Animals are no strangers to exercise, and pets can make for the perfect work out partner. Now, cats are apparently tackling yoga.
The photo below was uploaded by a Reddit user who said their friend left her cat alone with yoga equipment. When she came back, the feline apparently attempted to get fit with the help of an instructional exercise video.
Let's hope he's mentally prepared for downward-facing dog.
Uploaded by bitterxrival.
If you're looking for a companion of your own and are ready for the responsibility, take a look at the ASPCA adoption site or Petfinder.com.
LONDON (Reuters) - Two former editors of a British tabloid newspaper shut down by owner Rupert Murdoch over a phone-hacking scandal lost a legal battle on Friday to have criminal charges against them dropped.
Rebekah Brooks and Andy Coulson, both former News of the World editors and close associates of Prime Minister David Cameron, have pleaded not guilty to charges that they conspired to intercept people's voicemail messages in pursuit of stories.
Their lawyers had argued that once a message had been heard by its intended recipient it was no longer "in the course of transmission" as defined by the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act under which the charges were brought.
The hacking scandal prompted Murdoch to shut down the mass-selling Sunday tabloid in July 2011 and led to a huge police investigation and to a public inquiry that revealed embarrassingly cosy ties between the media and politicians.
The judge in charge of the hacking case had rejected the defence arguments advanced by lawyers for Brooks, Coulson and three other former News of the World staff in May, but this could not be reported at the time for legal reasons.
The defendants appealed, but the Court of Appeal upheld the earlier judgment on Friday and allowed it to be reported.
"There is no good reason why the first receipt of the communication should be considered as bringing the transmission to an end," the Court of Appeal judges wrote.
The ruling means that Brooks, Coulson and others will stand trial as planned in September on hacking and other charges.
Brooks and Coulson both deny charges of involvement in the bribery of public officials for stories, and Brooks also denies perverting the course of justice.
Brooks, who after leaving the News of the World went on to edit its sister paper the Sun, Britain's highest-selling newspaper, later became the boss of Murdoch's entire British newspaper arm until the hacking scandal forced her out.
In her heyday, she enjoyed close friendships with senior politicians including Cameron.
After leaving the News of the World, Coulson went on to work as Cameron's chief of communications. He was forced out of that job in January 2011 as the hacking scandal gathered pace.
(Reporting by Estelle Shirbon; Editing by Alistair Lyon)
NEW YORK/WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, West Virginia (Reuters) - September could be an opportune time for the Federal Reserve to consider scaling back its assets purchase, an influential official of the U.S. central bank said on Friday, as he stressed that the Fed must take a long view of economic progress and not be blinded by the most recent data.
The remarks by Fed Governor Jeremy Stein drew the attention of economists and investors after he ticked off several examples of improvement in the labor market since the Fed launched its bond-buying program last September.
Stein's speech, and a separate one on Friday by Jeffrey Lacker, president of the Richmond Fed, had some parallels to efforts by other Fed officials earlier this week to soothe market anxieties about a pullback in the bond purchases.
Nonetheless, Stein and Lacker took a more aggressive tone on when the central bank's unprecedented policy accommodation might be reduced.
Even so, differences within the Fed over the strength of the economy were in view as a third policymaker, John Williams, president of the San Francisco Fed, shelved his earlier view that the Fed could stop buying bonds by late 2013, saying, "It's too early to cut back on our programs right now."
The Fed's purchase of Treasuries and mortgage bonds at a monthly pace of $85 billion has provided a huge flow of liquidity into financial markets, driving up assets from stocks to bonds.
Yields on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note rose after Stein's remarks, a sharp reversal of stabilization in the market earlier in the day.
Markets had dropped hard in the days after Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke last week said the Fed expected to pare back on its bond purchases, known as quantitative easing, later this year and to halt it altogether by mid-2014, as long as the economy progresses as expected. Unemployment will likely have fallen to about 7 percent by then, he said.
But Stein on Friday, in an unusual move, trained investors' attention on the Fed's September policy meeting, though the policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee next meets in July.
"The best approach is for the committee to be clear that in making a decision in, say, September, it will give primary weight to the large stock of news that has accumulated since the inception of the program and will not be unduly influenced by whatever data releases arrive in the few weeks before the meeting," said Stein, a voting member of the policy committee.
Data from early September "will remain relevant for future decisions," even if it does not play a primary role in any policy decision in September, he said, in a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.
"If the news is bad, and it is confirmed by further bad news in October and November, this would suggest that the 7 percent unemployment goal is likely to be further away, and the remainder of the program would be extended accordingly," he said.
Stein's comments drew a sharp reaction on expectations of the Fed's policy path.
"Stein's remarks cannot be lightly dismissed and raise risks that some on the committee may have already essentially decided on September," said Michael Feroli, chief U.S. economist at JP Morgan in New York.
Lacker also put September in focus, saying the Fed meeting that month "is certainly a candidate" for when the Fed could first reduce its pace of buying, though he said that economic data would be key.
Nearly half of the economists polled by Reuters this month expect the Fed to start reducing the pace of asset purchases in September.
Williams, who is a voter on Fed policy this year, gave no preferred timeline for reducing bond purchases, saying only that doing so would be appropriate "at some point." If inflation continues to come in below expectations, that could point to the need for more stimulus, not less, he said.
He called the recent rise in Treasury rates a "healthy" development because it suggests markets no longer assume the Fed will keep rates low forever.
Lacker, one of the central bank's most hawkish officials and a persistent critic of the latest round of bond buying, said it was "wise" for Bernanke to clarify the Fed's views on future bond buying, but he stressed policy would still be loose as the Fed reduces "the pace at which it is adding accommodation." Lacker is not a voter on policy this year.
