During 'Live from MTV,' Max George from the Wanted shares his story about the Oscar-winning script.
By Christina Garibaldi
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PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 7-Nov-2013
ShareContact: Janet Lathrop
jlathrop@admin.umass.edu
413-545-0444
University of Massachusetts at Amherst
AMHERST, Mass. Applied mathematicians Markos Katsoulakis and Luc Rey-Bellet of the University of Massachusetts Amherst will share a three-year, $2.3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy, with others, to develop new methods to assess and improve mathematical modeling of multi-scale, complex systems. Once developed, the new methods are expected to have applications in energy research and materials synthesis.
As Katsoulakis explains, predictive mathematical models and algorithms have long complemented theory and experiments in applied sciences and engineering, but such computational models are now more important than ever because of the increased complexity of the problems plus advances in computing capabilities. A recognition of the vast predictive potential of modeling and efficient simulation of complex systems, he points out, is the fact that the 2013 Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded for the development of multi-scale models for complex chemical systems.
One of the primary practical applications planned by Katsoulakis and Rey-Bellet, with partners at Brown University and the University of Delaware, is to design highly efficient and cost-effective bimetallic catalysts using relatively inexpensive metals, allowing storage and production of clean hydrogen fuel from readily available sources such as ammonia.
Katsoulakis says, "The role of uncertainty and sensitivity quantification in this process turns out to be crucial, because the design of bimetallic catalysts rests on understanding how sensitive the catalyst's performance metrics are on its parent metals. Also, experiments have shown that performance depends on the micro-geometry of the arrangement of the two metals, that is structure and ordering of their layers. Given all the choices we have in selecting materials and geometries for the two-metal catalysts, this becomes a very complex system to model."
Being able to systematically evaluate which metal combinations in the catalyst are the most efficient and cost effective is one of the team's key goals. The challenge is an example of a model where new mathematical and computational techniques for assessing uncertainty and quantifying sensitivity can be extremely productive, the researchers say.
Over the next three years, the multi-institution team will develop new mathematical tools that describe uncertainty and model sensitivity using information theory, probability theory, statistical methods such as model selection and model reduction, rare events methods, multi-scale analysis and parameterization of coarse-grained models from finer scales and data.
Mathematical models are now routinely being asked to account for systems of
increasing complexity, that is handling millions or even billions of variables. In addition, a model must integrate data from different scales and must account for different spatial scales, for example from the molecular level all the way to the everyday macroscopic scale, and basic physical processes at different time scales.
The UMass Amherst mathematician says, "Interactions across scales are a unifying feature in all complex systems that we may experience in everyday life. Think of the effect that a single vehicle breakdown during rush hour may have to the overall traffic flow, even at very large distances from the scene." Taking all the different variables and mechanisms such as vehicle speeds, sizes, road network, weather, traffic volume and so on into account, represents a typical complex "multi-scale multi-physics" modeling, simulation and analysis problem that challenges current applied mathematical methods, he adds.
Handling real-life systems with unprecedented levels of complexity and multi-scale features requires not only more powerful computational capabilities, but also new mathematics, Katsoulakis explains. "Though high performance computing can allow us, for the first time, to simulate at least some complex systems, there are important concerns related to the effectiveness and reliability of the predictive computational models."
As in the traffic example, all such models depend on a large number of mechanisms and parameters but it is not immediately obvious which ones critically affect the final predictions and which ones can be ignored. Another, closely related, source of uncertainty is insufficient knowledge of a particular highly complex system.
Katsoulakis and Rey-Bellet believe that their research has great potential for wider impact in a number of fields because it will lay down the mathematical foundations for uncertainty quantification and sensitivity analysis in a broad class of complex systems typically encountered in physicochemical and biological processes, atmosphere and ocean science, and other types of complex networks.
Besides Katsoulakis and Rey-Bellet at UMass Amherst, collaborators are mathematician Petr Plechac and chemical engineer Dion Vlachos at the University of Delaware and applied mathematician Paul Dupuis at Brown University.
###
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 7-Nov-2013
ShareContact: Janet Lathrop
jlathrop@admin.umass.edu
413-545-0444
University of Massachusetts at Amherst
AMHERST, Mass. Applied mathematicians Markos Katsoulakis and Luc Rey-Bellet of the University of Massachusetts Amherst will share a three-year, $2.3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy, with others, to develop new methods to assess and improve mathematical modeling of multi-scale, complex systems. Once developed, the new methods are expected to have applications in energy research and materials synthesis.
As Katsoulakis explains, predictive mathematical models and algorithms have long complemented theory and experiments in applied sciences and engineering, but such computational models are now more important than ever because of the increased complexity of the problems plus advances in computing capabilities. A recognition of the vast predictive potential of modeling and efficient simulation of complex systems, he points out, is the fact that the 2013 Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded for the development of multi-scale models for complex chemical systems.
One of the primary practical applications planned by Katsoulakis and Rey-Bellet, with partners at Brown University and the University of Delaware, is to design highly efficient and cost-effective bimetallic catalysts using relatively inexpensive metals, allowing storage and production of clean hydrogen fuel from readily available sources such as ammonia.
Katsoulakis says, "The role of uncertainty and sensitivity quantification in this process turns out to be crucial, because the design of bimetallic catalysts rests on understanding how sensitive the catalyst's performance metrics are on its parent metals. Also, experiments have shown that performance depends on the micro-geometry of the arrangement of the two metals, that is structure and ordering of their layers. Given all the choices we have in selecting materials and geometries for the two-metal catalysts, this becomes a very complex system to model."
