Sunday, June 30, 2013

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Holographic TVs Are Getting Closer To Reality

Holographic TVs Are Getting Closer To Reality

New methods for producing color holographic video are here, and they could lead to cheaper, higher res and more energy efficient TVs. Daniel Smalley, a researcher at MIT, built a holographic display with about the same resolution as a standard-definition TV, which is able to depict motion because it updates its image 30 times a second. The display is run by an optical chip that Smalley made in his lab for about $10.

Read more...

    


Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/LQoyFlPzM2M/holographic-tvs-are-getting-closer-to-reality-628299239

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Observing live gene expression in the body

Observing live gene expression in the body [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 30-Jun-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Ueli Schibler
ueli.schibler@unige.ch
41-223-796-175
Universit de Genve

A team from UNIGE has developed a biotechnology that can be used in many biomedical sectors

Most of our physiological functions fluctuate throughout the day. They are coordinated by a central clock in the brain and by local oscillators, present in virtually every cell. Many molecular gearwheels of this internal clock have been described by Ueli Schibler, professor at the Faculty of Science of the University of Geneva (UNIGE), Switzerland. To study how the central clock synchronizes subordinate oscillators, the researcher's group used a variety of genetic and technological tools developed in collaboration with a team of UNIGE physicians. In this way, the scientists were able to directly observe the bioluminescence emitted by 'clock genes' in mice for several months. This biotechnology is applicable to numerous sectors of biomedical research, which attracted the attention of the editors from the journal "Genes & Development".

In mammals, there are many behaviors and biological functions that are regulated by internal clocks. Most of our cells have one, made from a family of 'clock genes', whose cyclic activity reaches a specific peak in 24 hours. These local oscillators are synchronized by a central 'pacemaker' in the brain which adjusts to light.

The firefly lights the way

The use of genetic engineering techniques enabled the study of molecular mechanisms that activate clock genes directly in cultured mammalian cells: 'We have coupled several of these genes to that of luciferase, the enzyme used by the female firefly for producing green light to attract males,' explained Ueli Schibler, member of the National Research Center Frontiers in Genetics. When a specific clock gene is activated in a cell that was transformed in this way, the light signal emitted can be measured using a highly sensitive bioluminescence detector. However, this device, which is capable of detecting signals on the order of a few photons, cannot be used for studying whole organisms. The contribution of Andr Liani's mechanical workshop, along with Jean-Pierre Wolf's and Luigi Bonacina's teams from UNIGE's Group of Applied Physics, was thus essential. These scientists developed a customized device that can accommodate mice for several months: 'We equipped it with reflective walls to deflect photons toward a highly sensitive photomultiplier tube to capture bioluminescence,' says Andr Liani.

Follow the daily expression of clock genes live

In collaboration with the University of Ulm and the Center for Integrative Genomics (CIG) of Lausanne, the biologists studied how the central clock synchronizes subordinate oscillators in mice. Various clock genes, coupled with the luciferase gene for light emission, were inserted into liver cells using a molecular vector. The time these rodents spent in the bioluminescent device allowed to demonstrate that the central clock generates signals, some of which act directly on the liver oscillators, and others which synchronize them indirectly by controlling the cycles of food intake.

or the effect of a medication in mice

'This technology enables a drastic reduction in the number of mice needed for this type of experiment, and furthermore, it is applicable to many areas of biomedical research,' says Camille Saini, researcher in the Department of Molecular Biology at UNIGE and first author of this article. These complementary genetic and engineering technology tools could be used to directly follow certain biochemical effects of metabolites like cholesterol or glucose, as well as the response to potential treatments of diseases such as hypercholesterolemia or diabetes. Monitoring the response to various hormones, neurotransmitters and other biochemical messengers is also part of this application range.

###


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


Observing live gene expression in the body [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 30-Jun-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Ueli Schibler
ueli.schibler@unige.ch
41-223-796-175
Universit de Genve

A team from UNIGE has developed a biotechnology that can be used in many biomedical sectors

Most of our physiological functions fluctuate throughout the day. They are coordinated by a central clock in the brain and by local oscillators, present in virtually every cell. Many molecular gearwheels of this internal clock have been described by Ueli Schibler, professor at the Faculty of Science of the University of Geneva (UNIGE), Switzerland. To study how the central clock synchronizes subordinate oscillators, the researcher's group used a variety of genetic and technological tools developed in collaboration with a team of UNIGE physicians. In this way, the scientists were able to directly observe the bioluminescence emitted by 'clock genes' in mice for several months. This biotechnology is applicable to numerous sectors of biomedical research, which attracted the attention of the editors from the journal "Genes & Development".

