E-hail app to order yellow cabs in NYC blocked by judge

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A pilot program that would allow people in New York City to hail yellow cabs using a smartphone app was blocked by a judge on Thursday, handing a victory to private car companies that have said the program threatens their business.

Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Carol Huff granted a request from the livery companies to freeze the new "e-hail" program that had been scheduled to begin as early as Friday.

The order will be in effect until at least March 18, when the two sides are due to return to court to argue the merits of a lawsuit brought by the livery companies against the city.

The pilot program would allow people to use a phone application to request a yellow cab ride. Taxi drivers would be able to receive such requests and confirm pickup locations.

Private car companies rely on prearranged pickups. Under New York's two-prong cab system, yellow cabs handle street hails but cannot accept phone pickups; livery cars do the opposite.

The program would be an option for New Yorkers accustomed to standing in the street and flagging down the city's approximately 13,000 yellow cabs. E-hail apps like Uber and Hailo have become popular in other cities.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Cynthia Johnston)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/e-hail-app-order-yellow-cabs-nyc-blocked-001653971.html

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PERSPECTIVE: Technology at root of disappointing job prospects ...

By Jordan Buie
Guest Writer

When I started attending Union University in 2006, Movie Gallery was the second largest movie rental company in the United States and Canada. By the end of April 2010, Movie Gallery had filed for bankruptcy.

One thing seemed certain: The quick disappearance of a company at the top of its market seemed less to do with the Great Recession ? which was well under way ? and more a result of companies? reaction to the recession and the tool with which they had chosen to combat it.

That tool was technology.

Technology?s defeat of human employment seemed to be growing terabyte by terabyte, as the lone attendants in grocery stores man self-check-out stations, once the job of workers now laid off because of machinery.

Noticing these changes, I wrote an editorial for the ?Cardinal & Cream? as a student at Union in April 2010 about technology taking over jobs. I think the former newspaper adviser chuckled, but the piece ran in the paper.

Fast forward three years.

In January, the Associated Press wire service ran a three-part series about why jobs are not coming back after the Recession.

The headline on the first piece read: ?AP IMPACT: Recession, tech kill middle-class jobs.?

Right there it was, the idea from my college perspective piece reported three years later, not as mere conjecture but the consensus of many economic experts.

In the first story, reported on Jan. 23 by Bernard Condon and Paul Wiseman, the writing almost restates my original thesis.

?Increasingly, jobs are disappearing in the service sector, home to two-thirds of all workers,? the story reported. ?They are being obliterated by technology. Year after year, the software that runs computers and an array of other machines and devices becomes more sophisticated and powerful and capable of doing more efficiently tasks that humans have always done.?

The point the article raises is that when times were hardest during the Great Recession, companies started using computers not only to replace the jobs of blue collar workers but also those of accountants, secretaries and other white-collar, degree-requiring jobs that previously were assumed to be safe careers.

The article reports that of 3.5 million jobs lost during the Recession that paid employees between $38,000 and $68,000 a year, only 2 percent returned.

The series continued with a second article, titled ?Practically human: Can smart machines do your job?? and the third, ?Will smart machines create a world without work??

Those articles bring up self-driving cars, a robotic library that finds any book and technology that makes electric company meter readers irrelevant.

The case these articles make is that the jobs most at stake are ones that are repetitive and require less creativity and critical thinking.

The article states people will still need to manage machines. But these jobs require extensive training.

In my 2010 piece, I cited Kurt Vonnegut?s 1952 novel ?Player Piano.?

?In Vonnegut?s world, capitalism?s drive for an industry driven by automated assemblies led to an overall decline in the quality of life,? I wrote. ?As automated industry eliminated the need for human laborers, the lower class was left at the mercy of the upper class in hopes that they might receive some of the few available managerial positions. However, most of the jobs available required intensely-specialized, doctorate-level degrees.?

I like to think that as a writer, I have job security against a machine. But the second article said a company in Durham, N. C., is using computers to produce automated sports stories, so maybe no job is safe.

But one thing seems certain. People who live their lives awake and sincere, as creators and innovators and people who make a difference in the lives of others, these people are much harder to replace.

Perhaps the answer for not being replaced by a machine is to not live like one.

Jordan Buie, class of 2010, is a writer for The Jackson Sun and has started a website to cover the technological revolution at www.thedailyfuture.com. You can reach Jordan at jbuie@thedailyfuture.com.

Source: http://www.cardinalandcream.info/2013/03/07/perspective-technology-at-root-of-disappointing-job-prospects/

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Food Stamps for Pets | WNEP.com ? Northeastern and Central ...

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Source: http://wnep.com/2013/03/07/food-stamps-for-pets/

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Sharp may seek fresh equity financing after Samsung deal: sources

TOKYO (Reuters) - Sharp Corp may sell new shares to help it repay a $2.1 billion convertible bond due in September, after a deal with Samsung Electronics Co raised $111 million in return for a 3 percent stake in the Japanese company, three sources familiar with the matter said.

"With Samsung, the tie-ups in panels are over. I doubt there will be any more," an executive at Sharp told Reuters on condition that he not be identified, due to the sensitivity of the matter.

The Samsung deal followed an agreement in December for Qualcomm Inc to invest as much as $120 million.

The potential sale of overseas TV assembly plants in Mexico and China could add more to Sharp's available cash but talks for Taiwan's Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd to buy a stake in the company have stalled with a March 26 deadline fast approaching.

Sharp, which in November said it may not be able to survive on its own, is in talks to offload its Chinese TV assembly plant to Lenovo Group Ltd and to sell its Mexico factory to Hon Hai, according to sources familiar with the discussions.

"Without investment from Hon Hai, Sharp will need to raise at least 50 billion yen ($535 million) from the sale of overseas factories and other assets to pay off the bond in September," said Deutsche Securities analyst Yasuo Nakane. The rest of the money would come from cashflow and fresh financing, he added.

The banks that bailed out Sharp in September with $3.9 billion in emergency loans, including Mizuho Financial Group Inc and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc , are not including a Hon Hai investment in a business plan they are hammering out for Japan's leading LCD panel maker, sources told Reuters last month.

The next step for Sharp is equity financing, an executive at one of the banks and a separate source at Sharp told Reuters. Fresh equity financing could total around $1 billion, according to analysts.

Sharp's shareholder equity ratio at the end of 2012 was 9.6 percent, less than half the 20 percent usually considered the minimum for financial health.

To secure its bailout last year, Sharp pledged to cut jobs and sell assets while mortgaging nearly all of its factories and offices in Japan, leaving it with only overseas assets that could be sold to improve its finances.

A junk rating from credit agencies has made raising money in the credit markets expensive for Sharp. Standard & Poor's rates Sharp's debt as B+, a highly speculative grade, while Fitch Ratings has Sharp at B-. Moody's Investors Service withdrew its rating on Sharp in April.

