Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/04/jay-z-raps-about-cuba-trip-obama-in-open-letter/
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Thursday, April 11, 2013
US unemployment aid applications plummet to 346K
In this Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2013, photo, Philadelphia police recruiting officer Samuel Cruz, right, talks with Ismail Azeer of Carteret, N.J., at the Edison Career Fair job fair in the Iselin section of Woodbridge Township, N.J. The number of Americans seeking U.S. unemployment benefits fell sharply last week to a seasonally adjusted 346,000, suggesting March's weak month of hiring may be a temporary slowdown. Employers added only 88,000 jobs in March after averaging 220,000 the previous four months. The drop in unemployment benefits suggests hiring could pick up again in April. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)
In this Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2013, photo, Philadelphia police recruiting officer Samuel Cruz, right, talks with Ismail Azeer of Carteret, N.J., at the Edison Career Fair job fair in the Iselin section of Woodbridge Township, N.J. The number of Americans seeking U.S. unemployment benefits fell sharply last week to a seasonally adjusted 346,000, suggesting March's weak month of hiring may be a temporary slowdown. Employers added only 88,000 jobs in March after averaging 220,000 the previous four months. The drop in unemployment benefits suggests hiring could pick up again in April. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)
In this Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2013, photo, job seekers wait in line to talk with prospective employers at the Edison Career Fair job fair in the Iselin section of Woodbridgeo Township, N.J. The number of Americans seeking U.S. unemployment benefits fell sharply last week to a seasonally adjusted 346,000, suggesting March's weak month of hiring may be a temporary slowdown. Employers added only 88,000 jobs in March after averaging 220,000 the previous four months. The drop in unemployment benefits suggests hiring could pick up again in April. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell sharply last week to a seasonally adjusted 346,000, signaling that the job market might be stronger than March's weak month of hiring suggested.
Applications for unemployment aid dropped 42,000 last week, the Labor Department said Thursday. The decline nearly reversed an increase over the previous three weeks. The four-week average, a less volatile measure, rose 3,000 to 358,000.
The number of unemployment applications has been volatile in the past two weeks largely because of the Easter holiday, a department spokesman said. The timing of the holiday changes from year to year. That makes it hard to adjust for school holidays and other changes that can cause temporary layoffs.
Applications had risen two weeks ago to 388,000, the highest level in four months. That spike "appears to have been a false alarm," Jim O'Sullivan, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics, said in a note to clients.
"The report should assuage some of the concerns raised by last week's weaker-than-expected data, particularly payrolls."
Employers added only 88,000 jobs in March, the government said last week. That followed four months in which job growth averaged 220,000. Last week's drop in applications for unemployment aid could signal that hiring is picking up in April. O'Sullivan noted that the average is near its level for the first three months of the year, when job gains averaged 168,000 a month.
In March, the unemployment rate fell to a four-year low of 7.6 percent last month, down from 7.7 percent. But the rate fell only because more people stopped looking for work and were no longer counted as unemployed.
Applications are a proxy for layoffs. The decline in applications signals that companies are laying off fewer workers.
Nearly 5.28 million people were receiving unemployment aid in the week that ended March 23, the latest period for which figures are available. That's about 10,000 fewer than in the previous week.
Still, layoffs are only half the equation. Businesses also need to be confident enough in the economic outlook to add more jobs.
Companies are posting more open positions but have been slow to fill them. Their reluctance to hire suggests that they are still cautious about the economy.
The Labor Department reported earlier this week that companies advertised about 11 percent more job openings in February than in the same month a year earlier. But the number of people hired each month declined over that time.
Employment experts and staffing firms say many businesses have become highly selective and appear to be waiting for perfect candidates.
Much of the increase in net job gains earlier this year was a result of declining layoffs. Job cuts fell in January to the lowest level in the 12 years that the government has tracked the data.
Economists think economic growth accelerated in the January-March quarter to an annual rate of 3 percent. That would be a vast improvement over the annual rate of 0.4 percent in the October-December, which was held back by steep defense cuts and slower restocking by companies.
One concern is that across-the-board government spending cuts that began on March 1 will shave a half-percentage point from growth this year. That may have also made businesses cautious about hiring last month.
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Bumpies! See Kim Kardashian, Jessica Simpson and Amber Rose?s Self-Portraits
The moms-to-be take selfies to another level by posting photos of their baby bellies via Instagram and Twitter.
