9/11 exhibit brings former president, first lady to tears

Top Line

Talking to ABC?s Diane Sawyer during a special tour of the newly opened George W. Bush Library, former First Lady Laura Bush says she and her husband have both been brought to tears by the new 9/11 exhibit at the museum.

?It?s very hard to walk through and it's hard to watch this,? the former first lady says, referring to a video in the exhibit that reviews the day-by-day response to the attack. ?People weep, I mean, there's that spot where George almost wept, in the Oval Office, when he was talking about it.?

The new museum, which is designed to progress chronologically through the Bush presidency, starts off in a well-lit room that lays out the agenda President Bush hoped to undertake when he first came into office at the beginning of 2001. But visitors soon turn a corner, moving into the shadows of the 9/11 exhibit, where a large piece of disfigured metal from the 82^nd or 83^rd of the second World Trade Center tower stands.

?This is the point of impact,? Mrs. Bush tells Sawyer, pointing to the memorial. ?And on the walls around here are the names of all the people who died on September 11th. And this is really, this big piece of the World Trade Center looks like a big sculpture, I think, but it's a memorial.?

As hard as it is for the former first lady to look back on those days, she says it also reminds her of the best qualities of the country.

?There?s something sort of encouraging about it, because of the way our country came together and the way we can come together,? Mrs. Bush says. ?And we forget that now in so much partisan rancor, and I think it's too bad, because I think our responsibility as citizens really is to come together.?

To join Diane and Mrs. Bush on their special tour of the museum, check out this episode of Top Line.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/power-players-abc-news/laura-bush-9-11-exhibit-bush-museum-brings-191638459.html

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Exxon 1Q earnings rise but production slips again

NEW YORK (AP) ? Growing is hard for a company as big as Exxon.

Exxon Mobil Corp. managed to increase earnings slightly in the first quarter thanks to surging profits from its chemical business and lower taxes.

But Exxon's makes the bulk of its profit by producing oil and natural gas. And that business slumped ? again ? in the first three months of the year as production and revenue declined. It was the seventh straight quarter in which production declined compared with the year earlier.

"This company has been very growth-challenged for some time," said Brian Youngberg, an analyst at Edward Jones. "If they can get to the point they could keep (production) flat investors would look very positively at that."

Shares of Exxon, the biggest energy company in the U.S., fell $1.36, or 1.5 percent, to close at $88.07 Thursday, even though its results were better than Wall Street expected.

Finding and producing enough oil and gas to replace the oil and gas sold every year is a difficult task for all of the major oil companies. That's because their production is already high, while the number of untapped oil resources is limited. Also, oil and gas companies have to be careful about investing in long-term projects because if oil and gas prices fall, those projects can quickly become money-losers.

Exxon said Thursday that its net income for the first quarter increased 0.5 percent while revenue fell 12 percent.

The company, based in Irving, Tex. reported net income of $9.5 billion, or $2.12 per share. Analysts expected earnings of $2.05 per share, according to FactSet. During last year's quarter, Exxon earned $9.45 billion, or $2 per share.

Revenue dropped to $108.8 billion from $124.1 billion.

Overall, production fell 3.5 percent. Exxon's oil production slipped 1 percent as its oil fields experienced natural declines from peak production. Production fell in Europe, Africa and Australia, but those declines were partly offset by increases in the U.S., Canada and Asia.

Exxon's revenue was also reduced by oil prices that were $8.66 per barrel lower than in last year's quarter.

Natural gas output fell 5.9 percent worldwide, driven by an 8.7 percent decline in the U.S. Exxon and other domestic gas producers cut back production starting last year after U.S. natural gas prices fell to decade-lows in the wake of the historically warm winter of 2011 - 2012.

Exxon's refining operations took advantage of lower oil prices, and the chemicals business benefited from lower natural gas prices in the U.S. compared with overseas. Exxon was able to sell those more cheaply-produced chemicals and fuels around the world at enormous profit.

"It's just a huge cost advantage," Youngberg said.

Profit at Exxon's global chemicals operation grew 62 percent in the quarter, to $639 million. U.S. refining profit grew 72 percent to $1 billion.

Exxon's results were also helped by a sharp decline in corporate and financing expenses, which Exxon attributed to "favorable tax impacts."

Exxon isn't the only big company with growing pains. Apple Inc., which has jockeyed with Exxon for the title of most valuable company, fell to second place recently as investors question its growth prospects. This comes even though Apple posted the same first-quarter profit as Exxon ? $9.5 billion ? but on about a third of the revenue.

Follow Jonathan Fahey at http://twitter.com/JonathanFahey .

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/exxon-1q-earnings-rise-production-slips-again-194046759--finance.html

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Mutation makes H5N1 flu lose its grip

Laboratory-added genetic change makes avian influenza unable to bind to bird cells

Laboratory-added genetic change makes avian influenza unable to bind to bird cells

By Tina Hesman Saey

Web edition: April 24, 2013

A mutation that helped make a laboratory version of the H5N1 bird flu transmissible through the air nearly obliterates the ability of the virus to latch onto avian cells. At the same time, the mutation slightly boosts the virus?s ability to infect human cells, an international team of researchers reports April 24 in Nature.

The finding follows up on controversial research published last year that transformed the H5N1 virus, a microbe usually restricted to birds, into one that could spread between ferrets through the air (SN: 6/2/12; p. 20; SN: 7/14/12, p. 8). Some scientists and policymakers questioned whether such research should be done at all. Others argued that the work could help spot viruses poised to become pandemic strains and might point to vaccine targets.

The new study shows that a mutation can have different effects in different flu strains, something that might not have been discovered without the earlier research. ?

In the course of transitioning from a bird flu to a human disease, influenza viruses generally develop a preference for grasping sugar molecules called receptors on the surface of human cells. One common mutation that helps viruses do that, called Q226L, changes an amino acid in the hemagglutinin protein ? the molecule that gives the virus the H in its name. Hemagglutinin acts as a grappling hook to snag cells, making easier for the virus to infect them. The Q226L mutation, which occurs in the experimental H5N1 work and in natural influenza strains that caused pandemics in 1957 and 1968, twists the hemagglutinin protein to better hang onto human cells.