($1 = 93.5200 Japanese yen)

(Additional reporting by Taiga Uranaka and Yoshiyuki Osada; Writing by Tim Kelly; Editing by Edmund Klamann)

(This story was refiled to correct the headline, first and eighth grafs to state that Sharp is likely to seek fresh equity financing, not bank loans)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/sharp-may-seek-fresh-equity-financing-samsung-deal-031100494--finance.html

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House passes funding bill, Obama reaches out to Senate

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Legislation easily passed the House of Representatives on Wednesday to avert another partisan budget battle and a possible government shutdown, and a dinner meeting between President Barack Obama and Senate Republicans offered signs of a thaw in relations.

By a vote of 267-151, the House passed a measure to fund government programs until the end of the fiscal year on September 30. The Democratic-controlled Senate is expected to pass a similar bill next week.

Without such legislation, federal agencies would run out of money on March 27.

The bill to continue funding the government without last-minute drama occurred as Obama took the unusual step of inviting Republican senators to a dinner on Wednesday night at a Washington hotel a few blocks from the White House that lasted about an hour and a half.

Attendees emerged optimistic about the prospects for the elusive big deal to put the nation's finances on a more sustainable track in a way that satisfies both Democrats and Republicans.

"It was a really good conversation," Republican Senator John Hoeven said.

"It was candid," he told Reuters in an interview. "We really talked about how do we get to a big agreement in terms of the debt and deficit."

An administration official told Reuters before the dinner that Obama had been hoping to take advantage of a lull in a series of budget crises to launch a dialogue with Republican lawmakers with the goal of reaching a broad deficit reduction deal.

While the meal was not intended to be a negotiation, it was an opportunity for Obama to make clear he is willing to consider some difficult spending cuts that are unpopular with his fellow Democrats in Congress, the official said.

Those could include cuts to programs that include the Social Security pension system and Medicare for the elderly.

Obama is due to discuss his other legislative priorities, including immigration reform, gun control and tackling climate change, at meetings with members of both political parties on Capitol Hill next week.

The dinner may have been a chance to reverse some of the angry partisan rhetoric that has stood in the way of compromise in recent weeks.

"The president greatly enjoyed the dinner and had a good exchange of ideas with the senators," a senior administration official told reporters.

Asked how the soiree had gone, Senator John McCain told journalists outside the hotel, "Just great. Fantastic."

Attendees included Senators Lindsey Graham, Bob Corker, and Kelly Ayotte and nine others. Graham drew up the guest list, the White House said.

The meetings between the president and lawmakers, whether or not they produce results, depart from what has been an at best a stand-offish relationship between Obama and Republicans in Congress.

They suggest that Obama and Republicans are getting the message that public patience with Washington is wearing thin. This has become apparent as Americans read of inconveniences they may soon confront at airports and elsewhere as a result of across-the-board cuts to the federal budget that kicked in on Friday after lawmakers and the White House failed to agree on an alternative.

"This is the first indication in really a long time that the president is willing to exert leadership and bring people together and that's exactly what needs to be done," said Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine, who has spoken by phone in recent days with Obama.

REPUBLICAN DOUBTERS

At the heart of the bitter U.S. budget dispute are deep differences over how to rein in growth of the $16.7 trillion federal debt. Obama wants to narrow the fiscal gap with spending cuts and tax hikes. Republicans do not want to concede again on taxes after doing so in negotiations over the "fiscal cliff" at the New Year.

Despite the scheduled dinners and meetings and the vote on funding the government, few expect those differences to be resolved any time soon.

Some Republicans remain skeptical of Obama's overtures. "This president has been exceptional in his lack of consultation and outreach to Congress," said John Cornyn of Texas, the second-ranking Senate Republican.

Cornyn, like Collins, was not invited to dinner with Obama, but he warned that talk of tax increases would be unwelcome. "I don't know if the purpose of the meeting is social or if he has an agenda. But if it is about raising taxes, we're done."

While Republicans have taken most of the beating in surveys in connection with the so-called sequestration, a Reuters/Ipsos online poll released on Wednesday showed 43 percent of people approve of Obama's handling of his job, down 7 percentage points from February 19.

Confounding the White House's efforts to blame Republicans for the spending cuts, most respondents in the online survey hold both Democrats and Republicans responsible.

As recently as last month, Republicans were threatening to use the bill to fund the government, called a "continuing resolution," to extract spending cuts from the White House.

Instead, the bill they fashioned, which passed on Wednesday, embraced the $85 billion in automatic spending cuts that were triggered last Friday, while providing some additional spending flexibility to the military and other security operations.

Republican Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma said his party would like to shift the cuts to other areas of the budget, noting that there are 20,000 military employees in his Oklahoma district.

"We'll sit down and renegotiate where they should come from," Cole said in the debate on the House floor. "We think we've got some great ideas, but they (the cuts) are going to occur. They're the first and appropriate step for getting our fiscal house back in order."

Many Democrats in the Republican-controlled House voted against the funding bill because it would not give the Obama administration flexibility in carrying out the new, automatic spending cuts for domestic programs such as education. Last month, Democrats had sought to replace about half of the automatic cuts with tax increases on the rich.

"This bill falls short in a number of areas, but most of all because it does nothing to prevent the loss of 750,000 jobs that will result because of the sequester," said Representative Chris Van Hollen, the senior Democrat on the House Budget Committee.

(Additional reporting by Mark Felsenthal, Susan Heavey, Thomas Ferraro and Rachelle Younglai.; Editing by Fred Barbash, David Brunnstrom and Eric Walsh)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/house-passes-funding-bill-obama-reaches-senate-011236847--business.html

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U.S. sees no ?unusual threat? to Americans after Chavez dies

Supporters of Venezuela's late President Hugo Chavez stretch out a national flag as they gather to see his coffin??

Six months after the deadly attack in Benghazi, Libya, U.S. officials said on Wednesday that they remain ?very vigilant? for possible violence against Americans and American personnel in Venezuela after Hugo Chavez?s death, but see no ?unusual threat.?

?Cooperation with the Venezuelan security services has been excellent, and we have no reason to think there is any unusual threat? to U.S. citizens or personnel, a senior Obama administration official told reporters on a conference call.

The official, who spoke to reporters on condition that she not be named, predicted that an official American delegation would attend Chavez's funeral, set for Friday. But the State Department is also considering the tit-for-tat expulsion of Venezuelan officials from U.S. soil after Caracas kicked out two American military attach?s on Tuesday. "We?re not ruling anything out at this point," she said.

Shortly after Chavez?s death became public on Tuesday, the U.S. Embassy in Caracas issued a warning to U.S. citizens to be cautious, avoid political gatherings or demonstrations, and keep emergency supplies including flashlights, cash, medicine and a cellphone on hand. And the embassy announced it would be closed through Friday.

