We've seen electric off-roaders tackle the Dakar Rally, but racing on the Baja peninsula has proven elusive -- until this weekend. After driving in smaller races, SRI's EV1 has joined the big leagues by starting in NORRA's Mexican 1000 rally. The 535HP, 400kW open-wheeler has participated in at least the first trio of special stages, and it will ideally join a handful of further stages that fit within the vehicle's 100-mile range. While the EV1 is far from the front of the Evolution class, at 36th place as of this writing, winning isn't the point -- SRI wants to drum up enough funding to hot-swap batteries and complete every stage in future races. Its project should at least be proof that smaller EVs can thrive in some of the world's harshest racing conditions.
WASHINGTON (AP) ? Russian authorities secretly recorded a telephone conversation in 2011 in which one of the Boston bombing suspects vaguely discussed jihad with his mother, officials said Saturday, days after the U.S. government finally received details about the call.
In another conversation, the mother of now-dead bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev was recorded talking to someone in southern Russia who is under FBI investigation in an unrelated case, officials said.
The conversations are significant because, had they been revealed earlier, they might have been enough evidence for the FBI to initiate a more thorough investigation of the Tsarnaev family.
As it was, Russian authorities told the FBI only that they had concerns that Tamerlan and his mother were religious extremists. With no additional information, the FBI conducted a limited inquiry and closed the case in June 2011.
Two years later, authorities say Tamerlan and his brother, Dzhohkar, detonated two homemade bombs near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three and injuring more than 260. Tamerlan was killed in a police shootout and Dzhohkar is under arrest.
In the past week, Russian authorities turned over to the United States information it had on Tamerlan and his mother, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva. The Tsarnaevs are ethnic Chechens who emigrated from southern Russia to the Boston area over the past 11 years.
Even had the FBI received the information from the Russian wiretaps earlier, it's not clear that the government could have prevented the attack.
In early 2011, the Russian FSB internal security service intercepted a conversation between Tamerlan and his mother vaguely discussing jihad, according to U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the investigation with reporters.
The two discussed the possibility of Tamerlan going to Palestine, but he told his mother he didn't speak the language there, according to the officials, who reviewed the information Russia shared with the U.S.
In a second call, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva spoke with a man in the Caucasus region of Russia who was under FBI investigation. Jacqueline Maguire, a spokeswoman for the FBI's Washington Field Office, where that investigation was based, declined to comment.
There was no information in the conversation that suggested a plot inside the United States, officials said.
It was not immediately clear why Russian authorities didn't share more information at the time. It is not unusual for countries, including the U.S., to be cagey with foreign authorities about what intelligence is being collected.
The FSB said Sunday that it would not comment.
Jim Treacy, the FBI's legal attache in Moscow between 2007 and 2009, said the Russians long asked for U.S. assistance regarding Chechen activity in the United States that might be related to terrorism.
"On any given day, you can get some very good cooperation," Treacy said. "The next you might find yourself totally shut out."
Zubeidat Tsarnaeva has denied that she or her sons were involved in terrorism. She has said she believed her sons have been framed by U.S. authorities.
But Ruslan Tsarni, an uncle of the Tsarnaev brothers and Zubeidat's former brother-in-law, said Saturday he believes the mother had a "big-time influence" as her older son increasingly embraced his Muslim faith and decided to quit boxing and school.
After receiving the narrow tip from Russia in March 2011, the FBI opened a preliminary investigation into Tamerlan and his mother. But the scope was extremely limited under the FBI's internal procedures.
After a few months, they found no evidence Tamerlan or his mother were involved in terrorism.
The FBI asked Russia for more information. After hearing nothing, it closed the case in June 2011.
In the fall of 2011, the FSB contacted the CIA with the same information. Again the FBI asked Russia for more details and never heard back.
At that time, however, the CIA asked that Tamerlan's and his mother's name be entered into a massive U.S. terrorism database.
The CIA declined to comment Saturday.
Authorities have said they've seen no connection between the brothers and a foreign terrorist group. Dzhohkar told FBI interrogators that he and his brother were angry over wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the deaths of Muslim civilians there.
Family members have said Tamerlan was religiously apathetic until 2008 or 2009, when he met a conservative Muslim convert known only to the family as Misha. Misha, they said, steered Tamerlan toward a stricter version of Islam.
Two U.S. officials say investigators believe they have identified Misha. While it was not clear whether the FBI had spoken to him, the officials said they have not found a connection between Misha and the Boston attack or terrorism in general.
___
Associated Press writer Adam Goldman in Washington and Michael Kunzelman in Boston contributed to this report.
It may be 2013, but 2001 will forever hold a special place in our hearts, in no small part due to the that lovable, red-eyed supercomputer known as HAL 9000. ThinkGeek has given us a couple ways to purchase HAL for our homes, but for folks who'd rather build their own, Adafruit's got you covered. User Phillip Burgess has posted the full instructions on how to craft your own, provided you've got access to a laser cutter and the requisite soldering, spray painting and sanding chops to complete the task. Adafruit's version will have you crafting HAL from an oversized arcade button and a sheet of acrylic -- and if you want your HAL to talk (and really, why wouldn't you), you'll need to build a voice box from an Arduino Uno board and an Adafruit Wave Shield. Total cost: just shy of $100. Check out the video of it in action after the break, and head on down to the source link for the full how-to. Oh, and feel free to whistle Sprach Zarathustra while you work.
LOUISVILLE, Neb. (AP) ? The Nebraska Game and Parks Commission has scheduled women?s archery classes for May at Platte River State Park near Louisville (LOO?-is-vihl) in eastern Nebraska.
