Sunday, April 28, 2013

NBA owner Michael Jordan marries over the weekend

Michael Jordan got married over the weekend in front of a few hundred of his family and closest friends.

The Charlotte Bobcats owner exchanged vows with 35-year-old former model Yvette Prieto on Saturday in Palm Beach, Fla., Jordan's manager Estee Portnoy told The Associated Press Sunday

The wedding took place at the Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea with nearly 300 guests in attendance, including Tiger Woods, Patrick Ewing, Spike Lee and Ahmad Rashad.

The ceremony was followed by a reception at the Bear's Club in Jupiter, Fla., a luxurious private golf club designed by Jack Nicklaus. Jordan, 50, owns a home near the course.

There were fireworks at night as part of the celebration.

In lieu of wedding gifts, donations were made to the James R. Jordan Foundation. The wedding flowers were donated to the Jupiter Medical Center.

The six-time NBA champion and Prieto met five years ago and were engaged last December.

Prieto wore a French silk voile corseted sheer sheath gown by J'Aton Couture, in an ecru palette with accents of flesh tones, with handmade silk lace created especially for her, and enhanced with Swarovski crystals. The gown featured French seamed crinoline borders, which cascaded into a dramatic cathedral train finished in the lace, with accents of a peacock-feathered design.

The couple and their guests were entertained by DJ MC Lyte, singers K'Jon, Robin Thicke and Grammy-Award winner Usher and The Source, an 18-piece band.

Everyone enjoyed an all-white, seven-layer white rum wedding cake that was covered in white fondant and sugar crystals, and adorned with crystal brooches and the couples' monogram on the top layer.

Guests sat at tables that were a continuous candle-lit landscape with a myriad of crystal candelabras and mercury glass vessels, each filled with one variety of white flower, including roses, peonies and tulips, and one accent of purple.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nba-owner-michael-jordan-marries-over-weekend-202151649.html

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Friday, April 26, 2013

Obama backs Planned Parenthood in political fight

WASHINGTON (AP) ? President Barack Obama vowed Friday to join Planned Parenthood in fighting against what he said are efforts by states to turn women's health back to the 1950s, before the Supreme Court legalized abortion nationwide, and singled out the GOP-governed states of North Dakota and Mississippi for criticism.

"When politicians try to turn Planned Parenthood into a punching bag, they're not just talking about you," Obama said, becoming the first sitting president to address the abortion-rights group in person. "They're talking about the millions of women who you serve."

Obama asserted that "an assault on women's rights" is underway across the country, with bills introduced in more than 40 states to limit or ban abortion or restrict access to birth control or other services.

"The fact is, after decades of progress, there's still those who want to turn back the clock to policies more suited to the 1950s than the 21st century," he said. "And they've been involved in an orchestrated and historic effort to roll back basic rights when it comes to women's health."

Last month, North Dakota Republican Gov. Jack Dalrymple signed a law that bans abortions as early as six weeks, or when a fetal heartbeat is detected, making the state the most restrictive in the nation in which to get the procedure.

Obama said "a woman may not even know that she's pregnant at six weeks."

More than a year ago in Mississippi, a "personhood" ballot initiative that would have defined life as beginning at fertilization was defeated by 58 percent of voters in November 2011, the same election in which staunch abortion opponent Phil Bryant, a Republican, was elected governor. Bryant had campaigned for the initiative. Abortion opponents are expected to soon begin a signature-drive to get a similar initiative on the ballot in 2014 or 2015.

"Mississippi's a conservative state, but they wanted to make clear there's nothing conservative about the government injecting itself into decisions best made between a woman and her doctor," Obama said of the voters there.

The president lauded Planned Parenthood's nearly 100 years of providing cancer screenings, contraception and other health services for women and assured those fighting to protect abortion rights that they have an ally in him.

"You've also got a president who's going to be right there with you, fighting every step of the way," Obama said.

In North Dakota, Republican state Rep. Bette Grande, an abortion opponent from Fargo who introduced the bill banning most abortions based on a fetal heartbeat, said she was happy Obama took notice of her state's stance on the issue.

"He is pointing it out because it's true. We have taken a serious look at the life of a child, and the nation is paying attention to that," she said. "We are dealing with life in North Dakota and something as basic as a beating heart."

Laurie Bertram Roberts, Mississippi president of the National Organization for Women, said voters in her state, while conservative, did not misunderstand what "personhood" would have meant for women and families.

"We understand that when you give a fertilized egg the rights of a person, that affects every aspect of pregnancy and reproductive health," she said.

Obama's pledge to stand with Planned Parenthood echoed his rhetoric in last year's presidential campaign after Republican rival Mitt Romney said he'd eliminate the organization's federal funding if elected. That incident, coupled with other issues, led Democrats to begin accusing Republicans of waging a "war on women." Obama went on to win a second term with 55 percent of the female vote, polls showed.

The president originally was scheduled to address Planned Parenthood on Thursday night, but the appearance was delayed to allow him to spend more time in Texas with the loved ones of those who were killed or injured in last week's explosion at a fertilizer plant in West, Texas.

In his short speech on Friday, Obama made no reference to a pair of abortion-related issues that made headlines in recent weeks.

On April 5, a federal judge in New York gave Obama's administration 30 days to begin allowing over-the-counter sales of the morning-after pill, saying the government's decision to limit such sales to those aged 17 and older was "arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable."

Planned Parenthood sided with the judge; the administration has yet to say whether it will file an appeal.

In Pennsylvania, abortion provider Kermit Gosnell is standing trial on charges of killing babies after they were born alive at his West Philadelphia clinic. He also is charged in the 2009 overdose death of a 41-year-old patient. Closing arguments in the case were set for Monday.

___

Associated Press writers Emily Wagster Pettus in Jackson, Miss., and James MacPherson in Bismarck, N.D., contributed to this report.

___

Follow Darlene Superville on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dsupervilleap

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-backs-planned-parenthood-political-fight-163153869.html

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Lawmakers introduce tough NKorea sanctions bill

(AP) ? Republican and Democratic lawmakers in the House are proposing to step up sanctions against North Korea by punishing companies, banks and governments that do prohibited business with it.

The bill crafted by leaders of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and introduced Friday is modeled on sanctions in force against Iran.

Congressional staffers say it's intended not only to improve enforcement of existing sanctions, but also to expand them.

The measure reflects growing concern over North Korea's nuclear weapon and missile development, and frustration over the failure of U.S. policy to stop it.

The bill was introduced by Reps. Ed Royce, R-Calif., and Eliot Engel, D-N.Y. Its prospects for becoming law are uncertain.