In mammals, there are many behaviors and biological functions that are regulated by internal clocks. Most of our cells have one, made from a family of 'clock genes', whose cyclic activity reaches a specific peak in 24 hours. These local oscillators are synchronized by a central 'pacemaker' in the brain which adjusts to light.

The firefly lights the way

The use of genetic engineering techniques enabled the study of molecular mechanisms that activate clock genes directly in cultured mammalian cells: 'We have coupled several of these genes to that of luciferase, the enzyme used by the female firefly for producing green light to attract males,' explained Ueli Schibler, member of the National Research Center Frontiers in Genetics. When a specific clock gene is activated in a cell that was transformed in this way, the light signal emitted can be measured using a highly sensitive bioluminescence detector. However, this device, which is capable of detecting signals on the order of a few photons, cannot be used for studying whole organisms. The contribution of Andr Liani's mechanical workshop, along with Jean-Pierre Wolf's and Luigi Bonacina's teams from UNIGE's Group of Applied Physics, was thus essential. These scientists developed a customized device that can accommodate mice for several months: 'We equipped it with reflective walls to deflect photons toward a highly sensitive photomultiplier tube to capture bioluminescence,' says Andr Liani.

Follow the daily expression of clock genes live

In collaboration with the University of Ulm and the Center for Integrative Genomics (CIG) of Lausanne, the biologists studied how the central clock synchronizes subordinate oscillators in mice. Various clock genes, coupled with the luciferase gene for light emission, were inserted into liver cells using a molecular vector. The time these rodents spent in the bioluminescent device allowed to demonstrate that the central clock generates signals, some of which act directly on the liver oscillators, and others which synchronize them indirectly by controlling the cycles of food intake.

or the effect of a medication in mice

'This technology enables a drastic reduction in the number of mice needed for this type of experiment, and furthermore, it is applicable to many areas of biomedical research,' says Camille Saini, researcher in the Department of Molecular Biology at UNIGE and first author of this article. These complementary genetic and engineering technology tools could be used to directly follow certain biochemical effects of metabolites like cholesterol or glucose, as well as the response to potential treatments of diseases such as hypercholesterolemia or diabetes. Monitoring the response to various hormones, neurotransmitters and other biochemical messengers is also part of this application range.

###


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-06/udg-olg062513.php

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Saturday, June 29, 2013

afreena: Northern Food: Devonshire Arms, Baslow, Derbyshire

I've been pretty underwhelmed with the dining options since moving to a small town in Derbyshire. This wasn't entirely unexpected, the more rural areas of the country just can't match the offer of the cities at the budget end of the market, the end where my eating out firmly rests at the moment.?

The big northern city combo of bargain Asian restaurants and a highly competitive casual drinking and dining market mean that it's easy to eat well for under twenty quid, all in, including a drink or two. Down here there are plenty of good options in the high end pub category, but when the average main course is upwards of fifteen quid alone, you're no longer in the cheap and cheerful range.

It would be daft, of course, to criticise the Peak District for not being Sheffield or Manchester. I'm not expecting to get Vietnamese food, but what has so far been disappointing is the pub food. There are loads of non-chain pubs in the vicinity, but sadly a lot of them aren't really serving anything better than a chain, and in some cases are dishing up something far worse. Rule of thumb: if the only chicken you have is in the freezer, and it's been there for god knows how long and has gone all grey and fibrous looking, then maybe take it off the menu. Just a suggestion.

So Sunday lunch at the Devonshire Arms in Baslow came as something of a surprise. Very nice food, served by some nice people who actually seemed to give a shit. Well done them.

The Sunday roast wasn't perfect, because they never are in pubs, but it was a good effort. Thick slices of pink beef rump, good gravy, a Yorkshire pudding that was fresh and pliable rather than ancient and fractured, and accurately cooked veggies. Only the roasts were a bit of a let down, being almost devoid of roasty brown goodness.

Pudding actually was perfect, at least it was as far as I'm concerned. Lemon posset, lemon sorbet and ginger biscuits. I thought the double lemon approach might have been citrus overkill, but it wasn't, it was divine, rich and creamy offset wonderfully by sweet and sharp. And anything can be improved by the addition of ginger biscuits.

