After collapsing and dying suddenly on Nov. 8, those close to rapper Heavy D wanted answers about his death. They've now got them with the revelation that he suffered a pulmonary embolism, a blood clot in his lungs, according to a Los Angeles coroner's report released on Tuesday.
chrissy teigen extremely loud and incredibly close chia seeds super bowl 2012 embers iowa caucus metta
Finally, the conversation changes.
It's time for the NBA to ditch the dollars and nonsense of the lockout for the alleys and oops in Lob City, the new nickname for the suddenly exciting Los Angeles Clippers.
For months, all the talk was about lockouts, salary caps and mediation. Now there are games that count as a new season begins Christmas Day.
For all practical purposes, Clippers fans have been locked out of competitive basketball for the better part of three decades. Now they get entertainment of the highest order ? watching Blake Griffin throw down lob passes from Chris Paul.
The 2011-12 season, shortened to 66 games, debuts Sunday when five marquee games will be played from morning deep into the night. This marks a first step for the league as it looks to bury a damaging offseason marred by a five-month labor dispute and several stars trying to force their way out of town.
The day begins with Boston and New York and then goes to an NBA Finals rematch with Miami at Dallas. Next up is Chicago at the Lakers, followed by the small-market special ? Orlando at Oklahoma City ? before CP3 makes his regular-season debut as a Clipper at Golden State in the nightcap.
"The lockout was hectic for everybody," Timberwolves forward Michael Beasley said. "We were bored! Now we feel like we've got a purpose in life. We can do what we do best."
It's time.
It's time for Derek Fisher to be seen in Lakers gold, not Brooks Brothers gray.
It's time for postgame news conferences with LeBron James and Dwyane Wade, not post-meeting sessions with David Stern and Adam Silver.
It's time for Dirk Nowitzki and the Dallas Mavericks to defend their title on the court, not for Jeffrey Kessler and the players' union to defend their decision to disband in the courts.
"I don't even want to talk about the lockout any more, man!" Oklahoma City forward Kevin Durant said. "It was just so frustrating to go through that and everything that went on, us meeting and not meeting and not coming to an agreement and fans getting upset with us. It was tough. But I'm glad we got through it."
It didn't look so good for a while. Once the dispute was finally settled, a whole new drama broke out with Paul and Dwight Howard looking for trades out of New Orleans and Orlando.
Howard eventually softened his stance, but his future is still the focus in Orlando.
"I don't think our situation is going to go away," Magic coach Stan Van Gundy said. "But I think it'll be a lot more focused on the games than there has been (focus) on the lockout."
The Lakers thought they had a deal for Paul, but Stern, acting as the owner of the Hornets, nixed that, and another crisis was born. The Clippers swooped in at the end, seizing some of the spotlight from Kobe and the Lakers for the first time since, well, ever.
"Hey, that's got to be driving Kobe," Lakers Hall of Famer Magic Johnson said. "That should drive (Pau) Gasol and (Andrew) Bynum and those guys and Derek Fisher to say, `Hey, no way I'm going to let them take over Los Angeles.'"
The two teams met twice in the preseason, and the rivalry quickly escalated. Bryant injured his wrist on a hard foul in the first game and Lakers agitator Matt Barnes shoved Griffin to the court in the second game.
That wasn't the only miniseries infused with more intensity and energy than any exhibition game in recent years.
The Timberwolves were buoyant after finishing their second game against the Bucks with a 12-0 run to finish the preseason 2-0. James and Quentin Richardson were seen trading shoulder blocks all the way down the floor in Miami's preseason finale against Orlando.
"That's our sanctuary. When we get out between the lines and we're playing, that's all that matters," Richardson said. "And that's definitely our escape from anything going on, or anything negative or anything like that."
The melodrama surrounding Paul's request to be traded from New Orleans could have ripple effects throughout the Western Conference. The Lakers have been grousing since losing out on Paul and sending Lamar Odom to Dallas, but they weren't the only team hurt by that decision.
The Rockets had agreed to send Kevin Martin and Luis Scola to the Hornets as part of a three-team deal that would have landed them Gasol. Instead, they had to abandon any designs on signing Nene, go with Sam Dalembert in the middle and do some serious damage control with Scola and Martin.
While all the drama was unfolding, the Thunder have been playing the role of the young, hungry contender, ferociously working while no one was watching and preparing to throw nothing but haymakers as soon as the bell rings.
The Heat are back for another run at the title. James, Wade and Chris Bosh had the whole league against them after a presumptuous welcome ceremony on South Beach. But the spotlight hasn't been quite as bright while everyone has been looking toward the Clippers and Magic, where Howard's wishes seem to change by the day.
"It's good to see other guys around the league get that attention," Wade said. "I think they got enough of us last year. It's good to see other teams, other franchises, get that spotlight for a while. Hope they enjoy it."
The fan hunger is there as well. The Clippers sold out their game against the Lakers, and the first in that series was the most viewed preseason game in NBATV history.
The Timberwolves had 15,000 people attend their home preseason game against the Bucks, and another 2,500 turned out for a free practice on a Monday afternoon just to get a glimpse of Ricky Rubio.
More than 10,000 fans watched a free practice with the New York Knicks, and the Thunder's rabid fan base packed the arena for Durant's return to the court.
"We had to sacrifice a little bit of time and there were some harsh words thrown our way, but at the end of the day, everybody got what they wanted, which was basketball," Durant said. "That's what we worked hard for, is to play the game of basketball. We had to work the business part out and now we're just back to basketball."
Let the games begin.
___
AP Sports Writers Tim Reynolds in Miami, Anne M. Peterson in Portland, Ore., Kyle Hightower in Orlando, Fla., and freelance writer Murray Evans in Oklahoma City contributed to this story.
___
Follow Jon Krawczynski on Twitter: http:http://www.twitter.com/APkrawczynski.
oregon stanford oregon stanford jon huntsman darrell hammond darrell hammond boxer rebellion
LOS ANGELES ? Tom Cruise's latest mission has won a holiday weekend that's shaping up with some silent nights at movie theaters as business continues to lag.
Studio estimates Sunday placed Cruise's "Mission: Impossible ? Ghost Protocol" a solid No. 1 with $26.5 million domestically over its first weekend in full release. The movie raised its total to $59 million since it started a week earlier in huge-screen cinemas and expanded nationwide last Wednesday, and distributor Paramount estimated that revenues will reach $72.7 million by Monday.
Cruise's fourth "Mission" flick was a bright spot over a Christmas weekend filled with so-so tidings for Hollywood, whose usually busy holiday stretch since Thanksgiving has been a bust.
Generally well-reviewed movies from Steven Spielberg ("The Adventures of Tintin"), David Fincher ("The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo") and Cameron Crowe ("We Bought a Zoo") ? with casts that include Matt Damon, Scarlett Johansson and Daniel Craig ? opened with modest to weak results.
Despite predictions from studio executives that 2011 could be a record-setter that would finish with a bang, domestic revenues remained stuck at a sluggish pace that has lingered all year.
Hollywood should finish the year with $10.1 billion domestically, down 4.5 percent from 2010, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com.
The picture gets worse taking into account higher ticket prices, which mean Hollywood brings in fewer fans for each dollar spent. Actual domestic attendance for 2011 will close out at about 1.27 billion, down 5.3 percent from the previous year's and the lowest head count since 1995, when admissions totaled 1.26 billion.
"Thank God 2011 is almost over, because we've had a real rough run here at the end of the year," said Hollywood.com analyst Paul Dergarabedian. "We always count on the holiday season to give us a big boost at the end of the year, and it just didn't happen.
"These admission numbers this year just tell me that we maybe have to set our sights a little lower in terms of attendance every year."
Since peaking at a modern high of 1.6 billion in 2002, domestic movie admissions have been on a general decline since.
Studio executives always insist that slow times result from weak films, but on paper, the strong lineup Hollywood presented this year should have had fans lining up in huge numbers. Pretty good films are out there this holiday season, yet blockbuster expectations fizzled, a sign that people might be skipping a trip to the theater in favor of home-viewing, video games or the countless other entertainment options their gadgets now offer.
Rising ticket prices, particularly the extra few dollars it costs to see 3-D films, also could be causing a backlash among fans.
With "Ghost Protocol" climbing toward the $100 million mark, it's a return to box-office form for Cruise, who had been Hollywood's most-dependable earner for two decades until he turned off fans with odd antics in his personal life six years ago.