The classes are being presented by the Beyond Becoming an Outdoors-Woman program. They will be held each Wednesday in May.
Participants may attend any of the classes. They Introduction to Archery on May 8; on May 15 is Shopping for Women?s Bows; on May 22, Tuning Your Bow; and on May 29, Fun with Archery.
The classes cost $5 each and run from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Roger G. Sykes Outdoor Heritage Education Complex. Loaner bows will be available.
To register visit http://www.outdoornebraska.ne.gov/Education/ or contact Christy Christiansen at 402-471-5547 or chisty.christiansen(at)nebraska.gov.
The park is west of Louisville on Nebraska Highway 66.
Tags: General news, Nebraska, North America, Sports, United States, Women's sports
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ROME (AP) ? A prosecutor says Italian politicians were the intended target of a gunman who shot and wounded two policemen in a crowded square outside the premier's office in Rome.
The attack Sunday came just as Italy's new government was being sworn in elsewhere in the city. Italy has suffered political deadlock since an inconclusive February election.
Rome Prosecutor Pierfilippo Laviani told reporters he had questioned the alleged assailant, who was taken to a hospital with bruises after being wrestled to the ground.
Laviani says the "desperate" gunman had "lost work, had lost everything." He said the man "wanted to shoot politicians, but given that he couldn't reach any, he shot the Carabinieri" police at the edge of Chigi Square.
Laviani said the man "confessed everything" and didn't appear mentally unbalanced.
There is more to travel than just jumping on a plane. The experience can be thrilling. There are a ton of travel options and a wide variety of adventures to take. Are you ready to have some fun? Following are some travel tips that can help you to get started.
Before you settle on a destination, be sure to consider the influence that the weather can have on your trip. Check the forecast for your destination. Freezing rain on a Florida beach, or unseasonal sunshine on an Aspen ski trip, will ruin the best laid travel plans.
You can save money by waiting until you reach your final destination to change currencies. If you know there won't be a place to easily exchange currency once you land in your destination country, exchange a limited amount before you leave and then look for a better exchange rate once you arrive in-country.
If there is hotel room available on a floor that is higher, you should request that one. It is easier for thieves to break into rooms that are close to the ground. If you can, request a hotel room that has only windows and no sliding glass doors. Rooms such as this can be broken into easier.
If you have a long travel time you should ensure that you give yourself some time to stretch, even if you are getting up for no reason. Sitting for too long reduces blood flow and can lead to blood clots.
Use caution when you get an email about great deals in travel. If you have signed up for a travel newsletter, you can trust these emails; avoid all others, though.
Whenever you go camping, but most importantly when you go hiking, you must carry local maps along with you. A GPS and compass will come in handy also in the event that you become lost or disoriented in the woods.
Don't wait until you are on the cruise ship to discover that you get seasick. This could ruin your entire trip and make you very dreadful. You will be bedridden, recovering from the seasickness, and not having fun. If you can, get a prescription for a sea sickness medication and take it with you.
This will enable you to hook your laptop up to the hotel tv. This allows you to watch Netflix and similar streaming services instead of expensive hotel movies.
Attach a label with your name and contact information to your luggage and place another one on the inside. This is good in the event the bag is lost, since it will help pinpoint who the owner is. Remember that your luggage and its contents are at risk whenever they leave your sight.
Research local laws and customs prior to traveling. Failure to do so can result in people being angry with you, or even jail time over something you wouldn't have expected to be a problem. Be respectful of local laws, customs, and authorities while traveling, and you should be fine.
If your travels include multiple countries, ensure that your visas are appropriate and up-to-date. It is important to understand that getting a visa doesn't automatically give you the power to get inside a country. There are different kinds of visas that you need to know about. A great place to find out the requirements is your travel agency. If you don't have a travel agency, you can consult the embassy of each country you are visiting.
The article shows you some ideas on how to make travel easier. Many people can be confused about all the decisions they have to make when traveling. That said, if you have great travel advice, you can easily plan a trip. Use the tips from this article and start making better travel plans today.
"You look ridiculous." This was not exactly the reaction I was hoping to receive from my wife the first time she saw me wearing Glass. She was long-since asleep when I arrived late the night before, and so had missed my triumphant, technologically augmented homecoming. I confess Google Glass is a bit odd-looking, but my wife is even more of a hardcore Trekker than I am and I thought somehow this headgear would channel her deep-seated love for bizarre, high-tech facial appendages.
Nope. She wasn't the least bit impressed. When she tried them later, she came around a bit, but spent more time saying the silicon grippers pinched her nose than reveling in the potential future applications of such technology. You can't please everybody.
MOSCOW (AP) ? A fire swept quickly through a psychiatric hospital outside Moscow early Friday, killing 38 people, most of them in their beds, officials said.
The one-story brick-and-wood hospital building housed patients with severe mental disorders, Health Ministry officials said. An emergency ministry official said the fire started in a wooden annex and then spread to the main brick building which had wooden beams.
The patients were under sedatives and most of them did not wake up, Yuri Deshevykh of the emergency situations ministry told RIA Novosti.
At least 29 people were burned alive, said Irina Gumennaya, a spokeswoman for the Russian Investigative Committee.
Investigators said 38 people, including 36 patients and two doctors, have died. They said a nurse managed to escape and save one patients, while another patient got out on his own. The emergency services also posted a list of the patients indicating they ranged in age from 20 to 76. Gumennaya told Russian news agencies that most of the people died in their beds.
Moscow region governor Andrei Vorobyev said some of the hospital windows were barred. Gumennaya quoted testimony of the surviving nurse who said that doors inside the hospital were not locked.
