people to help with community engagement, management, and social media would also be a big help for us because currently, we don’t have the human resources to really take full advantage of that and that’s something we’d like to look into. Have you focused on specific types of nightlife venues? What’s the biggest challenge for you guys? The most important thing for us is getting the users. I think we got the club on-boarding part down, at least for now. I think the hardest thing is just getting the word out, building a brand, and communicating that brand to our customers. Once you have that initial critical mass, things definitely get easier because when you’re discovering Discotech from your friend, you’re much more likely to trust that brand and that product than if you just saw it on a Facebook mobile ad or a Google ad. For us, we want to do things that build a strong initial following and then grows off of that. We want to take the strategy that we’ve used in LA and apply it in the different new cities that we’re launching in. There are a lot of plays that we can do that don’t currently exist. For example, a “Hotel Tonight” type of play with last minute deals because ultimately, a club operates very similarly to a hotel. They have a lot of overhead but selling a table or selling a hotel room doesn’t really have any incremental costs for them. They’re all about filling up that inventory. With the right data and the right connection to the customers, we can help clubs fill out, unfold inventory and have dynamic pricing like Uber.We want to incorporate surge pricing based on demand and inventory remaining. I think that is a really cool opportunity that would be disruptive in the space. People might possibly even bid on certain tables with customers being able to bid down or up. That’s something that doesn’t really exist today. For us, we also just want to make it a one-stop shop where people from different countries can get on one app and just make it very easy for them to get information and get onto the platform.There’s actually a few other potential things that we could be doing with the technology that we have. One of them is leveraging location based technology. For example, if you’re on the strip and you’re walking around and we know you open the app, then we know which clubs that you’re closest to. We could send you an exclusive deal or package. If it’s close to your birthday and we know that information, we can ping you in advance with a push notification offering you a special from the club that has birthday specials. There’s definitely a lot that we can do with customer data and location data to help with hyper targeting. There are other app players out there, but our biggest competitor is Tablelist. There have been a few players in the past who have tried to build products like ours that have failed. One more recognizable name is I think is EZ VIP. They’re actually on shark tank and they got funded by Mark Cuban. A lot of these players in the past were just nightclub promoters who thought that because they could promote well, they could go out and build a technology company and do this but that wasn’t true. They didn’t invest enough in operations and building out the technology and making sure things worked.We, on the other hand, are approaching this from the product side as a startup should. Then we figured out how clubbing works while doing it. That was much more easy for us. Again, our biggest competitor’s Tablelist. They’ve actually raised between $3-$4 million and they’re based down in Boston. Their stronghold is really that Boston, New York area. We don’t really run up against them. They don’t play in the markets here on the West Coast and we don’t really see them run up against us in Vegas either. We’re really racing, I think, to displace promoters in whichever markets that we’re in.Unlike Tablelist, however, we are much more focused on the broader market for nightlife. As their name implies, Tablelist, they’re much more focused on the VIP, the table part, which again while it is a big business, it does not address a lot of the ticketing and guest list needs of the masses. We also have a partnership with Wantickets who is the largest ticketing provider in the nightlife space. They’ve been in business for over 15 years and we have relationships with a good number of clubs. I’d say most clubs in the country. Our partnership with them gives us access to their ticketing inventory which gives us a lot more ticketing inventory than they have. Many times, the inventory for Wantickets is actually exclusive as well. The team is comprised of three founders. All three of us are UC Berkeley graduates, class of 2008. I (Ian) graduated from Berkeley with a degree in industrial engineering and business, and then started my professional career at Banning Company which is a management consulting firm. My office was based in San Francisco. After two years there, I moved down to LA and joined a medium sized private equity firm called The Gores Group which I believe had between $4-$5 billion of assets under management. Spent about a year and a half doing traditional M&A due diligence, mergers and acquisitions and then from year 1.5 to 2.5, I transitioned to an operational role at a couple of their portfolio companies. Our CTO Ian Bushong is an electrical engineer computer scientist graduate from UC Berkeley. I think he’s a region scholar and he started his career at a company called Ambarella. They’ve since gone public. They do semi conductor chips and software for video processing hardware and their biggest customer is GoPro. Our third co founder is named Mark Wu. After graduating from Berkeley with degrees in business and economics, he joined Zeus which is the online dating company and there, he specialized in digital marketing, user acquisition and search engine optimization. As CEO, I handle most of the business development for the business. Mark who’s our COO does a lot when it comes to design and helps with product management. Ian Bushong, our CTO, manages the product and the technology. We’re bringing on another full time developer very soon who is the former co-founder and CTO of a tech incubated company called Planted that raised over a million dollars. We’re really excited to be bringing him on board because he’s got a lot of relevant experience and we think he can hit the ground running. Then we also have interns who help us with operations and marketing. We also have contractors who helped us with tech development products from time to time as well. Discotech Inc develops and distributes the mobile application, Discotech. Discotech is a free to download application on iOS and Android platforms that allows users to browse events, reserve tables, purchase tickets, and sign up for VIP guest lists at nightlife venues in different cities. Discotech is currently partnered with over 130 nightlife venues in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Miami, San Diego, Orange County, San Francisco, and New York. We make it more efficient and transparent for our customers to make plans and enjoy a night out. Our company generates revenue from commissions we earn on table reservations, ticket sales, and guest list traffic that are sourced or transacted on our mobile application. In 2016, commissions from table reservations has comprised 76% of our company's net revenue. Guest list and ticket sales comprise 19% and 5% of our total net revenue respectively. In 2016 to date, we have generated approximately $153,000+ in net revenue off $1,350,000+ in gross merchandise volume. Our table reservation feature generates between a 10% and 20% commission on the gross spend of our end customers depending on the nightlife venue that we are partnered with. When a customer reserves a table on Discotech, we book the table on behalf of our customer with the nightlife venue, and then we follow up by providing confirmation and instructions to the customer. The customer ultimately checks in at the venue under their name, and pays for the table at the venue. (You can think of this service as "OpenTable for Nightlife") For payment, Discotech receives commission from our venue partners based on a percentage of our customer's gross spend. For ticket sales, Discotech handles the transaction directly on the platform. We sell tickets at face value + service fee to our end customers, who receive a digital ticket and QR code which they can use at the door to gain admission to the event. Discotech returns the face value portion of the ticket back to our club partners, and keeps the service fee as our commission for the transaction. Our ticket prices are always less than or equal to the price of tickets that are available directly on a nightlife venue's own website. Lastly, for guest list admission, we allow customers to add their names to a club or lounge's VIP guest list. At the venue, our customers can check in with their first and last name to receive free or discounted admission to the event. For generating this foot traffic, our venue partners pay us between a $3-$5 commission for every guest that checks in via our guest list. In the immediate future, we expect to see continued growth through the summer season. We expect to see our performance slow in the Winter of 2017, before expanding significantly in the Spring of 2017. (We have seen this pattern in the previous two years we have been in business) In addition to the strong organic growth that has been gaining momentum month over month, we believe that a future catalyst to our growth will be the launch of our web app product. Currently, our website is purely a lead generation platform to our Discotech mobile app. Visitors to our website are unable to create accounts, reserve tables, or make transactions on the website. To date, we are seeing over 2x as many unique visitors to our website compared to our mobile app. We believe the launch of our web app will result in a step function increase to all of our key performance metrics. Through the next 2-4 years, the management team forecasts continued YoY growth as we expand our app to new cities domestically and internationally. We also believe that new feature releases will be a source of continued growth and monetization. While the team is relentlessly focused on growing the business, our ultimate goal is to sell the company to a strategic buyer when the timing and opportunity are right. Economic downturn - Discotech, along with the nightlife industry, are susceptible to changes in discretionary spending and broader macro-economic shifts. Competition - Although the industry does not currently have any strong technological players, we could see this shift over time. Additionally, it is possible that a larger player from an adjacent market (such as OpenTable or Priceline) may enter into our space. While we think that these players are more likely to acquire players, there exists a non-zero chance that they decide to enter the space organically. Legislative Changes - Any legal changes surrounding alcohol consumption or nightlife regulation has the potential to negatively impact our business. Talent/HR - any significant changes to our management team or developer team would have a significant impact on the productivity of our business. Discotech currently has $172K in cash, $21K in accounts receivables, and $2K in current liabilities. The Company's networking capital is $191K. We are not currently burning cash on a monthly basis as our gross profit surpasses our expenses. We do not enter into investments for trading or speculative purposes. Our policy is to invest any cash in excess of our immediate requirements in investments designed to preserve capital and provide liquidity. Accordingly, our cash and cash equivalents are invested primarily in demand deposit accounts, certificates of deposit and money market funds that are currently providing only a minimal return. We anticipate using our available cash and the proceeds of this offering to expand our team and to invest in user-acquisition. Our most pressing hiring needs are for software developers and full time customer service/business development employees. Additional cash in the war chest will be used to acquire additional users via digital marketing, promotions, and SEO improvements. Discotech has a very disciplined and bottom-line focused management team, and we do not anticipate running our business with a burn rate which would put our company at risk of running out of cash. Although the proceeds of this offering are not necessary to the viability of our business (we are already profitable), it will be integral for: 1) Developing a functional web app, 2) Developing new features to our mobile application, and 3) Expanding to new geographies. We believe that building a new product line, improving our existing technology, and expanding to new cities will result in significant growth to all of our key metrics. Ultimately, we believe that this investment will have a positive ROI in the form of greater positive cash flows, and a boost to our multiplier when we exit the business. Our cash held as of July 25, 2016 is 84% greater than cash held as of the same date in 2015. This increase resulted primarily from new investments (new convertible notes and SAFE notes issued) and improvements to our business operations in 2016. We saw our cash position decline between July 2015 through February of 2016 since we had not yet achieved cash flow break even. Cash flow from the Company's operating activities are derived from net income/losses and changes to our accounts receivables. Net cash provided by operating activities was -$133,433 for the year ended 2015, which was driven by a net operating loss of -$104,910 and a $28,523 increase in accounts receivable. Net cash provided by operating activities was -$121,096 for the year ended 2014, which was driven by a net operating loss of -$117,623 and a $3,473 increase in accounts receivable. We have financed our operations over the past few years through convertible notes that we issued in 2013 and 2014 to the sum of $405,000. In March of 2016, our business operations became profitable, so we are also funding Discotech now through the cash flow that is being generated by our core business. Discotech does not currently use, and has never used a revolving loan facility or bank loan - we do not have any long term debt. Operationally, our total net revenue increased by $81K, or 227%, from 2014 to $117K in the year ended 2015. This increase was primarily driven by an increased customer install base, which increased by 160% from the prior year (14,892 at year end 2014 to 38,780 at year end in 2015). We have enjoyed our fastest growth in 2016. We have generated over $60K in net revenue in the months of May and June combined, and we are expecting to drive $40K in the month of July. We expect these trends to continue in the current fiscal year and in the coming few fiscal years. The key driver to our growth stems from the number of new users that we are able to onboard onto Discotech. In 2016, we have seen our new downloads skyrocket through word of mouth and other organic channels. As our user base continues to grow, the virality of our product grows alongside it as there are now more people to share the app with new potential customers. Furthermore, Discotech is constantly investing in our product and developing new features that will improve our customer experience. We believe that this will result in greater virality of our product, higher engagement rates, and greater monetization over time. As mentioned before, we believe that the launch of our web app product will be a significant boost to our business as it will allow us to target customers who are not looking to download a new app to book a night out. Over the past few years, we have demonstrated that there is a clear need for our product in the nightlife industry, that our customers love Discotech and are actively sharing it with their friends, and that we can generate revenue in a profitable manner. I believe that our team will drive consistent growth into the future, and additional capital will allow us to make smart investments that will supercharge our business. 1 1. Economic/Market Risks - Although the nightlife industry has been on a steady rise over time, it is susceptible to broader changes in the macro-economic environment. Because nightlife is often associated with the luxury and discretionary spend category, significant declines to the domestic/global economic health could reduce demand for nightlife spend. 2 2. Competitor Risk - There is a risk that larger reservation platforms such as OpenTable or Priceline could enter into our space. (We believe they are more likely to acquire into this space rather than start from scratch, but its a possibility) Furthermore, Discotech competes with other start ups that are also competing to disrupt the nightlife space. 3 3. Talent Risk - A key assumption to our growth is the ability to hire and bring on talent that will help us improve our product, operations, and marketing. Finding the right employee fit for Discotech takes time, and a delay in the recruitment process could hinder our growth. 4 4. Privacy Risk - Discotech stores customer data on our servers. While we treat this data with the utmost importance and take measures to safeguard this data, there exists risk of data breach / hacking that presents itself as a risk to our business. $100,000 1. Hire full-time software developer to support our development of web application and new features for the app. Discotech is the one nightclub app that has shined for us, and are so easy to work with! They produce what they say they will, and have established a great network for promotions and tables. They communicate well, are on top of all of our events, and have the knowledge of events and clients that I haven't seen with anyone else. And, they bring clients and guests! We have had nothing but great experiences with Discotech and look forward to our continuing relationship with them. Ian and the Discotech team are some of the brightest entrepreneurs I have ever come across. The journey that they share living and working together in San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles is truly inspiring. They have demonstrated perseverance and resourcefulness that gives me great confidence that they will be successful no matter what obstacles come their war. Boss and mom. Dabbling in small investments, REIT's, and 401k. Just started investing last year. Very new. Founder and CBO of The Wark Group. I am an IT professional working in Atlanta. Excited to be an investor in early stage companies like Discotech. Hi guys! Can't wait to see Discotech grow! I posted on FB which every person involved needs to do! The AP has so much potential but needs to be seen and used! This would have been huge when I was still in the scene! Good luck! Good luck fellas. I think you are all very smart young people and I like your story. I live in NYC. While not really into the club scene, I can see this being a valuable tool. Will test it out sometime soon. Good luck! Good day, My name is Zachary and I just invested in your idea and I look forward to your success. As a tech nerd myself I am obviously interested in all things technology. The opportunities unleashed thanks to ever evoling technology is truely a blessing. I await to hear about your future endeavours. Thank you for letting us be apart of this and God Bless. Hello, This is Anish and I am a software engineer. I love the idea of this business and I personally think you guys are doing great with this. I wish I can be more help to you guys. Strong Believer of Disruptive Thinking !! Ardent Believer of Disruptive Thinking./. Hi guys, it's great to learn more after retiring! Upon completion of my goal, I will contact you soon. Thanks. The following interview is with Ian Chen CEO of Discotech, the company that created Discotech Nightlife. Tell us a little bit about your company Discotech is essentially your virtual nightlife host. Our mobile app allows users to discover events, reserve bottle service, purchase pre-sale tickets, and sign up for VIP guest lists at nightlife venues in different cities. Online ticketing provider Wantickets has announced an exclusive partnership with nightlife app Discotech that will allow users to purchase tickets directly in the mobile app on their Android or iPhone devices. Founded in 2012 by three UC Berkeley alumni who were tired of being exploited by club promoters, Discotech serves as a one-stop "virtual concierge" that helps users find events, buy tickets, book tables, and RSVP for guest lists. Discotech is the free mobile nightlife app that allows users to browse events, request VIP & bottle service, purchase tickets, and explore nightlife in their area Want to enjoy a night out, but want to avoid all of the unnecessary hassles associated with a night on the town? Well, fear no more. It's silly to try to do and learn everything yourself, learn to surround yourself and rely on others to help you along the journey! Ian Chen was born and raised in the suburbs of Potomac, Maryland. Growing up, Ian was always a bit of a geek. Discotech's mission is to bring transparency and efficiency to the grossly outdated nightlife reservation space. The team is new to the Las Vegas tech community. Discotech is the premier nightlife app for customers to browse events, sign up for guestlists, and book tables at their favorite clubs. 21 Jul 2014 Posted by admin NNightlife: a ritual governed by uncertainty. Methodical showering, dressing, primping. Scouting a swank spot. Waiting in line to pass muster with the gatekeeper. Maybe getting in if you are one of the chosen few or, if you are not, walking away disappointed with your tail between your legs. Fans of the growing nightlife app genre have one more option to choose from on iOS, as Discotech has announced the launch of its app of the same name. The app allows users to browse local clubs, see which DJs are playing, sign onto guest lists, book tables and more, eventually earning loyalty points for the money they spend.
2019-04-22T16:29:16Z
https://wefunder.com/discotech
2018-01-02 Assigned to SILICON VALLEY BANK, AS ADMINISTRATIVE AGENT reassignment SILICON VALLEY BANK, AS ADMINISTRATIVE AGENT SECURITY INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS). Assignors: GENBAND US LLC, SONUS NETWORKS, INC. In a method and system for managing at least one media stream from a media source to a media destination, where the media stream passes through at least one network, providing a media manager for managing the media stream and the at least one network for performing at least one of the management functions bandwidth management, media hairpin detection, media path control, equal access or preventing media backhauling. In the media manager at least one of the media stream information types media routing, receive transport address, routed receive transport address, source network, destination network, media stream identifier, or bandwidth of the media stream is stored for a time period during which the media stream exists in the at least one network. The media manager uses at least one of the stored information types for performing at least one of the management functions. This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/314,119, filed Dec. 21, 2005, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety. The present application relates to media stream management on the internet. When communicating media over the internet, five problems arise: bandwidth management; hairpinning; backhauling; media path control; and equal access. These problems will be discussed below, such as in the context of Voice-over-Internet-Protocol (VoIP). It should be understood of course that the present application relates to any type of media stream management on the internet. By way of background, the “Open Systems Interconnection” protocol (OSI) comprises a seven layer model: application (layer 7); presentation (layer 6); session (layer 5); transport (layer 4); network (layer 3); data link (layer 2); and physical (layer 1). For VoIP, so-called “user agents” (UA) operating at the application layer send and receive information packets by use of the Session Internet Protocol (SIP), SDP, H.323, MGCP, Megaco etc. SIP and SDP are by far the most commonly used protocol for VoIP based communications. First, the problem of bandwidth management will be discussed. According to the low-level design scheme, information to be communicated is broken down into discrete packets of information, and these packets are directed from an originating endpoint to a destination endpoint. A higher level protocol is used to establish a connection between the endpoints. Accordingly, a virtual communications link is established and a long message is broken down into multiple packets and sent by the sender. The receiving end collects these packets and reassembles them into the original long message. However, the individual packets that comprise the message may travel over different routes to reach the endpoint, depending on network availability, loading, etc. When transmitting e-mail, web pages, and data files or the like, it is generally not crucial that data be transmitted in real-time, i.e., delays in the data transmission are generally acceptable if the intervening network is heavily loaded. However, with respect to real-time interactive communications, such as VoIP and videoconferences, excessive delay can make the communication unworkable. Therefore, for such real-time interactive media communications, properly allocating and managing the bandwidth is important. Also, as discussed hereafter, the problems of hairpinning, equal access, and backhauling need to be managed. Now the problems known as “hairpinning”, “bandwidth management” “media path control”, “equal access” and “backhauling” will be explained. Hairpinning describes the situation where the caller and callee are in the same network. Bandwidth management is a problem where a network has to manage how bandwidth is allocated for multimedia sessions based on policies for network topology or network users. Bandwidth management is necessary in order to provide guaranteed QoS (Quality of Service) to sessions and media streams which are admitted in the network and to prevent sessions from being established through the network where bandwidth is not available (using policy). Bandwidth may be tracked on single networks or between networks. Media Path Control is a problem where in order to control the QoS provided to a session media or to route the media through incompatible networks, the media stream needs to be routed through specific network elements (generally called media gateways or MGs). Media path is controlled independently from the path session signaling takes, especially in VoIP where the two paths are setup using different protocols (e.g. SIP for signaling and SDP for media). Equal access is a regulatory requirement which allows a subscriber to access long distance services by dialing a special code on his phone before dialing the intended recipient, thereby choosing a carrier of his choice. The user's service provider thus has to open up access to his physical infrastructure or service to third party long distance providers. For VoIP and other Internet based applications this may mean that the session signaling (that is, a signal to begin a call such as “INVITE”) and/or media stream must be routed to a third party long distance provider. Media backhauling is a problem where media is upstreamed to the provider's core network where the service offered is controlled instead of being routed through a shorter path between the subscribers. The shorter path, which is preferred, is either a direct path between the subscribers of through local servers located close to the subscribers who do not have the service intelligence. Session Border Controllers today integrating or coupling some forms of media management. It is an object to improve media stream management on the internet in the problem areas of bandwidth, hairpinning, media path control, equal access, and/or backhauling. In a method and system for managing at least one media stream from a media source to a media destination, where the media stream passes through at least one network, providing a media manager for managing the media stream and the at least one network and for performing at least one of a plurality of management functions, wherein the plurality of management functions include bandwidth management, media hairpin detection, media path control, equal access or preventing media backhauling. Storing in the media manager at least one of a plurality of media stream information types, wherein the plurality of media stream information types include media routing, receive transport address, routed receive transport address, source network, destination network, media stream identifier, or bandwidth of the media stream is stored for a time period during which the media stream exists in the at least one network. The media manager uses at least one of the stored information types for performing at least one of the management functions. FIGS. 6A/6B show the six steps and the different types of information for the particular media stream present and which are stored in the media manager for the media path control and equal access management examples of FIG. 5 (in a media routing scenario). For the purposes of promoting an understanding of the principles of the invention, reference will now be made to the preferred embodiment illustrated in the drawings and specific language will be used to describe the same. It will nevertheless be understood that no limitation of the scope of the invention is thereby intended, such alterations and further modifications in the illustrated device, and/or method, and such further applications of the principles of the invention as illustrated therein being contemplated as would normally occur now or in the future to one skilled in the art to which the invention relates. does not work in an ASP/ISP model where the signaling proxy may be owned by the ASP and the L3 (layer 3) network is owned by an ISP. FIG. 1 shows a media management system of the preferred embodiment where media stream management functions are used for a SIP call. It only shows INVITE request processing (known as call or session signaling) since all functions can be illustrated using that request as an example (an INVITE request is an invitation from a caller 13 (media destination 12) initiating a telephone call in VoIP to a callee 17 (media source 16). The processing for responses and other requests containing media information is identical. A media manager MM may independently exist and connects to the other components shown (SIP proxy 11 (a server), and media gateways MG1, MG2) via standard or proprietary interfaces/protocols. The media manager MM may be bundled up with the SIP proxy 11 and/or MG (media gateway) elements MG1, MG2 (See FIG. 2) as well. FIG. 1 shows the information flow which illustrates the method used and the algorithm which is common to all deployment models. In FIG. 1 the media manager MM holds the different types of media stream information (known as “information types” hereafter) for a particular media stream relating to the service being provided. For example, these information types are typically: 1) media routing information for the stream, denoted by MR, 2) destination transport addresses for the stream denoted by RX and NRX which contain an IP address and port pair, 3) source network SRC and destination network DEST information; and 4) bandwidth B/W information. The AS is the Application Server which controls the service, and may be bundled within the SIP proxy 11 as shown in FIG. 1, but it need not be. In a typical SIP call, the caller 13 (media destination 12) places the call on path 14 through the SIP proxy 11 to the application server AS along path 8, then back to the SIP proxy 11 along path 9, and then to the callee 17 (media source 16) along path 15. The SIP proxy 11 sends media stream update message (arrows 2 and 4) to the media manager MM to establish information types for a media stream in the media manager MM. Thus, the media manager MM can keep track of each media stream it knows in the networks it is managing, like the ISP Network 18. If the media stream is allowed by local policy and configuration on the media manager, it sends Media Stream OK message (arrows 3 and 5) to the SIP proxy 11. Otherwise, the Media Stream OK message is not sent (details not shown) and the SIP proxy 11 may decide the handling of the call at that point based on its own policy. At the end of the call, the SIP proxy 11 deletes the information types from the media manager MM (call termination is not shown). Details of the different stored media stream information types in the media manager MM are shown in FIGS. 3A/3B, 4A/4B, and 6A/6B. The method of FIG. 1 is applicable to both of the scenarios where 1) a media stream is routed through an intermediate system as shown in FIG. 1 (i.e., the media gateways MG1, MG2); or 2) sent directly between the caller 13 and the callee 17, the example shown in FIG. 2. FIG. 1 will now be described in greater detail. First call signaling will be described. The caller 13 (media destination 12) initiates a SIP INVITE on the path 14 to the SIP proxy/SBC 11 in the ASP network 10. The SIP proxy 11 is linked by paths 8, 9 to the application server AS. The application server AS and the SIP proxy 11 send the SIP INVITE along path 15 to the callee 17 (media source 16). Now media stream flow will be described. The ISP network shows media stream flow and includes the media manager MM and media gateway MG1 linked to the caller 13 via path 19, and media gateway MG2 linked to the callee 17 via path 20. Dashed line 21 shows the MM/MG1 interface path in the ISP network 18. Dashed line 22 shows the MM/MG2 interface path in the ISP network 18. Dashed line 7 shows the MM/SBC interface path between the ISP network media manager MM and ASP network SIP proxy/SBC 11. All three of these dashed lines are illustrated in the legend key at 26. Dashed line 23 shows the media stream path for the media stream (RTP/UDP) from media gateway MG1 to media gateway MG2. The legend key for this dashed line is indicated at 25. Solid lines 14, 8, 9, and 15, relating to legend key 24, indicate the path for the session (also known as call) signaling SIP/H.323/Megaco/RTSP. As shown in FIG. 1, the media manager MM performs one or more of the following management functions: bandwidth management; media hairpin detection; media path control; equal access management; and preventing media backhauling into the ASP network 10 used for session signaling. FIG. 2 shows a SIP call flow to illustrate hairpin detection, bandwidth management, and media backhauling prevention. The information types which are stored in the media manager MM in FIG. 2 and the information types being sent to and from the media manager are shown in FIGS. 3A/3B and FIGS. 4A/4B. In FIGS. 2, 3A/3B, and 4A/4B, a caller 13 places a call and the application server AS (where service is controlled) detects that a caller 13 is in the same network A (27) (which can be the ISP network in FIG. 1 but with media gateways) as the callee 17. The application server AS in network E (29), which is another ISP network, routes the call back into network A. At this point, the application server AS forwards the INVITE which is sent to the callee 17. The caller 13 and callee 17 are assumed to be in the same network A as shown at 27. The media manager MM and the media gateway MG are shown as a bundled system 6 in this example for simplicity. The interaction between the media manager MM and media gateway MG is not the subject of this preferred embodiment, but rather the subject of this preferred embodiment are the techniques used in the media manager MM which stores media stream information types to provide the indicated management functions. In FIG. 2, the steps which occur during session signaling when the caller places the SIP INVITE call are indicated by circles 1-6. In step 1, caller 13 initiates the SIP INVITE call on path 14 to the SIP proxy 11. In step 2 the SIP proxy 11 may send the media stream update message 2 containing information types to the media manager in the bundled network 6 via path 7. The media manager then replies with the media stream OK message 3 if the media stream is allowed. In step 3 the SIP proxy sends the SIP INVITE on path 8 to the application server AS in network E (29), and the SIP INVITE then returns on path 9 to the SIP proxy 11 (step 4). In step 5, the media manager MM in bundled system 6 may send a media stream update message 4 to the media manager. The media manager then replies with media stream OK message 5 if the media stream is allowed. Thereafter in step 6 the SIP proxy 11 forwards the SIP INVITE on path 15 in step 6 to the callee 17. FIGS. 3A/3B and 4A/4B will now be explained. In both figures, media routing for intra-network sessions is not required by the media manager MM policy configuration. FIGS. 3A/3B is the case where the media manager has been configured to route media for calls expected to be between networks A and E. FIGS. 4A/4B is the case where this is not required and shows the difference in stored information types on the media manager MM. In step 1, only one media stream is shown on path 14 for simplicity (call INVITE) and the receive transport address (IP address and port) of this media stream are shown as information type RX under the SDP (session description protocol) designation. In step 2 at path 7, the media stream update message 2 has information type MR (media routing) which contains information derived by executing media routing policy for the call expected at this point to be between networks A and E. The media manager MM expects to media route this call since MR(A,E) is “on”. In FIGS. 3A/3B and 4A/4B, the information types required for hairpin detection are: source network (Src-Network); destination network (Dest-Network); media routing (MR); and destination transport address (IP address and port) (marked as Dest IP). A port represents an end point or “channel” for network communication. Different ports allow different applications on a same computer to utilize network resources without interfering with each other. In FIGS. 3A/3B and 4A/4B, the information types required for bandwidth management are: bandwidth (B/W) calculated when processing the event; Dest IP (with port); MR; Src-Network; and Dest-Network. The bandwidth allocated to the media stream is stored as an information type corresponding to the media stream. The information for the source and destination network of the streams may also be maintained though they can be calculated using the former stored information values. The method for computing bandwidth for the networks can be described as follows. For all media streams maintained, the bandwidth used for source and destination networks is aggregated as well as the bandwidth used between these networks. This may be an alternative to maintaining the network at runtime. The information types required for backhaul prevention are: the Dest-IP (with port), MR; SRC Network; and Dest Network. The media manager MM thus maintains the information types of the media stream. The media manager MM computes various information types for the media stream as well as other objects like source and destination network or intermediate networks which it is aware the media stream will pass through. Some examples of this computation are illustrated for network A. Note that all of the computations are actually derived from the information types maintained for the media stream itself, and it can be either stored or computed on demand based on the media manager MM's knowledge of the media streams. The media manager MM uses information from the SIP proxy 11 to determine where the media stream is destined to go (based on transport address RX) and what the tentative source network is where it will be originated (based on Call-Dest-Network). This latter source network is where the SIP proxy thinks the media stream is destined to. The media routing MR information type for the call is determined using the source and destination information type media routing—MR(A, E)=on. This preferred embodiment focuses on the use of stored media stream information types maintained on a per media stream basis to implement the management functions. Using the media stream information types, the media manager MM can compute the bandwidth used between various networks or for a single network. For example, the bandwidth between network A and network E is 1 Mbps since it is known that there is a single media stream which is expected to exist originating from network E and terminating on network A. Note that the computation can be done for any object as long as its relationship to the media stream is known. For example the information type bandwidth (BW) can also be computed for a transit network as long as the topology is known of how the transit network is located between networks A and E. In summary, in step 2 the SIP proxy 11 sends a media stream update message 2 containing information types for the particular media stream to the media manager which are then stored by the media manager. Steps 3 and 4 are executed by the SIP Proxy and Application server and simply result in the SIP message to be forwarded along the indicated paths. In step 5, the SIP proxy sends the Media Stream Update message 4 to the media manager which contains the same information it sent earlier in Step 2 to the media manager. The media manager MM finds a “hit” in its run time cache/database of media streams it knows already exists in the network A. The hit is based on either the receive address RX (IP/port information) or the unique ID (FIGS. 4A/4B). When a hit is found, the media manager MM retrieves and updates the information types it created for the media stream in previous step 2. It now knows that the source network of the media stream is where the INVITE is destined to (which is network A itself) and re-applies the media routing policy. This is the hairpinning management scenario. The MM determines by applying the policy for media routing network A, MR(A, A) and determines that it is disabled. Since media routing is no longer necessary (directed by policy in the example), the media manager MM pushes the old media destination stored in the Dest-IP information type as NRX in the Media Stream OK message 5 to the SIP Proxy 11. In step 5, the bandwidth for network A is also updated. It is now known that there are no expected media streams between the networks A and E, and there is a single media stream within network A. So B/W(A,E)=0 Mbps and B/W(A,A)=1 Mbps. Since the SIP proxy 11 is able to push back the old media destination in the INVITE, media backhauling to the network C (or the application server or the SIP Proxy) is prevented. In this way, it is prevented unless necessary (e.g. for private to public network calls). For the bandwidth management function, the media manager creates an aggregated bandwidth value for at least one network from values of the bandwidth information type of at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through the at least one network. A new media stream is disallowed from setup in the at least one network if the aggregated bandwidth value exceeds an administratively provided bandwidth value in the media manager for the at least one network. The media source and the media destination may lie in the at least one network being managed. Also for bandwidth management, a media stream may be passing through at least two networks; and the media manager creates an aggregated bandwidth value for the at least two networks from values of the bandwidth information type of the at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through the at least two networks. For the media hairpin detection function the media manager detects that values of the information types source network and destination network of at least one media stream are the same. The media manager performs the backhauling prevention function by not routing a media stream in case a management determined policy of the media manager between media source network and media destination network does not require the media stream to be routed through a media gateway. FIG. 5 shows a media routing scenario, and more specifically a solution for media path control and equal access. Steps 1-3 are the same as in FIGS. 2 and 3A/3B. The point where it differs is steps 4 and 5, as shown in FIGS. 6A/6B. In step 4, the application server AS or the SIP proxy 11 may decide that in fact this call needs to pass through a provider selected by the user or administrator. If this information is decided by the application server AS, it is sent in the same INVITE back to the SIP proxy 11. The SIP proxy 11 may also invoke local policy to determine that the call needs to be sent through an interim network, as well (network I). In step 5, the same as before in FIGS. 2, 3A/3B, and 4A/4B, there is a “hit” with the previous information types stored for the existing media stream. The SIP Proxy also sends the Media Stream Update message 4 for the interim network with the Call-Interim-Network=I information type. The existing information types are updated as well as the new information types created since there is more than one media stream. As shown in FIG. 5, the new network which is inserted in the middle of the call is the IXC network I labeled 40. The media manager MM in this example inserts two media gateways MG1 and MG2 into the media stream and updates the information types with the media stream OK message 5 for the individual media streams as indicated in step 5. These media gateways MG are selected based on the information provided by the SIP Proxy in the Call-interim-Network information type. The example shows two media gateways MG1 and MG2, but in reality there could be just one or more than two. These are connected by path 43 to each other and via paths 41 and 42 to caller 13 and callee 17, respectively. The information types are updated for stream 1 and the new information types are created for stream 2 as shown. Example computations for networks A and I are shown as well. Like for FIGS. 3A/3B, FIGS. 6A/6B show the six steps and explain the stored information types of the media manager MM, but for the equal access example of FIG. 5 as explained above. For the media path control function the media manager based on stored information types alters media source and media destination information type values of a media stream by altering values of at least some of the stored information types of the media stream and creating a new media stream with associated information types having new values, and sending the routed receive transport address of the new media stream to the media source. For the equal access management function the media manager inserts at least one media gateway of a long distance carrier chosen by the media destination centrally of the at least one media stream. The media manager inserts the at least one media gateway, based on provisional information stored in said media manager, by altering a value of at least one of the information types of the media stream, and sending the routed receive transport address of the media stream to the media source. The ISP Network and the ASP network are shown separated for the preferred embodiment only; they may, however, be administratively controlled by the same entity and the separation may either not exist or be purely logical where the ASP network represents the core of the same network and the ISP network represents the access of the same network. a protocol used between the media gateway MG and the media manager MM could be anything. This listing of some possible variations is not intended to limit the scope of this disclosure which is showing a preferred embodiment among many possible embodiments. In the preferred embodiment, the media manager is not required to have the capabilities of managing all the indicated functions but may perform only one of the management functions indicated. While a preferred embodiment has been illustrated and described in detail in the drawings and foregoing description, the same is to be considered as illustrative and not restrictive in character, it being understood that only the preferred embodiment has been shown and described and that all changes and modifications that come within the spirit of the invention both now or in the future are desired to be protected. said media manager using at least one of said stored information types for performing at least one of said management functions. 2. The method of claim 1 wherein said bandwidth management function comprises the steps of: creating an aggregated bandwidth value for said at least one network from values of said bandwidth information type of said at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through said at least one network. 3. The method of claim 2 wherein a new media stream is disallowed from setup in said at least one network if said aggregated bandwidth value exceeds an administratively provided bandwidth value in said media manager for said at least one network. 4. The method of claim 2 wherein the media source and the media destination lie in said at least one network being managed. 5. The method of claim 1 wherein for bandwidth management, said at least one media stream is passing through at least two networks; and said media manager creates an aggregated bandwidth value for said at least two networks from values of said bandwidth information type of said at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through said at least two networks. 6. The method of claim 1 wherein for said media hairpin detection function said media manager detects that values of the information types source network and destination network of said at least one media stream are the same. 7. The method of claim 1 wherein for the media path control function said media manager based on stored information types alters the media source and media destination information type values of said at least one media stream by altering values of at least some of the stored information types of said at least one media stream and creating a new media stream with associated information types having new values, and sending the routed receive transport address of said new media stream to the media source. 8. The method of claim 1 wherein for the equal access management function said media manager inserts at least one media gateway of a long distance carrier chosen by said media destination centrally of said at least one media stream. 9. The method of claim 8 wherein said media manager inserts said at least one media gateway, based on provisional information stored in said media manager, by altering a value of at least one of the information types of said at least one media stream, and sending the routed receive transport address of said at least one media stream to said media source. 10. The method of claim 1 wherein said media manager performs said backhauling prevention function by not routing said media stream in case a management determined policy of said media manager between said media source network and said media destination network does not require the at least one media stream to be routed through a media gateway. 11. The method of claim 1 wherein said media manager is provided inside an SIP server. 12. The method of claim 1 wherein said media manager is provided inside a media gateway. 13. The method of claim 1 wherein said at least one network has at least one media gateway and said media manager controls said at least one media gateway. 14. The method of claim 1 wherein said media manager communicates with a session server which comprises an SIP proxy. 15. The method of claim 1 wherein the media stream comprises a voice-over internet protocol media stream. 16. The method of claim 1 wherein said at least one network has at least one media gateway and the media manager is bundled with the media gateway. 17. The method of claim 1 wherein said media manager communicates with a session server which comprises an SBC server. 18. The method of claim 1 wherein said at least one network comprises an ISP network with at least one media gateway and an RTP path. 19. The method of claim 1 wherein said at least one network has no media gateways and an RTP path between the media source and the media destination. 20. The method of claim 1 wherein during a signaling session, an invitation is sent from the media destination to the session server, then to the media manager, then to the application server, then from the application server back to the session server, then through the media manager to the session server, and then to the media source. 21. The method of claim 1 wherein a session server with which said media manager communicates is in an ASP network and said media manager is in an ISP network. 22. The method of claim 1 wherein a session server and said media manager in communication with said session server are in a common network. 23. The method of claim 22 wherein a media gateway is also provided in said common network with said media manager. 24. The method of claim 1 wherein a session server is provided in communication with said media manager, and said session server sends a media stream update message to said media manager, and said media manager responds with a media stream OK message depending upon how said media manager is managing at least one of said management functions. 26. The system of claim 25 wherein said bandwidth management function comprises: creating an aggregated bandwidth value for said at least one network from values of said bandwidth information type of said at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through said at least one network. 27. The system of claim 26 wherein a new media stream is disallowed from setup in said at least one network if said aggregated bandwidth value exceeds an administratively provided bandwidth value in said media manager for said at least one network. 28. The system of claim 26 wherein the media source and the media destination lie in said at least one network being managed. 29. The system of claim 25 wherein for bandwidth management, said media stream is passing through at least two networks; and said media manager creates an aggregated bandwidth value for said at least two networks from values of said bandwidth information type of said at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through said at least two networks. 30. The system of claim 25 wherein for said media hairpin detection function said media manager detects that values of the information types source network and destination network of said at least one media stream are the same. 31. The system of claim 25 wherein for the media path control function said media manager based on stored information types alters the media source and media destination information type values of said at least one media stream by altering values of at least some of the stored information types of said at least one media stream and creating a new media stream with associated information types having new values, and sending the routed receive transport address of said new media stream to the media source. 32. The system of claim 25 wherein for the equal access management function said media manager inserts at least one media gateway of a long distance carrier chosen by said media destination centrally of said at least one media stream. 33. The system of claim 32 wherein said media manager inserts said at least one media gateway, based on provisional information stored in said media manager, by altering a value of at least one of the information types of said media stream, and sending the routed receive transport address of said media stream to said media source. 34. The system of claim 25 wherein said media manager performs said backhauling prevention function by not routing said media at least one stream in case a management determined policy of said media manager between said media source network and said media destination network does not require the media stream to be routed through a media gateway. using at least one of said media manager stored information types for performing at least one of said management functions. 36. The computer program product of claim 35 wherein said bandwidth management function comprises the steps of: creating an aggregated bandwidth value for said at least one network from values of said bandwidth information type of said at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through said at least one network. 37. The computer program product of claim 36 wherein a new media stream is disallowed from setup in said at least one network if said aggregated bandwidth value exceeds an administratively provided bandwidth value in said media manager for said at least one network. 38. The computer program product of claim 36 wherein the media source and the media destination lie in said at least one network being managed. 39. The computer program product of claim 35 wherein for bandwidth management, said media stream is passing through at least two networks; and said media manager creates an aggregated bandwidth value for said at least two networks from values of said bandwidth information type of said at least one media stream and all additional media streams passing through said at least two networks. 40. The computer program product of claim 35 wherein for said media hairpin detection function said media manager detects that values of the information types source network and destination network of said at least one media stream are the same. 41. The computer program product of claim 35 wherein for the media path control function said media manager based on stored information types alters the media source and media destination information type values of said at least one media stream by altering values of at least some of the stored information types of said at least one media stream and creating a new media stream with associated information types having new values, and sending the routed receive transport address of said new media stream to the media source. 42. The computer program product of claim 35 wherein for the equal access management function said media manager inserts at least one media gateway of a long distance carrier chosen by said media destination centrally of said at least one media stream. 43. 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2019-04-21T08:53:49Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/US9692710B2/en
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A still further reason for the slowness of improvement in the present case arises from the peculiarity of the relations involved. In times of early violence, it is the weak that are subjugated and enslaved, and, as civilization advances, it is ever the lowest and most ignorant class of any society that falls into the condition of menial servitude. The feeblest, the least competent, the least provident, naturally sink to the bottom of the social scale, and become the helpers, the dependents, the drudges, and the servile appendages of the classes who have wealth, intelligence, and power. In domestic life these relations become organized with the abject class at the base of the social structure. Improving agencies will obviously not take effect alike upon the higher and lower elements. Many causes will operate powerfully to maintain separate interests, to favor the superior class, and to hinder their inferiors, so that servants will be the last to be reached by elevating agencies. How slowly ameliorating changes in the domestic relations have proceeded, and how long their worst features have survived, are shown by the tenacity with which a vicious system of domestic servitude was clung to even in this country. Multitudes still remember the order of things in which half the country bought their servants from the auction-block. That primitive condition in which the menial was a merchantable chattel, with hardly more rights than a brute, continued down to these times, and has been got rid of only in the present generation. The slave system could have lasted as long as it did only in a form of society in which the menial class was low, degraded, and without influence. And that the slave system has in turn widely reacted to promote the social debasement of the working-class there can be no doubt. The slave system, of course, grew more and more anomalous as the sense of justice and humanity strengthened among the people i but we must not forget that slavery in this country was not destroyed by the moral reprobation of the community. It was defended as an historic and permanent order of society until it was incidentally terminated by revolution. It is now easy to execrate its atrocious forms, but we have by no means escaped from the baneful influence of many of its ideas. The idea of an abject menial class is still entertained as a part of the normal constitution of human society, while the associations of a degrading and but recently abandoned system are still potent for the debasement of those who continue in the relations of domestic service. But, in spite of all this, the serving class, however disabled and degraded, will be found to have participated much in that general movement which we term the progress of society. Civilization may have been staggered by the "servant-girl problem," but it has not wholly broken down before it. The mistress can no longer kill her perverse domestic with impunity—although she may often think this is a step backward instead of forward. General tendencies have been at work which have put an end to the ancient order in this respect. In the early ages of domestic servitude, one of its incidents was the power of the master over the life of the servant. This prerogative has long since disappeared, though not because of the sixth commandment, or as a result of law reform, or the enactment of protective legislation. It was the culminating effect of a succession of natural causes, whose operation was gradual and extended over centuries. By captivity in time of war, or by the voluntary submission of the indigent, the prosperous and opulent became possessed of numerous servants, whom they chastised, sold, killed, and subjected to unlimited jurisdiction generally. In time the master possessed so many of these abject creatures that their numbers surpassed the accommodations of the household, and it became necessary to quarter them out upon the fields they cultivated. Here they lived in hamlets, and were called villagers, or villeins. Living apart from the master, it became less easy for him to keep a strict watch over their behavior, or to compel them to labor by chastisement. To incite them to work, gifts of money were made, and better results were obtained by making the pay proportionate to the results accomplished. Thus the master, using bribery instead of compulsion, and being removed from constant personal contact with his servants, had less occasion to become enraged at their short-comings, or to visit them with severe punishment. The exercise of dominion over life became less frequent, then ceased, and with a growing sense of justice the arbitrary power was forever lost, though it took centuries of the slow-working processes of evolution to accomplish this result. Potgresserus says that not till the twelfth century was the power lost. But if progress has brought amelioration to the servile class and promises still more, it has brought also its disadvantages, some of which are the results of changed and improved relations. In the early ages masters and servants were more nearly alike in employments and manners of living than they are now. The acquirement of wealth and the luxurious habits which wealth introduced destroyed this degree of equality; the additional advantages inured to the benefit of the master alone; the servant remained indigent. The effect of social progress was thus to separate their lives as well as their interests. Servants constitute an isolated class. By an unwritten social law they are cut off from intimacy with their superiors, and consequently fail to reap the advantages which follow a community of interests with those above them. They fail to be leavened by the influences which act for the elevation of the community at large. This has operated to retard their progress and elevation, and produces aggravating effects which are more marked in our own republican country than in those countries where social gradations are more definitely established. Even in slavery there was a certain community of interest and responsibility on the part of the master, of which we see but little in the surviving forms of domestic servitude. This isolation drives servants to self-defense against the iron hand of control on the part of masters and mistresses, and results in a spirit of antagonism, leading to tacit conspiracy against those whom they regard as their enemies. Obligations sit lightly upon servants, and they habitually study to promote their own interests by unscrupulous arts and all kinds of dishonest practices. This may be deplored, but we may well ask, What are the servants to do? They are a disintegrated as well as an isolated class, and can gain but imperfectly the benefits which arise from combination. Equality is the universal theory; why, then, should they not demand increasing privileges, and rebel against the circumstances that keep them down? But slow as has been the improvement of this class, and notwithstanding their humble social condition, and although they are too frequently regarded as a lower race of beings, with no rights except to obey, yet they have reached a stage of progress that entitles them to the protection of law, to which they are amenable also like all other people. The servant-girl has a legal status just as much as her mistress, and rights which ought to be held sacred, and, if they were so regarded, one important step toward the amelioration of the relations of lady and servant would be taken. The relation of mistress or master, as the case may be, and servant is based upon contract only, and the two parties to the contract are upon an equal footing so far as rights are concerned. They differ only in what they agree to do one is to work, and the other to pay and thereon hang all the law and the prophets. It naturally follows that physical punishment can not lawfully be administered to a domestic. As Chancellor Kent said, "that is not an incident of the contract of hiring." It is hardly necessary to enlarge upon this right of servants, as the physical punishment of a domestic is rarely, if ever, heard of. In the case of slavery, where the servant was owned, it was assumed to be for the interest of the master to provide medical attendance in time of sickness, but the free servant has no such claim. If a servant-girl falls sick, the mistress is not legally compelled to take steps to restore her to health. According to both Chancellor Kent and Mr. Story, the party hiring is not bound to provide a servant with medical attendance or medicines in case of sickness. If a gentleman at the servant's request sends for a physician, he is not liable to pay the doctor's bill unless he omits to make known who requests the services, or unless he exceeds his authority, or expressly or impliedly engages to be answerable, either by directly promising to pay for them, if rendered, or by doing or saying something which justifies the doctor supposing that he engages to pay him. But if the gentleman has hired a doctor, and given him to understand that he will pay him, he is bound to pay what the services are reasonably worth; he can, however, at any time give him notice that he will not be liable for further services. If he calls the doctor in to attend the servant without the servant's request or consent, he must foot the bill; it being considered merely a generous act on his part. A lady, too, under the same circumstances becomes similarly liable provided she never had a husband or has buried him. If she is still fettered by one, there seems to be some doubt as to whether she can make a valid contract that will bind anybody at all to pay the doctor. The law is not well settled. It may be said, however, generally, that she can not bind her husband, because the obligation of a husband to furnish medical attendance does not extend beyond his wife and own children, and he is under no obligations to provide it for a servant. And, as such attendance for a servant can hardly be called a necessary which the husband must provide the wife, she can not be considered as his agent for the employment of the doctor. So, too, she can not, as a rule, bind herself, because her identity is merged in that of her husband. She is not sui juris, and has no right to contract. But, if she has separate property, the case may be different. In New York she can be held liable on her separate estate, if the intention to charge it is declared in the very contract, which is the foundation of the charges. The rule everywhere, however, is not the same. There is a conspicuous lack of uniformity on the subject of married women's rights. Some day uniformity may be obtained. If those ladies who cry for the right of suffrage would shed half of their tears for a settlement of the laws pertaining to married women, they would accomplish results worth striving for. But to return to the doctor. The poor man, at present, had better take care when a married woman comes to employ him for her servant, or he may be "left out in the cold." Although not bound to furnish medical attendance and medicines, it seems the party hiring is bound to furnish proper food, and to support the servant during her sickness or disability, so long as she remains in his or her employ. Another right which a servant-girl has, is a right to the enjoyment of a good character provided she has one and the law presumes she has it until the contrary appear. There is, unfortunately, a tendency on the part of a great many people to speak too freely, too thoughtlessly, and even maliciously, of the characters of others. The more marked the inferiority in social position of the person talked about, the greater the freedom with which the unbridled tongue wags; and just in proportion as the maligned person's station in life is lowlier, the injury done is the more irreparable. So it frequently happens that the character of one who has lived in a menial relation to us is spoken slightingly of, in a manner not justified by the facts. Thoughtlessness of the consequences of idle words, revenge for some act of the servant, or some other motive, may be at the bottom of it, but they afford no justification. The law protects her or will, if she has cash enough to invoke its protection, or can persuade a lawyer to take her case on speculation. If, however, the communication is made by a person acting honestly and without actual malice, then, even though it be defamatory, the law protects the one making it. Servants bear such a peculiar relation to society that it is deemed necessary, for the common protection and well-being of its members, that honest and proper communications in regard to servants should be freely made, and that those called upon to make such communications should not be hampered by the apprehension of vexatious litigation. The good of the many is not to be sacrificed to save the few from injury. We see the same principle of protection in regard to communications made respecting the solvency of traders, the skill of professional practitioners, the trustworthiness of persons in confidential positions. The welfare of society demands that they be made freely, faithfully, and truly, and to give a servant a good character that is undeserved is a grievous offense. On the other hand, one who designedly gives a bad character not deserved, under the pretense of discharging some duty to herself or to society, offends against justice and humanity, and the law throws no protecting cloak around her words. On one occasion a gentleman unasked wrote a letter in regard to a servant's character to another party, with the result of injury to the servant. The man was sued, and the jury found that he had acted maliciously, and rendered a verdict against him. The judge remarked: "I do not mean to say that, in order to make libelous matter (written by a master) privileged, it is essential that the party who makes the communication should be put into action in consequence of a third party's putting questions to him. I am of opinion he may (when he thinks that another is about to take into his service one whom he knows ought not to be taken) set himself in motion and do some act to induce that other to seek information from and put questions to him. The answers to such questions, given bona fide with the intention of communicating such facts as the other party ought to know, will, although they contain slanderous matter, come within the scope of a privileged communication. But in such a case it will be a question for the jury whether the defendant has acted bona fide, intending honestly to discharge a duty, or whether he has acted maliciously, intending to do an injury to the servant." In another case, a person told a servant girl's mistress that the girl was irregular in her conduct. The result was, she lost her place, and sued her defamer. The judge remarked: "If a neighbor make inquiry of another respecting his own servants, that other may state what he believes to be true; but the. case is different where the statement is a voluntary act; yet, even in this case, the jury is to consider whether the words were dictated by a sense of the duty which one neighbor owes to another." Voluntary communications are looked upon askance. Stronger evidence is necessary to show that they were made in good faith than when the statements are made in response to inquiry. And if a lady unasked displays a forward and officious zeal in giving a character prejudicial to a former servant, it will be a material guide to the jury in ascertaining the real motive. The mere fact, however, that a communication is voluntarily made does not of necessity render it unprivileged, and, if the publication is warranted by an occasion apparently beneficial and honest, and there is no malice, it is not actionable. If, for instance, a lady who has given a servant a good character finds that she was not justified in so doing, it is her right and it becomes her duty to communicate the facts to the person to whom the other communication was made, in order to prevent that person's being misled by the previous recommendation, and such a communication is privileged. So, too, if a person to whom a servant has been recommended finds out that the character given was not justified by the servant's actions, and informs the lady who recommended her of the fact, and cautions her against giving recommendations for morality or honesty, this is, in the absence of malice, a privileged communication. Where a lady gives a character in response to an inquiry, she will not be presumed to have been actuated by malice. Even if what she says is untrue, she can not be successfully sued, unless the servant can prove that she spoke maliciously, and knew that what she said was untrue and injurious. And she need not prove the truth of her statement unless it is plain that she was actuated by malicious motives. If under such circumstances a prima facie case of falsehood be made out, she will be bound to show that the assertions were made under a belief in their truth. A lady once had a young woman in her employ, who was afterward dismissed. Having a chance to make another engagement, she referred to her former mistress, who wrote to the person making inquiry: "I parted with her on account of her incompetency, and not being lady-like nor good-tempered. P. S. May I trouble you to tell her that, this being the third time I have been referred to, I beg to decline any more applications?" The result could have been foreseen. The girl lost the engagement. Stung by the letter, she sued the writer, and general evidence was given of her competency, lady-like manners, and good temper, and that, in reply to the two previous applications which were made before her dismissal, the writer had recommended her. It did not appear in evidence why she was dismissed. The judge told the jury that they must decide whether there was sufficient proof that the defendant, in writing the letter, had been influenced by some improper-feeling toward the plaintiff to make a false statement knowingly. They found that there was, and the plaintiff got a verdict. On another occasion a man was asked about the character of a servant who had been in his employ, and he replied that she was dishonest. Of course, she lost the prospective engagement. She sued. It appeared from the evidence that the charge of stealing was not made until after she had left the defendant's service; that he had told her he would say nothing about it if she would resume her employment at his house, and that he afterward said to her that, if she would admit the theft, he would give her a character. The jury concluded that he was not acting bona fide in the reply he gave to the inquiry as to the girl's character, and gave her a verdict. In making a damaging statement to an inquiring person about a domestic, it is perhaps kinder to her to see that no one is present but the one interested in the inquiry. It may also turn out to be the safer course to pursue. It is true that such caution is not absolutely essential for the protection of the communication, but, if an opportunity is sought for making a charge before third persons when it might have been made in private, it affords strong evidence of a malicious intention, and thus deprives it of that immunity which the law allows to such a statement when made honestly; and, too, the fact that a third person is present is a circumstance which, taken in connection with others, such as the style and character of the language used, would have weight with a jury in determining whether the person making the statement had acted in good faith or had been influenced by malice, The same thing may be said of an accusation made to a servant in the presence of another. It is a question for the jury. If it is made at such a time, on such an occasion, and under such circumstances that the inference of malice prima facie arising from the accusation is rebutted, the burden of showing that it was actuated by malice or ill-will rests upon the servant. It must, for instance, be made in good faith and for a justifiable purpose, in the discharge of a duty, public or private, legal or moral, or in the prosecution of one's own rights and interests, and without any design to defame the person to whom it relates, even though it is all untrue. Thus, if a lady is about to discharge a servant, and calls in a third person to hear the reason therefor, and states the reason in that person's presence, the courts have held that such a communication made with honesty of purpose is privileged. It has been held, however, in Massachusetts, that a false charge made before a third person is libelous. If the statement is made in answer to inquiries, it must be to some person who has an interest in the inquiry, and not as mere matter of gossip.So, where a gentleman, having dismissed his servant for dishonesty, refused to give him a character, alleging to those who applied that he had dismissed him from his service for dishonesty, and the servant's brother afterward inquired of the master why he had so treated the servant, and was thus keeping him out of a situation, the gentleman replied, "He has robbed me, and I believe for years past." Only one instance of robbery had been charged or proved, but it was held, nevertheless, that the answer to the brother was privileged. It seems, too, that it is within the scope of privileged communications to honestly protect one's interest by informing servants of the dishonesty of a fellow-servant. A man, having dismissed his servant, afterward remarked to two other servants: "I discharged that man for robbing me; he is a thief, and if ever you speak to him again or have anything to do with him I shall consider you as bad as him, and shall discharge you." This was held on a subsequent trial to be a privileged communication. Let us now look at another right. Servants have well-defined rights in regard to wages. If they perform their part of the contract, they are entitled to a performance on the part of the party of the first part, to wit, the party hiring. Just what the servant has to do has been succinctly stated by Mr. Story: "A servant," says he, "is bound to obey all the just and reasonable commands of his master, to be careful and faithful as to all property committed to his charge, to do with diligence and care his proper and appointed work, and to behave with decency and in a manner consistent with his station as servant. . . .But the command must be just and reasonable, and within the fair scope of his employment." The right to the wages is not affected by the fact that there is nothing for her to do, if she is on hand and holds herself ready to serve. The hiring being an accomplished fact, and the time of service begun, the right to wages exists. If there is nothing to do, so much the luckier for the servant. As a matter of fact, however, it may be safely said that such an easy state of affairs seldom occurs in the experience of most domestics. The right to wages is unaffected also by damage done by the servant. For instance, if she injure articles or lose them in the course of the service, the party hiring can not without a specific agreement to such effect, deduct from the servant's wages their value, but must bring her cross-action against the servant for compensation. So that, if a lady deducts for some such cause a portion of her cook's wages, the cook would have a perfect right to sue for the sum deducted. Inasmuch, however, as the party hiring can bring a cross-action, or, as in New York practice, set up a counter-claim in the cook's action, for the lost articles, the cook's net recovery would be nil. In other words, the legal and illegal ways of settling for the damaged or lost articles end in similar results. "It is six of one and half a dozen of the other." As a matter of practice and advisability, the illegal method of deduction, although it overrides the servant's rights, is better for her, as it saves her the expense of a lawsuit merely for a principle. The wise cook will not grumble at it. She, if anybody, ought to know that the frying-pan is better than the fire. Nor can the party hiring deduct from the servant's wages any sum paid a physician called in by the hirer for the servant without the request or consent of the latter, nor in this case can a cross-action be brought for such sum, as the act is considered as merely one of generosity. If a servant hired for a specific time is wrongfully discharged before the expiration of the time for which she was hired, she can sue the party hiring for a breach of contract. She can bring an action either to recover for the services that she has actually rendered or for damages for the breach, in which latter case she can recover any amount already due her for services, and also compensation for damages sustained by the wrongful dismissal. She can not wait, however, until the expiration of the period for which she was hired, and then sue for the whole wages on the ground of a constructive service.! It is obligatory upon her to diligently try to find another place. She must make reasonable exertions to diminish the damages. This is an active duty which the law wisely imposes. "Public interest and sound morality accord with the law in demanding this, and if the injured party through negligence or willfulness allows the damages to be unnecessarily enhanced, the increased loss falls upon him, and he can recover nothing for damages which by reasonable diligence on his part could have been prevented." If the servant has been unable to find employment, and has been forced into involuntary idleness by circumstances, her damages will be an amount equal to the whole compensation agreed upon. This was held in a case where the action did not happen to be brought until the time of hiring had expired. In another case where a servant who had been hired for two months was discharged without cause at the end of five days, it was held that the servant was entitled to recover the wages for the whole two months, although there had been so few days' service. If, now, on the other hand, the servant hired for a specific time is justly dismissed, or without reasonable cause leaves the service, what are her rights in regard to wages? Chancellor Kent says that in such case she loses her right to wages for the period she served. This is, undoubtedly, the rule where the full performance of the contract is a condition precedent to the right to wages, and through the servant's fault fulfillment becomes out of the question. Common sense and strict justice, however, lead to a different rule where the fulfillment of the contract is prevented or rendered impossible by the sickness or death of the servant. The law makes a distinction between the willful or negligent violation of a contract and where its fulfillment is prevented by the act of God. "In the one case, the application of the rule operates as a punishment to persons wantonly guilty of the breach, and tends to preserve the contract inviolable. In the other case, its exception is calculated to protect the right of the unfortunate and honest man who is providentially and without fault on his part prevented from a full performance." In general, the contract is subject to the implied condition of health and strength, and sickness will excuse a servant from liability, and justify her in rescinding the agreement. Such are some of the rules regarding the rights to wages of servants who are hired for a specific time. With those who are not hired for any particular time, as is the case with the majority of domestic servants, the case is different. The servant is considered as hired with reference to the general understanding that she shall be entitled to her wages for the time she serves, and either party, in the absence of any agreement to the contrary, may determine the service at any time. The question most likely to arise on such termination is whether any notice must be given by the party terminating the service. In England, a month's notice is customary, and, if it is the hirer who ends the hiring, he can give a month's wages instead of the notice. If the dismissal is for misconduct, however, the servant is not entitled to the month's wages. The English rule has not been incorporated in the law of this country. As was stated by Chancellor Kent, there is no distinction between menial and other servants. Whether notice is to be given depends upon the contract between the parties, or, if that is silent on the subject, it depends upon the custom of the particular place. Where there is an express contract upon the subject, it is binding, and must be observed, except in case of the disobedience of the servant, or under some other such circumstances. If the parties have not seen fit to take the subject of notice into consideration, no notice is required unless a well-established custom to give notice exists. Before closing the discussion of the right to wages, mention should be made of an exception to the rule that the servant who performs faithfully her contract without breach is entitled to wages. The exception is that of persons whom the law deems unable to contract. Take the case of a married woman, for example. Where the common law still controls the relation of husband and wife, all wages the wife earns belong absolutely to him, and any promise made to pay her is considered as a promise made to him. And the common-law rule prevails except where it has been modified or changed by statute. In New York State, before 1860, a married woman who contracted for her personal services with the knowledge and consent of her husband, and was promised by the party hiring what her services were reasonably worth, acquired no title to her earnings in her own right. It was hard upon a poor wife, and the Legislature gallantly enlarged the rights of married women, so as to enable them to contract for their services, and receive and keep the pay for them for their sole and separate use, and to invest the same. Then take the case of minor servants. In general, a child's earnings belong to and are recoverable in the name of the parent. In the absence of an agreement, express or implied, that payment may be made to the child, the parent alone is entitled to the child's earnings. The father, if living, can claim his child's wages; but, if he be dead, they belong to the widow so long as she remains unmarried. The law puts upon her the support of the children, and so, if they go out to service while under age, gives her the right to their earnings, and to collect them. But if she marries again—presto!—her legal capacity is gone. She is no longer herself, but has merged her identity in another, and she can no longer control the property or earnings of her children. If in general there is an express or implied agreement that the child may receive the wages, that agreement supersedes the common law rule. For instance, if a minor makes a contract for her services on her own account, and the father knows of it and makes no objection, there is an implied assent that she shall have her own earnings. If, again, the parent resides in the same place, and neither receives nor claims any wages for the daughter's services for a long period, the inference would be strong that he or she intended that the daughter should receive her own earnings. Or, if the parent is absent for several years, and leaves the child to shift for itself, the presumption is that there was an intention to emancipate the child. In New York State the Legislature has taken a hand in this matter, and provided that payment of wages to a minor in service shall be valid unless the parents or guardians of such child notify the party employing the minor within thirty days after the service begins that they claim the child's wages. And, under any circumstances, if it appears that the child at service has no parent or guardian entitled to her wages, the mistress must pay them to the servant. Such are some of the rights of those who serve us. It would be a difficult task in the limits of a magazine article to treat of all their rights. Being human beings, and performing their lowly duties by contract only, the law clothes them with rights similar to those possessed by other persons, who are not compelled to undertake what we call menial work. Their property rights, for instance, are as sacred as those of princes. To steal a dollar from a cook is as wrong as to break open the safe of a banker. Their rights of life and limb also are just as inviolable as those of their employers. To kill a waitress is murder as well as when a queen is put to death violently. To chew up the thumb of a chamber-maid is mayhem just as surely as if it were the thumb of the President. ↑ 8 B. and C, 578. ↑ 1 Car. and Mar., 104. ↑ 30 N. Y., 20. ↑ 1 F. and F., 24. ↑ 3 Q. B., 11. ↑ 3 Q. B., 5; 109 Mass., 193. ↑ 16 C. B. N. S., 829. ↑ How. (IT. S.), 266. ↑ 16 Q. B., 322. ↑ 2 Story on Contr., § 1,297. ↑ 28 New York, 76. ↑ 1 E. D. Smith, 70. ↑ 26 How. Pr., 528. ↑ 2 Kent, p. 292. ↑ 20 N. Y., 197. ↑ 2 Story on Contr., § 1,303. ↑ Shars. Black., 426, n. ↑ Cooky's Black., p. 129, n. ↑ Shars. Black., 420, n. ↑ f 5 Wend., 204.