Including service we paid exactly twenty quid each for two courses and a drink or two, great value for the quality and locale. I liked it here, but I'll still have to dock them half a point for the lacklustre roast potatoes.

7.5/10

Nether End

Baslow

Derbyshire

DE45 1SR

Source: http://m62food.blogspot.com/2013/06/devonshire-arms-baslow-derbyshire.html

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Source: http://jokkanai.blogspot.com/2013/06/northern-food-devonshire-arms-baslow.html

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Hospitals seek high-tech help for hand hygiene

RICHMOND HEIGHTS, Mo. (AP) ? Hospitals have fretted for years over how to make sure doctors, nurses and staff keep their hands clean, but with only limited success. Now, some are turning to technology ? beepers, buzzers, lights and tracking systems that remind workers to sanitize, and chart those who don't.

Health experts say poor hand cleanliness is a factor in hospital-borne infections that kill tens of thousands of Americans each year. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta estimates that one of every 20 patients in U.S. hospitals gets a hospital-acquired infection each year.

"We've known for over 150 years that good hand hygiene prevents patients from getting infections," said Dr. John Jernigan, an epidemiologist for the CDC. "However, it's been a very chronic and difficult problem to get adherence levels up as high as we'd like them to be."

Hospitals have tried varying ways to promote better hygiene. Signs are posted in restrooms. Some even employ monitors who keep tabs and single out offenders.

Still, experts believe hospital workers wash up, at best, about 50 percent of the time. One St. Louis-area hospital believes it can approach 100 percent adherence.

Since last year, SSM St. Mary's Health Center in the St. Louis suburb of Richmond Heights, Mo., has been the test site for a system developed by Biovigil Inc., of Ann Arbor, Mich. A flashing light on a badge turns green when hands are clean, red if they're not. It also tracks each hand-cleaning opportunity ? the successes and the failures.

The failures have been few at the two units of St. Mary's where the system is being tested, the hospital said. One unit had 97 percent hand hygiene success, said Dr. Morey Gardner, the hospital's director of infection disease and prevention. The other had 99 percent success.

"The holy grail of infection prevention is in our grasp," Gardner said.

The Biovigil system is among many being tried at hospitals. A method developed by Arrowsight, based in Mt. Kisco, N.Y., uses video monitoring. It is being used in intensive care units at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, N.Y., and the University of California San Francisco Medical Center.

Akron, Ohio-based GOJO Industries, maker of Purell hand sanitizer, has developed an electronic compliance monitoring system using wireless technology to track when soap and hand sanitizer dispensers are used. The SmartLink system gives the hospital data on high- and low-compliance areas. The company said it has installed the system at several hospitals around the country, but didn't say how many.

HyGreen Inc.'s Hand Hygiene Reminder System was developed by two University of Florida doctors. The Gainesville, Fla., company now features two systems used in seven hospitals, including Veterans Administration hospitals in Chicago, Wilmington, Del., and Wilkes-Barre, Pa.

One is similar to Biovigil's green badge method. In HyGreen's, a wall-mounted hand wash sensor detects alcohol on the hands. The badge includes an active reminding system. Unclean hands create a warning buzz. If the buzz sounds three times, the worker is noted for noncompliance.

HyGreen spokeswoman Elena Fraser said that because some hospitals are moving away from alcohol-based sanitizers, HyGreen offers a second system. A touch of the sanitizer dispenser clears the worker to interact with a patient. If the worker shows up at the patient bed without hand-cleaning, the series of warning buzzes begins.

Fraser said hospital infections have dropped 66 percent at units of Miami Children's Hospital where the badge system has been implemented.

Nurses using the Biovigil system at St. Mary's near St. Louis wear a badge with changeable colored lights. A doorway sensor identifies when the nurse enters a patient's room, and the badge color changes to yellow.

The nurse washes his or her hands and places them close to the badge. A sensor in the badge detects chemical vapors from the alcohol-based solution. If hands are clean, the badge illuminates a bright green hand symbol.

If the nurse fails to sanitize, the badge stays yellow and chirps every 10 seconds for 40 seconds, then flashes red. Once the flashing red starts, the nurse has another 30 seconds to wash up, otherwise the badge turns solid red, denoting non-compliance. Either way, each instance is tracked by a computer. The hospital can track each individual's compliance.

Registered Nurse Theresa Gratton has helped lead the effort toward hand cleanliness at St. Mary's. She heard about the Biovigil system in early 2012 and convinced the hospital to give it a try.