Financial markets should brace for more volatility as they digest news of a reduction in quantitative easing, Lacker told a judicial conference in West Virginia, adding that it "should not interfere with the moderate-growth scenario that I have presented."
Williams said that the sudden rise in rates suggests some investors had become complacent about low rates and that froth had been building in some areas of financial markets.
"It's healthy to get some froth out of the market," he told reporters after his speech.
On the labor market, where unemployment remains high at 7.6 percent, Stein noted the rate was 8.1 percent when the bond purchase program was launched last year. Monthly job growth has jumped dramatically since then, he said, adding Fed forecasts are also more optimistic.
Stein said the Fed can be more specific about its plans for QE3 as it approaches its policy goals. The timeline Bernanke articulated illustrates a "greater willingness to spell out what the committee is looking for, as opposed to a 'we'll know it when we see it' approach," he said.
Still, Stein stressed that reducing the pace of QE3 is highly conditional on the economy. He added it did not mark a change in policy and was meant only to clarify things for investors.
Stein, a relatively new but highly respected member of the powerful Fed board, turned some heads back in February when he warned the massive asset purchases were showing signs of inflating price bubbles in junk bonds and other markets.
But on Friday he said while financial stability should play a roll in monetary policy decisions, the benefits of QE3 have surpassed the costs of the program, including such stability risks.
(Additional reporting by Ann Saphir in Rohnert Park, Calif., and Richard Leong in New York; Editing by Leslie Adler)
BlackBerry CEO says the PlayBook will never get BlackBerry 10
The dozens of loyal BlackBerry PlayBook owners out there were dealt a major blow on Friday when BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins said that he?d stopped plans to bring the new BlackBerry 10 platform to BlackBerry?s 7-inch tablet. Heins said that he was ?not satisfied with the user experience? that BlackBerry 10 provided on the PlayBook, which led him to make the ?difficult decision? to stop the plan and instead focus on the company?s core hardware products. While the news is certainly disappointing for PlayBook fans, it?s not entirely surprising since the tablet didn?t sell well when it launched two years ago and Heins has largely been cool to the idea of making a new version of the device.
From California to New York and Florida, the gay community cheered the U.S. Supreme Courts ruling on Wednesday. Some looked forward to the benefits of having their same-sex marriages recognized federally, while others anticipated further obstacles.
By Daniel Trotta,?Reuters / June 26, 2013
Skye Smith celebrates on Wednesday at a rally in Redding, Calif., after the U.S. Supreme Court's rulings on gay marriage issues.
AP Photo/The Record Searchlight, Greg Barnette
Enlarge
With cheers, tears and kisses, gays and lesbians across the United States celebrated Wednesday's historic Supreme Court decision in support of same-sex marriage, which provided cause for joy after years of protest.
Click Here for your FREE 30 DAYS of The Christian Science Monitor Weekly Digital Edition
Crowds turned out in gay?capitals such as West Hollywood in California, San Francisco, South Miami Beach in Florida and the New York gay?bar called the Stonewall Inn, seen as the birthplace of the gay?rights movement.
"It's so wonderful being down here celebrating and not protesting for a change," Roger Silva, 69, said outside the Stonewall, grateful that a New York law allowed him to marry his partner of 11 years in April. "I never thought this would be possible in New York, much less the country."
In a landmark ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court forced the federal government to recognize same-sex marriages in states where it is legal and in a separate ruling it cleared the way for same-sex marriages in California.
Stonewall has become synonymous with gay?rights since a police raid there on June 28, 1969, triggered a spontaneous and violent demonstration that popularized the slogan "Out of the closet and into the streets."
A jubilant crowd of several hundred gathered on Wednesday afternoon, many carrying U.S. flags and the rainbow flags that have been adopted by the movement for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality.
At least one man had mixed emotions.
"There's a bit of wistfulness - if I was younger, at the bottom rung, to enjoy all those benefits. But yes it is a great day," said Bruce Ward, 55, a writer.
In San Francisco, where an outspoken movement carried the flag for gay?rights after Stonewall, about 100 clergy members from all faiths celebrated the two Supreme Court decisions outside Grace Cathedral atop Nob Hill.
Across town in The Castro, a neighborhood at the center of gay?life in the city, more than 2,000 people gathered in the street, many waving rainbow flags and equal signs. Dance music blared from loudspeakers and children bounced on the shoulders of their parents.
Down the California coast in West Hollywood, more than 1,000 attended a rally in which same-sex couples brought their children, joining young celebrants including a woman in a rainbow-colored ballet tutu and at least two in rainbow bikinis.
"It means that my daughters are never going to have to explain that their family is second-class," said Jason Howe, who arrived with his married partner Adrian Perez and their twin daughters, Olivia and Clara.
Added Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr., who runs a popular celebrity blog under the assumed name Perez Hilton: "Today means that we have successfully educated America."
In South Beach, hundreds gathered at the LGBT visitors' center to celebrate and to declare that more work was left to be done, particularly in Florida, where a 2008 constitutional amendment outlawed same-sex marriages.
Amid hugs, kisses and congratulations, some people wished each other "Happy Pride Day" and "Happy Gay?Day."
"We have waited a long time for this ... We really cannot overstate how big a step forward this is," said Stratton Pollitzer, deputy director of Equality Florida.
Others engaged in legal discussions about the Supreme Court decision and the Florida law, with the common refrain that "we still have a long way to go."
Jack Tufano, 40, an architect, said he felt "relief" when the decision was announced "because my husband and I have been waiting" to get his U.S. citizenship. The two got married last year in New York.
"First thing we're going to do tomorrow is call the lawyer to get started," he said.