Being able to systematically evaluate which metal combinations in the catalyst are the most efficient and cost effective is one of the team's key goals. The challenge is an example of a model where new mathematical and computational techniques for assessing uncertainty and quantifying sensitivity can be extremely productive, the researchers say.
Over the next three years, the multi-institution team will develop new mathematical tools that describe uncertainty and model sensitivity using information theory, probability theory, statistical methods such as model selection and model reduction, rare events methods, multi-scale analysis and parameterization of coarse-grained models from finer scales and data.
Mathematical models are now routinely being asked to account for systems of
increasing complexity, that is handling millions or even billions of variables. In addition, a model must integrate data from different scales and must account for different spatial scales, for example from the molecular level all the way to the everyday macroscopic scale, and basic physical processes at different time scales.
The UMass Amherst mathematician says, "Interactions across scales are a unifying feature in all complex systems that we may experience in everyday life. Think of the effect that a single vehicle breakdown during rush hour may have to the overall traffic flow, even at very large distances from the scene." Taking all the different variables and mechanisms such as vehicle speeds, sizes, road network, weather, traffic volume and so on into account, represents a typical complex "multi-scale multi-physics" modeling, simulation and analysis problem that challenges current applied mathematical methods, he adds.
Handling real-life systems with unprecedented levels of complexity and multi-scale features requires not only more powerful computational capabilities, but also new mathematics, Katsoulakis explains. "Though high performance computing can allow us, for the first time, to simulate at least some complex systems, there are important concerns related to the effectiveness and reliability of the predictive computational models."
As in the traffic example, all such models depend on a large number of mechanisms and parameters but it is not immediately obvious which ones critically affect the final predictions and which ones can be ignored. Another, closely related, source of uncertainty is insufficient knowledge of a particular highly complex system.
Katsoulakis and Rey-Bellet believe that their research has great potential for wider impact in a number of fields because it will lay down the mathematical foundations for uncertainty quantification and sensitivity analysis in a broad class of complex systems typically encountered in physicochemical and biological processes, atmosphere and ocean science, and other types of complex networks.
Besides Katsoulakis and Rey-Bellet at UMass Amherst, collaborators are mathematician Petr Plechac and chemical engineer Dion Vlachos at the University of Delaware and applied mathematician Paul Dupuis at Brown University.
###
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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.
Police stand outside a building near the scene of a multiple shooting that took place at Al's Place Barber Shop in Detroit, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013. Detroit police say gunfire broke out at the barbershop known for gambling activity. Police Chief James Craig told reporters that police were looking for two vehicles that the suspects may have been using, a 2004 white Chevrolet Impala that may have a broken window and bullet holes in the back, and a 2004 black Impala. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
Police stand outside a building near the scene of a multiple shooting that took place at Al's Place Barber Shop in Detroit, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013. Detroit police say gunfire broke out at the barbershop known for gambling activity. Police Chief James Craig told reporters that police were looking for two vehicles that the suspects may have been using, a 2004 white Chevrolet Impala that may have a broken window and bullet holes in the back, and a 2004 black Impala. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
Detroit Police Chief James Craig addresses the media during a news conference in Detroit, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2013. Craig said a man has been apprehended and will be questioned about a barbershop shooting that killed three people and wounded several more on Wednesday night on the city's east side. Craig said that the man was wearing body armor when he was arrested on unrelated felony charges in suburban Rochester after the shootings. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
Police stand outside the scene of a multiple shooting at Al's Place Barber Shop in Detroit, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013. Detroit police say gunfire broke out at the barbershop known for gambling activity. Police Chief James Craig told reporters that police were looking for two vehicles that the suspects may have been using, a 2004 white Chevrolet Impala that may have a broken window and bullet holes in the back, and a 2004 black Impala. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
Police gather at a scene of a multiple shooting at Al's Place Barber Shop, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013, in Detroit. Detroit police say gunfire broke out at the barbershop known for gambling activity, leaving at least three people dead. (AP Photo/Detroit Free Press, Andre J. Jackson) DETROIT NEWS OUT; NO SALES; TV OUT; INTERNET OUT; MANDATORY CREDIT
People stand outside a barber shop, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013 in Detroit. Gunfire broke out Wednesday evening at a Detroit barbershop known for gambling activity, leaving at least two men dead, police say. (AP Photo/Detroit News, Elizabeth Conley) DETROIT FREE PRESS OUT; HUFFINGTON POST OUT
DETROIT (AP) — A convicted felon who was wearing body armor when police arrested him in a Detroit suburb will be questioned in an investigation into the fatal shooting of three men in a back gambling room of an east side barbershop.
Detroit Police Chief James Craig described the man as a person of interest in Wednesday evening's shooting at Al's Barber Shop that left six other people wounded. Speaking at a Thursday news conference at police headquarters, Craig said the bloodshed may have stemmed from an ongoing feud.
Craig did not name the person of interest and provided few details about the arrest. He said Rochester police picked up the man north of Detroit without incident on an unrelated felonious assault charge.
"Police wear body armor. Why would a community member be driving around in body armor?" said Craig, who described the latest mass shooting in Detroit as "urban terrorism."
Craig said 20 to 30 people were gambling in a tiny back room at the barbershop in a strip mall shortly before 6 p.m. when shots were fired from a high-powered rifle through an open back door.
When the gunfire began, the gamblers tried to escape the room through a door that led back into the barbershop, but that the jam of bodies prevented them from escaping.
"The shooter struck nine of the individuals inside the location," Craig said, adding that many people in the room were armed and at least one returned fire.
"Officers were able to develop information that there was an ongoing feud between a particular individual and several members of the gambling party," the chief said.