Source: http://feeds.celebritybabies.com/~r/celebrity-babies/~3/_f8Y9Isidek/
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Akamai demos Hyperconnected Living Room second-screen concept at NAB
Companion apps are nothing new, but while they can serve up bonus material for a TV show or medal counts for the Olympics, they can't see exactly what you're watching and display relevant information in realtime. Akamai's Hyperconnected Living Room concept demoed here at NAB aims to enhance the dual-screen experience by both pushing out on-demand movies and other streaming content and bringing related info to your slate, exactly when you'd expect to see it.
Akamai says it cooked up this demo especially for NAB "to get people thinking about the possibilities" of a second-screen experience. Those possibilities, if you haven't guessed, generally require you to open up your wallet. When Mission Impossible was playing on the big screen, pricing for a character's sunglasses popped up on the tablet. During a basketball game, we were prompted to buy tickets for an upcoming game. Depending on what you're watching, you may also see trivia from IMDB or links to players' stats.
To connect an iPad to the service, an Akamai rep simply signed into the web-based interface on both the TV and the tablet (though the service is generally compatible with any web-connected device). Once linked, the tablet can function as a remote for pausing and selecting content to stream, and users can personalize what ads and info they receive by providing details such as age, location and even clothing size. If you can't watch Mad Men without wondering where to buy Don Draper's fedora, you'll be all over the video demo below.
Filed under: Home Entertainment
Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/OOTkzpuyl4o/
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US budget deficit for March falls to $107 billion
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. federal budget deficit grew more slowly in March, keeping the annual spending shortfall on pace to finish below $1 trillion for the first time in five years.
The deficit grew by $106.5 billion in March, well below the $203.5 billion added in February, the Treasury Department said Wednesday.
Through the first six months of the year, the deficit has reached $600 billion. That's smaller than the $779 billion racked up in the first six months of the 2012 budget year. The budget year began on Oct. 1.
The deficit for the 2013 budget year is expected to be $845 billion, according to analysis by the independent Congressional Budget Office. That's down from $1.1 trillion in the 2012 budget year and the lowest since 2008.
The CBO estimate may be higher than the actual deficit. It does not reflect across-the-board spending cuts that took effect March 1.
In its budget request released Wednesday, the White House's budget office projected an annual deficit of $973 billion. That would still be the lowest in five years.
Higher Social Security taxes are helping to reduce the monthly deficit this year. The tax on most American's paychecks is 2 percentage points higher this year, boosting revenue in March by about $10 billion, the CBO said. The tax hike is projected to boost revenue by about $10 billion per month for the rest of the budget year, which ends Sept. 30.
The single biggest factor in March's decline related to emergency programs launched during the 2008 financial crisis. Payments from mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac increased $11 billion. Treasury also reduced by $26 billion the official cost of the bank bailouts and a related program to buy toxic mortgage investments.
The deficit hit a record $1.41 trillion in budget year 2009, which began four months before Obama took office. That deficit was due largely to the worst recession since the Great Depression. Tax revenue plummeted. And the government spent more on stimulus programs.
The budget gaps in 2010 and 2011 were slightly lower than the 2009 deficit as a gradually strengthening economy generated more tax revenue.
President George W. Bush also ran annual deficits through most of his two terms in office after he won approval for broad tax cuts and launched wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The last time the government ran an annual surplus was in 2001.
___
Daniel Wagner can be reached at www.twitter.com/wagnerreports .
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/us-budget-deficit-march-falls-200813963.html
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Wednesday, April 10, 2013
S&P revises Cyprus outlook to stable from negative
"I like small penises," said no women interviewed for an actually scientific study released Monday by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, or PNAS. Yes, PNAS is a funny sounding acronym, and, yes, PNAS has found that size does matter ? and that women prefer "showers" to "growers."