(Reporting by Edith Honan in New York; Zachary Fagenson in South Beach, Florida; Dana Feldman in West Hollywood, California; and Noah Berger and Ronnie Cohen in San Francisco; Editing by Dina Kyriakidou, Stacey Joyce and Lisa Shumaker)
QUITO, Ecuador (AP) ? President Barack Obama tried to cool the international frenzy over Edward Snowden on Thursday as Ecuador stepped up its defiance and said it was preemptively rejecting millions in trade benefits that it could lose by taking in the fugitive from his limbo in a Moscow airport.
The country seen as likeliest to shelter the National Security Agency leaker seemed determined to prove it could handle any repercussions, with three of its highest officials calling an early-morning news conference to "unilaterally and irrevocably renounce" $23 million a year in lowered tariffs on products such as roses, shrimp and frozen vegetables.
Fernando Alvarado, the secretary of communications for leftist President Rafael Correa, sarcastically suggested the U.S. use the money to train government employees to respect human rights.
Obama, meanwhile, sought to downplay the international chase for the man he called "a 29-year-old hacker" and lower the temperature of an issue that has raised tensions between the U.S. and uneasy partners Russia and China. Obama said in Senegal that the damage to U.S. national security has already been done and his top focus now is making sure it can't happen again.
"I'm not going to have one case with a suspect who we're trying to extradite suddenly be elevated to the point where I've got to start doing wheeling and dealing and trading on a whole host of other issues, simply to get a guy extradited so he can face the justice system," Obama said at a joint news conference with Senegal's President Macky Sall.
While the Ecuadorean government appeared angry over U.S. threats of punishment if it accepts Snowden, there were also mixed signals about how eager it was to grant asylum. For days, officials here have been blasting the U.S. and praising Snowden's leaks of NSA eavesdropping secrets as a blow for global human rights.
But they also have repeatedly insisted that they are nowhere close to making a decision on whether Snowden can leave Moscow, where he is believed to be holed up in an airport transit zone, for refuge in this oil-rich South American nation.
"It's a complex situation, we don't know how it'll be resolved," Correa told a news conference Thursday in his first public comments on the case aside from a handful of postings on Twitter.
The Ecuadorean leader said that in order for Snowden's asylum application to be processed, he would have to be in Ecuador or inside an Ecuadorean Embassy, "and he isn't." Another country would have to permit Snowden to transit its territory for that requirement to be met, Correa said.
WikiLeaks, which has been aiding Snowden, announced earlier he was en route to Ecuador and had received a travel document. On Wednesday, the Univision television network displayed an unsigned letter of safe passage for him.
Officials on Thursday acknowledged that the Ecuadorean Embassy in London had issued a June 22 letter of safe passage for Snowden that calls on other countries to allow him to travel to asylum in Ecuador. But Ecuador's secretary of political management, Betty Tola, said the letter was invalid because it was issued without the approval of the government in the capital, Quito.
She also threatened legal action against whoever leaked the document, which she said "has no validity and is the exclusive responsibility of the person who issued it."
"This demonstrates a total lack of coordination in the department of foreign affairs," said Santiago Basabe, a professor of political science at the Latin American School of Social Sciences in Quito. "It's no small question to issue a document of safe passage or a diplomatic document for someone like Snowden without this decision being taken directly by the foreign minister or president."
Other analysts, however, saw not confusion but internal divisions in the Ecuadorean government.
Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a think tank focused on Latin America, said many in Washington believed that Correa, a leftist elected to a third term in February, had been telegraphing a desire to moderate and take a softer tack toward the United States and private business.
Harder-core leftists led by Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino may be seeking to maintain a tough line, he said, a division expressing itself in confusing messages.
"I think there really are different factions within the government on this," Shifter said. "Correa wants to become more moderate. That has been the signal that has been communicated in Washington."
Embarrassment for the Obama administration over the surveillance revelations continued as the British newspaper The Guardian reported that it allowed the National Security Agency for more than two years to collect records detailing email and Internet use by Americans. The story cited documents showing that under the program a federal judge could approve a bulk collection order for Internet metadata every 90 days.
A senior Obama administration confirmed the program and said it ended in 2011, according to The Guardian. The records were first collected during the Bush administration and involved "communications with at least one communicant outside the United States or for which no communicant was known to be a citizen of the United States."
The report said that eventually the NSA was allowed to "analyze communications metadata associated with United States persons and persons believed to be in the United States," according to a 2007 Justice Department memo marked secret.
The U.S. administration is supposed to decide by Monday whether to grant Ecuador export privileges under the Generalized System of Preferences, a program meant to spur development and growth in poorer countries. The deadline was set long before the Snowden affair.
More broadly, a larger trade pact allowing reduced tariffs on more than $5 billion in annual exports to the U.S. is up for congressional renewal before July 21. While approval of the Andean Trade Preference Act has long been seen as doubtful in Washington, Ecuador has been lobbying strongly for its renewal.
On Wednesday, Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, pledged to lead an effort to block extension of U.S. tariff benefits if Ecuador grants asylum to Snowden, who turned 30 last week. Nearly half of Ecuador's billions a year in foreign trade depends on the United States.
The Obama administration said Thursday that accepting Snowden would damage the overall relationship between the two countries and analysts said it was almost certain that granting the leaker asylum would lead the U.S. to cut roughly $30 million a year in military and law enforcement assistance.
Granting asylum to Snowden would cause "great difficulties in our bilateral relationship," State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell said. "If they take that step, that would have very negative repercussions."
Alvarado, the communications minister, said his country rejects economic "blackmail" in the form of threats against the trade measures.
"The preferences were authorized for Andean countries as compensation for the fight against drugs, but soon became a new instrument of pressure," he said. "As a result, Ecuador unilaterally and irrevocably renounces these preferences."
Alvarado did not explicitly mention the separate effort to win trade benefits under the presidential order.