The official said authorities in Washington and Caracas ?remain very vigilant? after Venezuelan Vice President Nicolas Maduro delivered a ?broadside? against the U.S. on Tuesday.

[Slideshow: Venezuelans mourn fiery leader]

The embassy?s ?warden message? is the kind of warning the State Department delivers ?pretty regularly when we think there are reasons for Americans to be cautious,? but ?everything seems to be going very well for now,? the official said.

?Venezuela is one of the most violent countries in the world,? another State Department official said on the conference call, pointing to the country?s high murder rate. ?It?s inherently a violent place.?

The comments came after Republican Sen. Marco Rubio urged the Obama administration and other democratic governments in the Americas to "keep a watchful eye on the security situation."

Neither official mentioned Benghazi, where, on Sept. 11, 2012, terrorists struck an American compound and killed four U.S. citizens, including Ambassador Chris Stevens. But State Department officials have repeatedly said that that strike led to a comprehensive review of security mechanisms at U.S. missions worldwide.

A day after President Barack Obama expressed hope that Chavez?s death would open a ?new chapter? in relations but did not express condolences, the first official said the U.S. had expressed ?our sympathy to his family and to the Venezuelan people.?

?The way I was raised, when someone dies, you always express condolences, so we?ve done that,? she said.

Will the U.S. be represented as Venezuela formally mourns Chavez on Friday? ?I do expect that there will be a delegation,? the official said. But an announcement will come from the White House so, she added, ?stay tuned.?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/u-sees-no-unusual-threat-americans-chavez-dies-185123354--politics.html

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Venezuela's baseball team mourns death of Chavez

JUPITER, Fla. -- Venezuela's baseball team was taking pregame batting practice when players heard that president Hugo Chavez had died.

"He was a baseball man," manager Luis Sojo said after a 6-5 loss to the Miami Marlins in a warmup game for the World Baseball Classic. "At the World Baseball Classic in 2006 and 2009, the first call in the morning was his. And after the game, he used to call me, too. It's a very sad moment for our country. We wish the best to his family, we know they are going through a tough time right now."

Chavez died Tuesday at age 58 after a nearly two-year fight against cancer.

"It's sad what's happening to our country," first baseman Miguel Cabrera said. "We send our condolences to his family. This is something you don't wish on anybody.

"I don't know how his family is right now. He's no longer with us - it's very sad. I cannot comment a lot on it because I feel a lot of pain, and I'm not there in Venezuela."

Pitcher Carlos Zambrano said he hoped his fellow Venezuelans would come together.

"I'm very sad. I ask that the Venezuela people stay calm," Zambrano said. "We have to understand that the president had a family. He's a human being and it's sad. We send him the condolences to the Chavez family. We know it's a difficult moment. This caught us by surprise."

Some players did not want to discuss Chavez's death. Pitcher Anibal Sanchez and third baseman Pablo Sandoval both declined when asked to comment.

A Venezuela spokesman said the team had requested a pre-game moment of silence for Chavez and asked that flags be flown at half-staff, but was told all parties involved - the Marlins, Major League Baseball and Roger Dean Stadium - were not prepared to do so.

"There are things we can't control," Zambrano said. "For the respect of Venezuela, they have to do something before the first game against the Dominican Republic (at the WBC in Puerto Rico)."

Source: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/05/3269382/venezuelas-baseball-team-mourns.html

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Online ivory trade threatens Africa's elephants

In this April 17, 2011 photo released by Project for the Application of Law for Fauna on Tuesday, March 5, 2013, seized tusks including some from elephant babies are displayed in Pokola, Congo. Conservationists said Tuesday, March 5, 2013 there's a new threat to the survival of Africa's elephants that may be just as deadly as poachers' bullets: the black-market trade of ivory in cyberspace. (AP Photo/Project for the Application of Law for Fauna, Naftali Honig) EDITORIAL USE ONLY

In this April 17, 2011 photo released by Project for the Application of Law for Fauna on Tuesday, March 5, 2013, seized tusks including some from elephant babies are displayed in Pokola, Congo. Conservationists said Tuesday, March 5, 2013 there's a new threat to the survival of Africa's elephants that may be just as deadly as poachers' bullets: the black-market trade of ivory in cyberspace. (AP Photo/Project for the Application of Law for Fauna, Naftali Honig) EDITORIAL USE ONLY

In this May 22, 2012 photo released by Project for the Application of Law for Fauna on Tuesday, March 5, 2013, seized ivory from Conakry, Guinea, where there are few remaining elephants. Conservationists said Tuesday, March 5, 2013 there's a new threat to the survival of Africa's elephants that may be just as deadly as poachers' bullets: the black-market trade of ivory in cyberspace. (AP Photo/Project for the Application of Law for Fauna, Naftali Honig) EDITORIAL USE ONLY

FILE - In this June 7, 2003 file photo, cylinders, or Hanko, of wood, ivory and other material are shown at a Japanese signature seal shop in Tokyo. Hanko are used for everything from renting a house to opening a bank account. The stamps are legal and typically inlaid with ivory lettering. A conservation group claims that Google has something in common with illicit ivory traders in China and Thailand: It says the Internet search giant is helping fuel a dramatic surge in ivory demand in Asia that is killing African elephants at record levels. The Environmental Investigation Agency, a conservation advocacy group, said in a statement Tuesday, March 5, 2013, that there are some 10,000 ads on Google Japan's shopping site that promote the sale of ivory. (AP Photo/Shuji Kajiyama, File)

FILE - In this Jan. 4, 2013, ivory tusks are displayed after being confiscated by Hong Kong Customs in Hong Kong. A conservation group claims that Google has something in common with illicit ivory traders in China and Thailand: It says the Internet search giant is helping fuel a dramatic surge in ivory demand in Asia that is killing African elephants at record levels. The Environmental Investigation Agency, a conservation advocacy group, said in a statement Tuesday, March 5, 2013, that there are some 10,000 ads on Google Japan's shopping site that promote the sale of ivory. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung, File)

BANGKOK (AP) ? Conservationists say there's a new threat to the survival of Africa's endangered elephants that may be just as deadly as poachers' bullets: the black-market trade of ivory in cyberspace.

Illegal tusks are being bought and sold on countless Internet forums and shopping websites worldwide with increasing frequency, including Internet giant Google, according to activists. And wildlife groups attending the 178-nation Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species in Bangkok this week are calling on global law enforcement agencies to do something about it.

The elephant slaughter, which has reached crisis proportions unheard of in two decades, is largely being driven by skyrocketing demand in Asia, where tusks are often carved into tourist trinkets and ornaments.

"The Internet is anonymous, it's open 24 hours a day for business, and selling illegal ivory online is a low-risk, high-profit activity for criminals," Tania McCrea-Steele of the International Fund for Animal Welfare told The Associated Press on Tuesday from London.