2019-04-23T20:16:05Z
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Popular_Science_Monthly/Volume_22/April_1883/The_Legal_Status_of_Servant-Girls
Clostridium (Ruminiclostridium) thermocellum is a model fermentative anaerobic thermophile being studied and engineered for consolidated bioprocessing of lignocellulosic feedstocks into fuels and chemicals. Engineering efforts have resulted in significant improvements in ethanol yields and titers although further advances are required to make the bacterium industry-ready. For instance, fermentations at lower pH could enable co-culturing with microbes that have lower pH optima, augment productivity, and reduce buffering cost. C. thermocellum is typically grown at neutral pH, and little is known about its pH limits or pH homeostasis mechanisms. To better understand C. thermocellum pH homeostasis we grew strain LL1210 (C. thermocellum DSM1313 Δhpt ΔhydG Δldh Δpfl Δpta-ack), currently the highest ethanol producing strain of C. thermocellum, at different pH values in chemostat culture and applied systems biology tools. Clostridium thermocellum LL1210 was found to be growth-limited below pH 6.24 at a dilution rate of 0.1 h−1. F1F0-ATPase gene expression was upregulated while many ATP-utilizing enzymes and pathways were downregulated at pH 6.24. These included most flagella biosynthesis genes, genes for chemotaxis, and other motility-related genes (> 50) as well as sulfate transport and reduction, nitrate transport and nitrogen fixation, and fatty acid biosynthesis genes. Clustering and enrichment of differentially expressed genes at pH values 6.48, pH 6.24 and pH 6.12 (washout conditions) compared to pH 6.98 showed inverse differential expression patterns between the F1F0-ATPase and genes for other ATP-utilizing enzymes. At and below pH 6.24, amino acids including glutamate and valine; long-chain fatty acids, their iso-counterparts and glycerol conjugates; glycolysis intermediates 3-phosphoglycerate, glucose 6-phosphate, and glucose accumulated intracellularly. Glutamate was 267 times more abundant in cells at pH 6.24 compared to pH 6.98, and intercellular concentration reached 1.8 μmol/g pellet at pH 5.80 (stopped flow). Clostridium thermocellum LL1210 can grow under slightly acidic conditions, similar to limits reported for other strains. This foundational study provides a detailed characterization of a relatively acid-intolerant bacterium and provides genetic targets for strain improvement. Future studies should examine adding gene functions used by more acid-tolerant bacteria for improved pH homeostasis at acidic pH values. Clostridium (Ruminiclostridium) thermocellum is a model fermentative anaerobic thermophile being studied and engineered for consolidated bioprocessing of lignocellulosic feedstocks into fuels and chemicals [1–3]. C. thermocellum forms specialized biofilms for growth on cellulose and produces mobile and cell-bound enzyme complexes termed cellulosomes that mediate deconstruction of lignocellulosic substrates to short, β1,4-linked glucose oligosaccharides for fermentation to ethanol and organic acids. Wild type C. thermocellum fermentation products include acetic acid, lactic acid, formic acid, H2, ethanol, and amino acids such as valine , with additional products being made at high substrate loadings as a result of overflow metabolism . Organic acid production decreases biofuel yields and acidifies culture medium, each of which are undesirable for an industrial process. Therefore, metabolic engineering efforts have focused on modifying carbon metabolism to decrease production of acidic co-products and increase ethanol production [9–17]. In the highest yielding C. thermocellum strain published to date, strain LL1210, pathways for the synthesis of lactic acid, acetic acid, formic acid, and most H2 production were eliminated , followed by adaptive laboratory evolution to improve growth rate and ethanol titer . This allowed the strain to produce 22 g/L ethanol from 60 g/L cellulose, with a maximum theoretical yield for ethanol of 75% although further advances are required for the bacterium to be industry-ready. Ethanol yields and titers of up to 80% and 38 g/L, respectively, have also been achieved with an engineered C. thermocellum strain in co-culture with an engineered Thermoanaerobacterium saccharolyticum strain . While these strains synthesize essentially no organic acids as end products, fermentation of sugars to reduced compounds such as ethanol or butanol results in the production of a more oxidized compound such as bicarbonate, which will also result in acidification of the medium. Organisms must be tolerant to the fermentation conditions and the products formed during growth, especially at the high substrate levels required for industrial fermentations. The response to ethanol stress and ethanol-tolerant strains of C. thermocellum have been characterized [19, 20]. C. thermocellum inhibition by pentose sugars and compounds generated within switchgrass fermentations has also been characterized. However, deep understanding of the C. thermocellum response to low pH remains underexplored. While the anaerobic cellulolytic bacterium Fibrobacter succinogenes has been evolved for steady-state growth at pH 5.75 , known anaerobic cellulolytic bacteria typically do not grow at pH values lower than pH 6.0 . High-yielding- and highly productive ethanologens such as Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Zymomonas mobilis, which are not natively cellulolytic, have broad pH ranges (pH 2–6.5 and pH 3.5–7.5 , respectively). C. thermocellum is typically cultured in medium maintained at neutral pH and it maintains its intercellular pH between ~ 7.3–8.5 [24, 25]. For different C. thermocellum strains, growth has been reported between pH 5.9 and 8.1 , as low as pH 6.0 , and between pH 6.2 and 7.7 . The lower pH limit of the only C. thermocellum strain that is currently genetically tractable, strain DSM1313, has not been reported. A major mechanism of low pH toxicity is dissipation of the proton gradient across the cytoplasmic membrane. Weak acids such as acetic acid become protonated at the low pH in the supernatant, resulting in an uncharged molecule that can cross the cytoplasmic membrane. The cytoplasm is more alkaline, so the weak acid becomes deprotonated, effectively transporting a proton from outside the cell to the inside, collapsing the ∆pH and acidifying the cytoplasm. Cytoplasmic pH can be maintained by a variety of mechanisms that include proton pumps, antiporters, production of ammonia via urease and arginine deiminase pathways, and organic acid decarboxylation reactions that cleave a carboxylic acid side chain (pKa ~ 4.7) to bicarbonate (pKa = 6.4 and more volatile); tolerance to lower pH can be further enhanced by macromolecule repair or protection, lipid changes and biofilm formation [29–31]. Understanding and enhancing the mechanisms by which C. thermocellum responds to decreased pH will be critical for the industrial application of C. thermocellum for lignocellulosic biofuel production, but those mechanisms are not currently known. Therefore, to better understand the physiological response of C. thermocellum to acidic conditions, we cultured strain LL1210 at different pH values in chemostats and applied systems biology tools. Clostridium thermocellum LL1210 was cultured in duplicate chemostats fed with defined medium (MTC) containing 3 g/L cellobiose for 1058 h (Fig. 1, Additional file 1). After initial batch fermentation, steady-state chemostat growth was achieved for pH 7.0 at a dilution rate of 0.1 h−1. The culture pH was then reduced to pH 6.5 at hour 189.5 and stead-state growth was maintained. Culture pH was checked using a regularly calibrated external probe and reported in Additional file 1. A pH adjustment to pH 6.10 resulted in substantial decreases in cell densities (~ 308 h, Fig. 1), along with lower ethanol concentrations and concomitant increases in cellobiose concentrations (Additional file 1), which suggests the specific growth rate of strain LL1210 was lower than the dilution rate of 0.1 h−1. Medium flow was temporarily halted for 37.5 h and the culture pH set to 6.25, which restored cellobiose consumption, ethanol production and cell density and permitted medium flow to be resumed at dilution rate of 0.1 h−1. After the equivalent of three fermentor vessel volumes, the chemostats were adjusted from pH 6.25 to 6.15, which coincided with lower culture densities. The mean culture turbidity measurements nearest to the omics sampling points, as measured by optical density (OD600 nm) and their standard deviations were 0.655 (0.02), 0.651 (0.04), 0.533 (0.06), and 0.143 (0.05) for pH values pH 7, 6.5, 6.25 and 6.1, respectively. A change in dilution rate to 0.05 h−1 permitted growth at pH 6.10 and 6.00. At pH 5.90, culture turbidity steadily declined; the dilution rate was reduced to 0.01 h−1 and the OD continued to decline for 144 h in one chemostat while the other oscillated, indicative of stress, and eventually recovered. A single chemostat was able to maintain growth at pH 5.90 at a dilution rate of 0.01 h−1, although culture turbidity showed a steady decline at pH 5.80 over a 133 h period and was unable to recover when the flow was stopped for 84 h. Thus, growth-limiting pH for this system is approximately pH 6.25 using strain LL1210 in a chemostat with a dilution rate of 0.1 h−1 and slower dilution rates are required for steady-state growth below this pH. Samples at dilution rate of 0.1 h−1 were withdrawn from each bioreactor at pH 7 (actual pH = 6.98), pH 6.5 (actual pH = 6.48), pH 6.25 (actual pH = 6.24), and at apparent washout pH 6.15 (actual pH = 6.12) for analysis by transcriptomics and metabolomics (Fig. 1). Additional metabolomics samples were taken at pH 5.80 at a lower dilution rate (0.05 h−1) to help elucidate the physiological changes. A greater number of differentially expressed genes were observed as the pH diverged further from pH 6.98. Using pH 6.98 as a reference, there were 80, 469, and 536 differentially expressed genes, respectively, for cells growing at pH 6.48, 6.24, and pH 6.12 (Additional file 2). To more easily categorize gene expression responses to pH changes, differentially expressed genes were clustered (Fig. 2a), and then gene clusters were checked for enrichment of gene ontology (GO) terms in comparison to the frequency of GO terms for all genes in the C. thermocellum genome by Fisher’s exact test (Fig. 2b). Cluster 1 contained only one gene (a 2-isopropylmalate synthase; Clo1313_0857) and cluster 3 only contained tRNA genes and were omitted from enriched function tests. Cluster 2 contained genes for rRNA, tRNA, tRNA modification, purine metabolism, and polyamine transport but no enrichment of GO terms was found. Flagella biosynthesis and chemotaxis, sulfate transport and reduction, nitrate transport and nitrogen fixation, glutamate dehydrogenase (GLDH, Clo1313_1847), and fatty acid biosynthesis (clusters 4, 5, 6) were downregulated, while F0F1-ATP synthase genes (cluster 7) were upregulated at pH 6.24. Diguanylate cyclase genes Clo1313_1339, Clo1313_1404 (with TRP repeats), Clo1313_1813 (with putative polar amino acid sensor domains and a phosphodiesterase domain), and Clo1313_2478 (putative response regulator) were all found in cluster 4. Genes for MotAB (Clo1313_0056-7) were part of cluster 6. MotAB system has been show to generate flagellar torque using proton-motive force . Upon being shocked with pH 6.12, cells increased expression of genes for translational machinery (cluster 8), while gene expression decreased for carbohydrate binding and polysaccharide catabolic processing enzymes (cluster 9) including those for cellulosomal proteins CipA, OlpB, Orf2p, OlpA, CelD, CelH, CelR, CelV, CprA, CtManF, LecA, XynA, and XynD (Additional file 2). Cluster 9 also contained a malate shunt gene, phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (PEPCK, Clo1313_0415) . All but one of the glutamate synthase (GOGAT) genes (Clo1313_2032-3, Clo1313_2035-6) were also in cluster 9. Previous studies have identified genes commonly expressed during acid stress by Gram-positive neutrophilic bacteria , which includes genes for amino acid decarboxylases/antiporter systems, DnaK, GroEL, ClpP protease, urease, F1F0-ATPase, arginine deiminase (ADI), agmatine deiminase (AgDi), and cyclopropane fatty acid (CFA) synthase. Most of these gene systems were not differentially expressed in C. thermocellum and genes for ADI, AgDi, or CFA are not annotated in the genome. Rather than increasing in expression at low pH, several decarboxylases were downregulated at pH 6.24 and 6.12, including aspartate 1-decarboxylase (Clo1313_1318), diaminopimelate decarboxylase (Clo1313_1540), orotidine 5′-phosphate decarboxylase (Clo1313_1266), putative oxaloacetate decarboxylase (Clo1313_1523), and a putative sodium pump decarboxylase γ-subunit (Clo1313_1525). The only decarboxylase that was upregulated at any pH was the S-adenosylmethionine decarboxylase proenzyme (Clo1313_1509), which produces the aminopropyl substrate need for synthesis of the polyamines spermidine and spermine. However, expression of the agmatinase and spermidine synthase (Clo1313_1529-1530) that synthesize the spermidine and spermine were either not differentially expressed or showed decreased expression at lower pH. Then again, genes for a putative spermidine/putrescine ABC transporter (Clo1313_1471-5) were upregulated at pH 6.24 and 6.12 (Additional file 2). Because a polyamine transporter and biosynthetic gene were upregulated, and polyamines can decrease membrane permeability and may protect cells in acid environments , their potential to augment C. thermocellum LL1210 growth at lower pH values was evaluated. Medium was supplemented with 100 μM of the polyamines putrescine, spermidine, spermine, or metabolic precursor arginine and the terminal pH was determined after 144 h. C. thermocellum LL1210 fermentations with and without amendments initiated at pH 7 and 6.75 had similar growth profiles (Additional file 3). Downregulation of the GLDH (Clo1313_1847) and GOGAT (Clo1313_2032-3, Clo1313_2035-6) genes were observed at pH 6.12, but no significant expression changes were observed for the Type I glutamine synthetase (GS, Clo1313_2031), two Type III glutamine synthetases (Clo1313_1357 and Clo1313_2038), or the glutamate synthetase (Clo1313_1849) (Additional file 2). The type III glutamine synthase (Clo1313_2303) was significantly upregulated at pH 6.24 (Additional file 2). To examine the role of nitrogen metabolism in relation to pH and physiology, deletion strains for GLDH, GOGAT, GS, GS–GOGAT, and an annotated NifH (Clo1313_2339) were characterized using unbuffered (MOPS free) carbon-replete medium (10 g/L) (Additional file 4). Consistent with an earlier study , the parental strain had a higher specific growth rate compared to strain LL1210 (Additional file 4a). The final pH for the GS-mutant- and LL1210 cultures were about pH 6.3 and pH 5.9, respectively, whereas the range for the other strains was ~ pH 5.6–5.8 (Additional file 4b). In the unbuffered system, the GS mutant achieved the highest culture turbidity and produced the second highest titer of ethanol after strain LL1210 (2.0 and 2.7 g/L, respectively) (Additional file 4c). The higher final ethanol titers and pH values for strains GS and LL1210 coincided lower levels of residual substrate. Genes for two orphan histidine kinases previously predicted to be part of the sporulation cascade in C. thermocellum , a pro-σE processing protease and BofA, inhibitor of the stage IV pro-σK processing protease SpoIVFB, were upregulated in C. thermocellum LL1210 at pH 6.24 compared to 6.98 (Additional file 5). To better understand the role of sporulation in the pH response of C. thermcellum, growth and sporulation of strains LL1210, asporogenous strains M1726 (DSM1313 ∆hpt ∆spo0A1) and M1725 (DSM1313 ∆hpt ∆spo0A1 ∆ldh ∆pta), and the DSM1313 ∆hpt parental strain were examined. C. thermocellum sporulation was inefficient, consistent with an earlier study and sporulation-deficient mutant strains had neither a growth advantage or disadvantage at lower pH values for the conditions used in this study (Additional file 5). The molecular chaperone GrpE (Clo1313_0932) and heat shock protein Hsp 20 (Clo1313_0678) were upregulated (2.0- and 2.2-fold) at pH 6.12, which were previously found to be upregulated after furfural shock and heat shock in C. thermocellum ATCC 27405 . Hsp33 (Clo1313_2544) and MutS (Clo1313_1982) were upregulated at pH 6.24 (2.2- and 2.0-fold, respectively). Hsp33 was previously found to be more highly expressed in cellulose-adhered C. thermocellum ATCC 27405 compared to planktonic cells . At pH 6.12, downregulated genes included one of the annotated Clp protease genes (Clo1313_1116) (0.48-fold), an annotated DNA repair proteins RadC (Clo1313_1465) (0.36-fold), and UvrD (Clo1313_2004) (0.31-fold) and a small subunit of an exodeoxyribonuclease VII (Clo1313_1389) (0.50-fold). To further investigate the physiological changes that occur at lower pH values, metabolomics was performed to compare intercellular concentrations of metabolites when cells were exposed to pH 6.98, 6.48, 6.24, 6.12, and an additional time point at pH 5.80 (at a lower dilution rate 0.05 h−1). Peak areas for 91 metabolites identified by GS–MS were calculated for comparison (Additional file 6) and 39 of these were significantly higher at one or more of the pH values compared to pH 6.98 (Table 1). Most significantly, higher metabolites in cells at pH 6.24 were nitrogen (N)-containing metabolites that included glutamate, lysine, glycine, and five unknown N-metabolites (Table 1). There were also two unknown phosphate (P)-containing metabolites. Glutamate showed the largest differences in average fold change across all samples tested at lower pH values (Table 1). At pH 6.24, cells contained 267 times more glutamate than cells at pH 6.98 (significant α = 0.05). Intracellular concentrations of glutamate ranged from 0.004 μmol/g pellet at pH 6.98 to 1.798 μmol/g pellet at pH 5.80 (Additional file 6). Concentrations of intercellular valine, alanine, and threonine were also quantified on a μmol/g of pellet basis for comparison with glutamate concentrations. While glutamate and alanine peaked at pH 5.80 (2.660 μmol/g of pellet for alanine), valine and threonine peaked at 6.24 with concentrations of 5.312 and 0.267 μmol/g of pellet, respectively. Long-chain fatty acids, their iso-counterparts and glycerol conjugates accumulated at growth-limiting pH values, pH 6.12 and 5.80 (Table 1). Citramalate accumulated at pH 6.24, 6.12, and 5.80 (Table 1) and an accumulation of glycolysis intermediates 3-phosphoglycerate, glucose 6-phosphate, and glucose at pH values 6.12 and 5.80 was consistent with downregulation of genes for major downstream pathways, malate shunt (Clo1313_0415) and the TCA cycle (Clo1313_0708-9) (Additional file 2). At pH 6.24, only valine, alanine, and threonine extracellular concentrations were significantly higher than when pH was 6.98 (α = 0.05) (Additional file 7). Asparagine was significantly lower at pH 6.24 compared to 6.98 (α = 0.05). Extracellular glutamate was not significantly different at pH 6.24 compared to 6.98, although it was significantly lower at pH 6.48 compared to 6.24 (α = 0.05). When cells were shocked with pH 6.12 compared to when they were growing at pH 6.98, there were significantly lower concentrations of all detectable extracellular amino acids except methionine (α = 0.05). The amino acids that had the highest average extracellular concentrations in chemostats were valine (1.5 mM at pH 6.24), asparagine (147 μM at pH 6.98), and alanine (104 μM at pH 6.24). The highest average concentration of glutamate was 32 μM (near the limit of detection) at pH 6.24 (Additional file 7). An ABC-type branch-chain amino acid transporter gene (Clo1313_0822) was upregulated at pH 6.24 and 6.12 and ABC-type polar amino acid transport genes (Clo1313_0794-5) were upregulated at pH 6.24 (Additional file 2). To gain a global perspective on metabolic inhibition at growth-limiting pH values, at and below pH 6.24, key mechanisms and responses for pH homeostasis were summarized (Fig. 3). A key feature of the physiological response at lower pH values was changes in expression for use and conservation of ATP. At pH 6.24, LL1210 increased expression of its F1F0-ATPase (Fig. 2). The F1F0-ATPase likely pumps protons to maintain pH homeostasis by ATP hydrolysis as is the case of many other neutrophiles . Competing uses for ATP included valine transport, chaperones protecting cytoplasmic macromolecules from acid damage, and assimilation of ammonium by GS, GOGAT, and GLDH (Table 1, Additional file 2). ATP is also consumed by fatty acid biosynthesis (Table 1, Fig. 2), but there are many metabolites and downregulated genes for this aspect of metabolism. Therefore, it was omitted from Fig. 3, with the exception of biosynthesis pathways for valine and leucine, which are precursors for biosynthesis of iso-fatty acids. The accumulation of fatty acids and iso- derivatives may improve the capacity cytoplasmic membrane to repel protons, but adjustments to membrane lipid composition in response to an increase in proton concentrations are diverse among bacteria and not well understood . Though fatty acid adjustments may have reduced membrane permeability to protons, downregulation of fatty acid biosynthesis genes suggests that ATP conservation was more important. Other gene expression changes that decrease ATP consumption include downregulation of sulfate and nitrate ABC transporter and reduction genes and 80 putative flagella biosynthesis and motility genes (listed in Additional file 2). Reduction of proton influx may also have been achieved through downregulation of gene expression for proton-channeling motility proteins MotAB (Clo1313_0056-7) at pH 6.24 (Fig. 2) . The putative proton-pumping PPi-ase (Clo1313_0823) was constitutively and highly expressed at all pH values. Accumulation of intercellular phosphate at pH 5.80 (Table 1) may have been due to PPi-ase activity, ATP hydrolysis or other cellular activities. Another possibility is that collapse of the membrane gradient would have made PPi hydrolysis to free phosphate much more thermodynamically favorable via the membrane-bound PPi-ase. Both reduction of proton influx through MotAB and proton-pumping through the putative PPi-ase would allow more ATP conservation. Clostridium thermocellum strain LL1210 has deletions in key genes for metabolic pathways to produce acetate, lactate, formate, and H2, and it has among the highest reported ethanol yields and titers for this bacterium. LL1210 grew at pH 6.24 at a dilution rate of 0.1 h−1. At pH values at or below 6.24, we observed gene expression patterns and metabolite levels consistent with five pH homeostasis mechanisms used by C. thermocellum LL1210, namely (i) proton pumping by F1F0-ATPase, (ii) macromolecule protection by chaperones, and (iii) prevention of proton influx through MotAB were mechanisms supported by changes in gene expression (Fig. 2, Additional file 2); (iv) proton pumping by PPi-ases was supported by metabolomics (Table 1); and (v) changes in membrane fatty acid composition was supported by both techniques (Fig. 2, Additional file 2, Table 1). Differential expression analysis at pH 6.24 revealed that the F1F0-ATPase genes were upregulated (Fig. 2), consistent with a model that the bacterium uses F1F0-ATPases to pump-protons at the expense of ATP (Fig. 3). Increased expression and activity of F1F0-ATPases are associated with pH tolerance in several other bacteria challenged with sublethal pH conditions [29, 30, 38]. In addition to the F1F0-ATPase system, proton-pumping may be possible via a constitutively and highly expressed putative proton-pumping PPi-ase (Clo1313_0823) (top 9% of genes) [39, 40]. Rhodospirillum rubrum and plant proton-pumping PPi-ases are reversible and the C. thermocellum proton-pumping PPi-ase has been proposed to be important in energy metabolism in this organism ; further studies are required to experimentally test the function in C. thermocellum. Many ATP-utilizing enzymes and pathways were downregulated at lower pH, which included most of the flagella biosynthesis genes, genes for chemotaxis, and other motility-related genes (> 50) as well as sulfate transport and reduction, nitrate transport and nitrogen fixation, and fatty acid biosynthesis genes (Fig. 2, Additional file 2). Genes for sulfate transport/reduction and for nitrogen metabolism have shown differential expression in response to stresses [36, 52] and their roles in maintaining homeostasis and for channeling electrons to augment biofuels productively could better understood through modeling, biochemistry and genetic studies. In this study, clustered and enriched gene ontologies (GO) analyses indicate genes for enzymes using ATP had inverse differential expression patterns compared to F1F0-ATPase genes, which suggests metabolism is redirected to conserve energy (Fig. 2). Indeed, maintaining ∆pH and protecting macromolecules takes precedence over many reactions since critical enzymes for growth cannot function if they are damaged. In addition to a direct burden on ATP, flagella motility may have an indirect burden since protons channeled into the cell through MotAB would need to be pumped back out by to maintain pH homeostasis. Therefore, motAB downregulation at pH 6.24 would support pH homeostasis (Additional file 2, Fig. 3). Genes involved in polyamine transport and biosynthesis were differentially expressed at lower pH, suggesting a potential functional role for these compounds in pH tolerance. Specifically, the transporter (Clo1313_1471-5) and SAM decarboxylase gene (Clo1313_1509) were upregulated (Additional file 2). Medium supplementation with polyamines or arginine (a polyamine precursor) did not significantly improve growth or enable C. thermocellum to ferment to a lower terminal pH value compared to unsupplemented fermentations (Additional file 3). Instead, a functional role for stabilization of tRNAs during translation matches well with polyamine biosynthesis and transport gene expression profiles clustering with expression profiles of genes for tRNAs, tRNA modification proteins, rRNA, ribosomal proteins, ribosomal maturation factors, and translational initiation factors (Fig. 2, Additional file 2). Upregulation of translational machinery, tRNAs, and the polyamines that stabilize them, is likely a regulatory response to the abundance of available carbon at pH-limited growth. Genes involved in sporulation were upregulated at pH 6.24 in chemostat culture. Interestingly, strain LL1210 has a mutation in one of the two copies of the spo0A gene that results in an amino acid change ; Spo0A is generally the master regulator of sporulation, and the role of this mutation has not been established. However, examination of sporulation in different genetic backgrounds at acidic pH fermentation demonstrated that C. thermocellum is inefficient at sporulation, and that LL1210 is similar to the wild type strain. Further, a growth advantage for sporulation mutants in acidic, MOPS-free, carbon-replete medium was not observed (Additional file 5), suggesting that a programmed metabolic shutdown via sporulation is not a major driver of sensitivity to low pH. Nitrogen metabolism was strongly effected at lower pH values, resulting in increased secretion of amino acids including valine and alanine, which has been seen in other studies [8, 18], and also intracellular accumulation of glutamate with minimal secretion (Table 1, Additional files 5, 7). Some neutrophilic bacteria express glutamate decarboxylase in response to pH stress to convert glutamate into γ-aminobutyric acid; the decarboxylation reaction consumes protons from the cytoplasm which reduces intercellular pH . Heterologous expression of a glutamate decarboxylase in C. thermocellum LL1210 could make use of the accumulating intracellular glutamate, possibly enabling steady-state growth at pH values less than 6.25 with a dilution rate of 0.1 h−1. Glutamate decarboxylases with pH and temperature ranges suitable for C. thermocellum have already been characterized [44, 45], and heterologous expression of glutamate decarboxylase genes with enhanced production of γ-aminobutyric acid in distantly related organisms has been demonstrated . Urease is another target for improvement of pH tolerance in C. thermocellum. Urease activity in neutrophilic bacteria produces ammonia which is protonated intercellularly or exported and protonated to form ammonium thereby raising intracellular or extracellular pH . The urease genes had low expression in LL1210 at all pH values sampled (Additional file 2) in urea-containing growth medium. Previous work has showed that the parental strain (DSM1313 Δhpt) also had low urease expression in urea-containing fermentation medium, but that deletion of the GS gene caused significant upregulation of urease genes . Consistent with higher expression of the urease genes, higher terminal pH was also previously observed for the GS-mutant fermentations compared to the parental strain fermentations . It remains to be determined if higher urease expression increases C. thermocellum’s intracellular pH and enables steady-state growth at pH values below 6.25 with a dilution rate of 0.1 h−1. The GS mutant had less residual cellobiose and glucose in unbuffered medium than LL1210 and other nitrogen assimilation mutant strains tested (Additional file 4). Therefore, deletion of the GS in LL1210 might also improve substrate utilization and reduce or eliminate the need for buffering fermentation media. Clostridium thermocellum LL1210 can grow under slightly acidic conditions, similar to limits reported for related C. thermocellum strains. In nature, C. thermocellum may be exposed to acidic pH values, and if it is, metabolism will slow or the bacterium could sporulate, which are not aligned with industrial processes. This foundational study provides a detailed characterization of a relatively acid-intolerant bacterium and provides genetic targets for strain improvement. Future studies should examine adding gene functions used by more acid-tolerant bacteria for improved pH homeostasis at acidic pH values. Clostridium thermocellum strains DSM1313 ∆hpt , LL1210 , M1726 (LL376) , M1725 (LL375) , and AG1329 were used in this study. The GLDH (Clo1313_1847), GOGAT (Clo1313_2032-6), GS–GOGAT (Clo1313_2031-6), and a nifH (Clo1313_2339) strain were deleted in a C. thermocellum DSM1313 ∆hpt background to create AG1327, AG1328, AG2068, and AG2078, respectively. Mutants were constructed using the procedures described in detail [49, 50]. Strains are available upon request. Primers used to construct strain AG2078 and other strains used in this study as well as SNPs identified from genome sequencing are provided in Additional file 8. Strains were stored frozen at − 80 °C in a modified version of DSM 122 medium, referred to as CTFUD , that contains 50 mM of MOPS (morpholinepropanesulfonic acid) and 10 mM of sodium citrate. Actively growing cultures were transferred twice from freezer stocks prior to batch fermentation experiments and inocula were 2% of the final volume. Cells were routinely cultured at 55 °C in either 50 ml (160 ml serum bottles) or 10 ml (26 ml Balch tubes) of MTC medium as described earlier , except that MOPS was omitted in this study. The LL1210 strain was also cultured in 1 ml volumes in a 48-well plate reader (Biotek Eon, Winooski, VT, USA) inside a Coy anaerobic chamber kept at 55 °C with growth data collected at OD600 nm every 15 min. Growth in MTC-containing 100 μM of spermine (AC132750010, Fisher Scientific, Hampton, NH, USA), spermidine (S0266, Sigma-Aldrich, St. Louis, MO, USA), putrescine (AC112120250, Fisher Scientific) or arginine (A5006, Sigma-Aldrich) was assessed in plate reader assays. Strain LL1210 was grown at 55 °C in duplicate 750 ml (total vessel capacity 1.3 L) chemostat cultures using water-jacketed BioFlo110 bioreactors (New Brunswick Scientific, Edison, NJ, USA), essentially as described previously in another C. thermocellum chemostat study , except that the medium contained 3 g/L of cellobiose as the carbon source. Briefly, the MTC medium was MOPS free and fed at a dilution rate of 0.1 h−1, except where noted, for 1058 h. Temperature, pH, and agitation speed were monitored and controlled during fermentation using the BioCommand software (version 2.62). Gel-reference pH electrodes Mettler-Toledo (Woburn, MA) calibration, accuracy checks and pH control were maintained as described earlier , except that 1 N HCl and 3 N KOH were used for acid and base additions, respectively. Recalibration of the bioreactor probes was performed at 546 h after pH drifted by 0.08 and 0.12. Samples for omics were taken in 50 ml volumes; then harvested and stored as described in . For transcriptomics, two samples were taken from different chemostats at pH 6.48 and 6.12, and for pH values 6.98 and 6.24 biological duplicates and two technical replicates separated by at least one change of vessel medium were collected. For intracellular metabolomics, samples were taken immediately after transcriptomic samples, and additional biological duplicate samples were taken at pH 5.8 for metabolomics only. Culture turbidity was measured taking optical density readings at 600 nm using a Genesys 20 spectrophotometer (Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., Waltham, MA, USA). Cells were enumerated using a modified version of the direct cell counting procedure described in . Briefly, 1 ml of culture samples were preserved for up to 1 week in 0.025 mg/ml (final concentration) paraformaldehyde (Sigma-Aldrich,). Cells were diluted 1:1000 with 0.9% (m/v) saline solution and stained with 25 nM 4′,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (DAPI) (final concentration), immobilized to a 1.5 cm diameter section of a black MilliQ filter, and then imaged with a Zeiss Axio Imager.M1 with a Plan Apochromat 63×/1.4 Oil Immersion objective and X-Cite Series 120 Exfo fluorescence power source (Carl Zeiss, Germany). 8-bit images were imported into ImageJ (http://imagej.nih.gov/ij/) for manual or automated counting. Manual counting was performed with the cell counter plugin, and automated counting was performed with JAVA scripts (Additional file 1) which assumed cells were visible at a % Area (saturation threshold) of 1% (± 0.1%) with a particle size greater than 5 pixels after binary images had been processed with Watershed. Spherical morphologies were assumed to have a particle size range of 20–200 pixels and circularity of 0.85–1.00 for conservative estimates, and a particle size range of 50–100 pixels and circularity of 0.95–1.00 for liberal estimates. Automated parameters were validated with manual counts of 24 images. Stepwise calculations of standard deviation of progressively more sample counts were performed to ensure the count variance plateaued. Highly refractive mature spores were also observed by light microscopy after heat fixing to 20 μl of stationary cells to glass slides. Extracellular fermentation product samples for high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) were collected and processed as described in . HPLC data were generated using a Shimadzu Prominence LC-20A Series system (Shimadzu Scientific Instruments, Columbia, MD) fitted with a refractive index detector (model RID-20A) and an Aminex HPX 87H HPLC column (300 × 7.8 mm) (Bio-Rad, Hercules, Dallas, TX, USA) against known standards for cellobiose, glucose, ethanol, acetate, lactate, and formate. Intracellular metabolite fold changes and select metabolite concentrations were determined using a 5975C inert XL gas chromatography–mass spectrometer (Agilent, Santa Clara, CA) . Extracellular amino acid concentrations were quantified by an Aracus Amino Acid Analyzer (membraPure, Berlin, Germany) . Two-tailed paired T tests were performed to determine if amino acid concentrations were significantly different. Homoscedasticity was confirmed by performing Breusch–Pagan and Abridged White’s tests prior to performing T tests. Total RNA was isolated from 50 ml of chemostat sample using the procedures described in , and quantity and quality were determined using a Nanodrop instrument (ThermoFisher Scientific Waltham, MA). Depletion, library preparation and sequencing were completed at the Joint Genome Institute (JGI, Walnut Creek, CA). In short, 100 ng of total RNA was depleted of ribosomal material using a Ribo-Zero (TM) rRNA Removal Kit (Epicentre). The rRNA depleted RNA was fragmented and reversed transcribed using random hexamers and SSII (Invitrogen) followed by second strand synthesis. Stranded cDNA libraries were generated using the Illumina Truseq Stranded RNA LT kit, following the manufactures protocols, using ten cycles of PCR. qPCR was used to determine the concentration of the libraries. Libraries were pooled and sequenced on an Illumina HiSeq 2500 platform with version 2 chemistry in a 2 × 151 bp configuration (JGI, Walnut Creek, CA; Project ID 503106). Fastq files were verified for integrity by checksum and read quality checked using FastQC . RNAseq reads were trimmed using Trimmomatic MAXINFO method with target length and strictness parameters set to 40 and 0.8, respectively . Reads were mapped to C. thermocellum DSM1313 (NC_017304, last modified 2015/07/30) using Bowtie2 with the same parameters as the very-sensitive preset option expect the number of mismatches was set to 1 [57, 58], and reads were counted with HTSeq . Principle component analysis (PCA) was used to check for sample variation using JMP Genomics 8 (SAS Institute, Cary, NC, USA). Differential expression analysis was performed with DESeq 2 . Genes were considered significantly differential expressed when their adjusted p values were less than or equal to 0.05 and log2-fold change values were ≥ 1 or ≤ 1. Raw RNA-seq data have been deposited in NCBI SRA under project number PRJNA395926. PCA plots, raw counts, RPKM normalized gene counts, and differential expression are provided in Additional file 2. Genes found to be differentially expressed at pH 6.48, 6.23, and pH 6.12 compared to pH 6.98 were clustered by their expression patterns using the K-means cluster procedure in JMP Genomics 8. Fisher’s exact test was then performed on 7 of the 9 K-means clusters to identify enriched GO terms. Prior to this analysis, GO terms were identified for the entire C. thermocellum DSM1313 genome using the standard workflow in Blast2GO 4.1.5 . JMW designed and conducted experiments, analyzed data and wrote the manuscript. J-WM contributed to chemostat cultivation and sampling. MRJr contributed to chemostat cultivation and sampling, and HPLC analysis. NLE generated metabolomics data. DMK extracted RNA. TR generated and analyzed extracellular amino acid data and constructed the nifH mutant. MMA contributed nifH mutant construction. TJT analyzed metabolomics data. AMG oversaw nifH mutant construction, assisted with data interpretation and manuscript preparation. SDB designed experiments, analyzed data and wrote the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript. This work is supported by the BioEnergy Science Center (BESC), which is a US Department of Energy Bioenergy Research Center supported by the Office of Biological and Environmental Research in the DOE Office of Science. ORNL is managed by UT-Battelle, LLC, Oak Ridge, TN, USA, for the DOE under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725. RNA-Seq data were generated by the US Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute, a DOE Office of Science User Facility, is supported by the Office of Science of the US Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-AC02-05CH11231. The manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC, under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, preparation of the manuscript, or the decision to submit the work for publication. The publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan). This work is supported by the BioEnergy Science Center (BESC), which is a US Department of Energy Bioenergy Research Center supported by the Office of Biological and Environmental Research in the DOE Office of Science. ORNL is managed by UT-Battelle, LLC, Oak Ridge, TN, USA, for the DOE under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM1_ESM.xlsx Additional file 1. Data logs, substrate and product concentrations, internal and external pH readings, and media formulation for chemostat reactor cultures of C. thermocellum LL1210. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM2_ESM.xlsx Additional file 2. Raw and processed read counts, alignment statistics, log2-fold changes in the gene expression, and K-means clusters and GO enrichment of differentially expressed genes from samples taken from C. thermocellum LL1210 cultured in chemostats at pH values 6.98, 6.48, pH 6.24, and pH 6.12 (washout conditions). Gene expression at pH 6.98 was used as a reference for differential expression at lower pH values. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM3_ESM.docx Additional file 3: Figure S1. Average optical density at wave-length 600nm (A and C) and average terminal pH (B and D) of C. thermocellum LL1210 cultured in 48-well plates. OD600nm readings were taken automatically every 15 min in a microplate spectrophotometer (Biotek Eon, Winooski, VT) kept in an anaerobic chamber. Only 3-h time points are shown. Nine hundred microliters of inoculated medium was mixed with 100 μl of uninoculated medium supplemented with spermine, spermidine, or putrescine (polyamines), or arginine (polyamine precursor) so that the final concentration was 100 μM. Initial culture pH was 7.00 (A and B) or 6.75 (C and D). Averages were calculated from at least three biological replicates. Error bars indicate standard deviation and are colored the same as the amendments in the legend. Table S1. Average and standard deviation of maximum and terminal optical densities (600nm) and specific growth rate of C. thermocellum LL1210 cultured in media with and without amendments and having initial pHs of 7.00 and 6.75. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM4_ESM.docx Additional file 4: Figure S2. Average growth (A), terminal pH (B), and remaining substrates and products at the end of C. thermocellum-mutant strain fermentations of cellobiose in MOPS-free carbon-replete medium (C). Averages were computed with data from four biological replicates. Error bars in each graph indicate standard deviation. Some error bars are too small to see. Deletion mutants are designated as LL1210 (hydrogenase maturation protein, lactate dehydrogenase, pyruvate formate lyase, phosphotransacetylase and acetate kinase), GLDH (glutamate dehydrogenase), GS (glutamine synthetase), GOGAT (glutamate synthase), GS-GOGAT (both), and NifH (nitrogenase iron protein). The parental strain designated DSM1313 has a deletion in the hypoxanthine phosphoribosyltransferase. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM5_ESM.docx Additional file 5: Figure S3. Differential expression of genes found in Clostridia sporulation cascades. pro-σE processing protease is a stage III sporulation factor. BofA is an inhibitor of the stage IV pro-σK processing protease SpoIVFB. Table S2. Percentage of spherical morphologies 144 and 216 h after inoculation. Figure S4. Substrates and products (A) and the pH (B) after 144 and 216 h of C. thermocellum-mutant fermentations on MOPS-free carbon-replete medium starting with an initial pH of 6.75. Significant differences at α = 0.001 for comparisons with DSM1313 (∆hpt) are indicated with a “*” and comparisons with DSM1313 (∆hpt) and LL1210 are indicated with “**”. Averages were calculated with six biological replicates. Error bars indicate standard deviation. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM6_ESM.xlsx Additional file 6: Table S3. Fold changes of intercellular metabolite there were significantly higher or lower in concentration at growth-limiting pHs. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM7_ESM.xlsx Additional file 7. Extracellular amino acid concentrations in media from C. thermocellum LL1210 chemostats that were sampled when pH values were pH 6.48, pH 6.24, pH 6.12, and below. Demonstrations of data homoscedasticity for T tests. 13068_2018_1095_MOESM8_ESM.docx Additional file 8: Table S4. Strains and primers used in this study. Andrews S. FastQC: a quality control tool for high throughput sequence data. 2010. http://www.bioinformatics.babraham.ac.uk/projects/fastqc. Accessed 5 Feb 2016.