Craig declined to say whether police think the person of interest is the shooter. But he would say that the shooter is suspected in at least two other violent crimes.
Two of Wednesday's shooting victims died inside the gambling room. The third died later at a hospital. The conditions of the survivors were not available.
A witness told police that the shooter pulled into a rear alley and fired shots at someone in a pickup truck. He then got out of the car and began shooting into the open rear door of the barbershop.
Wednesday night police said they were seeking two vehicles believed to have been involved in the shooting.
Lorne Carter told the Detroit Free Press that he was smoking a cigarette against the wall of a nearby business when he heard what sounded like 30 to 40 rapid shots.
Detroit has one of the highest violent crime rates in the country. Including Wednesday night's barbershop slayings, 289 criminal homicides have been committed so far this year in Detroit.
Criminal homicides accounted for 386 of the 461 death investigations in 2012.
"Anytime you have ... shootings of nine, it certainly does rise up as one of Detroit's more violent incidents," Craig said.
Craig said one person was shot and three others wounded during a shooting in October 2012 on the city's west side. Seven teenagers — including five students at Cody Ninth Grade Academy — were shot and wounded while waiting at a bus stop near that school in June 2009.
___
Associated Press writers David N. Goodman and David Runk contributed to this report.
Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-11-07-Barbershop%20Shooting-Detroit/id-a11eaa1161684ce2938aedb2aa93c41e
We're all busy gearing up for Expand NY this weekend (you're coming, right?), but Brian, Peter and Terrence are taking a few moments out of their day to talk the week in tech. You can join along in the chat, just after the break. ...FILE - In this Oct. 1, 2013, file photo, New York Yankees' Alex Rodriguez arrives at the offices of Major League Baseball in New York. Attorneys for Rodriguez will appear in a New York courtroom for an initial court conference in his lawsuit against Major League Baseball. The New York Yankees third baseman is not expected at the meeting Thursday, Nov. 7, 2013, in Manhattan federal court. (AP Photo/David Karp, File)
FILE - In this Oct. 1, 2013, file photo, New York Yankees' Alex Rodriguez arrives at the offices of Major League Baseball in New York. Attorneys for Rodriguez will appear in a New York courtroom for an initial court conference in his lawsuit against Major League Baseball. The New York Yankees third baseman is not expected at the meeting Thursday, Nov. 7, 2013, in Manhattan federal court. (AP Photo/David Karp, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — Alex Rodriguez's legal team has gathered extensive additional evidence since he filed a lawsuit accusing Major League Baseball and Commissioner Bud Selig of trying to polish their images and destroy the third baseman's career and reputation, his lawyer said Thursday.
At a Manhattan federal court hearing, attorney Jordan Siev said his law office has gotten more evidence nearly every day to support its lawsuit accusing MLB and Selig of going on a "witch hunt" to ruin Rodriguez's reputation and career. He said the defendants went "way over the line."
He said evidence will prove that MLB and Selig engaged in behavior that subjects them to civil, "if not criminal," liability. The New York Yankees star did not attend the hearing.
MLB attorney Joseph Baumgarten responded by calling the lawsuit "inappropriate." He said the defendants will seek its dismissal.
"It doesn't belong in federal court," he said. Both sides were scheduled to file papers in the case on Friday. A hearing was scheduled for Jan. 23.
Siev is seeking to move the case back to state court, where it was originally filed.
At one point, U.S. District Judge Lorna G. Schofield noted: "It's ironic. Neither side wants to be here, but you're both here."
Baumgarten made little mention of Rodriguez's allegations, but Siev used the public forum to lash out at the league and Selig.
He said baseball's investigation had a "sole purpose of destroying Rodriguez's career and reputation" and was designed "to get Mr. Rodriguez at all costs in an effort to salvage Mr. Selig's reputation as he heads toward retirement."
Siev said Selig "saw this as an opportunity to bring down one of the biggest players in the game."
The lawyer recounted some highlights of the lawsuit, including allegations that the league intimidated and offered cash to witnesses, purchased documents and allowed one of its investigators to engage in an inappropriate sexual relationship with a witness. He said the league made sure to leak information about the investigation to the press along the way.
Outside court, lawyers declined to comment.
The litigation comes after Rodriguez was given a 211-game suspension by the league on Aug. 5 for alleged violations of baseball's drug agreement and labor contract.
He also is challenging the suspension.
Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2013-11-07-Yankees-Rodriguez%20Lawsuits/id-703db6badd344309a25923264e2bfcf9"Make the other person feel important." "Let the other fellow feel that the idea is his." "Make people like you." Those are some of the peppy commands that have sent generations of Americans out into the world, determined to win friends and influence people — oh, and make big bucks.
Dale Carnegie's book How to Win Friends and Influence People came out in November 1936 and has gone on to sell more than 30 million copies worldwide — making it one of the best-selling nonfiction books in American history. Despite taking knocks from the likes of Arthur Miller, who mocked its upbeat worldview in Death Of A Salesman, and Lenny Bruce, who titled his 1965 autobiography How To Talk Dirty And Influence People, Carnegie's blockbuster is still in print and still sells in the six figures yearly. Contemporary prophets of positivity like Oprah, Jack Canfield of the "Chicken Soup For The Soul" series and televangelist Joel Osteen, to name but a few, owe much to Carnegie's brisk gospel of sunny reinvention.
Carnegie is the subject of a new biography by Steven Watts, who has chronicled the lives of other American cultural dynamos like Henry Ford, Walt Disney and Hugh Hefner. To be ruthlessly honest (which is not a conversational style that Carnegie ever recommended), Watts' book, called Self-Help Messiah, is a tad lumbering. We readers are treated to way too much background information about, say, the genesis of the YMCA and the ethos of The Lost Generation. Watts might have profited by adopting some of the perky anecdotes and canny sense of audience that characterizes Carnegie's own writing style.