In one investigation last year, IFAW found 17,847 ivory products listed on 13 websites in China. The country, which conservationists call the world's leading destination for "blood ivory" exported out of Africa by smuggling gangs and heavily armed rebel militias, is not alone.

IFAW says illegal ivory trading online is an issue within the U.S., including on eBay, and it is rife on some websites in Europe, particularly nations with colonial links to Africa.

It is often advertised with code words like "ox-bone," ''white gold," ''unburnable bone," or "cold to the touch," and shipped through the mail.

Another conservation advocacy group, the Environmental Investigation Agency, said Tuesday that Google Japan's shopping site now has 10,000 ads promoting the sale of ivory.

About 80 percent of the ads are for "hanko," small wooden stamps inlaid with ivory lettering that are widely used in Japan to affix signature seals to official documents; the rest are carvings and other small objects.

The EIA said hanko sales are a "major demand driver for elephant ivory."

"While elephants are being mass slaughtered across Africa to produce ivory trinkets, it is shocking to discover that Google, with the massive resources it has at its disposal, is failing to enforce its own policies designed to help protect endangered elephants," said Allan Thorton, EIA's U.S.-based president.

Google said in an emailed response to The Associated Press that "ads for products obtained from endangered or threatened species are not allowed on Google. As soon as we detect ads that violate our advertising policies, we remove them."

The EIA said it had written a letter to Google CEO Larry Page on Feb. 22 urging the company to remove the ads because they violate Google's own policies. It said Google had not responded to the letter or taken down the advertisements.

About 70 years ago, up to 5 million elephants were believed to have roamed the African continent. Today, just several hundred thousand are left.

As Asian economies have grown, so has their demand for ivory. Over the last 12 months, an estimated 32,000 elephants were killed in Africa, according to the Born Free Foundation, which says black-market ivory sells for as much as $1,300 per pound, a huge multi-billion dollar business.

CITES banned the international ivory trade in 1989, but the move did not address domestic markets. Since then, Japan and China have imported legal ivory stocks from Africa in at least three controlled sales.

McCrea-Steele said IFAW has advised Google on illicit trading, as well as China's Alibaba Group, which runs the popular e-commerce platform Taobao. She said both were "very responsive" and had taken action to stamp out illicit activities.

IFAW has also worked with eBay, which it once called "one of the main channels through which trafficking in wildlife and wildlife products are conducted online." The company imposed its own voluntary ban in 2007 after IFAW helped persuade them that ivory was indeed being trafficked with the help of their site.

"They've cleaned up, that's sure," said Adrian Hiel, an IFAW official attending the CITES conference in the Thai capital. "But there are so many ads that come out every day, you have to be vigilant, you have to keep checking."

Even now, concerned Internet shoppers still allege ivory is being sold on eBay. One called attention to a carving of a rural Asian village scene selling for $1,000 that is labeled as "Fine Chinese Ox Bone." The item is advertised by a seller in Los Angeles with the note, "Ships to: Worldwide."

Hiel said it was always possible to make an educated guess based on where the object is being sold and how much it goes for. But "unless you buy it and examine it, it's hard to tell for sure what's legal and what's not."

"Our argument is that the onus should be on the seller to prove the legality of what they're selling," Hiel said. "Because law enforcement can't go around ordering stuff of eBay just to test the legality of it."

Dan Ashe, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said that when elephant poaching last reached crisis levels several decades ago, web-based trafficking was not something anybody had to consider.

Now, "Internet-based crime is an important aspect of control," he said. "It makes it much more difficult, but we have to deal with it."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/495d344a0d10421e9baa8ee77029cfbd/Article_2013-03-05-Elephant%20Ivory-Cyberspace/id-6c734db2e94c4f7bb6a02c1347d3cbf6

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MSI's mid-range S30 laptop is coming to Europe for 699 euro, we go hands-on (video)

When we first heard MSI was showing off a device at CeBIT called the S30, we assumed it was the successor to the S20, the company's first Windows 8 Ultrabook. Alas, though, it's not quite an Ultrabook, and it's certainly not as well-specced a system as the S20. What we have instead is a 13-inch thin-and-light, one that's headed to Europe for €699 and up. To start with a quick rundown of the specs, it comes either a Core i3 or i5 processor, along with 4GB of RAM and a variety of storage options, with the best one being a 500GB / 64GB SSD combo.

Oddly, that 1,366 x 768 display doesn't support touch -- a surprise given the price, and given that other machines in its class do include that feature. At least the touchpad seems to do a capable job of handling all the various Windows 8 gestures. Finishing up our tour, that 23mm-thick chassis (a bit too thick by Ultrabook standards) is wide enough to accommodate an Ethernet jack, along with HDMI-out and a VGA socket. Only one USB 3.0 port (plus one 2.0 connection) seems a bit stingy, though. In any case, enjoy our hands-on video, and maybe even stay tuned for a closer look at that S20 Slider.

Gallery: MSI S30 hands-on

Filed under: Laptops

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/06/msi-s30-hands-on/

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Lawmakers seek pardon for boxing champ

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Lawmakers seeking a presidential pardon for Jack Johnson, the world's first black heavyweight boxing champion imprisoned a century ago for his romantic relationships with white women, are renewing their efforts.

Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and John McCain joined Reps. Peter King, R-N.Y., and William "Mo" Cowan, D-Mass., on Tuesday in reintroducing a resolution urging President Barack Obama to pardon Johnson because he was wronged by a racially motivated conviction.

A similar resolution passed both houses of Congress in 2009, but Obama did not act on it. The Justice Department has told the bill's backers its general policy is not to process posthumous pardon requests.

Johnson was convicted of violating the Mann Act, which made it illegal to transport women across state lines for immoral purposes.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/apdefault/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-03-05-US-Congress-Boxing-Pardon/id-12803ec69e904951ba0f9e0b270a4154

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Fiscal fictions: the growth myth | Blog | Public Finance International

A number of governments have been putting their faith in ?expansionary fiscal consolidation? to grow their way out of recession. If this sounds like a contradiction in terms, it?s probably because it is?

The 2007-09 financial crisis left advanced economies with average levels of debt that, for the first time since the aftermath of the second world war, breached 100 percent GDP levels. In response, most governments have sought to place their fiscal policies on a sustainable path by adopting fiscal consolidation programmes.

Textbook analyses of government spending cuts and tax increases suggest that such efforts to reduce government debt will inevitably depress the economy. But there is an, admittedly controversial, view that raises the tantalising prospect of an expansionary fiscal consolidation, whereby the ?economy actually expands following such policies.