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/p-revises-cyprus-outlook-stable-negative-164557747--finance.html
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Father sobs on 911 after kids buried in collapse
A man, left, walks with police investigators Monday, April 8, 2013, around the scene of a collapsed construction site where two children died when the dirt walls collapsed Sunday night on Cedarbrook Court in Stanley, N.C. (AP Photo/Bob Leverone)
A man, left, walks with police investigators Monday, April 8, 2013, around the scene of a collapsed construction site where two children died when the dirt walls collapsed Sunday night on Cedarbrook Court in Stanley, N.C. (AP Photo/Bob Leverone)
Fire and rescue personnel make their way down Cedarbrook Court, Monday, April 8, 2013, to the end of the road where two children died when a wall of dirt fell on them while they were playing in a hole at a construction site behind their home, on Sunday, in Stanley, N.C. (AP Photo/Bob Leverone)
In this image made from video and provided by WSOC-TV Charlotte, authorities work to rescue two children at a construction site, Sunday, April 7, 2013, in Stanley, N.C. Two television stations are reporting that two children are trapped under a home under construction in Lincoln County near Charlotte. WBTV and WSOC report firefighters from several places, including Charlotte, are on the scene Sunday night. (AP Photo/WSOC TV)
In this image made from video and provided by WSOC-TV Charlotte, authorities work to rescue two children at a construction site, Sunday, April 7, 2013, in Stanley, N.C. Two television stations are reporting that two children are trapped under a home under construction in Lincoln County near Charlotte. WBTV and WSOC report firefighters from several places, including Charlotte, are on the scene Sunday night. (AP Photo/WSOC TV)
In this image made from video and provided by WSOC-TV Charlotte, authorities work to rescue two children at a construction site, Sunday, April 7, 2013, in Stanley, N.C. Two television stations are reporting that two children are trapped under a home under construction in Lincoln County near Charlotte. WBTV and WSOC report firefighters from several places, including Charlotte, are on the scene Sunday night. (AP Photo/WSOC TV)
STANLEY, N.C. (AP) ? A North Carolina man tearfully begged authorities to hurry to his house to rescue his daughter and her cousin, who were buried when the walls of a 24-foot deep pit he dug on his property collapsed.
Jordan Arwood, 31, was operating a backhoe Sunday night in the pit when the walls collapsed and he called 911.
Arwood's desperate voice is heard on a recording released by the Lincoln County communications center on Monday, when the children's bodies were recovered.
"Please hurry ... My children are buried under tons of dirt ... They're buried under tons of clay ... It fell on top of them," he said sobbing.
When the dispatcher asked him if he could see the children, Arwood said he couldn't.
"The entire wall collapsed on them. Get a crane. Get a bulldozer. Get anything you can, please," he said. "There's no way they can breathe."
As the dispatcher began encouraging him ? and with people wailing in the background ? Arwood began praying.
"Lord lift this dirt up off these children ... so the children will be alive and well ... I have to get my kids. Lord, please," he said.
The bodies of the two young cousins, 6-year-old Chloe Jade Arwood and 7-year-old James Levi Caldwell, were dug out Monday.
Later on Monday, sheriff's deputies removed firearms and a marijuana plant from Arwood's mobile home. Arwood is a felon who is not allowed to have guns. He was convicted in 2003 for possession of a controlled substance with intent to sell.
The father had been digging with a backhoe on the site Sunday, Sheriff David Carpenter said. Investigators described the pit as 20 feet by 20 feet with a sloped entrance leading down to the 24-foot bottom. The children were at the bottom of the pit retrieving a child-sized pickaxe when the walls fell in on them, Carpenter said.
The sheriff would not say what Arwood was building or whether he had any professional help. He did say that investigators would be looking into reports from neighbors that Arwood had been building some sort of protective bunker.
"It's a very large hole. It would look to be something like that, but I don't know. ... We're going to find out exactly what his intentions were," Carpenter said.
He said deputies would be speaking with county planning and zoning officials about any potential building code violations at the site.
Andrew Bryant, a planner with the Lincoln County Planning & Inspections Department, said no permits had been issued.
On the tape, Arwood said he didn't know what happened.
"They were inside the hole helping to get something and the wall collapsed," he said.
At one point, the dispatcher warned him not to put pressure on the dirt. But Arwood said he had to reach the children.
"If this was you and your children in the dirt, you'd be moving the dirt, too," he said.
Arwood's house was at the end of a gravel-covered road dotted with modular and mobile homes. It's a tight-knit rural community where neighbors sit outside on front porches and look out for each other.
When word spread about the disaster, they ran to Arwood's house and began helping. On Monday, they were somber, saying they were heartbroken for the family. They said Arwood told them it happened without warning and that he tried to grab the children, but they were just beyond his reach.
It was no secret that Arwood was digging a two-story deep hole. Neighbors said it wasn't unusual to see children in the pit when the girl's father was working there.
Neighbor Bradley Jones, who works in construction, said there was no structure to support the pit's tall dirt walls and that there was some concrete on a ledge on top of the hole.