2019-04-18T23:21:15Z
https://biotechnologyforbiofuels.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13068-018-1095-y
Try your luck gold prospecting and gold panning at the these Northern and Southern CALIFORNIA locations. Nobody likes a claim jumper, so watch for posted claims and pan only at sites and parks where the public is welcome. It's always a good idea to call ahead, visit Web sites and stop at the ranger station to make sure you know the rules. These areas and parks allow public access for gold panning. Auburn State Recreation Area: Includes 40 miles of the north and middle forks of the American River. From Auburn, reach the area from Highway 49 or Auburn-Foresthill Road. (530) 885-4527, www.parks.ca.gov. South Yuba River State Park: Includes a 20-mile stretch of the Yuba River's south fork. Off Highway 49, north of Nevada City. Nearest town is Bridgeport. (530) 432-2546, www.parks.ca.gov. Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park: Gold panning in Humbug Creek, behind buildings in North Bloomfield. Malakoff Diggins is 26 miles from Nevada City. (530) 265-2740, www.parks.ca.gov. Marshall Gold Discovery State Historic Park: South fork of the American River at Coloma, where gold was discovered in 1848. Panning lessons daily, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Cost $7. For large group reservations: (530) 295-1850. For more park information: (530) 622-3470, www.parks.ca.gov. Columbia State Historic Park: Look for Matelot Gulch Mining Co. inside the park for panning lessons. Cost is $8; (209) 532-9693, (209) 533-3105. Park is three miles north of Sonora off Highway 49. For more park information: (209) 588-9128, www.parks.ca.gov. Hangtown's Gold Bug Park & Mine: A 61.5-acre park in Placerville, 2635 Goldbug Lane. Gold panning in the troughs. Pan rental is $2 an hour. Check in at Hattie's Gift Shop if you want to pan. (530) 642-5207, www.goldbugpark.org. � Two square miles along the South Yuba River near the town of Washington have been set aside for gold panning. (530) 265-4531. � The Forest Service also has a gold panning parcel at the Union Flat Campground on the North Yuba River. (530) 288-3231. Eldorado National Forest: Gold panning is allowed, and the Eldorado National Forest Web site recommends two areas � PiPi Campground and the Cache Rock area. It also provides some good advice: "... it is your responsibility to determine whether you are on private land or a mining claim." Maps are available at ranger offices in Pioneer, Georgetown, Pollock Pines and Camino. www.fs.fed.us/r5/eldorado. The great "Gold Rush of 1849" caused California to be named "The Golden State". Even today, gold mining continues on a large scale. Gold ranks 3rd in California's mineral production. The state has produced over 150 million ounces of gold with most of that being produced in "The Mother Lode" placer mining areas. THE CALIFORNIA GOLD RUSH WAS THE SECOND USA GOLD RUSH FIRST ONE WAS OUT IN THE EAST GOLD BELT. Amador County was the most productive of "The Mother Lode" counties. This county produced approximately 6,500,000 ounces of placer gold and 7,700,000 ounces of lode gold. Mining continues today. The richest area in this county is about 1 mile wide across the west central part of the county from the south to the north. The Old Eureka Mine had the deepest shaft in America at 1,3500 feet deep and it was the largest producer in the mother lode in the early days. The Kennedy, Argonaut and Keystone Mines were also large gold mines in the same area. Sizable dredging and drift operations between 1850 - 1950 produced about 100,000 ounces of placer gold near Fiddletown along Indian Gulch which goes into Big Indian Creek. Big Indian Creek is said to contain placer gold in large quantities. Around the Plymouth area is said to be rich. Close to the town of Plymouth, in the west central part of the county there were many placer operations that produced tens of thousands of ounces of placer gold. The Loafer Hill mine, near Oleta, had several small gravel deposits that produced well. Near the town of Jackson, you will find the Gwin Mine, it produced lode gold in masses of crystallized arsenopyrite. These are great specimens. Jackson Creek reportedly contains placer gold. Hydraulic operations were located on this river that produced considerable placer gold. Hydraulic operations were located on this river that produced considerable placer gold. Near Volcano in the west central part of the county around Jackson Gulch and Ranchero Gulch there were some very rich placer deposits. Total production from Butte County, 1880-1959, is reported as approximately 3,200,000 ounces of placer gold and 104,000 ounces of lode gold. The Surcease Mine located at township 21N range 4E was a large producer of lode gold. The town of Magalia located in north central part of county, production from 1932 - 1959 was 15,976 ounces of placer gold. The Magalia Tertiary gravel deposits produce placer gold. The Perschbaker Mine, major producer prior until 1910 was a major lode gold producer. Cherokee City, area stream gravels, contain placer gold. On Cherokee Flat, alluvial gravel deposits contain placer gold. Oroville district, in south part of county, along the Feather River, had a total production between 1903-59, of 1,964,130 ounces. The area gravel deposits contain rich placer gold deposit. At Thompson's Flat there were large placer gold operations. Yankee Hill district, located at township 21N range 4E and 5E, in central part of county had a total production of 5,154 ounces of placer gold and 34,427 ounces of lode gold, all along the Feather River there are many placer operations and area lode gold mines. The Calaveras River channel and all tributaries contain rich placers. In the Table Mountain area placers were also very rich. Located at township 3N and Range 10E, along the Calaveras River, you will find the Jenny Lind district which had large scale dredge and dragline operations, with and estimated production of over 1,000,000 ounces of placer gold. Camanche district, in NW part of county, had a total production estimated at 1,000,000 ounces, along the Mokelumne River there were huge, bucket type dredge operations with rich placer gold. Campo Seco district, located at township 4N and 5N and range 10E, in northwest part of county had a total production around 70,000 ounces. All the area tributary stream gravels contain rich placers. You will also find the Pern Mine, it was primarily a copper mine with a rich by product of gold. Mokelumne Hill district located at township 5N range 11E. South of the Mokelumne Hill 2 miles you will find the Eclipse, Infernal, and other mines that were large producers of lode gold. Angeles Camp had many area mines. The Keystone, Lancha Plana, and Union mines were gold mines with a by product of copper. The Utica and Gold Cliff mines were major producers of lode gold. Melones districts contained over 800 lode mines. Carson Hill was the most productive area and contained many mines with rich lode gold deposits. The Sheep Ranch Mine was a huge producer of lode gold. The Royal Mine was also a large producer of lode gold, with over 10,000 ounces of production. Gold is reported on Mount Diablo, in Mitchell Canyon. There was an old prospect on Walnut Creek in a ravine tributary. Gold was reported with bornite and chalcopyrite. Between 1880 and 1990 Del Norte County has produced approximately 50,000 placer gold ounces and about 1,000 ounces from lode deposits. Diamond Creek area had several lode mines with placer possibilities. The Keystone mine was a lode mine in the Rockland district. Monkey Creek is said to contain placer gold. Shelly Creek contains placer gold associated with area quartz mines. The Smith River is definitly the place to look in this county. The Smith River produced about 45,000 ounces from placer operations dating back to the 1880's. Most of the tributaries contain gold as well. James Marshall discovered gold at Coloma in 1848 on the South Fork of the American River 8 mile northwest of Placerville to initiate the great gold rush of 1849-50. From 1880 through 1959 the county produced 1,267,700 ounces of gold, earlier production not being recorded, but probably very large. Along the American River and its tributaries, very many placer operations were conducted. In the Georgia Slade district, located at township 12N and range 10E, in northwest part of county there were many area quartz mines, that produced rich lode gold. In the area weathered gravel deposits, extensive hydraulic operations produce rich placer gold. Throughout the Mother Lode, East Belt, and West Belt districts in an area about 10-20 mi. wide extending north to south in the western part of the county. The total production is around 1,000,000 ounces. The Union and the Church mines were major lode gold producers. The Big Canyon, Mt. Pleasant, Pyramid, Sliger, Taylor, and Zantgraf mines, were all major producers of lode gold. Around the town of Fairplay had many area lode mines and placer operations. At the Indian diggings, placer grounds, and lode mines. Around the town of Georgetown in the North part of the county there were also many rich area placers. Around the town of Nashville there were also many area lode mines, opened in 1851 for rich lode gold. Also around Nashville there were rich area placer mines that were reactivated in the 1930s, when large, floating dragline dredges were introduced. Near the town of Placerville there are many old placer mines that exist near all local streams. If you go northeast 5.6 miles, along the American River there are some very rich gold placers. The gravel deposits in Cedar Ravine, Forest Hill, Smith's Flat, Webber Hill, and White Rock Canyon all had very rich placer gold mining history. If you go south 18 mile in township 9N and range 13E, you will find the Grizzly Flat Placers which were very rich. In the west central part of township 10N range 11E there were also some very rich mines that produced lode gold (hard rock mining). This is a very rich river. It contains good gold on most bars and benches. At the Briceburg recreation area approx 12 miles east of Mariposa on Hwy 140 you can sluice and pan for gold. Also at the day use Bagby rec. area between Mariposa and the samll town of Coulterville on hwy 49. Gold Dredging is available for a small fee. The GPAA also maintains a couple of members only claims in this area. Check out the local small towns around the area like Hornitos and Aqua Fria, these are less travelled but have abundant gold in the creeks and rivers. Placer gravels along the San Joaquin River produced 121,000 ounces between 1880 and 1959, when it was part of Madera County. All sand and gravel operations along the San Joaquin River between Friant and Herndon had rich placer gold operations. At the Friant Dam the gravel excavated for use in building the dam produced $196,977 in placer gold between 1940-42. Gold is the principal mineral resource of Humboldt County, primarily from placers along the Klamath and Trinity rivers. The total production through 1959 was 131,300 ounces. There are six lode gold mines shown on U. S. Forest Service quadrangles. It has long been known that this river contains placer gold almost everywhere in its length. Near the town of Orick the area ocean beach sands north and south of the mouth of the Klamath River was once worked for placer gold, platinum. Near the town of Orleans in the Northeast part of the county very many gravel bars and benches along the Klamath River to SOMES BAR in Siskiyou County along Highway 96 had very rich gold placer operations. Gold occurs throughout Imperial County in its arid mountain ranges. Here is where the classic pick, pan, shovel and burro prospector of the nineteenth century crisscrossed the desert between water holes. A minimum estimate of 235,000 ounces of lode and placer gold have come from this county. Northwest of Yuma, Arizona, in the southeast part of the county you will find Ogilby site of the Cargo Muchacho district, it had many old mines worked since Mexican times with a total production about 193,000 ounces. Gold can be found in all regional arroyo bottoms, benches, terraces. This is dry wash placers with abundant gold. There are many abandoned area lode mines that produced gold. Most of the gold is fine, grain, wire, nuggets, often with copper. On the Colorado River due north of Yuma, Arizona you will find Picacho Camp in the extreme southeast corner of the county. The Chocolate Mountains area placer and lode claims produce considerable gold. In the southwest you will find the Picacho Mountains that had many gold bearing veins in gneisses and schist’s overlain by lava’s, tufts, and conglomerates. The Paymaster district, minor lode gold production to the South by 5 miles the Picacho Mine, Bluejacket, and others produced some lode gold. A ghost town named Tumco was also a good producer from several area mines. Inyo County produced 496,000 ounces of gold between 1880 and 1959, primarily from lode mines scattered throughout the county, with a considerable percentage as byproduct from lead, silver, copper, and tungsten ores. In the Inyo Range, the Russ district opened in 1861) had many area mines that produced lode gold. On the west and east slopes of the Inyo Range in Mazurka and Marble canyons, there were many small scale placer workings. At Ballarat, in the South Park District, in the southcentral part of county there was a total production of over 100,000 ounces. There are many area old mine dumps that show gold traces. The Ratcliff Mine, was a chief producer of lode gold. Southwest of Ballarat 10~15 miles, in township 23S. range 42E and 43E, in the Argus Range, the Sherman district had a total production, 1939-41, of 14,184 ounces of lode gold. There are also many area lead, silver mines that had a by product of gold. The Arondo Mine was a rich producer of free gold. The Ruth Mine was also a rich producer of free gold, with pyrite. West of Bishop by 17 miles, the Willshire-Bishop Creek district, on east front of the Sierra Nevada Range and in the Tungsten Hills; had a total production, 75,000-100,000 ounces of by product gold, from lead, silver mines. The Bishop creek Mine and, at head of Bishop Creek and the Willshire Mine were large lode gold producers. The Pine creek Mine was once the largest domestic tungsten mine also had a by product of gold. The Cardinal Gold Mining Company Mine only produced lode gold. At Death Valley National Monument on slope of the Funeral Range you will find The Chloride Cliff district which had a total production of 60,000 ounces. Also the site of the Keane Wonder Mine which is now in ruins, but once a large lode gold producer. East of Lone Pine in the Inyo Mountains in north central part of the county, you will find the Union district, that had a total production,1860s-1959, between 10,000 and 50,000 ounces of lode gold. The Reward and Brown Monster mines, were major producers of lode gold. In area canyon and gulch gravels, slopes and drainage channels, placers gold can still be found. In the southeast corner of the county, you will find Tecopa. If you go east 5-10 miles, you will find the Resting Springs district, that had a total production through 1959 of 15,000 ounces of lode gold from lead, silver ores, from the Shoshone Group of mines. If you go west in the Panamint Mountains you will find Wild Rose district, a ranger station is located in Monument, west in the Panamint Range, had a total production of about 73,000 ounces of lode gold from the Skidoo Mine. A total of 1,777,000 ounces of gold came from Kern County between 1851 and 1959. Amalie district, is located between south summit of the Piute Mountains and Caliente Creek in township 30S. range 33E and 34E, it had a total production of 30,000 ounces of lode gold. The Amalie Mine was a major producer; but there were several other area mines that produced lode gold. If you head southeast by dirt road to Bodfish, the Green Mountain district located between the west slope of the Piute Mountains and edge of Kelsey Valley on east side of mountains, you will find the Bright Star Mine, which had production around, 34,000 ounces of lode gold. 7 miles northwest of Piute, in township 29S and range 33E, you will find the Joe Walker Mine which produced about 100,000 ounces of lode gold. In Kernville, located in township 25S. range 33E, the Cove district had a total production, 262,800 ounces, primarily from the Big Blue Mine. It produced free gold, associated with arsenopyrite. West in the Greenhorn Mountains at Lake Isabella along Greenhorn Gulch, extensive placers produced rich gold deposits. Also in area quartz mines there was some lode gold. West in township 26S. range 32E and 33E, the Keyes district had a total production, 39,600 ounces through 1959. There were numerous area Mines that produced lode gold. In Mohave in township 11N and range 15W, you will find the Pine Tree Mine, which produced 75,000 ounces of lode gold. If you go southwest by 4 mile in township 10N and 11N and range 11W, 12W, and 13W, you will find the Rosamond-Mohave district, that had total production, 278,250 ounces of gold plus silver. West of Rosamond several miles, you will find the Tropico Mine, it was a major producer into 1950s. Many other area mines around adjacent Wheeler Springs produced lode gold. If you go to the northeast 25 miles in the El Paso Mountains, all regional gravels contain placer gold, This is a rich area. There are major mines in the area. The Cudahy Camp, Owens Camp, Burro Schmidt's Tunnel, Colorado Camp, etc. all were rich in lode gold. If you go to Randsburg, in the heart of the Rand district, which lies along the Kern County, San Bernardino County line, produced nearly all of the 836,300 ounces of gold is from the Kern County half, with silver as a by product. The Yellow Aster Mine was the largest producer, and many other area mines produced lode gold. If you go northwest 9 miles, in Goler Gulch, the placer deposits were worked 1893-94. The GPAA has a claim at Goler Gulch, see the claim information page. Colors can be found by the dry wash method in Goler Wash located approximately 3 miles north east of Garlock Ghost town. Some of the area is ownwd by a prospect club out of Barstow. They are real friendly and encourage site tours and membership. The down side to this area is that it is open to off highway vehicles and the dirt road traffic gets heavy and noisy at times. There are no toilets or water or organized camping of any kind. The nearest formal camping is at Red Rock Canyon about 15 miles away. If you go to 16 miles south of Weldon, in township 28S. range 35E, you will find the St. Johns Mine, which was a rich lode gold producer. The Diamond Mountain district and Hayden Hill district, produced a total of 147,500 ounces of gold in Lassen County, with a considerable amount of unrecorded placer gold produced before 1880. At Hayden Hill, in northcentral part of county, in township 36N and 37N. range 10E and 11E, produced 116,000 ounces of lode gold, 1870-1910, from several mines. This burned down in 1910. Six miles south of Susanville, in township 29N. range 11E and 12E, the Diamond Mountain district had a total production of 10,000 ounces of placer gold and 22,000 ounces of lode gold. In area stream gravels of Tertiary age you can find placer gold. There are several area gold quartz lode veins in three types of igneous rocks, at the lode mines. Gold placers were worked in Los Angeles County between 1834 and 1838 by Mexican and Spanish miners, and by 1858 more than 6,000 miners were working placer deposits 35 miles northwest of the Los Angeles city hall. Most of the county's total production of gold through 1959 was 1,109,200 ounces which came from lode deposits, but small yields of placer gold are garnered every year by amateur gold hunters from many places, especially from sand and gravel pits and from the streams of the San Gabriel Mountains above Azusa. In the north central part of the county, you will find Acton, it is located in the Cedar and Mt. Gleason district, the area had many area mines and prospect pits, notably the Governor Mine, which had a total production of at least 50,000 ounces of lode gold. If you go north up San Gabriel Canyon, you will find Azusa, which is located in the San Gabriel district which had a total production, 1848-1957, of about 165,000 ounces of gold. In the San Gabriel range gravels, worked 1848-80 for estimated 120,000 ounces of placer gold and still productive of colors and nuggets to weekend panners and dredgers. There were also several area lode mines in area which contained gold quartz veins cutting igneous and metamorphic rocks. In the East Fork of the San Gabriel range, the old site of Eldoradoville which was a gold camp of early 1860s and favorite amateur gold hunting area today, in area watercourse and bench gravels you can find placer gold with some sizable nuggets. North along the Kern County line and south of Neenach, you will fin Lancaster, which is in the Antelope Valley district. Gold was discovered in 1934 in the Antelope Valley district. It had a total production through 1946 of 9,700 ounces. There are many area claims and prospects, and the River Mining Company Claims are the most productive for placer and lode gold. In Placerita Canyon State Park near Newhall, it is the area of original productive placer operations, in present gravel deposits you can still find placer gold. Northeast of San Fernando by 12 miles, in Pacoima Canyon, the headwater and area gravels and slopewash deposits contain placer gold. If you go 12 miles up the canyon from its mouth, you will find the Denver Mining and Milling Property which was a rich lode gold producer. In Tujunga located in Tujunga Canyon, the area gravel deposits contain colors and small nuggets. Total gold production of Madera County through 1959 is calculated at 90,000 ounces. Along the Fresno, Chowchilla, and San Joaquin rivers, there were many dredging operations from discovery years until now for its placer gold content. Near the town of Coarsegold there are many area lode gold mines hidden back in oak covered hills. The Fresno river runs through Coarsegold and Oakhurst yielding much fine gold to those willing to dig. North of Coarsegold by 2 miles there are old mine dumps with gold showings. Northeast of Coarsegold by 5 miles there are area gold quartz mines, and on dumps gold showings. Near Hildreth area extending to Grub Gulch, there are quartz mines that contain lode gold. Near Raymond you will find the Mount Raymond district, The Star Mine produced gold with lead. Chowchilla River is said to be rich in placer gold. Fish Creek is located in the North Fork district, and it contains many area lode gold mines and placer operations. Fresno River contains placer gold. We know for sure because we live on it! :-) Try some of our gold panning material. San Joaquin River is said to contain placer gold. Mariposa County is southernmost of the Mother Lode counties and has had a long and productive gold mining history, with total production of 2,144,500 ounces of gold recovered from 1880-1959, of which 583,500 ounces came from placer operations. Following the closure of mining during World War II, the annual gold production has been about 1,000 ounces. There were very many important lode gold and placer gold producers. The Copper Queen Mine produced copper with a by product of gold. In sections 9 and 10, of township 4S and range 15E, you will find the Fitch Mine which was a rich lode gold producer. West of Bagby in Quaternary gravels along the Merced range, placers produced 50,000 ounces of gold, between 1860-70. In Bear Valley , area mines, especially the Josephine produced lode gold. In Coulterville, which is located more or less central in the Mother Lode and East Belt areas, a northwest trending zone 3-4 miles wide extending from Mormon Bar into Tuolumne County, had a total production, about 1,009,000 ounces of lode gold. The major mines include the Princeton, Pine Tree, Mt. Ophir, Original and Ferguson, Hite, and Mariposa all which produced rich lode gold deposits. Aqua Fria and Mariposa Creeks were the first placers discovered before 1849, many rich placer gravels. In the Hornitos district, more than 500,000 gold ounces were produced along Hornitos Creek, in Quaternary gravels. This offers abundant placer gold for the panner. In the northwest part of county, you will find the Blanchard district; it is located along the Tuolumne county line, just south of Jawbone Ridge; and on the ridge between Moore and Jordan Creeks. 4-5 miles northwest of Bower Cave. There are many placers in regional Tertiary gravels which produced about 75,000 ounces of gold. Aqua Fria and Mariposa Creeks were the first placers discovered before 1849, many rich placer gravels. Two and a half miles south of Mariposa, in township 5S. range 18E, you will find the Mormon Bar district that had a total production, 75,000 gold ounces. Near the headwaters of Mariposa creek and its tributaries rich placer gold is to be found. At Mormon Bar, area of extensive dragline operations in the 1930s also rich placer gold is to be found. Southeast of Mariposa by 6 miles, the Silver Bar Mine can be found and it was a rich lode gold producer. Is rich in placer gold - though mostly fine or flour gold. River runs through Yosmeite. See Briceburg info above. It is reported that gravels along the Navarro River in Anderson Valley contain placer gold and platinum. From Merced Falls to Snelling in the alluvial plain between these towns the gravels were extensively operated 1929-43 by several connected bucket dredges of the Yosemite Mining and Dredging Company. They had a total production, 1880-1959, of 516,346 ounces of placer gold. LOOK FOR TAILING PILES FOR METAL DETECTING OF LARGE NUGGETS. It is reported that in the northeast part of the county there were several quartz mines in the High Grade District that produced about 14,000 ounces of lode gold. Gold mining began in Mono County in 1862, with a total production of 1,176,200 ounces through 1959, with activity continuing today. At the Blind Springs Hill district, you will find the Diana, Comet, Comanche, mines which were mainly copper, silver with a byproduct gold. In the Benton district, there are area lode mines with gold, lead, silver. In the Bodie district and State Monument to the ghost town in township 4N. range 27E, discovered 1860 had a total production through 1959 of 1,456,300 ounces of lode gold. There are many area old mines and dumps with gold showings. On slopes above the town of Bodie, the Standard Mine, was the principal producer. In the Casa Diablo Mountains, at Mammoth Lakes, there are scattered small mines and prospects for lode gold. In the Paterson, in the Sweetwater Range, there are area silver mines that had a by product of lode gold. At Tioga Pass, there are area quartz veins and stringers in granite with gold showings. At Bridgeport near headwaters of the Walker River, you will find Dog Creek which had very productive placers. North of Mono Lake, the Bodie Diggings had good placer gold. Northeast and east of the East Fork of the Walker river, just north of Masonic Mountain, in township 6N. range 26E, you will find the Masonic district. The area had many small mines, and the Pittsburgh Liberty Mine, was a major producer to district's total production of about 34,000 ounces of lode gold. At Bridgeport near headwaters of the Walker River, you will find Virginian Creek which had very productive placers. North of Mono Lake, the Bodie Diggings had good placer gold. Northeast and east of the East Fork of the Walker river, just north of Masonic Mountain, in township 6N. range 26E, you will find the Masonic district. The area had many small mines, and the Pittsburgh Liberty Mine, was a major producer to district's total production of about 34,000 ounces of lode gold. Is said to contain gold. It is reported that in the Los Burros district that there were small area mines in quartz veins that contain lode gold. Napa County had a total gold production of around 24,000 ounces the came as a by product of silver mining. Near Calistoga, north by 2 miles, you will find the Mt. Saint Helena Mine, the Palisades Mine and the Silverado Mine. Both placer and lode gold mines of Nevada County, opened in 1850 and continuing active to today, produced a total of over 18 million ounces of gold. Many placer deposits are known to be rich today, but have not been touched because of state laws ending hydraulic mining operations. Many Tertiary gravel deposits that produced at least half the placer gold through 1909 include the San Juan Ridge, North Columbia, Scotts Flat, Quaker Hill, and Red Dog, You Bet mines, all of which became big hydraulic operations with huge untouched reserves that are producing small amounts of placer gold by amateur panning and small scale high banking efforts. At French Corral all area stream gravels produce placer colors and nuggets. In Grass Valley and Nevada City districts, with very many Mother Lode area camps and mines, total production estimated at 2,200,000 ounces of placer gold and 11,000,000 ounces of lode gold. At Grass Valley, on outskirts of town, the Gold Hill Mine was the first lode mine in the district. At Ophir Hill, Rich Hill, Massachusetts Hill; you will find famous mines the Empire, North Star, Idaho, Maryland ( which had the largest production of any lode gold mine in state) all produced very rich lode gold deposits. At Nevada City; the Blue Tent and Sailor Flat operations were placer gold producers. The Champion, Providence, Canada Hill, Hoge, and Nevada City mines were very rich lode gold mines in this area. At Meadow Lake which is 35 miles east of Grass Valley, a relatively minor lode gold district of several mines, worked 1863-1905, with total production of about 10,000 ounces of lode gold. Although best known for its great placer mines, Placer County also produced substantial amounts of lode gold, with a total of production of over 2 million ounces from 1880-1959. The gold produced from 1849-1880 was not recorded, but probably was very considerable. One and half mile west of Colfax you will find the, the Rising Sun Mine, which was a leading gold mine in the county and had a total production of 200,000 ounces between 1866 and 1932, rich pockets in quartz stringers produced lode gold. East of Colfax by 5 miles you will find the Iowa Hill district, it consisted thick Tertiary gravel deposits worked hydraulically and by drifting. The many area placer operations produced 800,000 ounces of placer gold. The Morning Star Mine produced about 150,000 ounces of lode gold as well. The Dutch Flat - Gold Run district, along north boundary of Placer county due east of Grass Valley (Nevada County), all Tertiary stream channel gravels extending south from Nevada County, produced about 492,000 ounces through 1959 of placer gold from the Tertiary beds. At Forest Hill district, in southcentral part of county, extensive operations produced total of 344,000 gold ounces from area Tertiary channel gravels, worked by drift mining placer gold. East of Forest Hill by 5 miles in south part of the county, you will find the Michigan Bluff district which has a total production, 300,000 gold ounces. The Big Gun Mine, largest hydraulic operation in district produce rich placer gold. The Hidden Treasure Mine, richest drift mine in California was also a rich placer gold producer. There are several area lode gold mines, the Pioneer, Rawhide, etc. that were also rich. At Loomis the area gravel deposits along the American River were dredged during the 1930s for placer gold. At Penryn go east 1 mile, and you will find the Alabama Mine, it was a rich lode gold mine, with lead and silver. Near the town of Auburn along the American River, many rich placers existed. The Ophir district was most productive, with 1,500,000 ounces of lode gold produced. At the Green Emigrant Mine, the Crater, Bellevue, Oro Fino, and Three Stars mines, were very rich producers of lode gold. One of The favorite places to go is the Auburn State Recreation Area. It is located about 30 minutes east of Sacramento in the Mother Lode. It is easy to find on a map. It is a public area, therefore, claims cannot be filed so it is open for mining. The primary gold is placer and I suppose if you get real lucky you may find a vein, however, this area has been well prospected for 150 years. There is a lot of black sand in this system and usually plenty of fine gold as well. Up to one pennyweight nuggets are not uncommon to be found occasionally but, the norm is fine gold, flakes of all sizes and small nuggets. There are many areas where a person can get one pennyweight in one day with nothing more than a pan! A friend recently found more than a 7 pennyweight in nuggets in one afternoon! Just remember that before you set up the equipment, do your testing as there are also areas that contain little or no gold. Of the approximately 4,582,000 ounces of gold produced in Plumas County, 1855-1959, more than half came from Tertiary gravel placer mines worked on a large scale by hydraulic methods. The Gopher Hill, Nelson Point, Sawpit Flat, and Upper Spanish Creek mines, were all in alluvial gravels for there placer gold content. The Engles and Superior mines, primarily copper with a by product of gold. In the Crescent Mills district, in township 26N. range 9E, there was total production through 1959 of 3,255 ounces of placer gold and 32,069 ounces of lode gold. In area streams, in Quaternary gravels you will find placer gold. At the Green Mountain Mine they produced of 100,000 ounces of lode gold by 1890. In the Johnsville district, in the southcentral part of county, in east l/2 of township 22N. range 11E, they had a total production, 393,000 gold ounces. All regional stream and bench gravels contain placer gold. The Plumas-Eureka Mine, was a major producer of lode gold. At the La Porte district, in southwest part of the county, in township 21N and range 9E, was the hydraulic mining center since 1850s, with total production, 1855-1959, of 2,910,000 gold ounces. At Mumfords Mill the area copper mines had a by product of gold. At Spring Garden go northeast 9 mile and you will find the Walker Mine, primarily copper mine with a by product of gold. Near Belden, along the North Fork of the Feather River there are rich placer deposits. At Rich Bar, the area gravels along Indian Creek, a tributary of the Feather River, has very rich placers. The Ancient Yuba River channel traced northeast of La Porte for 10 miles 500-1,500 ft. wide and 10-130 ft. deep, with placer gold concentrated in lowermost 2 ft. above bedrock, it was very rich placer. A total of 108,800 gold ounces, mostly lode gold, came from many relatively small mines and a few placers scattered throughout Riverside County, 1893-1959. Southwest of Blythe by 20 miles, you will find The McCoy Mountain district, numerous copper mines had a by product of gold. North of Desert Center, a large area along the north boundary of the county, in township 2S and 3S and range 10E and 12E, the Pinon-Dale district had a total production, produced over 33,000 ounces of lode gold. The Lost Horse Mine, producer of 1,000 ounces of lode gold and The New Eldorado Mine, produced about 500 ounces of lode gold. At Packards Well go south 2 miles in the Palen Mountains to area copper mines that had some production of gold. West and Southwest of Perris, in township 4S and 5S and range 4W you will find the Pinanate district. In that district you would find the Good Hope Mine which was worked prior to 1850 by Mexicans, It produced 1,500 ounces of lode gold. Among the leading gold producing counties, Sacramento County produced over 6 million ounces of placer gold and 5,000 ounces of lode gold between 1880 and 1959. Along the Cosumnes River, stream and terrace gravels contain placer gold. The general area is south of the Cosumnes River in sand and gravel pits, and regional tributary streams and ancient channels all contain placer gold. Near Folsom, the center of intensive bucketline and dragline operations, had many area placer mining operations, and drift mines, mostly opened before 1930, district production about 3,000,000 ounces of placer gold. At Sloughhouse district, along the Cosumnes River in township 7N range 7E, had a total production of 1,700,000 ounces of placer gold produced by early hydraulic methods and dredging during the 1930s, many area stream gravel deposits contain placer gold. San Bernardino is the largest county in the United States and has very many mines scattered throughout its desert and mountain ranges. Although some placer deposits were worked in the early 1850s, most of the recorded production of 517,000 gold ounces through 1959 came from lode mines and as a by product of other base metal mines. South of Ludlow 7 miles, in township 6N and 7N and range 8E, you will find the Stedman district, the Bagdad Mine, discovered in 1903, 150,000 ounces of lode gold. Southwest of Needles by 36 miles on U.S. highway 95 to a westward trending road in the Turtle Mountains, at Carson Wells, you will find the Lost Arch Mine which produced lode gold. West of Oro Grande by 5 miles, you will find the Silver Mountain district, area silver mines had a by product of lode gold. The Black Diamond Mine produced gold, with copper and silver. Northeast of San Bernardino by 20-25 miles, in township 2N and 3N and range 1, 2, and 3E, you will find the Holcomb district which had a total production, 400,000 ounces of placer gold and 54,500 ounces of lode gold. The Ozier Mine, major producer since 1850 for lode gold. In Holcomb Valley many area rich placer deposits located in the 1860s, producing about 340,000 ounces of gold. Also in many valley area mines, mostly abandoned now you can find lode gold. Southeast of Twenty Nine Palms by 15 mile, in township 1S and range 11E and 12E, you will find the Dale district, which had the Brooklyn Mine which opened in 1893 and had a total production of 63,500 ounces of lode gold. Southeast of Victorville by 30 miles, you will fine the Wild Rose Group of claims that produced lode gold in tremolite. The total gold production of gold in San Diego County, 1869-1959, was about 219,800 ounces of lode gold, with very minor placer production. fifty-five Miles northeast of San Diego you will find Julian which was the most important gold producing section of the county. Around Julian there were area lode mines that produced well. If you go east of Julian by 5 miles, in vicinity of Banner, you will also find area lode mines. If you go south of Julian by 3 miles, you will find a copper mine that had a by product of gold. If you go south of Julian 4 miles, you will find the Friday Mine which was a nickel mine with a by product of gold. In the Ramona district, there is the Spaulding Mine which was a lode gold but it is said that in flats below the Little Three Mine you will find placer gold. In Wynola there are area small placer gravel deposits. The 1885-1959 production of 126,400 ounces of gold in San Joaquin County came largely from sporadic placer deposits along the Mokelumne River. In the Belota district, along the Calaveras River, in township 2 N and range 9 E, in east central part of county, a western extension of the Jenny Lind district in Calaveras County had a total production estimated between 20,000 and 40,000 gold ounces in numerous area Quaternary gravel deposits that produced rich placer gold. In Camanche, along the Mokelumne River all the way to Clements, numerous placer deposits. The Clements district in northeast corner. of county, along the Mokelumne River, production estimated between 50,000 and 100,000 gold ounces, all area Quaternary gravel deposits, worked small scale before World War I and dredged during 1930s for its rich placer gold. Near Linden, numerous area gravel deposits along the Calaveras River had rich placer gold. Also throughout the County Gold has been found and mined mostly in the flour variety. Only three locations have produced sizable nuggets. Mostly, West of Paso Robles, in the Mountain Country. A lot of it is private. Some is National Forest. (Los Padres National Forest). Just to the Northern Outside Boundary of the County in Monterey County and to the Eastern Boundary of San Luis meets the Kings & Kern County line, Nuggets have been found on Private Cattle Ranches for years. On JACK RANCH, now owned by the Hearst Corp., there is a butte behind the Headquarters, known as Gold Hill, for good reason. The Mission Padres of San Miguel Mission (7 miles north of Paso Robles) and Mission Indians mined gold there around 1805. Gold has been found North of there in the Castle Mountains, also known to the locals as Kings Peak. An abandoned town / mining district east of Pozo, CA. San Juan Creek and its tributaries. It's called the La Panza district, but no town of La Panza there today. Mostly flour gold. Two GPAA claims in the area. The area west of Mission San Antonio (Hwy 101) and east of Ragged Point (Hwy 1)is an old mining district called Los Burros, but it's mostly private. Between 1880 and 1959 Shasta County produced a total of 2,033,000 ounces of gold, of which 375,472 ounces came from placers. Each summer finds many amateur and "pocket" gold hunters, as well as dredgers, working the county's streams. Along the west central border of the county in the Deadwood district is French Gulch, It had a total production of 128,000 ounces, between 1848-1959, mostly from lode mines along Clear Creek, which were also the earliest placer discoveries. The Washington Mine, was discovered in 1852 and was a lode gold producer. The Greenhorn Mine, in section 33, or township 37N and range 5W was a copper mine with a by product of gold. In the Southwest corner of the county you will find Platina, which is located in the Harrison Gulch district, the Midas Mine discovered in 1894 and destroyed by fire in 1914 after producing more than 20,000 ounces of lode gold. West of Redding 4 miles the Silver King Mine was a silver mine with a byproduct of gold. Southwest of Redding by 10 miles, in township 31N range 6W, you will find the Igo district, along Clear Creek, the placers produced 115,022 ounces of gold, primarily 1933-42, with minor amounts since. Northwest of Redding by 20 miles The West Shasta district had a copper-zinc, gold production, 520,000 ounces. The south part of district, the Iron Mountain Mine by of product gold, with silver, copper. The Balaklala Mine was a silver mine with by product of gold. Six miles west of Redding is the ghost town of Shasta, now a historical monument, area old mines and site of early day gold rush for lode gold. Lode gold mines in Sierra County produced most of the total recorded 2,161,000 ounces of gold, with an unrecorded production prior to 1880 probably boosting the total well above 3,000,000 ounces. Allegheny and Downieville districts in southwest part of county about 10 miles apart, with total placer production of 194,000 gold ounces and drift mine total from Tertiary gravels of 485,000 ounces, total production recorded as 2,173,000 gold ounces. All regional stream gravels and bench deposits have panning colors and nuggets, The 16 to 1 Mine, principal producer of 100,000 ounces of lode gold located on Kanaka Creek. The Kenton Mine, also on Kanaka Creek was also a large producer. In Sierra City you will find The Sierra Buttes Mine and district, producer of 825,000 ounces of lode gold. I have personally dredged this creek with a 3" and 5" dredge below the Kenton Mine. This is one of the richest creeks in the Mother Lode as far as I am concerned. I found some good gold on Kanaka creek below the Kenton mine. Nice Nuggets with quartz attached. Jim Labuz and I dredged this creek with a 3" dredge on the Trios Mine Claim, owned by Harry Deter. We did real good for the time we were there. We found some real nice nuggets. This was an excellent place to dredge. Gold in several areas on the Slate Creek. The Slate Creek was filled with white quartz cobble from the many hydraulic mines. As a recreational, weekender miner, you will recover about an ounce or so in a week. It's common to find quartz with gold in it or on it. This last summer, several pieces were found that weighted from 7 grains to 17 pennyweight. Many have dredged this river in many places and always done well when they hit virgin dirt. This river replenishes every year. I saw a 22 pound nugget that came out of this river above Downieville. The nugget was name "The Lure". Many have done quite a bit of mining in this county and it is one of my favorite places to hunt for gold. Heart of the famed "Northern Mines", Siskiyou County contains more than 370 once active gold mines, which yielded 1,800,000 troy ounces of gold between 1880-1959, with a large unrecorded amount produced between 1850 and 1880. Each summer many amateur prospectors work the gold bearing streams throughout the county in perhaps the most rugged region in California. Compared to other California counties little has been officially reported on Siskiyou County and gold production and much of the information available is questionable. Placer mining is the main way that gold is taken, due to the complex geology in the county. Gold is not the only metal of importance in Siskiyou County. The county is said to contain large Platinum Group metal deposits. The Platinum Group Metals in the Klamath Mountains are unique in that they are composed largely of iridium and osmium, in the form of osmiridium, with platinum being lesser importance. The Klamath River has not been an important source of placer platinum because it is so fine and difficult to recover. Platinum Group Metals collected at the Ten Eyck Mine near Orleans on the Klamath were assayed at 92% osmiridium and 8% platinum. It is reported at a placer operation near Orleans that 3 ounces of osmiridium were saved in a period of 6 years. Platinum on the Salmon River and its tributaries was larger, with nuggets up to 1 ounce in weight being recovered. Most of the platinum has a black coating. The primary areas to look for platinum in Siskiyou County are Callahan, Seiad Valley, Independence, Ten Eyck, Orleans, Forks of the Salmon, Sawyers Bar and the North Fork of the Salmon River. Close to the southwest border of Shasta County Cottonwood creek and its tributaries (Antelope, Crow, Dry Driver and Roaring Creeks) have produced a large amount of placer gold. Estimates put it as high as 260,000 ounces and this may not be an exaggeration. The area was dredged with buckets in many places during the depression and little has been done since. Deadwood Creek is still a favorite with recreational prospectors and the area has a rich history of producing placer gold since the early days. Other producing streams in the area are Cherry, French, Indian and McAdam Creeks. Dillon Creek from where it joins the Klamath River in the west part of the county, has produced a considerable quantity of placer gold. It had a rich history of late from 1951 to 1960 it was worked on a large scale. For those who want to prospect the area, it is well to remember that this last discovery was of a type that required cyanide heap leaching and investigation to the local geology might prove profitable. Elk Creek produces gold throughout it’s length. Horse Creek is a very rich creek. Watch for natural cinnabar deposits that contain mercury. I filled a sluice completely full once on this creek with mercury. Humbug Creek placers were discovered on Humbug Creek about ten miles northwest of Yreka. Later many gold bearing quartz veins were found and worked. Overall estimates range upwards of over 600,000 ounces recovered. Large scale bucket dredging continued until 1950 and recreational miners are active in the area now. North of Happy Camp in area jade mines along Indian creek you will find nephrite jade, gold colors and nuggets, and most prized of all, jade laced with stringers of raw gold which is a prime collectors' gemstone. The Klamath River contains placer gold along its entire course through Siskiyou County. The Klamath River was a productive placer stream and many operations continue today. Many of the tributaries were major producers. Many gold lodes were also discovered near the river. Today, even though much of the river is claimed, amateurs find spots to work their dredges and many do very well. A study of local history and property rights is suggested. Some of the best locations are at where the following creeks come into the river; Humbug, Horse, Schutts Gulch, Scott River, Independence, Dillon, Elk, Indian, Thompson. This list is not complete and many of the tributaries produced large quantities of gold. Klamath River bar and bench gravels contained rich placers. All tributary creeks and bench deposits contain placer gold. From Somes Bare north along highway 96 following the Klamath River to Happy Camp, vast bench gravel deposits untouched to today, extremely rich extensions of huge hydraulic operations east of Happy Camp to highway turnoff to Yreka contains tremendous placer gold potential. As much as 50,000 ounces was produced at the Gilta Mine about 5 miles south of the town of Forks of Salmon. Of more interest to the amateur dredgers are the very rich placers which were found on Know-nothing Creek near the mine. Virtually nothing has been done in this area since the early 1900's. Along every mile of the Salmon River in Siskiyou County placer gold is found. Almost every type of placer mining has been used on the river. Both the north and south forks were productive and one stretch between Forks of Salmon and Sawyers Bar is estimated to have produced over 1,000,000 ounces. This is one of the richest rivers in Siskiyou County. Cecilville is located 30 miles southwest of Callahan on the South Fork of the Salmon River. The Salmon River produced considerable gold on both the east and south forks, near the point where they join in southwestern Siskiyou County. After the placers had been worked a for several years, lode veins were found and mined until 1940. The lodes had both massive bodies and stringers which ran to high grade pockets. If you go north of Cecilville by steep USFS road to the summit, the Black Bear Mine, now private property, but was a producer of 150,000 ounces of lode gold. Many area mines in regional canyons produced lode gold. The East fork of the South Fork of the Salmon River you will find placer gold, with platinum nuggets. The Forks of the Salmon was the center of large gold mining operations and all regional stream and bench gravels had very rich placers. There were huge hydraulic operations on the major streams which produced 1,000’s of ounces of placer gold. If you go southeast of this area, about 10 mi., you will find The King Solomon Mine which can be reached by Matthew’s creek jeep road. This mine was a major producer of lode gold with over 50,000 ounces recorded. The Liberty district is about 10 miles east of Forks of Salmon. The placers were discovered here in the 1850's. The area was active until the start of World War I and although some gold prospecting has taken place since. Many lode mines in the area. Sawyers Bar is located in the Salmon River district and contains roughly 800 square miles of extremely mountainous country between the Marble Mountains and Salmon and Trinity Wilderness areas. This area had a total production between 1855-1965 estimated at 16,000 ounces of placer gold and 20,000 ounces of lode gold. In all regional stream gravels you can find placer gold and platinum. There were very many huge hydraulic operations and Chinese diggings, accessible from the east on Sawyers Bar road. The North Fork of the Salmon River in all gravel and slope wash deposits you will find placer gold. In the South Fork gravel bars, especially near mouth of Black Gulch there are rich placer gold deposits. The Whites Gulch Mine was a hydraulic operation worked until 1970 for its placer gold. If you go east 10 mile to Idlewild which was the site of an old sawmill and USFS campground, the gravels of South Russian River have rich placer gold and platinum deposits on bedrock. It is reported that on the North Fork of the Salmon there were very many mines, The Hickey Mine, The Gallia Mine, The Red Hill Mine all of which were substantial producers. Also it should be noted that gold in this area is said to be fine to flour and you should have recovery systems that will handle that type of gold. A large amount of gold was recovered from the Scott River near the town of Callahan with most of the recorded production coming from a dredge operation which worked the stream for about five miles. There were also many lode deposits near Callahan. The veins were small, but they were rich. One lode mine is reported to have recovered between 15,000 and 20,000 ounces. Callahan is located 44 miles Southwest of Yreka at South end of Scott Valley. This is an area with enormous amount of mining activity. The bed of the South Fork of Scott River, from Callahan South toward headwaters there were great hydraulic operations and Chinese rock piles which still contain placer gold. Gold is still found after every winter runoff. Also placer gold is found in all gulches and creeks, with many lode mines hidden back in steep mountains. North along the Scott River, several miles of dredging operations which were halted in 1955 by law. Southwest of Callahan, by jeep road, the Martin McKeen Mine, was a producer of 12,100 ounces of lode gold. The Porphyry Dike Mine, was also an important producer of lode gold. Go North of Callahan 5 mile to Sugar Creek and follow west on USFS road to a hydraulic workings which contains very rich placer gold. Go South a few mile to Camp Eden, then go Southeast across canyon you will find the Blue Jay Mine, and in the gravels of nearby Jackson creek is an area which was a rich producer of gold nuggets after winter floods. Go East of Callahan 10-12 miles along Grouse Creek and you will also find additional rich placers. The Copper King Mine was a silver mine that had a by product of gold. South of Callahan 14 miles, Carter Meadows Recreation Area in Trail creek there is also rich placer showings. Fort Jones is located by traveling southwest along the Scott River road to Indian Creek, it had extensively dredged gold placers. All access roads into the Scott Bar Mountains lead to productive mines, most which were lode gold producers. Placer gold can be found in all regional gulches, canyons, streambeds, and bench deposits (some extensively worked). If you travel north 12 mile you will find the vanished town of Deadwood on old road. to Yreka and all area canyons and gulches contain gold. If you travel west down Scott River road you will find Cottonwood and Rancheria Creeks which had large scale dredging operations which produced over $4,000,000 in 1850s. There are many area lode gold mines, especially the Golden Eagle, produced 48,500 ounces until 1931. Placer mining began early during the gold rush in the area about five miles west of Fort Jones. Rich lode mines were found later in this area. West of Greenview 4 miles, in Quartz Valley, is where you will find Muccinsville which had several old mines on west side of Quartz Mountain and site of a 5 stamp mill remnant near Quartz Valley School. The area stream gravels contain pannable colors. Scott Bar is located where the Scott River meets the Klamath River. It is 3 miles east of Hamburg on highway 96. The Scott Bar Mine operated from 1850 until 1970 and had lode gold in hesitite. Placer gold was discovered here at the beginning of the gold rush and for many years the nearby area supported hydraulic and lode mines. It is worthy of note to amateur prospectors for many rich pockets were found here. The mines just west of this small town were lode and although they produced around 30,000 to 40,000 ounces they were considered worked out shortly after the turn of the century. Yreka is the county seat of Siskiyou County and contained many rich lode mines, rich placers. Following winter storms, large gold nuggets can be picked up within city limits, especially around the water works where, in December 1964 floods, several nuggets to 4 ounces each were found on the surface. Hawkinsville is a suburb of Yreka and was the site of a rich gold camp of early 1850s. The canyon and gulch gravels contain rich placer gold. Hungry Creek, area gravels and slope wash deposits contain placer gold. 14 miles southeast is the Peg Leg Mine which was a rich lode gold mine. The gold on Thompson Creek is large and slabby, but Thompson creek is very spotty and it is a good idea to have some good boulder moving equipment. Bedrock is generally deeper on this creek. Between 1880 and 1955 the Quaternary grave deposits of Stanislaus County produced 365,000 ounces of placer gold. Along the Stanislaus River near Oakdale to the Northeast to Knights Ferry in all the gravel bars, benches and terraces gravels you will find placer gold. Along the Tuolumne River, near Waterford all the way East to La Grange in the Tertiary gravels and benches you will find placer gold. Lode mines and placers produced over 2 million ounces of gold in Trinity County between 1880 and 1959, most of it came from placer gravels of the Trinity River. Trinity County is the dredgers best chance to find a large platinum nugget in the state of California. Several Nuggets of Platinum greater than 1 ounces have been found. Near the mouth of Coffee Creek, the area gravels contain placer colors and many area lode mines were big producers. If you go North along the East Fork of the Trinity River, especially in the Indian Creek tributary, you will find productive placer gold locations. On the west edge of the county, in gravels of the Trinity River stream, bench, and terrace gravels you can find placer gold. There are many area quartz mines that produced lode gold. Dedrick, Douglas City, Hay Fork, all gravel bars, benches, and tributary deposits along the Trinity River contain placer gold, platinum nuggets. Near Helena area gravel bars and benches along the Trinity River contain placer gold. If you go North along the East Fork of the Trinity River, especially in the Indian Creek tributary, you will find productive placer gold locations. In Junction City there are numerous area lode and placer mines. In Trinity Center, original town now under waters of Claire Engle Lake, but central in the Trinity Basin district, which had a total production of over 1,750,000 gold ounces from 1880-1959. There are many huge hydraulic operations, visible from the U.S. Forest Service logging roads, all of these produced placer gold and platinum. The Golden Jubilee Mine was a very productive lode gold mine. Three miles above old town site of Trinity Center you will find the Enright Claim which was a rich placer gold producer, with platinum nuggets to several ounces. In Weaverville there were many big productive mines along side roads that produced lode gold. The La Grange Mine was the largest hydraulic operation in area for placer gold. Tulare County had more than 60 lode mines, but only those in the White River District (discovered in 1853), produced a large amount of gold. The total gold production for this county was about 21,000 ounces. It had two districts the Mineral King District and the Whte River district that produced gold. In the Mineral King District there are many area prospects that produced lode gold in arsenopyrite deposits. In the White River District there were many manys that produced lode gold. South of Porterville by 30 miles, on the middle fork of the Tule River there were many small copper mines that had a by product of gold. South of Porterville 11 miles you will find the Deer Creek Mine. This mine was a silver mine that had a by product of gold. Tuolumne County produced over 3 million ounces of lode gold and over 8 million ounces of placer gold, the placers are thought to be the richest in the state. At Columbia many area gravel deposits are worked for placer gold. At Sawmill Flat, the Barney Pocket Mine was a big lode gold producer. In the south part of the county in township 1S and range 14E, 15E, and 16E the Quaternary stream gravels yielded about several 100’s of thousands of ounces. Near Groveland you will find the Longfellow Mine which was the most productive in the district with 24,200 gold ounces produced before 1899 of lode gold. Southwest of there at Big Oak Flat, the Washington Mine was also a rich lode gold producer. At Jamestown and Sonora, is the Columbia Basin district, which is about 2 miles in diameter, in parts of township 1N and 2N and range 14E and 15E in the northwest part of the county and it had a total production about 5,874,000 ounces of placer gold. In all area stream, bench, and terrace gravels you can find placer gold. About 3 miles south of Jamestown you will find the Mann Copper Mine that had a by product of gold. In Sonora the area gravel deposits in the streambeds, benches, were very rich and extensively worked for there placer gold. The O'Hara mines produced some beautiful crystallized lode gold. At Tuolumne, Standard and Soulsbybille, in the East Belt district, they had total production, 965,000 gold ounces. The area had very many area lode and placer mines. The area mines around the settlement of Pooleys Ranch also produced rich lode gold. West of Tuttletown, beginning of the Mother Lode belt of about 40 lode mines extending northwest to southeast across Tuolumne County had some very rich areas as well. At the headwaters of Moccasin Creek near Mariposa County, they had a total production over 2 million ounces. The Harvard Mine and the Dutch mines were the most productive properties in district with 450,000 ounces produced to 1928. Between Jamestown and Sonora and the Stanislaus River, the Pocket Belt district which is 5-6 miles wide had a total production 1,267,000 ounces of placer gold. There were many small area mines that produced lode gold. The Bonanza Mine was so rich that it produced 15,000 troy ounces in a week one time. A suggested prospecting site in southern California. It's the Piru Creek area in the Los Padres National Forest. It is located just north of Los Angeles in the Gorman Region on Interstate 5 in Ventura county. this is a very scenic and accesable area for the Southern California Prospector It is a year round creek good for panning and sluicing. The gold is fine flake with an occasional nugget. The placer gravels of Yuba County produced over 5 million ounces of gold, its lode mines yielded only 1 million gold ounces. In the Browns Valley and Smartville district, in central part of county, in township 16N. range 5E. There were many area mines that produced lode gold. The Hibbert and Burris mines were the most productive lode gold in the area. At Challenge there were lots of lode gold mines. In the Dobbins district, in the Indiana Ranch area, the California M Lode was a rich lode gold mine. In section 30 of township 18N and range 7E, you will find the Red Ravine Mine which was also a rich lode gold producer. At Smartvile there are many lode gold mines that are rich. I have a friend that is doing real well on the Feather River with a 5" dredge. He is on some club claims. At Marysville and Yuba City, regional gravels of the Feather River especially upstream toward the mountains are very rich in placer gold. In the Hammonton district, in S part of the county along the Yuba River, in parts of township 15N and 16N and range 4E and 5E, total production over 500,000 ounces. In Quaternary gravels, extensive placer operations were done in all regional buried channel and exposed Tertiary gravel deposits, these were extensively worked placers. I have used large dredges in this area on the Yuba River and I have personally had 10 ounce days with an 8" dredge.