But Carnegie is such a pivotal figure and his life story such a compelling testament to the power of positive thinking (and good luck) that the overstuffed feel of this book is an irritant rather than a deal-breaker.
Carnegie was born in Missouri in 1888; his parents were dirt-poor farmers. As a teenager, Carnegie enrolled in the tuition-free Missouri State Normal School for teachers, where he was humiliated by his ragged clothes and jug ears until he found distinction in the debate society. His "people skills" were subsequently honed on the road as a meat products salesman and by a stint at acting school in New York City.
As Watts depicts him, Carnegie seems to have been one of those people born with a bedrock optimism and belief in their own potential. He finally found his footing when he began to give workshops on public speaking to aspiring young businessmen at YMCAs along the Eastern Seaboard. The descriptions of those classes, in which sweaty, young middle managers would buckle at the knees and even faint out of fear of public speaking, are poignant.
As Watts shows, Carnegie's emphasis on projecting a sunny personality was part of a larger shift away from a Victorian concern with character and self-denial to a modern fascination with advertising, consumerism and self-promotion. Carnegie's teaching promised to pay off in self-fulfillment and fat wallets.
Steven Watts' other books include The People's Tycoon, Mr. Playboy and The Magic Kingdom.
Steven Watts' other books include The People's Tycoon, Mr. Playboy and The Magic Kingdom.
In How to Win Friends and Influence People, which was derived from those early YMCA classes, Carnegie wrote that he'd asked "thousands of businessmen to smile at someone every hour of the day for a week and then come to class and talk about the results." Carnegie proudly reported a stockbroker's comments: "I find that smiles are bringing me dollars, many dollars every day." Other businessmen who attested to the success of the Carnegie method were Walter Chrysler, John D. Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan.
Watts shows how particularly attuned Carnegie was to the psychological needs of Americans beaten down by the Great Depression, who needed to hear that positive thinking would garner positive results. It's easy, of course, for we contemporary readers to dismiss Carnegie's teaching as mere boosterism and Babbittry, but his self-help legacy has endured well beyond his own death in 1955, and flourishes in our own age.
Of all the anecdotes about Carnegie's far-reaching influence that Watts cites, one especially stays with me. During the 1960s, radical Youth International Party — Yippie — leader Jerry Rubin read How to Win Friends and Influence People to overcome his own fear of making public political speeches. He faced off, ideologically speaking, with President Lyndon Johnson, who had been a Carnegie method instructor in his youth in Texas. Sometimes truth is indeed stranger than fiction.
Chef Roy Choi was named Food and Wine Magazine's Best New Chef in 2010.
Chef Roy Choi was named Food and Wine Magazine's Best New Chef in 2010.
Roy Choi is a chef who's celebrated for food that isn't fancy. He's one of the founders of the food truck movement, where instead of hot dogs or ice cream, more unusual, gourmet dishes are prepared and sold. His Kogi trucks specialize in tacos filled with Korean barbecue.
Choi was born in South Korea in 1970 and moved to Los Angeles with his parents at the age of 2. His parents owned a Korean restaurant near Anaheim for a few years when he was a child. He tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross that his mother had some serious cooking talent.
"She had flavor in her fingertips," he says. "She had this connection and this innate ability to capture flavor in the moment and people felt it. Because our lives were so based around food, when someone is good at food, everyone notices and it's a big deal."
Customers line up at one of Roy Choi's Kogi BBQ food trucks near the campus of UCLA.
Customers line up at one of Roy Choi's Kogi BBQ food trucks near the campus of UCLA.
Choi's new book, L.A. Son: My Life, My City, My Food, is part memoir, part cookbook.
On what Korean tacos represent for him
The Korean taco was a phenomenon. ... It just came out of us, we didn't really think about it. The flavor, in a way, didn't exist before, but it was a mash up of everything we had gone through in our lives.
It became a voice for a certain part of Los Angeles and a certain part of immigration and a certain part of life that wasn't really out there in the universe. We all knew it and we all grew up with it, and it was all around us, but the taco kind of pulled it together. It was like a lint roller; it just put everything onto one thing. And then when you ate it, it all of a sudden made sense.
As I was putting it together, it was all of the pieces of my life coming together. It was almost like an avalanche. So it was growing up; it was being around low-riding; it was growing up in Korea, the immigration, being around the American school system; all the snack food and junk food that I've eaten; all of the tacos that I've eaten. It was all of these things. Then I really wanted to make it feel like Los Angeles, so I felt like it had to be just like a street taco in L.A.
On his Hawaiian restaurant, A-Frame, which is housed in an old IHOP
It's my love for the Hawaiian Islands, but it's not a tiki restaurant: It's really taking the feeling of "aloha." So we put people together, it's all communal seating, so strangers get to sit together. ... You eat everything with your hands and it's like a backyard barbecue.
... I wasn't always the most professional looking/acting dude in the world, so I'd go into restaurants, get treated not that well, kind of like crap. So what happened was I thought, "OK, if I ever make a restaurant, as soon as anyone opens that door, no matter where you're from, I want you to feel like we've been waiting for you."
On his rice bowl restaurant, Chego
That's a real personal place. ... A lot of Asian-Americans, growing up, we kind of live double lives. We had our refrigerators at home and the way we ate at home, and then we went to school and we couldn't really show that food because it was real stinky and stuff like that.