Officials from the Russian Investigative Committee said they are looking at poor fire regulations and short circuit as possible causes for the blaze that engulfed the hospital in the Ramenskiy settlement, some 85 kilometers (53 miles) north of Moscow.
Vadim Belovoshin of the emergency ministry said that it took fire fighters an hour to get to the hospital following an emergency call because a ferry across the canal was closed and the fire fighters had to make a detour.
Vorobyev told Russian state-television that the fire alarm seems to have worked but the fire spread too quickly.
Russia has a poor fire safety record, with about 12,000 deaths reported in 2012. In January, a fire in an underground parking lot killed 10 migrant workers from Tajikistan who were working and living there. In a similar incident in September, 14 Vietnamese workers were killed by fire at a clothing factory near Moscow.
In one of the most high-profile case of negligence, more than 150 people died in a night club in the city of Perm after a pyrotechnic show ignited a wooden ceiling.
NEW DELHI (AP) ? Part of a hospital building collapsed in central India on Friday after its roof came crashing down, injuring at least eight people, an official said.
More than a dozen people were rescued after being trapped in the rubble of the Kasturba Gandhi Hospital in Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh state, state minister Babu Lal Gaur said. None of the injuries were serious.
Police officer Upendra Jain said about two dozen people were believed to be on the first floor of the women's medical ward when its roof crashed down. The cause of the collapse was not immediately known.
The Press Trust of India news agency quoted local administrator Nikunj Shrivastava as saying that two people were killed in the building collapse. Shrivastava could not be immediately reached for comment.
The hospital is operated by state-run Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd., Gaur said. Bhopal is about 750 kilometers (465 miles) south of New Delhi.
Building collapses are common in India as builders try to cut corners by using substandard materials, and as multistory structures are built with inadequate supervision. The massive demand for housing around cities and pervasive corruption often result in builders adding unauthorized floors or constructing illegal buildings.
Earlier this month, at least 72 people were killed when an eight-story residential building being constructed illegally near Mumbai, India's financial capital, came crashing down in the worst building collapse in the country in decades.
Another 70 people were injured when the building in the Mumbai suburb of Thane caved in on April 4.
The Bad Astronomer writes "A experiment called IceCube ? consisting of sensitive light detectors buried deep in the Antarctic ice ? has detected two ultra-high-energy neutrinos, each with over a peta-electronVolt of energy (a quadrillion times the energy of a visible light photon), the highest energy neutrinos ever seen. The two events, nicknamed Bert and Ernie, have a 99% chance of originating outside our galaxy, likely created either by a supermassive black hole or an exploding gamma-ray burst."
Archeologists unearth new information on origins of Maya civilizationPublic release date: 25-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Takeshi Inomata inomata@email.arizona.edu 520-621-2961 University of Arizona
A new paper in the journal Science challenges the two prevailing theories on how the ancient civilization began
This release is available in Japanese.
The Maya civilization is well-known for its elaborate temples, sophisticated writing system, and mathematical and astronomical developments, yet the civilization's origins remain something of a mystery.
A new University of Arizona study to be published in the journal Science challenges the two prevailing theories on how the ancient civilization began, suggesting its origins are more complex than previously thought.
Anthropologists typically fall into one of two competing camps with regard to the origins of Maya civilization. The first camp believes that it developed almost entirely on its own in the jungles of what is now Guatemala and southern Mexico. The second believes that the Maya civilization developed as the result of direct influences from the older Olmec civilization and its center of La Venta.
It's likely that neither of those theories tells the full story, according to findings by a team of archaeologists led by UA husband-and-wife anthropologists Takeshi Inomata and Daniela Triadan.
"We really focused on the beginning of this civilization and how this remarkable civilization developed," said Inomata, UA professor of anthropology and the study's lead author.
In their excavations at Ceibal, an ancient Maya site in Guatemala, researchers found that Ceibal actually predates the growth of La Venta as a major center by as much as 200 years, suggesting that La Venta could not have been the prevailing influence over early Mayan development.
That does not make the Maya civilization older than the Olmec civilization since Olmec had another center prior to La Venta nor does it prove that the Maya civilization developed entirely independently, researchers say.
What it does indicate, they say, is that both Ceibal and La Venta probably participated in a broader cultural shift taking place in the period between 1,150-800 B.C.
"We're saying that the scenario of early Maya culture is really more complex than we thought," said UA anthropology graduate student Victor Castillo, who co-authored the paper with Inomata and Triadan.
"We have this idea of the origin of Maya civilization as an indigenous development, and we have this other idea that it was an external influence that triggered the social complexity of Maya civilization. We're now thinking it's not actually black and white," Castillo said.
There is no denying the striking similarities between Ceibal and La Venta, such as evidence of similar ritual practices and the presence of similar architecture namely the pyramids that would come to be the hallmark of Mesoamerican civilization but did not exist at the earlier Olmec center of San Lorenzo.
However, researchers don't think this is the case of simply one site mimicking the other. Rather, they suspect that both the Maya site of Ceibal and the Olmec site of La Venta were parts of a more geographically far-reaching cultural shift that occurred around 1,000 B.C., about the time when the Olmec center was transitioning from San Lorenzo to La Venta.
"Basically, there was a major social change happening from the southern Maya lowlands to possibly the coast of Chiapas and the southern Gulf Coast, and this site of Ceibal was a part of that broader social change," Inomata said. "The emergence of a new form of society with new architecture, with new rituals became really the important basis for all later Mesoamerican civilizations."