The draft bill does not name any particular entities but potentially could impact companies and banks in China through which the North conducts most of its business.

The draft gives the president authority to sanction governments for illicit dealings with North Korea but also authority to waive the bill's provisions on a case-by-case basis on national security grounds.

The legislation could irk Beijing at a time when the Obama administration seeks greater Chinese cooperation in pressuring Pyongyang to end war threats and honor past commitments on denuclearization.

Beijing signed up for the toughest U.N. sanctions yet on North Korea in response to a nuclear test in February.

But Royce has called for tougher unilateral steps, as the U.S. government did in 2005 against a Macau-based bank because it held about $25 million in North Korean funds. That measure had a significant impact, but proved complicated to undo when nuclear negotiations with North Korea finally got back on track.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-04-26-US-NKorea-Sanctions/id-1fc6dbef05374568bd82f7a2ae059972

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Three critically hurt in gas barge explosions near Mobile, Alabama

By Kaija Wilkinson

MOBILE, Alabama (Reuters) - Fires sparked by explosions engulfed two gasoline barges in the Mobile River, injuring three workers who remained in critical condition on Thursday, authorities said.

The blasts on Wednesday night aboard the fuel barges off the shore of Mobile, Alabama, forced officials to evacuate nearby shipyards and one cruise vessel, said Mobile Fire Chief Steve Dean.

For safety reasons, firefighters were keeping a distance from the barges, which were carrying raw gasoline and had already been the source of multiple explosions, Dean said.

The barge explosions forced the crew of Carnival Corp's cruise vessel Triumph to evacuate.

Three men working on the barges remained in critical condition with severe burns on Thursday, two in a burn unit, and the other in a surgical trauma unit, said Danny Whatley, nursing administrator for spokesman for Mobile's University of South Alabama Medical Center.

He declined to identify them, other than to say one was from Alabama and the others were from other U.S. states.

Mobile Fire and Rescue Department spokesman Steve Huffman said he didn't know who owned the barges or what their destination was.

The cause of the explosions was unknown and would not be determined until after firefighters reached the vessels, he said.

In February, an engine fire left Carnival Corp's Triumph and 4,000 passengers adrift in the Gulf of Mexico until they were towed back to land.

(Reporting by Kaija Wilkinson; Editing by Barbara Goldberg)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/two-barges-explode-river-near-mobile-alabama-032104546.html

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NASA probe observes meteors colliding with Saturn's rings

Apr. 25, 2013 ? NASA's Cassini spacecraft has provided the first direct evidence of small meteoroids breaking into streams of rubble and crashing into Saturn's rings.

These observations make Saturn's rings the only location besides Earth, the moon and Jupiter where scientists and amateur astronomers have been able to observe impacts as they occur. Studying the impact rate of meteoroids from outside the Saturnian system helps scientists understand how different planet systems in our solar system formed.

The solar system is full of small, speeding objects. These objects frequently pummel planetary bodies. The meteoroids at Saturn are estimated to range from about one-half inch to several yards (1 centimeter to several meters) in size. It took scientists years to distinguish tracks left by nine meteoroids in 2005, 2009 and 2012.

Details of the observations appear in a paper in the Thursday, April 25 edition of Science.

Results from Cassini have already shown Saturn's rings act as very effective detectors of many kinds of surrounding phenomena, including the interior structure of the planet and the orbits of its moons. For example, a subtle but extensive corrugation that ripples 12,000 miles (19,000 kilometers) across the innermost rings tells of a very large meteoroid impact in 1983.

"These new results imply the current-day impact rates for small particles at Saturn are about the same as those at Earth -- two very different neighborhoods in our solar system -- and this is exciting to see," said Linda Spilker, Cassini project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "It took Saturn's rings acting like a giant meteoroid detector -- 100 times the surface area of the Earth -- and Cassini's long-term tour of the Saturn system to address this question."

The Saturnian equinox in summer 2009 was an especially good time to see the debris left by meteoroid impacts. The very shallow sun angle on the rings caused the clouds of debris to look bright against the darkened rings in pictures from Cassini's imaging science subsystem.

"We knew these little impacts were constantly occurring, but we didn't know how big or how frequent they might be, and we didn't necessarily expect them to take the form of spectacular shearing clouds," said Matt Tiscareno, lead author of the paper and a Cassini participating scientist at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. "The sunlight shining edge-on to the rings at the Saturnian equinox acted like an anti-cloaking device, so these usually invisible features became plain to see."

Tiscareno and his colleagues now think meteoroids of this size probably break up on a first encounter with the rings, creating smaller, slower pieces that then enter into orbit around Saturn. The impact into the rings of these secondary meteoroid bits kicks up the clouds. The tiny particles forming these clouds have a range of orbital speeds around Saturn. The clouds they form soon are pulled into diagonal, extended bright streaks.

"Saturn's rings are unusually bright and clean, leading some to suggest that the rings are actually much younger than Saturn," said Jeff Cuzzi, a co-author of the paper and a Cassini interdisciplinary scientist specializing in planetary rings and dust at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. "To assess this dramatic claim, we must know more about the rate at which outside material is bombarding the rings. This latest analysis helps fill in that story with detection of impactors of a size that we weren't previously able to detect directly."

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, manages the Cassini-Huygens mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. JPL designed, developed and assembled the Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras. The imaging team consists of scientists from the United States, England, France and Germany. The imaging operations center is based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.

For images of the impacts and information about Cassini, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/cassini and http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov .

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


Journal Reference:

  1. Matthew S. Tiscareno, Colin J. Mitchell, Carl D. Murray, Daiana Di Nino, Matthew M. Hedman, J?rgen Schmidt, Joseph A. Burns, Jeffrey N. Cuzzi, Carolyn C. Porco, Kevin Beurle, and Michael W. Evans. Observations of Ejecta Clouds Produced by Impacts onto Saturn?s Rings. Science, 2013; 340 (6131): 460-464 DOI: 10.1126/science.1233524

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/SgDGsVxA4wQ/130425144654.htm

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Thursday, April 25, 2013

Insert Coin: Snapzoom gives Kickstarters a crack at its smartphone scope adapter (video)

In Insert Coin, we look at an exciting new tech project that requires funding before it can hit production. If you'd like to pitch a project, please send us a tip with "Insert Coin" as the subject line.