Usually virus strains with the mutation retain some power to hold onto bird cells, but not in the case of H5N1, says structural biologist and study coauthor Steven Gamblin of the MRC National Institute for Medical Research in London. The single amino acid alteration flips the H5 hemagglutinin from a protein with a high affinity for avian cells and almost none for human cells to one that clings weakly to human receptors but cannot get any handle on bird receptors. The mutant H5 binds human sugars 200 times more strongly than it does bird receptors, Gamblin and his colleagues found.

The mutant H5 gets only the weakest of holds on human sugars, says Ram Sasisekharan, an MIT biochemist who has conducted similar studies on other influenza viruses. Its grip does not rise above a threshold typically needed for other flu viruses to infect human cells, making the role of the mutation in transmissibility a mystery. ?It?s very confounding,? he says.

But Gamblin speculates that the virus?s abandonment of its avian past may allow it to evade components of human mucus called mucins, which are structurally similar to avian receptors. Normally, mucins glom onto flu viruses and tie up the grappling hooks, preventing hemagglutinin proteins from latching on to cells. Because the Q226L mutation destroys hemagglutinin?s ability to recognize bird receptors, it may allow the virus to slip past the mucins and get right to cells, aiding in transmission, Gamblin says.

This mutation also carries a potential upside for people: Because the mutant H5 can no longer bind to avian cells, viruses carrying the mutation probably would not be able to replicate in birds, Gamblin says. That could mean that the mutant virus may not be able to jump directly from birds into people. Instead, to pick up the mutation and become transmissible by air, H5N1 would first have to infect ? and reproduce in ? people or another animal. So far, only the laboratory created strains of H5N1 can spread through the air, and they contain other mutations that adapt the virus to live in mammals.

Source: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/349926/title/Mutation_makes_H5N1_flu_lose_its_grip

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Iron in primeval seas rusted by bacteria

Apr. 23, 2013 ? Researchers from the University of T?bingen have been able to show for the first time how microorganisms contributed to the formation of the world's biggest iron ore deposits. The biggest known deposits -- in South Africa and Australia -- are geological formations billions of years old. They are mainly composed of iron oxides -- minerals we know from the rusting process. These iron ores not only make up most of the world demand for iron -- the formations also help us to better understand the evolution of the atmosphere and climate, and provide important information on the activity of microorganisms in the early history of life on Earth.

The extent to which microbes in the Earth's ancient oceans contributed to the formation of iron deposits was previously unknown. Now an international team of researchers from the US, Canada and Germany has published new findings in the journal Nature Communications. Led by University of T?bingen geomicrobiologist Professor Andreas Kappler of the Center for Applied Geoscience, they found evidence of which microbes contributed to the formation of the iron ores, and were able to show how different metabolic processes can be distinguished in the rock formations today.

The iron in the Earth's ancient oceans was spat out of hot springs on the seafloor as dissolved, reduced ferrous [Fe(II)] iron. But most of today's iron ore is oxidized, ferric [Fe(III)] iron in the form of "rust minerals" -- indicating that the Fe(II) was oxidized as it was deposited. The classic model for the formation of iron deposits suggested that the Fe(II) from the Earth's core was oxidized by the oxygen produced by cyanobacteria (blue-green algae). This process can happen either chemically (as in the formation of rust) or by the action of microaerophilic iron-oxidizing bacteria.

But scientists are still debating at what point the Earth's atmosphere contained enough oxygen (produced by cyanobacteria) to allow the formation of big iron deposits. The oldest known iron ores were deposited in the Precambrian period and are up to four billion years old (the Earth itself is estimated to be about 4.6 billion years old). At this very early stage in geological history, there was little or no oxygen in the atmosphere. So the very oldest banded iron formations cannot be the result of O₂-dependent oxidation.

In 1993, bacteria were discovered which do not need oxygen but can oxidize Fe(II) by using energy from light (anoxygenic phototrophic iron-oxidizing bacteria). Studies by Professor Kappler's team in 2005 and 2010 showed that these bacteria transform dissolved ferric iron into iron oxide (rust) -- like the material in the early iron ores. Now, the geomicrobiologists from T?bingen have been able to demonstrate that, by examining the identity and structural properties of the iron minerals, it is possible to tell that the minerals were deposited by iron-oxidizing microbes and not by oxygen made available by the action of cyanobacteria. To do this, the researchers placed different amounts of organic material together with iron minerals into gold capsules and increased the pressure and temperature to simulate the transformation of the minerals over geological time. They ended up with structures of iron carbonate minerals (siderite, FeCO₃), just as they occur in geological iron formations. In particular, they were able to distinguish iron carbonate structures which had been formed in the presence of a rather small amount of organic compounds (microbial biomass) from those formed in the presence of a larger amount.

This research not only provides the first clear evidence that microorganisms were directly involved in the deposition of Earth's oldest iron formations; it also indicates that large populations of oxygen-producing cyanobacteria were at work in the shallow areas of the ancient oceans, while deeper water still reached by the light (the photic zone) tended to be populated by anoxyenic or micro-aerophilic iron-oxidizing bacteria which formed the iron deposits.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Universitaet T?bingen.

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Journal Reference:

1. Inga K?hler, Kurt O Konhauser, Dominic Papineau, Andrey Bekker, Andreas Kappler. Biological carbon precursor to diagenetic siderite with spherical structures in iron formations. Nature Communications, 2013; 4: 1741 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2770

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

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/Zix1TcAv23I/130423110750.htm

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Parents Share More Germs With Dogs Than Kids

Parents may have more in common with their dogs than their kids, at least with regard to microbial life.

A new study of the bacteria living on family members and their dogs revealed some surprises in the way microbes are shared within a household.

"One of the biggest surprises was that we could detect such a strong connection between their owners and pets," Rob Knight, a researcher at the University of Colorado Boulder, said in a statement. "In fact, the microbial connection seems to be stronger between parents and family dogs than between parents and their children." [In Photos: America's Favorite Pets]

By swabbing tongues, foreheads, feces, palms and paws, Knight and his colleagues collected bacteria samples from 60 families, including 17 households with children, involving 159 people and 36 dogs in total.