2019-04-21T18:09:39Z
https://www.goldfeverprospecting.com/cagolopapr.html
2005-02-10 Assigned to MICRON TECHNOLOGY, INC. reassignment MICRON TECHNOLOGY, INC. ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS). Assignors: AKRAM, SALMAN, RIGG, SIDNEY B., OLIVER, STEVEN D., WATKINS, CHARLES M., HEMBREE, DAVID R., KIRBY, KYLE K. Methods for forming interconnects in blind holes and microelectronic workpieces having such interconnects are disclosed herein. One aspect of the invention is directed toward a method for manufacturing a microelectronic workpiece having microelectronic dies with integrated circuits and terminals electrically coupled to the integrated circuits. In one embodiment, the method includes forming a blind hole in the workpiece. The blind hole extends from a first exterior side of the workpiece to an intermediate depth in the workpiece. The method continues by forming a vent in the workpiece. The vent is in fluid communication with the blind hole. The method further includes constructing an electrically conductive interconnect in at least a portion of the blind hole. The present invention relates to forming interconnects in microelectronic workpieces and microelectronic workpieces formed using such methods. Microelectronic devices, micromechanical devices, and other devices with microfeatures are typically formed by constructing several layers of components on a workpiece. In the case of microelectronic devices, a plurality of dies are fabricated on a single workpiece, and each die generally includes an integrated circuit and a plurality of bond-pads coupled to the integrated circuit. The dies are separated from each other and packaged to form individual microelectronic devices that can be attached to modules or installed in other products. One aspect of fabricating and packaging such dies is forming interconnects that electrically couple conductive components located in different layers. In some applications, it may be desirable to form interconnects that extend completely through the dies or through a significant portion of the dies. Such interconnects electrically couple bond-pads or other conductive elements proximate to one side of the dies to conductive elements proximate to the other side of the dies. Through-wafer interconnects, for example, are constructed by forming deep vias on the front side and/or backside of the wafer and in alignment with bond-pads at the front side of the wafer. The vias are often blind vias in that they are closed at one end. The blind vias are then filled with a conductive fill material. After further processing the wafer, it is eventually thinned to reduce the thickness of the final dies. Solder balls or other external electrical contacts are subsequently attached to the through-wafer interconnects at the backside and/or the front side of the wafer. The solder balls or external contacts can be attached either before or after singulating the dies from the wafer. One concern of forming through-wafer interconnects is that it is difficult to fill deep, narrow blind vias with electrically conductive material. In most processes using solder, for example, flux is used on a layer of nickel within the blind via to remove oxides from the nickel and to prevent the nickel and other materials in the via (e.g., solder) from forming oxides. When the molten solder enters the blind via, the flux solvent produces gases that can be trapped in the closed end of the blind via. This is problematic because the gases may produce voids or other discontinuities in the interconnect. In addition, the flux itself may be trapped in the fill material and cause additional voids or irregular regions within the interconnect. Another concern of forming through-wafer interconnects using blind vias is that vapor deposition processes may produce non-uniform seed layers on the sidewalls in the vias. This can affect subsequent plating processes in high aspect ratio holes because the nonuniform seed layers cause the plating rate to be higher at the openings than deep within the vias. The electroplating processes, for example, may “pinch-off” the openings of high aspect ratio holes before the holes are filled completely. Therefore, there is a need to more effectively form interconnects in blind vias and other deep holes in microfeature workpieces. FIGS. 1A-1K are side cross-sectional views illustrating a portion of a workpiece at stages of a method for forming interconnects in accordance with an embodiment of the invention. FIG. 2 is a side cross-sectional view of a portion of a workpiece illustrating a stage of a method for depositing conductive fill material into a blind hole accordance with another embodiment of the invention. FIGS. 3A-3C are side cross-sectional views of a portion of a workpiece illustrating stages of a method for depositing conductive fill material into a blind hole in accordance with yet another embodiment of the invention. FIG. 4 is a side cross-sectional view of a portion of a workpiece illustrating a stage of a method for forming interconnects in accordance with still another embodiment of the invention. FIG. 5 is a side cross-sectional view of a portion of a workpiece illustrating a stage of a method for forming interconnects in accordance with yet another embodiment of the invention. The following disclosure describes several embodiments of methods for forming interconnects in blind holes, and microelectronic workpieces having such interconnects. One aspect of the invention is directed toward a method for manufacturing a microelectronic workpiece having microelectronic dies with integrated circuits and terminals electrically coupled to the integrated circuits. In one embodiment, the method includes forming a blind hole in the workpiece. The blind hole extends from a first exterior side of the workpiece to an intermediate depth in the workpiece. The method continues by forming a vent in the workpiece. The vent extends to the blind hole such that gases or other fluids can flow from the blind hole to the vent. The vent can accordingly be in fluid communication with the blind hole. The method further includes constructing an electrically conductive interconnect in at least a portion of the blind hole. The method can then include removing material from a second exterior side of the workpiece to thin the workpiece. Before forming the vent, the method can also include applying a dielectric liner to at least a portion of the blind hole, depositing a barrier layer over at least a portion of the dielectric liner, and depositing a seed layer onto the barrier layer. A layer of resist is then deposited over the workpiece and an opening is formed in the resist over the blind hole. A conductive material is then deposited into the blind hole and over at least a portion of the seed layer. The conductive layer can act as a wetting agent for a conductive fill material that is deposited into the blind hole to form the interconnect after forming the vent. Another aspect of the invention is directed toward a microelectronic assembly including microfeature workpiece having a substrate with a first side and a second side. The assembly can include a microelectronic die on and/or in the substrate. The die includes an integrated circuit and a terminal electrically coupled to the integrated circuit. The assembly can also include a blind hole in the substrate extending from the first side of the substrate to an endpoint at an intermediate depth within the substrate. The assembly also includes a vent hole in the workpiece that is open to the blind hole and an electrically conductive interconnect in at least a portion of the blind hole. Specific details of several embodiments of the invention are described below with reference to interconnects extending from a terminal proximate to the front side of a workpiece, but the methods and workpieces described below can be used for other types of interconnects within microelectronic workpieces. Several details describing well-known structures or processes often associated with fabricating microelectronic devices are not set forth in the following description for purposes of clarity. Also, several other embodiments of the invention can have different configurations, components, or procedures than those described in this section. A person of ordinary skill in the art, therefore, will accordingly understand that the invention may have other embodiments with additional elements, or the invention may have other embodiments without several of the elements shown and described below with reference to FIGS. 1A-5. FIGS. 1A-1K illustrate various stages of a method for forming interconnects in a workpiece 10 in accordance with an embodiment of the invention. FIG. 1A illustrates the workpiece 10 at an initial stage before the interconnects have been formed. The workpiece 10 can include a substrate 12 having a first side 14 and a second side 16. The workpiece 10 can also include a plurality of microelectronic dies 20 on and/or in the substrate 12. Each microelectronic die 20 can include integrated circuitry 21 and a plurality of terminals 22 (e.g., bond-pads) operatively coupled to the integrated circuitry 21. The terminals 22 shown in FIG. 1A are external features at the first side 14 of the substrate 12. In other embodiments, however, the terminals 22 can be internal features that are embedded at an intermediate depth within the substrate 12. FIG. 1B is a side cross-sectional view of the area 1B shown in FIG. 1A. In previous processing steps, a first dielectric layer 30 was applied to the first side 14 of the substrate 12, and a second dielectric layer 32 was applied over the first dielectric layer 30. The second dielectric layer 32 was then patterned and etched to expose the terminal 22. The dielectric layers 30 and 32 can be a polyimide material, but these dielectric layers can be other nonconductive materials in other embodiments. For example, the first dielectric layer 30 and/or one or more of the subsequent dielectric layers can be parylene, a low temperature chemical vapor deposition (low temperature CVD) material such as tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS), silicon nitride (Si3N4), and silicon oxide (SiO2), and/or other suitable materials. The foregoing list of dielectric materials is not exhaustive. The dielectric layers 30 and 32 are not generally composed of the same material as each other, but these layers may be composed of the same material. In addition, one or both of the layers 30 and 32 may be omitted and/or additional layers may be included, such as in the case of a redistribution layer. After depositing the second dielectric layer 32, a mask 33 is applied over the second dielectric layer 32 and patterned as shown in FIG. 1B. The mask 33 can be a layer of resist that is patterned according to the arrangement of terminals 22 on the substrate 12. As such, the mask 33 has an opening over the terminal 22. Referring to FIG. 1C, a hole or aperture 40 is formed through at least part of the substrate 12. The hole 40 extends through the terminal 22, the first dielectric layer 30, and a portion of the substrate 12 to define a blind hole or via 45. For purposes of this specification, a “blind hole” or “blind via” refers to a hole or aperture that extends only partially through the substrate 12 or is otherwise closed at one end. The hole 40 is formed by etching through the materials using one or more individual etches. After forming the hole 40, the mask 33 is removed from the workpiece 10. The hole 40 can alternatively be formed using a laser in addition to or in lieu of etching. If a laser is used to form all or a portion of the hole 40, it is typically cleaned using chemical cleaning agents to remove slag or other contaminants. Although laser cutting the hole 40 may be advantageous because the substrate 12 does not need to be patterned (i.e., mask 33 would not need to be applied), etching the hole 40 may be easier because the slag does not need to be cleaned from the hole 40 and the depth of the hole 40 can be more precisely controlled with an etching process. A further advantage of using an etching process is that the first side 14 of the substrate 12 can be patterned and etched to simultaneously form a plurality of holes 40 aligned with corresponding terminals 22. Furthermore, the holes 40 can generally be more precisely aligned using an etching process as compared with a laser cutting process. Referring next to FIG. 1D, a third dielectric layer 34 is deposited onto the workpiece 10 to line the sidewalls of the hole 40 within the substrate 12. The third dielectric layer 34 electrically insulates components in the substrate 12 from an interconnect that is subsequently formed in the hole 40, as described in greater detail below. In one embodiment, the third dielectric layer 34 can be a low temperature CVD oxide, but in other embodiments the third dielectric layer 34 can be other suitable dielectric materials. A suitable etching process is then used to remove the third dielectric layer 34 from at least a portion of the terminal 22. A barrier layer 36 is then deposited onto the workpiece 10 over the third dielectric layer 34 and in electrical contact with the terminal 22. In practice, the barrier layer 36 generally covers the second dielectric layer 32 and the terminal 22 in addition to the third dielectric layer 34. The barrier layer 36 can be deposited onto the workpiece 10 using a vapor deposition process, such as CVD or physical vapor deposition (PVD). The barrier layer 36 can be composed of Ta, W, or other suitable materials. Referring next to FIG. 1E, a seed layer 50 is deposited onto the barrier layer 36. The seed layer 50 can be deposited using vapor deposition techniques, such as CVD, PVD, atomic layer deposition, and/or plating. The seed layer 50 can be composed of Cu or other suitable materials. The thickness of the seed layer 50 is generally 400 Angstroms to 2 microns. The seed layer 50, however, may not cover the barrier layer 36 uniformly. This may cause subsequent electroplating processes to not apply a uniform metal layer onto the workpiece. If the seed layer is deficient, it can be enhanced using an enhancement process that fills voids or noncontinuous regions of the seed layer 50 to form a more uniform seed layer. One suitable seed layer enhancement process is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,197,181, which is incorporated by reference. Referring next to FIG. 1F, a resist layer 60 is deposited onto the seed layer 50, and the resist layer 60 is patterned to have an opening 61 over the terminal 22 and corresponding blind hole 45. In several embodiments, a first conductive layer 52 can then be deposited onto the exposed portions of the seed layer 50 in the blind hole 45. The first conductive layer 52 can be Cu that is deposited onto the seed layer 50 in an electroless plating operation, electroplating operation, or another suitable method. The application of the first conductive layer 52 is an optional step that can be omitted in several embodiments. Referring to FIG. 1G, a second conductive layer 54 is deposited onto the first conductive layer 52 in the blind hole 45. The second conductive layer 54 is a wetting agent that facilitates depositing subsequent materials into the blind hole 45. The second conductive layer 54 can be Ni that is deposited onto the first conductive layer 52 using an electroless or electrolytic plating process. In other embodiments, the blind hole 45 may be coated with other suitable materials using other methods. Referring next to FIG. 1H, a vent hole 70 is formed in the substrate 12 extending from a bottom portion of the blind hole 45 to the second side 16 of the substrate 12. The vent hole 70 can be formed using a laser to cut through the substrate 12 from the second side 16 to the bottom of the blind hole 45. The laser can be aligned with the blind hole 45 and/or corresponding terminal 22 using scanning/alignment systems known in the art. A suitable laser is the Xise200 commercially available from Xsil Ltd. of Dublin, Ireland. After forming the vent hole 70, it is generally cleaned to remove ablated byproducts (i.e., slag) and/or other undesirable byproducts resulting from the laser. For example, the vent hole 70 can be cleaned using a suitable cleaning agent, such as 6% tetramethylammonium hydroxide (TMAH): propylene glycol. In other embodiments, the vent hole 70 may not be cleaned. In alternative embodiments, the vent hole 70 can be a different size or shape, and may be formed using an etching process (e.g., a dry etch and/or a wet etch), a mechanical drilling process, a dicing or laser slot, or another suitable method. In several embodiments, a temporary protective filling or coating 69 (shown in broken lines) can be deposited into the blind hole 45 before forming the vent hole 70. The protective filling 69 can be a photoresist, polymer, water, a solidified liquid or gas, or another suitable material. The protective filling 69 protects the sidewalls of the blind hole 45 from slag produced during the laser drilling process. The slag can negatively affect the plating of nickel onto the seed layer and/or the wetting of a conductive fill material into the blind hole 45. The protective filling 69 can be removed after forming the vent hole 70. Referring next to FIG. 1I, a conductive fill material 80 is deposited into the blind hole 45 to form an interconnect 82. The interconnect 82 has a first end 83 proximate to the terminal 22 and a second end 84 at the bottom of the blind hole 45. The fill material 80 can include Cu, Ni, Co, Ag, Au, solder, or other suitable materials or alloys of materials having the desired conductivity. The conductive fill material 80 can be deposited into the blind hole 45 using plating processes, solder wave processes, screen printing processes, reflow processes, vapor deposition processes, or other suitable techniques. The plating processes, for example, can be electroless plating processes or electroplating processes. Several additional embodiments of methods for depositing the fill material 80 into the blind hole 45 are described below with respect to FIGS. 2-3C. Referring to FIG. 1J, the resist layer 60 is removed from the workpiece 10 and a suitable etching process is used to remove the remaining portions of the seed layer 50 and barrier layer 36 on first side 14 of the substrate 12. Referring to FIG. 1K, the substrate 12 is thinned to a desired thickness “T” by removing material from the second side 16 of the substrate 12. In the illustrated embodiment, the second end 84 of the interconnect 82 is exposed after removing material from the second side 16. In one embodiment, the initial thickness of the substrate 12 is approximately 750 μm, and the final thickness T is approximately 100-500 μm. The initial and final thicknesses can be different in other embodiments. The second side 16 of the substrate 12 can be thinned using grinding, dry etching, chemical etching, chemical polishing, chemical mechanical planarization (CMP), or other suitable processes. One advantage of several embodiments of the method for forming interconnects 82 illustrated in FIGS. 1A-1K is that the vent hole 70 allows trapped air, gases, or volatile solvents to escape from the larger blind hole 45 when filling the blind hole with the fill material 80. In this way, the vent hole 70 allows the fill material 80 to more easily flow into the blind hole 45 and mitigates the likelihood of voids or discontinuities in the interconnect 82. Another advantage of several of the embodiments of the method described above in FIGS. 1A-1K is that the vent hole 70 will not become plugged while depositing the fill material 80 into the blind hole 45. Because the vent hole 70 is formed after depositing the second conductive layer 54, the fill material 80 deposited into the blind hole 45 will only flow as far as the wetting material (e.g., the second conductive layer 54) and will not flow into the vent hole 70. Accordingly, the vent hole 70 will remain open during the filling process and allow any gases and/or fluids trapped in the blind hole 45 to escape. FIGS. 2-3C illustrate several additional embodiments of methods for depositing the fill material into the blind hole 45. FIG. 2, for example, illustrates a method for filling the blind hole 45 using a plating process. This method can include several steps similar to those described above with respect to FIGS. 1A-1E. The subsequent stages of this method, however, may differ from those described above in that the fill material is plated into the blind hole 45 using a bottom-up plating process that selectively fills the blind hole 45 with fill material. In the illustrated embodiment, for example, the substrate 12 can conduct electrical current to the seed layer 50 or other conductive material (e.g., conductive layers 52 and 54) in the blind hole 45. In another embodiment, the conductive layers 52 and 54 may not be deposited onto the seed layer 50. This embodiment continues by applying an electrical potential to the second side 16 of the substrate 12 and an electrode 230 immersed in the plating solution 220. An electrical current accordingly passes through the substrate 12 such that the ions in the plating solution 220 plate onto the seed layer 50 and progressively plate onto each other to fill the blind hole 45 and form an interconnect 282. The plating process can be terminated when the blind hole 45 is either fully or partially filled with the conductive fill material. The workpiece 10 can then undergo further processing as described above in FIGS. 1J and 1K. FIGS. 3A-3C illustrate another embodiment of stages in a method for filling the blind hole 45 with a conductive fill material. This method can include several steps that are at least generally similar to those described above with respect to FIGS. 1A-1H. The subsequent stages of this method differ from those described above in that a vent hole is not formed through the substrate 12. Instead, the substrate 12 is releasably attached to a support member 310 (e.g., a carrier substrate) that includes a first side 312 and a second side 314 opposite the first side 312. The first side 312 of the support member 310 is releasably attached to the first side 14 of the substrate 12 with an adhesive material 320. The support member 310 has a vent hole 370 substantially aligned with the blind hole 45. The vent hole 370 can be formed either before or after the support member 310 is attached to the substrate 12. Referring next to FIG. 3B, the second side 16 of the substrate 12 is thinned until the bottom portion of the blind hole 45 is opened. The substrate 12 can be thinned using processes similar to those described above with respect to FIG. 1K. Referring to FIG. 3C, this embodiment continues by depositing a conductive fill material into the blind hole 45 to form an interconnect 382 extending through the substrate 12. The fill material can be solder, copper, or other suitable materials. The fill material can be deposited into the blind hole 45 using a solder wave process, but in other embodiments the fill material can be deposited using plating procedures or other suitable methods. FIG. 4 illustrates a stage in a method for forming an interconnect in a workpiece 410 in accordance with still another embodiment of the invention. Several stages of this method is at least generally similar to those described above with reference to FIGS. 1A-1F. The subsequent stages of this method, however, differ from those described above with reference to FIG. 1G-1K in that a plurality of vent holes 70 are formed for individual blind holes 45. In the illustrated embodiment, for example, two vent holes 470 are formed from the second side 16 of the substrate 12 to the blind hole 45. In other embodiments, more than two vent holes may be formed for each blind hole. FIG. 5 illustrates a stage in a method for forming an interconnect in a workpiece 510 in accordance with yet another embodiment of the invention. Several stages of this method are at least generally similar to the steps described above with respect to FIGS. 1A-1E. For example, the third dielectric layer 34, the barrier layer 36, and the seed layer 50 can be deposited onto the workpiece 510 to line the blind hole 45. The seed layer 50 can also be enhanced to provide a uniform seed layer. The subsequent stages of this method, however, differ from those described above in that the vent hole 570 is formed after completing the seed layer 50. After forming the vent hole 570, the workpiece 510 can undergo additional processing steps that are at least generally similar to those described above with respect to FIGS. 1F-1K. For example, first and second conductive layer 52 and 54 (FIGS. 1F and 1G) can be deposited into the blind hole 45, and then a fill material can be deposited into the blind hole 45 (FIG. 1I). In other embodiments, the blind hole 45 can be filled without depositing the first and second conductive layer 52 and 54 shown in FIG. 1F and 1G by electrochemically depositing a fill material onto the seed layer. The electrochemical deposition processes can be electroless plating processes or electroplating processes. In the case of electroplating processes, a potential can be applied to the backside of the substrate as shown in FIG. 2, or the potential can be applied directly to the seed layer as known in the art. From the foregoing, it will be appreciated that specific embodiments of the invention have been described herein for purposes of illustration, but that various modifications may be made without deviating from the spirit and scope of the invention. For example, various aspects of any of the foregoing embodiments can be combined in different combinations. Accordingly, the invention is not limited except as by the appended claims. constructing an electrically conductive interconnect in at least a portion of the blind hole. 2. The method of claim 1, further comprising removing material from a second exterior side of the workpiece to thin the workpiece. 3. The method of claim 1 wherein forming a blind hole in the workpiece comprises etching a hole into the workpiece such that a portion of the hole is aligned with the terminal and the hole does not extend completely through the workpiece. 4. The method of claim 1 wherein forming a blind hole in the workpiece comprises laser cutting a hole into the workpiece such that a portion of the hole is aligned with the terminal and the hole does not extend completely through the workpiece. forming a vent comprises laser cutting a hole from the second exterior side to the blind hole. 6. The method of claim 1 wherein forming a vent comprises laser cutting a hole from the second exterior side to the blind hole. 7. The method of claim 1 wherein forming a vent comprises etching and/or mechanically drilling a hole from the second exterior side to the blind hole. 8. The method of claim 1 wherein forming a vent comprises laser cutting a plurality of holes from the second exterior side to the blind hole. 9. The method of claim 1 wherein forming a vent comprises etching and/or mechanically drilling a plurality of holes from the second exterior side to the blind hole. removing the protective filling and/or coating after forming the vent. 11. The method of claim 1 wherein constructing an electrically conductive interconnect comprises filling the blind hole with a conductive fill material to form the interconnect. 12. The method of claim 1 wherein constructing an electrically conductive interconnect comprises filling the blind hole with a conductive fill material to form the interconnect, and wherein the conductive fill material includes Cu, Ni, Co, Ag, Au, solder, or other suitable materials or alloys of materials having the desired conductivity. 13. The method of claim 1 wherein constructing an electrically conductive interconnect comprises plating a conductive fill material into at least a portion of the blind hole. 14. The method of claim 13 wherein plating the conductive fill material into the blind hole comprises applying an electrical potential to the workpiece in the presence of a plating solution. 15. The method of claim 13 wherein plating the conductive fill material into the blind hole comprises electrolessly plating the fill material into the blind hole. applying a conductive layer into the blind hole and over at least a portion of the seed layer before forming the vent. 17. The method of claim 16, further comprising removing the layer of resist, seed layer, and barrier layer from the at least a portion of the workpiece outside the blind hole after constructing the interconnect and before removing material from a second exterior side of the workpiece to thin the workpiece. 18. The method of claim 16, further comprising enhancing the seed layer before applying the layer of resist. 19. The method of claim 16 wherein the conductive layer is a second conductive layer, and wherein the method further comprises applying a first conductive layer into the blind hole and over the seed layer after applying the layer of resist and before applying the second conductive layer. removing the layer of resist, seed layer, and barrier layer from the at least a portion of the workpiece outside the blind hole after filling the blind hole with a conductive fill material. applying a conductive layer into the blind hole and over at least a portion of the seed layer. thinning the substrate from the second side until at least a portion of the interconnect is exposed. 23. The method of claim 22 wherein forming a blind hole in the substrate comprises etching a hole into the substrate such that a portion of the hole is aligned with the terminal and the hole does not extend completely through the substrate. 24. The method of claim 22 wherein forming a blind hole in the substrate comprises laser cutting a hole into the substrate such that a portion of the hole is aligned with the terminal and the hole does not extend completely through the substrate. 25. The method of claim 22 wherein forming a vent hole comprises laser cutting a hole from the second side of the substrate to the blind hole, and wherein the vent hole extends to the blind hole such that gases or other fluids can flow from the blind hole to the vent hole. 26. The method of claim 22 wherein forming a vent hole comprises etching and/or mechanically drilling a hole from the second side of the substrate to the blind hole, and wherein the vent hole extends to the blind hole such that gases or other fluids can flow from the blind hole to the vent hole. 27. The method of claim 22 wherein forming a vent hole comprises laser cutting a plurality of holes from the second side of the substrate to the blind hole. 28. The method of claim 22 wherein forming a vent hole comprises etching and/or mechanically drilling a plurality of holes from the second side of the substrate to the blind hole. 29. The method of claim 22 wherein constructing an electrically conductive interconnect comprises filling the blind hole with a conductive fill material to form the interconnect. 30. The method of claim 22 wherein constructing an electrically conductive interconnect comprises filling the blind hole with a conductive fill material to form the interconnect, and wherein the conductive fill material includes Cu, Ni, Co, Ag, Au, solder, or other suitable materials or alloys of materials having the desired conductivity. 31. The method of claim 22 wherein constructing an electrically conductive interconnect comprises plating a conductive fill material into at least a portion of the blind hole. 32. The method of claim 31 wherein plating the conductive fill material into the blind hole comprises applying an electrical potential to the workpiece in the presence of a plating solution. 33. The method of claim 31 wherein plating the conductive fill material into the blind hole comprises electrolessly plating the fill material into the blind hole. applying a conductive layer into the blind hole and over at least a portion of the seed layer before forming the vent hole. 35. The method of claim 34, further comprising removing the layer of resist, seed layer, and barrier layer from the at least a portion of the substrate outside the blind hole after constructing the interconnect and before thinning the substrate. 36. The method of claim 34, further comprising enhancing the seed layer before applying the layer of resist. 37. The method of claim 34 wherein the conductive layer is a second conductive layer, and wherein the method further comprises applying a first conductive layer into the blind hole and over the seed layer after applying the layer of resist and before applying the second conductive layer. removing the layer of resist, seed layer, and barrier layer from the at least a portion of the substrate outside the blind hole after filling the blind hole with a conductive material. filling the passage with a conductive fill material to form an interconnect in electrical contact with the terminal. 41. The method of claim 40 wherein forming a blind hole in the substrate comprises etching a hole into the substrate such that a portion of the hole is aligned with the terminal and the hole does not extend completely through the substrate. 42. The method of claim 40 wherein forming a blind hole in the substrate comprises laser cutting a hole into the substrate such that a portion of the hole is aligned with the terminal and the hole does not extend completely through the substrate. 43. The method of claim 40 wherein forming a vent hole in the support member comprises forming a vent hole either before or after releasably attaching the first side of the substrate to the support member. 44. The method of claim 44 wherein filling the passage with a conductive fill material includes filling the passage with Cu, Ni, Co, Ag, Au, solder, or other suitable materials or alloys of materials having the desired conductivity. 45. The method of claim 40 wherein filling the passage with a conductive fill material including filling the passage using a solder wave process. applying a conductive layer into the blind hole and over at least a portion of the seed layer before releasably attaching the substrate to the support member. 47. The method of claim 46, further comprising removing the layer of resist, seed layer, and barrier layer from the at least a portion of the substrate outside the blind hole after constructing the interconnect. 48. The method of claim 46, further comprising enhancing the seed layer before applying the layer of resist. 49. The method of claim 46 wherein the conductive layer is a second conductive layer, and wherein the method further comprises applying a first conductive layer into the blind hole and over the seed layer after applying the layer of resist and before applying the second conductive layer. removing the layer of resist, seed layer, and barrier layer from the at least a portion of the substrate outside the blind hole after filling the passage with the conductive material. removing material from the backside of the workpiece to thin the workpiece and expose at least a portion of the conductive fill material in the first opening. 52. The method of claim 51 wherein forming the first opening comprises etching a blind hole into the workpiece. 53. The method of claim 51 wherein forming the first opening comprises laser cutting a blind hole into the workpiece. 54. The method of claim 51 wherein forming a second opening comprises laser cutting a vent hole from the backside of the workpiece to the first opening. 55. The method of claim 51 wherein forming a second opening comprises etching and/or mechanically drilling a vent hole from the backside of the workpiece to the first opening. 56. The method of claim 51 wherein filling the first opening with a conductive fill material comprises filling the first opening with Cu, Ni, Co, Ag, Au, solder, or other suitable materials or alloys of materials having the desired conductivity. thinning the workpiece from the backside of the substrate to expose at least a portion of the individual interconnects. an electrically conductive interconnect in at least a portion of the blind hole. 59. The assembly of claim 58 wherein the vent hole in the workpiece comprises a hole extending from the second side of the substrate to the blind hole. a conductive fill material disposed in the blind hole over at least a portion of the conductive layer and electrically coupled to the terminal. a metal fill disposed in the blind hole over at least a portion of the wetting agent and electrically coupled to the terminal. an electrically conductive interconnect in at least a portion of the blind hole and in contact with the terminal.
2019-04-22T22:47:09Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20060177999A1/en
So, the votes have been counted and the people have spoken and it is time to reflect a little on what has happened In Stockport, 2 parties have something to be happy about - Labour gained 4 seats and again topped the poll in terms of votes cast (33.39%) and the Liberal Democrats avoided a meltdown, coming second in terms of votes (31.02%) and, whilst they lost three seats that they had held in 2008 (including the Councillor leader, David Goddard's seat in Offerton), they managed to regain Cheadle and Gatley and hold on in Hazel Grove and Bredbury Green and Romiley. The big losers were the Conservatives who came third in vote share (25.33%) and lost two of their seats (Cheadle and Gatley and Heatons North). Control of the Council is now open to debate but I would guess that the Liberal Democrats will retain control with the support of the Independent Ratepayers and the People Matter councillor who supported the Liberal Democrat deputy leader (new leader?) in her slim hold in Manor. Of course, I could be wrong. This was an easy gain for Labour but the collapse in the Liberal Democrat share of the vote is truly catastrophic, coming third behind UKIP. The Lib Dem's John Reid took only 8.23% of the vote, down by 38.69% since 2008 and it is very much back to the drawing board for the party here. UKIP's Phil Lewis garnered a decent 11.8% of the vote to take second place whilst the former UKIP candidate in 2010, John Heginbotham, managed only 2.94% in his Independent tilt at the seat. The Conservatives' Stephen Holgate will be disappointed to have come in fourth and their vote share slipped compared with 2008 and last year suggesting that, even among their small base in this ward, they have suffered a post-budget backlash. Labour's Andy Sorton will doubtless battle to prevent Labour losing its heartland seat in the future having achieved a stunning 35.82% swing from the Liberal Democrats since 2008. I feel fairly pleased with myself with this result as it pretty much turned out as I predicted - Labour's Roy Driver managed to increase the Labour vote by an impressive 6.1% since last May and Labour's vote is up by 26.08% since 2008, the highest vote in this area that Labour has achieved since the creation of the Borough (I am happy to be corrected here) and higher than even Labour's Bill Prince achieved in 1980 when he was elected as Labour's one and only councillor in Bredbury. The Liberal Democrat's Christine Corris managed to hold on with a massively decreased majority from 2008 and a swing against the Liberal Democrats and to Labour of 22.92% in that period. Whilst 2008 was a disaster for Labour nationwide, this is still pretty stunning in the context of this ward. The Lib Dem vote fell sharply from last May (-7.7%) and the continued collapse of the Tory vote has probably helped Cllr Corris to hold on with a comfortable-ish majority of 181. The Conservatives will be pretty dumbstruck by their continuing fall in support in this area where a mix of Lib Dem targeting of the vote and the reaction to the Budget has led them to be out of the race for this ward. Their vote share has more than halved since 2008 and this is the worst showing they have had since the present ward was created. The BNP's Andy Webster took a fairly impressive share of the vote and, as ever, it isn't too easy to speculate where it would have gone if he hadn't stood; many of his supporters wouldn't have voted at all, a few would be Tories but evidence seems to show that BNP voters are often from a disproportionately Labour supporting background so this intervention may have helped Cllr Corris. The Liberal Democrats are probably delighted that there are no elections in this ward for a couple of years to give them time to rebuild their voter base but if Mr Driver stands again, I see him winning here. I got this one completely wrong and I hold my hands up. I was sure that the Conservatives would gain this seat and that Labour would begin to build up their vote share but, when I produced my predictions, the evidence of the post-Budget Conservative collapse wasn't clear and I did not take into account the impressive campaign machine of Councillor Lees who managed to get the vote out whilst the turnout overall for the ward fell sharply. The Lib Dem's 1594 votes were only 14 more than they achieved last year when they were roundly beaten by the Tories, but the turnout in this ward has fallen by a fifth since last May (913 voters less) and the Conservatives voters seem to be the ones who mainly stayed at home with their number of votes down by 906. This is what is known as the rule of differential turnout and the Liberal Democrats have worked it impressively in this ward. Whilst Cllr Lees share of the vote has fallen by 6.82% since 2008, the large fall by the Tories has meant there has been a swing to the Liberal Democrats of 2.06%. This has got to be very disappointing for the Conservatives who nearly took this seat from Cllr Lees in 2008, coming within 119 votes last time she defended the seat, so I guess there will be a post-mortem asking why they could not enthuse the base to turn out and vote. Labour's Kathryn Priestly held the vote share from last year (a slight increase of 0.13%) but I expect she will be very disappointed not to have held onto the voters from last year. Nevertheless, Labour has achieved a 13.66% rise in their vote since 2008. The BNP's Tony Dean achieved 4.1% of the vote and that will have probably have had a similar effect to what I described in Bredbury and Woodley. I am glad I posted last Wednesday night that I was putting this in the Liberal Democrat gain column instead of my initial belief it was a toss-up but a probable Tory hold. Too much was going wrong for the the Tories to see them hold this and congratulations to the new Liberal Democrat councillor Keith Holloway on his victory. Compared to last year, there was another depressing drop in the turnout here but Cheadle and Gatley managed one of the best turnouts in the borough with 41%. It seems that the Lib Dems managed to get their vote out better than the Conservatives who, despite only losing a small share of the vote on last year (-1.42%) saw their hopes of retaining this seat for Mick Jones fall from their fingers. I guess there will be a lot of blame laid at the hands of the Government's recent budget shambles but that didn't stop the Lib Dems from getting their vote out. As it happens, the turnout was very similar to that of 2008. The leaflet targeting of Labour voters by the Lib Dems (including quoting attacks on Labour by their former councillor in Manor) to get the Tories out may have had some success as the Labour vote fell back slightly from 2011 by 0.93% and all this added to the margins to make last year's very marginal ward slightly safer for the Liberal Democrat's and produce a gain for them. Labour's Colin Owen will be disappointed to have not progressed this year, especially given the Coalition government's troubles, but he still managed to improve Labour's vote share since 2008 from 8.77% to 20.4%. Now, I put this ward in my Toss Up column whilst predicting a Lib Dem hold, the result shows my foolhardiness and I will take the newly re-elected Cllr Pantall's good-natured comment on that post as a well-needed hand slap. It must be said though that nobody could have foreseen (at least until the few days) the remarkable drop in the Conservative share of the vote, especially given the absence of a UKIP candidate whose voters were unlikely to rush across to Labour or the Liberal Democrats. It would appear that they mostly stayed at home, which must be very worrying for the Conservatives. If they had stood this year, the evidence suggests that UKIP would have increased its share of the vote. The voter turnout was depressingly low in Cheadle Hulme North at just 33% but Councillor Pantall managed to get out his vote and, whilst only increasing the number of votes the Lib Dems got in 2011 by 9 votes, he increased the vote share by 10.83%. The Conservatives share fell by 5.12% whilst Labour's Emily Hewson increased the vote from last May by 1.1%. So, whilst Councillor Pantall's share of the vote has dropped by over 4% since 2008, he can be pleased with his comfortable majority and the success of his campaign. For Labour, a wonderful increase of over 22% since 2008 with a hefty swing to them from the Lib Dems, but disappointment that they haven't done better and a need to look at how it targets those voters resistant to them. As for the Conservatives' Chris Green, just thank your lucky stars that UKIP didn't stand or things could have been much worse. I predicted a solid Lib Dem victory here but guessed at a reduced majority for Cllr Grice - I was wrong as he managed to hold onto a fairly comfortable majority which, whilst his vote share fell in relation to 2008, the drop in the Conservative vote made more impressive than it could have been. Compared to 2008, the Lib Dem vote fell by 4.47%, the Conservative vote fell by 12.56%, whilst the Labour vote rose by 11.42% and UKIP vote rose by 6.85%. Compared to last May however, Labour's Theo Smith saw his vote fall slightly (-1.36%) but this is not a great ward for Labour and it was always going to be a struggle for him. Councillor Grice will be delighted to see his party's vote rise to 46.86% after last years drop but much of this, on a reduced turnout, seems to be based on the Lib Dems managing to get their vote out whilst the Conservatives (28.9%) suffered an anti-Coalition backlash with UKIP rising and many voters staying at home so dropping by 6.76% since 2011. Other than Cllr Grice, the big winner was UKIP's Cyril Peake who is the only candidate to actually increase his number of voters (up by 108) on 2011 and saw his vote share rise by 3.93% overall. This was bad news for the Conservatives' Julie Smith-Jones and will cause some serious soul-searching in the Tory camp. Despite a good campaign by sitting Councillor Ann Smith, this was always going to be a difficult battle for the Liberal Democrats after the seat swung heavily to Labour last year and, with the ward being the place where two LD councillors (Roy Driver and David White) defected to Labour out of frustration with the Coalition government and local cuts, has become a fairly safe Labour seat. On the face of it, the majority that Labour's Wendy Wild has achieved looks fairly low (267, 8.22%), but this is actually a swing to Labour and without a sitting councillor for the Lib Dems in a couple of years, I suspect the Labour majority will be closer to that of last May. Davenport and Cale Green had a higher turnout than 4 years ago although it dropped pretty dramatically from last year, which seems to have benefited the Liberal Democrats who also managed successfully to squeeze the Conservative vote which fell by 7.26% since last May and by 10.15% since 2008. Without question, a good result for the Lib Dems but only in terms of where they were last May. In terms of 2008, the Labour share of the vote has risen by 17.19% and the Lib Dem share has fallen by 7.39%, a swing to Labour of 12.29%. The healthy looking Lib Dem share of 38.01% would probably not have looked as good if the Tory vote hadn't so spectacularly collapsed. The Green Party's Phil Shaw managed a respectable 6.34% of the vote, although it is down since last May (-2.02%) and the Liberal's Graham Ogden left no mark on this contest with only 37 votes (1.14%). Whilst it is probably of little comfort to former Cllr Smith, I congratulate her on holding onto a personal vote that made things look slightly better than they could have done for her party. Another seat where I wrongly guessed a Conservative gain, although it was very close and the Conservatives, unlike in other parts of the borough, managed to increase their share of the vote compared to their successful campaign last May. The past few weeks' unmitigated bad news for the national party surely depressed the potential Conservative vote and, as with the rest of the borough, the turnout fell quite steeply. Councillor Hogg managed to get the Lib Dem vote out and is undoubtedly very relieved to see their vote share rise by 5.9% since last May. The result is actually worse for the Tories than it looks - this year there was no UKIP candidate and, when I first made my prediction of a Tory gain, I believed this would help them. The fact that it hasn't and that UKIP's vote seems to have stayed at home is very worrying for the Conservatives and their losing candidate, Oliver Johnstone. Interestingly, the Conservatives got exactly the same number of votes as in 2008 (1668) but, on a lower poll, have increased their vote share. Labour's Catherine Sheppard will be disappointed to have not made progress on last year but they can certainly be pleased to have escaped the worst of a squeeze - the vote since last year fell by only 0.61%. Congratulations to a relieved Councillor Hogg, he held on despite a big drop in his vote share since 2008, most of which has gone to Labour on a huge 12.105% swing. I predicted this one correctly with the share of the vote for the Conservatives and Labour fairly similar to last year but with a slight rise for both parties and Labour enjoying an additional swing from the Tories of 0.625%. It must be difficult for the Conservatives to know what has happened in this seat which used to be a fairly safe (at one time, very safe) bet for them. Whilst there have been demographic changes, it still has a demographic that should favour them but it seems that they are destined to be the most likely to succeed when Labour is doing badly. The Conservative candidate, Barbara Judson, can be pleased that she managed to increase the vote share by 1.2% since last May but, in a straight fight with Labour, they will need to be achieving in the mid 40's to be sure of a gain. Compared to 2008 when former Councillor Jones stood, the Tory vote has fallen by 14% whilst Labour's has risen by 22.34% (admittedly, 2008 was a terrible year for Labour), a swing of 18.17% to them. Labour will be delighted to have taken this seat and Councillor Sedgwick will be particulary pleased to have raised the Labour vote share since last year by 2.46%. The Green's veteran candidate, Janet Cuff, will be pleased that she didn't suffer a squeeze and saw her share of the vote rise compared to 2008 and 2011. For the Liberal Democrats and their candidate, Andrew Rawling, this is probably a result they would like to forget. Never a good seat for them, they were squeezed in this race and forced into 4th place. I got this one wrong but I did wonder (and added to my original post) what the effect of the intervention of the now 'People Matter' Cllr McAuley might be on behalf of Cllr Derbyshire. To be honest, I don't really think that it has made much difference to the result as Labour held its share compared to last year and it was the successful squeeze that the Lib Dems managed to put on the Tory vote that seems to be the main reason for this hold. I suppose he may have convinced a dozen or so people and that would be responsible for the hold, but it is not too worthy of consideration as it can't be quantified. Compared to last year, the Conservative vote share has fallen by 7.06%, some of that may have stayed at home but some will be the result of a 'keep Labour out' campaign. The Deputy Leader of the Council, Sue Derbyshire has worked very hard with her party on this campaign and managed to get her vote out very successfully and she deserves congratulations for this whilst others were losing out. Compared to 2008, her share of the vote has fallen by only 1.06% (remarkable really) and this is the reason for her victory. Labour's Walter Barrett will be deeply disappointed to have failed to take this seat by only 24 votes and will need to go to the drawing board to work out how to get former Tories to switch to Labour let alone gain even more former Liberal Democrat voters. However, the Labour vote compared to 2008 has risen by a stunning 20.19% and holding on to that share will be the basis of future victory hopes for Labour. The BNP's Duncan Warner again stood and his vote continued to decline. I predicted last year that Labour would take this seat at these elections and I guessed it would be a nailbiter - and it was: Labour's Laura Booth claiming the scalp of Council Leader, Dave Goddard, by just 45 votes. From all reports, this was a real battle and it came down to who could get the vote out and whether Labour could convince enough tactical Lib Dems that they could win. Equally, Dave Goddard had to convince Tories to vote for him to keep Labour out. In the end, Labour were successful and managed to increase their vote compared to last year by 5.13% whilst the Liberal Democrat's vote slipped by 0.41%. I don't doubt that some Tory supporters may have gone straight across to Labour, but it is more likely that they went to the Lib Dems at about the same rate as voters switched from the Lib Dems to Labour. Only 140 less voted than last year and it is all these slight margins which excite psephologists and frustrate party activists - it is the 'if only' rule: "if only I had got that vote out, if only I had canvassed that street again." The Conservative vote held up fairly well but, given they were the main opponents to the Lib Dems until last year, they will be concerned that they are clearly third here and weren't able to capitalise on the defection to them of Councillor Smith. UKIP's Harry Perry would have hoped to have gained at the expense of the Tory troubles nationally, but failed to do so and saw their vote slip back slightly. In such an interesting and close contest, it is hard to be an also-ran. In the end, it has been Labour's ability to crawl back from the doldrums of recent years and to make themselves a challenger in this ward which is the real story. It was always likely that if Labour re-established itself in Offerton then the main losers would be the Liberal Democrats. Since Mr Goddard last stood in 2008, the Labour share of the vote rose by an extraordinary 26.82% and the Lib Dem share has fallen by 12.47%, a swing of 19.645%. The disappearance of the BNP has added to the political weather - where has that vote gone? Evidence suggests that many are former Labour voters and the party was most successful here when Labour was nowhere, but the BNP voters are a mixed bunch and a lot will be voting UKIP and a few will stay at home. So, Stockport has lost its Council Leader and the Lib Dems have lost their party boss, it will be interesting to see what happens now but, for Mr Goddard, after 20 years as a councillor (many as a Labour representative), I suspect a bit of a deep breath and a sitdown is in order. I put this in my Toss Up column and wasn't sure who would win, but (again) I had not taken into account the effect of the 'omni-shambles' budget on Conservative-inclined voters and the Lib Dems successful campaign. Compared to last year, The Lib Dem vote fell only slightly (-0.37%) whilst the Conservative vote share fell by 4.81% giving the Lib Dems a more comfortable majority than last year though somewhat worse than 4 years ago when Councillor Orrell last stood. The Conservative candidate, John wright, will be disappointed not to have been able to hold or increase the Tory vote share and must be frustrated by the national picture which depressed the Tory vote, but UKIP's Izzy Bolton managed to increase their share of the vote (+2.98%) compared to last May and much of that must have come from the Conservatives. The veteran Green candidate, Ken Pease, will be pleased that he saw his vote share rise by 2.6%. Labour's Janet Rothwell managed to avoid a squeeze and increased her vote share since last May by 1.74%. I am sure that she will feel some disappointment not to have made a significant move forward and to be establishing the Labour Party as realistic challengers for the ward but, compared to 2008, the vote share is up by 16.38%. Councillor Orrell will be fairly pleased with the result but will be concerned at the low turnout and the fact that, compared to when she last stood for election (2008), her party's share of the vote fell by 14.39%. So - the story is that where there was a competitive battle, the turnout was quite good, and the Liberal Democrats did better than many predicted (including themselves, I would have thought) due to the fall in the Conservative vote compared to last year. It is probably why the Lib Dems managed to hold onto Hazel Grove, Bredbury Green and Romiley along with Manor whilst gaining Cheadle and Gatley. A lot of Conservatives will be very unhappy with David Cameron but I suspect a lot of Liberal Democrats, when the relative relief fades, will be concerned at the effect that being part of the Coalition has had on their local activist base. Across the north of Stockport and in the old Lancashire wards, the Lib Dems vote has collapsed as disastrously as it has in large parts of Manchester and Rochdale. It is amazing to see how their vote has disappeared in Brinnington and Central (won by the Lib Dems in 2008), Edgeley and Cheadle Heath (once a Lib Dem seat) and the best they achieved was 9.63% in Reddish South. As Labour discovered to its cost, you cannot wither away in wards or you may find that the way to recovery is a long one. For the Conservatives, a series of bitter blows when they had hoped for better - they are reduced to only 10 Councillors and are only able to rely (in fairly good times) on the Bramhall wards to return councillors in the Conservative cause. Third in terms of vote share across the Borough and a distant third in terms of the number of Councillors, there needs to be a lot of soul-searching in the Stockport Conservative camp. For Labour, not-quite unalloyed joy but joy nonetheless; for the third year in a row, Labour has increased its number of seats on the council and, for a successive year, have the highest number of votes cast across the borough. Whilst there will be disappointment at just missing out on taking Manor from the Liberal Democrats, there will be a lot of satisfaction at gaining 4 seats and finally getting a toe-hold in Offerton with the added bonus (for them) of removing David Goddard from his seat. Labour's success in pushing the Liberal Democrats close in Bredbury and Woodley offers them a strategy for becoming the largest party in Stockport with a successful rebuilding of their support in the east of the borough. So - much to contemplate. Your Manor analysis is bias to the extreme "squeezing the Tory vote to keep Labour out" how is this quantifiable in a statistically significant way, thats right it isn't. Manor was won by 28 votes and the Labour vote was down by just over 200 from last year. I suspect Walter Barrett just couldn't get the support the way Laura Booth could illustrated by the Labour Leaders comments in the MEN that he got what he wanted and Offerton was a bonus. Why put up a candidate you don't support? From speaking to nieghbours I think Cllr McAuley is more respected than you give him credit for. It was a flawless campaign from the Lib Dems to win by the margin they did, skillfully using McAuley's situation to their advantage. Clearly Labour need to get better at strategy apparently people where campaigning in brinnington while they were losing Manor, I think this has more to do with it. Labour's vote share, on a reduced turnout, is nearly the same as last year. The Tory vote was squeezed. In my analysis, I congratulate Councillor Derbyshire on her campaign. So, what is the issue? I still do not believe Cllr McAuley's situation shifted that many votes although, as I noted in my analysis, it may have been enough to swing the seat in such a close election. You are welcome to your opinion which, to be honest, considerably mirrors mine - I agree that the Lib Dems have played Cllr McAuley's situation well and that their campaign was excellent...so, where is the bias? Oh, the margin was 24 votes, not 28. I'm affraid the stats do lie as on the Stockport website it says turnout was up from last year. This is of course wrong, but I still contest your analysis that the McAuley factor had little impact for the following reasons. While turnout was down nationally in Stockport the Liberal vote in terms of numbers has remained relatively consistant over the last two years and actually in manor consistant outside of GE over the last few years. Hazel Grove, Bredbury Green and Romiley and Manor the variance was minimal. This is quite obviously down to working on a core vote quite successfully however Labour could not maintain the 200 votes that came out to vote the last time despite two very prominant media campaigns and a alot more campaigning over the year. Cheadle and Gately the Labour vote went down almost parallel to the Lib Dem vote. so simply putting this down simply to a national trend does not give sufficent attention to the local circumstances. While I agree it shifted few votes. I think it kept enough at home. An issue for Labour in the future when they contest the seat. I didn't get my statistics from the Stockport Council website - what I have analysed are the votes cast and they are correct. The turnout in Manor fell from 34.66% last May to 30.65% this time and that accounts for the Labour vote share fall. I agree that the turnout is consistent with a normal year but compared with 2008 only the Labour vote has risen. I admire your defence of Councillor McAuley and I have no issue with that, but the evidence is as I present it and, from what you write, you agree. In terms of the percentages you've obviously done your sums however your conclusion is muddled. On the one hand you say the Lib Vote has remained consistant while on the other your saying it is being proped up by a sucessful Tory squeeze its one or the other. Also while the Labour vote is the only one out of the two that has gone up over the last 2 years it is also the only one out of the two to have gone down numerically as well. Infact I think I''m right in saying the Liberal vote in Manor is the only one to have numerically gone up in Stockport compared with last year, which is significant in terms of what the mood amongst voters in that ward campared with other wards in the area. Also don't forget that the Leader of the Council could not hold on to his seat in Offerton which was safer than Manor and the Tory vote went down while the Libs stayed roughly the same and the Labour vote went up. This would indicate that tories in that area are more likey to turn Labour than Liberal. I think this illustrates the point that a more qualitative understanding of the McAuley factor is significant in any analysis of the Stockport election as it is not known what the feeling within the Labour Party was toward the candidate who by all accounts was not very supportive and even the Labour Leader claimed he got what he wanted on the night even with Derbyshires election and Offerton was a bonus. So my orginal point stands that a statistical interpretation of the results which leads to the Tory squeeze (which was also affected by national discontent) conclusion is more inductive than a the argument I put to you. Its not a defence of Cllr McAuley its a reasonable conclusion to reach with a more detailed look at the results. We will agree to differ; I have taken the same approach to all the wards I have reviewed. It is up to local politicians to decide what interpretation to place upon the results. As for Offerton, it is much more in line with normal vote movement to suggest that Cllr Goddard lost votes to Labour at a greater rate than he managed to gain them from Conservatives. I do not doubt that some Tories may have switched to Labour but it is likely to be a small minority compared to those who would switch to the Lib Dems to keep Labour out. To accept your argument one would need to fly in the face of all evidence to the contrary. I haven't just 'done my sums', I have researched voting patterns for many years and demographic shifts seldom happen in a vacuum. When it comes to Manor and Offerton, you have your view and you are welcome to share it, I happen to disagree. The actual numerical evidence is not to the contrary at all. As I said in the beginning your reductionist approach is leaving out and reducing key variables as insignificant anomolies that ultimately squew your analysis toward developing along the lines of a good night for Labour. Furthermore your suggesting that voters appear to be following some kind of national trend or confused model based broadly on a national swing suggesting the electorate and local campaigners are incapable of rational thought in relation to local issues and simply follow a national trend. The reality is that it is this kind of analysis that cost Labour the bradford By election. The out of touch senario that Mr Miliband likes to pontificate about. I'd be weary of your statistics if you ever decide to run for office yourself you may come a cropper. I am not a politician or member of any political party, I fell out with the Labour Party a long time ago. These are the statistics for Stockport - Labour got its highest share of the vote in many years in May (even up on 2011), the Liberal Democrats got their second worst result in recent memory and the Conservatives fell back very badly. Exactly how could this be described as a bad night for Labour (because none of my Lib Dem and Conservative supporting fellows see it as such)? You are angry with someone but it isn't (or shouldn't be) me. I suggest you look back at my original reflection on Manor and notice that I congratulated Cllr Derbyshire on her win because when things are close local variables do count and, in her case, her long service as councillor and hard working campaign is likely to be the major reason she has held her seat(along with everything else I suggest). My original predictions were based on the local makeup of each ward and I am sure I have never impuned anybody's ability to think rationally - indeed, the whole point of tactical voting, which I posit as being one of the reason for Cllr Derbyshire's victory, is that it is a decision based upon a person's choice. To deny that national issues effected the results goes against the opinion of most politicians and political commentators and I dare say that the closeness of the result in Manor will be mostly put down to that by the local Liberal Democrats than any failings on their part as the local administration. Thankfully, I will never run for election - if you have a response to my specific point about whether Labour's best share of the vote in Stockport Borough counts as a good night for them, I will respond, otherwise, this is getting really daft. :\ Angry? I'm merely stating a point of view about your analysis basis being flawed because the percentages do little to elucidate the Liberals overall managed to buck the national trend in terms of their capacity to maintain a critical mass of voters turning out. The issue for me with the analysis is purely academic. I suggest that Labour needed to take Manor in order to achieve status as the Boroughs Largest Party in the next two years and for the Tories to take hazel grove. My contention is that the narrow results are significant in appreciation of the information released by Cllr McAuley across the borough. As a consequence what I'm saying is to suggest the McAuley factor is insignificant does not reflect in the real data i.e. the numerical evidence. If Labour are to progress in Stockport they will have to hope the economy remains flatlined and that they can get the same 40 tamesiders out in Manor as well as in Offerton at the next election. Furthermore if they aren't the biggest party by the time they are in Government at the next general election then they will never achieve largest party status in Stockport. On that basis it can hardly be regarded as a good night for Labour. Read each of my comments on the wards, I have remarked on the success of the Lib Dems where it was exceptional. I have no axe to grind. Amyway, your opinion has now been expressed so I think it is best to move on. Os a chionn agus ar aghaidh!