Snapzoom gives Kickstarters a crack at its smartphone scope adapter

Snapzoom stole a lot of hearts at Engadget Expand, but it didn't quite steal enough votes to win our Insert Coin contest. Now you can exact some justice, as the smartphone adapter for binoculars, telescopes and microscopes is up for grabs on Kickstarter to let you zoom in on the moon, bacteria or whatever else you can think of. So far it's vacuumed up $15,000 toward its $55,000 goal, and while the early bird offer is sold out, backers can still grab one starting at $60, a hefty discount from the final $80 retail price. For $90, you'll even get a basic 10x25 compact Bushnell travel binocular tossed in, so if you want to see what made our Insert Coin judges go zoom-crazy, hit the source or video after the jump.

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Source: Snapzoom (Kickstarter)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/25/insert-coin-snapzoom-on-kickstarter/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=Feed_Classic&utm_campaign=Engadget

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Sprint retail locations to see Samsung Galaxy S4 delays

Sasmsung Galaxy S4

Though you'll still be able to order the Samsung Galaxy S4 from Sprint online starting Saturday, finding one in stores will be tough. 

We just got a note from Sprint saying that though they're still aiming to have the Samsung Galaxy S4 available for sale online and over the phone starting this upcoming Saturday as originally planned, retail and other channels may be a little behind. 

read more

    


Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/w8mXaVv7Y4c/story01.htm

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Mexican teachers attack political party offices

ACAPULCO, Mexico (AP) -- Striking teachers in Mexico's Guerrero state attacked the offices of four political parties and a building of the state's education department Wednesday after the legislature approved an education reform without meeting their demands.

Dozens of teachers carrying sticks and stones smashed windows, spray-painted insults at President Enrique Pena Nieto on walls and destroyed computers and furniture. They set fire to the state headquarters of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party and another building.

No injuries were reported as the teachers, some masked, ran wild after a protest march in the state capital of Chilpancingo.

Minervino Moran, a spokesman for the strikers, said the attacks were in response to the approval by Guerrero's legislators of legislation similar to a recently adopted federal education law that requires teachers to be evaluated and that seeks to remove control over hiring and firing from the teachers' union.

"We as leaders and as a movement endorse these actions because there is a lot of anger, a lot of outrage with the decision the (state) congress made," said Moran, a spokesman for Guerrero state's Education Workers Union.

The 20,000-member group went on strike in Guerrero state, where the resort city of Acapulco is located, shortly after Pena Nieto signed into law the sweeping education reform two months ago. Its members have since staged increasingly disruptive protests, including blocking the main highway connecting Mexico City to Acapulco.

Guerrero Gov. Angel Aguirre said in a tweet that prosecutors had issued arrest warrants for Moran and another union leader because they were the "masterminds of the acts of vandalism that took place today."

Television footage showed teachers trashing each of the buildings without the intervention of authorities.

Aguirre told Radio Formula that police didn't try to stop the attacks because officers were busy guarding the government palace and legislature building.

The national education law was seen as Pena Nieto's first major legislative victory after taking office Dec. 1. The constitutional amendment eliminates Mexico's decades-old practice of allowing the buying and selling of teaching jobs, and replaces it with a standardized national teaching test.

That's heresy to a radical splinter union of elementary and high school teachers in Guerrero, one of the country's poorest and worst-educated states. The teachers claim the test is a plot to fire them all as a step toward privatizing education, although there is little evidence the government plans that.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/mexican-teachers-attack-political-party-124039056.html

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Looking for life by the light of dying stars

Apr. 24, 2013 ? Because it has no source of energy, a dead star -- known as a white dwarf -- will eventually cool down and fade away. But circumstantial evidence suggests that white dwarfs can still support habitable planets, says Prof. Dan Maoz of Tel Aviv University's School of Physics and Astronomy.

Now Prof. Maoz and Prof. Avi Loeb, Director of Harvard University's Institute for Theory and Computation and a Sackler Professor by Special Appointment at TAU, have shown that, using advanced technology to become available within the next decade, it should be possible to detect biomarkers surrounding these planets -- including oxygen and methane -- that indicate the presence of life.

Published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, the researchers' "simulated spectrum" demonstrates that the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), set to be launched by NASA in 2018, will be capable of detecting oxygen and water in the atmosphere of an Earth-like planet orbiting a white dwarf after only a few hours of observation time -- much more easily than for an Earth-like planet orbiting a sun-like star.

Their collaboration is made possible by the Harvard TAU Astronomy Initiative, recently endowed by Dr. Raymond and Beverly Sackler.

Faint light, clear signals

"In the quest for extraterrestrial biological signatures, the first stars we study should be white dwarfs," said Prof. Loeb. Prof. Maoz agrees, noting that if "all the conditions are right, we'll be able to detect signs of life" on planets orbiting white dwarf stars using the much-anticipated JWST.

An abundance of heavy elements already observed on the surface of white dwarfs suggest rocky planets orbit a significant fraction of them. The researchers estimate that a survey of 500 of the closest white dwarfs could spot one or more habitable planets.

The unique characteristics of white dwarfs could make these planets easier to spot than planets orbiting normal stars, the researchers have shown. Their atmospheres can be detected and analyzed when a star dims as an orbiting planet crosses in front of it. As the background starlight shines through the planet's atmosphere, elements in the atmosphere will absorb some of the starlight, leaving chemical clues of their presence -- clues that can then be detected from the JWST.

When an Earth-like planet orbits a normal star, "the difficulty lies in the extreme faintness of the signal, which is hidden in the glare of the 'parent' star," Prof. Maoz says. "The novelty of our idea is that, if the parent star is a white dwarf, whose size is comparable to that of an Earth-sized planet, that glare is greatly reduced, and we can now realistically contemplate seeing the oxygen biomarker."

In order to estimate the kind of data that the JWST will be able to see, the researchers created a "synthetic spectrum," which replicates that of an inhabited planet similar to Earth orbiting a white dwarf. They demonstrated that the telescope should be able to pick up signs of oxygen and water, if they exist on the planet.

A critical sign of life

The presence of oxygen biomarkers would be the most critical signal of the presence of life on extraterrestrial planets. Earth's atmosphere, for example, is 21 percent oxygen, and this is entirely produced by our planet's plant life as a result of photosynthesis. Without the existence of plants, an atmosphere would be entirely devoid of oxygen.

The JWST will be ideal for hunting out signs of life on extraterrestrial planets because it is designed to look into the infrared region of the light spectrum, where such biomarkers are prominent. In addition, as a space-based telescope, it will be able to analyze the atmospheres of Earth-like planets outside our solar system without weeding out the similar signatures of Earth's own atmosphere.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by American Friends of Tel Aviv University.