Overall, the researchers' findings showed that the people and their household pets can greatly influence the microbes that live in the body. Sharing surfaces (countertops, doorknobs, you name it) and breathing the same indoor air seems to make it much easier for family members to swap skin microbes than tongue or gut bacteria in a home, the scientists say. And pets are part of the exchange.

"Our skin microbiota in particular seems to be the most malleable by our immediate surroundings, which includes the presence of household pets," study researcher Se Jin Song, a CU-Boulder doctoral student, said in a statement. Couples who had a dog shared more skin bacteria with each other than couples without a canine companion, the researchers found.

Meanwhile, parents seemed to have much more tongue and gut bacteria in common with their own children than with other children, but only after about age 3. (Kids are not born with a built-in microbiome, but acquire most of it by age 3.) The foreheads and palms of fathers and their infants had the weakest microbial connection of all the body sites and relationships studied by the researchers.?

Microbes vastly outnumber human cells in the body. Whereas some kinds of bacteria can make you sick, others are vital for various aspects of a person's health. Gut microbes, for example, can help to digest food, make vitamins and fight off disease.

The new study, which was detailed online today (April 17) in the open-access journal eLIFE, adds to previous research showing that the makeup of human bacteria is affected by factors like environmental exposure. For example, the "hygiene hypothesis," first put forth in the 1980s, posits that exposure to bacteria and other microorganisms can help bolster immunity to environmental antigens, cutting the risk of asthma and food allergies. There's more and more evidence that pets could play a role in this process.

"Recent studies link early exposure to pets to decreased prevalence of allergies, respiratory conditions and other immune disorders in later stages of development, and skin microbes in particular are now receiving more focus as important players in immune regulation," the researchers wrote.

Follow Megan Gannon on Twitter and Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook& Google+. Original article on LiveScience.com.

Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/parents-share-more-germs-dogs-kids-171631090.html

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A look at immigrant patients deported by hospitals

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) ? Over the last five years, American hospitals have sent at least 600 immigrants who were in the U.S. illegally back to their home countries to avoid paying for long-term care after serious illness or injury.

The Center for Social Justice at Seton Hall University has documented "medical repatriation" cases in 15 states involving patients from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Lithuania, Mexico, the Philippines and South Korea.

Here's a look at some of the most dramatic examples from a report issued in December:

___

Quelino Ojeda Jimenez was working atop a building at Chicago's Midway Airport in 2010 when he fell, suffering injuries that left him nearly quadriplegic and reliant on a ventilator.

Advocate Christ Medical Center cared for Jimenez for four months, absorbing more than $650,000 in costs, according to a 2011 Chicago Tribune story.

Three days before Christmas that year, the hospital put him aboard a medical flight and sent him to Mexico, even though his family protested. Crying and unable to speak, Jimenez could do nothing to prevent his removal.

The receiving hospital in Mexico lacked rehabilitation services and could not afford new filters for his ventilator. After suffering two heart attacks and a septic infection, Jimenez died on Jan. 2, 2012.

___

Luis Alberto Jimenez was working as a landscaper in Florida when the car he was in was struck by a drunk driver in February 2000.

Jimenez, then 35, suffered brain damage and other injuries and was treated at Martin Memorial Medical Center in Stuart, Fla., until June, when he was transferred to a nursing home.

The following January, he was readmitted to the hospital with an infection that doctors feared could be fatal. He stayed at the hospital for a year because no other long-term care provider would take him.

The hospital eventually filed a lawsuit in state court seeking permission to transport him to a hospital in his native Guatemala. A judge approved the flight in June 2003, and Jimenez was flown to Guatemala before the court could rule on an appeal filed by his legal guardian.

In mid-2004, the Florida District Court of Appeals overturned the lower court's order, declaring that state courts do not have the authority to permit deportations, which are regulated by federal immigration law. But by then Jimenez had been returned home, bedridden and suffering from seizures, to live with his elderly mother in a remote area of Guatemala.

___

Barbara Latasiewicz was working as a housekeeper in the Chicago area in 2009 when she had a stroke while scrubbing a bathtub. The Polish woman was paralyzed on her left side and needed around-the-clock care.

Adventist La Grange Memorial Hospital tried to find her long-term care, but 30 facilities refused to take her because she was undocumented. Latasiewicz had overstayed a temporary visa after arriving in the U.S. in 1990.

The hospital allowed her to stay without insurance or any other way to pay for 2? years at a cost of more than $1.4 million.

In early 2012, arrangements were made to transfer her to a stroke-specialty unit in Poland. She refused to consent to the transfer, which would permanently separate her from her son and grandchildren. The hospital obtained a judge's order allowing her transfer to Poland.

A March 1 story in the Chicago Tribune says the 60-year-old woman cried while sitting in the airport awaiting a flight out, knowing she would probably never return to the U.S., which had been her home for more than 20 years.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/look-immigrant-patients-deported-hospitals-071427622.html

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How Many Inboxes Do You Deal With?

Email, voice mail, Twitter feeds, Facebook streams, notifications on your favorite web sites, your actual mailbox, the place where people leave things for you?these are all inboxes and it's easy to become a victim of inbox overload.

We've talked about several really good ways to help tame your email inboxes. We've also discussed how to reduce your inboxes to streamline workflow and reduce stress. And we've even covered the psychology of why you suck at managing email.

So tell us:

Images by ollyy (Shutterstock) and Dvortygirl (Wikimedia Commons).

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/wD-0Keo7FiA/how-many-inboxes-do-you-deal-with-477186651

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Ryan Seacrest's Kardashian Interview: 5 Huge Surprises!

Given that the Kardashians lead such public lives, it's hard to believe there's anything about them we don't know. And yet Ryan Seacrest's recent interview with Kim Kardashian and her family -- their first all-access TV interview since last year's Oprah special -- still managed to shed some light on the reality stars. And it wasn't always flattering. Here are five things revealed during Sunday night's E! special.