2019-04-23T06:29:05Z
http://catholicleft.blogspot.com/2012/05/review-of-stockport-council-election.html
Matthew Chalk, Aaron R. Seitz, Peggy Seriès; Rapidly learned stimulus expectations alter perception of motion. Journal of Vision 2010;10(8):2. doi: 10.1167/10.8.2. Expectations broadly influence our experience of the world. However, the process by which they are acquired and then shape our sensory experiences is not well understood. Here, we examined whether expectations of simple stimulus features can be developed implicitly through a fast statistical learning procedure. We found that participants quickly and automatically developed expectations for the most frequently presented directions of motion and that this altered their perception of new motion directions, inducing attractive biases in the perceived direction as well as visual hallucinations in the absence of a stimulus. Further, the biases in motion direction estimation that we observed were well explained by a model that accounted for participants' behavior using a Bayesian strategy, combining a learned prior of the stimulus statistics (the expectation) with their sensory evidence (the actual stimulus) in a probabilistically optimal manner. Our results demonstrate that stimulus expectations are rapidly learned and can powerfully influence perception of simple visual features. As well as depending on the sensory input that we receive, our perception of the world is shaped by our expectations. These expectations can be manipulated quickly through sensory cues or experimentalists' instructions (Posner, Snyder, & Davidson, 1980; Sterzer, Frith, & Petrovic, 2008) or, more slowly, based on the statistics of previous sensory inputs. For example, in complex scenes, objects are recognized faster and more accurately when they are contextually appropriate to the visual scene as a whole: when presented with an image of a kitchen, people are better at recognizing a loaf of bread than a drum (Bar, 2004). In other words, we learn from past experience, which objects are expected within the context of a particular visual scene, and our perceptual sensitivity for these objects is increased accordingly. Indeed, it has been shown extensively that expectations modulate perceptual performance. When visual cues are used to inform participants the location that a stimulus is most likely to appear, their perceptual sensitivity for stimuli presented at this location is increased. This results in decreased reaction times, decreased detection thresholds, and increased sensitivity for discrimination of features such as orientation, form, or brightness for stimuli presented at the expected location (Doherty, Rao, Mesulam, & Nobre, 2005; Downing, 1988; Posner et al., 1980; Yu & Dayan, 2005b). More recently, it has been shown that, in complex tasks, participants implicitly learn which visual signals provide task-relevant information, such as predicting which stimuli are likely to be presented, and that this information can be used to optimize performance in the task (Chun, 2000; Eckstein, Abbey, Pham, & Shimozaki, 2004). As well as enhancing perceptual performance, expectations can also influence “what” is perceived. Specifically, recent studies have shown that rapidly learned expectations can help determine the perception of bistable stimuli (Haijiang, Saunders, Stone, & Backus, 2006; Sterzer et al., 2008). Perception of such bistable stimuli is unstable, undergoing frequent reversals (van Ee, 2005) whose dynamics can be altered voluntarily by the observer (van Ee, van Dam, & Brouwer, 2005), In contrast, perception of simple stimuli is typically unambiguous and, seemingly, not so easily changed. Therefore, whether expectations can also alter the perception of simple stimuli that are not bistable is unclear. A growing body of work suggests that perception is akin to Bayesian Inference (Knill & Pouget, 2004; Weiss, Simoncelli, & Adelson, 2002), where the brain represents sensory information probabilistically in the form of probability distributions. Here it is assumed that in situations of uncertainty, sensory information is combined with prior knowledge about the statistics of the world, serving to bias perception toward what is expected. This framework has been used to understand a great number of perceptual phenomena, such as why moving images appear to be moving slower when they are presented at low contrast (Stocker & Simoncelli, 2006), and the illusory “filling-in” of discontinuous contours (Komatsu, 2006; Lee & Mumford, 2003), adding support to the idea that expectations can alter the appearance of simple unambiguous visual stimuli. However, in these studies, participants' expectations (i.e., priors) are usually assumed to be acquired over long periods of time, through development and life experience. On the other hand, in the field of sensorimotor learning, it has been shown that participants can learn priors about novel statistics introduced during a psychophysical task and that they combine this with information about their sensorimotor uncertainty in a manner that is consistent with a Bayes optimal process (Faisal & Wolpert, 2009; Körding & Wolpert, 2004). In the visual domain, how new sensory priors are learned is an open question. Here we sought to understand whether stimulus expectations can be implicitly acquired through fast statistical learning, and if so, how such expectations are combined with visual signals to modulate perception of simple unambiguous stimuli. We examined this in the context of motion perception in a design where some motion directions were more likely to appear than others. Our hypothesis was that participants would automatically learn which directions were most likely to be presented and that these learned expectations would bias their perception of motion direction. A secondary hypothesis was that participants would solve the task using a Bayesian strategy, combining a learned prior of the stimulus statistics (the expectation) with their sensory evidence (the actual stimulus) in a probabilistic way. Twenty naive observers with normal or corrected-to-normal vision participated in this experiment. All participants in the study gave informed written consent, received compensation for their participation and were recruited from the Riverside, CA area. The University of California, Riverside Institutional Review Board approved the methods used in the study, which was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Visual stimuli were generated using the Matlab programming language and displayed using Psychophysics Toolbox (Brainard, 1997; Pelli, 1997) on Viewsonic P95f monitor running at 1024 × 768 at 100 Hz. The display luminance of the CRT monitor was made linear by means of an 8-bit lookup table. Participants viewed the display in a darkened room at a viewing distance of 100 cm with their motion constrained by a chin rest. Motion stimuli consisted of a field of dots (density: 2 dots/deg2 at 100 Hz refresh rate) moving coherently at a speed of 9°/sec within a circular annulus, with minimum and maximum diameter of 2.2° and 7°, respectively. The background luminance of the display was set to 5.2 cd/m2. At the beginning of each trial, a central fixation point (0.5° diameter, 12.2 cd/m2) was presented for 400 ms. With the fixation point still onscreen, the motion stimulus was then presented, along with a red bar which projected out (initial angle of bar randomized for each trial) from the fixation point (Figure 1). The bar was located entirely within the center of the annulus containing the moving dots (length 1.1°, width 0.03°, luminance 3.4 cd/m2). Participants indicated the direction of motion by orienting the red bar with a mouse, clicking the mouse button when they had made their estimate (estimation task). The display cleared when either the participant had clicked on the mouse, or a period of 3000 ms had elapsed. On trials where no motion stimulus was presented, the red bar still appeared and participants were required to estimate the perceived direction of motion as normal. Participants were instructed to fixate on the central point throughout this period. Participants' reaction time in the estimation task determined how long the stimulus was presented for. On average this was equal to 1978 ± 85 ms (standard error on the mean; see Supplementary Figure 7 for a plot of reaction time versus presented motion direction). After the estimation task had finished, there was a 200-ms delay before a vertical white line was presented at the center of the screen, with text to either side (reading “NO DOTS” and “DOTS,” respectively). Participants moved a cursor to the right or left of this line to indicate whether they had or had not seen a motion stimulus (detection) and clicked the mouse button to indicate their choice. The cursor flashed green or red for a correct or incorrect detection response, respectively. The screen was then cleared and there was a 400-ms blank period before the beginning of the next trial. Sequence of events in a single trial. Each trial began with a fixation point, followed by the appearance of a motion stimulus. A central bar projecting from the fixation point was presented simultaneously with the motion stimulus and allowed participants to estimate the direction of motion. After either participants had made an estimation, or a period of 3000 ms had elapsed, the stimulus disappeared and was replaced by a vertical line, with text to either side. Participants moved a cursor to either side of the line to indicate whether they had perceived the motion stimulus. Every 20 trials, participants were presented block feedback on the estimation task, with text displayed on screen telling participants what their average estimation error was in the previous 20 trials (e.g., “In the last 20 trials, your average estimation error was: 20°”). Block feedback rather than trial-by-trial feedback was given because we wanted to encourage participants to do their best at the estimation task, without interfering with their estimation behavior (and biases) on each trial. Participants took part in two experimental sessions lasting around 1 hour each, taken over successive days. Each session was divided into 5 blocks of 170 trials, where all stimulus configurations were presented, making 1700 trials in total (850 trials per session). Participants were presented stimuli at four different randomly interleaved contrast levels. The highest contrast level was at 1.7 cd/m2 above the 5.2 cd/m2 background. For each session, there were 250 trials at zero contrast and 100 trials at high contrast. Contrasts of other stimuli were determined using 4/1 and 2/1 staircases on detection performance (García-Pérez, 1998). For each session, there were 135 trials with the 2/1 staircase and 365 trials with the 4/1 staircase. For the two staircased contrast levels, on a given trial the direction of motion could be 0° ± 16°, ±32°, ±48°, or ±64°, with respect to a central reference angle. To reduce potential biases in the population, we averaged results due to reference repulsion from cardinal motion directions (Rauber & Treue, 1998); this central motion direction was randomized across participants. We manipulated participants' expectations about which motion directions were most likely to occur by presenting stimuli moving at ±32° more frequently than the others (Figure 2). Therefore, at the 4/1 staircased contrast level, there were 130 trials per session with motion at −32° and +32° and 15 trials per session for each of the other directions of motion. At the 2/1 staircased contrast level, there were an equal number of stimuli moving in each of the predetermined directions: 15 trials per session for each motion direction. At the highest contrast level, there were 25 trials per session with motion at −32° and +32° and 50 trials per session at completely random directions (among all possible directions, not just the predetermined directions used in the rest of the experiment). Probability distribution of presented motion directions. Two directions, 64° apart from each other, were presented in a larger number of trials than other directions. Motion direction is plotted relative to a reference direction at 0°, which was different for each subject. In the analysis of the estimation task, we looked only at trials where participants both reported seeing a stimulus and clicked on the mouse during stimulus presentation to indicate their estimate of motion direction. The first 100 trials from each session (∼25 trials from each contrast staircase) were excluded from the analysis to allow the staircases to converge on stable contrast levels (Supplementary Figure 2a). Data were analyzed for the 12 (of 20) participants who could adequately perform both tasks according to our predetermined performance criteria of detection greater than 80% (quantified as the fraction of trials where participants both detect the stimulus and click on the mouse during stimulus presentation to estimate its direction) and mean absolute estimation error less than 30° with the highest contrast stimuli in both experimental sessions (Supplementary Figure 1; see Supplementary materials for details of different participants' performance). Importantly, our analysis of participants' performance in the estimation task looked only at their responses to staircased contrast levels, and not their responses to the highest contrast stimuli, which we used to determine which participants should be included. In the estimation task, the variance of participants' motion direction estimates tended to be quite large and varied greatly across different participants and motion directions. We hypothesized that this was due to the fact that in some trials participants made completely random estimates. Thus, data were fitted to the distribution: (1 − a) · V(μ, κ) + a/2π, where a is the proportion of trials where the participant make random estimates, and V(μ, κ) is a von Mises (circular normal) distribution with mean μ and width determined by 1/κ, given by: V(μ, κ) = exp(κ cos(θ − μ)/(2πI 0(κ))). Parameters were chosen by maximizing the likelihood of generating the data from the distribution. Participants' estimation mean and standard deviation were taken as the circular mean and standard deviation of the von Mises distribution, V(μ, κ). The average biases obtained using this method were qualitatively similar to those obtained through calculating the estimated direction by simply averaging over trials, while the variances were significantly smaller and with more consistency across participants and motion directions when the parametric fits were used. Therefore, in all of the following analysis, we used this parametric method to quantify performance in the estimation task. There was no significant interaction between experimental session and motion direction on the estimation bias or standard deviation (p = 0.11 and p = 0.41, respectively, four-way within-subjects ANOVA). Therefore, we collapsed data across the two experimental sessions. There was a considerable degree of overlap between the luminance levels achieved using both staircases. After discounting the first 100 trials from each session, the population averaged standard deviation in the luminance of the 2/1 and the 4/1 staircased levels over the course of one experimental session was 0.051 ± 0.001 cd/m2 and 0.054 ± 0.001 cd/m2, respectively; similar to the average luminance difference between the two levels (0.052 ± 0.004 cd/m2). Further, there was no significant difference between the luminance levels achieved for both staircases (p = 0.23, three-way within-subjects ANOVA). This was reflected in the estimation data: there was no significant difference between participants' estimation standard deviations for both staircased contrast levels (p = 0.12, four-way within-subjects ANOVA). Therefore, we collapsed data across these contrast levels for all of the analysis described in the main text. Later, we looked at the effect of contrast level on participants' behavior by separating participants' responses at different luminance levels, depending on their detection performance at different luminance levels. Details of this procedure are described in the Supplementary materials. To analyze the distribution of estimations when no stimulus was present, we constructed histograms of participants' responses, binned into 16° windows. We converted these response histograms into probability distributions by normalizing them over all motion directions for each participant individually. There was no significant interaction between experimental session and motion direction on the response histograms (p = 0.87, four-way within-subjects ANOVA). There was also no significant three-way interaction between motion direction, experimental session, and detection response (p = 0.81, four-way within-subjects ANOVA). Therefore, we collapsed data across experimental sessions for analysis of the participants' responses when no stimulus was present. In this study, we were interested in how the uneven distribution of presented motion directions influenced participants' perception of the motion stimuli. By design, the probability distribution of presented motion stimuli was symmetrical around a central motion angle (Figure 2). Therefore, we figured that any asymmetry in participants' estimation and detection behavior for stimuli moving to either side of the central motion direction was likely due to factors other than the distribution of presented stimuli that was used, such as participants' implicit biases, or “reference biases” away from caudal motion directions (Rauber & Treue, 1998). To reduce the effect of such asymmetries from our analysis and to increase the number of data points that were available for each experimental condition, we averaged data from points corresponding to when the presented motion stimuli was moving to either side of the central motion direction. For the estimation task, this also required reversing the sign of the estimation biases for stimuli moving anticlockwise from the central motion direction before averaging (for “unfolded” versions of Figures 3a, 4a, and 5 see Supplementary Figures 4 and 5). Estimation responses in the absence of a stimulus. (a) Probability distribution of participants' estimates of motion direction when no stimulus was present. Response distributions are plotted for all trials (blue) as well as the subset of trials where participants reported detecting a stimulus (gray) and trials where they did not (red). Data points from either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together in this plot so that the furthest left data point corresponds to the central motion direction, and the vertical dashed line corresponds to the most frequently presented motion directions (±32°). Results are averaged over all participants and error bars represent within-subject standard error. (b) Probability ratio (p rel) that individual participants estimated within 8° from the most frequently presented motion directions (±32°) relative to other 16° bins, plotted for trials where the stimulus was undetected versus trials where the stimulus was detected. p rel was significantly greater than 1 for trials where participants reported detecting stimuli (p = 0.005, signed rank test) but was only marginally so when subjects failed to detect the stimulus (p = 0.13). Participants were also significantly more likely to estimate in the direction of the frequently presented motion directions on trials where they reported detecting stimuli versus trials where they did not (p = 0.012). Effect of expectations on estimation biases. (a) Participants' mean estimation bias is plotted against presented motion direction. Data points from either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together so that the furthest left point corresponds to the central motion direction, and the vertical dashed line corresponds to data taken from the two most frequently presented motion directions (±32°). Results are averaged over all participants and error bars represent within-subject standard error. (b) The estimation bias for stimuli moving at ±48° (black) and ±16° (red) from the central motion direction, plotted against the estimation bias at ±32°, for each participant. Again, data from stimuli moving to both sides of the central motion direction have been averaged together, with the sign of the bias for stimuli moving anticlockwise from the central motion direction (i.e., −48°, −32°, and −16°) reversed before averaging. The red and black crosses mark the population mean of both distributions, with the length of the lines on the crosses equal to the standard error. Effect of expectations on the standard deviation of estimations. The standard deviation in participants' estimation distributions is plotted against presented motion direction. Data points from either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together so that the furthest left point corresponds to the central motion direction, and the vertical dashed line corresponds to data taken from the two most frequently presented motion directions (±32°). Results are averaged over all participants and error bars represent within-subject standard error. First, we investigated whether participants learned to expect the most frequently presented motion directions. To assess this, we examined participants' estimation performance on trials where no stimulus was presented but where they reported seeing a stimulus in the detection task as well as clicking on the mouse to estimate its direction. On average, this occurred on 46 ± 3 trials for each participant (10.8 ± 2% of the total number of trials where no stimulus was presented). For this subset of trials, participants' estimation response probability varied significantly with motion direction, with a clear peak close to the most frequently presented motion directions (±32°; p < 0.001, three-way within-subjects ANOVA; Figure 3a, gray). We quantified the probability ratio that participants made estimates that were close to the most frequently presented motion directions, relative to other directions, by multiplying the probability that they estimated within 8° of these motion directions by the total number of 16° bins (p rel = p(θ est = ±32(8)°)). This probability ratio would be equal to 1 if participants were equally likely to estimate within 8° of ±32° as they were to estimate within other 16° bins. We found that the median value of p rel was significantly greater than 1, indicating that participants were strongly biased to report motion in the most frequently presented directions when no stimulus was presented (median(p rel) = 2.7; p = 0.005, signed rank test, comparing p rel to 1; Figure 3b). As on a large proportion of trials, the presented motion stimuli were moving in one of two directions, it is possible that participants could have habituated to automatically move the estimation bar toward one of these two directions, irrespective of their response in the detection task (note that the initial bar position was randomized on each trial and thus biases cannot arise from just leaving the mouse in its initial location). In this case, we would also expect their “no-stimulus” estimation distributions to be biased toward the two most frequently presented directions for trials where they did not detect a stimulus. However, on trials where participants did not report seeing a stimulus in the detection task (but where they did click the mouse while the stimulus was present to estimate its motion direction; on average, this occurred on 134 ± 9 trials for each participant; 32 ± 7% of the total number of trials where no stimulus was presented), there was no significant variation in the estimation response probability with motion direction (p = 0.12, three-way within-subjects ANOVA; Figure 3a, red). Further, for these trials, participants were not significantly more likely to estimate close to the most frequently presented motion directions than other motion directions (median(p rel) = 1.28; p = 0.13, signed rank test, comparing p rel to 1; Figure 3b). Indeed they were significantly more likely to report motion in the most frequently presented motion directions when they also reported detecting a stimulus compared to when they did not (p = 0.012, signed rank test, comparing the values of p rel obtained for trials where participants either did or did not report seeing a stimulus in the detection task; Figure 3b). It could be argued that we would observe similar results if participants' expectations influenced their behavior in the detection task, but not in the estimation task. Thus, in the absence of a presented stimulus, they would be more likely to report detecting a stimulus when they mistakenly perceived motion in one of the two most frequently presented motion directions, although their estimation responses would be unaltered by their expectations. In this case, participants' estimation responses would be distributed uniformly when we looked at data from all trials where no stimulus was presented (regardless of their response in the detection task). This was not what we found: when we looked at data from all zero-stimulus trials, participants estimation response probability varied significantly with motion direction (p < 0.001, three-way within-subjects ANOVA; Figure 3a, blue), and they were biased to report motion in the two most frequently presented directions (median(p rel) = 1.71; p < 0.001, signed rank test comparing p rel to 1). However, the size of this bias was reduced compared to the case when we looked only at trials where participants detected stimuli (p = 0.027, signed rank test comparing the values of p rel obtained for all trials with trials where participants reported seeing a stimulus in the detection task). Another response strategy that could have produced similar results is if, when participants were uncertain about the stimulus motion direction, they made estimations that were influenced by the stimulus presented immediately beforehand. In this case, we would expect the observed biases in participants' no-stimulus estimation distributions to disappear when we excluded trials that were immediately preceded by stimuli moving in the most frequently presented directions (±32°). However, when we excluded these trials from our analysis, participants' zero-stimulus estimations (for trials where they reported detecting a stimulus) were still strongly biased toward the two most frequently presented directions (median(p rel) = 2.11; p = 0.026, signed rank test, comparing p rel to 1). Taken together, our results indicate that the zero-stimulus biases we observed were not due to “response strategies” but rather were perceptual in origin: participants “hallucinated” motion in the most frequently presented directions when no stimulus was displayed. Further, these hallucinations developed extremely quickly. On trials where no stimulus was presented but where participants reported detecting a stimulus, they were significantly more likely to estimate within 8° of ±32° than other directions after a period of only 200 trials (p = 0.008, signed rank test, comparing p rel to 1 after 200 trials; see Supplementary Figure 3), indicating rapid learning of motion direction expectations. We next asked whether these learned expectations would bias participants' perceptions of real motion stimuli. Figure 4a shows the population averaged estimation bias, plotted against motion direction. In this plot, data points corresponding to presented stimuli moving to either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together (making sure to reverse the sign of the estimation bias when the presented stimuli was anticlockwise from the central motion direction before averaging; see Supplementary Figure 4 for an alternative version of this plot without averaging across the central motion direction). In this plot, the curve has a negative slope around +32°, which itself was unbiased. This indicates that estimations were attractively biased toward stimuli moving at +32° (and by symmetry, also to motion at −32°). Estimates of the central motion direction were unbiased, while estimates at +16° were positively biased, away from the center and toward stimuli moving at +32° (again, by symmetry, stimuli moving at −16° were biased away from the center, toward stimuli moving at −32°). Note that the apparent asymmetry in Figure 4a is expected and is due to the fact that the data points at 0° and 64° are not equivalent: 0° lies midway between the two most frequently presented directions, while +64° is on the edge of the distribution of presented motion directions (see Figure 2). Overall, there was a significant effect of motion direction on the estimation bias (p < 0.001, three-way within-subjects ANOVA). We wanted to quantify the extent to which individual participants' estimates were biased toward the most frequently presented motion directions. For participants whose estimates were attractively biased toward stimuli moving at +32°, we would expect their estimates of stimuli moving at +48° and +16° to be positively and negatively biased, respectively, compared to their estimation bias for stimuli moving at +32° (and by symmetry, we would also expect the converse to hold for stimuli moving anticlockwise from the central direction: for a participant whose estimates were attractively biased toward stimuli moving at −32°, we would expect the bias at −48° and −16° to be negatively biased and positively biased, respectively, compared to their estimation bias for stimuli moving at −32°). Figure 4b plots individual participants' estimation bias for stimuli moving at ±48° and ±16° versus their estimation bias at ±32° (plotted in black and red, respectively). Note that, similarly to Figure 4a, we averaged data from motion directions moving to either side of the central motion directions in this plot, making sure to reverse the sign of the bias for stimuli moving anticlockwise from the central motion direction. After doing this, the computed estimation biases at ±48° and ±16° were significantly smaller and larger, respectively, than the bias at ±32° (p = 0.005 and p = 0.001, respectively, signed rank test). This indicates that on average, participants were biased to estimate stimuli as moving in directions that were closer to the most frequently presented motion directions (±32°) than they actually were. Stimuli in between ±32° were expected to be biased by both frequently presented directions, and thus we expected that these directions should yield larger standard deviations in estimated angles than those outside of this range. Figure 5 plots the population-averaged standard deviation of estimations against motion direction. Again, for this plot, data points from either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together. The estimation standard deviation was greatest for the central motion direction at 0° and smallest for motion directions that were closer to the most frequently presented directions (±16°, ±32°, and ±48°). As with the estimation biases, there was a significant effect of motion direction on the estimation standard deviation (p < 0.001, three-way within-subjects ANOVA). One of our interests was the extent to which stimulus expectations influenced participants' performance in the detection task. To test this, we measured the fraction of trials where participants both detected stimuli and clicked on the mouse during stimulus presentation as a function of motion direction (Figure 6a). Participants were significantly more likely to detect stimuli moving in the most frequently presented motion directions (71.5 ± 2.5% detected at ± 32° versus 64.2 ± 2.5% detected over all other motion directions; p < 0.001 signed rank test; Figure 6b). Overall, there was a significant effect of motion direction on the fraction detected (p = 0.002, three-way within-subjects ANOVA). Effect of expectations on detection performance. (a) The fraction of trials where participants correctly detected a motion stimulus is plotted against presented motion direction. Data points from either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together so that the furthest left point corresponds to the central motion direction, and the vertical dashed line corresponds to data taken from the two most frequently presented motion directions (±32°). Results are averaged over all participants and error bars represent within-subject standard error. (b) The fraction of trials where participants correctly detected a stimulus, averaged over all presented motion directions except for ±32°, plotted against the fraction of trials where participants correctly detected a stimulus moving at ±32°, for each participant. The black cross marks the population mean, with the length of the lines on the cross equal to the standard error. Another measure that could reflect how easily participants detected stimuli was their reaction time in clicking the mouse during stimulus presentation. For trials where they detected a stimulus, participants' reaction time was significantly reduced for the most frequently presented motion directions, relative to other motion directions (1924 ± 86 ms at ±32° versus 1991 ± 85 ms over all other motion directions; p < 0.001, signed rank test; Supplementary Figure 7). Overall, there was a significant effect of motion direction on participants' reaction time (p = 0.003, three-way within-subjects ANOVA). To understand the nature of the biases in motion direction estimation that we observed, we tested among alternative models of how participants' expectations may be combined with the presented stimulus to produce the observed response distributions. Two classes of models were considered. The first class of model assumed that participants developed response strategies unrelated to perceptual changes. The second class of model assumed that participants solved the task using a Bayesian strategy, combining a learned prior of the stimulus statistics (the expectation) with their sensory evidence (the actual stimulus) in a probabilistic way. These models simulate the estimation distributions in the case where participants judged the stimulus to be present. The first two models looked at whether participants' behavior could be attributed to a “response bias.” The key assumption in both of these models was that participants followed different strategies on different trials: for example, by making an unbiased estimate of motion direction on a fraction of the trials and by estimating one of the most frequently presented motion directions on other trials. The first model (“ADD1”) assumed that when participants were unsure about which motion direction they had perceived, they made an estimate that was close to one of the two most frequently presented motion directions. p l ( θ o ⁢ b ⁢ s | ⁢ θ ) = V ( θ , κ l ) . p exp ( θ ) = 1 2 [ V ( − θ exp , κ exp ) + V ( θ exp , κ exp ) ] . p ( θ e ⁢ s ⁢ t | θ p ⁢ e ⁢ r ⁢ c ) = ( 1 − α ) · V ( θ p ⁢ e ⁢ r ⁢ c , κ m ) + α . where the asterisk denotes a convolution and a(θ) determines the proportion of trials that participants sampled from the “expected” distribution, p exp(θ). For this model, free parameters that were fitted to the estimation data for each participant were the center and width of participants' “expected” distributions (determined by θ exp and 1/κ exp, respectively), the width of their sensory likelihood (determined by 1/κ l ), the fraction of trials where they made estimates by sampling from their “expected” distribution (a(θ)), the magnitude of the “motor” noise in their responses (determined by 1/κ m ), and the fraction of trials where they made estimations that were completely random (α). The second “response bias” model (ADD2) assumed a more complex strategy, such that when participants were unsure of stimulus direction, they made estimates that were preferentially sampled from different proportions of their “expected” distribution. Crucially, the portion of this “expected” distribution that was sampled from depended on the actual stimulus motion direction. p c ⁢ l ⁢ o ⁢ c ⁢ k ⁢ w ⁢ i ⁢ s ⁢ e ( θ ) = V ( θ exp , κ exp ) . As before, on a single trial, participants made estimates that were either equal to their sensory observation θ obs or sampled from a learned distribution of expected motion directions. However, instead of sampling from a single distribution of expected motion directions, p exp(θ), participants could now make estimates that were sampled either from the distributions p anticlockwise(θ) or p clockwise(θ), with a probability that was dependent on the actual stimulus motion direction. For example, on a single trial, a participant might be aware that the stimulus was moving “anticlockwise from center” and thus would be more likely to make an estimate that was sampled from the distribution, p antilockwise(θ), than from p clockwise(θ). where a(θ) and b(θ) were additional free parameters that determined the proportion of trials where participants sampled from each distribution. Finally, we considered variations to the ADD1 and ADD2 models (denoted “ADD1_mode” and “ADD2_mode,” respectively) where, on trials where participants were unsure of the stimulus motion direction, they made perceptual estimates that were equal to the mode of the “expected” distribution. These models are equivalent to the ADD1 and ADD2 models, with “1/κ exp” set to zero. The second class of models assumed that participants combined a learned prior of the stimulus directions with their sensory evidence in a probabilistic manner. Specifically, unlike the previous models, where on individual trials participants either rely entirely on their sensory observations or on their expectations, in the Bayesian model participants make estimations based on a combination of both their sensory observation and expectations. A schematic of this model class is shown in Figure 7. Bayesian model. The posterior distribution of possible stimulus motion directions is constructed by combining prior knowledge about likely motion directions (the expectation) with the available sensory evidence (based on a noisy observation, θ obs) probabilistically. A perceptual estimate is made by taking the mean of the posterior distribution. This posterior distribution is used to make a perceptual estimate (θ perc). Additional “motor noise” is added to this perceptual estimate to produce the final estimation response (θ est). p ( θ ⁢ | θ o ⁢ b ⁢ s ) ∝ p p ⁢ r ⁢ i ⁢ o ⁢ r ( θ ) · p l ( θ o ⁢ b ⁢ s | ⁢ θ ) . While participants cannot access the “true” prior, p prior(θ), directly, we hypothesized that they learned an approximation of this distribution, denoted p exp(θ). In our model, this “learned prior” was parameterized similarly to p prior(θ) in ADD1 (see Equation 2). where Z is a normalization constant. An alternative choice would be for the perceptual estimate to be given by the maximum of the posterior distribution. For our work, both methods gave qualitatively identical results. We accounted for the “motor noise” associated with making the estimation response in a similar way to the previous models. For this model, the free parameters that were fitted to the estimation data for each participant were the center and width of participants' “expected” distribution (determined by θ exp and 1/κ exp, respectively), the width of their sensory likelihood (determined by 1/κ l), the magnitude of the “motor” noise in their responses (determined by 1/κ m), and the fraction of trials where they made estimations that were completely random (α). We included two variants of the Bayesian model: “BAYES_var,” where the width of the likelihood function was allowed to vary with the stimulus motion direction, and “BAYES,” where it was held constant. At the highest contrast, the stimulus was clearly visible, so we assumed that the perceptual uncertainty was close to zero (1/κ l ∼ 0). Therefore, for all models, the distribution of estimations should be given by Equation 3, with the substitution, θ exp = θ. We used this equation to fit participants' estimation distributions at high contrast (by maximizing the log probability of getting the observed the data; see later), thus allowing us to approximate the “motor noise” (determined by 1/κ m) for each participant. As with the rest of our data analysis, we modeled participants' responses to stimuli at both staircased contrast levels (although see Supplementary materials). Also, as all three models looked only at the estimation task, effectively ignoring the detection response, we initially looked only at data where participants detected the motion stimulus (see Supplementary materials for a version of the Bayesian model which incorporates the detection task). where the summation was taken over all trials, and θ i and θ i,data represent the presented motion direction and the estimation response on the ith trial, respectively. We found the maximum of the likelihood function using a simplex algorithm (the Matlab function “fminsearch”). We were concerned that for some participants our model fits might converge to local rather than local maxima. To reduce this possibility, we ran the model fits with a range of initial values for κ l and κ exp (κ l −1/2 and κ exp −1/2 were varied independently in 2° increments, between 1° and 21°), selecting the model fit that produced the highest value for the log-likelihood. The results obtained were also found to be robust to changes in all of the other initial parameter values. The models varied greatly with respect to the number of parameters that they required to fit the data. Excluding κ m (as this was obtained from the high contrast responses, not the low contrast responses that were the principle area of investigation), ADD1 and ADD2 required 9 and 14 free parameters, respectively: κ l , θ exp, κ exp, and α, plus 5 values for a(θ), and for ADD2, another 5 values for b(θ) (one for each presented motion direction). ADD1_mode and ADD2_mode required 8 and 13 free parameters, respectively (one less parameter than ADD1 and ADD2 respectively, as κ exp was no longer a free parameter). BAYES required only four free parameters (κ l , θ exp, κ exp, and α). BAYES_var required eight free parameters (including a value for κ l for each presented motion direction). where L is the likelihood of generating the experimental data from the model, k is the number of parameters in the model, and n is the number of data points available. In general, given two estimated models, the model with the lower value of BIC is the one to be preferred (Schwarz, 1978). The first term of this expression accounts for the error between the data and the model predictions, while the second term represents a penalty for including too much complexity in the model. Figure 8 plots, for each participant, the BIC obtained with each model, subtracted by the BIC obtained with the BAYES model. From this plot, we can see that the BIC values obtained with the ADD1, ADD2, ADD1_mode, ADD2_mode, and BAYES_var models were significantly greater than the BIC values obtained with the BAYES model (p = 0.002, p < 0.001, p = 0.003, p = 0.005, and p < 0.001, respectively; signed rank test). Thus, while a small minority of participants were not best fitted by the BAYES model (two participants exhibited a lower BIC value with the ADD1 model, two participants exhibited a lower BIC value with the ADD1_mode model, and two participants exhibited a lower BIC value with the ADD2_mode model), this model provided the best description of the data for the majority of participants. Model comparison. The Bayesian information criterion (BIC) evaluated with each model, subtracted by the BIC evaluated with the BAYES model, is plotted separately for each participant. Median values are indicated by horizontal red lines, 25th and 75th percentiles by horizontal blue lines. Values greater than zero indicate that the BAYES model provided the best description of the data. p-values indicate whether the median “BIC-BICBAYES” was significantly different form zero for each model (signed rank test). Each of the models described attempted to fit the estimation distributions for each participant. To achieve a qualitative understanding of how the estimation distributions predicted by each of the models compared to the experimental data, we analyzed the predicted estimation biases and standard deviations. As the ADD1_mode and the ADD2_mode and the BAYES models provided better fits to the data than the other models, we only analyze here the predicted estimation biases and standard deviations for these three models. In our previous analysis of the experimental data, we parameterized participants' estimation distributions as the sum of a circular normal distribution and a “flat” background probability (to account for the proportion of trials where they made random estimations). Participants' estimation means and standard deviations were then taken as the center and width of the fitted circular normal distribution, respectively. To be consistent with this, we computed biases and standard deviations from the estimation distributions predicted by each model in an identical way. Figure 9 shows the estimation biases and standard deviations predicted by each of the models, plotted alongside the experimental data. Both the BAYES and ADD2_mode models provided a good fit for the population averaged estimation biases (mean absolute error of 0.75° and 0.62° for the BAYES and ADD2_mode models, respectively). The ADD1_mode model, however, was unable to reproduce the repulsive biases away from the central motion direction (at ±16°) that were observed experimentally (mean absolute error of 2.14°; Figure 9a). This was also reflected in the fits of individual participants' estimation biases (quantified by calculating the mean absolute error for the fits of the estimation biases separately for each participant, averaged over motion directions). The error in the fits of the individual participants' estimation biases was significantly smaller for the BAYES model than for the ADD1_mode model (p < 0.001, signed rank test), while there was no significant difference between the BAYES and ADD2_mode models. Predicted biases (a) and standard deviations (b) for each model. Predictions for the ADD1_mode model (green), the ADD2_mode model (blue), and the BAYES model (black) are plotted alongside the experimental data (red). In both plots, data points from either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together so that the furthest left point corresponds to the central motion direction, and the vertical dashed line corresponds to the most frequently presented motion directions. In all plots, results are averaged over all participants and error bars represent within-subject standard error. The fact that the ADD1_mode model was unable to fit the experimentally observed repulsive biases away from the central motion direction can be explained by the fact that for this model we parameterized the “expected” distribution of motion directions, p exp(θ), to be symmetrical around 0°. Thus, even in the extreme case where all responses are sampled from this distribution, there would only be an attractive bias toward the central motion direction. The BAYES model produced estimation standard deviations that varied with motion direction in a qualitatively similar way to the experimental data (with a maximum at 0°, decreasing for stimuli moving further from the central motion direction), although in general, the model predicted values that were slightly larger than what was observed experimentally (Figure 9b). The fits for the estimation standard deviation produced by the ADD1_mode and ADD2_mode were worse than the BAYES model (mean absolute error of 5.11° and 2.74° for the ADD1_mode and ADD2_mode models , respectively, compared to 2.17° for the BAYES model) and did not vary with motion in a way that was similar to the experimental data. However, the error in the fits of the individual participants estimation standard deviations (quantified by calculating the mean absolute error for the fits of the estimation standard deviation separately for each participant, averaged over motion directions) was not significantly different between the models (p = 0.91 and p = 0.34, respectively, for comparisons of the ADD1_mode and ADD2_mode models with the BAYES model; signed rank test). While all the free parameters in the BAYES model (κ l , θ exp, κ exp, and α) were held constant across presented motion directions, in order for the “response bias” models (ADD1, ADD2, ADD1_mode, and ADD2_mode) to fit the data, additional free parameters were required (a(θ) and b(θ)), which had to be varied between different presented motion directions. Thus, for the ADD1 and ADD2 models to be valid, participants would have had to alter their response strategy, varying the proportion of trials where they sampled from their “expected” probability distributions, depending on the direction of the presented stimulus. In addition, the ADD1_mode and ADD2_mode models assumed that when participants were unsure about the presented motion direction, they made a perceptual estimate of motion direction that was exactly the same on each trial. This seems unrealistic: in reality there would be some trial-to-trial variation in the expected motion direction. In summary, BAYES exhibited significantly smaller BIC values than all of the other models, as well as producing fits for the estimation biases and standard deviation that were at least as good as the response bias models, despite the fact that it had fewer free parameters (4 parameters as opposed to 9, 14, 8, and 13 parameters for ADD1 and ADD2, ADD1_mode, and ADD2_mode, respectively), leading us to conclude that it provided the best description of participants' behavior. Overall, our results argue against the hypothesis that the observed estimation biases were produced by “response strategies” unrelated to perceptual changes but rather support the hypothesis that participants performed the task using a Bayesian strategy, where a learned a prior of expected stimulus directions was combined with their sensory evidence in a probabilistic way. We were interested to see whether the prior and likelihood distribution that we derived to fit participants' response distributions when a stimulus was present were sufficient to explain their estimation performance in the absence of any stimulus. While the original BAYES model ignored the detection task, in order to analyze participants “no-stimulus” behavior, it was important to incorporate this into our model. The full model, BAYES_dual, which is of the same form as the original Bayesian model, with the exception that it simulates the detection task, is described in the Supplementary materials. The BAYES_dual model required 3 additional parameters: participants' prior expectation that a stimulus would be presented on each trial, the probability that participants made sensory observations of the stimulus as being present, on trials where a stimulus was presented, and on trials where no stimulus was presented (see Supplementary materials). Importantly, these parameters were fitted using only data from trials where the stimulus was presented, and not zero-stimulus trials, which was what we were aiming to predict. Figure 10 shows the estimation distributions predicted by this model for trials where there was no stimulus present but where participants detected a stimulus (black), plotted alongside the experimentally measured distribution (red). The average “zero-stimulus” estimation distribution predicted by the model provided a good fit for the population averaged estimation distributions, with an R 2 value of 0.71. The behavior of individual participants was also well predicted by the model: the fits for participants' zero stimulus estimation distributions had a positive R 2 value for 8 out of 12 of them. For these participants, the median R 2 value was 0.65 (0.46, 0.83; 25th and 75th percentiles). The fact that the majority of participants' behavior in the absence of a stimulus could be predicted, based solely on their estimation responses in the presence of a stimulus, provides strong evidence in favor of the Bayesian model put forward here. Predicted estimation response probability distributions for trials where no stimulus is presented but where participants reported detecting a stimulus. Model predictions (gray; BAYES_dual model; see Supplementary materials for details) are plotted alongside the experimental results (red). Data points from either side of the central motion direction have been averaged together in this plot so that the furthest left data point corresponds to the central motion direction, and the vertical dashed line corresponds to the most frequently presented motion directions (±32°). Results are averaged over all participants and shaded error bars represent within-subject standard error. We found that participants quickly and automatically developed expectations for the most frequently presented directions of motion. On trials where no stimulus was presented, but where participants reported seeing a stimulus, they were strongly biased to report motion in the two most frequently presented motion directions (Figure 3). This bias could not be explained as due to any particular “response-strategy.” Participants' perception of real motion stimuli was also influenced by their learned expectations: they showed increased detection performance for the most frequently presented motion directions and estimated stimuli to be moving in directions that were more similar to the most frequently presented motion directions than they really were (Figures 4–6). Participants' estimation behavior was well described by a model which assumed that they solved the task using a Bayesian strategy, combining a learned prior of the stimulus statistics with their sensory evidence in a probabilistic way (Figures 7–9). Further, our model of participants' behavior in the presence of a stimulus was able to accurately predict their estimation responses when no stimulus was presented (Figure 10). Participants rapidly learned to expect the likely stimuli; within just a few minutes of task performance. One by-product of such rapid learning was that because participants learned which motion directions were expected within a very few number of trials, it was difficult for us to measure the short-term time course and dynamics of learning (Supplementary Figure 3). Future work could investigate this using a more complicated distribution of presented stimuli or statistical learning paradigm that produces slower learning of stimulus expectations (Eckstein et al., 2004; Orbán, Fiser, Aslin, & Lengyel, 2008). Recent studies have shown that rapidly learned expectations influence perception of bistable stimuli (Haijiang et al., 2006; Sterzer et al., 2008). In common with our results, these studies found attractive perceptual biases toward participants' expectations. However, while these studies looked at perception of relatively complex visual features, such as whether a stimulus was rotating (Sterzer et al., 2008), our experiment looked at perception of simple unambiguous features, which are likely to be processed at a lower level in the visual hierarchy, such as cortical area MT (Newsome, Britten, & Movshon, 1989). Whether similar neural changes are responsible for the effects of expectations on perception of both simple and more complicated stimulus features is an open question. Our finding, that participants perceived motion in expected directions when nothing was presented, is similar to what has been found in perceptual learning, where after learning participants report seeing dots moving in the trained direction when no stimulus is displayed (Seitz, Nanez, Holloway, Koyama, & Watanabe, 2005). However, an important difference between our results and what has been reported previously was the time taken for these hallucinations to develop: in the study of Seitz et al., it took around eight 1-hour sessions for participants to perceive motion in the trained direction when there was nothing there, while we observed this effect within the first 250 trials. It is interesting to consider whether these visual hallucinations were caused by the same underlying phenomena in both cases. Indeed, elucidating the similarities and differences between the physiological and the behavioral effects of different types of learning is an important goal for future research (Seitz & Watanabe, 2005). In our experiment, participants were implicitly asked to learn the statistics of the stimulus directions. In Bayesian terms, this corresponds to learning a prior distribution of the motion stimuli. Bayesian theory (MacKay, 2004) tells us how such knowledge should then be combined with sensory inputs to lead to optimal estimates. Our results can thus be interpreted in the context of two questions: (1) are participants able to learn a prior about motion stimuli in the course of our experiment; (2) is this prior combined optimally with participants' sensory observations to lead to motion estimates? We constructed a simple model of participants' estimation behavior, which assumed that on each trial they combined their sensory evidence (based on a noisy sensory measurement of motion direction) with a learned prior distribution of “expected” motion directions, in a probabilistically optimal manner (Figure 7). For each participant, we chose the width of the likelihood function and shape of the learned prior to maximize the probability of their estimation data being generated by the model. The model provided a good fit of participants' estimation biases and standard deviations (Figure 9). Interestingly, the quality of the fit to the data did not decrease when the width of the likelihood was held constant with presented motion direction (Figure 8). On average, the shape of participants' learned prior (Supplementary Figure 10) was found to be qualitatively similar to the actual distribution of presented stimuli (Figure 2), indicating that they were able to rapidly learn a multi-modal prior distribution of stimulus directions. In our experiment, the luminances of the two staircased contrast levels (determined by running staircases on the detection performance) were very similar to each other, with a large degree of overlap between them. Therefore, we combined data from both contrast levels for the majority of our analysis. Later, we looked at how participants' estimation behavior varied with the stimulus contrast by dividing participants' estimation responses into “low” and “high” contrast trials, determined by the contrast level of each individual trial rather than the staircased contrast level that it was a part of (see Supplementary materials for details). We found that the average magnitude of participants' estimation standard deviations increased for lower contrast levels, along with the magnitude of estimation biases toward the central motion direction (Supplementary Figure 6). This is consistent with what we would expect if participants behaved as Bayesian observers. At lower contrast levels, participants' sensory uncertainty should increase, causing an increase in the standard deviation of estimations. As a result of this, the learned prior would begin to dominate over sensory evidence, causing the magnitude of the estimation biases to increase (Stocker & Simoncelli, 2006). While we were not able fit participants' estimation behavior at varying contrast well using our Bayesian model (as there were too few data points per experimental conditions to well constrain the model), this will be an interesting question for future work. We reasoned that if our participants were indeed behaving as Bayesian observers, then the prior and likelihood derived from their estimation responses when a stimulus was present should also predict their estimation behavior when no stimulus was present. This is indeed what we found: the majority of participants' zero-stimulus estimation distributions were well fitted by the model (Figure 10). Therefore, while “hallucinating” motion when none is there will clearly be disadvantageous in most everyday situations (Seitz et al., 2005), in the context of our experiment, it is just what we would expect for an ideal Bayesian observer who sought to minimize their estimation error in the face of perceptual uncertainty. We compared the Bayesian model with various “response bias” models, which assumed that participants responded according to different strategies on different trials: either relying entirely on their sensory observations or on their expectations. These models were worse at describing the estimation data than the Bayesian model (larger BIC values; Figure 8), leading us to rule them out as an explanation for participants' behavior in the estimation task. We were interested to see whether participants' performance in the detection task was improved for stimuli moving in “expected” directions. We found that there was a significant increase in participants' detection performance as well as a significant decrease in reaction time for clicking the mouse during stimulus presentation for stimuli moving in the most frequently presented motion directions (Figure 6 and Supplementary Figure 7). Although somewhat smaller in magnitude, these effects are similar to what has been reported previously by Sekuler and Ball (1977), who found large improvements in both detection performance and reaction time when participants knew which direction stimuli would be moving in. Such an increase in perceptual sensitivity toward expected stimuli is similar to the effects of selective attention (Downing, 1988; Posner et al., 1980), suggesting that the learned expectations led participants to direct selective attention toward the expected stimuli. In the experiment of Sekuler and Ball (1977), participants reported that they experienced their eye movements being involuntarily “pulled” in the direction of the stimulus. It was suggested by the authors that mechanisms controlling eye movements might be capable of responding to very low luminance motion stimuli and thus that the resulting eye movements could be used by participants to help them correctly detect stimuli that were otherwise imperceptible. If this is the case, then it could have also contributed to changes in detection performance and reaction time with motion direction in our experiment. For example, if participants were biased to move their eyes in “expected” motion directions, then this could result in decreased detection thresholds for these motion directions. However, how such eye movements would influence estimation of motion direction is not so clear. Naively, if participants were biased to move their eyes in expected motion directions, then we might expect this to produce estimation biases away from these directions (as the motion component in this direction would be reduced, relative to the motion of the eye), which is not what we observed. A proper understanding of how extra-retinal eye-movement signals are combined with sensory signals to produce perceptual estimates is an important area for future work. We considered how participants' behavior in one task could have influenced their behavior in the other (Jazayeri & Movshon, 2007). Specifically, we asked whether biases in the estimation task could have come about as a result of participants optimizing their behavior in the detection task. To illustrate how this could happen, consider the case where participants' expectations influenced their detection performance, but not their perception of motion direction. Here, if participants were more likely to detect a stimulus when they perceived it to be moving in “expected” directions, then this would also cause the estimation distributions to be biased toward these directions when we looked just at trials where a stimulus was detected. However, this bias would disappear when we looked at estimation responses from all trials, regardless of participants' detection responses, which is not what we find experimentally (there was no significant difference between the estimation biases calculated from trials where participants detected stimuli, and from all trials; p = 0.71, five-way within-subjects ANOVA). On the other hand, if, on trials where participants did not detect a stimulus, they treated the estimation task as meaningless and provided random estimation responses, then on average we would still observe a bias toward the expected directions. This could allow participants to respond in a “self-consistent” way in both tasks (Stocker & Simoncelli, 2008): when they have settled on the hypothesis that there is no stimulus present, it makes little sense for them to scrutinize which direction it is moving in. However, as discussed earlier, participants' detection performance varied relatively weakly with motion direction, with a population averaged difference in detection performance of only 5.9 ± 1.0% between the two most frequently presented motion directions and other directions (Figure 6). Thus, it seems unlikely that the highly significant variation in estimation biases observed experimentally (varying by 14.6 ± 2.9° between stimuli moving at ±16° and ±64°; Figure 4a) could be brought about by such small changes in detection performance. The behavioral effects of sensory expectations have been often linked to those of attention, as both phenomena result in increased perceptual quality for attended or expected stimuli (Doherty et al., 2005; Downing, 1988; Posner et al., 1980; Summerfield & Egner, 2009). In the context of this experiment, it is possible that participants learned to direct feature-based attention toward the most frequently presented motion directions. Therefore, it is worthwhile comparing our results to previous experiments looking at the effects of feature-based attention on motion perception. Previous studies using transparent motion stimuli have shown that feature-based attention can modulate how different motion components are perceptually combined, thus altering the perceived directions (Chen, Meng, Matthews, & Qian, 2005; Tzvetanov, Womelsdorf, Niebergall, & Treue, 2006). For example, Chen et al. (2005) found that attending toward one of two overlapping motion signals reduced the degree of repulsion between the two motion signals so that the non-attended motion direction was perceived as being closer to the attended motion direction than it would be otherwise. This is consistent with our results, where attending to a particular motion direction resulted in an attractive bias in estimation-responses toward the attended direction. However, in these previous studies, attention acted to select one of two competing motion stimuli and thus modified the interaction between processing of these different motion signals. Here, we find that when participants “expect” stimuli to be moving in a particular motion direction, this alters the perceived direction of motion, even in the absence of any competing stimuli. It is interesting to consider how the perceptual effects that we observed here could be produced by changes at the neural level in the visual cortex. Much modeling work has looked at how visual neurons could encode information about sensory stimuli in the form of probability distributions, both at the single neuron (Deneve, 2008) and at the population level (Knill & Pouget, 2004; Ma, Beck, Latham, & Pouget, 2006; Pouget, Dayan, & Zemel, 2003). However, at present the evidence for neural encoding of the prior is minimal (Basso & Wurtz, 1997; Platt & Glimcher, 1999; Summerfield & Koechlin, 2008). On the other hand, recent experiments have shown that expectations of when and where motion stimuli are likely to be presented can result in increased reliability of neurons in visual area MT (Ghose & Bearl, 2009). In the context of visual attention, numerous studies have shown that selective attention increases the sensitivity of neurons that are tuned toward attended spatial (Spitzer, Desimone, & Moran, 1988; Treue & Maunsell, 1996) or feature (McAdams & Maunsell, 2000; Treue & Martínez Trujillo, 1999) dimensions. Looking specifically at visual motion, electrophysiological studies in macaque MT show that the firing rate of neurons that are tuned toward an attended motion direction are increased relative to neurons that are tuned toward other directions (Treue & Martínez Trujillo, 1999). Therefore, if, in our experiment, participants learned to direct feature-based attention toward expected motion directions, then it is likely that the gain of neurons that were tuned toward these directions was increased. When considered together with our results, this leads to the following questions. First, are the learned priors that seem to be involved in our task encoded directly by gain changes of sensory neurons such as are observed with attention (Dayan & Zemel, 1999; Rao, 2005; Yu & Dayan, 2005a)? Secondly, how are these changes interpreted, or “decoded,” by upstream cortical areas to produce the perceptual biases that we observed (Jazayeri, 2007, 2008; Jazayeri & Movshon, 2006, 2007; Seriès, Stocker, & Simoncelli, 2009)? Finally, an interesting goal for future research is to understand how priors that are learned over a short period of time are incorporated with and used to update long-term priors about the statistical structure of the world (Knill & Pouget, 2004; Weiss et al., 2002). We asked whether the statistics of past motion stimuli can modulate perception of new motion directions. This was indeed what we found: participants quickly developed expectations for the most frequently presented directions of motion, and this strongly influenced their perception of simple, unambiguous, visual stimuli, inducing a shift in the perceived direction of stimuli toward expected motion directions as well as hallucinations to see motion when none was presented. In our work, expectations can be directly interpreted and modeled as Bayesian priors. In a situation like ours where stimuli are presented to only one sensory modality, without conflict or ambiguity, expectations or Bayesian priors are often thought to develop slowly over a lifetime of sensory inputs. In contrast, we found that they can be learned rapidly, in a period of a few minutes. Moreover, we showed they are combined with sensory inputs in a way that is compatible with optimal Bayesian inference. In conclusion, our findings support the idea of a very plastic perceptual system in which prior knowledge is rapidly acquired and constantly used to shape our perceptions toward what we expect to see. Though useful for the system in the face of uncertainty, this plasticity comes at the cost of unconscious illusions and hallucinations. We would like to thank Dr. M. Oram and Prof. A. Thiele for their helpful comments and suggestions. We would also like to acknowledge the helpful and insightful comments provided by two anonymous reviewers on earlier versions of this manuscript. This research was supported by funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and the Medical Research Council of Great Britain. Author contributions: M. Chalk and A. R. Seitz contributed equally to this work. Address: IANC, School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, Room 2.49, 10 Crichton Street, Edinburgh, EH8 9QS, UK. Dayan P. Zemel R. (1999). Statistical models and sensory attention. Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Artificial Neural Networks (vol. 2, pp. 1017–1022). MacKay D. J. C. (2004). Information theory, inference, and learning algorithms. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Stocker A. Simoncelli E. (2008). A Bayesian Model of Conditioned Perception. Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, 20, 1409–1416. Yu A. Dayan P. (2005a). Inference, attention, and decision in a Bayesian neural architecture. Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, 17, 1577–1584.
2019-04-21T23:00:27Z
https://jov.arvojournals.org/article.aspx?articleid=2191633
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If you cannot trust somebody you won’t show your true colors and this will make it hard to have a relationship with another person. The more you trust somebody else the more you will get along with that person. If you have a relationship with another person you are not going to agree on everything and there will be disputes and arguments. If you find a healthy way to solve these disputes and arguments your relationship will get much stronger because you’ll will realize that even though you’ll don’t agree on something you’ll can still get along. If you cannot solve conflicts in a healthy way then you cannot have a relationship with another person. Any sort of implant will benefit you in the long run. When it comes to the matter of dental implants, it is quite similar to a beauty treatment. In most of the cases, tooth implants take place in the case of filling the space of missing teeth. But, sometimes, patients suffering for teeth damage and broken teeth also go for the implantation. 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They have many books and texts that gave important legal advice and guidance which were written all the way back in 100BCE. But after the British Empire set its foot in the country and made India a part of the empire, the common law replaced the ancient laws they country had. Japan is considered to be one of the first countries in the East to implement parts of the Western law in their legal system. They are thought to have used the German laws and codes to help them develop themselves. In the exact same fashion the Chinese gave up on their traditional outlook of law to adopt a similar western law and outlook. In the Europe the French and the Germans are credited with making great strides on the movement for better laws and regulations for solicitors at Sutherland. It was during this era that the English came up with their own type of common law. This same law was followed in the Americas, but certain parts of the continent, especially countries like Mexico instead followed the Spanish law or the French legal system. How To Groom And Style Facial Hair In Men? Many might think that having facial hair does not require much effort, but it does take work to maintain a certain style and to make it look well groomed. If you wish to maintain your beard you need to trim it regularly. This can be done at home or at a barber, especially if you wish to shape it in a certain way. It is also necessary to shampoo the beard, as you would shampoo hair on your head. Combing the beard and keeping it clean are some other ways of maintaining facial hair and any style that you might have. Unless you wish to grow your beard in thickness and length, you need to trim it regularly. This would also depend on the kind of natural hair growth you have. Those who have dense hair need to trim more often than others. There are different beard care kit that can be used for trimming. Usually razors and clippers are used for maintaining a beard. If you are skilled with scissors, you could also use a pair of sharp scissors to trim and maintain your beard or mustache. The time span for trimming usually extends to once a month or once a week, depending on the kind of style or growth that one wishes to keep. Regular cleaning is necessary. In order to keep the beard hair soft and easy to style, it is best to use a mild shampoo once or twice a week. For those who have long beards, they might need to do it more frequently. Shampoo and proper conditioning are crucial to beard care https://www.infamousgentleman.com.au/. This ensures that the hair stays shiny, manageable and clean. Use of a conditioner after shampooing has the same effect as it does on the hair on your head. It helps to soften the hair and add a shine to it. 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Therefore, the power of the human mind and how it has the capability to change the world is not to be taken lightly. Even in its simplest form, the power that your own mind has over your body, and the impact that it is able to create is tremendous. This effect that the human mind has over its own body is used for a variety of purposes. Usage of this for medical purposes can be significantly seen and these medical uses that are achieved through the usage of the human mind are proven to be quite effective. By adapting methodical treatments such as hypnosis that treat the body through the mind, one will be able to treat many conditions in the human body while also letting the patient reach a mental clarity and serenity that will be useful to them in the short term and also in the long term. Many more reasons are behind the increasing demand for treatments such as hypnotherapy, as these methods give so much and have no side effects. While issues such as anxiety, stress and phobias can be cured through hypnotic treatments, there are other conditions that can be rectified through a proper hypnosis session. Weight loss hypnotherapy acts as a good example of this as many who fail to lose obesity and other weight related problems resolve many matters that are related to it through a proper hypnosis session through a well trained professional in the matter. Hypnosis also helps one come to self-realization, while it also helps one focus more on matters at hand. Therefore, it can be an effective treatment medium for those who seek calmness in mind, whether they are doing something such as preparing for an exam, trying to quit a bad habit or even need to focus on performing in an upcoming sports event. In conclusion, it can be seen that hypnosis offers so much and could help so many people in various situations. Knowing when to get the treatment and choosing a reliable professional to get the services from should be done keeping the importance of hypnosis and the capability of it to create a positive change in your life in mind.