"Ghost Protocol" will be Cruise's first top-billed $100 million hit since 2006's "Mission: Impossible III." He had a supporting role in 2008's $100 million comedy hit "Tropic Thunder," which was headlined by Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr. and Jack Black.
Even with a No. 1 debut, "Ghost Protocol" still was a shadow of its predecessors. The first three "Mission: Impossible" movies ranged from $45 million to $58 million over opening weekend, but those installments opened at the start of the busy summer season.
As of Friday, "Ghost Protocol" also had brought in a healthy $118 million overseas.
Downey's "Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows" fell from No., 1 to No. 2 in its second weekend with $17.8 million. The family sequel "Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked" dropped from second to third with $13.3 million.
Both sequels trail well behind the business their predecessors did. "A Game of Shadows," from Warner Bros., lifted its domestic haul to $76.6 million, while 20th Century Fox's "Chipwrecked" pushed its receipts to $50.3 million.
The weekend's newcomers failed to light up the box office, too. Fincher and Craig's "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" from Sony was No. 4 with $13 million, Spielberg's "The Adventures of Tintin" from Paramount was No. 5 with $9.1 million and Crowe, Damon and Johansson's "We Bought a Zoo" from 20th Century Fox was No. 6 with $7.8 million.
"Dragon Tattoo" raised its total to $21.4 million since opening Tuesday night, while "Tintin" lifted its take to $17.1 million since debuting Wednesday.
European literary exports "Dragon Tattoo," adapted from Stieg Larsson's Swedish best-seller, and "Tintin," based on Belgian artist Herge's storybook classics, are finding a lukewarm reception among U.S. crowds.
"Dragon Tattoo" has been a sensation among U.S. readers yet failed to challenge "Mission: Impossible" and the other established franchises at the top of the box office.
Beloved by generations of readers overseas, "Tintin" launched internationally two months ahead of its U.S. release. But the blockbuster global attention, with nearly $250 million already in the bank from foreign markets, did not translate to crowds in the United States.
The calendar made it a tough weekend for Hollywood, with Christmas Eve ? always a slow night for movie-going ? falling on Saturday, usually the best day of the week at theaters.
Christmas Day typically is a strong one for movies, as fans squeeze in a film between unwrapping presents and sitting down to family dinners.
Two big holiday releases ? Spielberg's World War I epic "War Horse" and Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock's Sept. 11 drama "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close" ? opened Christmas Day, but estimates on their revenues will not be available until Monday.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Where available, latest international numbers are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
1. "Mission: Impossible ? Ghost Protocol," $26.5 million.
2. "Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows," $17.8 million.
3. "Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked," $13.3 million ($20.1 million international).
4. "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," $13 million.
5. "The Adventures of Tintin," $9.1 million.
6. "We Bought a Zoo," $7.8 million ($1.1 million international).
7. "New Year's Eve," $3 million.
8. "Arthur Christmas," $2.7 million ($9.7 million international).
9. "Hugo," $2.03 million.
10. "The Muppets," $2 million ($500,000 international).
___
Online:
http://www.hollywood.com
http://www.rentrak.com
___
Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.
acrylamide advent calendar adobe air 2005yu55 advanced search personhood amendment haynesworth
If fire, grazing and insect attack, the most likely causes of decline, remain unchecked, then?frankincense?production could be doomed altogether.
Trees that produce frankincense, a fragrant resin used in incense and perfumes and a central part of the Christmas story, are declining so fast that production could be halved over the next 15 years, scientists said on Wednesday.
Skip to next paragraphIn a study published in the British Ecological Society's Journal of Applied Ecology, ecologists from the Netherlands and Ethiopia looked at large-scale field studies and predicted that tree numbers could decline by 90 percent in the next 50 years.
If fire, grazing and insect attack, the most likely causes of decline, remain unchecked, then frankincense production could be doomed altogether, they warned.
Frankincense, best known in religious teachings as one of the gifts laid before the newborn Messiah, is obtained by tapping various species of Boswellia, a small, deciduous tree that grows across Africa from northern Nigeria to the highlands of Ethiopia and Eritrea.
Cutting the Boswellia's bark produces the frankincense resin, a white substance with a strong, sweet smell. The resin is burnt in churches, mosques and at ceremonies, as well as being used by the perfume industry and in herbal medicines.
Despite its economic importance, incense has been traded internationally for thousands of years, little is known about how tapping affects Boswellia populations.
Working in an isolated part of northwest Ethiopia near the source of the Blue Nile, a research team led by Frans Bongers of Wageningen University in the Netherlands studied 13 two-hectare plots, some where trees were tapped for frankincense and some where they were untapped.
Over two years, they monitored survival, growth and seed production of more than 6,000 Boswellia trees and used the data to build mathematical models to predict the fate of Boswellia populations in coming years. The forecasts suggest Boswellia populations are declining so dramatically that frankincense production could be halved in the next 15 years.
"Current management of Boswellia populations is clearly unsustainable," Bongers said in a statement. "Our models show that within 50 years, populations of Boswellia will be decimated, and the declining populations mean frankincense production is doomed."
The researchers found that all the Boswellia populations they studied are declining, not only those from tapped trees, a finding that suggests factors other than tapping are at the root of the problem.
Bongers said the main causes of the trees' decline are likely to be burning, grazing and attack by the long-horn beetle, which lays its eggs under the Boswellia's bark.
The scientists urged local authorities to introduce better management incentives to ensure farmers work harder to protect Boswellia trees. In the short-term this meant preventing fires and beetle attack, Bongers said, but in the longer-term, large areas should be set aside and protected for five to 10 years to allow Boswellia saplings to become established.
ed lee garmin nuvi 1450 amzn tommy john surgery colorado weather alcohol poisoning alcohol poisoning
Samsung makes some top-quality smartphones, but doesn't bestow them upon Verizon Wireless often. Sure, there's the new Galaxy Nexus?($299.99, 4 stars), but Android 4.0 aside, it lags behind Motorola's latest offering, the Droid RAZR ($299.99, 4.5 stars). The Samsung Illusion ($79.99 with a two-year contract) doesn't stand a chance against either of those two devices, but then again, it isn't trying to. Like many other Samsung phones for Verizon, the Illusion is a decent, midrange option, although it feels like it should be free with contract. It lacks 4G, and you don't have to look hard or spend more than $100 with contract to find something better.
Design and Call Quality
The Samsung Illusion measures 4.5 by 2.4 by 0.5 inches (HWD) and weighs 4.2 ounces. It's made entirely of plastic, with a textured back panel. Unlike the gigantic Galaxy Nexus, the Illusion is a comfortable size to hold for any hand. The 3.5-inch, 320-by-480-pixel capacitive touch screen is bright and vibrant, though that resolution is disappointingly low. I would have much preferred to see the 800-by-480 screens that are now becoming standard. I had no problem typing on the onscreen QWERTY keyboard with accuracy. Four touch functions keys sit beneath the display, which are suitably responsive.
The Illusion is a dual-band EV-DO Rev A (800/1900MHz) with 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi. You can also use the phone as a mobile hotspot with the appropriate plan to provide a Wi-Fi connection for up to five devices. But while there are still plenty of 3G phones coming out for Verizon, the carrier's 4G network now covers 200 million Americans; a lack of 4G is a definite minus in my book.
Voice quality is excellent. Reception is average, and incoming calls sound rich and clear, with volume that can go extremely loud. On the other end, calls made with the phone are equally clear and feature good background noise cancellation. The speakerphone sounds fine, though it's a little low for outdoor use. Calls sounded clear and natural through a?Jawbone Era?Bluetooth headset ($129, 4.5 stars) and voice dialing worked accurately. Battery life was excellent at 8 hours, 10 minutes of talk time.
Hardware, Android, and Apps
Inside, the Illusion is powered by the same 1GHz Cortex A8-based Hummingbird CPU found in the?4G Samsung Droid Charge?($199.99, 4 stars) as well as last year's Samsung Galaxy S line. It's decently fast, though it lags far behind dual-core devices like the Motorola Droid Bionic?($199.99, 4.5 stars).
The Illusion runs Android 2.3.5 (Gingerbread) with Samsung's TouchWiz UI layer. It isn't as all-encompassing as HTC's Sense UI, but it adds some nice color and graphic enhancements. There are five customizable home screens that come preloaded with some useful apps and widgets. Verizon has added some undeletable bloatware to the Illusion, but no more than you find in most Android phones nowadays. There are no plans so far for an upgrade to Android 4.0 "Ice Cream Sandwich."
You get Google Maps Navigation for voice-enabled, turn-by-turn GPS directions, along with some other useful, preinstalled apps. Of course, you also have your pick of more than 250,000+ apps from the Android Market, most of which should work well on the Illusion.