When you're going through that whole puberty/teenage angst ... you don't want to show that. Chego was my vision to show that food, to open the refrigerator, to show it to the world, and then make these rice bowls that were under $10. So it was also a platform to create great, delicious, healthy fast food that's affordable.
On growing up in Orange County and the cultural differences between his family and his friends
I was doomed because everyone had peroxide in their hair and they were coming from ski trips on Mammoth Mountain and snorkeling trips in the Cayman Islands, listening to Depeche Mode and The Cure, and I had never seen anything like that before. It wasn't really my rhythm.
“ A lot of Asian-Americans, growing up, we kind of live double lives. We had our refrigerators at home and the way we ate at home, and then we went to school and we couldn't really show that food because it was real stinky ...
I did the best I could. I was doomed because there weren't that many Asians and girls weren't really feeling me, but I was also doomed because if we get down to the food, the food was different for me too. I was embarrassed to show the food [we were eating] because everywhere I went, it was so different. Youngsters are mean to each other sometimes so I'd bring friends over and they'd look at my food and they'd be like, "Ew, what is that?"
... When you bring a bunch of rich friends from Orange Country over to your house and your whole house is surrounded by dead salted fish, it was tough.
... I loved it at the time. When I say the word "embarrassed" it's not that I was embarrassed and that I tried to shy away from it or that I tried to put it into the dirt and hope that it never came out again; it's just I didn't have the language to really stick up for it at that time.
On his addictions
Gambling hit me at like 22, 21. And it was three years of the darkest time of my life, but it started out just all fireworks and pom-poms, you know?
It was an amazing ride for the first year, I mean tens of thousands of dollars in shoeboxes ... just ballin' crazy. ... And then I started losing. And when you start losing in gambling, then you start chasing it. ... I lost all my friends; I lost all my family; I stole from my family ... sold everything I had.
... I'm addicted to feeding people right now. It's a good thing. I don't know how long this is gonna last right now, so I'm living it up and really focusing and putting everything I got into it. I'm putting my back into it.
Now that anyone (well, anyone with an invitation) with a spare $1,500 can get their very own Google Glass, the folks in Mountain View have thoughtfully released a software update for the famous wearable. We're frankly surprised Glass owners weren't able to do this before, but you can now look up ...PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 7-Nov-2013
ShareContact: Alison Barbuti
alison.barbuti@manchester.ac.uk
44-016-127-58383
University of Manchester
The genetic make-up of a patient's tumour could be used to personalise their treatment, and help to decide whether they would benefit from receiving additional drugs as part of their radiotherapy programme, according to a recent study involving scientists from the Manchester Cancer Research Centre.
Tumours with lower levels of oxygen known as hypoxia often respond less well to radiation therapy. There are several agents that can be given to patients before radiotherapy to reduce hypoxia, but these are not given as standard. Being able to measure how well-oxygenated an individual's tumour is would give doctors a valuable way of identifying which patients might benefit from treatment with hypoxia reducing agents before radiotherapy.
Hypoxia has previously been investigated by looking at the expression of certain genes, and Manchester researchers have come up with a genetic profile for tumours that should indicate the overall level of oxygenation.
Researchers at The University of Manchester, part of the Manchester Cancer Research Centre, carried out the study in patients diagnosed with cancer of the bladder and larynx. These patients subsequently underwent either standard radiotherapy or radiotherapy with the addition of two agents which in combination are known to increase oxygenation: nicotinamide and carbogen.
The team tested patients' tumour samples for 26 genes in order to classify them as more or less hypoxic, and then analysed whether this hypoxia score related to the results of treatment.
"Our goal is to find ways of predicting how patients will respond to different treatments. Future cancer treatments will be personalised so that patients get the best therapy for their tumour." said Professor Catharine West, who led the research. "Personalising therapy will not only increase the number of people surviving cancer but also decrease side-effects, as patients would be spared from having treatments that are unlikely to work in their tumour."
A paper recently published in Clinical Cancer Research describes how the group found that for laryngeal tumours, those classed as more hypoxic saw a significant benefit from receiving additional agents as well as radiation therapy. However, in bladder cancer, patients with more hypoxic tumours did not benefit from adding extra agents.
Professor West added: "We will now test how the hypoxia score works in the clinic in a trial starting in December in patients with head and neck cancer. I have studied ways of measuring hypoxia in tumours for many years so this is a very exciting finding that could help us optimise how we use radiotherapy to get the best outcome for patients."
###
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 7-Nov-2013
ShareContact: Alison Barbuti
alison.barbuti@manchester.ac.uk
44-016-127-58383
University of Manchester
The genetic make-up of a patient's tumour could be used to personalise their treatment, and help to decide whether they would benefit from receiving additional drugs as part of their radiotherapy programme, according to a recent study involving scientists from the Manchester Cancer Research Centre.
Tumours with lower levels of oxygen known as hypoxia often respond less well to radiation therapy. There are several agents that can be given to patients before radiotherapy to reduce hypoxia, but these are not given as standard. Being able to measure how well-oxygenated an individual's tumour is would give doctors a valuable way of identifying which patients might benefit from treatment with hypoxia reducing agents before radiotherapy.
Hypoxia has previously been investigated by looking at the expression of certain genes, and Manchester researchers have come up with a genetic profile for tumours that should indicate the overall level of oxygenation.
Researchers at The University of Manchester, part of the Manchester Cancer Research Centre, carried out the study in patients diagnosed with cancer of the bladder and larynx. These patients subsequently underwent either standard radiotherapy or radiotherapy with the addition of two agents which in combination are known to increase oxygenation: nicotinamide and carbogen.