The Science paper, titled "Early Ceremonial Constructions at Ceibal, Guatemala, and the Origins of Lowland Maya Civilization," is based on seven years of excavations at Ceibal.
Additional authors of the paper include Japanese researchers Kazuo Aoyama of the University of Ibaraki, Mito and Hitoshi Yonenobu of the Naruto University of Education, Tokushima.
"We were looking at the emergence of specific cultural traits that were shared by many of those Mesoamerican centers, particularly the form of rituals and the construction of the pyramids," Inomata said. "This gives us a new idea about the beginning of Maya civilization, and it also tells us about how common traits shared by many different Mesoamerican civilizations emerged during that time."
###
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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.
Archeologists unearth new information on origins of Maya civilizationPublic release date: 25-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Takeshi Inomata inomata@email.arizona.edu 520-621-2961 University of Arizona
A new paper in the journal Science challenges the two prevailing theories on how the ancient civilization began
This release is available in Japanese.
The Maya civilization is well-known for its elaborate temples, sophisticated writing system, and mathematical and astronomical developments, yet the civilization's origins remain something of a mystery.
A new University of Arizona study to be published in the journal Science challenges the two prevailing theories on how the ancient civilization began, suggesting its origins are more complex than previously thought.
Anthropologists typically fall into one of two competing camps with regard to the origins of Maya civilization. The first camp believes that it developed almost entirely on its own in the jungles of what is now Guatemala and southern Mexico. The second believes that the Maya civilization developed as the result of direct influences from the older Olmec civilization and its center of La Venta.
It's likely that neither of those theories tells the full story, according to findings by a team of archaeologists led by UA husband-and-wife anthropologists Takeshi Inomata and Daniela Triadan.
"We really focused on the beginning of this civilization and how this remarkable civilization developed," said Inomata, UA professor of anthropology and the study's lead author.
In their excavations at Ceibal, an ancient Maya site in Guatemala, researchers found that Ceibal actually predates the growth of La Venta as a major center by as much as 200 years, suggesting that La Venta could not have been the prevailing influence over early Mayan development.
That does not make the Maya civilization older than the Olmec civilization since Olmec had another center prior to La Venta nor does it prove that the Maya civilization developed entirely independently, researchers say.
What it does indicate, they say, is that both Ceibal and La Venta probably participated in a broader cultural shift taking place in the period between 1,150-800 B.C.
"We're saying that the scenario of early Maya culture is really more complex than we thought," said UA anthropology graduate student Victor Castillo, who co-authored the paper with Inomata and Triadan.
"We have this idea of the origin of Maya civilization as an indigenous development, and we have this other idea that it was an external influence that triggered the social complexity of Maya civilization. We're now thinking it's not actually black and white," Castillo said.
There is no denying the striking similarities between Ceibal and La Venta, such as evidence of similar ritual practices and the presence of similar architecture namely the pyramids that would come to be the hallmark of Mesoamerican civilization but did not exist at the earlier Olmec center of San Lorenzo.
However, researchers don't think this is the case of simply one site mimicking the other. Rather, they suspect that both the Maya site of Ceibal and the Olmec site of La Venta were parts of a more geographically far-reaching cultural shift that occurred around 1,000 B.C., about the time when the Olmec center was transitioning from San Lorenzo to La Venta.
"Basically, there was a major social change happening from the southern Maya lowlands to possibly the coast of Chiapas and the southern Gulf Coast, and this site of Ceibal was a part of that broader social change," Inomata said. "The emergence of a new form of society with new architecture, with new rituals became really the important basis for all later Mesoamerican civilizations."
The Science paper, titled "Early Ceremonial Constructions at Ceibal, Guatemala, and the Origins of Lowland Maya Civilization," is based on seven years of excavations at Ceibal.
Additional authors of the paper include Japanese researchers Kazuo Aoyama of the University of Ibaraki, Mito and Hitoshi Yonenobu of the Naruto University of Education, Tokushima.
"We were looking at the emergence of specific cultural traits that were shared by many of those Mesoamerican centers, particularly the form of rituals and the construction of the pyramids," Inomata said. "This gives us a new idea about the beginning of Maya civilization, and it also tells us about how common traits shared by many different Mesoamerican civilizations emerged during that time."
###
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
All Critics (40) | Top Critics (22) | Fresh (38) | Rotten (2)
A thousand-watt jolt of mischief, a spunky, funky, ebullient indie that packs its 81 minutes with cinematic exhilaration.
It may be a slight movie, but it has its sunny charms.
A movie about teenage taggers in the Bronx should be fast and raw, scruffy and loose, and Adam Leon's Gimme the Loot is just that.
As it lopes along, the movie offers a warm but very sharp portrait of New York's have-nots and their uneasy relationship with the haves.
"Gimme the Loot" shouldn't be as appealing and exuberant as it is, it really shouldn't.
Tashiana Washington and Ty Hickson are terrific in the main roles. So is Zo? Lescaze as Ginnie, a spoiled white kid who teaches the taggers a thing or two about drift and being dissolute.
Simultaneously real and hopeful, "Loot" has almost no plot, but when the setting is so fresh and the characters feel so raw and alive, who needs one?
Ghetto laughs with a sophisticated point of view.
...a magical, summery treat.
Promotes robbery and can't be serious in expecting us to care whether Malcolm and Sofia become more than friends.
The winner of the Indie Spirit 'One to Watch' award could never work again and will always have a memorable New York City film to his credit.
An impressive debut feature, Gimme the Loot is also an unusual take on characters who want to leave their stamp on "the city that never sleeps."
Much more grownup than it looks, Gimme the Loot is that rare teen-centric film whose brisk pace is unburdened by sentimentality.