Gratton said patients are aware of the risk of infection and frequently inquire about whether caregivers have washed their hands. She said the badge relieves their anxiety.

Bill Rogers, a 65-year-old retiree recuperating at St. Mary's from back surgery and a heart scare, agreed.

"The first thing I noticed up here was the badges," Rogers said. "It is comforting for me to know their hands are clean as soon as the badge beeps and it goes from yellow to green."

St. Mary's is expanding the Biovigil system later this year to other units of the hospital and to employees other than nurses, though details are still being worked out, Gardner said. Eventually, the system may be expanded to SSM's seven other St. Louis-area hospitals, he said.

Biovigil's chief client officer, Brent Nibarger, said customers won't buy the system but will pay a subscription fee of about $12 a month per badge.

The CDC's Jernigan said the high-tech systems can only help.

"For a health care worker, keeping their hands clean is the single most important thing they can do to protect their patients," Jernigan said.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/hospitals-seek-high-tech-help-hand-hygiene-071012525.html

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The Top 3 Places in Colorado Google Trekker Should Go

Do you get envious of people who tweet beautiful hiking pics while you?re stuck inside at work? You can have the last laugh with Google?s 15 lens camera.

You can now sign-up to borrow one of the company?s Trekkers, a soccer ball-shaped camera that captures a 360-degree panorama ? just like the Google Street View camera. As the Verge reports, Google previously only let select employees and a few third-party organizations take the Trekkers out to scenic places including the Grand Canyon and the Canadian Arctic, but now the company is giving any third-party organization the chance to apply online for loaner Trekker backpacks.

The footage that winning applicants capture could be added to Google's growing library of Street View scenes around the world, though its unclear for now just how much, if any, other monetary compensation Google will provide to volunteers.

Google has already mapped the wintertime slopes of Colorado. What about for summer scenes? With so many beautiful places in the state, where should Google Trekker go in Colorado?

Here are our top 3 picks.

Devil?s Head Trail

Although not as high profile as the other two on the list, Devil?s Head trail is 15 miles outside of Castle Rock and a great hike for kids. The 1.4 mile long trail is relatively easy, and takes approximately 45 to 90 minutes on a one way hike with an elevation gain of 940 feet. Once there, there are 143 steps to get to Devil?s Head Lookout, the last of the seven original Front Range Lookout towers still in service. Though over 20,000 people hike it every year, Devil?s Head Trail remains a Colorado secret.

West Maroon Trail

Though they feature prominently on King Soopers cards, the Maroon Bells are still one of the most stunning views in the state. The trail meanders through aspen and around Maroon Lake, all in the shadow of the Bells. This easy hike gives a sustained view rather than just at the end.

The Colorado Trail

Stretching almost 500 miles from Denver to Durango, the Colorado Trail is a great snapshot of the state. Trail users experience six wilderness areas and eight mountain ranges topping out at 13,271 feet, just below Coney Summit at 13,334 feet. The average elevation is over 10,000 feet and it rises and falls dramatically. Users traveling from Denver to Durango will climb 89,354 feet. Now who wants to carry Trekker the whole way?

Are you feeling inspired? You can apply here. Have a better suggestion? Let us know in the comments below.

Source: http://kunc.org/post/top-3-places-colorado-google-trekker-should-go

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Video: Paulson: We Need More Action From Congress

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Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/video/cnbc/52333999/

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Friday, June 28, 2013

This Climate Fix Might Be Decades Ahead Of Its Time

Global Thermostat's pilot plant in Menlo Park, Calif., pulls carbon dioxide from the surrounding air. The next challenge is to find uses for the captured gas.

Courtesy of Global Thermostat

Global Thermostat's pilot plant in Menlo Park, Calif., pulls carbon dioxide from the surrounding air. The next challenge is to find uses for the captured gas.

Courtesy of Global Thermostat

Every year, people add 30 billion tons of carbon dioxide to the air, mostly by burning fossil fuels. That's contributing to climate change. A few scientists have been dreaming about ways to pull some of that CO2 out of the air, but face stiff skepticism and major hurdles. This is the story of one scientist who's pressing ahead.

Peter Eisenberger is a distinguished professor of earth and environmental sciences at Columbia University. Earlier in his career, he ran the university's famed Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, and founded Columbia's Earth Institute. He was never one of those scientists who tinkered into the night on inventions. But he realized he didn't need to be.