In recent days, the hole was muddy from the rain. He said he warned his daughter, Chelsea, who babysits for the children, not to go in.
"It was dangerous. There was nothing to reinforce those walls," he said.
Chelsea said Arwood told her that he was building the structure to "protect his family" - it was going to be a bunker.
"It's so sad," she said.
___
Biesecker reported from Raleigh. Associated Press news researcher Monika Mathur in Washington contributed to this report.
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A fly mutation suggests a new route for tackling amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
Apr. 8, 2013 ? A team of researchers, led by Marc Freeman, PhD, an early career scientist with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and associate professor of neurobiology at the University of Massachusetts Medical School have discovered a gene in the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster that, when mutant, blocks the self-destruction of damaged axons, which could hold clues to treating motor neuron diseases, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
A neuron has a very distinctive form -- a bush of dendrites that receive signals, an incredibly long axon, which is like a long tail, and "a little dot" between them that is the cell body, housing the genetic headquarters. Every part of the neuron is required for it to transmit messages. "If anything breaks along any part of the neuron, the cell unplugs from the circuit and no longer functions," explained Dr. Freeman, who presented this research at the Genetics Society of America's 54th Annual Drosophila Research Conference in Washington, D.C.
Once the long tail-like axon is damaged, it shrivels away, basically self-destructing, and resulting in neurons that no longer operate. This catastrophic damage can happen in several ways: from inflammation, a neurodegenerative disease, a metabolic disorder such as diabetes, toxin exposure, or tumor growth. Such axon loss is thought to be a primary factor that leads to functional loss in patients with neurological disorders -- it is equivalent to going into an electrical circuit and randomly cutting wires.
The study of axon destruction in response to damage goes back to British neurophysiologist Augustus Waller, who in 1850 described how an axon separated from the cell body and cut off from its nutrient supply breaks apart and is dismantled by scavenger cells. "The idea that this process, called Wallerian degeneration, was a passive wasting away of the axon held for 150 years," Dr. Freeman said.
Then in the late 1980s, researchers discovered a mutation in the mouse, called Wlds, which enables a damaged axon to survive for weeks after injury. "That fundamentally changed how we think about an axon. Under certain circumstances, axons can survive for a much longer time than we have given them credit for," Dr. Freeman explained.
Freeman's laboratory speculated that if axon self-destruction is an active process, then there should be genes in the fly genome whose normal function is to destroy cut axons. They decided if they could break those genes responsible for axon destruction, then the axons shouldn't fall apart. To identify those genes, they performed a labor-intensive screen, randomly breaking genes in the fly genome and looking for those that when broken blocked axon destruction after injury.
This approach led to the identification of one gene, called dSarm, whose normal function is to promote the destruction of the axon after injury. "We got beautiful protection of axons when we knocked out this molecule," Dr. Freeman said. Mice and humans have forms of this gene too, and Freeman and colleagues have shown its functions in a similar way in mice. The preservation of these signaling mechanisms from flies to humans is a sign of evolutionary retention and argues for its importance.
To get closer to applying the axon death gene to the study of disease, the researchers crossed the mouse version of the Sarm mutation into a mouse model that has a type of familial ALS, which is also in humans. Although the mice still lost weight and had difficulty with a mobility test, they lived about 10 days longer than their brethren without the Sarm mutation, and at least half of their motor neurons remained intact. "Since not all the motor neurons are needed," Dr. Freeman said, "even with a 50 percent reduction a patient could feel very close to normal. It would be life-changing for the patient, so it's a step in the right direction."
"We used Wallerian degeneration as a model for axon degeneration. We've identified a signal pathway whose normal function is to promote axon destruction after injury, and hope to build on this research to better understand the role of axon death in neurodegenerative diseases," Dr. Freeman summed up.
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Genetics Society of America, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
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Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/2dkY31vqYR8/130408133915.htm
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Hooters sued by former waitress in dispute over wig
Following brain surgery, your main worry should not be whether you?ll get fired at work for refusing to wear a wig that scrapes your scar. But former Hooters waitress Sandra Lupo contends in a lawsuit that?s what happened when she declined to don a wig and her hours were reduced so much, she was forced to quit.
She filed a disability discrimination lawsuit in Missouri against Hooters of St. Peters, LLC and Hooters of America LLC and is seeking $25,000 for mental and emotional distress, plus punitive damages, attorney fees and other relief.