Multimedia and Conclusions
There's a side-mounted microSD card slot on the left side of the Illusion, which is a big plus. Samsung includes a 2GB card, but our 32GB and 64GB SanDisk cards worked fine. You also get 990MB of free internal storage.
Music sounded good over both wired 3.5mm headphones as well as?Altec Lansing BackBeat?Bluetooth headphones ($99.99, 3.5 stars). The Illusion was able to play AAC, MP3, OGG, WAV, and WMA test files, but not FLAC. All of our video test files played back without a hitch, at resolutions up to 720p.
The 3.2-megapixel camera is disappointing. Though it snaps photos in a quick .3 second, it lacks auto-focus or an LED flash. Test photos look decent, with average color and detail, but they're no replacement for an average digital camera. The camera also captures 720-by-480 (DVD quality, not HD) video at a smooth 30 frames per second both indoors and out.
Throughout the course of my testing, I kept finding myself thinking, why isn't this phone free? The Illusion has the makings of an excellent entry-level smartphone, the kind you get for free with a two-year contract. While it's a solid starter device, there are too many other good options on Verizon in the same price range to recommend it highly.
The Samsung Stratosphere?($99.99, 3.5 stars) gets you access to Verizon's 4G LTE network along with a much nicer display and a physical QWERTY keyboard for just $20 more than the Illusion. The Pantech Breakout?($99.99, 3.5 stars) drops the keyboard, but also has 4G LTE and a better display. Then there's the iPhone 4?($99, 4 stars), which isn't 4G, but has a gorgeous display and the best app selection out there. All three beat the Illusion handily, showing that this might be the right budget Android phone, but it's being sold for the wrong price.
Benchmarks
Continuous talk time: 8 hours 10 minutes
More Cell Phone Reviews:
??? HTC Wildfire S (MetroPCS)
??? Samsung Illusion (Verizon Wireless)
??? Samsung Galaxy Nexus (Verizon Wireless)
??? LG Optimus Slider (Virgin Mobile)
??? Samsung Focus S (AT&T)
?? more
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/IBDsdsWgKG8/0,2817,2397828,00.asp
lettuce recall zanesville ohio zanesville ohio light field camera world series game 1 exotic animals exotic animals
ScienceDaily (Dec. 20, 2011) ? Mockingbirds rarely remove the 'alien' eggs parasitic cowbirds lay in their nests because keeping them dilutes the risk of their own eggs being attacked.
The study, by Oxford University and Argentinean scientists, examined the behaviour of the chalk-browed mockingbird (Mimus saturninus) which is parasitized by the shiny cowbird (Molothrus bonariensis) in Argentina.
A report of the research is published in this week's Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
Shiny cowbirds regularly visit mockingbird nests and attack and puncture any eggs they find there -- damaged eggs are later removed by the mockingbird host. During these visits cowbirds will often lay their own eggs in the nest for mockingbirds to hatch and bring up alongside their own chicks.
Whilst mockingbirds will mob an attacking cowbird, once an alien egg has been laid in their nest they will usually accept it -- even though it looks very different from their own eggs.
The researchers recorded video of 130 cowbird visits to see what happened to the eggs in mockingbird nests over three breeding seasons. They experimentally manipulated clutch compositions to compare host egg survival in clutches with different numbers of cowbird eggs. They found that mockingbird eggs were more likely to survive a puncture attack when more cowbird eggs were present in the nest.
Computer simulations showed that this is likely to be a widespread phenomenon, and that, paradoxically, the greater the local density of parasites, the stronger the benefit hosts get from the presence of parasite eggs.
'It seems that the advantage mockingbirds gain from leaving these alien eggs in their nests is that they attract some of the destructive behaviour in later cowbird visits, and this benefit outweighs the cost of later having to rear the cowbird nestlings,' said Professor Alex Kacelnik from Oxford University's Department of Zoology, an author of the report. 'This is likely to be because, unlike other parasitic birds such as the cuckoo, mockingbird chicks do well in competition with their parasitic nest-mates -- fledging at rates similar to those of unparasitized broods.'
Of 347 mockingbird nests studied 89% were parasitized with one or more cowbird eggs, 35% receiving more than three, and 16% more than five (typically, they received around three).
'It might be expected that this high rate of parasitism would encourage a host to evolve more effective anti-parasite defences,' said Ros Gloag from Oxford University's Department of Zoology, an author of the report. 'In fact, the opposite is probably true: the higher the intensity of parasitism, the higher the frequency of puncturing attacks and the greater the importance of diluting this risk. Thus, hosts benefit more by not rejecting parasite eggs when there are more parasites around.'
Recommend this story on Facebook, Twitter,
and Google +1:
Other bookmarking and sharing tools:
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Oxford.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/tS-NvJp8RIM/111220194810.htm
julian beever appeasement ian stewart ian stewart odom colt mccoy vt
![[ Back to EurekAlert! ]](http://www.eurekalert.org/images/back2e.gif){kind=small}
Public release date: 15-Dec-2011
Share ] Contact: Jennifer Beal
jbeal@wiley.com
Wiley-Blackwell
Weinheim, Germany -- Wiley-VCH, part of the scientific and technical publishing business of John Wiley & Sons, Inc., and ChemPubSoc Europe, an association of 16 chemical societies, have announced the launch of ChemPlusChem, a multidisciplinary journal centering on chemistry (http://www.ChemPlusChem.org).
Original papers published will cover at least two different aspects (subfields) of chemistry or one of chemistry and one of another scientific discipline (one chemistry topic plus another one, hence the title ChemPlusChem). ChemPlusChem, in this new exciting form, will succeed the Collection of Czechoslovak Chemical Communications which will cease publication at the end of 2011.
ChemPlusChem will, as its predecessor did, feature strictly peer-reviewed full papers, communications, reviews, and mini-reviews from all subfields of chemistry. The journal will be published online only, ensuring rapid publication and colourful presentation of the results. The first articles will appear online shortly, with the first issue following in January 2012.
ChemPlusChem is tailored to multidisciplinary chemistry, biology, materials, and physics researchers from across the world. Collaboration is a prerequisite to multidisciplinary science, and the portion of papers with contributions from two or more research groups has more than doubled within the last ten years in Chemistry journals. ChemPlusChem is the first journal to specifically provide a high-quality forum for papers arising from these scientific partnerships.
According to Professor Wolfram Koch, Executive Director of the German Chemical Society and President of several of the journals published by ChemPubSoc Europe, "The ChemPubSoc Europe members are excited about this new project. Dedicated to truly interdisciplinary work and committed to the highest quality standards, ChemPlusChem complements the portfolio of ChemPubSoc Europe journals in an ideal way. As European chemical societies which serve the chemical community we are proud to launch this new journal together with our long-standing partner Wiley-VCH."
The Editor, Dr. Neville Compton from Wiley-VCH, and Professor Koch on behalf of ChemPubSoc Europe, are delighted to have secured the services of Professors Matthias Driess, Michal Hocek, and Nico Sommerdijk as co-chairmen of the Editorial Board of ChemPlusChem.
"To be an active part of crossdisciplinary research can be a tremendous 'catalyst' to boost creativity in chemistry and in turn to convince colleagues from other disciplines to interconnect with the beauty and power of chemistry," said Professor Matthias Driess from the Berlin Institute of Technology. "The launch of ChemPlusChem will be of benefit to all crossdisciplinary researchers and will ensure that fruitful scientific collaborations keep heading in the right direction."
According to Associate Professor Michal Hocek from the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry, Czech Republic, "The chemical community urgently needs a general multidisciplinary journal with a broadly defined scope to accommodate high quality, complex papers covering several subject categories in parallel."
Associate Professor Nico Sommerdijk from the Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands said of the new journal, "Great inventions almost always are the product of multidisciplinary research! There is a great need for a chemistry journal that is able to review and publish creative studies that bring together contributions from many areas of research. I think ChemPlusChem will be that journal."