"If you looked at knowledge as a commodity, we had generated this enormous amount of knowledge and we hadn't even begun to think of the many ways we could apply it," Eisenberger says. He decided he'd settle on a problem he wanted to solve, and then dive into the pool of knowledge for existing technologies that could help him.

He started looking for a way to pull carbon dioxide right out of the air. "And it turned out the best device already exists," he says. "It's called a monolith. That is the same type of instrument that's in the catalytic converter in your car. It cleans up your exhaust."

Eisenberg's monoliths grab carbon dioxide from the air, and release it again when you heat them up.

He teamed up with a colleague at Columbia, Graciela Chichilnisky, and formed a company to develop the idea. Global Thermostat got seed money from Edgar Bronfman, Jr. ? CEO of Warner Music Group and the former CEO of Seagram's, his family's business.

The company has built two pilot plants in Menlo Park, Calif. But of course there are big issues to solve: what do you do with the carbon dioxide once you've captured it, and how do you make money?

"If they don't tell you you're crazy, you're not doing something worthwhile," says Peter Eisenberger, co-founder of Global Thermostat, a firm that's building a device to pull carbon dioxide from the air.

Chris Schmauch/Global Thermostat

"So we then we looked for ways to monetize CO2, and found that lots of people wanted to use CO2 as a feedstock to make a valuable product," Eisenberger says.

Growers pipe carbon dioxide into greenhouses. Oil companies pump it underground to help them squeeze out more oil. Soda companies use it to put bubbles in their drinks. These are mostly small-scale applications.

Maybe someday Eisenberg could get paid to clean up the atmosphere by sucking out the CO2 and burying it underground, though there's no market for that now.

But using carbon dioxide to make fuel could someday be big. So Eisenberger's first project involves using CO2 to feed algae that churn out biofuel.

"Our first demonstration plant is being erected right now down in Daphne, Alabama, with an algae company called Algae Systems, which sits on Mobile Bay," Eisenberger says. "They'll be floating their algae in plastic bags on the top of the water. We'll be piping in CO2 that we pull out of the air, and the sun will do the rest."

Of course, this one project will have zero effect on how much carbon dioxide is in the earth's atmosphere. But Eisenberger has much grander ambitions.

"I believe we have something that's economically viable, so our company will be successful," he says. "But I'm really in this because I want to contribute to a long term solution that the world needs."

Eisenberger says if he can open the door to capturing carbon dioxide from the air ? and make the process cheap enough ? someday we could actually slow down, or possibly even reverse, the buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Robert Socolow at Princeton University started hearing a buzz about this technology a few years back.

"It's catchy," Socolow admits. "It's attractive conceptually that one could basically pour carbon dioxide into the atmosphere for the next several decades, and pull it out later and everything would be fine." But the appeal of the idea also worried him ? people might use the mere prospect of this technology as an excuse not to act.

So Socolow spearheaded a critique of the technique, on behalf of the American Physical Society.

Socolow's panel concluded that the technology would be hopelessly expensive, costing $600 for every ton of carbon dioxide it drew out of the air. And the scale would also be huge. In order to capture the emissions would waft into the air from a single coal-fired power plant, you'd need to build a structure 20 miles long and 30 feet high. "It's like the Great Wall of China," Socolow says.

The committee concluded that it would make a lot more sense to cut down on emissions first ? make our cars, homes and factories more efficient. Panel members also said it makes much more sense to capture carbon dioxide directly from smokestacks, where it's concentrated, instead of from the air.

Socolow says, maybe someday we'll have our emissions under control, and then we might need to remove some of the carbon dioxide that's already in the air, with a capture technology. But, in his view, that's a long way away. "I locate it in the 22nd century," he says. In other words, this might be a good project for Eisenberger's great-great-great grandchildren.

Researchers currently working on carbon dioxide capture technologies say the American Physical Society critique has made it much harder for them to raise money. Klaus Lackner, at Columbia University says he was turned down for a government grant. David Keith, at Harvard and the University of Calgary, says he struggled to get funding for his small company.

"It's a very powerful report from a very credible group of people and it may well help to kill us and other efforts," Keith says.

Proponents of air-capture technologies say some of the panel's conclusions are just plain wrong ? especially the estimated cost of $600 per ton.

"We have had third party reports, independent people, evaluating our technology, and it's under $50 a ton," Eisenberger says. He hasn't actually demonstrated that cost yet, and he agrees that nobody should take his word for it. But he's stopped arguing with his critics.