He did suggest, however, how the U.S. could use the money saved from Ecuadorean tariffs ? to train government employees to respect citizens' rights.
"Ecuador offers the United States $23 million a year in economic aid, an amount similar to what we were receiving under the tariff benefits, with the purpose of providing human rights training that will contribute to avoid violations of people's privacy, that degrade humanity," he said.
___
Pace reported from Dakar, Senegal. Gonzalo Solano in Quito, Peter Orsi in Caracas, Venezuela, and Ken Thomas in Washington contributed to this report.
Type 2 diabetes patients transplanted with own bone marrow stem cells reduces insulin usePublic release date: 28-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Robert Miranda cogcomm@aol.com Cell Transplantation Center of Excellence for Aging and Brain Repair
Putnam Valley, NY. (June 28 2013) A study carried out in India examining the safety and efficacy of self-donated (autologous), transplanted bone marrow stem cells in patients with type 2 diabetes (TD2M), has found that patients receiving the transplants, when compared to a control group of TD2M patients who did not receive transplantation, required less insulin post-transplantation.
The study appears as an early e-publication for the journal Cell Transplantation, and is now freely available on-line at http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/cog/ct/pre-prints/ct0920bhansali.
"There is growing interest in the scientific community for cellular therapies that use bone marrow-derived cells for the treatment of type 2 diabetes mellitus and its complications," said study corresponding author Anil Bhansali, PhD professor and head of the Endocrinology Department at the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education in Chandrigarh, India. "But the potential of stem cell therapy for this disease is yet to be fully explored."
While there is growing interest in using stem cell transplantation to treat TD2M, few studies have examined the utility of bone marrow-derived stem cells. By experimenting with bone marrow-derived stem cells, the researchers sought to exploit the rich source of stem cells in bone marrow.
Their study aimed at evaluating the efficacy and safety of autologous bone marrow-derived stem cell transplantation in patients with T2DM and who also had good glycemic control. Good glycemic control emerged as an important factor in the transplantation group and in the non-transplanted control group.
Cell transplantation had a significant impact on the patients in this study as those administered cells demonstrated a significant reduction in insulin requirement. A significantly smaller reduction in the insulin requirement of the control group was also observed but a "repeated emphasis on life style modification" was believed to be a contributing factor in this effect.
According to Dr. Bhansali, the strength of their study included the inclusion of a homogenous patient population with T2DM which exhibited good glycemic control, and the presence of a similar control group that did not get cell transplants.
"The efficacy and safety of stem cell therapy needs to be established in a greater number of patients and with a longer duration follow-up," concluded Bhansali and his co-authors. "The data available so far from animal and human studies is encouraging, however, it has enormous limitations."
The researchers recommended determining which type of stem cells -hematopoietic, bone marrow or placenta-derived - might be best to treat T2DM. In addition, they said that post-transplantation patients needed close monitoring for the development of neoplasia as stem cells - whether multipotent or pluripotent - have the potential for malignant transformation.
They concluded that "autologous bone marrow-derived stem cell therapy in patients with T2DM results in significant decrease in insulin dose requirement."
###
Contact:
Dr. Anil Bhansali
Email: anilbhansaliendocrine@rediffmail.com
Citation: Bhansali, A.; Asokumra,P.; Walia, R.; Bhansali, S.; Gupta, V.; Jain, A.; Sachdeva, N.; Sharma, R. R.; Marwaha, N.; Khandelwal, N. Efficacy and Safety of Autologous Bone Marrow Derived Stem Cell Transplantation in patients with Type 2 Diabetes mellitus: A randomized placebo-controlled study. Cell Transplantation.
Appeared or available online: April 2, 2013
The Coeditors-in-chief for CELL TRANSPLANTATION are at the Diabetes Research Institute, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and Center for Neuropsychiatry, China Medical University Hospital, TaiChung, Taiwan. Contact, Camillo Ricordi, MD at ricordi@miami.edu or Shinn-Zong Lin, MD, PhD at shinnzong@yahoo.com.tw or David Eve, PhD at celltransplantation@gmail.com
News release by Florida Science Communications http://www.sciencescribe.net
[ | 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.
Type 2 diabetes patients transplanted with own bone marrow stem cells reduces insulin usePublic release date: 28-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Robert Miranda cogcomm@aol.com Cell Transplantation Center of Excellence for Aging and Brain Repair
Putnam Valley, NY. (June 28 2013) A study carried out in India examining the safety and efficacy of self-donated (autologous), transplanted bone marrow stem cells in patients with type 2 diabetes (TD2M), has found that patients receiving the transplants, when compared to a control group of TD2M patients who did not receive transplantation, required less insulin post-transplantation.
The study appears as an early e-publication for the journal Cell Transplantation, and is now freely available on-line at http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/cog/ct/pre-prints/ct0920bhansali.
"There is growing interest in the scientific community for cellular therapies that use bone marrow-derived cells for the treatment of type 2 diabetes mellitus and its complications," said study corresponding author Anil Bhansali, PhD professor and head of the Endocrinology Department at the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education in Chandrigarh, India. "But the potential of stem cell therapy for this disease is yet to be fully explored."
While there is growing interest in using stem cell transplantation to treat TD2M, few studies have examined the utility of bone marrow-derived stem cells. By experimenting with bone marrow-derived stem cells, the researchers sought to exploit the rich source of stem cells in bone marrow.
Their study aimed at evaluating the efficacy and safety of autologous bone marrow-derived stem cell transplantation in patients with T2DM and who also had good glycemic control. Good glycemic control emerged as an important factor in the transplantation group and in the non-transplanted control group.
Cell transplantation had a significant impact on the patients in this study as those administered cells demonstrated a significant reduction in insulin requirement. A significantly smaller reduction in the insulin requirement of the control group was also observed but a "repeated emphasis on life style modification" was believed to be a contributing factor in this effect.