Source: http://www.ivillage.com/5-things-revealed-ryan-seacrests-kardashian-family-interview/1-a-534067?dst=iv%3AiVillage%3A5-things-revealed-ryan-seacrests-kardashian-family-interview-534067

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Hagel: US committed to Israel's military edge

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) ? U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel assured Israel on Monday that the Obama administration is committed to preserving and improving the Jewish state's military edge in the Middle East.

Hagel, on his first visit to Israel as Pentagon chief, also declared that it is Israel's right to decide for itself whether to attack Iran to stop it from building a nuclear bomb.

Those two messages appeared to form the foundation of Hagel's effort to improve U.S. relations with Israel, which have been strained in recent years by obstacles to reviving Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and by the threat of an Iranian bomb.

Later, Hagel was flown in an Israeli Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter over northern Israel to view the Golan Heights, an area along the Syrian border that Israel captured during the 1967 Six-Day War.

The flight appeared to be aimed in part at impressing upon Hagel the narrow reaches of Israel and its vulnerability to troubled areas like Syria, which is in the midst of civil war.

An Israeli Defense Forces information packet provided to those who took the flight with Hagel noted that "the State of Nebraska is nine times the State of Israel." Hagel is a former two-term Republican senator from Nebraska.

At a joint news conference with Hagel prior to their flight, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon, said security in the Golan Heights is one of Israel's chief worries about Syria's turmoil. He also appeared to refer to an Israeli military operation in response to a violation of what he termed an Israeli "red line" with regard to the Syrian conflict.

Yaalon said Israel has declared it will not "allow sophisticated weapons to be delivered or to be taken by rogue elements like Hezbollah and other rogue elements that are operating now in Syria. And we proved it; when they crossed these red lines we operated, we acted." He did not elaborate on what action Israel took.

In his appearance with Yaalon, Hagel was asked whether he believes it would be advisable for Israel to attack Iran on its own.

"That calculation has to be made by" Israel, he replied after noting, "Israel is a sovereign nation; every sovereign nation has a right to defend itself."

Hagel did not mention a concern that U.S. officials have voiced in the past, namely, that an Israeli strike would run the risk of igniting a wider war that could draw in the United States.

As evidence of Washington's commitment to preserving Israel's so-called qualitative military edge in the Mideast, Hagel said the U.S. will permit Israel to buy various new weapons, including U.S. missiles and advanced radars for its strike aircraft.

"We are committed to providing Israel with whatever support is necessary for Israel to maintain military superiority over any state or coalition of states and non-state actors," Hagel said.

Yaalon was asked about reports that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons in its struggle against rebel forces.

He did not specifically say whether Israel believes such weapons have been used, but he said that Syria must not cross the "red line" of allowing any chemical weapons to fall into the hands of what Yaalon called "rogue elements."

He said that "red line" has not yet been crossed, adding, "but we are ready to operate if any rogue element is going to put their hands (on chemical agents) or chemical agents are going to be delivered."

Hagel also was meeting Monday with Israeli President Shimon Peres, and on Tuesday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

___

Associated Press writer Josef Federman contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/hagel-us-committed-israels-military-edge-100201278--politics.html

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Group kicks off planting of ancient tree clones

In this photograph taken April 18, 2013, Jake Milarch holds coastal redwood clones developed in the Archangel Ancient Tree Archive lab in Copemish, Mich. Milarch and other members of the nonprofit group hope to plant millions of redwood clones to reforest the planet and fight climate change. (AP Photo/John Flesher)

In this photograph taken April 18, 2013, Jake Milarch holds coastal redwood clones developed in the Archangel Ancient Tree Archive lab in Copemish, Mich. Milarch and other members of the nonprofit group hope to plant millions of redwood clones to reforest the planet and fight climate change. (AP Photo/John Flesher)

In this photo taken April 18, 2013 shows clones of coastal redwood trees in the Archangel Ancient Tree Archive laboratory in Copemish, Mich. The nonprofit group hopes to plant millions of genetic copies of ancient redwoods around the world. (AP Photo/John Flesher)

This October 2011, photo provided by Archangel Ancient Tree Archive shows an unidentified person standing beside a coastal redwood tree near Crescent City, Calif., that is among dozens the group has cloned. The group hopes to plant thousands of genetic copies of the trees around the world. (AP Photo/Courtesy Archangel Ancient Tree Archive)

COPEMISH, Mich. (AP) ? A team led by a nurseryman from northern Michigan and his sons has raced against time for two decades, snipping branches from some of the world's biggest and most durable trees with plans to produce clones that could restore ancient forests and help fight climate change.

Now comes the most ambitious phase of the quest: getting the new trees into the ground.

Ceremonial plantings of two dozen clones from California's mighty coastal redwoods will take place Monday in seven nations: Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Ireland, Canada, Germany and the U.S.

Although measuring just 18-inches tall, the laboratory-produced trees are genetic duplicates of three giants that were cut down in northern California more than a century ago. Remarkably, shoots still emerge from the stumps, including one known as the Fieldbrook Stump near McKinleyville, which measures 35 feet in diameter. It's believed to be about 4,000 years old. The tree was about 40 stories high before it was felled.

"This is a first step toward mass production," said David Milarch, co-founder of Archangel Ancient Tree Archive, a nonprofit group spearheading the project. "We need to reforest the planet; it's imperative. To do that, it just makes sense to use the largest, oldest, most iconic trees that ever lived."

Milarch and his sons Jared and Jake, who have a family-owned nursery in the village of Copemish, Mich., became concerned about the condition of the world's forests in the 1990s. They began crisscrossing the U.S. in search of "champion" trees that have lived hundreds or even thousands of years, convinced that superior genes enabled them to outlast others of their species. Scientific opinion varies on whether that's true, with skeptics saying the survivors may simply have been lucky.

The Archangel leaders say they're out to prove the doubters wrong. They've developed several methods of producing genetic copies from cuttings, including placing branch tips less than an inch long in baby food jars containing nutrients and hormones. The specimens are cultivated in labs until large enough to be planted.