"I'm just going to go do it," he says. "And doing it or not ? that's the answer."

Pursuing a big idea takes some hard-headedness, and thick skin.

"If they don't tell you you're crazy, you're not doing something worthwhile," Eisenberger says. "Because what you do when you innovate is you disturb the existing order."

Fortunately, this won't be an academic argument forever. "That's the beauty of science. The people that take the time to come into the lab and see it working and do their own evaluation of the cost and the performance, they know it's not crazy."

If the researchers pursuing this technology can really make it inexpensive to draw carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, Eisenberger says it could be a game-changer.

We could start producing fuels with the carbon dioxide that's already in the air, instead of unearthing more fossil fuels. This won't happen quickly, though.

"The energy infrastructure of the world is $55 trillion," Eisenberger says. So a technology to replace that is "not like a new Google app."

Still, human societies have made such transitions before. "They just don't happen in a day," Eisenberger says. "But they happen."

There's certainly no guarantee that capturing carbon dioxide from the air would ever become a big enough enterprise to make a difference to Earth's climate. But it won't even be put to the test unless people like Eisenberger give it a try.

Source: http://www.npr.org/2013/06/27/189522647/this-climate-fix-might-be-decades-ahead-of-its-time?ft=1&f=1007

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Netflix renews 'Orange is the New Black' for season two, before season one launches

Netflix renews 'Orange is the New Black' series for season two, before season one launches

Netflix is putting its money where its mouth is when it comes to building a library of first-run content, tonight announcing it's signed up new series Orange is the New Black for a second season, set for release in 2014. That's particularly notable because unlike Hemlock Grove's renewal last week, this series hasn't even been posted to the streaming site yet. It's not the company's first bold move however, as it signed up for two seasons of House of Cards without seeing anything first, but that had David Fincher and Kevin Spacey attached. This new show is written by Weeds creator Jenji Kohan and follows a woman from Brooklyn sentenced to 15 months in federal prison -- season one debuts July 11th.

Filed under: ,

Comments

Source: Netflix

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/BY8RkJ6L3VI/

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Thursday, June 27, 2013

Paparazzo sues Justin Bieber for alleged assault

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Justin Bieber has been sued by a paparazzo who claims the singer kicked and punched him last year at a Southern California shopping center.

A lawsuit filed Wednesday alleges the "Baby" crooner attacked Jose Osmin Hernandez Duran after Bieber and his then-girlfriend went to the movies at The Commons in Calabasas.

Bieber's representatives did not respond to a request for comment.

Duran claims Bieber started to leave the shopping center in his Mercedes, but got out of his car and sprinted toward him.

Duran says Bieber jumped into the air from 6 to 8 feet away to deliver a martial-arts-type kick to the photographer's gut before punching him in the face.

The suit seeks unspecified damages for "severe and extreme emotional distress" and negligence.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/paparazzo-sues-justin-bieber-alleged-assault-023647768.html

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'A Night With Janis Joplin' heads to Broadway

NEW YORK (AP) ? The boozy, bluesy, hot-mama howl of Janis Joplin is heading to Broadway.

Producers said Wednesday that the musical "A Night With Janis Joplin" starring Mary Bridget Davies as the iconic singer will start previews at the Lyceum Theatre on Sept. 20.

The show, written and directed by Randy Johnson, has a live onstage band and features Joplin hits and classic songs such as "Piece of My Heart," ''Mercedes Benz," ''Me and Bobby McGee," ''Ball and Chain" and "Summertime."

The show has already been staged at Portland Center Stage in Oregon; the Cleveland Play House; Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.; the Pasadena Playhouse in California; and the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

Davies, who was raised in Cleveland, first won the role in 2005 after beating 150 actresses. She has appeared in the musical revue "It Ain't Nothin' But the Blues" and another Joplin musical, "Love, Janis." She has toured with Joplin's band, Big Brother & the Holding Company and has released the album "Wanna Feel Somethin.'"

Joplin rose to fame during San Francisco's 1967 "Summer of Love," gaining acclaim when she performed her version of blues singer Big Mama Thornton's "Ball and Chain" at the Monterey International Pop Festival. She died of a heroin overdose in Hollywood in 1970.