###
About ChemPubSoc Europe:
ChemPubSoc Europe (http://www.chempubsoc.eu) is an organisation of 16 European chemical societies, founded in the late 1990s as a consequence of the amalgamation of more than a dozen chemical journals owned by national chemical societies into a number of high quality European journals. ChemPubSoc Europe's journals, which are all published with Wiley-VCH, are: ChemistryA European Journal, European Journal of Organic Chemistry, European Journal of Inorganic Chemistry, ChemBioChem, ChemPhysChem, ChemMedChem, ChemSusChem, ChemCatChem, ChemistryOpen, and ChemViews The ChemPubSoc Europe Magazine. All participating societies share a commitment to scientific excellence, to publishing ethics, and to the highest standards in publication, which are the basis for the success of the ChemPubSoc Europe journals. ChemPubSoc Europe has approximately 72,000 members.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public release date: 15-Dec-2011 Share ] Contact: Jennifer Beal
jbeal@wiley.com
Wiley-Blackwell
Weinheim, Germany -- Wiley-VCH, part of the scientific and technical publishing business of John Wiley & Sons, Inc., and ChemPubSoc Europe, an association of 16 chemical societies, have announced the launch of ChemPlusChem, a multidisciplinary journal centering on chemistry (http://www.ChemPlusChem.org).
Original papers published will cover at least two different aspects (subfields) of chemistry or one of chemistry and one of another scientific discipline (one chemistry topic plus another one, hence the title ChemPlusChem). ChemPlusChem, in this new exciting form, will succeed the Collection of Czechoslovak Chemical Communications which will cease publication at the end of 2011.
ChemPlusChem will, as its predecessor did, feature strictly peer-reviewed full papers, communications, reviews, and mini-reviews from all subfields of chemistry. The journal will be published online only, ensuring rapid publication and colourful presentation of the results. The first articles will appear online shortly, with the first issue following in January 2012.
ChemPlusChem is tailored to multidisciplinary chemistry, biology, materials, and physics researchers from across the world. Collaboration is a prerequisite to multidisciplinary science, and the portion of papers with contributions from two or more research groups has more than doubled within the last ten years in Chemistry journals. ChemPlusChem is the first journal to specifically provide a high-quality forum for papers arising from these scientific partnerships.
According to Professor Wolfram Koch, Executive Director of the German Chemical Society and President of several of the journals published by ChemPubSoc Europe, "The ChemPubSoc Europe members are excited about this new project. Dedicated to truly interdisciplinary work and committed to the highest quality standards, ChemPlusChem complements the portfolio of ChemPubSoc Europe journals in an ideal way. As European chemical societies which serve the chemical community we are proud to launch this new journal together with our long-standing partner Wiley-VCH."
The Editor, Dr. Neville Compton from Wiley-VCH, and Professor Koch on behalf of ChemPubSoc Europe, are delighted to have secured the services of Professors Matthias Driess, Michal Hocek, and Nico Sommerdijk as co-chairmen of the Editorial Board of ChemPlusChem.
"To be an active part of crossdisciplinary research can be a tremendous 'catalyst' to boost creativity in chemistry and in turn to convince colleagues from other disciplines to interconnect with the beauty and power of chemistry," said Professor Matthias Driess from the Berlin Institute of Technology. "The launch of ChemPlusChem will be of benefit to all crossdisciplinary researchers and will ensure that fruitful scientific collaborations keep heading in the right direction."
According to Associate Professor Michal Hocek from the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry, Czech Republic, "The chemical community urgently needs a general multidisciplinary journal with a broadly defined scope to accommodate high quality, complex papers covering several subject categories in parallel."
Associate Professor Nico Sommerdijk from the Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands said of the new journal, "Great inventions almost always are the product of multidisciplinary research! There is a great need for a chemistry journal that is able to review and publish creative studies that bring together contributions from many areas of research. I think ChemPlusChem will be that journal."
###
About ChemPubSoc Europe:
ChemPubSoc Europe (http://www.chempubsoc.eu) is an organisation of 16 European chemical societies, founded in the late 1990s as a consequence of the amalgamation of more than a dozen chemical journals owned by national chemical societies into a number of high quality European journals. ChemPubSoc Europe's journals, which are all published with Wiley-VCH, are: ChemistryA European Journal, European Journal of Organic Chemistry, European Journal of Inorganic Chemistry, ChemBioChem, ChemPhysChem, ChemMedChem, ChemSusChem, ChemCatChem, ChemistryOpen, and ChemViews The ChemPubSoc Europe Magazine. All participating societies share a commitment to scientific excellence, to publishing ethics, and to the highest standards in publication, which are the basis for the success of the ChemPubSoc Europe journals. ChemPubSoc Europe has approximately 72,000 members.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-12/w-wac121511.php
ohio issue 2 ohio issue 2 mississippi personhood mississippi personhood issue 2 ohio issue 2 ohio election results 2011
WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? An explicit ban on insider trading by federal lawmakers could narrow existing law covering the conduct, a top Securities and Exchange Commission official warned on Tuesday.
Any changes need to be "carefully calibrated" so that they do not hurt insider trading prosecutions outside of Congress, enforcement director Robert Khuzami told a House panel.
The House Financial Services Committee on Tuesday considered legislation that would prohibit members of Congress and their staff from trading in securities or commodities based on non-public information gleaned through their jobs.
The bill has languished in Congress for the past five years, but saw renewed interest after a recent television report on "60 Minutes" that found some lawmakers profited from inside information.
The chairman of the House committee, Spencer Bachus, was one of the lawmakers singled out by the report for trading stock options after a Treasury briefing about the economic collapse in 2008. At Tuesday's hearing, he said he would schedule a markup of the legislation.
"In practice, we have never seen these rules applied to Congress," said Representative Louise Slaughter, a Democrat from New York who introduced the bill. "We want to remove any current ambiguity."
"We are trying to set the bar higher for members of Congress," said Representative Timothy Walz, a Democrat from Minnesota who co-sponsored the bill.
While the SEC prosecutes insider trading under general anti-fraud provisions, the agency has never used the laws to go after members of Congress.
The bill could narrow some existing laws, Khuzami said.
The proposed legislation targets information related to pending legislation, for example, and might exempt information obtained through a regulatory briefing, he said.
Khuzami suggested lawmakers instead create an explicit fiduciary duty between members of Congress to keep information gained on the job confidential and not use it for private gain. The agency would be able to use that general duty to go after insider trading in Congress, he said.
"Highlighting a duty by members of Congress ... is the simplest way to go," he said.
The existing proposal had support in the single digits before the 60 Minutes report, but won 171 co-sponsors in recent weeks, Slaughter said.
A Senate panel considered similar legislation last week.
(Reporting by Aruna Viswanatha; editing by Matthew Lewis)
jay leno machine gun kelly lindsey lohan reed hastings cujo hpv vaccine hurricane tracking
Scotty McCreery is having a good week.
The most recent American Idol winner was named Best New Artist at last night's American Country Awards, accepting the trophy via a live performance, as seen here:
The young crooner also watched his debut album, "Clear as Day," surpass 500,000 sold copies, a feat that took only two months to accomplish. It currently sits atop the Billboard Country Albums chart.
“It’s huge," Scotty said in a statement. "Every artist dreams of a gold album and works hard for it, so it’s a major accomplishment to have your debut album go gold. This is just incredible."
Way to go, Scotty M! We're very happy to see you overcome this Thanksgiving incident.
Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2011/12/scotty-mccreery-debut-album-goes-gold/
brandon marshall headless horseman headless horseman brandon lloyd brandon lloyd publishers clearing house scare tactics
U.S. regional carrier C Spire (former Cellular South) announced today that it's carrying the Sony Ericsson Xperia Play for $49.99 on contract (and after $50 rebate). The so-called Playstation phone -- nicknamed for its Playstation-like slide-out controls -- is the same as we've crawled all over for the past year or so, with a 4-inch display, 1GHz Snapdragon II processor, 5MP rear camera and a slew of available games.
We're not yet seeing the Xperia Play on C Spire's website, but you can call telesales (855-277-4734) or get it in a C Spire store.
Source: Press release
More: Read our Xperia Play review
 |  |
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/9kTOyHL77rQ/story01.htm
osteopathy diphtheria diphtheria smokey robinson smokey robinson del rio del rio
STATE COLLEGE, Pa. ? The full story about what happened in the Penn State child-sex abuse scandal will only come out through the civil lawsuits that now appear inevitable, and the matter raises novel and challenging legal issues, according to lawyers with experience in similar litigation.
Lawyers for people who say former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky victimized them have been surfacing and speaking out in recent days, raising the likelihood the criminal charges currently pending against him will eventually be followed by civil lawsuits.
Sandusky is accused of abusing eight boys, some on campus, over 15 years, allegations that were not immediately brought to the attention of authorities even though high-level people at Penn State apparently knew about them.
The scandal resulted in the ousting of school President Graham Spanier and longtime coach Joe Paterno, and has brought shame to one of college football's legendary programs.