Such episodes were initially discussed in the context of debt stabilisation efforts in the 1980s in Denmark and Ireland. But there have since been claims that they can be found in many other countries, in other time periods. This possibility of an expansionary consolidation has been seized upon by some politicians; for ?example, the British chancellor George Osborne, who argued in his emergency Budget of May 2010 that it would ?stimulate economic growth and confidence?.

The argument in support of such an apparently paradoxical result is based on the idea that undertaking a fiscal consolidation leads to households and firms feeling better about their future economic prospects. This then spurs current investment and consumption decisions which more than offset the negative consequences of the fiscal tightening.

In recent research that I have conducted with Eric Leeper and Huixin Bi, we have taken this thesis at face value and attempted to assess whether or not such effects could plausibly generate an expansionary fiscal consolidation in typical developed economies, particularly those in the eurozone.

Our analysis shows that a very particular set of conditions must be in place to generate an expansionary fiscal consolidation. If any one of these conditions is not fulfilled, then a consolidation will not expand the economy in the short run.

The first condition is that as debt levels rise, people must come to expect that a fiscal consolidation is imminent. The second requires that consumers and firms anticipate that the fiscal consolidation will be based on higher taxes rather than lower government spending, but the adopted policy surprises people and turns out to rely more on spending cuts than tax increases.

Finally, the third condition requires that the central bank?supports the fiscal consolidation by relaxing monetary policy.

While the first condition seems reasonable ? we all realise that we live in an age of austerity -? the remaining conditions are not. Historically, fiscal consolidations were often based on tax increases. The data shows that they were likely to contain episodes where governments unexpectedly cut spending rather than raised taxes.

In contrast, an International Monetary Fund report on current fiscal consolidation efforts in eight economies (including those of Ireland, Greece, Portugal and Spain) shows that these are all predominantly based on spending cuts rather than tax increases, which is also the case in the UK.

The IMF and other organisations have also been advising countries to base their debt reduction strategies on spending cuts before tax increases -? advice that politicians who are increasingly reluctant to raise taxes have not resisted.

Given the political environment, it seems unlikely that people will erroneously expect policy makers to return to debt reduction strategies based more on tax increases than spending cuts.?And even if consumers and firms did systematically misjudge the likely form the consolidation would take, the third condition is also unlikely to be met.

Economies in the eurozone no longer have control over their national monetary policy. Even those economies, such as the UK, that retain control over interest rates, are currently stuck (internal Bank of England debates notwithstanding) at the zero lower bound.

Central banks generally cannot simply cut interest rates in support of fiscal consolidation efforts. And even if they could, countries like the UK are seeing inflation staying stubbornly above the official inflation target (partly in response to the inflationary consequences of changes in tax policy), making it unlikely that central banks will ease further.

So, conditions are not ripe for a fiscal consolidation to expand economic activity in any of the developed economies. But there is also an additional message about policy.
Even if it were possible to engineer the conditions that would deliver an expansionary fiscal consolidation, this is unlikely to be a good thing.

An expansionary fiscal consolidation relies on depressing the economy by leading households and firms to believe that ?one debt reduction strategy will be followed, only to induce a boom by implementing a different, less costly, policy. It works by fooling people, which is rarely desirable. In short, debt reduction is, inevitably, a long and painful process.

Campbell Leith is professor of macroeconomics at the University of Glasgow. Along with Huixin Bi and Eric Leeper, he is an author of? Uncertain fiscal consolidations, published in the Economic Journal, February 2013

Source: http://opinion.publicfinanceinternational.org/2013/03/fiscal-fictions-the-growth-myth/

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Apple's education-only 21.5-inch iMac gets bump in specs, now sells for $1,099

We've already seen Cupertino's 21.5-inch iMac up for sale on the company's refurb store, and now it looks like the smaller model of the new all-in-ones is ready to be taken at a cost tailored for educational institutions. Unlike with previous education-only deals, however, Apple's pricing its newly redesigned iMac starting at $1,099 instead of $999 -- and that includes Intel's 3.3GHz, dual-core i3 CPU alongside HD Graphics 4000, a 500GB hard drive and 4GB of RAM. While the aforementioned specs are different than the ones found in the pricier entry-level variant for every-day consumers, it's worth mentioning Apple does offer the ability to upgrade some of the iMac's internals, such as memory and built-in storage. Those with the proper credentials can start ordering now from Apple, with, as MacRumors points out, orders being expected to ship within 5-7 business days.

Filed under: Desktops, Apple

Comments

Via: MacRumors

Source: Apple

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/05/apple-education-only-new-imac/

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Chavez's breathing problems have worsened

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's breathing problems have worsened and he is suffering from a "severe" new respiratory infection as he struggles to recover from cancer surgery, the government said in a somber update on Monday.

The 58-year-old socialist leader has not been seen in public nor heard from in almost three months since undergoing surgery in Cuba. It was his fourth operation since the disease was detected in mid-2011.

"Today there is a worsening of his respiratory function. Related to his depressed immune system, there is now a new, severe infection," Information Minister Ernesto Villegas said, reading the latest brief, official statement on his condition.

Chavez made a surprise homecoming two weeks ago with none of the fanfare and celebration that accompanied previous returns from treatment in Havana.

The government said Chavez was fighting for his life behind armed guards at a Caracas military hospital.

"The president has been receiving high-impact chemotherapy, along with other complementary treatments ... his general condition continues to be very delicate," Villegas said.

Chavez suffered multiple complications after the December 11 surgery, including unexpected bleeding and an earlier severe respiratory infection that officials said had been controlled.

The government said he had trouble speaking because he was breathing through a tracheal tube, but that he was giving orders to ministers by writing them down.

"The commander-president remains clinging to Christ and to life, conscious of the difficulties that he is facing, and complying strictly with the program designed by his medical team," Villegas said.

Chavez had previously undergone grueling rounds of chemotherapy and radiation treatment, which at times left him bald and bloated. He twice wrongly declared himself cured.

The only sight of the former soldier since his latest operation were four photos published by the government while he was still in Havana, showing him lying in a hospital bed.

CHAVEZ'S HOMECOMING

Vice President Nicolas Maduro - Chavez's preferred successor - said on Friday the president had decided for himself in mid-February that he would return to Venezuela from Cuba.

Chavez was going to begin a "tougher and more intense" phase of his treatment, Maduro said, and he wanted to be in Caracas.

Maduro said that included chemotherapy - prompting some in the opposition to question whether chemotherapy can be successfully given to patients in such a delicate state.

The government is furious at rumors in recent days that Chavez might have died, blaming them on an opposition plot by "far-right fascists" to destabilize the OPEC nation, which boasts the world's biggest oil reserves.

In his broadcast from the military hospital, Villegas warned people to stay on alert against a "psychological war" being prepared abroad and used by the local opposition.

Opposition leaders have accused Maduro of repeatedly lying about the president's real condition. Several dozen anti-government student protesters have chained themselves up in public to demand proof that Chavez is alive and in Venezuela.