In recent years, they have focused on towering sequoias and redwoods, considering them best suited to absorb massive volumes of carbon dioxide, the greenhouse gas primarily responsible for climate change.

"If we get enough of these trees out there, we'll make a difference," said Jared Milarch, the group's executive director.

Archangel has an inventory of several thousand clones in various stages of growth that were taken from more than 70 redwoods and giant sequoias. NASA engineer Steve Craft, who helped arrange for David Milarch to address an agency gathering, said research shows that those species hold much more carbon than other varieties.

The challenge is to find places to put the trees, people to nurture them and money to continue the project, Jared Milarch said. The group is funded through donations and doesn't charge for its clones.

"A lot of trees will be planted by a lot of groups on Arbor Day, but 90 percent of them will die," David Milarch said. "It's a feel-good thing. You can't plant trees and walk away and expect them to take care of themselves."

The recipients of Archangel redwoods have pledged to care for them properly, he said. The first planting of about 250 took place in December on a ranch near Port Orford, Ore. Others will be planted during Earth Day observances Monday at the College of Marin in Kentwood, Calif., and in parks and private estates in the other six countries.

"I know the trees will thrive here," said Tom Burke, landscape manager at the College of Marin. "We've had redwoods in this area since God planted them."

___

Online: http://www.ancienttreearchive.org

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-04-22-US-Replanting-Redwoods/id-c35aaa0930e3401d9214bc2c76e30a62

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Guess Something About A High Altitude Balloon And Maybe Win A Trip To Space

KLM is going to send someone into space on an SXC Lynx spaceship in 2014. They're releasing a high altitude balloon tomorrow morning and if you guess the altitude and coordinates of where it will pop you'll be the one on that flight. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/15XIDHVr-WQ/guess-something-about-a-high-altitude-balloon-and-maybe-win-a-trip-to-space

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How Canned Food Conquered the World?And How It Almost Didn't

The BBC has a wonderful dive into the history of canning, tracing its origins from a technology designed to help expand and sustain the British Empire, to a miracle commodity of modern capitalism. And it almost failed before it ever got going. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/EU2McGFuX64/how-canned-food-conquered-the-worldand-how-it-almost-didnt

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Buying our first house... - RearParty

I have just read the last thread by blondiie, which was helpful but still a little confused.

Me and OH are planning to buy our first home when he is back but I just don't know where to start and once he is home want to get things moving as quickly as possible.

Do we see a mortgage adviser first so that we know what we can actually afford before viewing any houses? and dumb question but where do we even find a mortgage adviser and is one company better than another?

Very excited and want to get an appointment booked for when OH is home (If I need to) any extra info wold be great.. Thanks

Source: http://www.rearparty.co.uk/finance/10459-buying-our-first-house.html

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Incredible Thermal Imaging Video of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev in Hiding

While we had previously seen the stunning thermal images that helped police confirm that Boston Marathon bombing suspect was indeed hiding in a boat, under a tarp, now the raw video of the camera in action has been released. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/sQ_FGMKt4J8/incredible-thermal-imaging-video-of-dzhokhar-tsarnaev-in-hiding

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Rescuers struggle to reach China quake zone as toll climbs

By Michael Martina and Maxim Duncan

LUSHAN, China (Reuters) - Rescuers struggled to reach a remote, rural corner of southwestern China on Sunday as the toll of the dead and missing from the country's worst earthquake in three years climbed to 208 with almost 1,000 serious injuries.

The 6.6 magnitude quake struck in Lushan county, near the city of Ya'an in the southwestern province of Sichuan, close to where a devastating 7.9 quake hit in May 2008, killing 70,000.

Most of the deaths were concentrated in Lushan, a short drive up the valley from Ya'an, but rescuers' progress was hampered by the narrowness of the road and landslides, as well as government controls restricting access to avoid traffic jams.

"The Lushan county center is getting back to normal, but the need is still considerable in terms of shelter and materials," said Kevin Xia of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

"Supplies have had difficulty getting into the region because of the traffic jams. Most of our supplies are still on the way."

In Ya'an, relief workers from across China expressed frustration with gaining access to Lushan and the villages beyond, up in the mountains.

"We're in a hurry. There are people that need help and we have supplies in the back (of the car)," said one man from the Shandong Province Earthquake Emergency Response Team, who declined to give his name.

The Ministry of Civil Affairs put the number of dead at 184 and missing at 24, with more than 11,800 injured.

Hundreds of armed police were blocked from using roads that were wrecked by landslides and marched in single file with shovels en route to Baoxing, one of the hardest hit areas. Xinhua news agency said 18,000 troops were in the area.

The Foreign Ministry thanked foreign governments for offers of help, but said the country was able to cope.

In Lushan, doctors and nurses tended to people in the open or under tents in the grounds of the main hospital, surrounded by shattered glass, plaster and concrete. Water and electricity were cut off by the quake, but the spring weather is warm.

"I was scared. I've never seen an earthquake this big before," said farmer Chen Tianxiong, 37, lying on a stretcher between tents, his family looking on.

In another tent, Zhou Lin sat tending to his wife and three-day-old son who were evacuated from a Lushan hospital soon after the quake struck on Saturday.

"I was worried the child or his mother would be hurt. The buildings were all shaking. I was extremely scared. But now I don't feel afraid any more," said Zhou, looking at his child who was wrapped in a blanket on a makeshift bed.

Premier Li Keqiang flew into the disaster zone by helicopter to comfort the injured and displaced, chatting to rescuers and clambering over rubble.

"Treat and heal your wounds with peace of mind," Xinhua quoted Li as telling patients at a hospital. "The government will take care of all the costs for those severely wounded."

Chen Yong, the vice director of the Ya'an city government earthquake response office, told reporters on Saturday that the death toll was unlikely to rise dramatically.

Already poor, many of the earthquake victims said the government was their only hope.

Cao Bangying, 36, whose family had set up mattresses and makeshift cots under a dump truck, said her house had been destroyed.