2019-04-26T00:13:44Z
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１つまたは複数のデータイメージのそれぞれのための、別々のライフサイクルポリシを定めるためのシステムおよび方法。 System and method for determining for each of the one or more data images, separate lifecycle policy. バックアップサーバが、第１のデータ記憶媒体から第２のデータ記憶媒体にデータイメージを移し始める時点を示す、第１の時点値を選択するように構成される。 Backup server, the first data storage medium indicates when to start transferring the data image to a second data storage medium, configured to select a first time value. この時点値は、暦日付および１日のうちの時間（複数可）に相当する。 The time value corresponds to the time (s) of the calendar with and 1 day. ライフサイクルポリシを定めるために、バックアップサーバは、層状の記憶階層の中の各データ記憶媒体についてそれぞれの時点値を選択し続けるように構成される。 To determine the life cycle policy, the backup server is configured to continue to select each time point values ​​for each data storage medium in a layered storage hierarchy. バックアップサーバは、コピー先データ記憶媒体へのデータイメージの移動完了検出時に、コピー元データ記憶媒体上のデータイメージのコピーを削除するようにさらに構成することができる。 Backup server can during movement completion detection data image to the copy destination data storage medium is further configured to delete the copy of the data image on the copy source data storage medium. さらに、バックアップサーバは、２つ以上のライフサイクルポリシ間のスケジューリングの競合を検出することができる。 Further, the backup server can detect a scheduling conflict between two or more life cycle policy. 本発明は、コンピュータ処理の分野に関し、より詳細には、データイメージのための時間ベースのライフサイクルポリシを定めることに関する。 The present invention relates to the field of computer processing, and more particularly to determine the time-based life cycle policy for the data image. コンピュータメモリの記憶域およびデータ帯域幅が増加するにつれ、企業や産業界が日々管理するデータの量および複雑さも増す。 As storage and data bandwidth of the computer memory is increased, also increases the amount and complexity of data that companies and industry manage every day. 社内で管理され得るデータの大部分は、会社や作業グループのために管理されるコンテンツを含む。 Most of the data that can be managed in-house, including the content to be managed for the company or work group. そのような情報には、電子的な文書、発表、タスク、ディスカッショントピック等が含まれ得る。 Such information, electronic documents, presentations, tasks, may include discussion topics, and the like. この情報の業務上の価値にもよるが、特定の情報へのアクセスは安全かつ非公開であり得るのに対し、他の情報はより広範な、または一般からのアクセスさえ有する場合がある。 Depending on the value of the business of this information, there is a case whereas access to specific information can be a safe and private, other information may have broader, or even public access. 記憶されるデータの様々な例は、極めて重要な情報をしばしば含み得るので、データの喪失を防ぐために、情報サーバおよびエンドユーザシステムのコンテンツをバックアップ記憶域にバックアップすることができる。 Various examples of stored the data, so may include vital information often in order to prevent loss of data, it is possible to back up the contents of the information server and the end user system to a backup storage. そのような場合、専用サーバおよび記憶サブシステムが、バックアップシステムを含むことができる。 In such a case, a dedicated server and a storage subsystem can comprise a backup system. バックアップシステムは、データをバックアップするためのデータ量および時間を減らしてマシンを保護しようとする。 Backup systems attempt to protect the machine by reducing the amount of data and the time for backing up data. 一部の方法は、重複排除を使用してバックアップするデータの量を減らすが、そのような方法は、実施するのに時間およびネットワーク帯域幅を依然として消費する場合がある。 Some methods, although reducing the amount of data to be backed up using deduplication, such methods may still time consuming and network bandwidth to implement. 例えば、ネットワークを介し、スケジュールされたバックアップをエンドユーザのラップトップ上で実行するには、増分バックアップでさえ、ファイルを走査し、変更されたファイルを検出するのに時間がかかる。 For example, via a network, to execute a scheduled backup on a laptop end users, even incremental backup, scan the file, it takes time to detect the changed files. このように走査し、ファイルを検出するには、重複排除または他の方法を使用する前に大量の時間がかかる。 Thus scan, to find the file, such a large amount of time before using deduplication or other methods. バックアップを行う際に大量の時間がかかることに加え、多数のエンドユーザシステムに基づく情報技術（ＩＴ）インフラを管理し、サポートすることは大きな課題を示す。 In addition it takes a lot of time when performing backup, managing a large number of end-user system based on information technology (IT) infrastructure, supporting indicates a major challenge. ＩＴ管理者は、データバックアップおよびデータ保護、データ復旧、復元および再始動、アーカイビングおよび長期保持、ならびに記憶アーキテクチャを管理するのに必要な日々の処理および手続きのための管理システムを開発することができる。 IT administrators, data backup and data protection, data recovery, recovery and restart, to develop a management system for day-to-day processing and procedures needed to manage archiving and long-term retention, and storage architecture it can. 情報ライフサイクル管理（ＩＬＭ）と呼ぶことができるこの管理システムは、コンピューティング装置上の記憶システムを管理するための１組の戦略を指す。 The management system may be referred to as information lifecycle management and (ILM) refers to a set of strategies for managing the storage system on the computing device. ＩＬＭの動作面での態様には、情報をその実用寿命の間中、効果的に管理するために特定のポリシを適用することが含まれる。 The aspects of the operating surface of the ILM, during its service life information includes applying a specific policy to effectively manage. ＩＬＭを利用することは、ある記憶階層から別の記憶階層へ、ユーザがバックアップイメージを自動的に移動させることを可能にする。 Utilizing the ILM, to a certain memory hierarchy from another storage hierarchy, it allows a user to move the backup images automatically. 現在の方法は、バックアップイメージの複製をいつ行うのかを決定するために、可能な限り早い（ＡＳＡＰ）手法、使用可能容量法、またはデータ分類法を利用する。 Current methods, in order to determine whether and when performing a copy of the backup image, fast (ASAP) approach as much as possible, to use the available capacity method, or a data classification method. しかし、対応する記憶リソースが別のバックアップ操作または他の操作によって利用されている場合があるので、ＡＳＡＰ手法を利用することは問題をはらむ。 However, because it may corresponding storage resource is being utilized by another backup operation or other operations, utilizing ASAP approach problematic. 使用可能容量法に関してもやはり、別の操作がその記憶リソースにアクセスしている可能性がある。 Again with respect to available capacity method, there is a possibility that another operation is accessing the storage resources. さらに、一貫性のある結果をもたらす、使用可能なディスク空き容量を求めることは困難な場合がある。 Furthermore, results in consistent, it may be difficult to determine the available disk space. 最高水準値などの所定の限度を高く設定しすぎる場合、使用可能な記憶空間が不十分であることが原因で、１回または複数回のバックアップ操作が失敗する可能性がある。 If set too high a predetermined limit, such as the highest level value, because it storage space available is insufficient, there is a possibility that one or multiple backup operation fails. 最低水準値などの所定の限度を低く設定しすぎる場合、使用可能な一部の記憶空間を十分活用できない場合がある。 If set too low a predetermined limit, such as lowest value, may not be sufficiently utilize the storage space of some available. データ分類に基づく解決策では、データが別の記憶階層にあまりに早く移動される場合があり、そのデータは他の記憶階層の中にあるので復元操作が長引く。 In the solution based on the data classification, there are cases where data is moved too early to another storage hierarchy, the data restore operation is prolonged because in other storage hierarchy. またあるときは、データが別の記憶階層にあまりに遅く移動される場合があり、現在の記憶階層をほぼ一杯にする。 There is also a case, there is a case where data is moved too slowly to another storage hierarchy, is nearly full the current storage hierarchy. 今度は、バックアップ操作が持続時間の点で長くなり、キャパシティコストが高くなる。 This time, the longer the point backup operation of duration, capacity cost increases. 上記の内容に鑑みて、データイメージのための時間ベースのライフサイクルポリシを定めるための改善されたシステムおよび方法が求められる。 In view of the foregoing, an improved system and method for determining a time-based life cycle policy for the data image are determined. データイメージのための時間ベースのライフサイクルポリシを定めるためのシステムおよび方法を考える。 Consider a system and method for determining the time-based life cycle policy for the data image. 一実施形態では、コンピュータシステムが、複数のデータ記憶媒体に結合されるバックアップサーバと、その複数のデータ記憶媒体に含まれるデータ記憶媒体に結合される少なくとも１台のクライアントコンピュータとを含む。 In one embodiment, includes a computer system, a backup server coupled to the plurality of data storage medium, and at least one client computer coupled to a data storage medium contained in the plurality of data storage media. このデータ記憶媒体は、クライアントコンピュータに対応するデータイメージのバックアップコピーを記憶する。 The data storage medium stores a backup copy of the data image corresponding to the client computer. バックアップサーバは、複数のデータ記憶媒体のうちの第２の記憶媒体にデータイメージを移し始める時点を示す、第１の時点値を選択するように構成される。 Backup server, indicating when the second storage medium of the plurality of data storage media starts transferring a data image, configured to select a first time value. この時点値は、暦日付および１日のうちの時間（複数可）に相当してもよい。 The time value may correspond to the time (s) of the calendar with and 1 day. 一実施形態では、この第２のデータ記憶媒体は、層状の記憶階層の中で、第１のデータ記憶媒体よりも低い階層に関連する。 In one embodiment, the second data storage medium, in a layered storage hierarchy, related to the lower hierarchy than the first data storage medium. 例えば、第２のデータ記憶媒体は、第１のデータ記憶媒体よりもアクセス頻度が低くてもよい。 For example, a second data storage medium may access frequency lower than the first data storage medium. 第２のデータ記憶媒体は、勤務時間中の日々のアクセスではなく、データ復旧操作用に使用することができる。 Second data storage medium is not a daily access during office hours, it can be used for data recovery operations. 第２の記憶媒体は、層状の記憶階層の中の最終記憶媒体に相当しなくてもよい。 The second storage medium may not correspond to the final storage medium in a layered storage hierarchy. ライフサイクルポリシを定めるために、バックアップサーバは、層状の記憶階層の中の各データ記憶媒体についてそれぞれの時点値を選択し続けるように構成することができる。 To determine the life cycle policy, the backup server can be configured to continue to select each time point values ​​for each data storage medium in a layered storage hierarchy. バックアップサーバは、コピー先データ記憶媒体へのデータイメージの移動完了検出時に、コピー元データ記憶媒体上のデータイメージのコピーを削除するようにさらに構成することができる。 Backup server can during movement completion detection data image to the copy destination data storage medium is further configured to delete the copy of the data image on the copy source data storage medium. さらに、バックアップサーバは、スケジューリングの競合を検出することができる。 Further, the backup server can detect the scheduling conflict. スケジューリングの競合を定める基準には、他のライフサイクルポリシに関連する暦情報および１日のうちの時間または他の時間増分、データイメージおよび個々のバックアップイメージそれぞれのデータクラスまたは業務上の価値、記憶媒体それぞれの現在の使用可能容量、スケジュールされた各ライフサイクルのバックアップ／複製操作ごとの、スケジュールされた移動を完了した時点での記憶媒体それぞれの予測（推定）使用可能容量、各記憶媒体内のデータ形式のそれぞれをなす各データイメージの大きさ、ならびに記憶媒体のそれぞれに対するバックアップ／複製操作のデータ転送速度のうちの少なくとも１つが含まれ得る。 The criteria defining the scheduling conflicts, time or other time increment, the data image and value of the individual backup image each data class or business of the calendar information and day associated with other life cycle policy storage media their current available capacity of each backup / replication operation for each life cycle scheduled, each storage medium upon completion of the movement scheduled predicted (estimated) usable capacity, within each storage medium the size of each data image constituting the respective data formats, as well as at least one of the data transfer speed of the backup / replication operations on respective storage media may be included. 以下の説明および添付図面を参照することにより、これらのおよび他の実施形態が理解される。 By reference to the following description and accompanying drawings, these and other embodiments are understood. 情報ライフサイクルの一実施形態を例示する、全体的なブロック図を示す。 It illustrates one embodiment of an information life-cycle, showing an overall block diagram. 時間ベースのライフサイクルスケジューリングの一実施形態を例示する、全体的なブロック図を示す。 It illustrates one embodiment of a time-based lifecycle scheduling shows an overall block diagram. データイメージのための時間ベースのライフサイクルポリシを定める方法の、別の実施形態を例示する流れ図を示す。 The method of determining the time-based life cycle policy for the data image, indicating a flow diagram illustrating another embodiment. ネットワークアーキテクチャの一実施形態を例示する、全体的なブロック図を示す。 It illustrates one embodiment of a network architecture, showing a general block diagram. 本発明は様々な修正および代替形態を許すが、特定の実施形態を例として図示し、本明細書で詳しく説明する。 The present invention allows various modifications and alternative forms, illustrate specific embodiments as examples, it will be described in detail herein. ただし、図面および図面に対する詳細な説明は、本発明を開示する特定の形態に限定することは意図せず、逆に本発明は、特許請求の範囲によって定める本発明の趣旨および範囲に含まれるあらゆる修正形態、等価物、および代替形態を範囲に含むことを理解すべきである。 However, a detailed description of the drawings and it is not intended to be limited to the particular forms disclosed the present invention and the present invention conversely, fall within the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims all modifications, equivalents, and should be understood to include a range of alternatives. 本発明を完全に理解できるようにするために、以下の説明では多数の具体的詳細を記載する。 In order to provide a thorough understanding of the present invention, the following description describes numerous specific details. ただし、本発明はこれらの具体的詳細なしに実施できることを当業者なら理解されよう。 However, the present invention will be understood by those skilled in the art may be practiced without these specific details. 場合によっては、本発明を不明瞭にすることを回避するために、よく知られている回路、構造、信号、コンピュータプログラム命令、および技法は詳しく示していない。 Sometimes, in order to avoid obscuring the present invention, well-known circuits, structures, signals, computer program instructions, and techniques are not shown in detail. 図１を参照して、情報ライフサイクル１００の一実施形態の全体的なブロック図を示す。 Referring to FIG. 1 shows a general block diagram of one embodiment of an information life-cycle 100. 情報ライフサイクル１００、または単純にライフサイクル１００は、作成および最初に記憶してから、データが使われなくなり、削除される時点までの情報システムのデータおよび関連メタデータの流れの管理を示す。 Information Lifecycle 100 or simply lifecycle 100, it involves creating and initially stored, the data is no longer used, showing the management of the flow of data and associated metadata information systems to the point to be deleted. データイメージは、少なくとも１つまたは複数の情報ファイル、関連メタデータ、およびディレクトリ、フォルダ、サブフォルダなどの関連記憶構成情報を含むことができる。 Data image may include at least one or more information files, related metadata and directory, folder, the associated memory configuration information, such as a subfolder. データイメージ１５０は、データ記憶媒体１１０上に記憶することができる。 Data image 150 can be stored on the data storage medium 110. 一実施形態では、時点ｔ１において、データイメージ１５０をデータ記憶媒体１１０上に最初に記憶する。 In one embodiment, at time t1, initially store data image 150 on the data storage medium 110. 別の実施形態では、時点ｔ１より前の期間にわたりデータイメージ１５０をデータ記憶媒体１１０上に記憶していても、時点ｔ１をライフサイクル１００の最初の時点として選択することができる。 In another embodiment, also store a data image 150 on the data storage medium 110 over the period before time t1, it is possible to select a time point t1 as the first point in the life cycle 100. 一実施形態では、データ記憶媒体１１０は、１台または複数台のクライアントコンピュータのデータを記憶するために使用する、ファイルシステムに関連するディスクドライブとすることができる。 In one embodiment, the data storage medium 110 can be used to store the data of one or a plurality of client computers, the disk drives associated with the file system. スケジュールされたバックアップ操作は、データ記憶媒体１２０などの別の記憶媒体上に記憶される、データイメージ１５０のコピーを作成することができる。 Scheduled backup operation is stored on another storage medium, such as a data storage medium 120, it is possible to create a copy of the data image 150. スナップショットイメージ１５２が、データイメージ１５０のコピーに相当することができる。 Snapshot image 152 may correspond to a copy of the data image 150. スナップショットイメージ１５２内の１つまたは複数のファイルは、データイメージ１５０を記憶するために使用される形式とは異なるファイル形式を含むことができる。 One or more files in the snapshot image 152 can include a different file format than the format used to store data image 150. バックアップ操作は、情報技術（ＩＴ）管理者による、所定のスケジュールイベントとすることができる。 Backup operation, by the information technology (IT) administrators, can be a predetermined schedule events. スナップショットイメージ１５２を作成するバックアップ操作は、利用できる特定の時間窓の間にスケジュールすることができ、その利用できる特定の時間窓の間、データ記憶媒体１２０の同時アクセスが生じないように決定が下される。 Backup operation to create a snapshot image 152 can be scheduled during a specific time window available, during a particular time window which can be its use, determined as simultaneous access of the data storage medium 120 is not generated It is made. 例えば、バックアップ操作が行われているときに、不図示の別のライフサイクルポリシがデータ記憶媒体１２０に同時にアクセスしていないと判定することができる。 For example, it can be determined that time, another life cycle policy (not shown) is not simultaneously access the data storage medium 120 which backup operation is being performed. 一実施形態では、スナップショットイメージ１５２を作成した後、データ記憶媒体１１０からデータイメージ１５０を削除し、または失効させることができる。 In one embodiment, after creating a snapshot image 152, and deletes the data image 150 from data storage medium 110, or may be revoked. この削除は、ＩＴ管理者によるスケジュールに応じて、スナップショットを作成した直後に、またはその所定時間後に行うことができる。 This deletion, depending on the schedule by the IT administrator, immediately after creating the snapshot, or can be performed after the predetermined time. 上記に記載したプロセスは、データイメージ１５０のその後の移動についても繰り返すことができる。 Process described above can be repeated for subsequent movement of the data image 150. ライフサイクル１００内に示すデータの流れについて続けると、図１内に複製１として示す、その後の所定の複製操作が、スナップショットイメージ１５２をデータ記憶媒体１２０からデータ記憶媒体１３０に移すことができる。 Continuing with the flow of the data shown in the life cycle 100, shown as one copy in FIG. 1, subsequent predetermined replication operation, can transfer snapshot image 152 from the data storage medium 120 in the data storage medium 130. その後のこの複製操作は、最初のバックアップ操作を完了した、図１内に遅延１として示す所定の遅延後に行うことができる。 Subsequent The replication operation was completed the first backup operation can be performed after a predetermined delay, shown as a delay 1 in Figure 1. スナップショットイメージ１５２内に記憶されたデータのコピーを作成し、複製イメージ１５４によって図１内に示す。 Make a copy of the data stored in the snapshot image 152, shown in FIG. 1 by the duplicate image 154. 本明細書で使用するとき、用語「複製」は、データイメージの最初のバックアップ操作後に行うコピー操作を指し、複製操作はスナップショットイメージに対して、またはスナップショットイメージの他の後続のコピーに対して行われる。 As used herein, the term "replication" refers to the copy operation performed after the first backup operation data image, duplication operation for snapshot image, or to a snapshot other subsequent copies of the image It is performed Te. 複製イメージ１５４を作成する複製操作は、利用できる特定の時間窓の間にスケジュールすることができる。 Duplication operation to create a duplicate image 154, can be scheduled during a specific time window available. 例えば、時点ｔ３と時点ｔ４との間に生じる時間窓は、第１の複製操作について利用できる時間窓である。 For example, the time window occurring between the time t3 and the time t4 is the time window available for the first replication operation. 一実施形態では、特定した時点値ｔ３およびｔ４は、グラフィカルユーザインターフェイス（ＧＵＩ）を備えるバックアップアプリケーションを利用するシステム管理者が選択することができる。 In one embodiment, the time value t3 and t4 when identified, may be a system administrator to use the backup application with a graphical user interface (GUI) to select. 特定した所与の時点値は、１つまたは複数の条件によって適格と認めることができる。 Given time value specified may be deemed qualified by one or more conditions. さもなければ競合が生じる可能性があり、ＧＵＩ内のメッセージをシステム管理者に提示して、既存のライフサイクルポリシに対応する１つまたは複数の記憶された値を修正することにより、競合を解消する機会を与えることができる。 Otherwise there may be a conflict by presenting the message in the GUI system administrator, to modify one or more stored values ​​that correspond to existing life cycle policy, eliminating conflicts it is possible to give a chance to. 例えば、第１の複製操作（図１内に複製１として示す）のための時間窓用の１つの条件は、その時間窓が、バックアップ操作のための時間窓と所定の閾値を超えて重複しないことであり得る。 For example, one condition for the time window for the first replication operation (shown as duplicated in FIG. 1 1), the time window does not overlap beyond the time window with a predetermined threshold for backup operations can be that. 一実施形態では、この条件は、重複を一切認めなくてもよい。 In one embodiment, this condition, duplicate may not be recognized at all. 別の実施形態では、この条件は、３０分または他の選択された持続時間の重複を認めることができる。 In another embodiment, this condition can be observed duplication of 30 minutes or other selected duration. 閾値は、バックアップ操作および第１の複製操作によるデータ記憶媒体１３０の同時アクセスについての許容範囲を、もしあれば示すことができる。 Threshold, the allowable range for simultaneous access of the data storage medium 130 by the backup operation and the first replication operation, it is possible to indicate if any. さらに、不図示の他のデータイメージについて、他のバックアップ操作および複製操作が行われていてもよい。 Furthermore, another data image (not shown), other backup operations and duplication operations may be performed. 所与のデータ記憶媒体の同時アクセスは、バックアップ操作および複製操作の両方を十分遅くして、許容できる所定の持続時間内にこれらの操作を終えることを妨げる場合がある。 Simultaneous access of a given data storage medium is sufficiently slow both backup operation and replication operation, which may prevent the finish these operations allowable within a predetermined duration. 上述の重複条件に加え、スケジューリングの競合が発生したかどうかを判定するために、他の条件も使用することができる。 In addition to the overlap condition described above, to determine whether the scheduling conflict occurs, other conditions may be used. 例えば、２つ以上のデータイメージに対応する、第１の複製操作のための２つ以上の時間窓は重複しても構わないと決定することができる。 For example, corresponding to two or more data images, two or more time windows for the first replication operation can be determined as may be duplicated. スナップショットイメージ１５２および不図示の別のスナップショットイメージのために、時点ｔ３と時点ｔ４との間の時間窓を使用することができる。 For another snapshot image snapshot image 152 and not shown, can be used a time window between the time t3 and the time point t4. 時点値ｔ３は、スナップショットイメージをデータ記憶媒体１２０からデータ記憶媒体１３０に最初に移動可能にする時点を示すことができる。 Time value t3 may indicate the time of initially movable in the data storage medium 130 of the snapshot image from the data storage medium 120. 複製するためにどのスナップショットイメージを第１に優先させるのかについての選択は、特定した時点値ｔ３に加えて他の条件に基づくことができる。 Selection of whether to prioritize which snapshot images on the first to replicate may be based on other conditions in addition to the time value t3 that specified. これらの他の条件には、コピー元データ記憶媒体またはコピー先データ記憶媒体の現在の使用可能容量、対応するデータイメージの業務上の価値、データイメージの古さ、およびデータイメージの大きさのうちの少なくとも１つが含まれ得る。 These other conditions, the current available capacity of the copy source data storage medium or destination data storage medium, the value of business of the corresponding data image, the age of the data image, and of the size of the data image At least one, but it may be included. 他の条件も可能であり、考えられる。 Other conditions are also possible and conceivable. データイメージ１５０の削除と同様に、複製イメージ１５４を作成した後、データ記憶媒体１２０からスナップショットイメージ１５２を削除し、または失効させることができる。 Like the deletion of data image 150, after creating a duplicate image 154, delete a snapshot image 152 from the data storage medium 120, or may be revoked. この削除は、複製イメージ１５４を作成した直後に、またはその所定時間後に行うことができる。 This deletion can be performed immediately after creating a duplicate image 154, or after the predetermined time. 上記に記載した移動プロセスは、システム管理によって定められるように、あと数回繰り返すことができる。 Transfer process described above, as defined by the system management, it can be repeated several more times. 例えば、図１内に複製２として示す、もう１つの複製操作が、複製イメージ１５４をデータ記憶媒体１３０からデータ記憶媒体１４０に移すことができる。 For example, it is shown in FIG. 1 as a replica 2, another replication operations, can be transferred duplicate image 154 from the data storage medium 130 in the data storage medium 140. その後のこの複製操作は、前の複製操作を完了した、図１内に遅延２として示す所定の遅延後に行うことができる。 Subsequent The replication operation was completed the previous replication operation can be performed after a predetermined delay, shown as second delay in FIG. 複製イメージ１５４内に記憶されたデータのコピーを作成し、複製イメージ１５６によって示す。 Creates a copy of the data stored in the duplicate image 154 is indicated by duplicate image 156. スナップショットイメージ１５２の削除と同様に、複製イメージ１５６を作成した後、データ記憶媒体１３０から複製イメージ１５４を削除し、または失効させることができる。 Like the deletion of the snapshot image 152, after creating a duplicate image 156, remove the duplicate image 154 from the data storage medium 130, or may be revoked. この削除は、複製イメージ１５６を作成した直後に、またはその所定時間後に行うことができる。 This deletion can be performed immediately after creating a duplicate image 156, or after the predetermined time. 一実施形態では、データ記憶媒体１４０は、データイメージ１５０をオフサイトの記憶位置、オンサイトのテープ記憶媒体、または他の場所に送る前の、データイメージ１５０のライフサイクル内の最終データ記憶媒体であり得る。 In one embodiment, the data storage medium 140, the storage position of the off data image 150 site, on-site tape storage media or before being sent to another location, the final data storage medium in the life cycle of the data image 150, possible. データ記憶媒体１１０−１４０は、層状の記憶域を表すことができる。 Data storage medium 110-140 may represent the storage layer. 層状の記憶域は、合計の記憶コストを減らすために、様々な種類の記憶媒体に様々なデータクラスを割り当てることを含むことができる。 Storage layered in order to reduce the storage cost of the total, may comprise assigning a different data classes in a variety of storage media. データクラスは、所定のデータ保護レベル、システム性能目標、所定の業務上の価値、およびデータの利用頻度のうちの少なくとも１つに基づくことができる。 Data class, a predetermined level of data protection, system performance target may be based on at least one of the predetermined value of business, and the data frequency of use. データを特定の媒体に自動で割り当てるために、１つまたは複数の所定のポリシをソフトウェア内で利用することができる。 To automatically allocate data to a particular medium, it is possible to utilize one or more predetermined policy within the software. 層状の記憶域の一例は、極めて重要なまたは最近アクセスしたファイルを記憶するための第１の層を含むことができる。 An example of a storage layer can include a first layer for storing critical or recently accessed files. 第１の層の記憶域は、ダブルパリティＲＡＩＤ（安価／独立したディスクの冗長アレイ）など、高価かつ高品質の媒体上にデータを記憶することができる。 Storage of the first layer, such as a double-parity RAID (inexpensive / independent disks redundant array), data can be stored on expensive, high-quality media. この層状の記憶域は、財務ファイルおよび分類されたファイルを記憶するための第２の層を含むことができる。 Storage of this layered may include a second layer for storing financial files and classification files. 第２の層は、従来のストレージエリアネットワーク（ＳＡＮ）内のより安価な媒体上にデータを記憶することができる。 The second layer is capable of storing data on a less expensive medium in a conventional storage area network (SAN). 層状記憶システム内の層の数が増えるにつれ、データの業務上の価値および対応する記憶域のコストは両方とも低下し得る。 As the number of layers in a layered storage system increases, the cost of storage value and corresponding on the data of the business may be reduced both. 例えば、この層状の記憶域は、イベント駆動型ファイル、滅多に使用しないファイル、または未分類のファイルを記憶するための第３の層を含むことができる。 For example, storage of this layered may include a third layer for storing event-driven file, rarely used file, or unclassified file. 第３の層は、記録可能なコンパクトディスク（ＣＤ−Ｒ）またはテープ上にデータを記憶することができる。 The third layer is capable of storing data on a recordable compact disk (CD-R) or on the tape. データ記憶媒体１１０−１４０に使用するための記憶域の種類の選択は、所与のデータイメージ１５０のデータクラスに基づくことができる。 Selection of the type of storage to be used for data storage medium 110-140 can be based on data class of a given data image 150. 次に図２を参照して、時間ベースのライフサイクルスケジューリング２００の一実施形態の全体的なブロック図を示す。 Referring now to FIG. 2 shows a general block diagram of an embodiment of a time-based lifecycle scheduling 200. ４つのデータイメージのそれぞれについてのライフサイクルの一部を図示する。 It illustrates a part of the life cycle for each of the four data image. イメージ２などのデータイメージを例にとり、バックアップ操作が時点ｔ３０において始まり、時点ｔ３０から時点ｔ３２までの持続時間の間続くようにスケジュールされていることが見て取れる。 Taking the data image, such as an image 2 as an example, beginning at time t30 backup operation, it can be seen that is the duration until the time t32 continues as scheduled from time t30. このバックアップ操作は、媒体１と呼ぶデータ記憶媒体へのメモリ書込みアクセスを含む。 The backup operation includes a memory write access to the data storage medium called a medium 1. 時点ｔ３３においてその後のバックアップ操作が始まる前に、時点ｔ３２から時点ｔ３３までに示す所定の遅延が発生する。 Before subsequent backup operation begins at time t33, predetermined delay indicated from the time t32 to the time t33 is generated. 一実施形態では、本明細書で使用するとき、用語「バックアップ」は、データセットをコピーし、別の形式に変換し、（例えば起こり得る将来の復元のために）記憶するプロセスを指す。 In one embodiment, as used herein, the term "backup" copies the data set, converted into a different format, refers to the process of (for the future restoration may occur for example) stored. 一実施形態では、用語「複製」は、形式を変更することなしに、データセットのコピーを作成し、記憶するプロセスを指す。 In one embodiment, the term "replication", without changing the format refers to the process of creating a copy of the data set is stored. あるいは複製は、コピー元の位置にコピーを残すことなしに、データセットをある位置から別の位置に移すことを伴い得る。 Alternatively replication, without leaving a copy to the original position, may involve transferring from a location in the data set to another position. 他の実施形態では、バックアップは形式の変更を伴わなくてもよく、または複製は、何らかの形式変更を伴ってもよい。 In other embodiments, the backup may not involve changes in form, or replication may involve some form changes. そのような数多くの代替的実施形態が可能であり、考えられる。 Such many alternative embodiments are possible contemplated. 第１の複製は、時点ｔ３３から時点ｔ３６までの持続時間の間続くことができる。 The first replication may continue for the duration from time point t33 to time point t36. この第１の複製操作は、媒体１からのメモリ読取アクセス、および媒体４へのメモリ書込みアクセスを含む。 The first replication operation, memory read access from the medium 1, and a memory write access to the medium 4. データ記憶媒体、媒体１および媒体４は、層状記憶システムの異なる層の中に含まれてもよい。 Data storage medium, medium 1 and medium 4 may be included in different layers of a layered storage system. 図２に示すように、データイメージ、イメージ２に関する例について続けると、時点ｔ３６と時点ｔ３８との間に第２の所定の遅延が発生し得る。 As shown in FIG. 2, the data image, continuing the example about the image 2, the second predetermined delay may occur between the time t36 and the time t38. 第２の複製は、時点ｔ３８から時点ｔ４１までの持続時間の間続くことができる。 Second replication may continue for the duration from time point t38 to time point t41. この第２の複製操作は、媒体４からのメモリ読取アクセス、および媒体８へのメモリ書込みアクセスを含む。 This second replication operation comprises a memory write access to the memory read access, and the medium 8 from the medium 4. データ記憶媒体、媒体４および媒体８は、層状記憶システムの異なる層の中に含まれてもよい。 Data storage medium, medium 4 and medium 8 may be included in different layers of a layered storage system. その後、不図示の１つまたは複数の遅延および複製操作が生じてもよい。 Thereafter, one or more delay and duplication operations not shown may occur. さもなければ、所定の遅延の後、層状の記憶域からデータイメージ、イメージ２を削除することができる。 Otherwise, after a predetermined delay, it is possible to delete data image, the image 2 from the storage layer. 図２に示すように異なる時点において発生するが、データイメージ、イメージ１、イメージ３、およびイメージ４についても同様の操作および遅延を示す。 Although occurring at different points in time as shown in FIG. 2, it shows data images, Image 1, Image 3, and the same operations and delays the image 4. 印を付けた時点間の持続時間として、スケジュールされた時間窓を示す。 As the duration between time points marked, indicating the scheduled time window. 例えば、イメージ１の複製操作のための時間窓は、時点ｔ３１と時点ｔ３４との間である。 For example, the time window for duplication operations of the image 1 is between time t31 and time t34. イメージ２のバックアップ操作のためのスケジュールされた時間窓は、時点ｔ３０と時点ｔ３２との間である。 Scheduled time window for backup operations of the image 2 is between time t30 and time t32. あるいは、時間窓は、暦日付および１日のうちの時間（複数可）に相当する所与の開始時間に始まる、持続時間によって指定することができる。 Alternatively, the time window begins at a given start time corresponding to the time (s) of the calendar with and 1 day, it may be specified by the duration. 例えば、時点ｔ３１と時点ｔ３４との間の持続時間を２時間とすることができる。 For example, the duration between the time t31 and the time t34 can be set to 2 hours. 時点ｔ３１は、３月１４日の５：００ＡＭの時間に相当することができる。 Point in time t31, it is possible to correspond to 5:00 AM in the time of March 14. したがって、イメージ１の複製操作は、３月１４日の５：００ＡＭに始まり、３月１４日の７：００ＡＭに終わるように指定することができる。 Therefore, the replication operation of the image 1, beginning with the 5:00 AM of March 14, it is possible to specify that end up in the 7:00 AM of March 14. その結果、２時間の時間窓が特定の暦日付上で生じるように指定される。 As a result, a two-hour time window is specified to occur on a particular calendar date. 図２に示すスケジューリング情報は、グラフィカルユーザインターフェイス（ＧＵＩ）上でＩＴ管理者に提示することができる。 Scheduling information shown in FIG. 2, it can be presented to the IT administrator on a graphical user interface (GUI). 暦情報、１日のうちの時間または他の時間増分、データイメージおよび個々のバックアップイメージそれぞれのデータクラスまたは業務上の価値、記憶媒体それぞれの現在の使用可能容量、スケジュールされた各ライフサイクルのバックアップ／複製操作ごとの、スケジュールされた移動を完了した時点での記憶媒体それぞれの予測（推定）使用可能容量、各記憶媒体内のデータ形式のそれぞれをなす各データイメージの大きさ、記憶媒体のそれぞれに対するバックアップ／複製操作のデータ転送速度、データ記憶媒体の相対的または絶対的な財務コスト、ならびにバックアップ／複製操作がスケジュールされた時間窓よりも早く終了すると推定される推定加速窓（例えばイメージ２では、複製は、時点ｔ３３と時点ｔ３６との間のスケジュ Calendar information, time or other time increment of the day, the data image and value of the individual backup image each data class or business, the current available capacity of each storage medium, a backup of each life cycle scheduled / per replication operations, scheduled recording medium each of the prediction of the movement at the time of completion of the (estimated) usable capacity, the size of each data image constituting the respective data format within each storage medium, each of the storage medium data transfer rate of the backup / replication operations on, the data storage medium relative or absolute financial cost, and backup / estimated acceleration windows duplication operation is estimated and end earlier than the scheduled time window (e.g., image 2 , schedule between replication time t33 and the time point t36 ルされた窓ではなく、時点ｔ３３と時点ｔ３５との間の加速窓内で終了すると推定することができる）のうちの少なくとも１つなど、説明図を簡略化するために不図示の追加情報をＧＵＩ内でユーザに提示してもよい。 Rather than Le is a window, at least such as one of it can be estimated that the ends in the acceleration window between time t33 and time t35), the additional information not shown in order to simplify the illustration it may be presented to the user in the GUI. 上記の基準をユーザに提示することに加え、上記の基準を使用してスケジューリングの競合を検出することができる。 In addition to presenting the above criteria to the user, it is possible to detect the scheduling conflict by using the above criteria. スケジューリングの競合の検出について次に説明する。 Next will be described the detection of the scheduling conflict. スケジューリングの競合を検出することは、所与の記憶媒体が２つの異なるライフサイクルポリシによってアクセスされる期間を少なくとも特定することを含む。 Detecting a scheduling conflict involves at least certain periods of a given storage medium is accessed by two different life cycle policy. 例えば、図２に示すスケジューリング２００を参照して、時点ｔ３１と時点ｔ３２との間に、媒体１として示す記憶媒体は、イメージ１の複製操作に由来するメモリ読取アクセスと、イメージ２のバックアップ操作に由来するメモリ書込みアクセスとを有する。 For example, with reference to the scheduling 200 shown in FIG. 2, between the time t31 and the time t32, the storage medium shown as medium 1, a memory read access from the duplication operation of the image 1, the backup operation of the image 2 origin and a memory write access to. この同時アクセスは、個々のアクセスのそれぞれの開始時間を遅らせ、さらに各アクセスについてのそれぞれの持続時間を長引かせる可能性がある。 The simultaneous access is delayed respective start times of the individual access, has the potential to further prolong the respective duration of each access. その結果、これらの操作は十分遅くなり、ことによるとスケジュールされた時間窓のうちで終わらない可能性がある。 As a result, these operations are sufficient slower, and due to that there is a possibility that does not end in one of the scheduled time window. ここでは、イメージ１の複製操作のためのスケジュールされた時間窓は、時点ｔ３１と時点ｔ３４との間である。 Here, the scheduled time window for duplication operations of the image 1 is between time t31 and time t34. イメージ２のバックアップ操作のためのスケジュールされた時間窓は、時点ｔ３０と時点ｔ３２との間である。 Scheduled time window for backup operations of the image 2 is between time t30 and time t32. 競合を検出することは、所与の記憶媒体が、日々の業務活動のためにアクセスされる期間を特定することも含むことができる。 Detecting a conflict, given the storage medium may also include identifying the time period to be accessed for daily business activities. 例えば、バックアップ操作を平日の８：００ＡＭから６：００ＰＭの間にスケジュールしてはいけない場合がある。 For example, there is a case that should not be scheduled during the backup operation weekdays from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM. ユーザは、バックアップ操作に由来するメモリ読取アクセスを有することになる、それぞれのデータ記憶媒体にアクセスする。 The user will have a memory read access from the backup operation to access the respective data storage medium. 同様に、第１の複製操作をこれらの業務時間中にスケジュールしてはいけない場合がある。 Similarly, the first replication operation was scheduled during these business hours in some cases do not. ユーザは、複製操作に由来するメモリ読取アクセスを有することになる、復元操作用のそれぞれのデータ記憶媒体にアクセスし得る。 The user will have a memory read access from the duplicate operation may access the respective data storage medium for the restore operation. これらの時間中は操作をスケジュールしてはならないことをＩＴ管理者に示すために、これらの時間窓をＧＵＩ内のウィンドウペインの中でブロック状態として示すことができる。 During these times to indicate that should not schedule operations IT administrator can indicate these time windows as a block state in the window panes in the GUI. 所与のデータイメージのための所与のライフサイクルポリシのバックアップ／複製操作をスケジュールするとき、提案した時間窓についてスケジューリングの競合を検出することは、先に説明した提示基準をさらに含むことができる。 When scheduling a backup / replication operations given life cycle policy for the given data image, detecting a scheduling conflict for the proposed time window may further include a presentation criteria described previously . 例えば所与のデータ記憶媒体について、提案した時間窓は、以前にスケジュールされたライフサイクルの時間窓と重複しない可能性があるが、その所与のデータ記憶媒体が容量最高水準値に達していることがある。 For example, for a given data storage medium, the proposed time window, there is a possibility that does not overlap with previously scheduled time window of the life cycle, the given data storage medium has reached the capacitance highest level value Sometimes. 上記に記載した基準を使用する他の検査の組合せも可能であり、考えられる。 The combination of other tests using the criteria described above are possible and contemplated. 競合が自動で検出され、ＧＵＩのウィンドウペインなどによりＩＴ管理者に提示される場合、データイメージのライフサイクルに関するバックアップ／複製操作をスケジューリングする負担はより少なくなる可能性がある。 Conflict is detected automatically, if it is presented to the IT administrator by such as a window pane of the GUI, there is a possibility that the burden is less to schedule a backup / duplication operation on the life cycle of the data image. 所与のデータイメージのためのライフサイクルポリシを定義する段階の間、ＧＵＩによる時間ベースの手法は、競合を検出するための可能な解決策をさらに提供することができる。 Life during the step of defining a cycle policy, time by GUI based approach for a given data image, may further provide a possible solution for detecting conflicts. 例えば、前にスケジュールされた操作の時間窓またはデータ記憶媒体に関する新たな値を、ソフトウェアアプリケーションが決定することができる。 For example, a new value for the time window or a data storage medium operations scheduled earlier, can be a software application to determine. この先行バックアップ／複製操作は、提案したバックアップ／複製操作と同じデータ記憶媒体にアクセスし、それにより競合を引き起こしている場合がある。 This prior backup / replication operations, access the same data storage medium with the proposed backup / replication operation, which may thereby causing the conflict. 新たな値は、先行操作が依然として成功裏に完了することを可能にし、次に、提案した操作をスケジュール可能にすることができる。 New value allows the predecessor is still successfully completed, then the proposed operation may enable scheduling. 例えば、ユーザは、先行操作を４時間続くようにスケジュールしている場合がある。 For example, a user may have scheduled predecessor the to last 4 hours. ソフトウェアアプリケーションは、バックアップイメージの大きさおよびデータ記憶媒体のデータ転送速度から、先行操作が３時間続き得ると判断することができる。 Software application, it can be determined that the data rate of the size and the data storage medium of the backup image, the preceding operation is obtained 3 hours continued. したがって、どちらの方向が競合を解決するのかに応じて、先行操作を１時間早めてまたは１時間後方へスケジュールすることができる。 Thus, depending on which direction is either to resolve the conflict, the predecessor can be scheduled to 1 hour earlier or in 1 hour backwards. 先行操作に関するどんな新たな値も、ＧＵＩによりユーザに提示することができる。 Any new values ​​for predecessors may also be presented to the user by the GUI. 競合の解決策を見つけることについて続けると、上記に記載した解決策と同様に、ソフトウェアアプリケーションは、提案したバックアップ／複製操作の時間窓またはデータ記憶媒体に関する新たな値を決定することができる。 Continuing about finding conflict solutions, like the solution described above, the software application may determine a new value for the time window or data storage medium of the proposed backup / replication operations. ユーザによる選択を利用し、このアプリケーションは、１つまたは複数の新たな値が可能かどうかを判定するために計算を実行し、可能な場合、その新たな値をＧＵＩによりユーザに提示することができる。 Using selection by the user, the application, that one or more new values ​​to perform calculations to determine whether it is possible, if possible, be presented to the user the new value by the GUI it can. この計算は、競合を検出するための先に列挙した基準を入力として含んでもよい。 This calculation may include the criteria listed above for detecting conflicts as input. ＧＵＩによりＩＴ管理者に情報を提示することに関して上記に記載したように、データイメージの時間ベースのライフサイクルポリシの定義は時間窓を含むことができる。 As described above for presenting information to the IT administrator by GUI, the definition of the time-based lifecycle policy data image may include a time window. 情報ライフサイクルを決定するとき、この時間窓は、データクラス、使用可能容量、データ転送速度、および他の手法と組み合わせることができる。 When determining the information lifecycle, this time window, data classes can be combined available capacity, data transfer rate, and other techniques. ソフトウェアアプリケーションによって提供され、ＧＵＩまたはコマンドラインインターフェイスによって提示される時間窓は、所与のデータイメージについてバックアップ／複製操作をいつ、どのデータ記憶媒体上で行うのかをユーザが厳密に指定できるようにする。 Provided by the software application, a time window that is presented by the GUI or command line interface, so that the backup / replication operations for a given data image when, whether carried out in which data storage medium on the user can specify exactly . ユーザは、暦に基づく手法を利用し、Ｓｙｍａｎｔｅｃ ＮｅｔＢａｃｋｕｐ（登録商標）などのバックアップアプリケーション内で、それぞれのバックアップ／複製操作のための日付および時間窓を指定することができる。 The user can use a technique based on calendar, in the backup applications, such as Symantec NetBackup (TM), specifying the date and time window for each backup / replication operations. バックアップアプリケーションは、各コピー先またはデータ記憶媒体に時間ベースのスケジュールを関連させ、もしくは結び付けることができる。 Backup application is related to time-based schedule to each destination or a data storage medium, or can be associated. このようにして、ユーザが、少なくともスナップショットのコピー先およびバックアップ／複製のコピー先を含むデータ記憶ライフサイクルポリシを作成すると、それぞれのバックアップ／複製操作にスケジュールが結び付けられる。 In this way, when the user creates a data storage lifecycle policy including at least a snapshot destination and the backup / replication destination, the schedule is tied to each backup / replication operations. スケジュールは、操作のそれぞれをいつ行うのかを規定する。 Schedule, to define whether and when to carry out the respective operation. 例えば、スナップショットイメージを作成した後、複製操作を２週間後に行って、そのスナップショットイメージをディスク記憶域に移すことができる。 For example, after creating a snapshot image, by performing a copy operation after 2 weeks, it is possible to transfer the snapshot image to disk storage. この２週間の間、スナップショットイメージを使用してデータ復旧を行うことができる。 During this two weeks, it is possible to perform data recovery using the snapshot image. ２週間後、そのスナップショットイメージは失効し、削除されることが見込まれ得る。 After two weeks, the snapshot image is revoked, can be expected to be deleted. したがって、それぞれのデータイメージの複数のコピーが保たれることはない。 Therefore, there is no possibility that multiple copies of each data image is maintained. ディスク上のそれぞれのバックアップイメージを長期保存のためにテープに移すために、複製操作において定めた第２のスケジュールを使用することができる。 Each backup image on disk for transfer to tape for long-term storage, can be used a second schedule set in the replication operation. この第２のスケジュールは一ヶ月後の予定でもよい。 The second schedule may be scheduled after the first month. 図３を参照して、データイメージのための時間ベースのライフサイクルポリシを定める方法３００の一実施形態の概要を示す。 Referring to FIG. 3 shows an outline of an embodiment of a method 300 for determining a time-based life cycle policy for the data image. 解説目的で、データはウェブサイトに対応するものとして記載する。 In illustrative purposes, the data is described as corresponding to the web site. ただし、本明細書に記載の方法および機構は、他のウェブサイトでないデータにも適用することができる。 However, the methods and mechanisms described herein can be applied to data that is not other web sites. 上記に記載したコンピュータシステム１００内に具体化されるコンポーネントは、概して方法２００に従って動作することができる。 Components that are embodied in the computer system 100 described above may operate in accordance with generally the method 200. 解説目的で、この実施形態における各ステップは順番に示す。 In illustrative purposes, each step in this embodiment is shown in sequence. ただし、別の実施形態では、一部のステップは図示するのと異なる順序で行うことができ、一部のステップは同時に実行することができ、一部のステップは他のステップと組み合わせることができ、一部のステップはなくてもよい。 However, in another embodiment, some of the steps can be performed in a different order as shown, some of the steps may be performed concurrently, some steps may be combined with other steps , it may not be part of the step. ブロック３０２で、ライフサイクル内のバックアップおよび複製操作用のポリシをデータイメージのために決定する。 At block 302, determines a backup and policies for duplication operations in the life cycle for the data image. 例えば、このポリシは、層状の記憶域の中の層の数、記憶媒体の種類および数、イメージを所与の記憶媒体上に記憶すべき持続時間、特定の操作をブロックする１日のうちの時間等を決定することを含むことができる。 For example, this policy, the number of layers in the storage layer, the type and number of the storage medium, the duration to be stored on a given storage medium an image, of the day to block certain operations It may include determining the time and the like. ブロック３０４で、ユーザは、所与の記憶層上の所与のデータイメージのバックアップ／複製操作に関する時間ベースのスケジュールを提案することができる。 At block 304, the user can propose a time-based schedule for backup / replication operations given data image on a given storage layer. このスケジュールは、暦日付、１日のうちの時間、対応するデータイメージの対応する先行の移動後の所定の持続時間など、ある時点の指示を含むことができる。 This schedule, calendar date, time of day, such as a predetermined duration after the corresponding preceding movement of the corresponding data images may include an indication of a certain point in time. 提案したスケジュールを指定するために、ユーザは、ＧＵＩ内のウィンドウを選択し、ＧＵＩ内のウィンドウを選択／ドラッグし、コマンドライン上に値を入力し、またはそれ以外の方法を行うことができる。 To specify the proposed schedule, the user selects a window in GUI, and window selection / drag in the GUI, can be performed by entering a value on the command line or otherwise. スケジューリングの競合を検出するには、先に記載した基準を利用することができる。 To detect scheduling conflicts may utilize the criteria described above. 提案した時間ベースのスケジュールについて競合が検出されず（条件ブロック３０６）、情報ライフサイクルに関する記憶層の終わりに達していない場合（条件ブロック３０８）、ブロック３１０で、ライフサイクル内の次の記憶層を選択することができる。 Proposed not detected contention for time-based schedule if (conditional block 306), does not reach the end of the storage layer related information lifecycle (conditional block 308), at block 310, the next storage layer within the lifecycle it can be selected. 現在スケジュールしているデータイメージの情報ライフサイクルは、対応するデータ記憶媒体に関連する、提案された時間ベースのスケジュールを有し得る。 Information Lifecycle data image that is currently scheduled is associated with a corresponding data storage medium may have a proposed time-based scheduling. 次いで、方法３００の制御流れは、ブロックＡを経由してブロック３０４に戻る。 Then, the control flow of the method 300 returns to block 304 via block A. ブロック３０４で、次に提案する時間ベースのスケジュールを入力することができる。 At block 304, it is possible to enter a time-based schedule next proposed. 情報ライフサイクルに関する記憶層の終わりに達する場合（条件ブロック３０８）、かつスケジュールするデータイメージがさらにある場合（条件ブロック３１２）、ブロック３１４で次のデータイメージを選択する。 Information when reaching the end of the life cycle regarding memory layer (conditional block 308), and if the data image is further to schedule (conditional block 312), selects the next data image in block 314. 現在スケジュールしているデータイメージの情報ライフサイクルは、対応するデータ記憶媒体に関連する、提案された時間ベースのスケジュールを有し得る。 Information Lifecycle data image that is currently scheduled is associated with a corresponding data storage medium may have a proposed time-based scheduling. 次いで、方法３００の制御流れは、ブロックＡを経由してブロック３０４に戻る。 Then, the control flow of the method 300 returns to block 304 via block A. ブロック３０４で、次に提案する時間ベースのスケジュールを入力することができる。 At block 304, it is possible to enter a time-based schedule next proposed. ライフサイクルをスケジュールするために、それ以上データイメージがない場合（条件ブロック３１２）、ブロック３１６で、ライフサイクルの時間ベースのスケジューリングが完了する。 To schedule a life cycle, if more data image is not (conditional block 312), in block 316, time-based scheduling of life cycle is complete. あるいは、方法３００の制御流れは、条件ブロック３０６に戻ることができる。 Alternatively, the control flow of the method 300 may return to the condition block 306. 例えば、ＩＴ管理者は、競合しない複数のライフサイクルポリシをスケジュールすることができる。 For example, IT administrators, it is possible to schedule multiple life cycle policy that does not conflict. しかし、バックアップサーバ上で実行されるアプリケーションによって検査されない競合が、後で起こり得る。 However, unchecked by the application running on the backup server conflicts may occur later. 新たなスケジューリングは行われていないが、ことによると競合は依然として起こる可能性があり、競合を解消するために１つまたは複数の既存のライフサイクルポリシを修正することができる。 New scheduling is not performed, there is a possibility that due to conflict still occurs, it is possible to modify one or more existing life cycle policy for resolving the conflict. 提案した時間ベースのスケジュールについて競合が検出され（条件ブロック３０６）、競合する先行バックアップ／複製操作のスケジュールを、他の競合を引き起こすことなしに成功裏に変更できると判定される場合（条件ブロック３１８）、ブロック３２２で、決定した変更を行うことができる。 Proposed for time-based scheduling conflict is detected (conditional block 306), the preceding backup / replication operation schedule of competing, if it is determined that can be changed successfully without causing other competitive (conditional block 318 ), at block 322, it is possible to perform the determined changes. 変更の決定は、先に記載したように行うことができる。 The determination of changes can be made as previously described. 先行バックアップ／複製操作の情報ライフサイクルを修正し、または加速して、対応するデータ記憶媒体に関連する新たな定義を定めることができる。 Fixed leading backup / copy information lifecycle operation, or acceleration, it is possible to define a new definition associated with corresponding data storage medium. さらに、現在スケジュールしているデータイメージの情報ライフサイクルは、対応するデータ記憶媒体に関連する、提案された時間ベースのスケジュールを有し得る。 Furthermore, information life cycle of the data image that is currently scheduled is associated with a corresponding data storage medium may have a proposed time-based scheduling. 次いで、方法３００の制御流れは、ブロックＡを経由してブロック３０４に戻る。 Then, the control flow of the method 300 returns to block 304 via block A. ブロック３０４で、次に提案する時間ベースのスケジュールを入力することができる。 At block 304, it is possible to enter a time-based schedule next proposed. 提案した時間ベースのスケジュールについて競合が検出され（条件ブロック３０６）、競合する先行バックアップ／複製操作のスケジュールを、他の競合を引き起こすことなしに成功裏に変更できないと判定される場合（条件ブロック３１８）、ブロック３２０で、現在のデータイメージおよび現在のデータ記憶媒体について提案したスケジュールを変更する。 Proposed time-based schedule for conflict is detected (conditional block 306), the preceding backup / replication operation schedule of competing, if it is determined that can not be changed successfully without causing other competitive (conditional block 318 ), at block 320, reschedule proposed for the current data image and the current data storage media. 提案される変更は、先に記載した計算を使用して提供することができる。 The proposed changes are may be provided using the calculations described above. さもなければ、提案される時間ベースのスケジュールをユーザが調節するために、システムの基準をＧＵＩなどによりユーザに提示することができる。 Otherwise, in order to the proposed time-based scheduling user to adjust, it can be presented to the user by the reference system GUI like. 次いで、方法３００の制御流れは、ブロックＡを経由してブロック３０４に戻る。 Then, the control flow of the method 300 returns to block 304 via block A. ブロック３０４で、次に提案する時間ベースのスケジュールを入力することができる。 At block 304, it is possible to enter a time-based schedule next proposed. 次に図４を参照して、ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００の一実施形態を示す。 Referring now to FIG. 4 shows an embodiment of a network architecture 400. ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００は、ネットワーク４８０を介して互いに、ファイルサーバ４９０に、およびバックアップサーバ４５０に相互接続される、アプリケーションコンピュータシステム４２２およびクライアントコンピュータシステム４２０を含む。 Network architecture 400, to each other via a network 480, the file server 490, and the backup server 450 are interconnected to comprise the application computer system 422 and client computer system 420. バックアップサーバ４５０には、ディスク記憶域４６０およびディスク記憶域４６２が結合される。 The backup server 450, a disk storage 460 and disk storage 462 is coupled. ネットワーク４８０は、無線接続、ダイレクトローカルエリアネットワーク（ＬＡＮ）接続、インターネットなどの広域ネットワーク（ＷＡＮ）接続、ルータ等を含む様々な技法を含むことができる。 Network 480, a wireless connection, direct local area network (LAN) connection, a wide area network (WAN) such as the Internet connection, may include various techniques including routers and the like. ネットワーク４８０は、同じく無線とすることができる１つまたは複数のＬＡＮを含んでもよい。 Network 480 may also include one or more LAN which can be wireless. ネットワーク４８０は、リモートダイレクトメモリアクセス（ＲＤＭＡ）ハードウェアおよび／またはソフトウェア、伝送制御プロトコル／インターネットプロトコル（ＴＣＰ／ＩＰ）ハードウェアおよび／またはソフトウェア、ルータ、中継器、スイッチ、グリッド、ならびに／または他のものをさらに含むことができる。 Network 480, remote direct memory access (RDMA) hardware and / or software, Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol (TCP / IP) hardware and / or software, routers, repeaters, switches, grid, and / or other It may further include a thing. ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００の様々な実施形態において、アプリケーションコンピュータシステム４２２は、ビジネスに不可欠なアプリケーションをホストする任意の数のサーバおよびデータベースサーバを表す。 In various embodiments of the network architecture 400, application computer system 422 represents any number of servers and database servers that host business critical applications. クライアントコンピュータシステム４２０は、サーバ、デスクトップＰＣ、ラップトップ、ハンドヘルドコンピュータなど、任意の数の据置き型コンピュータまたはモバイルコンピュータを表す。 The client computer system 420 represents a server, a desktop PC, a laptop, a handheld computer, any number of stationary computers or mobile computer. クライアント４２０は、少なくとも単一のプロセッサ４０２およびメモリ媒体４３０を含むことができる。 The client 420 may include at least a single processor 402 and a memory medium 430. クライアント４２０は、ソフトウェアアプリケーションの命令を実行するためにプロセッサ４０２を使用することができる。 The client 420 may use the processor 402 to execute instructions of a software application. クライアント４２０は、そのメモリ媒体４３０上に１つまたは複数のソフトウェアアプリケーションを含むことができる。 The client 420 may include one or more software applications on its memory medium 430. 例えば、クライアント４２０は、バックアップエージェント４１４を含むことができる。 For example, client 420 may include a backup agent 414. 同様に、クライアント４２０は、クライアント内で仮想環境を作り出し、維持する際に使用するための仮想化エージェント４１２を含むことができる。 Similarly, client 420 may include a virtualization agent 412 for use in creating the virtual environment in the client, maintain. 一部の実施形態では、システム４２２および４２０は、動作環境、例えばベースＯＳ４１６および／または仮想ＯＳレイヤ４３６などのオペレーティングシステムを含むことができる。 In some embodiments, the system 422 and 420 may operate to include environment, for example, operating systems such as base OS416 and / or virtual OS layer 436. 様々な実施形態において、提供されるベースＯＳ４１６は、ＭＳ−ＤＯＳ（登録商標）、ＭＳ−ＷＩＮＤＯＷＳ（登録商標）、ＯＳ／２（登録商標）、ＵＮＩＸ（登録商標）、Ｌｉｎｕｘ（登録商標）、Ｓｏｌａｒｉｓ（登録商標）、または他の知られているオペレーティングシステムが含まれる、様々なオペレーティングシステムのどれでもよい。 In various embodiments, the base OS416 provided is, MS-DOS (registered trademark), MS-WINDOWS (registered trademark), OS / 2 (registered trademark), UNIX (registered trademark), Linux (registered trademark), Solaris (registered trademark), or other known operating system include, be any of a variety of operating systems. 一部の実施形態では、システム４２２および４２０は、ＩＴ管理者によって提供される、レイヤの共通のイメージを使用する仮想ＯＳレイヤ４３６しか有さない。 In some embodiments, the system 422 and 420 is provided by the IT administrator, has only virtual OS layer 436 using a common image layer. 他の実施形態では、システム４２２および４２０は、ベースＯＳ４１６および仮想ＯＳレイヤ４３６の両方を有する。 In other embodiments, the system 422 and 420 have both base OS416 and virtual OS layer 436. オペレーティングシステムは、システムのハードウェアとソフトウェアアプリケーションとの間でインターフェイスすることができる。 The operating system may be an interface between the system hardware and software applications. システム４２２および４２０のコンポーネントについて続けると、ファイルシステム４３０が含まれてもよい。 Continuing with the components of system 422 and 420 may include a file system 430. ファイルサーバ４９０、バックアップサーバ４５０、または他の任意のコンピュータシステムもしくはサーバ上のファイルシステムと同様に、ファイルシステム４４０は、データを記憶し、組織化し、操作し、取り出すための専用データベースとして動作することができる。 The file server 490, similar to the backup server 450 or other file system on any computer system or server, file system 440 may be storing data, organize, manipulate, operate as a dedicated database to retrieve can. ユーザは、ファイルシステム４４０を介して、対応するデータ記憶媒体上に記憶されたディレクトリを閲覧することができる。 The user, via the file system 440, it is possible to browse stored on the corresponding data storage medium directory. ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００内のファイルサーバ４９０は、データを記憶するように構成される任意の種類のサーバとすることができる。 The file server 490 in network architecture 400 may be any type of server configured to store data. 一実施形態では、ファイルサーバ４９０は、ネットワーク接続ストレージ（ＮＡＳ）装置とすることができる。 In one embodiment, the file server 490 may be a network attached storage (NAS) device. ファイルサーバ４９０は、コンピュータシステム４２２および４２０、ならびに他の情報サーバ（不図示）にファイル記憶サービスを提供することに特化したコンピュータとすることができる。 The file server 490 may be a computer system 422 and 420, as well as other information server computers that specialize in providing file storage service (not shown). ファイルサーバ４９０上のオペレーティングシステムおよび他のソフトウェアは、ファイルシステムの機能、ファイルへのアクセス、およびこれらの機能の管理を提供する。 Operating system and other software on the file server 490, the function of the file system, access to files, and provides the management of these functions. ファイルサーバ４９０は、論理的で冗長な記憶コンテナまたはＲＡＩＤアレイ（安価／独立したディスクの冗長アレイ）へとしばしば構成される、１つまたは複数のハードディスクを含むことができる。 The file server 490 is often configured to logically redundant storage containers or RAID arrays (inexpensive / independent disks redundant array) can include one or more hard disks. データ４９２は、ファイルサーバ４９０のハードディスクの１つまたは複数に記憶することができる。 Data 492 may be one or more in the storage of the hard disk of the file server 490. ファイルサーバ４９０は、ファイルシステムレベルでデータの記憶を行うことができる。 The file server 490 may perform storage of data at the file system level. ファイルサーバ４９０は、（ＵＮＩＸシステム上で普及している）ネットワークファイルシステム（ＮＦＳ）、（ＭＳ Ｗｉｎｄｏｗｓシステムで使用される）ＳＭＢ／ＣＩＦＳ（サーバメッセージブロック／共通インターネットファイルシステム）、（Ａｐｐｌｅ Ｍａｃｉｎｔｏｓｈ Ｃｏｍｐｕｔｅｒｓで使用される）ＡＦＰなどのファイルベースのプロトコルを使用することができる。 File server 490, (popular are on a UNIX system) network file system (NFS), (MS is used in Windows systems) SMB / CIFS (Server Message Block / Common Internet File System), in (Apple Macintosh Computers You can use the file-based protocols such as used by the) AFP. 図４の例では、ファイルサーバ４９０上のファイルは、ネットワーク４８０内に含まれるネットワークファイルシステム（ＮＦＳ）インターフェイスを介してアクセスすることができる。 In the example of FIG. 4, a file on the file server 490 can be accessed via a network file system (NFS) interfaces included in the network 480. 次にバックアップ記憶装置４６０を参照して、装置４６０は、ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００内のデータのバックアップコピーを記憶するために使用することができる。 Referring now to the backup storage device 460, device 460 may be used to store a backup copy of the data in network architecture 400. バックアップデータ４９４は、データ４９２のコピー、コンピュータシステム４２２および４２０内に含まれるデータのコピー、ならびに他の情報サーバ（不図示）内に含まれるデータのコピーを記憶することができる。 Backup data 494 may be stored copy of the data 492, a copy of the data contained in the copy of the data contained in the computer system 422 and 420 as well as other information server, (not shown). バックアップ記憶装置４６０は、１つまたは複数のハードディスク、テープ駆動機構、サーバブレード、または専用装置からなる数種類の記憶域を含むことができ、またはそのような記憶域にさらに結合されてもよく、ＲＡＭ、フラッシュＲＡＭ、ＭＥＭＳ（微小電子機械システム）記憶域、バッテリバックアップ付きＲＡＭ、および／または不揮発性ＲＡＭ（ＮＶＲＡＭ）など、様々なメモリ装置を含むことができる。 Backup storage device 460, one or more hard disks, tape drives, the server blade or a dedicated device consists can include several types of storage, or may be further coupled to such storage,, RAM It may include a flash RAM, MEMS (micro-electromechanical systems) storage, battery-backed RAM, and / or such nonvolatile RAM (NVRAM), a variety of memory devices. バックアップ記憶装置４６２は、装置４６０上に記憶されたデータのバックアップコピーを記憶するために使用することができる。 Backup storage device 462 can be used to store a backup copy of the data stored on device 460. バックアップ記憶装置４６２は、バックアップ記憶装置４６０について上記に列挙したメモリ装置のうちの１つまたは複数を含むことができる。 Backup storage device 462, the backup storage device 460 can include one or more of the memory devices listed above. 一実施形態では、バックアップ記憶装置４６０上にイメージをコピーすると、ファイルサーバ４９０上に記憶された対応するデータを削除することができる。 In one embodiment, it is possible when copying an image on a backup storage device 460, deletes the corresponding data stored on the file server 490. 同様に、バックアップ記憶装置４６２上にイメージをコピーすると、バックアップ記憶装置４６０上に記憶された対応するデータを削除することができる。 Similarly, copying the images on to a backup storage device 462 may delete the corresponding data stored on the backup storage device 460. 先に説明した、所与のデータイメージの情報ライフサイクルを定めるために使用する時間ベースのスケジュールは、バックアップ記憶装置４６０および４６２のそれぞれに関連することができる。 Described above, time-based schedules used to define the information lifecycle of a given data image can be associated with each backup storage device 460 and 462. 一実施形態では、ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００内のバックアップサーバ４５０は、バックアップアプリケーション４５８を含むことができる。 In one embodiment, the backup server 450 in network architecture 400 may include a backup application 458. このバックアップアプリケーション４５８、または「バックアップマネージャ」は、メモリ媒体４７０上に記憶され、１回または複数回のバックアップ操作を行うためにプロセッサ４５２によって実行可能なプログラム命令を含むことができる。 