Should the Venezuelan leader step down or die, an election would be held within 30 days and would probably pit Maduro against opposition leader Henrique Capriles, who lost to Chavez in a presidential election in October.

The stakes are also high for the rest of Latin America. Chavez has been the most vocal critic of Washington in the region and has funded hefty aid programs for leftist governments from Bolivia to Cuba.

(Additional reporting by Patricia Velez; Editing by Kieran Murray and Christopher Wilson)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/venezuela-says-chavezs-breathing-problems-worsened-024327679.html

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ASUS Transformer Pad TF300 first non-Nexus to get Android 4.2; roll out begins today in the US

ASUS has announced that they will begin pushing the Android 4.2 over-the-air update to the Transformer Pad TF300 for folks in the US today. Other regions will follow during the month of March. This makes ASUS, and the TF300, the first non-Nexus tablets to see the 4.2 update, which includes the long awaited multiple user support. In addition to the version bump to 4.2, ASUS says the update will also bring enhanced performance and stability. To go along with the OTA, ASUS will also offer updates for their App Locker, Virtual Keyboard, Lock Screen and Setup Wizard applications. 

Also mentioned in the press release are the Transformer Pad Infinity, The MeMo Pad Smart 10-inch, and the MeMo pad, which are slated to receive the 4.2 update during the second quarter of 2013. Notably absent is any mention of 4.2 for the Transformer Prime.

The TF300 was a popular -- and very capable -- tablet for ASUS last year. With the new features in Android 4.2 it should offer a great experience for owners throughout 2013. Jump past the break to see the full press release.

Discuss in the TF300 forums

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/z8SiaNevmos/story01.htm

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Allan Calhamer, creator of game 'Diplomacy,' dies

CHICAGO (AP) ? As a kid rooting around in the attic of his boyhood home, Allan Calhamer stumbled across an old book of maps and became entranced by faraway places that no longer existed, such as the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires.

That discovery and a brewing fascination with world politics and international affairs were the genesis of "Diplomacy," the board game he would create years later as a history student at Harvard University in the 1950s. After its commercial release in 1959, the game earned a loyal legion of fans in the U.S. and elsewhere that reportedly included President John F. Kennedy, Henry Kissinger and Walter Cronkite, among others.

Calhamer died Monday at a hospital in the western Chicago suburbs where he grew up, his daughter Selenne Calhamer-Boling said. He was 81.

"He was brilliant and iconoclastic and designed this game that's played around the world, and he's adored by nerds throughout the world," his daughter said by phone Saturday. "But at the end of the day he was a great dad. He was at all the T-ball games and all the screechy, horrible orchestra concerts and all the klutzy ballet recitals. I guess that's how I'll remember him."

Calhamer tested early versions of the game out on Harvard classmates before perfecting it. After its commercial release, Avalon Hill bought the rights and helped make it an international hit. The game is still for sale, and was re-released in 1999 with a colorful new map and metal pieces.

Players represent seven European powers at the beginning of the 20th century and vie for dominance by strategically forging and breaking alliances. Unlike "Risk," there are no dice, and a player's success is largely based on his or her negotiating skills.

Inspiration for the game was also supplied by a Harvard professor who taught a class in 19th-century Europe and wrote a book called "Origins of the World War."

Calhamer said in a 2009 interview with Chicago magazine that reading the book recalled for him the atlas in his parents' attic.

"That brought everything together," Calhamer told the magazine. "I thought, 'What a board game that would make.'"

After graduating in 1953, Calhamer followed a fanciful path, living for a time on Walden Pond because he was fan of Henry David Thoreau's famous work and later working as a park ranger at the Statue of Liberty.

In his late 30s, he met his wife, Hilda, in New York. At her insistence they settled in his hometown of La Grange Park, Ill. Calhamer-Boling said her father then shed his "dilettante" ways and picked up a steady job as a postman, which allowed him pursue hobbies and his art. He tried developing other games, as well, but they never caught on, she said.

Since his death, emails have been pouring in to the family from "Diplomacy" fans around the world who wanted to convey how much the game meant to them, Calhamer-Boling said.

The moving messages were not what she expected.

"I always think of it as such an intellectual game because it's so strategic," she said. "But what I'm seeing over and over again in these emails is that the recurring theme is: 'I was a really really nerdy awkward kid who had trouble relating to people, but because 'Diplomacy' required interpersonal skills and required you to get people to do what you wanted them to do that's how I built my social skills.'"

Calhamer is survived by his wife and two daughters.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-03-02-Obit-Allan%20Calhamer/id-6f204f06a18c457dac63462133bbaec9

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February 25, 2013:

RT's Oscar Picks 2013 - Results
We at Rotten Tomatoes freely admit we're not the world's greatest Oscar prognosticators. Still, we...

February 24, 2013:

2013 Academy Awards Winners
The 85th Academy Awards are scheduled to take place on Sunday, February 24th in Los Angeles, and if...

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/771307454/

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The New Essential Apps February 2013

iPhones. iPads. Android. Windows Phone. We've updated all of our essential apps lists to include a few forgotten favorites, some long awaited arrivals and, as always, even more amazing apps. Check them out! More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/1oENlgiRUNo/the-new-essential-apps-february-2013

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Holograms, 'Minority Report' Gestures And Other Ways Your ...

Editor?s note:?Jeff Cavins?is the CEO of visual collaboration company?FuzeBox. Follow him on Twitter @cavwave.

I probably won?t ruffle too many feathers when I say very few people love meetings.

As much as we?d like to think otherwise, meetings just don?t elicit the same emotions as, say, space flight. Of course, that doesn?t mean they?ll stay that way forever. In fact, looking down the road just three to five years, there are some incredible technologies that will hit the mass market and change the way we communicate with coworkers, customers and colleagues. I?d wager that within that timeframe, meetings are going to become less like Office Space and more like Star Wars.

Using new technologies like 3D spatial binaural audio, gesture interfaces, and super-high-resolution video, we will be able to build incredibly immersive (and relatively inexpensive) experiences for workers to connect more effectively. Even new technology that allows visually stunning projection of holograms will begin to find application in the meetings arena. Although this sounds like sci-fi, the idea of near-real remote communication is a Holy Grail for productivity.

We are inheriting a world full of pixels. In cities such as San Francisco, New York and London, the average 14-year old is going to school with $1,500 in technology in their backpack. And the products that they carry and use throughout the day are screens and displays that enable them to communicate visually and in real time.

Meetings are going to become less like Office Space and more like Star Wars.

Studies have long shown how audio and video cues are essential aspects of human-to-human interaction. The better and more lifelike we can make our remote meetings, the better we can work together. Expressions and gestures are critical for conveying body language; in fact, 60 percent of all communication is conveyed via body language.