According to Dr. Bhansali, the strength of their study included the inclusion of a homogenous patient population with T2DM which exhibited good glycemic control, and the presence of a similar control group that did not get cell transplants.
"The efficacy and safety of stem cell therapy needs to be established in a greater number of patients and with a longer duration follow-up," concluded Bhansali and his co-authors. "The data available so far from animal and human studies is encouraging, however, it has enormous limitations."
The researchers recommended determining which type of stem cells -hematopoietic, bone marrow or placenta-derived - might be best to treat T2DM. In addition, they said that post-transplantation patients needed close monitoring for the development of neoplasia as stem cells - whether multipotent or pluripotent - have the potential for malignant transformation.
They concluded that "autologous bone marrow-derived stem cell therapy in patients with T2DM results in significant decrease in insulin dose requirement."
###
Contact:
Dr. Anil Bhansali
Email: anilbhansaliendocrine@rediffmail.com
Citation: Bhansali, A.; Asokumra,P.; Walia, R.; Bhansali, S.; Gupta, V.; Jain, A.; Sachdeva, N.; Sharma, R. R.; Marwaha, N.; Khandelwal, N. Efficacy and Safety of Autologous Bone Marrow Derived Stem Cell Transplantation in patients with Type 2 Diabetes mellitus: A randomized placebo-controlled study. Cell Transplantation.
Appeared or available online: April 2, 2013
The Coeditors-in-chief for CELL TRANSPLANTATION are at the Diabetes Research Institute, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and Center for Neuropsychiatry, China Medical University Hospital, TaiChung, Taiwan. Contact, Camillo Ricordi, MD at ricordi@miami.edu or Shinn-Zong Lin, MD, PhD at shinnzong@yahoo.com.tw or David Eve, PhD at celltransplantation@gmail.com
News release by Florida Science Communications http://www.sciencescribe.net
[ | 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.
BAMAKO, Mali (AP) ? The officer who led a coup last year that plunged Mali into chaos asked for forgiveness from the Malian people during a ceremony meant to heal the rift between soldiers who supported the putsch and the presidential guard who fought to defend the former president.
Coup leader Capt. Amadou Haya Sanogo said that he and his brothers and sisters in green-beret uniform "want to ask for forgiveness from Malians as a whole."
After the coup, the green berets led a purge of the red beret-wearing presidential guard. Many red berets were "disappeared," while others were imprisoned and allegedly tortured.
Interim President Dioncounda Traore said Wednesday the ceremony marked the reconciliation of the two sides and announced that all red beret soldiers still incarcerated had been freed.
On Wednesday, Paula Deen appeared on TODAY with Matt Lauer to address the scandal over revelations that she had used racial slurs in the past. Her apology and explanation for her behavior was lengthy, but opinions are split over how effective her 13-minute mea culpa really was.
"She appeared very genuine," said Lily Golightly, owner and publicist with New York-based Golightly Media. "Her YouTube videos were kind of strange, and this interview should have cleared things up."
Unfortunately for Deen, the interview may have had the opposite effect.
David E. Johnson, CEO of Strategic Vision, a public relations and branding agency, calls her appearance a "non-apology" of Nixonian proportions. "(Former President Richard Nixon) never apologized by saying he was guilty or wrong about Watergate; she was the same way," he said.
And Golightly admits, "Toward the end it was kind of bizarre."
"From a PR aspect, what people wanted to know is -- could there be any more fallout, any more shoes to drop," he says. But Deen's categorically saying she'd never used the N-word other than what has already been discussed was a terrible move. "From a PR standpoint, that's a horrendous scandal. Now if anyone ever comes out with anything, ever caught her on a cell phone making a racial slur, she's done."
Other low points, according to Johnson:
Referring to her work in the African-American/minority community: "That was odd because the one thing we have not heard from outside of her family is a rush of colleagues, ex-employees or African-American community members coming to her defense about all she's done in the community."
Getting personal by naming Food Network (which canceled her show) and QVC (which has not yet disassociated with her): "The Food Network reference came almost as a veiled threat, wink-wink to her fans, daring them to boycott... With QVC she was almost daring them to take some action, as if she was calling them out."
Her gestures and manner of speech seemed stilted and practiced: "It was almost mechanical, especially when she reached over and touched Matt's leg."
Her poor, poor me stance: "She appeared angry at everyone who's been talking or questioning her, and it was almost like she felt she was a victim. The public and corporations wanted her to sincerely, humbly apologize and assume responsibility. Instead she went into a long thing about young African-Americans using the N-word."
Saying, "I is what I is": The pidgin colloquialism rang instantly with racial connotations, something Deen seemed tone deaf about. "My wife was saying that's what she's going to remember from this interview most."
The fate of Deen's star power and her cooking empire remains to be seen; the apology (or lack thereof) could mean the difference between Paula Deen rising again or not. A successful mea culpa may put famous faces back into the public eye, though rarely without tarnish. Think of Bill Clinton, Tiger Woods, Alec Baldwin -- they've all been involved with scandals of varying degree and complexities, yet they all have returned to a place where they're accepted if not celebrated.
Deen seems to have done enough, according to some fans, who Tweeted post-interview with their support:
For other fans, reaction was a little more mixed.
So what can Deen do next? Golightly says she still has a few more steps to take.
"She needs to do something good now," she explains. "You have to outweigh the bad with good. She needs to come out on the other side and start inspiring social change. As an international businesswoman, she has the power to do that."
But in Johnson's perception, it's over. "There are some people who will still go crazy over Paula Deen, but the brand as we knew it is gone forever," he said. "She can't resurrect it -- and it's all due to the failed apology. Watching her on TODAY, she clearly doesn't understand the changes that have gone on in civil society. The apology has done her in."