___

Online: http://www.anightwithjanisjoplin.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/night-janis-joplin-heads-broadway-190252900.html

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Casey Anthony Defamation Lawsuits to Proceed in Federal Court

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/06/casey-anthony-defamation-lawsuits-to-proceed-in-federal-court/

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Obama to lay out three-part plan for addressing climate change (cbsnews)

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Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/315057498?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Miesha Tate to pose nude in ESPN the Magazine

UFC bantamweight Miesha Tate is joining the ranks of MMA fighters who have posed nude in ESPN the Magazine's Body Issue. The magazine announced today that Tate will appear in the yearly issue that shows off athletes' bodies. It will hit newsstands on July 12.

Tate's opposing coach on the upcoming season of "The Ultimate Fighter," UFC women's bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey, was on last season's cover. Both women appearing in the magazine will give them one more thing to trash talk about as they film the TUF that will air in September.

[Related: Mets' Matt Harvey to flaunt curves in 'Body Issue']

UFC president Dana White said the filming is filled with their squabbles every day.

"It's going exactly the way you thought it would be going: bad," White said. "Dead serious. Miesha and Ronda hate each other. It's literally crazy drama every day. It's irritating."

Other fighters who have been in the Body Issue include Jon Jones and Gina Carano.

Related coverage on Yahoo! Sports:
? Native American fighter Dan Hornbuckle more than a face in the crowd
? Is Chris Weidman the one to take out Anderson Silva?
? Ricardo Lamas depending on family to get over disappointing pursuit of UFC belt

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mma-cagewriter/miesha-tate-pose-nude-espn-magazine-201403709.html

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Emmys: MTV 'Catfish's' Nev Schulman Says Manti Te'o Proved His Reality Show's Legit

By Jethro Nededog

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - With a second season of MTV's "Catfish: The TV Show" debuting Tuesday at 10/9c, Nev Schulman has become one of reality television's most interesting people. He has seen himself catapulted from indie documentary filmmaker to TV's most well-known internet scam buster/matchmaker.

His reality career was created and then boosted by serendipitous story turns, beginning with the success of "Catfish," the 2010 doc in which Schulman's brother Ariel and friend Henry Joost filmed his online romance with a woman who turned out to have created a fake identity.

The MTV reality series of the same name, in which Shulman and Max Joseph travel the country arranging in-person meetings between folks engaged in online-only romances, debuted last November to some buzz.

It had a further spotlight shone on it in January, when college football player Manti Te'o's online romance was revealed to be a sham. The show's ratings rose 30 percent with the news, and Nev found himself in great demand by reporters seeking his explanation for how such a thing could happen.

Had you ever planned to have a career in reality TV? I never thought this would be the career path that I would end up taking. The movie came as a big surprise, and its success was also very unexpected.

The TV show sort of hatched organically from that. And now that I'm part of the entertainment industry, I feel a lot more opportunity to continue doing that, but it was never anything that I pursued initially.

Some viewers wonder if your stories are doctored, since reality shows already carry with them the suspicion that they're scripted. How do you deal with that? For those people who don't think the show's legit, I need only to point to Manti Te'o as a case study to prove that this is a very real thing. It's happening frequently, and basically if you turn your cameras on and go out in the world looking for it, it's there. We didn't have to script it; we didn't have to make anything up. It found us.

When the Te'o story broke, you began to investigate his case. What was it like to compete with the press at the time? I had an interesting leg up, in a small way, because I had received correspondence from some of the people who had been involved in the story. Months earlier, they had reached out to me, prior to any of the news happening. Unfortunately, I hadn't seen those emails because they had been buried under many other emails similar in nature. But when the story broke, I reached back out to those people, and I definitely had an interesting inside angle.

But in the end, I didn't have much of an advantage over the press except that a tremendous amount of people reached out to me when they heard about the story because they thought they were in communication with or "being catfished" by the same person. That's when everybody started to realize this was not some small, strange, once-in-a-while kind of thing.

Do you plan on expanding into other reality series?

The exciting thing right now is that I'm speaking at a lot of schools, colleges and universities and not just about the show and my experiences in the film. Generally, more about the best practices in being online and protecting yourself and being accountable and honest. Sort of the unofficial rules of the internet that no one seems to have been able to establish yet.