"Being without a home while having a child of this age is difficult," Cao said, cradling her nine-month-old baby. "We can only rely on the government to help us."

No schools had collapsed, unlike in 2008 when many poorly constructed schools crumpled causing huge public anger, prompting a nationwide campaign of re-building.

Ya'an is a city of 1.5 million people and is considered one of the birthplaces of Chinese tea culture. It is also the home to one of China's main centers for protecting the giant panda.

(Writing by Ben Blanchard, Additional reporting by Sui-Lee Wee; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/rescuers-struggle-reach-china-quake-zone-toll-climbs-032552277.html

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Job Growth: City Cores Versus 'Burbs. (Willisms)

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The Chechen Connection

Chechen soldiers take a break after a long night on the road as they attempt to retake Chechnya's capital, Grozny, circa 1999.

Photo by Laurent Van Der Stockt/Gamma/Getty Images

There is much that we don't yet know about Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings. But we do know that their family is ethnically Chechen, as in the Russian republic of Chechnya, where war broke out in 1994. Although that war began as a movement for Chechen sovereignty and independence, it escalated into two extraordinarily bloody, messy, vicious armed conflicts, during which hundreds of thousands of people were killed. The Chechen capital, Grozny, was thoroughly destroyed. Photographs taken there after the war's end look eerily old-fashioned, as though they were from Warsaw or Dresden in 1945.

One of the brothers was born in Kyrgyzstan, a former Soviet republic, and it is not odd that they later went to school in Dagestan, another Russian republic. Nor is it strange that the brothers were speaking and posting to their Facebook pages in Russian, which is still the dominant language in much of the post-Soviet world. There are many Russian Muslims and many Chechens living in ethnically Russian Russia, and it wouldn't be surprising if there are many Chechens living in ethnically Kyrgyz Kyrgyzstan as well. The Soviet Union was a multinational, multiethnic, multireligious state. Much of the post-Soviet world remains equally if sometimes uncomfortably mixed.

What seems exotic to Americans, in other words, could prove to be a fairly common story: A Chechen family moves around the former Soviet Union for a few years, finally strikes it lucky, and ends up in the United States. They've been here for a decade. The brothers went to high school in Boston. One was a boxing champion, the other a freshman at the University of Massachusetts?Dartmouth.

But something went terribly wrong, and perhaps that something had to do with Chechnya. The two bloody Chechen wars caused incredible damage?the 26-year-old older brother, who was killed in a shootout with police early Friday, may well remember the violence?and inspired an equally bloody terrorist movement. Once a largely secular population, some Chechens became radicalized after losing their homes, friends, and families. Highlights of Chechen terrorism include the violent storming of a Moscow theater, attacks by several female suicide bombers, and the bombing of a Moscow airport. Worst of all was the 2004 siege of a primary school in the city of Beslan, a disaster that ended with the deaths of hundreds of parents and children. The nihilism and cruelty of Chechen terrorists?who have often targeted innocent bystanders?seem to have an echo in the horribly random Boston Marathon bombings.

One or both of the brothers might well have been in touch with Chechen separatists, whose websites they were reportedly reading. They could even have been in touch with al-Qaida. But I wouldn't jump to that conclusion. Chechen terrorists have in the past been more anti-Russian than pro-Islam. They were never anti-American.

Look, instead, at another possibility?one that is in some ways more disturbing than the convenient "foreigners who hate us" explanation. Although very little has been confirmed, the behavior of the Tsarnaev brothers looks less like that of hardened, trained terrorists and far more closely resembles the second-generation European Muslims who have staged bombings in Madrid, London, and other European cities. Educated and brought up in Europe, these young men nevertheless felt out of place in Europe. Unable to integrate, some turned toward a half-remembered, half-mythological homeland in search of a firmer, fiercer identity. Often they did so with the help of a radical cleric like the one the Tsarnaev brothers may have known. "I do not have a single American friend," Tamerlan Tsarnaev reportedly said of himself. That's the kind of statement that might have been made by a young Pakistani living in Coventry or a young Algerian living in Paris.

We don't expect to hear it from someone who grew up in Boston, a city that has taught generations of foreigners to become Americans in a country that likes to think of itself as a melting pot. But now it might be time to change our expectations. These terrorists are a lot less like the 9/11 attackers and a lot more like the men known as the Tube bombers of London or the train bombers of Spain. Our response is going to have to be different?very different?as well.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=de1760349600994af94e25912891e367

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'Shame on you!' Gun vote shamed by Obama, Giffords, Maisch

'Shame' was the word of the day after the U.S. Senate failed to pass gun control legislation yesterday. A spectator in the gallery yelled out 'Shame on you!' while President Obama referred to the vote as 'pretty shameful' and Rep. Gabby Giffords wrote 'Shame on them' in an op-ed about the senators.

By Alan Fram and David Espo / April 18, 2013

President Barack Obama puts his arm around former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) of Arizona before speaking about the defeat of measures to reduce gun violence, at the White House Rose Garden, April 17. President Obama called the votes 'pretty shameful,' echoing the cry of 'Shame on you!' heard in the gallery immediately after the vote, and echoed in turn by Representative Giffords' editorial published this morning.

Manuel Balce Ceneta / AP

Enlarge

Senate Republicans and a small band of rural-state Democrats scuttled the most far-reaching gun control legislation in two decades Wednesday, rejecting tighter background checks for buyers and a ban on assault weapons as they spurned pleas from families of victims of last winter's school massacre in Newtown, Conn.

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Survivors of the shootings watched from the spectator galleries above the Senate floor. "Shame on you," shouted one, Patricia Maisch, who was present two years ago when a gunman in Tucson, Ariz., killed six and wounded 13 others, including former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

"This effort isn't over," President Barack Obama vowed at the White House moments after the defeat on one of his top domestic priorities. Surrounded by Ms. Giffords and Newtown relatives, he said opponents of the legislation in both parties "caved to the pressure" of special interests and called it "a pretty shameful day for Washington."

A ban on high-capacity ammunition magazines also fell in a series of showdown votes. A bid to loosen restrictions on concealed weapons carried across state lines was rejected, as well.