Shortly after Microsoft released its Xbox 360 HD update to Halo: Combat Evolved -- a game which allowed players to seamlessly switch between the original game's graphics and the update -- the company filed a patent for games "having a plurality of game engines." That patent filing just got published today, and it seemingly attempts to specifically lock down the concept of gaming classics being re-released in an updated form while also allowing longtime fans to switch between the original game and the update.
Microsoft-owned Halo developer 343 Industries is at the forefront of the filing, with executive producer Daniel Ayoub's name listed first and two other 343 employees rounding out the list. The description of the patent does allow for some flexibility. "A game having a plurality of engines is described. In one or more implementations, a computing device displays an output of a first engine of a game by a computing device. An input is received by the computing device to switch from the output of the first engine of the game to an output of a second engine of the game, the first and second engines being executed concurrently by the computing device," it reads. However, later on in the filing, it specifically speaks to "remakes of games" that "attempt to captivate their audiences by leveraging emotions associated with the initial game." Certainly a blunt way to put that, eh?
MILWAUKEE (AP) ? Curtis Tarr, the former head of the Selective Service System who oversaw the lottery for the draft during the Vietnam War, has died.
Tarr died of pneumonia on Friday at his home in Walnut Creek, Calif., his daughter, Pam Tarr, said Wednesday. He was 88.
President Richard Nixon appointed Tarr as director of the Selective Service System in 1970. The nation had held its first lottery drawing for the draft in December 1969, and Tarr was responsible for implementing the changes, said Dick Flahavan, spokesman for the Selective Service. Before the lottery, local draft boards had control over who was called and who was not.
"The lottery system took the local personalities out of the system," Flahavan said, adding that it was "much fairer, much more objective, more efficient."
Each day of the year was assigned a randomly drawn number from 1 to 365. So, for example, May 1 might be assigned No. 100, and men with May 1 birthdays would be called after those with birthdays assigned the numbers one to 99.
"It obviously was a big deal for young men who were of the appropriate age," Flahavan said. "And lotteries and birthdates meant a lot in those days and were tracked on all the campuses and so on."
The lottery was introduced as the war was winding down. In 1970, the draft called men with numbers through 195. The next year, it called up to 125, and by 1972, the military's needs were being satisfied with volunteers, he said.
Tarr led the Selective Service until May 1972 and then served a year as undersecretary of state for security assistance, a position that gave him responsibility for military programs with other nations. He left government service in 1973 and went on to work for Deere & Co., Cornell University and Intermet Corp., in a variety of management roles.
But Pam Tarr said there's no question that her father will be remembered for the lottery. People still approach her to show her their draft cards with her father's signature.
"I don't think he would say it was one of his great achievements, it was one of his greatest responsibilities," she said. "He was a very principled man, and in every position he had, he wanted to do what was right."
Tarr also had pushed to eliminate college deferments for the draft, believing they unfairly discriminated against the poor and those who were uneducated, she said. But Congress wouldn't approve that.
Tarr did reduce the number of conscientious objectors by changing the guidelines for who would qualify. He felt that there were many who weren't objecting on religious grounds but were simply opposed to the war, Pam Tarr said.
Born Sept. 18, 1924, in Stockton, Calif., to Esther Reed Tarr and Florence Tarr, he served with the U.S. Army in Europe during World War II. After leaving the military, he earned his bachelor's degree at Stanford University, a master's degree in business administration at Harvard University and his doctorate at Stanford. His dissertation focused on the armed services.
Tarr was named president of Lawrence College in Appleton, Wis., in 1963 and was instrumental in its merger with Milwaukee-Downer College, which formed Lawrence University. He also established the university's first overseas program, in Germany.
While at Lawrence, Tarr was appointed by Wisconsin Gov. Warren Knowles to lead a task force looking at the relationship between the state and local governments. That gained him notice in the Republican Party and eventually led to an appointment at the Pentagon. From there, he was named head of the Selective Service.
Tarr is survived by his second wife, Mary Katherine Tarr, and another daughter, Cynthia Tarr, of Sonoma, Calif., according to his daughter Pam Tarr, who lives in Valley Village, Calif.
His first wife, Elizabeth Tarr, died in September. They divorced in 1977.
___
Associated Press writer Carrie Antlfinger contributed to this report.
PARIS (Reuters) - French police arrested six people on Monday who are suspected of belonging to a radical Islamist cell and of preparing attacks in France, a police source said.
The suspects, aged 22 to 38, were arrested in and near the Paris region. They were all known to police for various offences and one had appeared in an anti-terrorism investigation.
They can be held for questioning for up to 96 hours before judges decide whether to put them under formal investigation.
France has been on heightened security alert since January, when its military intervened in Mali to help repel al Qaeda-linked Islamist rebels who had seized control of the north of the former French colony.
A Muslim convert suspected of stabbing a French soldier in a religiously motivated attack was placed under formal investigation last month.
Alexandre Dhaussy, 22, is suspected of stabbing the soldier in the neck while he was patrolling a Paris business district, and then fleeing the scene. The soldier survived and is out of hospital.
(Reporting by Ingrid Melander; Editing by Alistair Lyon)
GE Capital, Healthcare Financial Services, an operating unit of General Electric Company (GE - Analyst Report), recently provided a debt financing of $89 million to full-service commercial real estate firm MB Real Estate to fund the acquisition of a medical office building (MOB) in Atlanta, Ga.
Headquartered in Chicago, MB Real Estate offers a diversified portfolio of asset and facilities management services, leasing, project and construction management, tenant representation and investment services to private and public organizations across the country.