"Hooters of America believes the lawsuit is without foundation, denies the accusations and has filed a motion that the lawsuit be dismissed," the company said in a statement to NBC News. Hooters, in an April 5 response to the court, denies most of her statements and says ?its actions were taken for legitimate, nondiscriminatory business reasons.?
Hooters is a privately held chain of restaurants that bank on attractive waitresses wearing short shorts and cleavage-hugging shirts.
Lupo, who had been working at the Hooters of St. Peters, Mo., since 2005, was in her last six weeks of nursing school and was at her computer in June 2012 when she felt tingling and numbness on her left side. ?I was bleeding out in my brain,? she told NBCNews.com.
She spent a week in the hospital following her July 2 surgery and was visited by her Hooters manager, according to her suit filed on the Circuit Court of St. Charles County.
The lawsuit claims that her store manager told her ?she could return to work as soon as she was capable, and that, she could wear a ?chemo cap? or any other items of jewelry to distract from her lack of hair and the visibility of her cranial scar.?
Her hair had been cut to ?-inch for the surgery.
On July 16, Lupo?s doctors gave her the all-clear to return to work. Soon after, she met with her manager and the Hooters' regional manager, who said she would be required to wear a wig at work, according to Lupo?s lawsuit.
Hooters? April 5 filing does not address whether any of its employees told Lupo to wear a wig. It says that her manager ?informed her she would need a head covering.?
At the time of the meeting, Lupo protested that she was unable to afford a wig, which can cost from several hundred to several thousands of dollars, according to her claim.
When she did return to work July 21, wigless, she was told a wig was required. She then borrowed a wig but it ?caused extreme stress to her body because of the surgery and the healing wound,? according to the suit.
Hooters then reduced her hours ?to the point that Plaintiff could not earn an income, thereby forcing Plaintiff to quit,? according to the suit. ?It is and has been the routine custom, policy and practice of Defendants to reduce their employees? hours which forces them to voluntarily resign thereby making them ineligible for unemployment compensation.?
The Hooters filing specifically denies that allegation.
After Lupo said she could not wear the wig, Hooters stopped scheduling her for as many hours, she said.
?I actually had to beg for one shift a week,? Lupo said. Pre-surgery, she was working several days a week while finishing nursing school. She had also trained staff and worked promotions for the restaurant, but no alternate duties were offered to her.
?They refused to accommodate it,? she said.
Today she is recovered, graduated and working as a registered nurse.
?Justice,? she said, is the main goal of the lawsuit.
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Exclusive: Beyonce, Jay-Z Cuba visit had Treasury Department OK - source (reuters)
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
German thieves swipe 5 tons of Nutella
BERLIN (AP) ? These thieves might really have sticky fingers.
Police said Monday an unknown number of culprits made off with 5 metric tons (5.5 tons) of Nutella chocolate-hazelnut spread from a parked trailer in the central German town of Bad Hersfeld over the weekend.
The gooey loot is worth an estimated 16,000 euros ($20,710).
Germans news agency dpa reported that thieves have previously stolen a load of energy drinks from the same location.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/germany-thieves-swipe-5-tons-chocolate-spread-103316137.html
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Microalgae produce more oil faster for energy, food or products
Apr. 7, 2013 ? Scientists have described technology that accelerates microalgae's ability to produce many different types of renewable oils for fuels, chemicals, foods and personal-care products within days using standard industrial fermentation.
The presentation was part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS) on April 7.
Walter Rakitsky, Ph.D, explained that microalgae are the original oil producers on earth, and that all of the oil-producing machinery present in higher plants resides within these single-cell organisms. Solazyme's breakthrough biotechnology platform unlocks the power of microalgae, achieving over 80 percent oil within each individual cell at commercial scale while changing the triglyceride oil paradigm by their ability to tailor the oil profiles by carbon chain and saturation. The ability to produce multiple oils in a matter of days out of one plant location using standard industrial fermentation is a game-changer. Solazyme's patented microalgae strains have become the workhorses of a growing industry focused on producing commercial quantities of microalgal oil for energy and food applications. Rakitsky is with Solazyme, Inc., of South San Francisco, Calif., one of the largest and most successful of those companies, which in 2011 supplied 100 percent microalgal-derived advanced biofuel for the first U.S. passenger jetliner flight powered by advanced biofuel.
In a keynote talk at the ACS meeting, Rakitsky described Solazyme's technology platform that enables the company to produce multiple oils from heart-healthy high-oleic oils for food to oils that are tailored to have specific performance and functionality benefits in industry, such as safer dielectric fluids and oils that are the highest-value cuts of the barrel for advanced fuels. The benefits of these oils far surpass those of other oils that are currently available today.