The team tested patients' tumour samples for 26 genes in order to classify them as more or less hypoxic, and then analysed whether this hypoxia score related to the results of treatment.
"Our goal is to find ways of predicting how patients will respond to different treatments. Future cancer treatments will be personalised so that patients get the best therapy for their tumour." said Professor Catharine West, who led the research. "Personalising therapy will not only increase the number of people surviving cancer but also decrease side-effects, as patients would be spared from having treatments that are unlikely to work in their tumour."
A paper recently published in Clinical Cancer Research describes how the group found that for laryngeal tumours, those classed as more hypoxic saw a significant benefit from receiving additional agents as well as radiation therapy. However, in bladder cancer, patients with more hypoxic tumours did not benefit from adding extra agents.
Professor West added: "We will now test how the hypoxia score works in the clinic in a trial starting in December in patients with head and neck cancer. I have studied ways of measuring hypoxia in tumours for many years so this is a very exciting finding that could help us optimise how we use radiotherapy to get the best outcome for patients."
###
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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.
They divorced about two years ago, but Charlie Sheen and Brooke Mueller are unable to move on from the bitterness in their relationship.
On Monday, the former "Two and a Half Men" star's ex-wife attempted to get a temporary restraining order against him after he attacked her and her parenting skills to TMZ. In court docs, Brooke claims that Charlie said, "[T]here will be a reckoning. There will be a whirlwind. That they will all reap while desperate begging for my forgiveness. You've all been warned. I will exercise every resource at my disposal. I will, I will, I will, I will empty my entire war chest and if I can't get it done, I know a guy who can."
However, the judge denied her emergency request and set a hearing for next month. Responding to the slapdown, the 48-year-old actor tweeted, "oh, by the way, nice try this morning Brooke. you are a chubby weirdo who will lose at every turn trying to get between me and my boys. c."
Probably ignoring counsel's advice to avoid her, Charlie followed up that message with a photo of a grenade on a cake on Tuesday. Along with the photo, he tweeted, "happy Bday Brooke when you're done sucking off the parking lot at Home Depot why don't ya 'blow' out this candle. c." Stay linked to GossipCenter as the drama continues.
LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AP) — Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat ingested lethal radioactive polonium before his death nine years ago and had high levels of it in his body that could not have been accidental, Swiss scientists confirmed Thursday.
The Swiss lab examined Arafat's remains and his underclothes and a travel bag that he had with him in the days before his death in a Paris hospital and found that the polonium and lead amounts could not be naturally occurring. The timeframe of his illness and death were also consistent with polonium poisoning, they said.
"You don't accidentally or voluntarily absorb a source of polonium — it's not something that appears in the environment like that," said Patrice Mangin, director of the Lausanne University Hospital's forensics center. He said he could not say unequivocally what killed Arafat — the biological samples obtained just last year were far too degraded.
"Our results reasonably support the poisoning theory," said Francois Bochud, director of the Institute of Radiation Physics that carried out the probe, though he was careful to emphasize the lingering questions that will require further investigation to answer.
"Can we exclude polonium as cause of death? The response is clearly 'no,' he said. "Was polonium the cause of the death for certain? The answer is no."
The Palestinian leader died in November 2004 at a French military hospital, a month after falling violently ill at his Israeli-besieged West Bank compound. Palestinian officials have alleged from the start that Israel poisoned Arafat, a claim Israel denies.
Suha Arafat, his widow, called on the Palestinian leadership Thursday to seek justice for her husband.
Speaking to The Associated Press by phone from the Qatari capital Doha, she did not mention Israel, but argued that only countries with nuclear capabilities have access to polonium.
"I can't accuse anyone, but it's clear this is a crime, and only countries with nuclear reactors can have and do that," she said.
"Now the ball is in the hands of the Palestinian Authority. They have to find the tools and pursue the legal case. They can resort to international legal institutions and international courts," she added.
Scientists not connected to the study said polonium is not naturally found in the human body.
"It's quite difficult to understand why (Arafat) might have had any polonium, if he was just in his headquarters in Ramallah," said Alastair Hay, a professor of environmental toxicology at the University of Leeds. "He wasn't somebody who was moving in and out of atomic energy plants or dealing with radioactive isotopes."
Derek Hill, a radiation expert at University College London, pointed out however that the polonium findings could have been the result of contamination.
"Somebody might have tried to doctor the evidence for their own political objectives," he said.
The Swiss scientists noted in their report they could not account for the "chain of custody" of the specimens between Arafat's death and when they were received in Lausanne last February.
Bochud said polonium can be obtained with authorization, noting that his own lab receives it in liquid form for research.
In that form, he said, just a minuscule amount slipped into food or drink would be lethal within about a month.
The 108-page report on the findings was published Wednesday by the Qatar-based satellite TV station Al-Jazeera. The station, along with Mrs. Arafat, had initiated the renewed investigation of Arafat's death last year.
Arafat's body was exhumed earlier this year. The Swiss report said his remains and the burial soil contained elevated levels of polonium-210.
Israeli officials vehemently denied any role in Arafat's death.
Paul Hirschson, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, dismissed the allegations as "hogwash."
Former Israeli official Dov Weisglass said Israel had no motive to kill Arafat at a time when he had been sidelined and isolated at his West Bank compound.
"I can assure you that officially, Israel had nothing to do with it," Weisglass, a senior adviser to then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, said in a phone interview. "In late 2004, Israel had no reason whatsoever even to consider a step of this kind."
Polonium first hit the headlines when it was used to kill KGB agent-turned-Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006.
It can be a byproduct of the chemical processing of uranium, but usually is made artificially in a nuclear reactor or a particle accelerator. Israel has a nuclear research center and is widely believed to have a nuclear arsenal, but remains ambiguous about the subject.