MB Real Estate has added a prized asset in its kitty as this MOB was recognized in 2012 as the Best International Medical Office Building of the Year by Building Owners and Managers Association International (BOMA). The eight-storied building serves as the headquarters for Piedmont Healthcare, one of the largest physician-owned and directed, multi-specialty groups in North Carolina and the Southeast region.? ?
General Electric is one of the largest and the most diversified technology and financial services corporations in the world. With products and services ranging from aircraft engines, power generation, water processing, and security technology to medical imaging, business and consumer financing, media content, and industrial products, the company serves over 100 million customers worldwide.
Its segments include Power & Water, Oil & Gas, Energy Management, Aviation, Healthcare, Transportation, Home & Business Solutions, and GE Capital. With more than 60 senior secured MOB financings since 2011, GE Capital, Healthcare Financial Services has an in-depth industry know-how and expertise as a reliable debt provider.
General Electric currently has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Other companies in the industry that are worth mentioning include Compass Diversified Holdings (CODI - Snapshot Report), ITT Corporation (ITT - Analyst Report) and Honeywell International Inc. (HON - Analyst Report), each carrying a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).
June 24, 2013 ? The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured a new image of nearby spiral galaxy Messier 61, also known as NGC 4303. The galaxy, located only 55 million light-years away from Earth, is roughly the size of the Milky Way, with a diameter of around 100,000 light-years.
The galaxy is notable for one particular reason -- six supernovae have been observed within Messier 61, a total that places it in the top handful of galaxies alongside Messier 83, also with six, and NGC 6946, with a grand total of nine observed supernovae.
In this Hubble image the galaxy is seen face-on as if posing for a photograph, allowing us to study its structure closely. The spiral arms can be seen in stunning detail, swirling inwards to the very center of the galaxy, where they form a smaller, intensely bright spiral. In the outer regions, these vast arms are sprinkled with bright blue regions where new stars are being formed from hot, dense clouds of gas.
Messier 61 is part of the Virgo Galaxy Cluster, a massive group of galaxies in the constellation of Virgo (the Virgin). Galaxy clusters, or groups of galaxies, are among the biggest structures in the Universe to be held together by gravity alone. The Virgo Cluster contains more than 1300 galaxies and forms the central region of the Local Supercluster, an even bigger gathering of galaxies. The image was taken using data from Hubble's Wide Field Camera 2.
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by NASA.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
NEW YORK (AP) ? Funeral services for actor James Gandolfini will be Thursday at the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine in New York City.
An HBO spokeswoman speaking on behalf of the family says the funeral is scheduled for 10 a.m.
The 51-year-old star of "The Sopranos" died Wednesday in Rome. Family spokesmanMichael Kobold says Gandolfini died of a heart attack.
Port Authority of New York & New Jersey spokesman Steve Coleman tells the Star-Ledger of Newark that a Signature Airlines flight carrying Gandolfini's body arrived at Newark Liberty International Airport from Rome Sunday night. The body was taken from the airport around 11:20 p.m. but Coleman did not say where.
The actor had been headed to Sicily to appear at the Taormina Film Festival, which paid tribute to him Saturday.
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Ten car-bomb explosions killed at least 39 people across the Iraqi capital on Monday, police and medical sources said.
In the central district of Karada, two parked car bombs went off killing at least eight people, and another two car bombs exploded simultaneously near a market in the western district of Jihad, killing eight.
Violence has been increasing in Iraq in recent months, with more than 1,000 people killed in May alone, making it the deadliest month since the sectarian bloodletting of 2006-07.
Insurgents including al Qaeda's Iraqi affiliate have been regaining ground and recruits from the country's Sunni minority, which feels sidelined since the U.S.-led invasion toppled former dictator Saddam Hussein and empowered majority Shi'ites.
Sectarian tensions in Iraq and the wider region have been inflamed by the civil war in Syria, where mainly Sunni Muslim rebels are fighting to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad, whose Alawite sect derives from Shi'ite Islam.
(Reporting Kareem Raheem and Suadad al-Salhy; Writing by Isabel Coles; Editing by Michael Roddy)
Even though the startup scene is still nascent, Sub-Saharan Africa continues to grow pools of capital and entrepreneurial know-how in hubs like Nairobi, Kenya. Today, the Nairobi-based Savannah Fund, which is raising up to $10 million for startups in the region, just graduated its first batch of companies at PivotEast, a Disrupt-like competition for African mobile startups. They include a Ghanaian e-commerce startup called?Ahonya?that sells electronics, a Ugandan mobile game developer called Kola Studios that's popularized a local card game and SafariDesk, a site that helps travelers find off-the-beat experiences and places for luxury camping.
By Nadia Damouni and Siddharth Cavale (Reuters) - Tensions started rising at Men's Wearhouse Inc over the past six months, as founder and executive chairman George Zimmer increasingly butted heads with his handpicked CEO over the clothing retailer's strategy. CEO Doug Ewert wanted to sell the company's K&G Fashion Superstore business, while Zimmer wanted to keep it, two sources familiar with the situation said. Zimmer also objected to rising compensation for top executives, including Ewert, while the board thought it was appropriate, the sources said. Zimmer, who is known to U.S. ...
MOSCOW (AP) ? Confusion over the whereabouts of National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden grew on Monday after a plane took off from Moscow for Cuba with an empty seat booked in his name.
The founder of the WikiLeaks secret-spilling organization, Julian Assange, insisted he couldn't go into details about where Snowden is, but said that he was safe.
Snowden has applied for asylum in Ecuador, Iceland and possibly other countries, he said.
An Aeroflot representative who wouldn't give her name told The Associated Press that Snowden wasn't on flight SU150 to Havana, which was filled with journalists trying to track him down. AP reporters on the flight couldn't see him either.
Security around the aircraft was heavy prior to boarding and guards tried to prevent the scrum of photographers and cameramen from taking pictures of the plane, heightening the speculation that he might have been secretly escorted on board.