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/nasa/~3/ftCCORIXq54/130424112318.htm

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'Red line': Chemical weapons in Syria

By Maayan Lubell

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Syrian government forces have used chemical weapons - probably nerve gas - in their fight against rebels trying to force out President Bashar al-Assad, the Israeli military's top intelligence analyst said on Tuesday.

Brigadier-General Itai Brun made the comments at a Tel Aviv security conference a day after U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on a visit to Israel that U.S. intelligence agencies were still assessing whether such weapons had been employed.

U.S. President Barack Obama has called the use of chemical weapons a "red line" for the United States that would trigger unspecified U.S. action.

"To the best of our understanding, there was use of lethal chemical weapons. Which chemical weapons? Probably sarin," Brun said in the most definitive Israeli statement on the issue to date.

Photos of victims showing foam coming out of their mouths and contracted pupils were signs deadly gas had been used, he said.

Forces loyal to Assad were behind the attacks on "armed (rebels) on a number of occasions in the past few months, including the most reported incident on March 19", Brun said.

The Syrian government and rebels last month accused each other of launching a chemical attack near the northern city of Aleppo.

On Monday, Hagel said the use of chemical weapons by Assad's forces would be a "game changer" and the United States and Israel "have options for all contingencies".

Hagel met Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Tuesday, a day after flying in an Israeli military helicopter over the occupied Golan Heights on the edge of the fighting in Syria that has entered its third year.

"This is a difficult and dangerous time, this is a time when friends and allies must remain close, closer than ever," Hagel, in remarks to reporters before his talks with Netanyahu, said about the United States and Israel.

IMPASSE

Discussions between Syria and the United Nations on a U.N. investigation of possible use of chemical weapons have been at an impasse due to the Syrian government's refusal to let the inspectors visit anywhere but Aleppo, diplomats and U.N. officials said last week.

U.N. diplomats said Britain and France had provided Ban's office with what they believed to be strong evidence that chemical weapons also had been used in the city of Homs.

Israel, which has advanced intelligence capabilities that it shares with its Western allies, has voiced concerned that parts of Syria's chemical arsenal would end up in the hands of jihadi fighters or the Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah, with which it waged a 2006 war.

Israel leaders have cautioned they will not allow that to happen. In an attack it has not formally confirmed, Israeli planes bombed an arms convoy in Syria in February, destroying anti-aircraft weapons destined for Hezbollah.

Brun, who was speaking at the annual security conference of The Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, said Israel's military was studying a number of future scenarios facing Syria.

"More likely, as time goes by, are the scenarios of chaos and anarchy, or that of (Syria) breaking up into cantons. These pose major challenges for Israel. The chance of a different central government still exists, but it is growing less likely with time," Brun said.

(Additional reporting by Jeffrey Heller and David Alexander; Editing by Jeffrey Heller and Alison Williams)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/israeli-general-says-syria-government-forces-used-chemical-074330220.html

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Wednesday, April 24, 2013

U.S. sues Novartis, alleging kickbacks to pharmacies

By Bernard Vaughan and Jonathan Stempel

(Reuters) - The U.S. government filed a civil fraud lawsuit against Novartis AG on Tuesday, accusing a unit of the Swiss drug maker of causing the Medicare and Medicaid programs to pay tens of millions of dollars in reimbursements based on fraudulent, kickback-tainted claims.

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in Manhattan said Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp had since 2005 induced at least 20 pharmacies to switch thousands of kidney transplant patients to its immunosuppressant drug Myfortic from competitors' drugs, in exchange for kickbacks disguised as rebates and discounts.

He said Novartis tried to conceal the scheme by omitting the agreements from rebate and discount contracts with pharmacies.

In one alleged case, Novartis offered a Los Angeles pharmacist a "bonus" rebate of 5 percent of that pharmacist's annual Myfortic sales, or several hundred thousand dollars, to switch as many as 1,000 patients to Myfortic.

"Novartis co-opted the independence of certain pharmacists and turned them into salespeople," Bharara said in a statement.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Manhattan, and seeks civil penalties and triple damages from Novartis for violating the federal False Claims Act.

Novartis spokeswoman Julie Masow had no immediate comment.

Myfortic net sales totaled $579 million in 2012, up 12 percent from a year earlier, according to Novartis' annual report. The Novartis Pharmaceuticals unit has offices in East Hanover, New Jersey.

In his announcement, Bharara called Novartis a "repeat offender," referring to a settlement of health care fraud charges based on kickbacks less than three years ago.

Novartis in September 2010 agreed to pay $422.5 million to resolve criminal and civil liability over its marketing of several drugs, including the epilepsy drug Trileptal. (http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2010/September/10-civ-1102.html)

The case is U.S. v. Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 11-08196.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel and Bernard Vaughan in New York; Editing by Gary Hill and David Gregorio)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/u-sues-novartis-over-alleged-fraudulent-kickbacks-205628061--finance.html

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Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Taliban capture 11 from helicopter in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) ? A Turkish transport helicopter carrying at least 11 civilians was forced to make an emergency landing in a Taliban-controlled area in eastern Afghanistan, and the insurgents took all the people on board prisoner, including eight Turks and a Russian, officials said Monday.

The civilian aircraft landed in strong winds and heavy rain on Sunday in the village of Dahra Mangal in the Azra district of Logar province, southeast of Kabul, District Governor Hamidullah Hamid told The Associated Press.

He said the helicopter came down in a gorge in the densely forested region, known for narrow gorges and rugged mountains, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the Pakistani border.

The Taliban fighters then captured everyone aboard the helicopter and took them away, Hamid said.

In a telephone interview, Arsala Jamal, the Logar provincial governor, identified the prisoners as eight Turks, one Afghan translator and two foreign pilots of unknown nationality.

In Ankara, a spokesman at Turkey's Foreign Ministry confirmed that eight Turks were aboard the helicopter but had no information on their condition or what had happened to them after the emergency landing. The official spoke on condition of anonymity in keeping with ministry regulations.

Stepan Anikeyev, the Russian Embassy's press attache in Kabul, said in a phone interview that a Russian man was being held prisoner. He said the Russians know he was one of the two pilots, but they don't have details about his identity yet, and they are in "constant touch" with local officials in Afghanistan.

There was no information about the other pilot.

"A helicopter that belongs to no military organization made emergency landing in an area of Logar province," Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqi said. "We have sent our police forces to the area to investigate the situation, to find out the reason of the landing and to know who was in the helicopter, how many of them were there and their whereabouts at the moment."

Security forces were dispatched to the area where the helicopter landed and engaged in firefights with the Taliban but quickly retreated because they had no support, said Logar Deputy Police Chief Rais Khan Abdul Rahimzai.