Athletic Director Tim Curley was placed on administrative leave, and Vice President Gary Schultz, who was in charge of the university's police department, stepped down.
Schultz and Curley are charged with lying to the grand jury and failure to report to police, and Sandusky is charged with child sex abuse. All maintain their innocence.
One of the first tasks will be to winnow out any claimants who may seize upon the scandal in hopes of financial gain.
"It does happen that people who come out of the woodwork do not have a real case," said Gerald J. Williams, a Philadelphia lawyer who has handled civil rights cases involving child abuse. "But by the same token, in this kind of case, there are often a lot of people who have just been quiet about their encounters with the defendant."
Reed Smith, a Pittsburgh-based law firm with more than 1,700 attorneys, said Thursday it had been retained by the board of trustees, although a Penn State spokesman downplayed the threat of civil exposure.
"Nobody here is spending any time thinking about that or talking about that," said university relations vice president Bill Mahon.
Legal experts said Sandusky, the school and other likely defendants would all face different levels and types of possible legal problems in civil court. That would hinge on the evidence produced by the discovery process, which in civil litigation generates much more information than in a criminal trial, where defendants have a broader right against self-incrimination.
"You're going to see everybody pointing at somebody else to try and get themselves out of it," said Slade McLaughlin, a Philadelphia lawyer who has pursued claims in the Philadelphia Catholic priest abuse case. "When you've got 19, 20 kids coming out, saying `He did it, he did it,' I don't understand why anyone at Penn State in their right mind would say, `Let's fight this.'"
McLaughlin said he based those numbers on direct conversations with lawyers who have already lined up clients, as well as with investigators for those lawyers who are currently combing for potential evidence to use when lawsuits are ready to be filed. He does not currently represent any accusers, but expects to become involved in the near future.
"I've heard there are people out there going to the rallies, scouting around, talking to people who went to The Second Mile gatherings," McLaughlin said. The Second Mile is a charity Sandusky founded for at-risk children where, according the attorney general's office, he met the eight boys he is accused of sexually abusing.
Lynne Abraham, the former Philadelphia district attorney who has been hired by The Second Mile, said the charity might be destroyed by the scandal.
"If we can reconstitute ourselves ... will the public and donors have faith in us?" she said. "The need doesn't go away if an organization closes. The need just goes someplace else."
Harrisburg lawyer Ben Andreozzi, whose firm specializes in sexual abuse litigation, represents at least one male client who accuses Sandusky of severe sexual assault. He told the Legal Intelligencer he and another lawyer are in "active communication" with other potential clients.
State police said one adult has contacted them.
Justine Andronici, a lawyer with the Centre County Women's Resource Center in Bellefonte, on Thursday confirmed a story in The Harrisburg Patriot-News that she and attorney Andy Shubin were working to help people who have come forward to accuse Sandusky in the wake of a Monday night television interview during which he denied criminal wrongdoing.
At least three other Pennsylvania lawyers have told the AP in recent days that they have been in contact with purported victims or their representatives about potential lawsuits.
"I've been doing this for 24 years, and I've never seen this activity," said Altoona lawyer Richard M. Serbin, who has pursued well over 150 claims against Catholic and non-Catholic religious institutions, and others, across the state. "Some of the people I've seen on TV that are supposedly handling these cases, I've never even heard of."
The myriad of legal issues raised in the scandal includes whether Penn State, a "state-related" university that is getting more than $272 million from state government this year, will be able to assert government status that might limit liability.
"They are not entitled to sovereign immunity," said Matthew Casey, a Philadelphia lawyer who has handled catastrophic injury cases. "It doesn't mean that they won't attempt to invoke sovereign immunity, but the appellate case law is pretty clear on that."
The response by Penn State officials to reports of abuse will probably form a key part of any legal battle, as well as the circumstances surrounding Sandusky's abrupt retirement in 1999 at the height of his coaching career.
Another complicating factor is the statute of limitations in these kinds of cases for juvenile victims. Until August 2002 the clock ran out at age 20, but that year the Legislature raised the limit to 30. Prosecutors accused Sandusky of crimes from 1994 to 2009, and it's unclear whether civil allegations will date back further.
Serbin said Pennsylvania's law remains one of the weakest in the country, from the standpoint of child abuse victims. When it was changed nine years ago, the new provisions were not made retroactive, and courts tend to enforce the time limits strictly.
"So some of these cases may already be stale, and my hunch is, some of them are," Serbin said.
Several experts predicted any civil cases will wind up in Centre County Common Pleas Court ? not federal court ? and that judges will be sympathetic to having the cases captioned anonymously, if that is what the accusers want.
Some lawyers suggested Penn State, a large institution that can afford a vigorous legal defense, should consider reaching out to victims in an effort to avoid lawsuits.
"New facts are going to come out, I'm sure, in the civil litigation," Casey said. "It's one of the reasons that Penn State and the other potential defendants may decide to do whatever they can to prevent that from happening, and people going under oath. It's very dangerous."
Mahon said that has not been a subject of discussion.
"We don't have the identities of victims, other than maybe some of them going to the press," he said.
Lawyers had different theories regarding whether to file a lawsuit immediately, or after criminal charges have been resolved. Some say delays never helps plaintiffs, but others believe details that emerge from the criminal cases will strengthen their hand. Publicity now, of course may also generate additional clients.
So many facts remain unknown that it is difficult to say how much a legitimate claim of sexual abuse against a child might be worth in the eyes of a jury, and the grand jury report showed a vast range of alleged actions by Sandusky, from apparent sexual overtures to an eye-witnessed attack in the team's locker room showers.
"I know whatever number ends up being on it, it's going to be a very, very large number," said Williams, the Philadelphia plaintiffs' lawyer. "Because of the nature of the liability, the nature of the cases, and the nature of the damages."
___
Scolforo reported from Harrisburg. Maryclaire Dale in Philadelphia contributed to this report.
eagles magic johnson involuntary manslaughter stevens johnson syndrome verdict in michael jackson trial verdict in michael jackson trial
ABSTRACT:
Previous study indicated a high prevalence of ocular fundus pathology among patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD), while the relationship between them has never been explored in a Chinese Population.
This cross-sectional study included 9 670 participants enrolled in a medical screening program. Ocular fundus examination was performed by ophthalmologists using ophthalmoscopes. The presence of eGFR less than 60 mL/min/1.73 m2 and/or proteinuria was defined as CKD.
Compared to participants without CKD, participants with CKD had higher prevalence of retinopathy (28.5% vs. 16.3%, P<0.001), glaucoma suspect (3.1% vs. 1.8%, P=0.004), age-related macular degeneration (1.7% vs. 0.9%, P=0.01) and overall eye pathology (32.0% vs. 19.4%, P<0.001). After adjusting for potential confounders, the odds ratio of proteinuria for overall eye pathology and retinopathy was 1.29 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.07-1.55) and 1.37 (95% CI 1.12-1.67), respectively. The results were robust after excluding participants with hypertension or with diabetes.
Ocular fundus pathology is common among Chinese patients with CKD. Regular eye exam among persons with proteinuria is warranted.
derrick mason derrick mason lamichael james lamichael james epstein harrisburg pa chynna phillips
NEW YORK (AP) ? Kim Cattrall was on stage recently when her past loudly interrupted.
"The curtain went up and somebody yelled out, 'Love 'ya, Sam!'" the actress says with a wry smile.
The "Sam" in question is, of course, the man-eater Samantha Jones from "Sex and the City." The trouble was that Cattrall wasn't playing Samantha on this night: She was trying to be Amanda in a production of Noel Coward's "Private Lives."
Momentarily shaken, Cattrall pressed on. "You just go to yourself, 'Oh, that's sweet.' And then you go, 'OK, let's go. Who's got the first line?' You're in character. It's just what you do."
Since putting down her last cosmopolitan in the second "Sex and the City" movie, Cattrall has politely been trying to shake off Samantha and remind people that she's also a veteran theater actress.
That mission will get easier when "Private Lives" opens Thursday at the Music Box Theatre. Cattrall steps into the role played by respected actresses including Gertrude Lawrence, Maggie Smith and Elizabeth Taylor.
It's the tale of a divorced couple who discover they have adjoining rooms while honeymooning with their new spouses and rekindle their romance. Cattrall stars opposite Paul Gross, star of the TV shows "Due South" and "Slings and Arrows."
Cattrall, 55, in person is as thoughtful and sincere as Samantha is not, a beauty with a regal air whose stunning appeal hasn't faded in the years since she was an ingenue in "Police Academy," ''Mannequin" and "Porky's."