None of this is as far away as it seems. We?re seeing a lot of this technology in niche use cases today, and things are developing very quickly. The personal jet of corporate communication, a $100,000 telepresence system, can now be recreated using an app and a few UHD TVs over the Internet with a $100 Logitech camera. That would not have been possible two years ago.

That said, here?s a brief glimpse into the technology that will power a not-so-distant future.

Ultra HD Live Video Streaming

Pervasive screens and the theme of pixels everywhere are a major trend in our lives: smartphones, tablets, phablets, and hybrids. These form factors are heading in two different directions ? small and portable, and large and immersive.

Everyone is fixated on mobile solutions that sit in our pockets and move with us as we go about our lives, but the other side of this coin has yet to be tapped: the big-screen market of TVs and 30-plus-inch monitors and the way these larger screens and densely packed pixels arrays will enable large-dimension personal telepresence. These new UHD monitors, placed in our homes and businesses, could lead to a whole new set of more immersive, high-end applications for meetings.

Ultra HD-quality screens and streaming of 4K video-conferencing (which, by the way, is four times the resolution of your retina screen) can represent the ultimate meeting experience. When the quality is so good that you feel like you can touch the person on the screen, your eyes are tricked into thinking it?s real, especially when projected onto a life-sized screen. This incredible level of fidelity is available today on high-caliber telepresence systems. Unfortunately, they cost millions of dollars and requires camera hardware that is not available on the mass market, not to mention the prohibitively expensive bandwidth required to actually use them.

Luckily, software is ahead of the curve and can help close that hardware gap. In 12 months, we?ll see $100 cameras capable of capturing a 4K-quality video conference, the release of codecs like H.265 that process the live video to fit through public Internet pipes, and $5,000 Ultra HD screens playing it on the wall.

And this isn?t just for business. There?s a reason why companies, from Apple to Intel to Samsung, are pouring billions in R&D into this space. On the consumer side this is a Trojan horse into the living room.

3D Binaural Audio

Ever been on a conference call with multiple people where folks continually talk over each other? It?s a mess, and nearly impossible to resolve the voices, or better yet understand what is being said. The issue is that the voices are being pushed to you from a one-dimension mono speaker with super-low fidelity. Not only do bad audio calls make your brain hurt, they actually reduce cognitive function and introduce fatigue as you strain to make sense of the conversation. Thankfully, there?s a software-only solution: 3D spatial, binaural sound.

3D spatial binaural sound is where meeting attendees actually sound like they?re coming from different parts of the room (to the left, to the right, closer, or further away), which in turn allows the brain to unlock and understand simultaneous voices. 3D sound is also possible to implement regardless of the microphone or speaker setup. The result is something akin to magic.

Demos have been around for a while, but real-life use cases have been notoriously difficult to implement. Luckily, I can tell you with confidence that 3D audio is fewer than 12 months away.

Gesture Interfaces

Many of us have seen Minority Report, but most of us probably remember the gesture-based, crime-fighting computer interface more than we do the plot. Technology such as the Leap Motion sensor and Microsoft?s Kinect are making this a possibility. In the realm of meetings, this means easily creating virtual breakout rooms with a wave of your hand, gesturing documents from your work screen to your meeting screen for instant sharing, and detailed, no-touch manipulation of images and video. Or effortlessly mute participants with too much background noise and reorganize video feeds.

Combine the gestures with tactile feedback and projected interfaces and you?ve got the beginnings of a life-like holodeck.

Holograms

The video of Tupac Shakur performing at the Coachella music festival in 2012 drew millions of views on YouTube. Behind the Mars-exploring Curiosity Rover, it was the most delightful technological feat of 2012. ?Holograms ? while difficult to pull off and still prohibitively expensive (the Coachella performance reportedly cost $400,000) ? will become the new private jet of communication and threaten to unseat telepresence as a ?must have? by CEOs and leaders of industry.

Questions remain about the feasibility of creating holograms in realtime (the company who created Tupac is now bankrupt), and they?ll probably be fairly noisy without curated video content to project, but it certainly remains a possibility that holograms could crack C-level Fortune 100 suites in three to four years.

Either way, these four technologies are not as far away as they might seem. And it?s likely that in just a few short years, the way we communicate will be on par with the furthest reaches of our collective imagination just 30 years ago. So what?s left to invent once we get to holograms, pervasive life-like screens, 3D audio and next-gen interfaces? Will this be the opus of innovation in communications? Well, there?s always teleporting, but that?s just science fiction.

FuzeBox is the global leader in real time visual collaboration applications for millions of end users across various businesses. Its flagship application, Fuze HD, allows people to communicate, collaborate and share content from any device, across any network, anywhere in the world. Fuze HD is a mobile and web-based collaboration service that features integrated audio conferencing as well as high-definition, synchronized video and image sharing. The company?s technology is based on a real-time visual communications platform that converges...

? Learn more

Source: http://techcrunch.com/2013/03/01/holograms-3d-spatial-audio-minority-report-gestures-and-others-ways-your-meetings-will-change-by-2018/

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Wolf in sheep's clothing: Uncovering how deadly bacteria trick the immune system

Friday, March 1, 2013

An outbreak of tuberculosis in the skid row area of downtown Los Angeles may have exposed up to 4,500 individuals to the bacterium that causes the deadly disease and has left federal officials scrambling to intervene.

The outbreak is occurring during winter, when homeless individuals are driven to crowded shelters, when influenza is peaking and when people's vitamin D levels, typically boosted by sunlight exposure, are low. A new UCLA study offers critical insight into how various bacteria may manipulate such factors to their advantage.

In a study published online Feb. 28 in the journal Science, UCLA researchers demonstrate that certain cunning bacteria ? including the type that causes tuberculosis ? can pretend to be viruses when infecting humans, allowing them to hijack the body's immune response so that they can hide out, unhindered, inside our cells. The findings may also help explain how viral infections like the flu make us more susceptible to subsequent bacterial infections such as pneumonia.

The study is particularly relevant to tuberculosis, which kills 1.4 million people worldwide each year. In the case of the recent Los Angeles outbreak, the findings could provide clues as to how the flu and a lack of vitamin D may have given the tuberculosis bacterium an edge.

"With 8.7 million in the world falling ill with tuberculosis each year, a better understanding of how these bacteria avoid our immune system could lead to new ways to fight them and to better, more targeted treatments," said senior author Dr. Robert L. Modlin, chief of dermatology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a professor of microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics in the UCLA Division of Life Sciences.

The protection our immune system provides against bacteria-based diseases and infections depends on the critical response of T cells ? white blood cells that play a central role in fighting infections ? and in particular on the release of a protein called interferon-gamma. Interferon-gamma utilizes the vitamin D hormone to alert and activate cells to destroy invading bacteria.