Writer-director Adam Leon has crafted a classic New York story, a film imbued with the fast rhythms and muggy sensations of city life during the summer.
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An article in the April 29 issue of The New Republic has generated considerable interest in U.S. child care as its content and perspective have been picked up and extended in social media, other magazines, U.S. TV, radio and daily newspapers and even in offshore news media. The hell of American daycare: the barely regulated, unsafe business of looking after our children describes a case of a fire in a family child-care home caring for seven very young children. The case -- prominent in the media for some time -- involved an untrained 23-year-old caregiver/owner who had left the kids alone to go shop at Target, a practice that --? testimony at the trial asserted -- was not new. An oil-filled pot left cooking on the stove caught fire and four children died. Eventually the caregiver who -- it became clear -- had a criminal record -- was sentenced to 80 years in prison.
The article indicts the United States for -- essentially -- child neglect. The author writes that ?despite the fact that work and family life has changed profoundly in recent decades, we lack anything resembling an actual child care system. Excellent day cares are available, of course, if you have the money to pay for them and the luck to secure a spot. But the overall quality is wildly uneven and barely monitored, and at the lower end, it?s Dickensian.?
Jonathan Cohn, the author, reports research that ?deemed the majority of operations to be ?fair? or ?poor? and notes that while ?day care is a bruising financial burden for many families,? ?only minimal assistance is available to offset these expenses. And so many parents put their kids in whatever they can find and whatever they can afford, hoping it will be good enough.? The article chronicles how President Richard Nixon?s presidential veto of a national child-care program back in 1970 had ended movement towards a child-care system in the U.S. ?
Does this all sound familiar? To me, it?s like looking at a mirror image of our own child-care situation. Reading Cohn?s story, I found myself substituting ?Canadian? for ?American,? and expect that others with an interest in early childhood education and child care, young children and social policy in Canada will be doing the same. ?
The article illustrates the absence of a child-care system, which for parents translates to mean that there are few (or no) options, and that securing good child care is in large part, a matter of luck. Cohn?s interview with one of the dead toddlers? mothers, a single mother trying to keep a job to earn a living for herself and her child -- and maybe even advance to a better job -- says it all about what the lack of child-care options to help her and other parents mean. This is not different than what we hear in Canada -- the stories parents tell about the lack of choices available in Canada reflect our equally dismal situation.
The story of ?Jackie?s Daycare? -- the child-care home in which the tragedy occurred -- with its lack of public oversight and unsafe, insalubrious conditions (the home child care in this case was ?registered,? with virtually no requirements and monitored not at all, or minimally, at best) reflect the kinds of perilous conditions in some unregulated (sometimes illegal) child care revealed in a CBC Marketplace story only last month. And while Canada has not experienced a child-care tragedy on the scale of this one in some time, just in the last two weeks, two child death cases in unregulated child care in Mississauga, ON and Port Coquitlam, BC have come back to the criminal courts, though they have received much less media interest in Canada than the ?Jackie?s Daycare? case did in the U.S. ?
There is also a telling parallel (though different methodology) between the U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) study that found that most of the child care it studied was ?fair? or ?poor? and the sole national Canadian study of quality, You Bet I Care! (now almost 15 years old) that reported that of the centres it studied, ?the majority provided care that was of minimal to mediocre quality.?
Demand for child care has grown as the labour force participation rate of mothers with young children has continued to rise in both countries (though more steeply and to a higher rate in Canada) while today the child development value of high quality early childhood education and care is well recognized by experts and the general public in both countries.
And ironically, the rejection of a national child-care program by the highest government official in the U.S. and in Canada -- President Richard Nixon in 1971 and Prime Minister Stephan Harper in 2006 -- is unique to the two countries. In 1971, as a very recent immigrant to Canada fresh from working on the American Head Start program, I had been following the successful progress of national legislation to begin building the first U.S. national child-care program through both houses of Congress. I was stunned when Nixon exercised the rarely-used presidential veto to override Congressional assent (his veto message spoke of the threat of ?Sovietizing? the American family and his opposition to coming down on the ?side of communal approaches to child rearing against the family-centered approach") -- just as I was stunned 35 years later when Stephen Harper unilaterally abrogated the hard-won federal-provincial bilateral agreements that were to set the stage for building Canada?s first national child-care program.
Following the end of Canada?s first effort at a national child-care program, in 2008, Canada was ranked lower than the United States (which was among the lower ranking countries studied) in a 25-country UNICEF study of early childhood education and child-care access and quality benchmarks. ?
This year, in his federal budget proposal, Barack Obama included funds to the states for preschool targeted to modest and low income families, as well as increased funds for Head Start -- not quite the comprehensive national early childhood education and care program we envision here in Canada. Still -- it?s a far cry from the contempt for ECEC that Canadians with an interest in child care have been experiencing from the Conservative federal government since 2006 and the ?we can?t afford it? from tax-cutting and books-balancing provincial political parties and governments. Indeed, based on the UNICEF study, it seems that Canada spends even less money on ECEC than does the U.S.
So Canadians who still think that most young families need, and want, the kinds of options for decent quality affordable child care and early childhood education that families in other countries enjoy need to be thinking about their political choices and preparing to join with others in exercising them. Otherwise, our child-care choices for the foreseeable future will remain limited to cross-border examination of our own unsatisfactory reflection in American mirrors.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rose on Thursday, boosted by gains in shares of materials companies, including iron ore producer Cliffs Natural Resources Inc, and by a drop in weekly jobless claims.