She's built a career switching from commercial films to theater, but the Samanthas in her career seem to stick more in the popular consciousness than her role in "Three Sisters." She's been in "View From the Bridge" at the Lee Strasberg Institute, in a Donmar Warehouse production of David Mamet's "The Cryptogram" and played a quadriplegic sculptor in a London production of "Whose Life Is It Anyway?"
"If you look at my resume, you'll see my theater and film ? they look like two different actors in a lot of ways," she says. "I knew from a very early age that if I wanted to be viable in the theater world, people know who you are if you have film credits."
Richard Eyre, the director of "Private Lives" and who helmed "Mary Poppins" and Indiscretions" on Broadway and also was head of the Royal National Theatre, has long been hoping to work with Cattrall.
"Quite often people think actors who have celebrity because of a TV career have not proved themselves on the stage. But she was a stage actress before she became a television actress," he says. "It doesn't go away."
The two didn't initially intend to team up for the Coward play. They actually planned to work on a production of Henrik Ibsen's "Ghosts," which created a sensation by raising the taboo topic of venereal disease. But they found out there was another production of "Ghosts" in the works that had booked a theater in London.
While searching for an alternative work, Cattrall was sent "Private Lives" by messenger. "I read like the first 15, 16 pages and I called Richard and I said, 'We've got to do this. Let's leave syphilis behind,'" she says with a laugh.
"It really made me laugh. I loved the clip of it. I loved the barb of it. I loved the screwball comedy of it. I had been doing such heavy things and I thought this would be really, really great."
A successful run in London led to a stint in Toronto and now Broadway, a trans-national trip that has significance for Cattrall, who was born in Britain, grew up in Canada and now lives in New York. "This play is hitting every major stop. It's really quite astounding," she says.
While Coward plays are often considered to be frothy and mannered, Cattrall sees "Private Lives" to be ahead of its time. There are very dark elements, including allusions to wife-beating, and Cattrall's character has a feminist streak. "What he's really writing about is heterosexual relationships and the obsession of love," she says of Coward.
Cattrall, who made her Broadway debut in "Wild Honey" with Ian McKellen in 1986, has found plenty of work since "Sex and the City" began winding down. She was in a stage production of "Antony and Cleopatra" for director Janet Suzman, in the miniseries "Any Human Heart" on PBS, and in the films "Meet Monica Velour" and Roman Polanski's "The Ghost Writer" opposite Pierce Brosnan and Ewan McGregor.
The theater is where she feels happiest, though. For one thing, there are fewer Samantha Jones parts, which she now gets offered a lot. "The theater, for me, especially now, is where the best parts are," she says.
"I love Samantha but I don't think the writing could surpass what we were given on a weekly basis. And secondly, I feel like I did it to the best of my ability. To revisit it outside the actual creative team, I don't think would be that satisfying for me."
She likes to cite a lesson she learned from actor Jack Lemon. When they met, she asked him the secret of his longevity in show business. His reply is something she's taken to heart: Take things that scare you.
But she doesn't want to be preachy about it.
"I'm not interested in educating people about me and what I've done and haven't done. They can read it in the Playbill," she says. "What I want for them is, hopefully, to be entertained and have an experience that will possibly have them buy another ticket to a straight play."
___
Online:
http://www.privatelivesbroadway.com
jim thome jim thome fun fun fun fest fun fun fun fest move your money alabama vs lsu alabama vs lsu
Public release date: 14-Nov-2011 Share ] Contact: Summer Freeman
summer.freeman@stjude.org
901-595-3061
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
A century after the valves that link the lymphatic and blood systems were first described, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientists have detailed how those valves form and identified a gene that is critical to the process.
The gene is Prox1. Earlier work led by Guillermo Oliver, Ph.D., a member of the St. Jude Department of Genetics, showed Prox1 was essential for formation and maintenance of the entire lymphatic vasculature. The lymphatic vasculature is the network of vessels and ducts that help maintain the body's fluid balance and serves as a highway along which everything from cancer cells to disease-fighting immune components moves. Oliver is senior author of the new study, which appeared in the October 15 edition of the scientific journal Genes & Development.
The new research suggests that Prox1 is also essential for proper formation of the one-way valves that control movement of fluid and nutrients from the lymphatic system into the blood stream. Researchers found evidence that the Prox1 protein also has a role in formation of the venous valves.
"Understanding how valves form is crucial to efforts to develop treatments for valve defects that affect both children and adults," said the paper's first author, R. Sathish Srinivasan, Ph.D., a research associate in the St. Jude Department of Genetics. Those defects are linked to a variety of problems including lymphedema and deep vein thrombosis, which are blood clots that form deep in veins and have the potential for causing life-threatening complications. Lymphedema is the painful and sometimes disfiguring swelling that can occur when lymph flow is disrupted.
For more than a decade, the lymphatic system has been a focus of Oliver's laboratory. The laboratory's contributions through the years include evidence that leaky lymphatic vessels might contribute to obesity. Oliver and his colleagues also demonstrated how the lymphatic system forms from Prox1-producing cells destined to become lymphatic endothelial cells (LECs) when they leave the developing veins and migrate throughout the body.
The investigators also showed the Coup-TFII gene is essential to the process. The Coup-TFII protein binds to the promoter region of the Prox1 gene. The binding switches on production of the Prox1 protein that is required to create and maintain the lymphatic system. The newer research builds on that earlier work from Oliver's laboratory. The latest study focused on the lymphovenous valves. These valves are found at just two locations in the body, on either side of the chest just under the clavicle bone where the lymphatic vessels intersect with the subclavian and internal jugular veins.
Working in mice, investigators discovered that these lymphovenous valves form from a newly identified subtype of endothelial cell found in developing veins. Like the LECs that form the lymphatic system, the newly identified endothelial cells make Prox1. But while the LECs leave the veins and migrate throughout the body, these endothelial cells stay put to form the lymphovenous valves.
Researchers demonstrated the process requires two copies of the Prox1 gene. That ensures adequate levels of the Coup-TFII-Prox1 complex and with it enough Prox1 to build and maintain the lymphatic system. Mice engineered to carry a single copy of Prox1 either did not survive or were born without lymphovenous and venous valves.
"If you have only one copy of Prox1 you are going to have a reduction in the Coup-TFII Prox1 complex and so a dramatic reduction in the number of cells available to build the lymphatic system. That explains the defects we see," Srinivasan said.
###
The study was supported in part by a grant from the National Institutes of Health and ALSAC.
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital is internationally recognized for its pioneering research and treatment of children with cancer and other life-threatening diseases. The hospital's research has helped push overall survival rates for childhood cancer from less than 20 percent when the institution opened to almost 80 percent today. It is the first and only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center devoted solely to children, and no family ever pays St. Jude for care. For more information, visit www.stjude.org.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public release date: 14-Nov-2011 Share ] Contact: Summer Freeman
summer.freeman@stjude.org
901-595-3061
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
A century after the valves that link the lymphatic and blood systems were first described, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientists have detailed how those valves form and identified a gene that is critical to the process.
The gene is Prox1. Earlier work led by Guillermo Oliver, Ph.D., a member of the St. Jude Department of Genetics, showed Prox1 was essential for formation and maintenance of the entire lymphatic vasculature. The lymphatic vasculature is the network of vessels and ducts that help maintain the body's fluid balance and serves as a highway along which everything from cancer cells to disease-fighting immune components moves. Oliver is senior author of the new study, which appeared in the October 15 edition of the scientific journal Genes & Development.
The new research suggests that Prox1 is also essential for proper formation of the one-way valves that control movement of fluid and nutrients from the lymphatic system into the blood stream. Researchers found evidence that the Prox1 protein also has a role in formation of the venous valves.
"Understanding how valves form is crucial to efforts to develop treatments for valve defects that affect both children and adults," said the paper's first author, R. Sathish Srinivasan, Ph.D., a research associate in the St. Jude Department of Genetics. Those defects are linked to a variety of problems including lymphedema and deep vein thrombosis, which are blood clots that form deep in veins and have the potential for causing life-threatening complications. Lymphedema is the painful and sometimes disfiguring swelling that can occur when lymph flow is disrupted.
For more than a decade, the lymphatic system has been a focus of Oliver's laboratory. The laboratory's contributions through the years include evidence that leaky lymphatic vessels might contribute to obesity. Oliver and his colleagues also demonstrated how the lymphatic system forms from Prox1-producing cells destined to become lymphatic endothelial cells (LECs) when they leave the developing veins and migrate throughout the body.