"We brought the police back because there was no help from the (NATO) coalition or the Afghan army. The police were unable to secure the area, which is very rural, and we were worried," Rahimzai said.

He said that information they had from the region was that the prisoners were taken by the Taliban to Hisarak district of neighboring Nangarhar province.

Hamid said that repeated calls for the Afghan army or NATO help went unanswered, and police were unable to secure the area, 15 kilometers (nine miles) from the district police compound in the town of Azra.

NATO confirmed that the Turkish helicopter went down on Sunday, but the International Security Assistance Force did not have any other details. It did say there were "no ISAF" or "U.S. personnel onboard the Turkish helicopter," denying an earlier Taliban claim that they had detained Americans on the aircraft.

ISAF spokeswoman Erin Stattel said the coalition was assisting in the recovery of the aircraft, but would not say how. She could not say whether the helicopter made a precautionary landing or the Taliban had forced it down.

Turkey's state-run Anadolu Agency, quoting an unidentified official from the Khorasan Logistics company in Kabul, said an MI-8 type helicopter belonging to the company made an emergency landing near the town of Azra due to bad weather conditions. There were 11 people on board, including eight Turks, one Afghan and one Russian, Anadolu quoted the official as saying.

The helicopter reportedly belonged to a company called Khorasan Cargo Airlines. No one was answering telephones at Khorasan's offices in Kabul or in Dubai.

Rahimzai said he didn't know what kind of cargo the helicopter was carrying, where it was headed, or whether it was working for NATO.

Although the capture or kidnapping of foreigners is not uncommon in Afghanistan, large scale captures of foreigners are rare.

The last such instance occurred in July 2007 when the Taliban abducted 23 South Korean church volunteers as they traveled by bus along a dangerous road in southern Afghanistan. The militants killed two men soon after taking them and later gradually released all the remaining captives over a month.

Last month, the Taliban released a Turkish engineer that they kidnapped two years ago. Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said at the time that the engineer was released as a goodwill gesture.

___

AP writers Amir Shah and Patrick Quinn in Kabul, Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, and Nataliya Vasilyeva in Moscow contributed to this report.

___

Follow Thomas Wagner on Twitter at: www.twitter.com/tjpwagner.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/taliban-capture-11-helicopter-afghanistan-124735354.html

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Monday, April 22, 2013

Reese Witherspoon Arrested!

Resse Witherspoon arrested? The answer that question would be a shocking yes. The actress and her hubby were both arrested on Friday.   One of the last celebrities that I ever thought I would be writing about getting arrested is Witherspoon and her husband Jim Toth. She was booked for disorderly conduct, while he was busted for a DUI. So what exactly happened that caused one of Hollywood’s most beloved actresses to end up behind bars? According to Variety, which is usually pretty accurate in their reporting, the arrests occurred on Friday night. It all began when the cops pulled over Toth on suspicion of drunk driving. While he was being booked for driving under the influence, it is being reported that Witherspoon got mouthy with the cops shouting “Do you know my name?? When the arresting officer replied “”No, I don’t need to know your name”,?The Legally Blonde star took her mouthiness to the next level by answering “You’re about to find out who I am … You are going to be on national news.” That wasn’t even the worst part, Reese allegedly was getting upset over how long it was taking to arrest Jim. She became both visually [...]

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/RightCelebrity/~3/2ZDovV6bkjs/

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Sunday, April 21, 2013

Yahoo axing six more apps and services as part of streamlining effort

Get ready to say goodbye to another another batch of Yahoo products at the end of this month. As the company continues to streamline and focus its services, March 31st will be the last day of stand-alone existence for Upcoming, Yahoo Deals, Yahoo Kids, Yahoo SMS Alerts, Yahoo Mail and Messages for feature phones. Noting an aim to slim down to roughly 15 offerings from 75, as The Register points out, this follows a few weeks after the company nixed other services like its BlackBerry app. Additionally, if you've been hanging onto the old version of Yahoo! mail, you'll have no choice but to switch to the new version by June 3rd. Yahoo! There's not word on what we can expect next, although EVP of Platforms Jay Rossiter notes that cuts like these are needed so it can focus on the likes of its new Mail and Weather apps. You'll find the details for each cut at the source link.

Update: The total number of offerings being killed is six, not seven as initially reported.

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Via: The Register

Source: Yahoo

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/21/yahoo-axing-seven-more-apps-and-services-as-part-of-streamlining/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=Feed_Classic&utm_campaign=Engadget

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Saturday, April 20, 2013

Colorado Sports Hall of Fame to induct former greats

Don Baylor and Stan Williams provide a major baseball influence for Thursday night's Colorado Sports Hall of Fame induction banquet at the Denver Marriott City Center.

Baylor ushered in major-league baseball as the first manager of the Rockies in 1993. Williams came out of Denver East High School in 1954, signed a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers and became a member of one of baseball's strongest starting pitching rotations. The hard-throwing right-hander was the first Colorado baseball prospect to make it big in the major leagues.

By the time Williams moved up to the Dodgers in 1958, the team had moved from Brooklyn to Los Angeles. His pitching partners were Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale and Johnny Podres. Koufax and Drysdale have been inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

"Koufax was unbelievable," Williams said. "He always picked the day to pitch when the other team wasn't going to score any runs."

Williams posted a 109-94 record in 15 major-league seasons while pitching for six teams, including the New York Yankees and Cleveland Indians. After his playing days, Williams stayed in baseball as a pitching coach and a scout until 2010.

Baylor, the hitting coach for the Arizona Diamondbacks, will always have a special place in Rockies history.

"It was the right time and place for me when I came to the Rockies," Baylor said in a phone interview this week. "I became part of the baseball history there. It was a great ride. Everybody had their arms around us cheering for us. No one could ever forget our first game in Mile High Stadium."

Others being inducted Thursday are Broncos safety Steve Atwater, defenseman Adam Foote of the Avalanche and golfer Steve Jones, who excelled at the University of Colorado and won the 1996 U.S. Open.

Source: http://www.fortmorgantimes.com/fort-morgan-sports/ci_23053181/colorado-sports-hall-fame-induct-former-greats?source=rss

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Friday, April 19, 2013

From mice to humans, comfort is being carried by mom

From mice to humans, comfort is being carried by mom [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 18-Apr-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Mary Beth O'Leary
moleary@cell.com
617-397-2802
Cell Press

There is a very good reason mothers often carry their crying babies, pacing the floor, to help them calm down. New research published in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on April 18 shows that infants experience an automatic calming reaction upon being carried, whether they are mouse or human babies.