"For the first time in history, we have unlocked the ability to completely design and tailor oils," he said. "This breakthrough allows us to create oils optimized for everything from high-performance jet and diesel fuel to renewable chemicals to skin-care products and heart-healthy food oils. These oils could replace or enhance the properties of oils derived from the world's three dominant sources: petroleum, plants and animals."
Producing custom-tailored oils starts with optimizing the algae to produce the right kind of oil, and from there, the flexibility of the fermentation platform really comes into play. Solazyme is able to produce all of these oils in one location simply by switching out the strain of microalgae they use, Rakitsky explained. Unlike other algal oil production processes, in which algae grow in open ponds, Solazyme grows microalgae in total darkness in the same kind of fermentation vats used to produce vinegar, medicines and scores of other products. Instead of sunlight, energy for the microalgae's growth comes from low-cost, plant-based sugars. This gives the company a completely consistent, repeatable industrial process to produce tailored oil at scale.
Sugar from traditional sources such as sugarcane and corn has advantages for growing microalgae, especially their abundance and relatively low cost, Rakitsky said. The company's first fit-for-purpose commercial-scale production plant is under construction with their partner Bunge next to a sugarcane mill in Brazil. Initial production capacity will be 110,000 tons of microalgal oil annually, expanding up to 330,700 tons. In addition, the company has a production agreement with ADM in Clinton, Iowa, for 22,000 tons of oil, expandable to 110,000 tons. Ultimately, cellulosic sources of sugars from non-food plants or plant waste materials, like grasses or corn stover, may take over as those technologies reach the right scale and cost structures.
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TESS project will launch telescopes to perform full-sky search for transiting exoplanets
Apr. 8, 2013 ? Following a three-year competition, NASA has selected the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) project at MIT for a planned launch in 2017. The space agency announced the mission -- to be funded by a $200 million grant to the MIT-led team -- this afternoon.
TESS team partners include the MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research (MKI) and MIT Lincoln Laboratory; NASA's Goddard Spaceflight Center; Orbital Sciences Corporation; NASA's Ames Research Center; the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics; The Aerospace Corporation; and the Space Telescope Science Institute.
The project, led by principal investigator George Ricker, a senior research scientist at MKI, will use an array of wide-field cameras to perform an all-sky survey to discover transiting exoplanets, ranging from Earth-sized planets to gas giants, in orbit around the brightest stars in the sun's neighborhood.
An exoplanet is a planet orbiting a star other than the sun; a transiting exoplanet is one that periodically eclipses its host star.
"TESS will carry out the first space-borne all-sky transit survey, covering 400 times as much sky as any previous mission," Ricker says. "It will identify thousands of new planets in the solar neighborhood, with a special focus on planets comparable in size to the Earth."
TESS relies upon a number of innovations developed by the MIT team over the past seven years. "For TESS, we were able to devise a special new 'Goldilocks' orbit for the spacecraft -- one which is not too close, and not too far, from both the Earth and the moon," Ricker says.
As a result, every two weeks TESS approaches close enough to the Earth for high data-downlink rates, while remaining above the planet's harmful radiation belts. This special orbit will remain stable for decades, keeping TESS's sensitive cameras in a very stable temperature range.
With TESS, it will be possible to study the masses, sizes, densities, orbits and atmospheres of a large cohort of small planets, including a sample of rocky worlds in the habitable zones of their host stars. TESS will provide prime targets for further characterization by the James Webb Space Telescope, as well as other large ground-based and space-based telescopes of the future.
TESS project members include Ricker; Josh Winn, an associate professor of physics at MIT; and Sara Seager, a professor of planetary science and physics at MIT.
"We're very excited about TESS because it's the natural next step in exoplanetary science," Winn says.
"The selection of TESS has just accelerated our chances of finding life on another planet within the next decade," Seager adds.
MKI research scientists Roland Vanderspek and Joel Villasenor will serve as deputy principal investigator and payload scientist, respectively. Principal research scientist Alan Levine serves as a co-investigator. Tony Smith of Lincoln Lab will manage the TESS payload effort, Lincoln Lab will develop the optical cameras and custom charge-coupled devices required by the mission.