The investigators also showed the Coup-TFII gene is essential to the process. The Coup-TFII protein binds to the promoter region of the Prox1 gene. The binding switches on production of the Prox1 protein that is required to create and maintain the lymphatic system. The newer research builds on that earlier work from Oliver's laboratory. The latest study focused on the lymphovenous valves. These valves are found at just two locations in the body, on either side of the chest just under the clavicle bone where the lymphatic vessels intersect with the subclavian and internal jugular veins.
Working in mice, investigators discovered that these lymphovenous valves form from a newly identified subtype of endothelial cell found in developing veins. Like the LECs that form the lymphatic system, the newly identified endothelial cells make Prox1. But while the LECs leave the veins and migrate throughout the body, these endothelial cells stay put to form the lymphovenous valves.
Researchers demonstrated the process requires two copies of the Prox1 gene. That ensures adequate levels of the Coup-TFII-Prox1 complex and with it enough Prox1 to build and maintain the lymphatic system. Mice engineered to carry a single copy of Prox1 either did not survive or were born without lymphovenous and venous valves.
"If you have only one copy of Prox1 you are going to have a reduction in the Coup-TFII Prox1 complex and so a dramatic reduction in the number of cells available to build the lymphatic system. That explains the defects we see," Srinivasan said.
###
The study was supported in part by a grant from the National Institutes of Health and ALSAC.
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital is internationally recognized for its pioneering research and treatment of children with cancer and other life-threatening diseases. The hospital's research has helped push overall survival rates for childhood cancer from less than 20 percent when the institution opened to almost 80 percent today. It is the first and only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center devoted solely to children, and no family ever pays St. Jude for care. For more information, visit www.stjude.org.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-11/sjcr-sol111411.php
joey lawrence joey lawrence iraq war iraq war loma prieta loma prieta harold camping
Public release date: 15-Nov-2011 Share ] Contact: Morgan Kelly
mgnkelly@princeton.edu
609-258-5729
Princeton University
The first climate study to focus on variations in daily weather conditions has found that day-to-day weather has grown increasingly erratic and extreme, with significant fluctuations in sunshine and rainfall affecting more than a third of the planet.
Princeton University researchers recently reported in the Journal of Climate that extremely sunny or cloudy days are more common than in the early 1980s, and that swings from thunderstorms to dry days rose considerably since the late 1990s. These swings could have consequences for ecosystem stability and the control of pests and diseases, as well as for industries such as agriculture and solar-energy production, all of which are vulnerable to inconsistent and extreme weather, the researchers noted.
The day-to-day variations also could affect what scientists could expect to see as the Earth's climate changes, according to the researchers and other scientists familiar with the work. Constant fluctuations in severe conditions could alter how the atmosphere distributes heat and rainfall, as well as inhibit the ability of plants to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, possibly leading to higher levels of the greenhouse gas than currently accounted for.
Existing climate-change models have historically been evaluated against the average weather per month, an approach that hides variability, explained lead author David Medvigy, an assistant professor in the Department of Geosciences at Princeton. To conduct their analysis, he and co-author Claudie Beaulieu, a postdoctoral research fellow in Princeton's Program in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, used a recently developed computer program that has allowed climatologists to examine weather data on a daily level for the first time, Medvigy said.
"Monthly averages reflect a misty world that is a little rainy and cloudy every day. That is very different from the weather of our actual world, where some days are very sunny and dry," Medvigy said.
"Our work adds to what we know about climate change in the real world and places the whole problem of climate change in a new light," he said. "Nobody has looked for these daily changes on a global scale. We usually think of climate change as an increase in mean global temperature and potentially more extreme conditions -- there's practically no discussion of day-to-day variability."
The Princeton findings stress that analysis of erratic daily conditions such as frequent thunderstorms may in fact be crucial to truly understanding the factors shaping the climate and affecting the atmosphere, said William Rossow, a professor of earth system science and environmental engineering at the City College of New York.
"It's important to know what the daily extremes might do because we might care about that sooner," said Rossow, who also has studied weather variability. He had no role in the Princeton research but is familiar with it.
Rossow said existing climate-change models show light rain more frequently than they should and don't show extreme precipitation. "If it rains a little bit every day, the atmosphere may respond differently than if there's a really big rainstorm once every week. One of the things you find about rainstorms is that the really extreme ones are at a scale the atmosphere responds to," he said.
Although climate-change models predict future changes in weather as the planet warms, those calculations are hindered by a lack of representation of day-to-day patterns, Rossow said.
"If you don't know what role variability is playing now, you're not in a very strong position for making remarks about how it might change in the future," he said. "We're at a stage where we had better take a look at what this research is pointing out."
Medvigy and Beaulieu determined sunshine variation by analyzing fluctuations in solar radiation captured by the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project from 1984 to 2007. To gauge precipitation, the researchers used daily rainfall data from the Global Precipitation Climatology Project spanning 1997 to 2007.
Medvigy and Beaulieu found that during those respective periods, extremes in sunshine and rainfall became more common on a day-to-day basis. In hypothetical terms, Medvigy said, these findings would mean that a region that experienced the greatest increase in sunshine variability might have had partly cloudy conditions every day in 1984, but by 2007 the days would have been either sunny or heavily cloudy with no in-between. For rainfall, the uptick in variation he and Beaulieu observed could be thought of as an area experiencing a light mist every day in 1997, but within ten years the days came to increasingly fluctuate between dryness and downpour.
The researchers observed at least some increase in variability for 35 percent of the world during the time periods analyzed. Regions such as equatorial Africa and Asia experienced the greatest increase in the frequency of extreme conditions, with erratic shifts in weather occurring throughout the year. In more temperate regions such as the United States, day-to-day variability increased to a lesser degree and typically only seasonally. In the northeastern United States, for instance, sudden jumps from sunny to bleak days became more common during the winter from 1984 to 2007.
In the 23 years that sunshine variability rose for tropical Africa and Asia, those areas also showed a greater occurrence of towering thunderstorm clouds known as convective clouds, Medvigy said. Tropical areas that experienced more and more unbalanced levels of sunshine and rainfall witnessed an in-kind jump in convective cloud cover. Although the relationship between these clouds and weather variations needs more study, Medvigy said, the findings could indicate that the sunnier days accelerate the rate at which water evaporates then condenses in the atmosphere to form rain, thus producing heavy rain more often.
Storms have lasting effect on daily weather patterns
Although the most extreme weather variations in the study were observed in the tropics, spurts of extreme weather are global in reach, Rossow said. The atmosphere, he said, is a fluid, and when severe weather such as a convective-cloud thunderstorm "punches" it, the disturbance spreads around the world. Weather that increasingly leaps from one extreme condition to another in short periods of time, as the Princeton research suggests, affects the equilibrium of heat and rain worldwide, he said.
"Storms are violent and significant events while they are individually localized, their disturbance radiates," Rossow said.
"Wherever it's raining heavily, especially, or variably is where the atmosphere is being punched. As soon as it is punched somewhere in the tropics it starts waves that go all the way around the planet," he said. "So we can see waves coming off the west Pacific convection activity and going all the way around the planet in the tropical band. The atmosphere also has the job of moving heat from the equator to the poles, and storms are the source of heat to the atmosphere, so if a storm's location or its timing or its seasonality is altered, that's going to change how the circulation responds."
These sweeping atmospheric changes can interact with local conditions such as temperature and topography to skew regular weather patterns, Rossow said.
"Signals end up going over the whole globe, and whether they're important in a particular place or not depends on what else is happening," he said. "But you can think of storms as being the disturbances in an otherwise smooth flow. That's why this is a climate issue even though we're talking about daily variability in specific locations."
The impact of these fluctuations on natural and manmade systems could be as substantial as the fallout predicted from rises in the Earth's average temperature, Medvigy said. Inconsistent sunshine could impair the effectiveness of solar-energy production and with fluctuating rainfall also included harm agriculture, he said. Wetter, hotter conditions also breed disease and parasites such as mosquitoes, particularly in tropical areas, he said.
On a larger scale, wild shifts in day-to-day conditions would diminish the ability of trees and plants to remove carbon from the atmosphere, Medvigy said. In 2010, he and Harvard University researchers reported in the journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that erratic rain and sunlight impair photosynthesis. That study concluded that this effect upsets the structure of ecosystems, as certain plants and trees particularly broad-leafed trees more than conifers adapt better than others.