Cliffs jumped 20.6 percent to $21.97 after it posted earnings late on Wednesday that were much better than analysts had estimated. The S&P 500 materials index <.splrcma> was up 1.4 percent.
Telecommuncations companies also rose following gains in Verizon Communications Inc. The stock rose 2.1 percent to $52.87 after sources told Reuters it has hired advisers to prepare a possible $100 billion cash and stock bid to take full control of Verizon Wireless from joint venture partner, Vodafone Group Plc.
Companies reporting results in the past 24 hours lifted the growth forecast for S&P 500 companies quarterly earnings to 3.6 percent. At the start of the reporting period the forecast was growth of just 1.5 percent.
Investors have closely watched earnings to see if they would be enough to extend the market's uptrend that began at the start of the year, especially since recent economic data has suggested slowing growth in March and early April. Worries about global weakness have also hung over the market.
"Basic materials companies around the globe were worried about potential slowdown in China, and now it looks like those stocks have risen," Alan Lancz, president of Alan B. Lancz & Associates Inc., an investment advisory firm in Toledo, Ohio.
Thursday's U.S. data supported an upbeat view of the economy, however. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits in the latest week dropped a surprising 16,000 to a seasonally adjusted 339,000 versus expectations for 351,000.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was up 78.16 points, or 0.53 percent, at 14,754.46. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 11.02 points, or 0.70 percent, at 1,589.81. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 28.70 points, or 0.88 percent, at 3,298.35.
United Parcel Service Inc , considered an economic bellwether, advanced 2 percent to $85.14 after the world's largest package-delivery company reported a quarterly profit above analysts' estimates.
Akamai Technologies Inc surged 19.1 percent to $43 as the best performer on the S&P 500 after the Internet content delivery company posted first-quarter earnings above Wall Street estimates late on Wednesday and also forecast second-quarter results above analysts' expectations.
But Exxon Mobil Corp and 3M Co bucked the trend as their shares fell.
Exxon fell 1.1 percent to $88.48. The largest U.S. company by market capitalization said its quarterly profit edged up, helped by its chemicals business, but oil and gas production fell.
Fellow Dow component 3M Co lost 2.4 percent to $105.29 after the diversified U.S. manufacturer posted first-quarter earnings and revenue that missed Wall Street expectations and cut its 2013 profit forecast.
(This version of the story corrects paragraph 7 to remove extra word "to" before "a surprising 16,000" to read "dropped a surprising 16,000".)
I?m so excited to have Heather from Brie Brie Blooms shar?ing this super adorable stick bug kids craft today! And, even more excited to announce that she is going to be a reg?u?lar con?trib?u?tor here on Mom Endeav?ors! We?ll have a more offi?cial announce?ment later, but for today, enjoy this super cute?craft!!
My four year old daugh?ter is obsessed with bugs. ?Not the pretty but?ter?flies and lady?bugs that most lit?tle girls enjoy chas?ing in the gar?den. ?She loves every oppor?tu?nity to get up close and per?sonal with creepy crawlies. ?Her infat?u?a?tion with bugs and insects has brought great learn?ing oppor?tu?ni?ties. ?She knows there are bound?aries and doesn?t pick any?thing up with out ask?ing an adult first. ?We have had a lot of fun wel?com?ing Spring this year by spend?ing time out?side study?ing bugs and insects. ?This week we learned all about stick bugs and made a fun craft to go along with our les?son. We read a few fun facts about stick bugs before we worked on our project.?
This kids craft is sim?ple and requires just a few sup?plies that you might already have at?home.
Project sup?plies:
pipe clean?ers (light brown, dark brown, and?beige)
pop?si?cle?stick
thread
We made our stick bug tex?tured but it?s not a nec?es?sary step. ?To add the bumpy tex?ture to the stick bug you will need a cou?ple more supplies.
Sup?plies needed for texture:
1 cup Borax (found near laun?dry deter?gent in most stores)
plas?tic con?tainer (we used an empty peanut but?ter?tub)
Begin by mak?ing the stick bug?s body with the pipeclean?ers. ?Fold the light brown piece in half and then twist until you reach the end leav?ing about an inch untwisted to look like anten?nas. ?Then cut the dark brown pipecleaner into three pieces and twist around the body for legs. ?Use a small piece of the beige pipecleaner to make a bow shape then twist it around the body to add a?face.?
You have a stick bug! ?If you would like to add tex?ture to the body, stir your Borax into hot water in the plas?tic con?tainer. ?Then use a piece of string to attach the stick bug to the pop?si?cle stick. Gen?tly drop the stick bug into the Borax solu?tion but be sure to leave the head out of the liquid. ?
We let our stick bug sit in the Borax solu?tion overnight. ?Crys?tals formed and made our crea?ture look?real!
Cut the string and remove the pop?si?cle stick. ?The crys?tals are solid but the stick bug?s body and legs are still bendable.
My daugh?ter had so much fun play?ing with her bug out?side. ?She left it in our tree to meet friends.
Luck?ily she hasn?t asked for a real pet stick bug yet!
?
What kinds of bugs are your kids?into?
Heather is a preschool teacher and mommy to one sassy lit?tle girl. ?She shares fam?ily activ?i?ties, class?room ideas, snacks, and kids crafts at her blog, Brie Brie Blooms.
Apr. 6, 2013 ? As many as three quarters of advanced ovarian cancer patients appeared to respond to a new two-step immunotherapy approach -- including one patient who achieved complete remission -- according research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania that will be presented at the AACR Annual Meeting 2013 (Presentation #LB-335).