The study is the first to show that the infant calming response to carrying is a coordinated set of central, motor, and cardiac regulations and an evolutionarily conserved component of mother-infant interactions, the researchers say. It might also explain a frustrating reality for new parents: that calm and relaxed very young children will so often start crying again just as soon as they are put back down.

"From humans to mice, mammalian infants become calm and relaxed when they are carried by their mother," says Kumi Kuroda of the RIKEN Brain Science Institute in Saitama, Japan. "This infant response reduces the maternal burden of carrying and is beneficial for both the mother and the infant."

In other words, a mother's arms really are the best place for a young baby to be in terms of his or her chances of survival. And mothers certainly appreciate a calm and relaxed baby. That babies naturally stop crying when they are carried is an evolutionary win-win.

The idea that this very familiar scenario also plays out in mice occurred to Kuroda while cleaning the cages of her lab's mouse colony. "When I picked the pups up at the back skin very softly and swiftly as mouse mothers did, they immediately stopped moving and became compact. They appeared relaxed, but not totally floppy, and kept the limbs flexed. This calming response in mice appeared similar to me to soothing by maternal carrying in human babies."

Kuroda and her colleagues found in careful tests that the heart rates of human babies slow immediately upon carrying. After they managed to find ECG monitor electrodes small enough to use on conscious mouse pups, the researchers found that the same goes for mice.

Both mouse and human babies also stop moving when they are carried. And when baby mice are carried, their ultrasonic cries stop, too.

The researchers traced that response in the mice to a sense known as proprioception, the way that information about body movements is perceived. They also found that particular parts of the brain and parasympathetic nervous system are key in mediating the coordinated response to carrying.

The findings have important implications for parenting and may even play a role in preventing child abuse, the researchers say, by helping grownups see things from an infant's point of view.

"A scientific understanding of this infant response will save parents from misreading the restart of crying as the intention of the infant to control the parents, as some parenting theoriessuch as the 'cry it out' type of strategysuggest," Kuroda says. "Rather, this phenomenon should be interpreted as a natural consequence of the infant sensorimotor systems."

If parents understand that properly, perhaps they will be less frustrated by the crying, Kuroda says. And that puts those children at lower risk of abuse.

###

Current Biology, Esposito et al.: "Infant Calming Responses during Maternal Carrying in Humans and Mice."


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share 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.


From mice to humans, comfort is being carried by mom [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 18-Apr-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Mary Beth O'Leary
moleary@cell.com
617-397-2802
Cell Press

There is a very good reason mothers often carry their crying babies, pacing the floor, to help them calm down. New research published in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on April 18 shows that infants experience an automatic calming reaction upon being carried, whether they are mouse or human babies.

The study is the first to show that the infant calming response to carrying is a coordinated set of central, motor, and cardiac regulations and an evolutionarily conserved component of mother-infant interactions, the researchers say. It might also explain a frustrating reality for new parents: that calm and relaxed very young children will so often start crying again just as soon as they are put back down.

"From humans to mice, mammalian infants become calm and relaxed when they are carried by their mother," says Kumi Kuroda of the RIKEN Brain Science Institute in Saitama, Japan. "This infant response reduces the maternal burden of carrying and is beneficial for both the mother and the infant."

In other words, a mother's arms really are the best place for a young baby to be in terms of his or her chances of survival. And mothers certainly appreciate a calm and relaxed baby. That babies naturally stop crying when they are carried is an evolutionary win-win.

The idea that this very familiar scenario also plays out in mice occurred to Kuroda while cleaning the cages of her lab's mouse colony. "When I picked the pups up at the back skin very softly and swiftly as mouse mothers did, they immediately stopped moving and became compact. They appeared relaxed, but not totally floppy, and kept the limbs flexed. This calming response in mice appeared similar to me to soothing by maternal carrying in human babies."

Kuroda and her colleagues found in careful tests that the heart rates of human babies slow immediately upon carrying. After they managed to find ECG monitor electrodes small enough to use on conscious mouse pups, the researchers found that the same goes for mice.

Both mouse and human babies also stop moving when they are carried. And when baby mice are carried, their ultrasonic cries stop, too.

The researchers traced that response in the mice to a sense known as proprioception, the way that information about body movements is perceived. They also found that particular parts of the brain and parasympathetic nervous system are key in mediating the coordinated response to carrying.

The findings have important implications for parenting and may even play a role in preventing child abuse, the researchers say, by helping grownups see things from an infant's point of view.

"A scientific understanding of this infant response will save parents from misreading the restart of crying as the intention of the infant to control the parents, as some parenting theoriessuch as the 'cry it out' type of strategysuggest," Kuroda says. "Rather, this phenomenon should be interpreted as a natural consequence of the infant sensorimotor systems."

If parents understand that properly, perhaps they will be less frustrated by the crying, Kuroda says. And that puts those children at lower risk of abuse.

###

Current Biology, Esposito et al.: "Infant Calming Responses during Maternal Carrying in Humans and Mice."


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share 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/2013-04/cp-fmt041113.php

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Codan Radio Communications: Defense - RnR Company Profiles

Synopsis
Strategic Defence Intelligence?s ?Codan Radio Communications: Defense ? Company Profile and SWOT Report? contains in depth information and data about the company and its operations. The profile contains a company overview, key facts,major products and services, swot analysis, business description, company history, key employees as well as company locations and subsidiaries.

Summary
This report is a crucial resource for industry executives and anyone looking to access key information about ?Codan Radio Communications?

The report utilizes a wide range of primary and secondary sources, which are analyzed and presented in a consistent and easily accessible format. Strategic Defence Intelligence strictly follows a standardized research methodology to ensure high levels of data quality and these characteristics guarantee a unique report.

Scope
- Examines and identifies key information and issues about ?Codan Radio Communications? for business intelligence requirements.
- Studies and presents the company?s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities (growth potential) and threats (competition). Strategic and operational business information is objectively reported.
- The profile also contains information on business operations, company history, major products and services, key employees, locations and subsidiaries.

Reasons?To?Buy
- Quickly enhance your understanding of ?Codan Radio Communications?
- Gain insight into the marketplace and a better understanding of internal and external factors which could impact the industry.
- Increase business/sales activities by understanding your competitors? businesses better.
- Recognize potential partnerships and suppliers.