Mrs. Arafat said the Swiss experts told her that had the remains been examined a year later, traces of polonium would have vanished.
In a statement put out by his office, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas urged official Palestinian bodies to "follow up the investigation and to reveal all the facts about the death of the late leader Yasser Arafat, and to put the whole truth before the Palestinian people and the world."
The investigation was seen as potentially embarrassing to Abbas and his inner circle. The Palestinian investigation quickly hit a dead end. Abbas must now show publicly that he is interested in a vigorous follow-up, while not disrupting his negotiations with Israel.
The U.S. wants Israel and the Palestinians to keep negotiating, even though there appears to be no visible progress after more than three months of meetings. Abbas was in the Jordanian capital Amman on Thursday for a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.
On Friday, the Palestinian committee that has been investigating Arafat's death was to hold a news conference.
___
Associated Press writers Mohammed Daragmen in Ramallah, West Bank, Daniel Estrin in Jerusalem and Lori Hinnant in Paris, and AP Medical Writer Maria Cheng in London contributed to this report.
A French court has ordered Google to block from its search results pictures of former Formula One motor racing president Max Mosley participating in a sado-masochistic sex party with five women.
Google’s lawyers are still studying Wednesday’s ruling and plan to appeal. They say the Paris High Court wants the company to build a censorship machine.
The pictures were initially published under the headline “F1 BOSS HAS SICK NAZI ORGY WITH 5 HOOKERS” on March 30, 2008, by now-defunct British newspaper News of the World, which paid one of the women to record the event using a hidden video camera.
A subsequent court case found that, while the video showed participants speaking German and wearing modern German military uniforms or playing the role of prisoners, there was no evidence of a Nazi theme. In the same ruling, the High Court of England and Wales found that the newspaper had infringed Mosley’s right to privacy and awarded him £60,000 (then $120,000) in damages.
Mosley has also had publication of the photos declared illegal in separate cases in France and Germany, according to a statement released by his U.K. lawyers, Collyer Bristow.
“This is a welcome decision. The action was brought in respect of a small number of specific images ruled illegal in the English and French courts several years ago. Despite their illegality and my repeated notifications to them, Google continued to make the images available on its own webpages,” Mosley said in the statement.
However, the company maintains that it has responded to Mosley’s notifications by removing links to the photos.
In the present case, Mosley had asked the Paris High Court to go further, banning Google from showing or linking to nine specific photos
In the present case, Mosley had asked the Paris High Court to go further, banning Google from showing or linking to nine specific photos without waiting for notification about individual publications of them.
The court ordered that Google France and its U.S. parent company not show or link to the images for five years, or pay a €1,000 ($1,575) fine for each lapse. It is not clear whether the ruling, which Google has two months to implement, is intended to apply to Internet users outside France, and Google’s lawyers are still studying it.
“This is a troubling ruling with serious consequences for free expression and we will appeal it. Even though we already provide a fast and effective way of removing unlawful material from our search index, the French court has instructed us to build what we believe amounts to a censorship machine,” said Google Associate General Counsel Daphne Keller in a statement.
A company spokesman declined to answer further questions about the case.
Wednesday’s ruling only concerns Google, and will not affect the publishers of the Web pages carrying the images, which will remain online. Nor will it affect other search engines—and a rapid comparison with Microsoft’s Bing shows that it offers an equally comprehensive selection of links to the disputed images in its search results.
After a night of raucous, a Brazilian gal shared a video of Justin Bieber catching some Z’s.
In the clip titled” Justin Bieber sleeping with girl in Brasil,” the 19-year-old sleeps soundly on a pull out couch as the camera gal blows a kiss at him and quietly lets him rest.
Before his sleepy session was caught on film, the “Baby” singer was charged with defacing public property while out on a graffiti run with his buddies.
According to reports, Bieber was officially charged by Brazil's civil police force with "defacing a building or urban monument by graffiti or other means” after tagging the abandoned Hotel Nacional to avoid fans.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Connie Francis, Alan Alda and Joe Montegna are joining forces to help raise money for veterans suffering the wounds of war.
The trio will host the Homeward Bound telethon to benefit victims of post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury. The four-hour event, airing at 7 p.m. EST Sunday on the Military Channel, is a fundraiser for several charities.
Other celebrities set to participate include Mark Harmon and other "NCIS" cast members, Kevin Spacey, Jason Bateman, Lou Diamond Phillips, Gloria Loring and James Brolin. Scheduled performers include the American Military Spouses Choir, Patti Austin, Michael Feinstein, Ben Vereen and Steve Tyrell.
"This is a 45-year-old dream for me," said Francis, who entertained troops during the Vietnam War. A telethon was needed then but the social climate wasn't receptive to aiding veterans, the singer-actress said.
The Homeward Bound telethon came together after she gave a speech two years ago criticizing the lack of help for injured veterans and caught the attention of businessman Leonard Wilf, an owner of the Minnesota Vikings NFL team, Francis said. She and Wilf joined with producer Bruce Charet to establish the Haven From the Storm Foundation for veterans.
Money raised by the telethon will be donated to charities that provide services and support to servicemen and women and their family members coping with war's aftermath, including the American Red Cross and Wounded Warrior Project, telethon organizers said. Gary Smith, whose credits include the Tony and Emmy Awards ceremonies, is the executive producer.
Francis, who said she endured a dark period in which she required mental health care, is focusing on victims of PTSD and the high rate of military suicides. She said she wants to erase the stigma of mental illness for those who have served as well as civilians.