The backup application 458 or "Backup Manager", is stored in the memory medium 470 may include program instructions executable by the processor 452 to perform the backup operation one or more times. バックアップ操作は、部分的バックアップまたは完全バックアップを、例えばあるコンピュータシステム上に、またはあるコンピュータシステムから別のシステムに作成すること、あるコンピュータシステム上で、またはあるコンピュータシステムから別のコンピュータシステムに復元機能（例えば部分的もしくは粒度の細かい復元機能、または完全な復元機能）を実行することを含むことができ、他の操作も含むことができる。 Backup operation, a partial or full backup, for example, on one computer system, or be made from one computer system to another, restoration functions on one computer system, or from one computer system to another computer system (such as partially or fine restore granularity, or perfect reconstruction function) can involve the execution, but may also include other operations. バックアップマネージャ４５８は、先に説明した、所与のデータイメージの情報ライフサイクルを定めるための時間ベースのスケジューリングをユーザが実行できるようにし得る。 Backup manager 458, described above, may be to perform a user time-based scheduling for determining the information lifecycle of a given data image. バックアップサーバ４５０上のバックアップマネージャ４５８は、データ４９２の様々な種類のバックアップを作成するように構成することができる。 Backup Manager 458 on the backup server 450 can be configured to create a different type of backup data 492. 例えば、イメージベースの、ファイルベースの、または他の種類のバックアップを作成することができる。 For example, it is possible to create image-based, file-based, or other types of backup. 一部の実施形態では、バックアップマネージャ４５８は、ファイルサーバ４９０などの特定のシステムのバックアップを作成するようにバックアップマネージャ４５８に指図する、ユーザ入力を受け取ることができる。 In some embodiments, the backup manager 458 directs the Backup Manager 458 to create a backup of a particular system, such as file server 490 can receive user input. 一部の実施形態では、バックアップマネージャ４５８は、特定のシステムのバックアップを自動で作成することができ、例えば、バックアップマネージャは、特定のシステムの定期的バックアップを実行するようにスケジュールすることができる。 In some embodiments, the backup manager 458 may create automatic backup of a particular system, for example, the backup manager may be scheduled to run periodically backup of a particular system. バックアップマネージャ４５８は、バックアップまたはファイルサーバイメージ４７４を、仮想ハードディスク（ＶＨＤ）形式、Ｖ２Ｉ形式、仮想マシンディスク形式（ＶＭＤＫ）形式などの一般に知られているファイル形式で作成し、記憶することができる。 Backup Manager 458, a backup or file server image 474 may be a virtual hard disk (VHD) format, V2I format, created in a file format that is commonly known, such as virtual machine disk format (VMDK) format, and stores. データバックアップ操作の説明を続けると、一実施形態では、バックアップサーバ４５０上のバックアップマネージャ４５８が、ファイルサーバイメージ４７４など、データ４９２のバックアップを作成し、それをバックアップ記憶装置４６０上に記憶することができる。 Continuing with data backup operation, in one embodiment, the backup manager 458 on the backup server 450, such as file server image 474, that a backup of data 492, and stores it on the backup storage device 460 it can. 別の実施形態では、バックアップマネージャ４５８が、バックアップをバックアップサーバ４５０上に、例えば図示のようにバックアップサーバ４５０のメモリ媒体４７０上に記憶することができる。 In another embodiment, it is possible to back up manager 458 stores on the backup server 450 to backup, for example, as shown in the memory medium 470 of the backup server 450. さらに他の実施形態では、バックアップマネージャ４５８が、バックアップを代わりに別の装置上に、例えばネットワーク４８０を介して接続される別のコンピュータシステム（別のサーバなど）上に記憶することができる。 In yet another embodiment, it is possible to back up manager 458, on the other device instead backup and stores, for example, on another computer system connected via a network 480 (such as another server). 一実施形態では、バックアップマネージャ４５８は、ファイルサーバ４９０を使用することなしに、コンピュータシステム４２２および４２０のバックアップを直接作成することができる。 In one embodiment, the backup manager 458, without the use of a file server 490, it is possible to create a backup of computer system 422 and 420 directly. そのようなバックアップは、ファイルサーバ４９０上でまだ更新されていない可能性がある、コンピュータシステム４２２および４２０上のデータを保護するために実行することができる。 Such backup may not yet been updated on the file server 490, it can be performed in order to protect the data on the computer system 422 and 420. 一部の実施形態では、コンピュータシステム４２２および４２０がネットワーク４８０に接続されている場合、バックアップマネージャ４５８が、コンピュータシステム４２２および４２０のファイルごとのバックアップを自動で作成することができる。 In some embodiments, if the computer system 422 and 420 are connected to the network 480 can be the backup manager 458 to create a backup of each file in the computer system 422 and 420 automatically. この場合、コンピュータシステム４２２および４２０の毎日または週に１回スケジュールされたバックアップなど、スケジュールされた定期的バックアップを実施することができる。 In this case, such as computer system 422 and 420 of backups scheduled once daily or weekly can be performed regularly scheduled backups. バックアップを作成する一環として、バックアップマネージャ４５８は、対応するファイルまたはデータイメージに関連するカタログメタデータ４５６も作成することができる。 As part of creating a backup, the backup manager 458, catalog metadata 456 associated with the corresponding file or data image can also be created. クライアント４２０上のデータのバックアップなどのバックアップ操作中にバックアップマネージャ４５８が作成するカタログメタデータ４５６は、ファイルのためのメタデータを含むことができる。 Catalog metadata 456 Backup Manager 458 during a backup operation, such as backup of data on the client 420 is created, it may include metadata for the file. メタデータには、データ名、データの大きさ、データのフィンガープリント、バッチ番号、ならびにデータの種類、バージョン番号、所有権、許可、最終更新日時、誤りコード等のうちの少なくとも１つまたは複数が含まれ得る。 Metadata, data name, the size of the data, the data of the fingerprint, batch number and the type of data, version number, ownership, permissions, last update date and time, at least one or more of such error code It may be included. バッチ番号は、関連するバックアップエントリを作成した特定のバックアップ操作を識別するために使用することができる。 Batch number may be used to identify the particular backup operation that created the backup entries associated. 他の形式のメタデータおよび／または識別情報が当業者には明らかになるであろう。 Metadata and / or identification information of other formats will be apparent to those skilled in the art. カタログメタデータ４５６は、例えば後でブラウジングを復元するために使用可能であり得る。 Catalog metadata 456, for example, may be used later to restore the browsing. 代替的実施形態では、クライアント、サーバ、および記憶域の数および種類は、図４に示す数および種類に限定されないことを指摘しておく。 In an alternative embodiment, the client, server, and the number and type of storage is should be pointed out that the invention is not limited to the number and type shown in Figure 4. サーバ、デスクトップ、ラップトップ、およびモバイルクライアントのほぼ任意の数および組合せを、モデムバンク、ダイレクトＬＡＮ接続、無線接続、ＷＡＮリンク等の様々な組合せを介して、ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００内で相互接続することができる。 Servers, desktops, laptops, and nearly any number and combination of mobile clients, modem banks, direct LAN connections, wireless connections, through various combinations of such WAN link, be interconnected in a network architecture within 400 it can. また、様々な時点において、１台または複数台のクライアントがオフラインで動作することができる。 Also, at various times, may be one or a plurality of clients to work offline. さらに、モバイルユーザがあちこち移動して、ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００に接続し、ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００への接続を断ち、ネットワークアーキテクチャ４００に再接続するとき、個々のクライアントの接続の種類は動作中に変わり得る。 Furthermore, the mobile user to move around, connected to the network architecture 400, cut off the connection to the network architecture 400, when reconnecting to the network architecture 400, the type of connection of the individual client may change during operation. 様々な実施形態において、本明細書に記載した方法および機構の一部または複数の部分が、クラウドコンピューティング環境の一部を形成することができる。 In various embodiments, a portion or portions of the methods and mechanisms described herein may form part of a cloud computing environment. そのような実施形態では、１つまたは複数の様々なモデルに従い、リソースをサービスとしてインターネットを介して提供することができる。 In such embodiments, in accordance with one or more of various models can be provided over the Internet resource as a service. そうしたモデルには、サービスとしてのインフラストラクチャ（ＩａａＳ）、サービスとしてのプラットフォーム（ＰａａＳ）、およびサービスとしてのソフトウェア（ＳａａＳ）が含まれ得る。 The such models, infrastructure as a service (IaaS), may include platform (PaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS) as a service. ＩａａＳでは、コンピュータインフラストラクチャがサービスとして送られる。 In IaaS, computer infrastructure is delivered as a service. そのような場合、コンピューティング装置は概してサービスプロバイダが所有し、運営する。 In such a case, the computing device generally service provider owns and operates. ＰａａＳモデルでは、ソフトウェアソリューションを開発するために開発者が使用するソフトウェアツールおよび基礎をなす装置がサービスとして提供され、サービスプロバイダによってホストされ得る。 The PaaS model, device constituting the software tools and basic developers used to develop a software solution is provided as a service may be hosted by a service provider. ＳａａＳは、典型的にはサービスプロバイダがソフトウェアをサービスとしてオンデマンドでライセンス供与することを含む。 SaaS is typically involves the service provider license on demand software as a service. サービスプロバイダは、ソフトウェアをホストすることができ、またはソフトウェアを所与の期間にわたり顧客に展開することができる。 Service provider can deploy can host the software, or the software to the customer over a given period of time. 上記のモデルの多数の組合せが可能であり、考えられる。 Numerous combinations of the above models are possible, conceivable. 上記の実施形態をかなり詳細に説明してきたが、上記の開示を完全に理解すれば、数多くの変形および修正が当業者に明らかになる。 Having described the above embodiments in considerable detail, if the above disclosure is fully appreciated, numerous variations and modifications will become apparent to those skilled in the art. 特許請求の範囲は、そのようなすべての変形および修正を包含するように解釈されることを意図する。 The claims are intended to be interpreted to embrace all such variations and modifications. 前記第１のライフサイクルに対応するデータを記憶するステップであって、前記データは、前記データイメージ、前記第１の時点値、前記第２の時点値、前記第１のデータ記憶媒体、および前記第２のデータ記憶媒体を識別するデータを含む、データを記憶するステップと を含む、方法。 A step of storing data corresponding to the first life-cycle, the data, the data image, the first time value, the second time value, said first data storage medium, and the including data identifying a second data storage medium, and storing the data, method. 前記第１のデータ記憶媒体から前記第２のデータ記憶媒体への前記データイメージの移動がバックアップ操作を含み、前記第２のデータ記憶媒体から前記第３のデータ記憶媒体への前記データイメージの移動が複製操作を含む、請求項１に記載の方法。 It comprises moving the backup operation of the data image from the first data storage medium into the second data storage medium, moving from the second data storage medium of the data image to the third data storage medium There containing replication operation method of claim 1. 前記複製操作中に前記データイメージを移すために、利用できる１つまたは複数の時間窓をユーザに提示するステップであって、前記利用できる１つまたは複数の時間窓は、前記バックアップ操作のための時間窓と所定の閾値を超えて重複しない、提示するステップをさらに含む、請求項２に記載の方法。 To transfer the data image during the copy operation, a step of presenting the one or more time windows that are available to the user, the one or more time windows available, for the backup operation not overlap in time beyond the window with a predetermined threshold value, further comprising the step of presenting, method of claim 2. 前記特定した第２の時点値に加え、前記複製操作中の前記データイメージの前記最初の移動の許可が、前記第２のデータ記憶媒体または前記第３の記憶媒体の現在の使用可能容量、前記データイメージの業務上の価値、前記データイメージの古さ、および前記データイメージの大きさのうちの少なくとも１つによってさらに適格と認められる、請求項３に記載の方法。 The identified added to the second point value, the permission of the first movement of the data image in the copy operation, the current available capacity of the second data storage medium or the third storage medium, wherein value business data image, the age of the data image, and deemed more qualified by at least one of the size of the data image, the method according to claim 3. 競合を検出するステップをさらに含み、前記競合は、２つ以上のライフサイクルポリシが、所与のデータ記憶媒体のスケジュールされた同時アクセスを含むこと、所与のデータ記憶媒体の使用可能容量が、所定の閾値に達したこと、スケジュールされた移動を完了した時点での所与のデータ記憶媒体の予測使用可能容量が、所定の閾値に一致すること、および所与のデータイメージを移動するための予測持続時間が、使用可能な時間窓を超えることのうちの少なくとも１つを含む、請求項２に記載の方法。 Further comprising detecting conflicts, the conflict, two or more life cycle policy is to include concurrent access scheduled for a given data storage medium, the usable capacity of a given data storage medium, it reaches a predetermined threshold value, the predicted available capacity of a given data storage medium upon completion of the movement which has been scheduled, it coincides with a predetermined threshold value, and for moving a given data image predicted duration, including at least one of exceed the available time window method of claim 2. 前記競合を検出することに応答して、前記競合に対応するメッセージを提示し、既存のライフサイクルに対応する１つまたは複数の記憶された値を修正する機会をユーザに与えるステップをさらに含む、請求項５に記載の方法。 In response to detecting the conflict, presenting a message corresponding to the conflict, further comprising the step of providing an opportunity to the user to modify one or more stored values ​​that correspond to existing life cycle, the method of claim 5. それぞれの時点値に到達したこと、および特定した他の任意の適格値に到達したことを検出することに応答して、前記データイメージを複製操作中に移動するステップをさらに含む、請求項４に記載の方法。 It has reached each time point value, and in response to detecting that it has reached the specified any other qualifying value, further comprising the step of moving the data image during replication operation to claim 4 the method described. それぞれのコピー元データ記憶媒体からの前記データイメージの移動が完了したことを検出することに応答して、前記それぞれのコピー元データ記憶媒体上の前記データイメージのコピーを削除するステップをさらに含む、請求項７に記載の方法。 In response to detecting the movement of the data image from each of the copy source data storage medium has been completed, further comprising the step of deleting the copy of the data images on the respective copy source data storage medium, the method of claim 7. 前記第１のデータ記憶媒体から前記第２のデータ記憶媒体への前記データイメージの移動がバックアップ操作を含み、前記第２のデータ記憶媒体から前記第３のデータ記憶媒体への前記データイメージの移動が複製操作を含む、請求項９に記載のコンピュータシステム。 It comprises moving the backup operation of the data image from the first data storage medium into the second data storage medium, moving from the second data storage medium of the data image to the third data storage medium There containing replication operation, the computer system according to claim 9. 前記バックアップサーバが、前記複製操作中に前記データイメージを移すために、利用できる１つまたは複数の時間窓をユーザに提示するようにさらに構成され、前記利用できる１つまたは複数の時間窓は、前記バックアップ操作のための時間窓と所定の閾値を超えて重複しない、請求項１０に記載のコンピュータシステム。 Said backup server, to transfer the data image during the copy operation, further configured to present one or more time windows that are available to the user, the one or more time windows available, do not overlap by more than a time window with a predetermined threshold for the backup operation, computer system of claim 10. 前記特定した第２の時点値に加え、前記複製操作中の前記データイメージの前記最初の移動の許可が、前記第２のデータ記憶媒体または前記第３の記憶媒体の現在の使用可能容量、前記データイメージの業務上の価値、前記データイメージの古さ、および前記データイメージの大きさのうちの少なくとも１つによってさらに適格と認められる、請求項１１に記載のコンピュータシステム。 The identified added to the second point value, the permission of the first movement of the data image in the copy operation, the current available capacity of the second data storage medium or the third storage medium, wherein value business data image, the age of the data image, and deemed more qualified by at least one of the size of the data image, the computer system according to claim 11. 前記バックアップサーバが、競合を検出するようにさらに構成され、前記競合は、２つ以上のライフサイクルポリシが、所与のデータ記憶媒体のスケジュールされた同時アクセスを含むこと、所与のデータ記憶媒体の使用可能容量が、所定の閾値に達したこと、スケジュールされた移動を完了した時点での所与のデータ記憶媒体の予測使用可能容量が、所定の閾値に一致すること、および所与のデータイメージを移動するための予測持続時間が、使用可能な時間窓を超えることのうちの少なくとも１つを含む、請求項１０に記載のコンピュータシステム。 Said backup server is further configured to detect conflicts, the conflict, two or more life cycle policy is to include concurrent access scheduled for a given data storage medium, a given data storage medium available capacity of, it reaches a predetermined threshold, the predicted available capacity of a given data storage medium at the time of completing the movement scheduled matches a predetermined threshold, and a given data predicted duration for moving the image, including at least one of exceed the available time windows, computer system of claim 10. 前記競合を検出することに応答して、前記バックアップサーバが、前記競合に対応するメッセージを提示し、既存のライフサイクルに対応する１つまたは複数の記憶された値を修正する機会をユーザに与えるように構成される、請求項１３に記載のコンピュータシステム。 In response to detecting the conflict, the backup server, presents the message corresponding to the conflict, give the user the opportunity to modify one or more stored values ​​that correspond to existing lifecycle configured, computer system of claim 13. それぞれの時点値に到達したこと、および特定した他の任意の適格値に到達したことを検出することに応答して、前記データイメージを複製操作中に移動することをさらに含む、請求項１２に記載のコンピュータシステム。 It has reached each time point value, and in response to detecting that it has reached the specified any other qualifying value, further comprising moving the data image during replication operation to claim 12 the computer system according. 前記バックアップサーバが、それぞれのコピー元データ記憶媒体からの前記データイメージの移動が完了したことを検出することに応答して、前記それぞれのコピー元データ記憶媒体上の前記データイメージのコピーを削除するようにさらに構成される、請求項１５に記載のコンピュータシステム。 Said backup server, in response to detecting that the movement of the data image from each of the copy source data storage medium has been completed, deleting the copy of the data images on the respective copy source data storage medium further configured to, computer system of claim 15. 前記第１のライフサイクルに対応するデータを記憶することであって、前記データは、前記データイメージ、前記第１の時点値、前記第２の時点値、前記第１のデータ記憶媒体、および前記第２のデータ記憶媒体を識別するデータを含む、データを記憶する ために前記プロセッサによって実行可能である、コンピュータ可読記憶媒体。 The method comprising storing the data corresponding to the first life-cycle, the data, the data image, the first time value, the second time value, said first data storage medium, and the including data identifying a second data storage medium, executable by the processor for storing data, a computer readable storage medium. 前記第１のデータ記憶媒体から前記第２のデータ記憶媒体への前記データイメージの移動がバックアップ操作を含み、前記第２のデータ記憶媒体から前記第３のデータ記憶媒体への前記データイメージの移動が複製操作を含む、請求項１７に記載のコンピュータ可読記憶媒体。 It comprises moving the backup operation of the data image from the first data storage medium into the second data storage medium, moving from the second data storage medium of the data image to the third data storage medium There containing replication operation, computer-readable storage medium of claim 17. 前記プログラム命令が、前記複製操作中に前記データイメージを移すために、利用できる１つまたは複数の時間窓をユーザに提示するためにさらに実行可能であり、前記利用できる１つまたは複数の時間窓は、前記バックアップ操作のための時間窓と所定の閾値を超えて重複しない、請求項１８に記載のコンピュータ可読記憶媒体。 It said program instructions, to transfer the data image during the copy operation is further executable to present one or more time windows that are available to the user, the one or more time windows that are available It does not overlap beyond the time window with a predetermined threshold for the backup operation, computer-readable storage medium of claim 18. 前記特定した第２の時点値に加え、前記複製操作中の前記データイメージの前記最初の移動の許可が、前記第２のデータ記憶媒体または前記第３の記憶媒体の現在の使用可能容量、前記データイメージの業務上の価値、前記データイメージの古さ、および前記データイメージの大きさのうちの少なくとも１つによってさらに適格と認められる、請求項１９に記載のコンピュータ可読記憶媒体。 The identified added to the second point value, the permission of the first movement of the data image in the copy operation, the current available capacity of the second data storage medium or the third storage medium, wherein value business data image, the age of the data image, and the data image is recognized that further qualified by at least one of size, computer-readable storage medium of claim 19.
2019-04-26T08:34:24Z
https://patents.google.com/patent/JP2013525932A/en
Retrotransposons have been suggested to provide a substrate for non-allelic homologous recombination (NAHR) and thereby promote gene family expansion. Their precise role, however, is controversial. Here we ask whether retrotransposons contributed to the recent expansions of the Androgen-binding protein (Abp) gene families that occurred independently in the mouse and rat genomes. Using dot plot analysis, we found that the most recent duplication in the Abp region of the mouse genome is flanked by L1Md_T elements. Analysis of the sequence of these elements revealed breakpoints that are the relicts of the recombination that caused the duplication, confirming that the duplication arose as a result of NAHR using L1 elements as substrates. L1 and ERVII retrotransposons are considerably denser in the Abp regions than in one Mb flanking regions, while other repeat types are depleted in the Abp regions compared to flanking regions. L1 retrotransposons preferentially accumulated in the Abp gene regions after lineage separation and roughly followed the pattern of Abp gene expansion. By contrast, the proportion of shared vs. lineage-specific ERVII repeats in the Abp region resembles the rest of the genome. We confirmed the role of L1 repeats in Abp gene duplication with the identification of recombinant L1Md_T elements at the edges of the most recent mouse Abp gene duplication. High densities of L1 and ERVII repeats were found in the Abp gene region with abrupt transitions at the region boundaries, suggesting that their higher densities are tightly associated with Abp gene duplication. We observed that the major accumulation of L1 elements occurred after the split of the mouse and rat lineages and that there is a striking overlap between the timing of L1 accumulation and expansion of the Abp gene family in the mouse genome. Establishing a link between the accumulation of L1 elements and the expansion of the Abp gene family and identification of an NAHR-related breakpoint in the most recent duplication are the main contributions of our study. The origin of gene diversity has attracted great interest since Ohno’s proposal that gene duplications create new genetic material [1, 2]. Subsequently, numerous gene families arising as a result of expansions from a single gene have been identified . Sequencing of mammalian genomes, including primates, rodents and others shows that ~90% of genes have been preserved, usually as single copies without duplication, disruption or deletion, since their last common ancestors. The remaining ~10% of genes are subject to frequent duplication, deletion and pseudogene formation [4–6]. These represent the volatile portion of the mammalian gene complement and generally possess functions that differ from those of the conserved gene set. Gene families, such as those involved in chemosensation, reproduction, host defense and immunity, and toxin metabolism that are expanded, usually as tandem duplications, in one lineage are often expanded in another. This is very likely because they confer similar evolutionary responses to similar environmental challenges. As expected in a scenario in which selection pressures favor an increase in copy number, these expanded gene families often show the footprints of positive selection in elevated ratios of nonsynonymous to synonymous nucleotide substitutions (dN/dS; sometimes reported as the rate Ka/Ks; ) in their coding regions [8–12]. Moreover, gene deletion and pseudogene formation events are rare, except among genes that have also been subject to duplication [4–6]. There are, however, important exceptions to the idea that gene families that are expanded in one lineage are similarly expanded in other lineages. In a study of the problem of separating derived from ancestral features of mouse and human genomes, Ponting and Goodstadt reviewed the sequence properties of those mammal genomes and presented the following conclusions: 1) large numbers of rodent- or primate-specific genes lie within these greatly expanded groups of genes; 2) loss of ancient single-copy genes appears to have been rare, as were gains of new functional genes. Instead, most changes to the gene repertoire have occurred in large multicopy families; 3) the numbers and the sequences of such ‘environmental genes’ change, as adaptive responses to infection and other environmental pressures, including conspecific competition; and 4) the larger number of rodent-specific gene duplicates found in the mouse genome is almost entirely due to genes with roles in chemosensation, such as olfactory and vomeronasal receptors and pheromone genes. Although one may infer the ultimate causes of the expansions of gene families from the functions of the genes themselves, the mechanisms underlying these expansions often are elusive. More than 50% of mammalian genomes are composed of retrotransposons, a heterogeneous group of transposable elements that can be divided into several families according to their origins [4–6, 14]. Different families have been active during rodent evolution and the timing of their activity varies between lineages. Seven families have been active during the evolution of mice and rats: L1 (LINE), B2 (SINE), ERVI, ERVII, ERVIII and MaLR (LTR) . The B1 (SINE) activity is mouse lineage-specific whereas ID elements (a family of SINEs) predominate in the rat lineage . Because the elements of each family are numerous and have highly homologous sequences, they may cause misalignment and serve as homology breakpoints for non-allelic homologous recombination (NAHR). As a result, a gene between the homologous repeat sequences could be duplicated, deleted or inverted. Interestingly, certain families of retrotransposons were found to be enriched at the junctions of segmental duplications in the human, bovine, mouse, rat and grapevine genomes [15–22]. Alu (SINE) elements appear to be the predominant repeat sequences at junctions in primates where they contribute to the interspersed pattern of gene duplication characterizing the human genome [15, 17]. In the cattle and rodent genomes where tandem duplication predominates, junctions are enriched for L1 and LTR elements [16–18, 20–22]. Moreover, L1 elements were found to mediate globin duplication in the ancestor of simian primates . However, only ~12% of all human duplications resulted from misalignment of two repeat elements , refuting the importance of repeat sequences in the production of duplications. Alu repeats are preferentially associated with actively duplicating clusters on human chromosome 22 , suggesting that repeats accelerate evolution by gene duplication and thereby cause expansion and/or contraction of gene families . Alu repeats have also been found associated with gene clusters on human chromosome 7 and Mirs, a type of SINE repeat, are associated with an OR gene cluster on human chromosome 17 . In mice and other non-human organisms, L1 elements are enriched throughout the regions surrounding the olfactory and vomeronasal receptors (ORs, V1Rs and V2Rs; ). Those authors could not, however, confirm the hypothesis that high densities of these L1 elements contributed to the expansions themselves. Nevertheless, the exceptional L1 densities in regions of considerably expanded gene families along with the knowledge that repetitive sequences are associated with an elevated recombination rate [29–33] and ectopic recombination [34–39] suggest that further investigation of this relationship is warranted. For our study we chose the Androgen-binding protein (Abp) gene family because it expanded recently enough that some paralogs have identical sequences and there is copy number variation between strains . This gene region expanded independently in the mouse and rat genomes and to a much greater extent in the mouse genome than in the rat genome . ABPs mediate assortative mate selection, based on subspecies recognition that potentially limits gene exchange between subspecies where they meet ([42, 43] reviewed in ) and there is evidence that ABP constitutes a system of incipient reinforcement along the European hybrid zone where house mouse subspecies make secondary contact . In this study, we examined the role of repeat element sequences in the expansions of the mouse and rat Abp gene families. We searched the Abp region for evidence that retrotransposons contributed to the gene family expansions, possibly serving as the substrates for NAHR. We further characterised the pattern of accumulation of repeats in the Abp region, forging a putative link between accumulation of retrotransposons and Abp gene family expansion. In order to capture recent duplication events, a dot plot analysis was produced for the Abp gene family regions of the mouse and rat. The UCSC genome browser (http://genome.ucsc.edu/; ) was used to obtain the sequence of the Abp region for the mouse from the NCBIM37 (mm9) genome assembly and the sequence of the Abp region for the rat from the Baylor 3.4 (rn4) assembly. Coordinates of Abp genes for the two rodents (Additional files 1 & 2 in ) were used to define the boundaries of the whole gene family region using the UCSC genome browser. The span of the whole region was selected in order to subsequently split the region into 50 kb non-overlapping bins (Table 1). We produced the dot plot matrix for the region in both genomes using the BLASTZ program and plotted the results using R project code (http://www.R-project.org/; ). We used these dot plots to search for patterns of recent duplication events. Repeat content viewed on the dot plot was retrieved from the “rmsk” table downloaded from the UCSC genome browser. This table represents an output of the RepeatMasker program (http://www.repeatmasker.org/; ). 1(NCBIM37) and rat genomes (Baylor 3.4). Start and end coordinates identified to enable splitting of the regions into 50 kb bins. We assessed the densities of eight repeat families active in rodent lineages: L1, B1, ID, B2, ERV1 (ERVI), ERVK (ERVII), ERVL (ERVIII), MaLR [4, 6] in the Abp gene family region. Although, we are aware that the contribution by size may not implicitly correlate with the actual counts, we assumed that the total sequence contribution of each repeat family matters more than the actual counts of repeats in the region under consideration. Therefore, we characterized the density, defined as coverage by repeats of a particular repeat family in base pairs (bp). Density, rather than counts, was also assessed in many previous studies (e.g. [5, 6]). All the information on the distribution of repeats and their positions in the mouse genome was retrieved from the rmsk table (see above). We divided the Abp gene family region into 50 kilobase (kb) non-overlapping bins to capture the mean and median repeat densities and their variability within the Abp regions. For the density of repeats in the gene family region, we assumed that the densities before the expansion of the gene family corresponded to the densities in the flanking regions. Thus, as a reference, we compared the densities in the Abp gene family regions with 50 kb non-overlapping bins in one megabase (Mb) segments proximal and distal to them. We excluded regions containing assembly gaps according the UCSC genome browser from the analysis if they covered more than 20% of the bin. Otherwise, we normalized the repeat density within the 50 kb bin according to the following formula: (coverage in bp) × (50,000 / (50,000 – gaps in bp)). We used the Mann–Whitney U-test to contrast bins from within the Abp region against bins of downstream and upstream sequences on either side of these regions and we applied the Bonferroni correction to account for multiple comparisons. All analyses were performed in the statistical environment R. We retrieved intronic sequences of Abp genes from mouse and rat genome sequences for use in dating the expansion of their Abp gene families (Additional file 3). We used intron b for all mouse and rat sequences. Sequences were aligned using the MUSCLE multiple alignment tool [50, 51] and pairwise differences were calculated using the APE package for the R-project . We used the Kimura 2-parameter model with Gamma correction as a substitution model. To assess whether the accumulation of repeats in the Abp gene family regions is species specific (i.e. the repeats accumulated after the split of the lineages leading to mouse and rat), we divided repeat subfamilies (as defined by RepeatMasker) in the mouse and rat genomes according to whether they are shared between these two genomes or are unique for each of them. The subfamily was considered as specific to one lineage if no copy of that subfamily was found in the other genome. Repeats that belong to species-specific subfamilies thus likely accumulated after the split of the mouse and rat lineages, whereas those belonging to shared subfamilies resided within the gene family regions before the split of the two species. The proportions of density contributed by lineage-specific and lineage-shared repeats in the Abp gene family regions were compared to the autosomal-wide proportion of these repeats. Repeat sequences in the Abp gene family region in both genomes were divided into bins by 1% of their divergence from consensus obtained from the rmsk table (to get a percentage divergence, the millidiv numbers in the table were divided by 10). Fold change in density of repeats contributed by specific and shared repeat subfamilies (see above) was subsequently plotted by divergence bin. The fold change represents how many times the density of repeats in a given divergence bin is higher or lower than the average autosomal-wide density (the same density equals 1) in non-overlapping windows of the same size as the size of the Abp region (e.g. for the Abp region in the mouse genome, the autosomal genome was split into 3 Mb windows). Windows containing assembly gaps involving more than 10% of the sequence were excluded from this analysis. The distributions were subsequently compared to pairwise half distances between intronic sequences of each gene family (see above). Because of the tandem structure of the duplications in the Abp gene regions, we used dot plots to identify duplication blocks and breakpoints (Additional files 1 and 2). Two large duplications occurred recently in the mouse Abp region, increasing the number of < Abpbg-Abpa > modules several times (Figure 1). The most recent event occurred <200,000 years ago . In this event, one block of genes duplicated to produce the genes < Abpbg14p-Abpa14p > Abpbg31p < Abpbg15p-Abpa15 > (hereinafter abbreviated 14-31-15) and < Abpbg16p-Abpa16p > Abpbg32p < Abpbg17p-Abpa17 > (abbreviated 16-32-17). Figure 2 shows a dot plot of the 14-31-15 and 16-32-17 gene duplication blocks diagramed in Figure 1. The green lines flanking the diagonal Abp gene blocks contain the dots representing L1 elements belonging to a very young L1 subfamily (L1Md_T) that apparently misaligned to cause the duplication. The specific breakpoints are shown in Figure 3 and are described in detail below. Tandem duplications preceding the two large duplications were older and their structures were considerably eroded by deletions and insertions of younger elements. A model for recent Abp gene duplication events. (A) Partial map of Abp genes with arrows depicting genes (Abpa in blue, Abpbg in red); solid filled arrows are complete (potentially expressed) genes, while open arrows are putative pseudogenes (modified from ). <Abpbg-Abpa > modules are numbered 7–19 above the linkage map. Two duplications are depicted: 1) a large block of genes that duplicated to create the products underlined in green and orange; 2) those paralogs/modules designated X, Y and Z in the block on the right created products that are underlined in orange (14-31-15) and blue (16-32-17). The center portion of the Abp gene region created by these two duplications is shown as “Final Product” at the bottom of (A). (B) A phylogeny of the genes in the two duplications shown in A (modified from ). The partial Abp phylogeny (panel B) was modified from Laukaitis et al. , who produced an NJ phylogeny of intron 2 from rodent Abpa genes (their Figure 3, yellow clade at the top of the figure). The Abp branches derived from the mouse genome (labeled B6) were retained and the other branches removed. Paralog products are in a typeface color matching the bars that designate their places in the duplications and age estimates in Panel A. The age estimates of the duplications calculated by Laukaitis et al. were also retained and are shown in red typeface. Dot plot of the most recent duplication in the mouse Abp gene family region. L1 (light blue, dark blue) and ERVII (red, orange) repeat content and orientation is diagrammed on the sides with different colours (L1 plus strand, light blue; L1 minus strand, dark blue; ERVII plus strand, red; ERVII minus strand, orange). For the recent Abp gene family duplication of 14-31-15 and 16-32-17, genes are depicted with coloured lines (Abpbg, red; Abpa, blue). L1Md_T repeat elements on the edges of the duplicated blocks are marked with green lines. Breakpoints for the most recent Abp gene duplication. A) The region of alignment in all three sequences between ~30 kb and ~36 kb includes the nearly full-length L1Md_T sequence. The aligned sequences are shown as bars with the L1Md_T element set off by a bracket above the bars. Bar 1: the 33 kb region immediately to the left of Abpbg14p; bar 2: the L1Md_T repeat on the right flank of Abpa15; and bar 3: the region containing the L1Md_T repeat to the right of Abpa17. Bars in the upper part of the figure show the alignment of the three sequences over slightly more than 20 kb. Regions that align in all three sequences are tinted yellow; regions that align in two of three are tinted green and regions that do not align in any of the three are untinted. B) An alignment of 360 bp of the three sequences that surround the gap shown by black arrows in panel A. Two duplications that occur within the gap are depicted with red bars. We bracketed in green a GGTT preceding the rest of the duplication, which is marked with a red bar/bracket. We note that there are also shorter indels, e.g., TGTGTTTTCCTGTTTTTC, within the gap. Proximal to and at four nucleotides in the gap (GGTT), sequences 2 and 3 are identical (i.e. seven of eleven divergent sites shown in the figure). However, distal to the gap, 2 is identical to 1, while 3 differs at four divergent sites. C) Bars representing the entire L1Md_T sequences 1, 2 and 3 show that, for 384 divergent sites proximal to the breakpoint, 2 is identical to 3; for 127 divergent sites following the breakpoint 2 is identical to 1. We identified the L1Md_T sequences on the left flank of bg14p, between a15 and bg16p, and on the right flank of a17. These are shown within the sets of green lines in Figure 2. We aligned 20–30 kb surrounding these L1Md_T sequences and examined the alignment for putative breakpoints. The best candidate region is shown in Figure 3 where Panel A shows a complete alignment of the three L1MD_T sequences with a putative breakpoint identified. This candidate breakpoint is shown in detail in Figure 3B wherein a 50 bp sequence is repeated on the left flank of bg14p, but appears in only one copy in the L1Md_T sequences on the right of a15 and a17. Thus, in the a15 and a17 sequences in this region, the missing repeated sequence plus 42 bp preceding it constitute an 84 bp “gap” in sequences 2 and 3 (Figure 3B). We suggest that this unequal distribution of the duplicated 50 bp sequence is consistent with the notion of a misalignment that created the breaks that resulted in the duplication of the ancestral segment to produce the 14-31-15 and 16-32-17 segments (Figure 1). This is supported by eleven divergent sites shown in Figure 3B. Sequences 2 and 3 are identical at four divergent sites proximal to, and three divergent sites within the gap just described. Beyond (distal to) the gap, sequences 1 and 2 are identical at four divergent sites. These patterns are consistent at 384 divergent sites upstream and 127 divergent sites downstream of the mis-paired AGCA/GGTT shown in the gap, and they support the idea that this is the breakpoint for the duplication (Figure 3C). Returning to Figure 3B, we propose that the misalignment that created the break probably occurred during replication at the point where synthesis of a new strand had proceeded just to the end of the GGTT (in the first green bracket). If a hairpin loop formed in strand 1 at that moment, the newly synthesized GGTT end might have slipped ahead to line up with the AGCA further downstream. This mismatch could have been stabilized by the TTT ahead of both tetra-nucleotides and the continuing synthesis of the duplicated 51 bp of sequence beyond them. In fact, slippage would be expected in the gap sequence because it is rich in a core unit of G followed by three or more Ts. In any event, destabilization at the mis-paired AGCA/GGTT (second green bracket) would then set the stage for the impending break by which NAHR produced the duplication of the Abp genes in this region. There may be alternative explanations but the important point is that the result was to switch strands at the AGCA/GGTT breakpoint as shown by the pattern of divergent sites we described above. A more detailed exploration of the entire Abp gene region clarified the proposal of Karn and Laukaitis for the majority of genes in the center of the 3 Mb region. It is apparent from our dot plot analyses that the 14-31-15 and 16-32-17 duplication was preceded by a duplication of a much larger gene block containing the progenitors of what are now < Abpbg-Abpa > modules 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12, as well as the single Abpbg pseudogenes 29 and 31. This large block duplicated to create all the genes identified in the region shown in Final Product (bottom of Figure 1A) except the < AbpbgX-AbpaX > AbpbgY < AbpbgZ-AbpaZ > progenitor of 14-31-15 and 16-32-17. Thus, this original product accounted for all the other genes from the < Abpbg7-Abpa7 > to the < Abpbg19-Abpa19 > modules. In this process, the Abpbg29 gene in the original < Abpbg29-Abpa29 > module in the center of the duplication product was eliminated. Figure 1B shows the portion of the center Abp clade with genes not described in this duplication removed. All the Abpa gene pairs arising from the duplication are directly related as predicted by this model. We contrasted the repeat density in 50 kb non-overlapping bins in the Abp gene family regions and in flanking regions one Mb proximal and distal to the gene regions (Figure 4; Additional file 3). ERVII and L1 repeat families were found to be in high densities in the Abp regions, whereas the other families (B1, B2, ID and MaLR) are depleted in these regions. The densities for the L1 repeats were more than ten times higher in the Abp regions than in the flanking regions and this family covered on average more than 30% of the 50 kb non-overlapping bins from the Abp region in both genomes. This pattern was statistically significant, for all elements in the mouse genome and for L1, ERVII and ID in the rat genome (Additional file 3). Densities of repeat families on chromosome 7 in mouse (A) and chromosome 1 in rat (B) genomes within 50 kb windows plotted along the physical position of the chromosome in the Abp gene family regions and their one Mb flanking regions. Densities are based on the RepeatMasker output provided at the UCSC Genome Browser website for mouse (NCBI M37/mm9) and rat (Baylor 3.4/rn4) genomes. The L1 and ERVII subfamilies were divided according to whether they were shared between mouse and rat, or whether they were specific to one of the lineages. We compared the proportions of repeat density in the Abp region contributed by either the shared or lineage-specific groups (Table 2; Additional file 4). A considerable portion of the L1 repeat density in the Abp region (>90% in mouse, >80% in rat) is composed of young lineage-specific repeats, which contrasts with the genome-wide pattern for the L1 family where only about 50% of repeats are lineage-specific. The difference is statistically significant in both genomes (Table 2). The density of ERVII family repeats is almost equally distributed between lineage-specific and lineage-shared elements. Despite the significant difference between the ratios in the Apb region and flanking regions, ERVII density does not differ substantially from the genome-wide pattern (51% genome-wide vs. 57% in the Abp region; Table 2). 1Data resampling with Bonferroni correction (n = 4) used to obtain p-values. The accumulation of L1 and ERVII repeats in the Abp region was also analyzed in the context of their age (i.e. the approximate time that the repeats were inserted in the Abp region). We compared the distributions of fold-change in repeat density of lineage-specific and lineage-shared repeats given the divergence from consensus (Figure 5A, B – middle, bottom) with the actual distributions of pairwise distances for the Abp genes (Figure 5A, B – top). The fold-change in density of L1 and ERVII repeats unique for mouse and rat was the focus of our evaluation. We found that the rapid accumulation of L1 elements occurred after the split of the two lineages. The increased rate of accumulation (i.e. insertion) of L1 repeats in the mouse genome is characterized by two peaks that correspond to the distribution of the pairwise distances between Abp genes (Figure 5A, B – top, middle). The increased rate of accumulation in the rat genome was also lineage-specific, however, the correspondence between the L1 accumulation and the gene family expansion was not so clear. The pattern of ERVII retrotransposon accumulation differs from the L1 pattern in that it exhibits, on average, an increased rate of accumulation along almost its entire evolutionary history, with considerable accumulation even before the split of the lineages (Figure 5A, B – top, bottom). Change in repeat density over time compared with the timing of Abp gene duplications. The mouse genome is shown in (A) and the rat is in (B). Top panels show the approximate timing of Abp gene duplications. Fold-change in density of L1 (center) and ERVII (bottom) repeats are colored depending on whether they are contributed by unique (orange/violet) or shared (grey for both) repeat subfamilies. All are plotted along 1% divergence bins. Divergence for the two repeat families represents divergence from genome-wide consensus (i.e. approximate time when the element was inserted in the Abp region). Dating of the Abp gene duplications was based on the distribution of pairwise half distances between Abp genes using the Kimura 2-parameter mutation model. Given the pattern of unique and shared repeat subfamilies on the genome-wide scale for all repeat families, the mouse-rat split occurred around 20% of divergence from consensus (red line). The evolution of gene families is still poorly understood, despite the appearance of an ever-increasing number of sequenced genomes. Many gene families have expanded much faster than expected based on random gene gain and loss, and transposable elements (i.e. retrotransposons) and selection have been cited as main causes of gene family expansion and contraction . Retrotransposons are associated with local recombination [29–33], perpetuate ectopic recombination [34–39] and are enriched at the breakpoints of segmental duplications in various organisms [16, 17, 21, 22]. Because repeat elements also represent highly homologous sequences, high local densities may have caused instability and consequently an increase in the rate of NAHR, as proposed for Alu elements in the human genome . While repeat enrichment at the junctions of segmental duplications is associated with only ~12% of all duplications , this subgroup may represent the tandem duplications responsible for active expansion of gene families, such as the Alu repeats on human chromosome 22 . We focused on Abp genes because their expansions in the mouse and rat genomes occurred after the divergence of the two species. We searched the Abp regions for evidence that retrotransposons contributed to their gene expansions, perhaps acting as substrates for NAHR. Further, we investigated the patterns of retrotransposon accumulation in the Abp region and establish a link between their accumulation and the Abp gene family expansion. Dot plot analyses suggest that retrotransposons served as substrates for NAHR in the most recent mouse Abp gene family region duplication. We identified L1Md_T elements at the edges of the most recently duplicated gene block of the Abp gene region, proposed to have occurred by NAHR . Recombination after misalignment of the L1Md_T sequences flanking the 14-31-15 and 16-32-17 segments could have caused this duplication. Analysis of the three L1Md_T repeats implicated in this event reveals evidence of recombination between the two outer elements to create a hybrid middle repeat (Figure 3). We sought additional breakpoints at the edges of older duplication blocks. Unfortunately these erode quickly as elements are being inserted and deleted. We suppose that the duplication we identified must have been very recent and it is even possible that they are not yet fixed in the population, consistent with findings of copy number variation in this region . Karn and Laukaitis suggested that there were two mechanisms involved in the duplications leading to the 64 Abp paralogs in the mouse genome: a slower one that produced paralogs in an inverse adjacent order as predicted by Katju and Lynch , and a faster one that proceeded by NAHR and produced paralogs in direct, not inverse, order. In this report, we identify L1Md_T elements on the flanks of the most recent Abp duplication block with breakpoints produced by NAHR. Thereby, we provide the details of the second mechanism and an example of NAHR causing duplication resulting in daughter gene blocks in direct, not inverse order. Identification of L1Md_T elements at the edges of the most recent Abp gene duplication in the mouse genome motivated us to further explore retrotransposons in the Abp gene family regions of mouse and rat. L1 and ERVII repeats are denser in the Abp regions than in the regions flanking them, with L1 repeat densities 10 times higher in the rodent Abp regions than in one Mb flanking regions. There are also sharp transitions between the high density of L1 and ERVII repeats within the Abp gene family region and the less dense flanking regions. The abruptness of these transitions shows that the high densities of L1 and ERVII are specific to the Abp regions and are not a general property of the genomic regions in which the Abp families reside. It is interesting that our observations of high L1 density in the Abp regions are similar to reports of high densities of L1 retrotransposons in the regions harboring V1R, V2R and OR receptor gene families of rodents and several other non-human organisms . Similarly, others have found enrichment of retrotransposons (Alu and Mir elements) around human gene clusters [26, 27]. All this supports the view that the association between higher retrotransposon densities and the duplicated nature of the Abp region is not coincidental. Since L1 and LTR (including ERVII) repeat families are enriched at junctions of segmental duplications in the mouse and rat genome [16, 18, 21, 22], one may speculate on the role of the increased density of repeat elements in gene family expansion. We want to know what drove the accumulation of retroelement repeats in the Abp gene regions. One possibility is that selection for increased gene copy number resulting from densely packed repeat elements is a cause of the association. However, there are alternative explanations wherein the higher densities of these repeats might have resulted indirectly from the duplicated nature of the Abp region. Among these are: 1) the repeats accumulated in the region passively along with newly-duplicated Abp genes; 2) as redundancy of gene function increased with continued Abp gene duplication, the region more readily accepted insertion of additional repeats; and 3) accumulation of repeat elements occurred because they contributed to the allelic regulation of particular genes . In fact it is likely that multiple mechanisms led to the observed pattern of repeats. The approximate ages of retrotransposon accumulations were assessed by comparing ratios of the densities of lineage-specific vs. lineage-shared subfamilies in the Abp region with the genome-wide ratios (Table 2; Additional file 4). We found striking differences between L1 and ERVII repeat families in both the mouse and rat genomes. ERVII subfamilies were distributed approximately equally between lineage-specific and lineage-shared subfamilies in both genomes. This was not true for the L1 family where the majority of repeats (>90% in the mouse and >80% in the rat genome) were lineage-specific. Thus, >50% of ERVII repeat content originated from insertions that occurred near the ancestor of the Abp gene family, while almost no L1s were present in the Abp region before its expansion. Because we were concerned about the effect of gene conversion on our ability to time L1 accumulation, we also analyzed L1 repeats for gene conversion events which could obscure that timing and found evidence only of intra-, not inter-subfamily gene conversion events (data not shown). Intra-family gene conversion events may have occurred as part of the misalignment and recombination characterizing NAHR. In any event, these would not influence our ability to differentiate between unique and shared L1 repeats or to discern the overall pattern of repeat accumulation. We dated the change in L1 and ERVII retrotransposon densities along evolutionary time and compared it with the time frame of Abp gene expansion inferred from pairwise distances (Figure 5). The change in L1 density over evolutionary time in the mouse genome occurs in two clear peaks composed of exclusively mouse lineage-specific repeats, which correspond to the distribution of pairwise distances of Abp genes. The correspondence between the pattern of gene duplication events and the date of repeat insertions in the mouse genome suggests that the two processes are related. This finding may be explained by three scenarios: 1) repeats are intrinsically involved in the gene family expansion process, 2) repeats accumulated immediately after the duplication to promote allelic regulation and 3) repeats accumulated as a result of an increase in tolerance due to an increase in redundancy. However, the third scenario is not likely because it predicts that the accumulation of repeats would not closely follow gene pairwise distances and would continue even after the burst of duplication. The first and second explanations cannot be sufficiently resolved with our data. However, the idea that Abp gene duplication results from accumulation of L1 elements seems most likely in light of the findings we report here. The situation is quite different for the ERVII family. The rate of ERVII accumulation (fold change) in the Abp gene region along almost its entire evolutionary history is several times higher than expected from the genome-wide distribution, with considerable repeat insertion before the mouse and rat split. The high density of mouse and rat shared ERVII repeats (i.e. repeats inserted long before the Abp gene family expansion) leaves little doubt that their high densities resulted from passive duplication and/or an unconditionally higher tolerance of accumulation by the Abp gene region. The fact that these repeats were present at high density long before the Abp gene family expansion occurred makes the link between their higher densities and the expansion less clear. We have presented direct evidence for the contribution of a repeat element, L1Md_T, to the Abp gene region expansion. Our evidence includes identification of the breakpoint of a very recent duplication within a hybrid L1Md_T element, which strongly supports the supposition that this duplication occurred by NAHR . We have explored the literature for an observation similar to the breakpoints in the L1Md_T elements that we describe here for the most recent duplication of Abp genes. The reports we found involved breakpoints producing duplications of genes or parts of genes in cancer and other diseases in somatic cells. These instances of NAHR are examples of mitotic recombinations producing clinically significant aberrations but not stable increases in gene copy number in the genome. To the best of our knowledge, the breakpoints we describe in repeat elements that have produced duplicated paralogs by meiotic NAHR in the germ line constitute a unique observation in studies of gene duplication. We also found higher densities of L1 and ERVII retrotransposons along with depletion of other retrotransposon types occurring with abrupt transitions at the gene region boundaries, suggesting that the occurrence of these repeats is tightly associated with Abp gene duplication. We observed that the major contribution to the total L1 density occurred after the split of the two lineages in both genomes, with clear overlap between the accumulation pattern of L1 elements and the Abp gene family expansion, at least in the mouse genome. Regardless of whether the higher densities of L1 repeats are a cause or a consequence of the gene family expansion, this demonstrates the putative link between the accumulation of these elements and the gene family expansion. By contrast, the accumulation pattern of ERVII repeats is complex with a considerable portion of the total ERVII density predating the mouse-rat lineage split, similar to genome-wide patterns. Data sets supporting the results of this article are included within the article and its Additional files. VJ received support from the Institutional Research Support grant No. SVV-2013-267 201 and from the Grant Agency of Charles University in Prague grant No. 6421/2012. The authors thank Pavel Munclinger for support of VJ in PM’s laboratory at Charles University. CML was supported by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number P50 CA095060, 2P30 CA023074 and U54 CA143924. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. VJ, CML and RCK conceived of the project, analyzed the data and wrote the manuscript. VJ performed bioinformatic analyses. RCK and CML performed detailed sequence analysis. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