Key Highlights
Codan Radio Communications (Codan) designs and builds premium communications equipment for High Frequency (HF) radio humanitarian, security and protection applications. The company offers a series of HF transceivers that are suitable for the combination of portable, vehicle and base station systems. In addition, it offers a range of accessories including modems, antennas, high power amplifiers, crosspatches, telephone interconnect and remote control components. The company supplies its products to the United Nations, Red Cross and other international aid agencies. It operates service centers and manufacturing facilities in Australia, the US, the UK, China and India. The company is an operating division of Codan Limited, an Australian based company. Codan is headquartered in Newton, Australia.

Table of content

1 Business Analysis
1.1 Company Overview
1.2 Business Description
1.3 Major Products and Services
2 SWOT Analysis
2.1 SWOT Analysis - Overview
2.2 Strengths
2.3 Weaknesses
2.4 Opportunities
2.5 Threats
3 History
4 Key Employees
5 Locations and Subsidiaries
5.1 Head Office
5.2 Other Locations and Subsidiaries
6 Appendix
6.1 Methodology
6.2 DisclaimerTable 1: Major Products and Services
Table 2: History
Table 3: Key Employees
Table 4: Locations

Source: http://www.rnrcompanyprofiles.com/codan-radio-communications-defense-company-profile-and-swot-report-report.html

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Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Lullabies and other music may help sick preemies

By Genevra Pittman

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Singing or playing womb-like sounds in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) may help slow the heart rate and improve sleep and eating patterns of premature babies, a new study suggests.

Researchers found infants who had respiratory distress or sepsis tended to do better while listening to their parents sing a lullaby or to sounds mimicking a mother's heartbeat or fluid in the womb.

"We are learning from the literature and studies like this that premature infants do not necessarily grow best tucked away in an incubator," said Joanne Loewy, head of the Louis Armstrong Center for Music and Medicine at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York.

"Neurologic function can be enhanced with music; vital signs can be enhanced through interactive sounds and music therapy," she told Reuters Health.

Her new study included 272 preemies being treated at 11 NICUs that had music therapists.

At different times over two weeks, babies' parents sang to them or therapists used one of two devices meant to simulate womb sounds for 10 minutes. Loewy and her colleagues compared preemies' vital signs during those periods, as well as their eating and sleeping, to times when no sounds were played.

They found the babies' heart rates dropped by one or two beats per minute, on average, while they listened to the lullaby and heartbeat sounds and just after they'd heard other womb-like sounds.

"The singing is extremely important because it represents familiarity - the baby heard the mother and father's voice as early as 16 weeks," Loewy explained, "plus you have melody and rhythm in song."

Sucking rates sped up with the heartbeat sounds, in particular, and there was a longer-term improvement in sleep patterns tied to the womb-like fluid noises, the researchers reported Monday in Pediatrics.

Previous research into the soothing effects of music has found mixed results among both babies and, for example, adults on ventilators in intensive care (see Reuters Health articles of September 16, 2009 here: http://reut.rs/m1JBau and December 8, 2010, here: http://reut.rs/eZ1lk5).

There were no babies in the new study who were exposed only to silence or quiet talking in the NICU, so the researchers can't say how these preemies would have compared to a no-music group - only that they did better while hearing music.

They said the sounds used in these NICUs can be replicated by parents without the help of a music therapist, if one isn't available.

"The wonderful thing about these instruments is that the body can take it over," Loewy said.

"We teach (parents) to hold the baby over the heart, to hold them skin-to-skin, to make ?ahh' sounds to enhance that womb-like atmosphere."

Loewy said she and her colleagues especially encourage parents to sing songs that are important to their family and culture, which can ease their stress as well.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/cxXOG Pediatrics, online April 15, 2013.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/lullabies-other-music-may-help-sick-preemies-043649663.html

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NJ men seek leniency in Somalia terror case

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) ? An attorney for one of two New Jersey men who pleaded guilty to trying to join an armed Islamic group in Somalia in order to wage holy war against non-Muslims said his client was such an amateur that he asked a man who turned out to be an undercover informant if he could take his beloved pet cat with him to Egypt and suggested he might go nightclubbing and surfing while there.

Federal prosecutors, however, sought to portray Mohamed Alessa and Carlos Almonte as dangerous, calculating would-be terrorists bent on joining an overseas organization in order to kill "disbelievers in Islam." Prosecutors said the two carried videos on their cellphones of American soldiers being beheaded and considered Maj. Nidal Hasan, the alleged perpetrator of the worst mass shooting on a U.S. military installation at Fort Hood, Texas, a role model.

Alessa, 23, of North Bergen, and Carlos Eduardo Almonte, 27, of Elmwood Park, each spoke Monday at their sentencing hearing in federal court in Newark, asking U.S. District Judge Dickinson Debevoise for leniency.

"I've learned it's not a game. I have no one to blame but myself. My family is paying the price now." Alessa said, apologizing profusely for the "anguish" and "shame" he had brought on his parents, who were in the courtroom.

He spoke of being a once-troubled teenager prone to outbursts of anger that he didn't understand, and spoke of his longing to be given a second chance.

"After all, I only consider myself a Jersey boy," he added.

Almonte, known as Omar, echoed Alessa's statement of being an isolated, lonely teenager who had looked up to an older, father-figure type who had seemingly taken the two under his wing, become their friend and urged them to channel their anger into joining militant groups overseas. That man turned out to be an undercover informant for the New York City Police Department.

Alessa's attorney, Stanley L. Cohen, said it was the undercover NYPD officer who repeatedly insisted Alessa and Almonte get passports and buy tickets to Egypt, from where they allegedly would move on to Somalia.

Cohen said Alessa asked the undercover officer if he could take his cat with him.

"He can't take his house cat, Princess, overseas to do jihad ? he is devastated," Cohen said. "The reality of it is, no one in this room, not the government, not the agents, not me knows where Alessa would have ended up."

Prosecutors sought to counter the image of the two men as misguided, troubled teens entrapped by a government informant.

Assistant U.S. Attorney L. Judson Welle reviewed transcripts of audio tapes made by the informant, purporting to show Alessa and Almonte relishing the thought of getting the chance to kill American soldiers overseas. The two men viewed multiple online videos, including some they kept on their cellphones, that showed U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan under sniper attacks, ambushes, IED attacks, executions and beheadings, according to Welle.

"I like watching (disbelievers) get slaughtered," Almonte allegedly said, according to a transcript of an undercover tape shown in court.

"Your honor, if you send a message that homegrown violent extremism will be met with serious consequences, it will be less likely that others will engage in this crime," Welle said.

Alessa and Almonte were arrested in June 2010 as they prepared to board separate planes to Egypt at New York's JFK Airport.

They each pleaded guilty in 2011 to a charge of conspiring within the United States to murder individuals outside the U.S. by trying to join al-Shabab, a designated terrorist organization.