That last vote marked a rare defeat for the National Rifle Association on a day it generally triumphed over Obama, gun control advocates and many of the individuals whose lives have been affected by mass shootings in Connecticut and elsewhere.

Gun control advocates, including Obama, had voiced high hopes for significant action after the Newtown shootings. But the lineup of possible legislation gradually dwindled to a focus on background checks, and in the end even that could not win Senate passage. Chances in the Republican-controlled House had seemed even slimmer.

By agreement of Senate leaders, a 60-vote majority was required for approval of any of the provisions brought to a vote.

The vote on the background check was 54-46, well short of the 60 votes needed to advance. Forty-one Republicans and five Democrats voted to reject the plan.

The proposed ban on assault weapons commanded 40 votes; the bid to block sales of high capacity ammunition clips drew 46.

The NRA-backed proposal on concealed carry permits got 57.

In the hours before the key vote on background checks, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., bluntly accused the National Rifle Association of making false claims about the expansion of background checks that he and Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., were backing.

"Where I come from in West Virginia, I don't know how to put the words any plainer than this: That is a lie. That is simply a lie," he said, accusing the organization of telling its supporters that friends, neighbors and some family members would need federal permission to transfer ownership of firearms to one another.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/oRT301hm1gU/Shame-on-you!-Gun-vote-shamed-by-Obama-Giffords-Maisch

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Primitive fish may shed light on evolution of limbs

Once thought to be extinct, the?coelacanth (through its DNA) is aiding scientists in their growing understanding of evolution. When inserted into mice, the fish's DNA causes the mammals to grow limbs. In the fish the same DNA codes for fins, not limbs.?

By Tia Ghose,?LiveScience / April 17, 2013

Scientists have sequenced the genome of the coelacanth, a primitive "living fossil" that has evolved little over the past 400 million years. DNA from the coelacanth can make limbs sprout in mice.

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The genome of a primitive fish that was once thought to have died when the dinosaurs did has now been sequenced by scientists ? and when put into mice, some of the fish DNA caused mice to sprout limbs.

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The new analysis, described today (April 17) in the journal Nature, could help to reveal how primitive fish swapped their fins for limbs when they moved from land to sea.

The fish, called a?coelacanth, seems to carry snippets of DNA that can turn on genes that code for forelimbs and hind limbs in mice. The new discovery could shed light on how four-legged creatures, called tetrapods, evolved. [Image Gallery: The Freakiest Fish]

"It really is a cornerstone from which we can view tetrapod?evolution," said study co-author Chris Amemiya, a geneticist at the Benaroya Research Institute in Seattle, Wash.

Living fossil

The coelacanth was once thought to have gone extinct about 70 million years ago, roughly around the time dinosaurs vanished. But in 1938, a fish trawler brought a bluish-purple, 3.3-foot-long (1 meter) fish with fleshy fins to the South African naturalist Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer. It turned out to be an African coelacanth.

Over the next several decades, scientists unearthed a few hundred of the elusive creatures living around the Comoros Islands in the Indian Ocean, as well as off parts of Indonesia.

The coelacanth intrigued scientists because it was a kind of "living fossil": It had changed so little over the last 400 million years that it might reveal how?fish first grew limbs?and walked on land.

Deepening the mystery, other research showed that fish, mice and other animals carry many of the same genes. But in fish, those genes code for fins, whereas in land-based animals, they create limbs.

Mysterious genes

Because the fish were so endangered, it was difficult to study their body plan in detail. But Amemiya and his colleagues managed to get tissue samples from a coelacanth from the Comoros Islands.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/cKWI3ymLbco/Primitive-fish-may-shed-light-on-evolution-of-limbs

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You're Invited to a #SundaySupper Shower for Babies, Brides & more!

This week,?#SundaySupper is throwing a virtual shower! Whether you?re hosting a baby shower or a bridal shower ? or any other kind of party ? we?ll have you covered with delicious recipes to serve your guests from beginning to end.

Every Sunday, a fabulous team of food bloggers (like me!) gather together virtually for #SundaySupper? ? a movement created to bring Sunday Supper back to the family table.

This Sunday, April 21st,?the #SundaySupper theme is ?April Showers? ? and while party hostesses are going to love our event, you don?t have to be throwing ?a baby or bridal shower to enjoy the fun! We have food bloggers that will be sharing sweet treats, appetizer recipes, drinks, cookies, main dishes, and more. Great stuff for parties, but also for sharing at your own family table. This will be my first time hosting #SundaySupper, so I?m beyond excited for this event!

Want to know what we?ll be sharing this Sunday? Below you will find a sneak peek of all the recipes that we have planned ? as you?ll see, it?s an event you don?t want to miss!

Starters, Appetizers & Snacks

Soups, Salads & Sandwiches

Main Dishes

Cakes

Cookies, Brownies & Dessert Bars

Sweet Treats

Drink Recipes

Join our #SundaySupper Chat!

One of the best parts of #SundaySupper is our weekly Twitter chat. If you love food, you definitely want to join us! Just follow the hashtag #SundaySupper?on Twitter this Sunday, April 21st at 7pm EST, and we?ll be chatting about food and fun for baby showers, bridal showers, and parties!

Want even more #SundaySupper? Follow our?#SundaySupper Pinterest board?for recipes that are sure to impress!

About the Author: brandie (369 Posts)

Brandie Valenzuela is a food blogger and writer at Home Cooking Memories. She lives in Las Vegas, NV where she enjoys cooking, baking, modern-day recipe keeping and making everyday memories with her family. She is known to have an extremely normal obsession with cupcake liners, ribbons and office supplies.

Source: http://homecookingmemories.com/sunday-supper-shower-babies-brides/

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FBI releases photos of bombing suspects

[Updated at 7:10 p.m. ET]

The FBI intensified its manhunt in the Boston Marathon bombing case on Thursday by releasing images of two men they deem to be suspects. It asked that anyone with information about the men or who may have seen them in the vicinity of the marathon finish line on Monday to step forward with information as soon as possible.