The Interfax news agency, which has extensive contacts with Russian security agencies, cited a source as saying that Snowden could have flown out in a different plane unseen by journalists.
Others speculated that Russian security agencies might want to keep Snowden in Russia for a more thorough debriefing.
Snowden has not been seen since he arrived in Moscow on Sunday from Hong Kong, where he had been hiding for several weeks to evade U.S. justice and left to dodge efforts to extradite him.
After spending a night in Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport, he had been expected to fly to Cuba and Venezuela en route to possible asylum in Ecuador.
Interfax quoted an unidentified "well-informed source" in Moscow saying that Russia has received a U.S. request to extradite Snowden and responded by saying it will consider it. But the same source said that Russia can't detain and extradite Snowden since he hasn't crossed the Russian border.
Justice Department officials in Washington did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Experts said it was likely that the Russians were questioning Snowden, interested in what he knew about U.S. electronic espionage against Moscow.
"If Russian special services hadn't shown interest in Snowden, they would have been utterly unprofessional," Igor Korotchenko, a former colonel in Russia's top military command turned security analyst, said on state Rossiya 24 television.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday that it would be "deeply troubling" if Russia or Hong Kong had notice of Snowden's plans and that it would affect their relations with the United States.
The controversy over Snowden could further hurt U.S.-Russian relations, already strained over arguments about Syria and a ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian children.
The Kremlin has previously said that Russia would be ready to consider Snowden's request for asylum.
Aeroflot said earlier that Snowden had registered for the flight using his American passport, which the United States recently annulled.
Ecuador's Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino said his government had received an asylum request, adding Monday that the decision "has to do with freedom of expression and with the security of citizens around the world." The anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks also said it would help Snowden.
Ecuador has rejected the United States' previous efforts at cooperation, and has been helping Assange avoid prosecution by allowing him to stay at its embassy in London.
But Assange's comments in a telephone conference with reporters that Snowden had applied in multiple places opened other possibilities of where he might try to go.
WikiLeaks has said it is providing legal help to Snowden at his request and that he was being escorted by diplomats and legal advisors from the group.
Icelandic officials have confirmed receiving an informal request for asylum conveyed by WikiLeaks, which has strong links to the tiny North Atlantic nation. But authorities there have insisted that Snowden must be on Icelandic soil before lodging a formal request.
Snowden gave documents to The Guardian and The Washington Post newspapers disclosing U.S. surveillance programs that collect vast amounts of phone records and online data in the name of foreign intelligence, often sweeping up information on American citizens.
Officials have the ability to collect phone and Internet information broadly but need a warrant to examine specific cases where they believe terrorism is involved.
Snowden had been in hiding for several weeks in Hong Kong, a former British colony with a high degree of autonomy from mainland China. The United States formally sought Snowden's extradition from Hong Kong to face espionage charges but was rebuffed; Hong Kong officials said the U.S. request did not fully comply with their laws.
The Justice Department rejected that claim, saying its request met all of the requirements of the extradition treaty between the U.S. and Hong Kong.
During conversations last week, including a phone call Wednesday between Attorney General Eric Holder and Hong Kong Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen, Hong Kong officials never raised any issues regarding sufficiency of the U.S. request, a Justice representative said.
The United States was in touch through diplomatic and law enforcement channels with countries that Snowden could travel through or to, reminding them that Snowden is wanted on criminal charges and reiterating Washington's position that Snowden should only be permitted to travel back to the U.S., a State Department official said.
U.S. officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the case.
Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said, "Given our intensified cooperation after the Boston marathon bombings and our history of working with Russia on law enforcement matters ? including returning numerous high-level criminals back to Russia at the request of the Russian government ? we expect the Russian government to look at all options available to expel Mr. Snowden back to the U.S. to face justice for the crimes with which he is charged."
Still, the United States is likely to have problems interrupting Snowden's passage. The United States does not have an extradition treaty with Russia, but does with Cuba, Venezuela and Ecuador. Even with an extradition agreement though, any country could give Snowden a political exemption.
It also wasn't clear Snowden was finished disclosing highly classified information.
Snowden has perhaps more than 200 sensitive documents, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said on CBS' "Face the Nation."
Snowden has asked for legal advice from former Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon, the judge's office said Monday. Garzon told The Associated Press earlier that he was considering the case but had yet to speak directly to Snowden.
"Before making any decision in this regard it is my intention to study and assess the case in depth as well as to communicate with Mr. Snowden," Monday's statement read.
Garzon is best known for indicting a totalitarian ruler, former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, in 1998, and trying to put him on trial in Madrid for crimes against humanity.
But has been suspended from office in Spain for starting an investigation into killings committed during the Spanish Civil War and the early years of the Franco dictatorship.
___
Associated Press White House Correspondent Julie Pace and Associated Press writers Philip Elliott, Matthew Lee and Frederic J. Frommer in Washington, Lynn Berry and Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow, Kevin Chan in Hong Kong and Sylvia Hui in London contributed to this report.
___
Follow Philip Elliott on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/philip_elliott
![[ Back to EurekAlert! ]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vAj77Gsh-KQ0cz5JyVTePb6VrQm4eLrMl1VtVharUq5fWxmV3sLzSB3Rs3y7YEnS_hmJUAAbucgpSpM0C0g9l_W9QQmXVTVULZEsnS8DM=s0-d){kind=small}
Public release date: 28-Jun-2013
Share ] 
Even though the startup scene is still nascent, Sub-Saharan Africa continues to grow pools of capital and entrepreneurial know-how in hubs like Nairobi, Kenya. Today, the Nairobi-based Savannah Fund, which is raising up to $10 million for startups in the region, just graduated its first batch of companies at