The immunotherapy has two steps -- a personalized dendritic cell vaccination and adoptive T-cell therapy. The team reports that in the study of 31 patients, vaccination therapy alone showed about a 61 percent clinical benefit, and the combination of both therapies showed about a 75 percent benefit.
The findings offer new hope for the large number of ovarian cancer patients who relapse following treatment. The first step of the immunotherapy approach is to preserve the patient's tumor cells alive, using sterile techniques at the time of surgery so they can be used to manufacture a personalized vaccine that teaches the patient's own immune system to attack the tumor. Then, the Penn Medicine team isolates immune cells called dendritic cells from patients' blood through a process called apheresis, which is similar to the process used for blood donation. Researchers then prepare each patient's personalized vaccine by exposing her dendritic cells to the tumor tissue that was collected during surgery.
Because ovarian cancer symptoms can be stealth and easily mistaken for other issues -- constipation, weight gain, bloating, or more frequent urination -- more than 60 percent of patients are diagnosed only after the disease has spread to their lymph nodes or other distant sites in the body, when treatment is much less likely to produce a cure compared to when the disease is detected early. As the fifth leading cause of cancer-related deaths among women in the United States, it takes the lives of more than 14,000 women each year.
"Given these grim outcomes, there is definitely a vast unmet need for the development of novel, alternate therapies," said lead author Lana Kandalaft, PharmD, PhD, MTR, a research assistant professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology and director of clinical development and operations in Penn Medicine's Ovarian Cancer Research Center. "This is the first time such a combination immunotherapy approach has been used for patients with ovarian cancer, and we believe the results are leading us toward a completely new way to treat this disease."
Both treatments are given in conjunction with bevacizumab, a drug that controls the blood vessel growth that feeds tumors. Combining bevacizumab with immunotherapy makes a powerful duo, Kandalaft says. The vaccine trial is still open to accrual to test new combinatorial strategies.
The other Penn authors are Janos Tanyi, Cheryl Chiang, Daniel Powell, and George Coukos. This study was funded by a National Cancer Institute Ovarian Specialized Program of Research Excellence grant, the National Institutes of Health and the Ovarian Cancer Immunotherapy Initiative.
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VATICAN CITY (AP) ? Pope Francis will spend Monday's Vatican holiday praying at the tomb of Peter, the church's first pontiff, during a visit to the excavated necropolis under St. Peter's Basilica.
A Vatican statement called the visit private, but promised to release photos and video later in the day. The basilica was built over the location where early Christians would gather in secret, at a time of persecution in ancient Rome, to pray at an unmarked tomb believed to be that of Peter, the apostle Jesus chose to lead his church.
In past years, popes often spent the day after Easter, known in Italy as "little Easter," at Castel Gandolfo, the Vatican palace in the Alban Hills, a short drive from Rome. But that oasis of sprawling gardens and strolling paths in the quaint hill town is occupied by the predecessor of Francis, Benedict XVI, who spent the last hours of his papacy there before becoming the first pope in 600 years to retire. Benedict is staying in Castel Gandolfo until a monastery at the Vatican in Rome can be readied for him.
Many Italians spend "little Easter" by having a picnic lunch in the countryside or in city parks, and Francis told Romans and tourists who gathered in St. Peter's Square on Monday at noon to see him to "have a good lunch." Francis said he was praying that Easter would inspire the faithful so that "hatred gives way to love, lies to truth," and that it would especially comfort those in "most need of trust and hope."
He spoke to them from the studio window of the apartment in the Apostolic Palace overlooking the square. Benedict and popes before him lived there, but so far Francis, who stresses simplicity, has declined to move into the quarters. Instead, he has continued to stay in a hotel on Vatican City's grounds, the same residence where as Buenos Aires archbishop he stayed with fellow cardinals to elect Benedict's successor.
They chose him, Jorge Bergoglio, the first pontiff from South America.
St. Peter's mission was to continue to preach the message of Jesus and reach more souls. Francis, as a Jesuit, is steeped in the evangelizing mission of the church, and the necropolis tour brings him back to the origins of the church in its simplest years as a community of Christians professing their faith in defiance of the crackdown by Roman emperors.
Peter himself was among the Christian martyrs during Nero's reign. He is believed to have been crucified, head down, on the Vatican hill.
Constantine, the first Christian emperor, had an early basilica built on the slopes of the Vatican Hill, burying the pagan and Christian cemetery ? necropolis means 'city of the dead' ? that surrounded Peter's burial site. The current basilica, named after St. Peter, was constructed over the earlier basilica that was deemed unsafe and demolished in the late 15th century. The Baroque master architect Bernini designed the bronze canopy over the central altar over the spot of Peter's burial site. The current basilica was planned as an awe-inspiring monument that would project the image of a powerful church.
Under popes of the last century, extensive excavations were carried out of the sprawling necropolis. In 1965, archaeologists said they had found the bones of Peter in an area near an ancient Greek inscription saying "Peter is here."
Part of a nearby necropolis came to light in 2003 during construction of a parking lot.
A few years ago, the Vatican unveiled the largest and most luxurious of the pagan tombs under St. Peter's Basilica, that of a family of former slaves. Guided tours of the necropolis, upon appointment, have been one of the most sought-after attractions for tourists to the Vatican.
Apr. 1, 2013 ? By middle age, most people have age-related declines in near vision (presbyopia) requiring bifocals or reading glasses. An emerging technique called hyperopic orthokeratology (OK) may provide a new alternative for restoring near vision without the need for glasses, according to new research.
The study, "Refractive Changes from Hyperopic Orthokeratology Monovision in Presbyopes," appears in the April issue of Optometry and Vision Science, official journal of the American Academy of Optometry. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins , a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.