2019-04-20T12:20:46Z
https://bmcevolbiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2148-13-107
The White County Board of Zoning Appeals met on Thursday, August 21, 2008 at 7:30 p.m. in the Commissioners’ Meeting Room, Second Floor, County Building, Monticello, Indiana. Members attending were: Gerald Cartmell, David Scott, Charles Mellon, Jerry Thompson, and Carl (Shaker) Hites. Also attending were Attorney Robert Little and Director Diann Weaver. Visitors attending were: James Hashu, Walter Sparks, Kay & Glenn Jennings, Terry Pickens, Steve Parrish, Bonnie Parrish, Gina & Rod Gaddis, Perry McWilliams, Lynn Anderson Joe Hickman, and Bob Wrede. The meeting was called to order by Vice President Jerry Thompson and roll call was taken. Dave Scott made a motion to dispense with reading and approve the minutes of the July 17, 2008 meeting. Motion was seconded by and carried unanimously. Attorney Little swore in all Board members and audience members. Director Weaver stated, and 14. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, oops I’m sorry, 14 yes, I didn’t turn the page. We will treat them the evidence as one but we will vote on them individually. Correct? Make sure I have that right. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay just so everyone understands that so. #2711 Terrence M. Pickens; The property is located on Part of Lots 13 and 14 in Hinshaw’s White Point Addition, located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2406 N. West Shafer Drive. Continued from July 17, 2008. Request: He is requesting an 8’ front setback variance and a 5’ rear setback variance to bring the existing cottage and attached garage into compliance and to separate the lots and change the lot lines. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, now do you want me to read all of those or stop there? Stop? Gerald Cartmell asked, they’ve all ready been in haven’t they? There’s no point in reading them. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, basically we have. Director Weaver stated, we have, yea. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, so just the fact announcing the number of the variance and leave it at that, yea we’ve been down this before. Gerald Cartmell stated, that’s the man that has that slip of paper down there. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, yep. Attorney Little asked, yea you did that last time right? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, yes. I’ll leave it right there if that’s fine with the Board and everyone. Okay and sir you are? Terry Pickens stated, Terry Pickens. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, yes, do you have anything? Terry Pickens stated, I’ve gone before the Board previously on this matter, it was actually voted in my favor at one point but then it was suggested that if, to keep the lots separate which is a way I purchased them originally that I redraw some lot lines in order to bring the property into closer compliance which I did and I submitted to the, at the last hearing that was affected by the road widening project. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, okay, Diann do you have anything on this? Director Weaver stated, I do not have anything additional, no. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay. Questions from the Board? Gerald do you want to start? Nothing? Charlie? Dave Scott stated, the only question I have uh, I realize the county’s created a hardship here for you when they put the road through there. Terry Pickens stated, yes sir. Terry Pickens stated, well Dave what I did was I bought these separately at different times so the problem being the way the lot lines fell, there were several encroachments when I bought them and it was the Boards suggestion that if I had the lines redrawn that I could actually have property that’s in better compliance. It’s a lot easier to, if I ever sold one piece to still, to find a buyer for one piece then to sell the whole um, um, package. I bought them separately, I’d like to stay in the community and on the lake and if I were to sell a piece to a relative or somebody I could legally do that so, you know. Dave Scott stated, when we do this it creates a situation where anytime anybody wants to make an improvement or do anything to any of these lots they’re going to be in here for a variance by making these lots so small. Terry Pickens stated, yes, right, and they got smaller even when the frontage was taken. Dave Scott stated, I realize that. Terry Pickens stated, they took like half of the property. Dave Scott stated, um, and I guess what I’m thinking is that somebody unknowingly is going to buy one of these thinking that he can do something on it and whoever’s up here may not grant him those variances. Terry Pickens stated, yea, no I would have to make the buyer aware that you know it’s less than the square footage needed, no, I don’t see that you could build anything more on here there’s to many pieces on here as it is and that’s the way it was, you know I didn’t, I bought them separately and I would just try to make them into better compliance by redrawing the lines. I’ve had them for 17 years. Terry Pickens stated, I’ll probably have them for another 17 years. Terry Pickens stated, I actually had to buy that lot 13 from a different owner you know. You know there’s no more adjacent property for sale. I did approach my neighbor but they’re not willing to sell at this time. Director Weaver stated, I might refresh the Boards memory that this was granted a variance I think like last December to bring these structures into compliance and it did as part of that request did join them all together as one and the reason that Mr. Pickens is here is to separate them back so each lot has it’s own variance and can be kept separate. Terry Pickens stated, and Diann will say to file the paperwork to combine them at that point. Director Weaver stated, the application was for all of the lots on one application. Terry Pickens stated, for the purpose of this hearing, right. Director Weaver stated, on this one you did a separate application for each lot. Terry Pickens stated, right just keep them the way they were when I purchased them. Terry Pickens stated, so that the, wouldn’t be demised by, you know assemblage is good in one way but then you know, if you assemble it, it’s not big enough to run it as a ongoing business because it’s you know just a few buildings there so separately is the only thing that makes sense to me and it’s not that I would sell one off you know, I wanted to keep them the way they were when I purchased them that’s all. Thank you. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Dave do you have anything else? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay. Shaker I’ll just call on you. Your kind of being thrown into fire here right away but. Carl Hites stated, I don’t have any questions, thank you. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, thank you. Anyone here care to speak either in favor or against the variance? If not is the Board ready to vote? Let’s vote. 1. That the property is currently zoned B-2, General Business. 6. That the request is for an 8’ front setback variance and a 5’ rear setback variance to bring the existing cottage and attached garage into compliance and to separate the lots and change the lot lines on Lot Number Thirteen (13) in White Point Hinshaw Addition, in Union Township, White County, Indiana. COMMON DESCRIPTION: The property is located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2406 N. West Shafer Drive. The variance was granted based on the findings of fact by a vote of 4 affirmative and 1 negative. Attorney Little stated, Mr. Chairman I report that the Board has approved Petition #2711 by a 4 to 1 vote. #2712 Terrence M. Pickens; The property is located on Part of Lots 14 and 15 in Hinshaw’s White Point Addition, located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2408 N. West Shafer Drive. Continued from July 17, 2008. Request: He is requesting a 13’ front setback variance and a 6’ rear setback variance and a 20’ lot width variance and a 63 square foot space variance to bring the existing cottage and attached garage into compliance and to separate the lots and to change the lot lines. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, and again Mr. Pickens do you have anything? Terry Pickens stated, um once again Mr. Milligan made every effort to draw the lines in such a way where there would only be 2 cars per, aloud per cottage. Terry Pickens stated, that’s about it. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay. Diann anything? Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Gerald, nothing. Charlie? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, no, Dave Scott and Shaker? Anyone here care to speak for or against? If not ready to vote? Okay. 6. That the request is for a 13’ front setback variance and a 6’ rear setback variance and a 20’ lot width variance and a 63 square foot space variance to bring the existing cottage and attached garage into compliance and to separate the lots and to change the lot lines on pt lot 14 and pt lot 15 in White Point Hinshaw Addition, in Union Township, White County, Indiana. COMMON DESCRIPTION: The property is located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2408 N. West Shafer Drive. Attorney Little stated, once again Mr. Chairman I’ll report that the Board is approved this petition #2712 by a vote of 4 to 1. #2713 Terrence M. Pickens; The property is located on Part of Lot 15 and part of Lot 14 in Hinshaw’s White Point Addition, located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2410 N. West Shafer Drive. Continued from July 17, 2008. Request: He is requesting an 18’ front setback variance and a 5’ rear setback variance and a 15’ lot width variance and a 1,088 square foot space variance to bring the existing cottage into compliance and to separate the lots and change lot lines. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, and again Mr. Pickens? Terry Pickens stated, nothing else. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, nothing else. Diann? Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, nothing else? Gerald, once again? No, Charlie? Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Shaker? Nothing. To the audience, yea, nay. Let’s vote. 6. That the request is for an 18’ front setback variance and a 5’ rear setback variance and a 15’ lot width variance and a 1,088 square foot space variance to bring the existing cottage into compliance and to separate the lots and change lot lines on pt lot 15 and pt lot 14 in White Point Hinshaw Addition, in Union Township, White County, Indiana. COMMON DESCRIPTION: The property is located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2410 N. West Shafer Drive. Attorney Little stated, just for the record every Board member is supposed to answer every question and try to make sure that all the questions get answered so we don’t have any ballots that don’t count. Mr. President I can report that the Board has again voted 4 to 1 to approve this petition #2713. #2714 Terrence M. Pickens; The property is located on Part of Lots 15 and 16 in Hinshaw’s White Point Addition, located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2410 N. West Shafer Drive. Continued from July 17, 2008. Request: He is requesting a 24’ front setback variance and a 4’ rear setback variance to bring the cottage into compliance and to allow for a proposed detached carport to separate lots and change lot lines. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Mr. Pickens? Terry Pickens stated, yes on this particular lot I also have to replace the well house that’s badly deteriorated along with the uh, there was a garage there but we had to remove it because we had to lower the topography of the land in order to get vehicles in and to be able to park and I’m asking to put up a carport with open on all sides just to put the boat in the winter time. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Diann? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay. Gerald, nothing. Charlie? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, nothing, Dave Scott? Shaker? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, nothing. Anyone here care to address? Let’s vote. Director Weaver asked, Mr. Pickens did you bring your sign back? Terry Pickens stated, I did. 6. That the request is for a 24’ front setback variance and a 4’ rear setback variance to bring the cottage into compliance and to allow for a proposed detached carport to separate lots and change lot lines on pt Lot 15 and Lot 16 in White Point Hinshaw Addition, in Union Township, White County, Indiana. COMMON DESCRIPTION: The property is located just North of C.R. 225 N at 2412 N. West Shafer Drive. Attorney Little stated, and again Mr. President petition #2714 has been approved by this Board by a vote of 4 to 1. Terry Pickens stated, thank you for your understanding on this matter, appreciate it. #2738 W. Dean & Marcia Cook; The property is located on 1.164 A, on Part NE NE 22-27-03, located East of State Road 39 on C.R. 175 North before C.R. 725 East. Tabled from July 17, 2008. Request: They are requesting a 54’ front setback variance to build a new pole building. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, anyone here representing the Cook’s? Yes? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, all right, thank you. Yes sir? Gary Cosgray stated, my name’s Gary Cosgray alias Dean Cook. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, all righty. Do you have anything to present to the Board other than I read for the record? Gary Cosgray stated, no Dean’s got them everything that I’ve got with me. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, all right. Diann do you have anything? Director Weaver stated, we did receive some additional information that you do have in your packet. Director Weaver stated, we have a letter from Mr. Little and copies of some documents that were supplied by his office. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, why don’t you go ahead and enter those for the record if you would please. Director Weaver stated, the letter from Mr. Little’s office is dated August 5, 2008 addressed to the White County Board of Zoning Appeals, it says Dear Sir’s I represent Steve and Bonnie Parrish, adjoining property owners to the Cook property. Pursuant to my earlier conversations with our office, and Jerry Altman, I am submitting on their behalf copies of the following documents: 1. Grant of Right of Way (Easement), 2. Deed to Cooks. At this point, I still am trying to determine ownership of the real estate underlying the right of way. I also note, however, that the legal description contained in the Deed to the Cooks as repeated in the surveys in your file, do not appear to have a correct description of the property drawn. I have attempted to highlight the questioned portion of the legal description for you. I will get you a copy of anything further I find that might be helpful. Very Truly yours, Robert H. Little. And there is a personal representative’s deed from the Lingenfelter and Parrish to Thelma Lucille Parrish for the estate of Thelma Lucille Parrish conveying to W. Dean Cook and Marcia E. Cook, a warranty deed from the same. There is a document that’s labeled, headed as an easement and there is another warranty deed from the Parrish’s to the Cook’s and a personal representatives deed from Thelma Lucille Parrish Estate deeding to the Cooks. And that’s all I have. Dave Scott asked, uh, Mr. Little can you testify or no? Gary Cosgray asked, I don’t think he’s supposed to, is he? Gary Cosgray asked, is he really supposed to or not? Attorney Little stated, I would prefer not to, the Parrish’s are here and I would prefer to have them answer. The time I submitted what I did, I didn’t know I was going to be here tonight. Dave Scott stated, okay I just wondered if you say the language in the legal description uh, isn’t such that you can describe the easement? Attorney Little stated, what my letter said, I think I can explain what my letter says since I wrote it, what the letter said was there was what appears to be an error in the legal description the deed to the Cooks and that it was a dimension or a direction of north 8 degrees west, I think it was supposed to read north 89 degrees west which means the line around the farm goes in the wrong direction. That’s the point of that submission on the deed there would be an error then on the legal description on the deed. Dave Scott asked, so does that work in favor or against the petitioner of the, of the variance? Attorney Little stated, the, if the legal description is accurate then the petitioner seeking the variance doesn’t own where he would be putting the proposed barn. Dave Scott stated, I think I’m going to make a motion that we table this until both sides have an opportunity to, I’m a little uncomfortable voting on this not knowing. Gerald Cartmell stated, either way, either way, if that’s the case. Gerald Cartmell asked, it’s either 8 or 89, right? Attorney Little stated, I believe it’s supposed to be 89 degrees that would make sense for the right angle of the property turns on the drawing you have but the deed says, and both deeds, 2 deeds that I have in prestige it says 8 degrees. Dave Scott stated, the only thing we do have a, a survey here from a registered surveyor that describes it also. Attorney Little stated, that survey describes it as 89 degrees that’s correct. That’s why I think it is supposed to say 89 degrees. Charlie Mellon stated, I’ll second it. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay it’s been moved to table this and is there a second? Gerald Cartmell stated, Charlie seconded it. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, 18th. Gerald Cartmell stated, and guess who was the idiot who did it to start out with. Dave Scott stated, but well that’s the thing, I mean Mr. Milligan stamped this thing saying that the way he’s read it then its accurate, his drawings accurate and does that fit the setbacks that they’re asking for? Director Weaver stated, as it’s drawn, well the request came from that drawing. Gerald Cartmell stated, from Milligan’s drawing. Director Weaver stated, I mean, we, we figure out what the request is by what’s submitted to us by that survey. So yes it would coincide. Dave Scott asked, and you think the drawing may be correct? Attorney Little stated, I think the drawing is correct for what it’s supposed to be but I don’t think it’s correct as to what was actually deeded or what was described in the deed. Gerald Cartmell stated, I see. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, we do have a motion and a second, want to continue that, to table this? All in favor say aye. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, all opposed? Okay, probably be best. Be tabled to, you said September 18th Diann? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, heard you right, okay. Director Weaver stated, I can provide the information to our attorney, actually he’s already got this information and we can see what he has to say. Gerald Cartmell asked, do you go back to the original deed from Parrish and Lingenfelter, is that what you do? Director Weaver stated, I think what our attorney would need to decide is if you guys can actually vote on this the way it’s presented or if the legal description needs to be taken care of prior to any action by you guys. That’s what I would assume. Dave Scott asked, when they bought that wouldn’t they have had a title search? Director Weaver stated, I don’t know. Dave Scott stated, he may want to go back to the title company and make sure. Gerald Cartmell stated, White County Abstract or whatever he is. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, um hum. Yep, okay it’s been tabled let’s move along. #2741 Pride Property, LLC; The property is located on Pt Lot 1 in Wayside Lodge Subdivision, located North of Norway Dam off of CR 350 North to Shore Acres Court. Tabled from July 29, 2008. Request: They are requesting a 939 Sq. Ft. space variance and a 24’ width variance to separate lots. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, and sir I know who you are but who, you are? Joe Hickman stated, I’m Joe Hickman and I’m representing Pride Properties. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, yes, thank you. Joe Hickman stated, basically what we request being done, we own 3 parcels out there. We own lot number 1 of Wayside Lodge, lot number 2, and also a triangular shape parcel out by the road that includes a recently vacated road. We want to increase the size of both of the lots by incorporating the parcel into them to make 2 residential lots. Um, it’s only going to affect the center property line of the 2 lots and that would extend through the parcel. It wouldn’t have any impact on either one of our neighbors on either side of us. And that’s basically my case for now. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, all right. Uh, Mr. Little we have a letter here probably ought to be entered correct? Director Weaver stated, well the one, one of them you had at the last meeting. I don’t know that it was read though because we tabled this right a way. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, do we have a copy of that? Director Weaver stated, you have a new one as well so you actually have 2. Attorney Little stated, I don’t see that one in mine. Joe Hickman asked, is this a letter of support? Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, uh, I haven’t read clear through it. We’ll find out here in a second, Hashu, the name Hashu. Joe Hickman stated, that’s my neighbor to the west. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, all right. Just go ahead and read them for the record please. Attorney Little stated, all right, it’s a letter dated July 21, 2008 from Lawrence Hashu, and it bears the signature with an address in Chesterton Indiana addressed to the White Area Plan Commission, Sirs: I am writing in reference to the proposed variance request by Pride properties, LLC for space and width on property located at 3546 N. Shore Acres Ct., Wayside Lodge Addition, Liberty Township, White County Indiana. I own the property adjacent to the above mentioned property. I opposed the granting of this variance. It would make both lots too small to support the existing dwellings and any new proposed building erected there. The parking in this area is very limited. The rest of the subdivision and surrounding buildings are one bedroom vacation/weekend cottages and lack of parking is already a problem for these small dwellings. People park along the roadside and it creates a dangerous situation with traffic and causes many near misses for pedestrians and cars. This proposal is for a larger dwelling and there will not be adequate room for parking and the building available. By granting the variance, it will also cause unsightly crowding of the structures, possible water runoff problems, a devaluation of property values, and stress and hardships among current and future residents. I also believe that all residents with adjoining property have not been properly notified on this variance request by mail. I believe the commission should adhere to the standards set forth in the buildings codes to provide for uniformity and order in this neighborhood. These standards were established for this reason and a variance from them should not be granted. Thank you signed Lawrence Hashu and it’s notarized showing you received it July 22, 2008. Director Weaver stated, as a result of this letter we did table this at the last meeting, we re-notified and picked up the owner that was missed so all the owners to my knowledge have been notified at this time. Joe Hickman asked, which owner was that that was missed, Mr. Sparks or Hunt. Director Weaver stated, across the, I can’t tell you a name, across the road is all I can tell you. Joe Hickman stated, oh okay, because, well yea. I’d like to address a couple of the oppositions if I may. Director Weaver stated, that’s the information he sent us. Attorney Little stated, there is an additional letter from Joe Hickman who is basically offering to be here to answer questions. I don’t see any point to read this letter in here you can say anything that they have for questions. Joe Hickman stated, no, no. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, so he read this as well? Director Weaver stated, it hasn’t been read either. Attorney Little stated, all right, we have another letter. This one is dated August 14, 2008 to White County Area Plan Commission, In reference to real estate: Lot 2 and pt Lot 1 in Wayside Lodge Subdivision in Liberty Township, White, County, IL 3546 N. Shore Acres Ct. I am the property owner of Lot 3, east of above mentioned lot and have been so for plus forty years. I feel by dividing this property you will have two houses on small lots and the house on Lot 1 will by built practically on top of the house to the west. In fact they would be building a house on a lot that is over 1/3 smaller then the code allows. I have viewed the lines staked out for the division and clearly there will be issues regarding congestion and the lack of parking. Also, the existing house will loose access to part of its boat lift as it is over the division line. A member of your board came out on August 2nd and spoke to some of the neighbors, myself included, and he could not figure out where a house could be built. I also understand that there is a person interested in buying the parcel in its entirety. I think that dividing this land and building a house on a small lot on top of the adjoining houses would congest the area and bring down property values. I would hope maybe another member of your board could view this land because of it’s off shape, it is hard to visualize the concerns of the neighbors. Thank you for your attention on this matter. Sincerely, Thomas Anderson & Lynn Anderson, showing you folks received it on August 15, 2008. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, all right, thank you. Joe Hickman stated, I think Mrs. Anderson has changed her mind because I spoke to her previously and she said she didn’t have a problem with this, obviously her mind has changed and I appreciate that. As far as lot size I’ve listed 11 lots in Wayside Court, their square footage and acreage and also lots to the west, 6 lots to the west the 2 lots that I am proposing are considerably larger then any of the existing lots out there and the way that the lots are constructed they’re on a bend so we’re going to have 8 almost 89’ of frontage on lot number 1, 113’ of frontage on lot number 2. There’s ample area for parking on lot number 2, we’re going to build up a retaining wall with a 20 x 40’ area that would accommodate 3 to 4 cars easily. The other lot there’s absolutely no problem for parking there. There’s a building footprint with all the setback requirements of 1900 square feet. You could build 2 levels, realistically you’re going to have maybe a 1200 square foot, one level building with a walkout basement, it’d be new construction. It’s going to do nothing but add to the value of the property in the area, it’s not going to be a detriment at all. I understand Mr. or my neighbors concerns to the west of me. He is a 37’ wide lot and he has a building or his home is 5’ away from the property line. What I would do, I would guarantee that we would move at least 15’ in from our property line to insure that he would have 20’ setback there and we would adhere to all the other setbacks that are in the variance. We’re not going to affect his view at all if anything we’ve improved his view, there was a garage up about a foot off of the property line on the water side. We took that down, gave him 90% more view of Kean’s Bay. We cut the brush up on the hillside, that’s improved it, um and if anyone says putting in a 300, 400 thousand dollar home in a neighborhood is going to detract from the value of it, I just strongly disagree with that. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, thank you. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, um, anyone here care to address the variance either for or against? Okay. Yes sir, yes, come forward. Jim Hashu stated, I’m Jim Hashu, I’m on the adjacent property west of there at 3542 N. Shore Acres Court and I’m here to oppose the variance, my brother Lawrence was the letter that was written, um, I can just reiterate the same things that he has in there about parking, this property is being shown now. The lot, 2 property’s for sale, people are parking along that curve on the roadside, there’s not even enough room to park a car in there now. The previous owner was there. The previous owner was there for 12 years. He didn’t throw large parties, he had occasional people over, most of the time the area that they’re proposing to build a house on was used as parking lot for the lot 2 where the house is now and 3 or 4 cars in there pretty much filled that lot, of course there was that small building on there too but we’re opposed to the granting of the variance because of that. The other lots may be smaller in that subdivision but they’re all single bedroom, slab type cottages, vacation cottages and that’s what’s in that area in that subdivision. Thank you. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, just a minute, just a minute please. I’ll give you another opportunity here in a second. Anyone else care to address for or against? Yes sir, come forward, then I’ll come back to you, okay. Walter Sparks stated, my name is Walter Sparks, I own the property across the road from the property that they’re working on here and I’ve lived there since 1973, there’s been a constant battle and people coming up there at the cottages, looking for a place to park, they come across the road on my property without permission, without contacting me and I’m getting damn sick and tired of it and adding more to it would only increase the problem so I ask you to not grant this variance, it’s not good for the neighborhood. Thank you. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, thank you. Yes ma’am come forward. Lynn Anderson stated, Lynn Anderson, Lynn Anderson. Lynn Anderson stated, yes, um, I originally did say, well I asked him about it because I didn’t understand the scanning and that and then when they laid out the lines of where they were actually going to cut the property up, it’s, it just looks like your taking all the property from the one house that’s originally there, they own, I mean they only have a little bit and then they’ve got like a narrow part where there going to have to build a house and it would be more like a long skinny house and they’re really would be no parking to speak of and I just think it would make the are way to congested. It’s open, it’s beautiful right now and I really think by putting another house there it would take away from the property values, I don’t care how much the house cost if it doesn’t look right in the neighborhood. If it’s not built, if they built one on top of the other, I just don’t think it’s going to bring up your property values. Thank you. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay thank you. Anyone else? Joe Hickman stated, no I’m done, that’s fine. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, okay. Diann do you have anything else? Director Weaver stated, no I just was going to clarify that and I don’t know how this got missed but your survey does not show the current house, there is a current house on lot 2. The pictures do show that home and I just wanted to make sure you realize that. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, okay. Dave Scott do you have any questions or comments? Dave Scott asked, now this survey back here that shows the building area is that back on the plan? Director Weaver stated, well the one I was looking at didn’t have it yea, okay. As far as I’m aware it’s accurate, yes. I might add also the road has been vacated and you do have information from the secretary of the county commissioners stating that they did vacate that. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, they did vacate that? Director Weaver stated, they did vacate the road. Gerald Cartmell stated, I think that road originally probably years ago went around the lake before all the stuff was ever built. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, hum. Director Weaver stated, that’s what it kind of looks like on the plat, yea. I provided you a copy of the original plat of this area also. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, I’ll go back, Shaker do you have any comments or anything to add? Shaker Hites stated, I don’t. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, back to you Dave do you have anything else? Dave Scott stated, I don’t. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Charlie Mellon? Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Gerald Cartmell? Nothing. No other discussion is the Board ready to vote? Let’s vote. Director Weaver stated, they have 2 variances before the Board one for each lot so they can be separated. Attorney Little stated, all right, and it looks like you’ve got them as 2 separate petitions so we’ll make it clear, we’re voting on 1 petition first. Director Weaver stated, they are 2 separate petitions. Attorney Little stated, number 2741. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, do you have something before we vote? Joe Hickman stated, well I don’t know why you don’t vote on both together because if one, if it’s approved and fine if it’s not then you know that’s fine also. Director Weaver stated, they can incorporate the evidence but they have to vote on each one separately. Director Weaver asked, did you bring your signs back? Joe Hickman stated, no, I did not, I’ll bring them tomorrow. That proper notice was given by mail to adjoining property owners. Beginning at the Southeast corner of said Lot Number One; thence South 89 degrees 42 minutes 00 seconds West along the South lot line of said Lot Number One 77.32 feet; thence North 56 degrees 30 minutes 00 seconds West 25.71 feet; thence along the S.F.L.E.C.C. property line North 48 degrees 42 minutes 00 seconds East 48.34 feet and North 60 degrees 42 minutes 00 seconds East 40.46 feet; thence South 38 degrees 05 minutes 31 seconds East 43.74 feet; thence South 00 degrees 18 minutes 00 seconds East along the East lot line of said Lot 1 31.06 feet to the point of beginning. Beginning at the Southeast corner of Lot Number One in Wayside Lodge Subdivision; thence South 41 degrees 42 minutes 55 seconds East 28.16 feet; thence South 43 degrees 30 minutes 00 seconds West along a public road right-of-way 36.38 feet; thence North 56 degrees 30 minutes 00 seconds West 85.16 feet; thence South 89 degrees 42 minutes 00 seconds West along the South lot line of said Lot Number One 77.32 feet to the point of beginning, containing 0.054 of an Acre, more or less. COMMON DESCRIPTION: Property is located North of Norway Dam off of CR 350 North to Shore Acres Court. (1) The variance request (is) (is not) a variance from a use district or classifications under are plan law. Vote: 3 is not, 2 is. (2) The granting of this variance (will) (will not) be injurious to the public health, safety, morals and welfare of the community. Vote: 3 will not, 2 will. (3) The use and value of the area adjacent to the property included in the variance request (will) (will not) be affected in a substantially adverse manner. Vote 3 will, 2 will not. (4) The strict application of the terms of the zoning ordinance is being applied to a situation that (is) (is not) common to other properties in the same zoning district. Vote: 2 is, 3 is not. (5) The strict application of the terms of the zoning ordinance (will) (will not) result in unusual and unnecessary hardship. Vote: 2 will, 3 will not. (6a) This situation (is) (is not) such that there are exceptional or extraordinary circumstances or conditions applying to the property in question or to the intended use of the property that does not apply generally to other properties or class of uses in the same zoning district. Vote: 2 will, 3 will not. (6b) this situation (is) (is not) such that such variance is necessary for the preservation and enjoyment of a substantial property right possessed by other property in the same zoning district and in the vicinity. Vote: 2 will, 3 will not. (6c) This situation (is) (is not) such that the authorizing of such variance will be of substantial detriment to adjacent property and will materially impair the purposes of the ordinance of the public interest. Vote: 2 will, 3 will not. (6d) This situation (is) (is not) such that the Board specifically fins the condition or situation of the specific piece of property for which the variance is sought is of so typical or recurrent a nature as to make reasonably practicable the formulation of a general regulation, under an amendment of the ordinance, for such conditions or situations. Vote: 2 will, 3 will not. The variance was denied based on the findings of fact by a vote of 2 for and 3 against. A vote of 3 “for” is necessary to grant a variance. Attorney Little stated, Mr. President I would report that the Board has denied the petition #2741 by a 3-2 vote. Joe Hickman stated, I’ll withdraw the request on the second. #2742 Pride Property, LLC; The property is located on Pt Lot 1 and Lot 2 in Wayside Lodge Subdivision, located North of Norway Dam off of CR 350 North to Shore Acres Court. Tabled from July 29, 2008. Request: They are requesting an 850 Sq. Ft. space variance and a 10’ width variance to separate lots. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, variance #2742 has been withdrawn. #2743 Rodney W. & Gina M. Gaddis; The property is located on Tract 54, S S 28-28-03 .151 acres, located North of Lowes Bridge off of Lake Road 64 East at 5483 Albertson Court. Request: They are requesting an 18’ rear setback variance and a 5’ west side setback variance to build a new home and attached garage. Rodney Gaddis stated, Rodney W. Gaddis. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, you are Mr. Gaddis, okay. Rodney Gaddis stated, um hum. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, do you have anything you’d like to add other than what I presented to the Board sir? Rodney Gaddis stated, uh thank you Mr. President, I’d just like to say that what I’m proposing is to as you said to remove all the existing aged structures replacing with complete new, redeveloping the land a little more efficiently and still support the theme of the existing part and the structures around it which will give us, it’s going to be our principle residence, we will living there 100%. I’m open for any kind of questions. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, okay, sounds good. Okay just a second to get caught here. Diann do you have anything? Director Weaver stated, no, I do not. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, this variance, do we have anything here that needs to be mentioned? Okay that’s from him, okay what about this here from Patterson’s should that be entered? Director Weaver stated, I think that’s a neighbor is what that is. Rodney Gaddis stated, yes Terry Patterson. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, why don’t we? Is he present? Rodney Gaddis stated, no he’s not. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay Bob do you have that one. Attorney Little, yes I do, there do appear to be a couple of letters. This one is a letter, a brief letter addressed attention Members of the White County Area Plan Commission, Please be advised that I have reviewed the variance request for the proposed construction at 5483 Albertson Court. The structure will allow more distance between my unit than there is with the existing structure. The rear set back will be in line with my existing unit and will not interfere with the road usage at all. Therefore I am giving my formal approval for the variance to be granted. It’s signed by Terry Patterson indicating address of 5491 Albertson Court, dated July 12th. There’s a second letter in here from Joyce McConkey. Is she a neighbor as well? Rodney Gaddis stated, yes sir on the other side. Attorney Little stated, and it’s also addressed to the members of the White County Area Plan Commission, after reviewing the variance request for the proposed construction at 5483 Albertson Court, I give my approval for the variance to be granted. The structure will be farther from my property line than the existing structure is now. The rear of the proposed structure will not cause any loss of use to the drive behind. Also the rear of the unit will be in line with other units, and she gives her address as 5475 Albertson Court, Monticello, with a mailing address in Sycamore IL. And here name was Joyce McConkey also dated July 12, 2008. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, I have another one here from a Mark Klaczak. Attorney Little stated, let me borrow yours I don’t see that in my file. This one’s addressed to the Members of the White County Area Plan Commission, dated July 27, 2008. I have reviewed the variance request for 5483 Albertson Court and as the President of Golden Beach Club, Inc. I give my formal approval for the variance. The setback on both sides of the proposed new structure will allow more distance between neighboring units than there exists at this time. The rear setback will not interfere with the road use at all and will be in line with adjacent units. Mark Klaczak signed it and gives his address at 5443 E. 600 N. in Monticello and then gives a mailing address in Beecher, IL. Then there’s one last letter from Rod Gaddis, is that who’s here? Rod Gaddis stated, that’s me. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, yes that’s him. I’m sorry. Attorney Little asked, do we need to read that? Attorney Little stated, all right. Gerald Cartmell stated, I’m looking at everything, go ahead on come back to me. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, Charlie? Charlie Mellon stated, I was out there and there’s not much room on the west side I guess 5’, you building a new house on the same footprint? Rodney Gaddis stated, yes sir, the difference being if you were out there you see the tip out that was on the kitchen on the existing unit? Rodney Gaddis stated, the wall of the new unit will be, will be the same spot of long wall it will not be over where the tip out’s at. Charlie Mellon asked, how about the hang over? Rodney Gaddis stated, the hang over will still won’t be out as far as that is, it’s only 10”, 8” hang over. Charlie Mellon stated, okay. I noticed the hang over on the other one. Charlie Mellon stated, okay that’s all I had. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay Dave Scott? Dave Scott stated, I got a little problem with the garage being to close off the road, it appears this road's a dead end. Rodney Gaddis stated, all it is it just goes to 2 units on the west side and the east side it goes 2 more units that way, yes it’s just a, basically a private drive to 3 other houses. Director Weaver stated, it’s a T, Dave. Director Weaver stated, it T’s and he’s right at the T. Rodney Gaddis stated, right at the T. Dave Scott stated, oh okay. Rodney Gaddis stated, yea. It’s actually 2’ in off the pin which the road is probably another 2’ farther back then that but we’ve got to go technically with the pin. Rodney Gaddis stated, yes sir. The garage will be carpenter built off the back of it. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, anything else Dave? Shaker do you have any comments? Shaker Hites stated, no, I don’t. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, Gerald back to you. Gerald Cartmell asked, you can’t center that anymore on the lot other than you are? Rodney Gaddis asked, as far as which direction sir? Gerald Cartmell stated, well to the right, to the east I guess. Rodney Gaddis stated, if I do my proposal to do this uh, I have a 16’ gravel area there which is where the parking carport is now and with the parking a lot of these places as a premium that would give me availability to park 2 cars there with out interfering with any roads or anything what so ever. Gerald Cartmell asked, if you did move it over? Rodney Gaddis stated, if I moved it over it would take away all the extra parking I would have yes sir. Gerald Cartmell stated, you’re definitely not going to park out front. Rodney Gaddis stated, no sir or behind it. Gerald Cartmell stated, okay that’s all I have. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, any other discussion? Is the Board ready to vote? Let’s vote. Director Weaver asked, did you bring your sign back. Rodney Gaddis stated, yes ma’am but I have it out in my vehicle so I’ll have to bring it to you. Commencing at the Southeast Corner of the Southeast Quarter of the Southwest Quarter of said Section 28; Thence North 01 Degree 45 Minutes 40 Seconds West a distance of 298.06 feet; Thence South 62 Degrees 00 Minutes 00 Seconds West a distance of 181.60 feet; Thence North 44 Degrees 27 Minutes 25 Seconds West a distance of 66.10 feet; Thence North 28 Degrees 00 Minutes 00 Seconds West a distance of 20.00 feet; Thence North 62 Degrees 00 Minutes 00 Seconds East a distance of 200.00 feet to the Point of Beginning; Thence North 28 Degrees 00 Minutes 00 Seconds West a distance of 132.63 feet; Thence North 63 Degrees 20 Minutes 32 Seconds East along the Northern Indiana Public Service Company Property Line a distance of 50.01 feet; Thence South 28 Degrees 00 Minutes 00 Seconds East a distance of 131.46 feet; Thence South 62 Degrees 00 Minutes 00 Seconds West a distance of 50.00 feet to the point of Beginning, containing 0.151 of an acre. COMMON DESCRIPTION: Property is located North of Lowes Bridge off of Lake Road 64 East at 5483 E. Albertson Court. Attorney Little stated, the Board approved it by a vote of 4 to 1 petition #2743. Rodney Gaddis stated, thank you very much. #2744 Joseph J. & Karen M. Samas; The property is located on Lot 42 in the Isle of Homes, located North of Norway Dam off of Lake Road 10 E, in the Isle of Homes at 3159 Cardinal Drive. Request: They are requesting an 8’ South side setback variance and an 8’ North side setback variance to add a second story onto the existing home. Perry McWilliams stated, I’m Perry McWilliams. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, and are you the contractor? Perry McWilliams stated, yes, yea. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, I thought so but yet, do we have something that says that he can speak for them? Director Weaver stated, yes and you have a copy of it attached to your staff report. Perry McWilliams stated, guys all we’re going to do here is from the footprint that you see, the original house that’s there we’re going straight up with a second story. The house currently has 2’ overhangs on it so we’re actually going to be narrowing the second story because we’re not going to have these wide overhangs on there. We’ll end up reducing that so, by a foot and so at least we’re going to be coming in a little bit as far as the vertically and the side setbacks will be improving what’s there right now. The carport that remains where it’s at more or less, we’ll probably rebuild that roof system on that but the house itself is going straight up. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay, okay. Charlie Mellon stated, nice looking so now, I about got lost finding it. Perry McWilliams stated, it’s a very nice house, these people bought it I think 4 years ago I’d say and totally, it’s a real nice house but not enough bedrooms. Gerald Cartmell asked, do you have a monopoly back there? Perry McWilliams stated, no, no. Gerald Cartmell stated, I’m looking for this sign and all I see is McWilliams Construction, what’s going on here. Perry McWilliams stated, yea, I know, I know. Director Weaver stated, I noticed that to. Perry McWilliams stated, I know. Charlie Mellon asked, Keesling’s house? Gerald Cartmell stated, nobody’s going to build Keesling’s right now. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Diann do you have anything? Director Weaver stated, no, I don’t. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, anyone here care to speak for or against? Mr. Hites, you have anything? Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, okay, Dave Scott? Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, Charlie? Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, and Gerald? Gerald Cartmell asked, you say it’s going to be less overhang, right? Perry McWilliams stated, it really is because it’s on 2’ right now and we’re only going to have a foot up above there. Dave Scott asked, the house that’s on the survey shows the overhangs? Perry McWilliams stated, yes, yes. Perry McWilliams stated, no, I didn’t, I never remember to do that. I’ll bring it in tomorrow. 6. That the request is for an 8’ south side setback variance and an 8’ north side setback variance to add a second story onto the existing home on Lot Number Forty-Two (42) in the Isle of Homes, a subdivision situated in Sections 8, 9, and 16, Township 27 North, Range 3 West in Union Township and Liberty Township, White County, Indiana. COMMON DESCRIPTION: Property is located North of Norway Dam off of Lake Road 10 E, in the Isle of Homes at 3159 N. Cardinal Drive. Attorney Little stated, let me correct myself here, Mr. Vice President I’m happy to report that the Board has approved petition #2744 unanimously. Perry McWilliams stated, thanks guys I sure appreciate it. #2746 Donna J. Dallinger; The property is located on 1 Acre Out NW cor NE NE 30-27-03, located West of Monticello off of County Road 100 N. at 3804 E. 100 N. Request: She is requesting an 11’ front setback variance and an 83’ rear setback variance to build a room addition onto the existing home. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, is anyone here representing the Dallinger’s? Gerald Cartmell asked, Perry you want to take that one over. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, and there isn’t. Gerald Cartmell stated, it’s supposed to be Criswell. Perry McWilliams stated, oh Vernie is, oh. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, I knew most of that was the Parrish’s back there but I thought I’ve made assumptions before and was wrong so. Perry McWilliams asked, was Vernie supposed to represent them? A member from the audience stated, I guess I can do it. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, anyway with no representation this will be tabled. Director Weaver stated, tabled until September 18th. Director Weaver stated, wow that was easy. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, okay, any other business Diann to be brought before the Board? Director Weaver stated, no I was just going to mention that for those of you that didn’t all ready have your new ordinance, you’ve got your new ordinance laying there. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, that is our personal copy? Director Weaver stated, that is your personal copy. Director Weaver stated, Shaker we have provide you in the blue, the blue hard copy, nope the other one. The binder is the new zoning ordinance. Director Weaver stated, we have provided you a copy of the old zoning ordinance and subdivision ordinance. The blue book that you raised up is the Indiana Codes. Dave Scott asked, what’s going to be the problem? What’s wrong with it? Director Weaver stated, we changed the front setback in the ag zoning from 60’ to 75, I don’t really remember the reasoning for that but we did it. Gerald Cartmell stated, I remember talking about it but I don’t remember why now. Director Weaver stated, I don’t either and then on decks previously they had um, if they were unroofed it could go as close as 4’ to any of the property lines um but now they are specifically addressed so they have to either meet the setback for an accessory structure or primary structure. Dave Scott stated, and if they’re hooked to the house they then have to meet the setback to the primary structure? Director Weaver stated, right, but that’s not the way they were handled in the old ordinance so I think we might have to look at those. Those might become a problem so. Charlie Mellon stated, the City Monday night went ahead and approved it. Director Weaver stated, right, it’s only effective right now in the county and in the City of Monticello. As far as I know nobody else has approved it. Dave Scott stated, our guys signed ours Tuesday night. Director Weaver stated, they did. Dave Scott stated, I don’t think, maybe I was supposed to bring it and I didn’t, like the other letter I didn’t bring. Director Weaver asked, was it effective immediately? Dave Scott stated, yes, well whatever, they just signed whatever you sent them. Director Weaver stated, well there was an effective date on it. Director Weaver asked, can you have Michelle give me a call in the morning? Dave Scott stated, if you don’t hear from her call her. Director Weaver stated, I’ll call her. That’s really all I have. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, okay now I got the letter, September 3rd. Director Weaver stated, September 4th. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, 4th is our next meeting. Director Weaver stated, the meeting that we were supposed to have next week has been postponed to September 4th, the Herald Journal did not, they over looked our ads. Director Weaver stated, they didn’t get the ads in the paper in time so we could not have it next week. Director Weaver stated, Shaker we will still need you at that next meeting. Director Weaver stated, I’ve talked to Dave Stimmel yesterday and he will not be back until our regular September meeting. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, what about Bob is he going to be needed? Don’t know yet? Director Weaver stated, not as far as I’m aware but I don’t always know this far in advance. Shaker Hites asked, so when Dave’s coming I don’t need to come, is that correct? Director Weaver stated, not unless you choose to, you know you don’t have to, you cannot, we can’t have you both voting. We can only have one or the other. Charlie Mellon stated, next summer we’ll need you. Shaker Hites stated, might learn a lot. Charlie Mellon stated, about 6 or 8 meetings. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, but he can’t fill in for me can he? Director Weaver stated, he can only fill in for Dave Stimmel. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, or anybody else, I guess is what I’m saying. Gerald Cartmell stated, to bad he can’t be at large. Director Weaver stated, I know. Gerald Cartmell stated, maybe we need to talk to the Commissioners about that. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, probably tired of seeing us. Director Weaver stated, I think it’s state law, we will go ahead and provide you a copy of the packet each time that way if Dave can’t make it at last minute then you will have the information. Shaker Hites asked, either Dave? Director Weaver stated, no, just Dave Stimmel. Gerald Cartmell stated, I tried. Director Weaver stated, just Dave Stimmel. Gerald Cartmell stated, I tried to get you some work here. Director Weaver stated, but we will keep you informed so. Vice President Jerry Thompson asked, do you have anything? You’re welcome to speak if you do have something. A member from the audience stated, we just want to speak with Bob when he’s done. Gerald Cartmell stated, oh there is. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, there is. Gerald Cartmell stated, we need to talk about our attorney. Gerald Cartmell asked, will it be on the record or not. Charlie Mellon stated, shut it off. Vice President Jerry Thompson stated, I don’t think we need to, myself do we?
2019-04-20T15:03:51Z
http://minutes.whitecountyindiana.us/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=800&Itemid=857