At a late-afternoon news conference here, FBI Special Agent Richard Deslauriers released surveillance tape and displayed photos of two young men captured in the moments before the twin explosions that killed 3 and injured 170.

"Somebody out there knows these individuals as friends, neighbors, co-workers or family members," Deslauriers said. ?Though it may be difficult, the nation is counting on those with information to come forward and provide it to us."

The release of the images represented a significant breakthrough in a massive manhunt that has consumed local, state and federal law enforcement since the detonation of two shrapnel-packed bombs that plunged the annual Patriot's Day race?the nation's most prestigious marathon?into terror and chaos.

Supect 1 (left) Suspect 2 (right) (FBI.gov) Click image to see more photos.

The man Deslauriers called Suspect One is seen wearing a dark hat, while Suspect Two is wearing a white hat. Deslaurier said Suspect Two is believed to have set a backpack down in front of the Forum restaurant along the marathon route near Copley Square.

Deslauriers said the two men appeared to be walking together along Boylston Street in the vicinity of the explosions.

"We know the public will play a critical role in identifying and locating these individuals. Somebody out there knows these individuals," Deslauriers said.

He described the men as likely armed and extremely dangerous, and said no one should try to take any action to apprehend them. He said those with information should contact law enforcement.

On Thursday morning, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano asked for the public's help in identifying possible suspects.

"I wouldn't characterize them as suspects under the technical term, but we need the public's help in locating these individuals," Napolitano said when asked to give an update on the marathon probe during a Committee on Homeland Security budget meeting on Capitol Hill.

"The investigation is proceeding apace," Napolitano added. "This is not an 'NCIS' episode. Sometimes you have to take the time to properly put the chain together to identify the perpetrators."

Also on Thursday morning, the U.S. attorney's office for the District of Massachusetts sent out a tweet encouraging anyone with information to submit clues, video or photos to an FBI Web page dedicated to the investigation.

President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama flew to Boston on Thursday to attend an interfaith memorial service and visit hospitalized victims. "Every one of us has been touched by this attack on your beloved city. Every one us stands with you," Obama told the crowd attending the church service at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston.

There, Obama honored the families of those killed in the blast?Martin Richard, 8, of Dorchester; Krystle Campbell, 29, of Medford; and Lingzi Lu, 23, a Boston University graduate student from China.

The improvised explosive devices were located about 100 yards apart in the bustling Copley Square area. Several blocks of Boston's downtown remain closed as authorities comb the area for evidence.

To contact the FBI with information, call 1-800-CALL-FBI or online at bostonmarathontips.fbi.gov.

Yahoo News' Beth Fouhy contributed reporting from New York.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/report-boston-investigators-may-release-photos-bombing-suspects-124108345.html

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Resurgence of endangered deer in Patagonian 'Eden' highlights conservation success

Resurgence of endangered deer in Patagonian 'Eden' highlights conservation success

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

The Huemul, a species of deer found only in the Latin American region of Patagonia, is bouncing back from the brink of possible extinction as a result of collaboration between conservationists and the Chilean government, says a new study.

By controlling cattle farming and policing to prevent poaching in the Bernardo O'Higgins National Park ? a vast "natural Eden" covering 3.5 million hectares ? conservation efforts have allowed the deer to return to areas of natural habitat from which it had completely disappeared.

Researchers are hailing the findings as an example of collaborations between local government and scientists leading to real conservation success, and a possible model for future efforts to maintain the extraordinary biodiversity found in this part of Chile.

The study by researchers from Cambridge, the Wildlife Conservation Society and CONAF, the Chilean national forestry commission, is released today in the journal Oryx, published by conservation charity Fauna and Flora International.

A national symbol that features on the Chilean coat-of-arms, Huemul deer are estimated to have suffered reductions of 99 per cent in size since the 19th century, according to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

Researchers believe 50 per cent of this decline has come in recent years, with only 2,500 deer now left in the wild.

The Huemul is a naturally tame and approachable animal, which led to it becoming easy prey for hunters, particularly with the arrival of European colonists in the area who would hunt Huemul for meat to feed their dogs.

Recent increases by local farmers in the practice of releasing cattle indiscriminately into national parkland for retrieval later in the year has damaged the habitats of endemic wildlife such as the Huemul, and, coupled with continued hunting of the species, deer populations plummeted.

The joint efforts of conservationists and researchers with government and private initiatives created a small number of field stations in this remote natural paradise on the tip of South America ? one of the least populated areas of the world, requiring a boat trip of two days along the region's stunning fjords to reach.

This created a base for monitoring endangered species and natural habitats, as well as a team of park rangers enforcing conservation laws that ? although they had been in place since the late sixties ? had never been policed on the ground.

The impact was almost immediate, within five short years ? from 2004 to 2008 ? the Huemul population in the national park not only stabilised but also began to increase, with deer coming down from the hostile mountain areas it had sought refuge in and back to the sea-level valleys where it naturally thrives.

"National parks are at the heart of modern conservation, but there has to be an investment in management and protection on the ground. You can't just have a 'paper park', where an area is ring-fenced on a map but physically ignored," said Crist?bal Brice?o, a researcher from Cambridge's Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, who co-authored the study.

"Our results suggest that synergistic conservation actions, such as cattle removal and poaching control, brought about by increased infrastructure, can lead to the recovery of species such as the threated Huemul."

For Brice?o, the "scattering" of endangered species as habitats are encroached on creates not only external threats - but also extremely limited mating diversity.

This leads to levels of inbreeding that can reach "a critical extent from which there's no return", causing susceptibility to disease and increased extinction risk, as with another Chilean mammal that Brice?o is researching called Darwin's Fox ? named for the scientific genius that first discovered it ? with barely 500 now left in the world.

The Huemul's success offers encouragement for Brice?o and others in the field: "I think it's beautiful that this has turned out to be an example of real hope for an endangered species, an example we would like to replicate."

###

University of Cambridge: http://www.cam.ac.uk

Thanks to University of Cambridge for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127781/Resurgence_of_endangered_deer_in_Patagonian__Eden__highlights_conservation_success

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