The research team found that bacteria can pretend to be viruses, triggering the immune system to launch an attack with a different protein, called interferon-beta, which is designed to fight viruses, not bacteria. Not only is interferon-beta ineffective against bacteria, but it can also block the action of interferon-gamma, to the advantage of bacteria. Further, if a real virus were to infect the body, triggering interferon-beta, it would divert the attention of the immune response, preventing an attack on the bacterial invader. The researchers say this may explain why the flu can lead to a more serious bacterial-based infection like pneumonia.

"Like a wolf in sheep's clothing, the bacteria can fool the immune system into launching an attack against the wrong type of infection, thus weakening the response against the bacteria," said first author Rosane M. B. Teles, a researcher in the dermatology division at the Geffen School of Medicine.

For the study, the team examined the mechanisms by which the virus-fighting interferon-beta protein suppresses the interferon-gamma defense response to bacterial infections, tricking the immune system into making the wrong defense choices.

The researchers studied leprosy as a model and then applied what they learned to understand tuberculosis, given that leprosy and tuberculosis are caused by related bacteria. Modlin noted that leprosy is an outstanding model for studying immune mechanisms in host defense since it presents as a clinical spectrum that correlates with the level and type of immune response of the pathogen.

The scientists first compared the genetic expression of the virus-fighting interferon-beta protein and the bacteria-fighting interferon-gamma protein in skin lesions from leprosy patients. They found that interferon-gamma was expressed in patients with the milder form of the disease and that interferon-beta was significantly increased in those with the more serious, progressive form of leprosy.

The researchers then compared the genes triggered by interferon-beta in these leprosy skin lesions with those found by two other groups of investigators in the blood of tuberculosis patients. Remarkably, there was a significant overlap. The interferon-beta genes were more frequent in both the skin lesions of leprosy patients with extensive disease and the blood of tuberculosis patients with more severe disease.

"We found this common interferon-beta gene pattern correlated with the greater extent of disease in both leprosy and tuberculosis, which are two very distinct diseases," Teles said.

Previous work by the UCLA team demonstrated that the interferon-gamma defense pathway relies on a specific mechanism involving vitamin D, a natural hormone that plays an essential role in the body's fight against infections. The current study found that interferon-beta suppressed elements involved in the interferon-gamma?triggered vitamin D pathway, preventing the immune system from killing the bacteria.

"The study raises the possibility that a decrease or increase of one of these two interferon proteins could shift the balance from mild to more serious disease," Modlin said. "We may find that therapeutic interventions to block or enhance specific interferon responses may be an effective strategy to alter the balance in favor of protection against bacterial diseases."

The new findings may indicate why, in winter, Los Angeles skid row residents are at an added disadvantage in dealing with tuberculosis ? for at least three reasons. First, because of colder weather at night, indigent homeless people tend to stay in shelters, where they live in close proximity with others, facilitating the spread of the infection. Second, due to the seasonal rise in influenza, the body's immune system could be diverted by the flu virus to produce interferon-beta, blocking an effective immune response to the tuberculosis bacteria. And finally, the drop in vitamin D levels associated with a decrease in exposure to sunlight during the winter months could diminish the ability of individuals' immune systems to kill the tuberculosis bacteria.

"With TB on the rise, this scenario could play out not only in cities in the United States but all over the world," Modlin said. "We hope that our findings may provide insight into harnessing new methods to combat TB and other bacterial infections as well."

Modlin noted that 8.7 million become ill with tuberculosis each year, and 1.4 million die from the disease. He added that an increase or decrease in one of the two interferon proteins could help explain why some people may be more resilient against or susceptible to the infection or have a more serious course of the disease.

The next step, according to Teles, is to further understand the mechanisms that bacterial pathogens use to activate interferon-beta and how bacteria can manipulate the immune system to block the potent interferon-gamma host antimicrobial responses in human infections.

###

University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences: http://www.uclahealth.org/

Thanks to University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences 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/127087/Wolf_in_sheep_s_clothing__Uncovering_how_deadly_bacteria_trick_the_immune_system_

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It's a 'go' for SpaceX launch to space station

NASA / Kim Shiflett

This Dragon spacecraft will launch on the upcoming SpaceX CRS-2 mission. The flight will be the second commercial resupply mission to the International Space Station by SpaceX.

By Miriam Kramer
Space.com

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. ? The weather looks promising for the planned Friday launch of a privately built robotic space capsule to the International Space Station, NASA says.

The unmanned Dragon space capsule, built by the private spaceflight company SpaceX of Hawthorne, Calif., is slated to launch toward the space station Friday?at 10:10 a.m. EST. Weather forecasts predict a 80 percent chance of favorable conditions for launch. NASA and SpaceX officials gave the scheduled mission a final "go" for launch earlier Thursday.

"The mission is the second of 12 SpaceX flights contracted by NASA to resupply the International Space Station," NASA officials said in a mission update. "It will mark the third trip by a Dragon capsule to the orbiting laboratory, following a demonstration flight in May 2012 and the first resupply mission in October 2012."

SpaceX has a $1.6 billion contract with NASA to provide 12 unmanned cargo deliveries to the space station. Another company, Orbital Sciences Corp. based in Virginia, has a $1.9 billion contract for eight mission using its own Antares rocket and Cygnus spacecraft.

The Dragon spacecraft is expected to deliver 1,200 pounds ?(544 kilograms) worth of supplies to the six international crew members on board the station. The capsule is scheduled to return to Earth with 2,300 pounds (1,043 kg) of material from the space station when it splashes down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Baja California on March 25.

SpaceX

On Monday, Falcon 9 and Dragon underwent a successful static fire in preparation for launch to the International Space Station. Engineers ran through all countdown processes as if it were launch day, ending with all nine engines on the rocket firing for nearly two seconds.

SpaceX conducted a?successful rocket engine test, known as a "static test fire" on Monday. The rocket's 9 Merlin engines were fired for a few seconds while the rocket was held down on the launch pad.

NASA is relying on SpaceX, Orbital Sciences and other private companies to develop new private spacecraft to supply the International Space Station with cargo and ultimately ferry American astronauts into and from low-Earth orbit.

With the retirement of the space shuttle fleet in 2011, NASA has been dependent on Russia's Soyuz spacecraft to fly astronauts to the space station, and use unmanned cargo ships built by Russia, Japan and Europe to deliver supplies to the orbiting laboratory.

The space agency?also is developing a new rocket and spacecraft, the Orion space capsule and its Space Launch System mega-rocket, for future deep-space exploration missions to the moon, asteroids and Mars.

You can follow Space.com staff writer Miriam Kramer on Twitter?@mirikramer.?Follow Space.com on Twitter?@Spacedotcom. We're also on?Facebook?and?Google+.

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

Source: http://science.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/28/17133678-its-a-go-for-spacex-launch-to-space-station?lite

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