The charges could carry from 30 years to life in prison, but they will likely face less under the terms of their plea agreement.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nj-men-seek-leniency-somalia-terror-case-172622688.html

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Hawaii clears land use for the Thirty Meter Telescope, construction to start in 2014

Hawaii clears land use for the Thirty Meter Telescope

The Thirty Meter Telescope has been under development for more than a decade, but the sheer amount of land needed on Hawaii's Mauna Kea for its namesake main mirror has proved problematic: locals have formally challenged the multi-university effort over concerns that it might damage both the environment and natives' heritage. Regardless of which stance you take on the issue, the project is going forward now that the state's Board of Land and Natural Resources has granted an official land permit. The move clears an optical and near-infrared telescope with nine times the coverage area of its peers, and three times the sharpness. That's enough to observe light from 13 billion years ago as well as put a heavy focus on tracking extrasolar planets, including planets in the making. Any impact on science or Mauna Kea will have to wait when construction doesn't even start until April 2014, although we're hoping that environmental care requirements attached to the permit will let us appreciate both the early universe and modern-day Earth in equal measure.

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Via: Pacific Business News

Source: Thirty Meter Telescope

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/Og76dKe_lH4/

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Monday, April 15, 2013

Reading holds Liverpool to 0-0 in EPL

Associated Press Sports

updated 12:25 p.m. ET April 13, 2013

READING, England (AP) -Reading ended its club record eight-game losing run with a 0-0 draw against Liverpool in the English Premier League on Saturday that did little to ease its relegation fears.

The hosts were indebted to goalkeeper Alex McCarthy, who was playing his first match in more than five months and produced a string of stunning saves to almost certainly ensure Liverpool fails to qualify for the Champions League for a fourth straight season.

Luis Suarez, Steven Gerrard, Philippe Coutinho and Daniel Sturridge couldn't beat McCarthy.

Reading stays last in the standings, equal on points with Queens Park Rangers but with an inferior goal difference.

Liverpool is unlikely to even qualify for the Europa League, sitting eight points behind fifth-place Tottenham in the only guaranteed berth but having played a match more.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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PST: Robbie Keane and the Galaxy are MLS' last unbeaten team, a mark they'll seek to defend against FC Dallas (7:30 p.m. ET; NBCSN, Live Extra).

Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/51528484/ns/sports-soccer/

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Nanosponges soak up toxins released by bacterial infections and venom

Apr. 14, 2013 ? Engineers at the University of California, San Diego have invented a "nanosponge" capable of safely removing a broad class of dangerous toxins from the bloodstream -- including toxins produced by MRSA, E. coli, poisonous snakes and bees. These nanosponges, which thus far have been studied in mice, can neutralize "pore-forming toxins," which destroy cells by poking holes in their cell membranes. Unlike other anti-toxin platforms that need to be custom synthesized for individual toxin type, the nanosponges can absorb different pore-forming toxins regardless of their molecular structures. In a study against alpha-haemolysin toxin from MRSA, pre-innoculation with nanosponges enabled 89 percent of mice to survive lethal doses.

Administering nanosponges after the lethal dose led to 44 percent survival.

The team, led by nanoengineers at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering, published the findings in Nature Nanotechnology April 14.

"This is a new way to remove toxins from the bloodstream," said Liangfang Zhang, a nanoengineering professor at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering and the senior author on the study. "Instead of creating specific treatments for individual toxins, we are developing a platform that can neutralize toxins caused by a wide range of pathogens, including MRSA and other antibiotic resistant bacteria," said Zhang. The work could also lead to non-species-specific therapies for venomous snake bites and bee stings, which would make it more likely that health care providers or at-risk individuals will have life-saving treatments available when they need them most.

The researchers are aiming to translate this work into approved therapies. "One of the first applications we are aiming for would be an anti-virulence treatment for MRSA. That's why we studied one of the most virulent toxins from MRSA in our experiments," said "Jack" Che-Ming Hu, the first author on the paper. Hu, now a post-doctoral researcher in Zhang's lab, earned his Ph.D. in bioengineering from UC San Diego in 2011.

Aspects of this work will be presented April 18 at Research Expo, the annual graduate student research and networking event of the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering.

Nanosponges as Decoys

In order to evade the immune system and remain in circulation in the bloodstream, the nanosponges are wrapped in red blood cell membranes. This red blood cell cloaking technology was developed in Liangfang Zhang's lab at UC San Diego. The researchers previously demonstrated that nanoparticles disguised as red blood cells could be used to deliver cancer-fighting drugs directly to a tumor. Zhang also has a faculty appointment at the UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center.

Red blood cells are one of the primary targets of pore-forming toxins. When a group of toxins all puncture the same cell, forming a pore, uncontrolled ions rush in and the cell dies.

The nanosponges look like red blood cells, and therefore serve as red blood cell decoys that collect the toxins. The nanosponges absorb damaging toxins and divert them away from their cellular targets. The nanosponges had a half-life of 40 hours in the researchers' experiments in mice. Eventually the liver safely metabolized both the nanosponges and the sequestered toxins, with the liver incurring no discernible damage.

Each nanosponge has a diameter of approximately 85 nanometers and is made of a biocompatible polymer core wrapped in segments of red blood cells membranes.

Zhang's team separates the red blood cells from a small sample of blood using a centrifuge and then puts the cells into a solution that causes them to swell and burst, releasing hemoglobin and leaving RBC skins behind. The skins are then mixed with the ball-shaped nanoparticles until they are coated with a red blood cell membrane.

Just one red blood cell membrane can make thousands of nanosponges, which are 3,000 times smaller than a red blood cell. With a single dose, this army of nanosponges floods the blood stream, outnumbering red blood cells and intercepting toxins.

Based on test-tube experiments, the number of toxins each nanosponge could absorb depended on the toxin. For example, approximately 85 alpha-haemolysin toxin produced by MRSA, 30 stretpolysin-O toxins and 850 melittin monomoers, which are part of bee venom.

In mice, administering nanosponges and alpha-haemolysin toxin simultaneously at a toxin-to-nanosponge ratio of 70:1 neutralized the toxins and caused no discernible damage.

One next step, the researchers say, is to pursue clinical trials.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of California - San Diego, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


Journal Reference:

  1. Che-Ming J. Hu, Ronnie H. Fang, Jonathan Copp, Brian T. Luk, Liangfang Zhang. A biomimetic nanosponge that absorbs pore-forming toxins. Nature Nanotechnology, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nnano.2013.54

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_science/~3/JCulDU1774Y/130414193435.htm

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