For middle-aged patients with presbyopia, wearing OK contact lenses overnight can restore up-close vision in one eye, according to the study by Paul Gifford, PhD, FAAO, and Helen A Swarbrick, PhD, FAAO, of University of New South Wales, Sydney. "The authors have shown the feasibility of correcting one eye for near vision through OK, in which overnight contact lens wear shapes the cornea of one eye to allow in-focus near vision for reading," comments Anthony Adams, OD, PhD, Editor-in-Chief of Optometry and Vision Science.
Overnight OK Lens Wear Restores Near Vision in One Eye
The study included 16 middle-aged patients (43 to 59 years) with age-related loss of near vision, or presbyopia. Presbyopia is caused by age-related loss of flexibility in the cornea -- the transparent front part that lets light into the eye.
Orthokeratology is a clinical technique to correct vision using specially designed rigid contact lenses to manipulate the shape of the cornea. Dr Adams likens OK therapy to orthodontic treatment using braces to change the alignment of the teeth.
Drs Gifford and Swarbick evaluated a "monocular" technique, with patients wearing a custom-made OK lens in one eye overnight for one week. To preserve normal distance vision, the other eye was left untreated.
In all patients, the monocular OK technique was successful in restoring near vision in the treated eye. The improvement was apparent on the first day after overnight OK lens wear, and increased further during the treatment week. Eye examination confirmed that the OK lenses altered the shape of the cornea, as they were designed to do.
Nightly Lens Wear Needed to Retain Correction
Vision in the untreated eye was unaffected, and all patients retained normal distance vision with that eye; essentially this gives the patient the dequivalent of 'monovision' that is usually done with contact lenses or surgery. To retain the correction in near vision, patients had to continue wearing their OK lenses every night. Dr Adams likens this ongoing treatment to the "retainer" that orthodontic patients have to wear nightly. As expected, when patients stopped wearing their OK lens after the treatment week, presbyopia rapidly returned.
By about age 45 to 50, most people need bifocals or some other form of vision correction to restore vision for reading and other up-close tasks. Alternatives for presbyopia have been introduced, including fitting a contact lens for distance vision in one eye and a lens for near vision in the other eye. This is the so called monovision, now the authors show it can be achieved without the need to wear a contact lens during the day. "However, the chief problem with monovision for many people is that their stereoscopic 3D vision is degraded and many find that hard to tolerate," according to Dr Adams.
Although overnight OK is not a new technique, it has been mainly used to reduce nearsightedness (myopia) in younger patients. The new study shows that OK is similarly effective in changing corneal shape, and achieving desired correction in near vision, in older patients with presbyopia.
The new study suggests that overnight OK lenses are a feasible alternative for correction of presbyopia, "sufficient to provide functional near vision correction white retaining good distance visual acuity," Drs Gifford and Swarbick write. The technique is safe, with the cornea returning to its previous shape about a week after the patient stops wearing the lenses.
"This study demonstrates that OK is quite viable as a nonsurgical option for monovision that does not require wearing contact lenses during the day, although it does require 'retainer' orthokeratology contact lenses to be worn overnight," Dr Adams adds. "This possibility will certainly appeal to many people, especially since the changes in the corneal curvature of the treated eye are fully reversible."
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Journal Reference:
Paul Gifford, Helen A. Swarbrick. Refractive Changes From Hyperopic Orthokeratology Monovision in Presbyopes. Optometry and Vision Science, 2013; 90 (4): 306 DOI: 10.1097/OPX.0b013e318287328e
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With all of the options available to drivers, and the multitude of fuel efficiency claims, finding the greenest option can be difficult. But?Ford is offering prizes of $50,000 to software developers to come up with a smartphone app that helps people make sense of the barrage of information.
By Antony Ingram,?Guest blogger / March 30, 2013
A Ford logo is seen on a car during a press preview at the 2013 New York International Auto Show in New York. Ford is offerering cash prizes to app developers who can make sense of the wide array of information on fuel-efficient cars.
Mike Segar/Reuters
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Life can be confusing for those motivated into greener cars with the aim of saving money.
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With all the options available to today's buyers--more efficient gasoline, diesel, hybrids, plug-in hybrids, electric cars, biofuels and more--it's hard to know what is really best. Throw in the multitude of fuel efficiency claims, electric range and more, and, well, it gets pretty tough to understand.
That's why, says Earth Techling, Ford is offering prizes of $50,000 to software developers to come up with a smartphone app that helps people make sense of the barrage of information.
The Personalized Fuel Efficiency Apps Challenge asks software developers to design something that helps consumers better understand and improve their personal fuel efficiency. The service they provide will be highly personalized, taking into account the various factors that can see a car's fuel economy stray from official figures.
There's an element of irony in this of course, which is that Ford's recent Fusion and C-Max Hybrid models are particularly susceptible to driving style, resulting in many customers missing EPA numbers by a significant margin.
Using these as an example, one of the contest's successful apps might give consumers a better idea of how their driving style and typical use would impact upon fuel efficiency--perhaps leading to fewer disappointments.
Apps will be based on the OpenXC platform,?an open-source platform developed by Ford for research applications. A software and hardware development kit gives developers access to a wide range of vehicle data. By using both real-time data from the car, and historical data, an app could offer a truly tailored service.
Interested parties can register with Ford via the contest's website, and submissions for apps open on April 24.
The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of the best auto bloggers out there. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs. To contact us about a blogger,?click here.?To add or view a comment on a guest blog, please go to the blogger's own site by clicking on the link in the blog description box above.
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Public release date: 25-Apr-2013
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