"NASA's Explorer Program gives us a wonderful opportunity to carry out forefront space science with a relatively small university-based group and on a time scale well-matched to the rapidly evolving field of extrasolar planets," says Jackie Hewitt, a professor of physics and director of the Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research. "At MIT, TESS has the involvement of faculty and research staff of the Kavli Institute, the Department of Physics, and the Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, so we will be actively engaging students in this exciting work."
Previous sky surveys with ground-based telescopes have mainly picked out giant exoplanets. NASA's Kepler spacecraft has recently uncovered the existence of many smaller exoplanets, but the stars Kepler examines are faint and difficult to study. In contrast, TESS will examine a large number of small planets around the very brightest stars in the sky.
"The TESS legacy will be a catalog of the nearest and brightest main-sequence stars hosting transiting exoplanets, which will forever be the most favorable targets for detailed investigations," Ricker said.
The other mission selected today by NASA is the Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER). It will be mounted on the International Space Station and measure the variability of cosmic X-ray sources, a process called X-ray timing, to explore the exotic states of matter within neutron stars and reveal their interior and surface compositions. NICER's principal investigator is Keith Gendreau of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. The MKI group, lead by Ricker, is also a partner in the NICER mission.
"The Explorer Program has a long and stellar history of deploying truly innovative missions to study some of the most exciting questions in space science," John Grunsfeld, NASA's associate administrator for science, said in the space agency's statement today. "With these missions we will learn about the most extreme states of matter by studying neutron stars and we will identify many nearby star systems with rocky planets in the habitable zone for further study by telescopes such as the James Webb Space Telescope."
The Explorer Program is NASA's oldest continuous program and has launched more than 90 missions. It began in 1958 with the Explorer 1, which discovered the Earth's radiation belts. Another Explorer mission, the Cosmic Background Explorer, led to a Nobel Prize. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center manages the program for the agency's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.
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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/nasa/~3/cplw9eJkJs8/130408055047.htm
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NGS Family History Conference: Exhibitor Profile-Polonica ...
POLISH? MISSION
?3535 Indian Trail
Orchard Lake, Michigan
www.polishmission.com
?3535 Indian Trail
Orchard Lake, Michigan
www.polishmission.com
?The Polish Mission of Orchard Lake Schools, founded in 1885 by Polish immigrants, is to preserve and promote Polish and Polish-American culture, tradition, and history for present and future generations.? Marcin Chumiecki, Director.
Discover your Polish heritage and family tree with help from the Polish Mission?s Polonica Americana Research Institute. It is here where families come together to research their roots, discover the villages and records of their ancestors, and document their family history. PARI has experienced staff to help guide you through online data bases, microforms, and other pertinent records. PARI is a FamilySearch affiliate and, therefore, has rental access to thousands of microfilms and microfiche to aid in the investigation of one?s family background. Additionally, our facility offers fee-based workshops, classes, and lectures for both groups and individuals. We share our space with the Polish Panorama, a 106 figure theatre which showcases 1,000 years of Polish history. Cecile W. Jensen, CG and Dr. Hal Learman, Directors.Galeria
The Galeria is proud to serve as home to one of the most prestigious collections of Polish art in the United States. The Galeria also hosts art competitions, changing exhibits, as well as a variety of cultural events such as gallery talks, films, and musical programs. Evelyn Bachorski-Bowman, Director.
Museums, Archives, and Rare Books
The Museums, Archives, and Rare Book Room are cornerstones of the Polish Mission?s rich history. Ever since our founding in 1885, Polonia has safeguarded their treasured objects so future generations can shape a better future by learning from a rich and storied past. Our ongoing work includes detailed conservation, exhibit development, and creating outreach programs. We continue to welcome new additions to our collections through donations. Beata Owczarski, Librarian.
Exhibitor Profile-Polonica American Research Institute
Source: http://conference.ngsgenealogy.org/2013/04/exhibitor-profile-polonica-american.html
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Monday, April 8, 2013
Nantucket Mini Easel from Levenger
Levenger has developed an impressive line of iPad accessories, and they’ve been expanding their line to include some accessories designed specifically for the smaller iPad mini. ?Their new Nantucket Mini Easel Stand for the iPad mini is sized to be just right for the smaller iPad, other small tablets, or even a smart phone. ?It’s [...]
Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2013/04/08/nantucket-mini-easel-from-levenger/
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Kerry mourns 'selfless, idealistic' U.S. diplomat
ISTANBUL (AP) ? U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday railed against the "cowardly" terrorists responsible for the attack that killed five Americans in Afghanistan, including a "selfless, idealistic" young diplomat on a mission to donate books to students.