In the context of the current study, Medvigy said, the impact of variability on photosynthesis could mean that more carbon will remain in the atmosphere than climate models currently anticipate, considering that the models factor in normal plant-based carbon absorption. Moreover, if the meteorological tumult he and Beaulieu observed is caused by greenhouse gases, these fluctuations could become self-perpetuating by increasingly trapping the gases that agitated weather patterns in the first place.
"We have not yet looked for direct ties between weather variability and increased carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere, but I would not be surprised if they are connected in some way," Medvigy said.
"Increases in variability diminish the efficiency with which plants and trees remove carbon dioxide from the air," he said. "All of a sudden, the land and the atmosphere are no longer in balance, and plants cannot absorb levels of carbon dioxide proportional to the concentrations in the environment. That will affect everybody."
###
The study was published online Oct. 14 by the Journal of Climate, and was funded by grants from the Princeton Carbon Mitigation Initiative and the Fonds Qubcois de la Recherche sur la Nature et les Technologies.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public release date: 15-Nov-2011 Share ] Contact: Morgan Kelly
mgnkelly@princeton.edu
609-258-5729
Princeton University
The first climate study to focus on variations in daily weather conditions has found that day-to-day weather has grown increasingly erratic and extreme, with significant fluctuations in sunshine and rainfall affecting more than a third of the planet.
Princeton University researchers recently reported in the Journal of Climate that extremely sunny or cloudy days are more common than in the early 1980s, and that swings from thunderstorms to dry days rose considerably since the late 1990s. These swings could have consequences for ecosystem stability and the control of pests and diseases, as well as for industries such as agriculture and solar-energy production, all of which are vulnerable to inconsistent and extreme weather, the researchers noted.
The day-to-day variations also could affect what scientists could expect to see as the Earth's climate changes, according to the researchers and other scientists familiar with the work. Constant fluctuations in severe conditions could alter how the atmosphere distributes heat and rainfall, as well as inhibit the ability of plants to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, possibly leading to higher levels of the greenhouse gas than currently accounted for.
Existing climate-change models have historically been evaluated against the average weather per month, an approach that hides variability, explained lead author David Medvigy, an assistant professor in the Department of Geosciences at Princeton. To conduct their analysis, he and co-author Claudie Beaulieu, a postdoctoral research fellow in Princeton's Program in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, used a recently developed computer program that has allowed climatologists to examine weather data on a daily level for the first time, Medvigy said.
"Monthly averages reflect a misty world that is a little rainy and cloudy every day. That is very different from the weather of our actual world, where some days are very sunny and dry," Medvigy said.
"Our work adds to what we know about climate change in the real world and places the whole problem of climate change in a new light," he said. "Nobody has looked for these daily changes on a global scale. We usually think of climate change as an increase in mean global temperature and potentially more extreme conditions -- there's practically no discussion of day-to-day variability."
The Princeton findings stress that analysis of erratic daily conditions such as frequent thunderstorms may in fact be crucial to truly understanding the factors shaping the climate and affecting the atmosphere, said William Rossow, a professor of earth system science and environmental engineering at the City College of New York.
"It's important to know what the daily extremes might do because we might care about that sooner," said Rossow, who also has studied weather variability. He had no role in the Princeton research but is familiar with it.
Rossow said existing climate-change models show light rain more frequently than they should and don't show extreme precipitation. "If it rains a little bit every day, the atmosphere may respond differently than if there's a really big rainstorm once every week. One of the things you find about rainstorms is that the really extreme ones are at a scale the atmosphere responds to," he said.
Although climate-change models predict future changes in weather as the planet warms, those calculations are hindered by a lack of representation of day-to-day patterns, Rossow said.
"If you don't know what role variability is playing now, you're not in a very strong position for making remarks about how it might change in the future," he said. "We're at a stage where we had better take a look at what this research is pointing out."
Medvigy and Beaulieu determined sunshine variation by analyzing fluctuations in solar radiation captured by the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project from 1984 to 2007. To gauge precipitation, the researchers used daily rainfall data from the Global Precipitation Climatology Project spanning 1997 to 2007.
Medvigy and Beaulieu found that during those respective periods, extremes in sunshine and rainfall became more common on a day-to-day basis. In hypothetical terms, Medvigy said, these findings would mean that a region that experienced the greatest increase in sunshine variability might have had partly cloudy conditions every day in 1984, but by 2007 the days would have been either sunny or heavily cloudy with no in-between. For rainfall, the uptick in variation he and Beaulieu observed could be thought of as an area experiencing a light mist every day in 1997, but within ten years the days came to increasingly fluctuate between dryness and downpour.
The researchers observed at least some increase in variability for 35 percent of the world during the time periods analyzed. Regions such as equatorial Africa and Asia experienced the greatest increase in the frequency of extreme conditions, with erratic shifts in weather occurring throughout the year. In more temperate regions such as the United States, day-to-day variability increased to a lesser degree and typically only seasonally. In the northeastern United States, for instance, sudden jumps from sunny to bleak days became more common during the winter from 1984 to 2007.
In the 23 years that sunshine variability rose for tropical Africa and Asia, those areas also showed a greater occurrence of towering thunderstorm clouds known as convective clouds, Medvigy said. Tropical areas that experienced more and more unbalanced levels of sunshine and rainfall witnessed an in-kind jump in convective cloud cover. Although the relationship between these clouds and weather variations needs more study, Medvigy said, the findings could indicate that the sunnier days accelerate the rate at which water evaporates then condenses in the atmosphere to form rain, thus producing heavy rain more often.
Storms have lasting effect on daily weather patterns
Although the most extreme weather variations in the study were observed in the tropics, spurts of extreme weather are global in reach, Rossow said. The atmosphere, he said, is a fluid, and when severe weather such as a convective-cloud thunderstorm "punches" it, the disturbance spreads around the world. Weather that increasingly leaps from one extreme condition to another in short periods of time, as the Princeton research suggests, affects the equilibrium of heat and rain worldwide, he said.
"Storms are violent and significant events while they are individually localized, their disturbance radiates," Rossow said.
"Wherever it's raining heavily, especially, or variably is where the atmosphere is being punched. As soon as it is punched somewhere in the tropics it starts waves that go all the way around the planet," he said. "So we can see waves coming off the west Pacific convection activity and going all the way around the planet in the tropical band. The atmosphere also has the job of moving heat from the equator to the poles, and storms are the source of heat to the atmosphere, so if a storm's location or its timing or its seasonality is altered, that's going to change how the circulation responds."
These sweeping atmospheric changes can interact with local conditions such as temperature and topography to skew regular weather patterns, Rossow said.
"Signals end up going over the whole globe, and whether they're important in a particular place or not depends on what else is happening," he said. "But you can think of storms as being the disturbances in an otherwise smooth flow. That's why this is a climate issue even though we're talking about daily variability in specific locations."
The impact of these fluctuations on natural and manmade systems could be as substantial as the fallout predicted from rises in the Earth's average temperature, Medvigy said. Inconsistent sunshine could impair the effectiveness of solar-energy production and with fluctuating rainfall also included harm agriculture, he said. Wetter, hotter conditions also breed disease and parasites such as mosquitoes, particularly in tropical areas, he said.
On a larger scale, wild shifts in day-to-day conditions would diminish the ability of trees and plants to remove carbon from the atmosphere, Medvigy said. In 2010, he and Harvard University researchers reported in the journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that erratic rain and sunlight impair photosynthesis. That study concluded that this effect upsets the structure of ecosystems, as certain plants and trees particularly broad-leafed trees more than conifers adapt better than others.
In the context of the current study, Medvigy said, the impact of variability on photosynthesis could mean that more carbon will remain in the atmosphere than climate models currently anticipate, considering that the models factor in normal plant-based carbon absorption. Moreover, if the meteorological tumult he and Beaulieu observed is caused by greenhouse gases, these fluctuations could become self-perpetuating by increasingly trapping the gases that agitated weather patterns in the first place.
"We have not yet looked for direct ties between weather variability and increased carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere, but I would not be surprised if they are connected in some way," Medvigy said.
"Increases in variability diminish the efficiency with which plants and trees remove carbon dioxide from the air," he said. "All of a sudden, the land and the atmosphere are no longer in balance, and plants cannot absorb levels of carbon dioxide proportional to the concentrations in the environment. That will affect everybody."
###
The study was published online Oct. 14 by the Journal of Climate, and was funded by grants from the Princeton Carbon Mitigation Initiative and the Fonds Qubcois de la Recherche sur la Nature et les Technologies.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-11/pu-eed111511.php
veterans day 2011 country music awards cnbc debate family circus spanier jorge posada walmart black friday ad