In 2012, the U.S. military suffered the highest number of suicides ever recorded, prompting then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to declare it an epidemic.
The telethon will also stream live online and be rebroadcast on the Armed Forces Network on Veterans Day on Monday. The event's first two hours will air Sunday on stations PIX11 in New York, WGN Chicago and KTLA Los Angeles.
___
Online:
http://www.homewardboundtelethon.org
We reassess why "Thor" just may be the best movie Marvel Studios has ever released.
By Alex Zalben
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 7-Nov-2013
ShareContact: Renate Bayaz
renate.bayaz@springer.com
49-622-148-78531
Springer
Springer and the Mathematical Biosciences Institute (MBI) in the US have signed a publishing agreement to collaborate on the Mathematical Biosciences Institute Graduate Lecture Series. The lecture series consists of readable, up-to-date collections of authored volumes that are tutorial in nature and are inspired by annual programs at the MBI. Publication will commence in early 2014.
The purpose of the MBI Graduate Lecture Series is to provide curricular materials that illustrate the applications of the mathematical sciences to the life sciences. The collections are organized as independent volumes, each one suitable for use as a two-week module in standard graduate courses in the mathematical sciences. They are written in a style accessible to researchers, professionals and graduate students. The MBI Graduate Lecture Series can also serve as an introduction for researchers to recent and emerging subject areas in the mathematical biosciences.
All books in the lecture series will be available as eBooks on Springer's online platform, SpringerLink (link.springer.com), and in print. The Mathematical Biosciences Institute has editorial oversight of the series and Springer will publish, market and sell the books. Approximately five to eight books are planned each year.
Marty Golubitsky, Director of the Mathematical Biosciences Institute, said, "Interaction between the mathematical and life sciences is rapidly expanding to the benefit of both disciplines. The MBI Graduate Lecture Series aims to accessibly showcase some of the recent and exciting research at this interface."
Achi Dosanjh, Senior Editor Mathematics at Springer, said, "Springer is delighted to be working with the Mathematical Biosciences Institute to provide professional publishing, international marketing and distribution services for the MBI lectures."
###
The Mathematical Biosciences Institute fosters innovation in the application of mathematical, statistical, and computational methods in the resolution of significant problems in the biosciences. In addition, the institute encourages the development of new areas in the mathematical sciences motivated by important questions in the biosciences. To accomplish this mission, MBI holds many weeklong research workshops each year, trains postdoctoral fellows and sponsors a variety of educational programs.
Springer Science+Business Media is a leading global scientific, technical and medical publisher, providing researchers in academia, scientific institutions and corporate R&D departments with quality content via innovative information products and services. Springer is also a trusted local-language publisher in Europe especially in Germany and the Netherlands primarily for physicians and professionals working in healthcare and road safety education. Springer published roughly 2,200 English-language journals and more than 8,000 new books in 2012, and the group is home to the world's largest STM eBook collection, as well as the most comprehensive portfolio of open access journals. In 2012, Springer Science+Business Media S.A. generated sales of approximately EUR 981 million. The group employs more than 7,000 individuals across the globe.
Share
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE: 7-Nov-2013
ShareContact: Renate Bayaz
renate.bayaz@springer.com
49-622-148-78531
Springer
Springer and the Mathematical Biosciences Institute (MBI) in the US have signed a publishing agreement to collaborate on the Mathematical Biosciences Institute Graduate Lecture Series. The lecture series consists of readable, up-to-date collections of authored volumes that are tutorial in nature and are inspired by annual programs at the MBI. Publication will commence in early 2014.
The purpose of the MBI Graduate Lecture Series is to provide curricular materials that illustrate the applications of the mathematical sciences to the life sciences. The collections are organized as independent volumes, each one suitable for use as a two-week module in standard graduate courses in the mathematical sciences. They are written in a style accessible to researchers, professionals and graduate students. The MBI Graduate Lecture Series can also serve as an introduction for researchers to recent and emerging subject areas in the mathematical biosciences.
All books in the lecture series will be available as eBooks on Springer's online platform, SpringerLink (link.springer.com), and in print. The Mathematical Biosciences Institute has editorial oversight of the series and Springer will publish, market and sell the books. Approximately five to eight books are planned each year.
Marty Golubitsky, Director of the Mathematical Biosciences Institute, said, "Interaction between the mathematical and life sciences is rapidly expanding to the benefit of both disciplines. The MBI Graduate Lecture Series aims to accessibly showcase some of the recent and exciting research at this interface."
Achi Dosanjh, Senior Editor Mathematics at Springer, said, "Springer is delighted to be working with the Mathematical Biosciences Institute to provide professional publishing, international marketing and distribution services for the MBI lectures."
###
The Mathematical Biosciences Institute fosters innovation in the application of mathematical, statistical, and computational methods in the resolution of significant problems in the biosciences. In addition, the institute encourages the development of new areas in the mathematical sciences motivated by important questions in the biosciences. To accomplish this mission, MBI holds many weeklong research workshops each year, trains postdoctoral fellows and sponsors a variety of educational programs.
Springer Science+Business Media is a leading global scientific, technical and medical publisher, providing researchers in academia, scientific institutions and corporate R&D departments with quality content via innovative information products and services. Springer is also a trusted local-language publisher in Europe especially in Germany and the Netherlands primarily for physicians and professionals working in healthcare and road safety education. Springer published roughly 2,200 English-language journals and more than 8,000 new books in 2012, and the group is home to the world's largest STM eBook collection, as well as the most comprehensive portfolio of open access journals. In 2012, Springer Science+Business Media S.A. generated sales of approximately EUR 981 million. The group employs more than 7,000 individuals across the globe.
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.