In the deadliest day in eight months for the United States in the war, militants killed six Americans in separate attacks Saturday, the violence occurring hours after the U.S. military's top officer arrived in Afghanistan for consultations with Afghan and U.S.-led coalition officials.
Kerry, in Turkey for meetings with the country's leaders, said 25-year-old Anne Smedinghoff of Illinois had assisted him when he visited Afghanistan two weeks ago. She served as his control officer, an honor often bestowed on up-and-coming members of the U.S. foreign service.
At a news conference with Turkey's foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, Kerry described Smedinghoff as "a selfless, idealistic woman who woke up yesterday morning and set out to bring textbooks to school children, to bring them knowledge."
"Anne and those with her," Kerry said, "were attacked by the Taliban terrorists who woke up that day not with a mission to educate or to help, but with a mission to destroy. A brave American was determined to brighten the light of learning through books, written in the native tongue of the students she had never met, whom she felt it incumbent to help."
Kerry said Smedinghoff "was met by a cowardly terrorist determined to bring darkness and death to total strangers. These are the challenges that our citizens face, not just in Afghanistan but in many dangerous parts of the world ? where a nihilism, an empty approach, is willing to take life rather than give it."
The attack also killed three U.S. service members, a U.S. civilian who worked for the U.S. Defense Department and an Afghan doctor when the group was struck by an explosion while traveling to a school in southern Afghanistan, according to coalition officials and the State Department.
Another American civilian was killed in a separate attack in eastern Afghanistan, the U.S. military said in a statement.
It was the deadliest day for Americans since Aug. 16, when seven U.S. service members died in two attacks in Kandahar province, the birthplace of the Taliban insurgency. Six were killed when their helicopter was shot down by insurgents and one soldier died in a roadside bomb explosion.
Officials said the explosion Saturday came just as a coalition convoy drove past a caravan of vehicles carrying the governor of Zabul province to the event at the school.
A Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility and said the bomber was seeking to target either a coalition convoy or the governor.
Kerry said the terrorists only "strengthened the resolve of the nation, the diplomatic corps, the military, all resources determined to continue the hard work of helping people to help themselves."
He said "America does not and will not cower before terrorism. We are going to forge on, we're going to step up. ... We put ourselves in harm's way because we believe in giving hope to our brothers and sisters all over the world, knowing that we share universal human values with people all over the world ? the dignity of opportunity and progress," the Obama administration's top diplomat said.
"So it is now up to us to determine what the legacy of this tragedy will be. Where others seek to destroy, we intend to show a stronger determination in order to brighten our shared future, even when others try to darken it with violence. That was Anne's mission," he added.
The deaths brought the number of foreign military troops killed this year to 30, including 22 Americans. A total of six foreign civilians have died in Afghanistan so far this year, according to an AP count.
The Taliban have said civilians working for the government or the coalition are legitimate targets, despite a warning from the United Nations that such killings may violate international law.
In earlier remarks Sunday to U.S. consulate workers, Kerry said that "folks who want to kill people, and that's all they want to do, are scared of knowledge. They want to shut the doors and they don't want people to make their choices about the future. For them, it's you do things our way, or we throw acid in your face or we put a bullet in your face," he said.
Kerry described Smedinghoff as "vivacious, smart, capable, chosen often by the ambassador there to be the lead person because of her capacity."
He said "there are no words for anyone to describe the extraordinary harsh contradiction for a young 25-year-old woman, with all of her future ahead of her, believing in the possibilities of diplomacy to improve people's lives, making a difference, having an impact" to be killed, Kerry said.
Smedinghoff previously served in Venezuela.
"The world lost a truly beautiful soul today," her parents, Tom and Mary Beth Smedinghoff, said in a statement emailed to The Washington Post.
"Working as a public diplomacy officer, she particularly enjoyed the opportunity to work directly with the Afghan people and was always looking for opportunities to reach out and help to make a difference in the lives of those living in a country ravaged by war," they said. "We are consoled knowing that she was doing what she loved, and that she was serving her country by helping to make a positive difference in the world."
The last American diplomat killed on the job was Chris Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya. Stevens and three other American died in an attack Sept. 11 on a U.S. facility in Benghazi, Libya. No one has yet been brought to justice in that attack.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/kerry-mourns-selfless-idealistic-us-diplomat-124435005--politics.html
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