But yeah, I'm definitely interested in working on more shows as a host and also as a producer. I think it's a field I'm well suited for.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/emmys-mtv-catfishs-nev-schulman-says-manti-teo-202848679.html

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Tuesday, June 25, 2013

AOL Reader beta officially available for your RSS-perusing needs (hands-on)

AOL Reader beta officially available for your RSSperusing needs handson

Wondering how AOL's RSS client will rank as a Google Reader replacement? Today's the day we find out, as the access doors to the AOL Reader beta have officially swung open. Feedly's been killing it for some weeks, and Digg's freemium setup is two days away -- but we couldn't resist getting an early taste of what our parent company (Disclaimer alert!) is cooking. Join us past the break where we've spilled all the details about this latest entrant in the field of feed readers.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/06/24/aol-reader-hands-on/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=Feed_Classic&utm_campaign=Engadget

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Time To Reset The Education Agenda

The end of another school year is leaving a bad taste in many people?s mouths. A steady diet of government austerity and top-down ?accountability? mandates have left numerous communities across the country with a severe case of sour stomachs over how their schools are being governed.

As the school year closed in Michigan, hundreds of protestors gathered at the state capital in Lansing to protest state school budgets and policies that have left classrooms overcrowded and eliminated art, music, and other educational programs in schools.

In Pennsylvania, teachers, parents, and public school activists have staged multiple actions (see here, here, and here) to protest severe budget cuts that have eliminated programs and laid off teachers.

At the state capital of North Carolina, boisterous ?Moral Monday? demonstrations against the state?s conservative government have made public education funding part of a rallying cry for a more progressive agenda in that state.

These protests are a continuation of a months-long Education Spring unifying diverse factions across the nation in efforts to reverse education policy mandates and bolster public schools instead of punishing them and closing them down.

The uprising has not gone unnoticed by people at the centers of policy, power, and opinion in Washington.

In the U.S. Department of Education, the halls of Congress, and the meeting rooms of think tanks and foundations, uncertainly, impasse, and calls for a new direction are now the order of the day.

Uncertainty Sets In At The Top

In a surprise announcement to the media, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan hit the pause button for implementation of new teacher evaluations tied to new standards-based tests. Now states will get an additional year to roll out the new tests and more flexibility in how they fund teacher training for the standards.

Duncan?s actions come on the heels of a call from Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, who had previously called for a ?moratorium? on the high stakes associated with standards-based testing for at least a year.

These calls for pause are clearly a response to widespread concerns over basing accountability systems for schools and teachers largely on standardized tests.

As the above-cited reporter Joy Resmovits observed, the standards and testing regime has been ?in motion for years, but recently, as the rubber hits the road with the new tests rolling out in 2013, the outcry has been magnified. Schools are grappling with all of these demands amid an escalating fiscal crisis. The message, coming from teachers, their unions and other advocacy groups, is clear: Too much is changing simultaneously.?

In a video conversation with Dan Brown, a teaching ambassador fellow for the department, Duncan claimed ?this is not a major shift at all? in the Department?s mindset. But that?s not necessarily the message being heard in school districts.

As?Education Week?s veteran journalist Alyson Klein wrote, Duncan?s decision to communicate the change in ?a big, splashy announcement? had the effect of imparting some uncertainty about the reform agenda.

Klein quoted New Jersey Commissioner of Education Chris Cerf who said, ?The manner in which this was executed did put the thumb on the scale in favor of delay.? This risks, according to Cerf, ?energizing folks who frankly have never gotten on board? the standards and testing mandate.

What the delay also ?risks? is more articles like the one that appeared in The Baltimore Sun that used the announcement as an opportunity to voice the ?concerns? teachers and administrators have with the new system and report the absurdity of ?devising a system to evaluate teachers based on student test scores? when ?only about one-third of the state?s teachers are in subjects that have standardized tests.?

The imposition of higher standards and more testing is already an idea that hasn?t stood up well to close scrutiny. Now there will be more time for more scrutiny.

Policy Impasse Becomes The New Normal

In the halls of Congress, senators and members of the House working on reauthorizing federal education policies, known as No Child Left Behind, showed clear signs of locking into the same uncompromising positions that have characterized congressional action in other policy arenas.

At the very start of the process, veteran Beltway pundit Frederick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute stated flat out, ?There will be no reauthorization in 2013 or 2014.?

Since his prognostication, some of the roadblocks to reauthorization have come to pass ? such as a mostly partisan bill from the Senate committee dominated by Democrats and competing ?hard-hitting? bills from Republicans in both the Senate and the House in strong opposition.

Reinforcing Hess? conclusions, a recent survey of education policy ?insiders? found that only 8 percent thought NCLB reauthorization would take place this year, with 81 percent seeing it happen after January 2015.

Calls For A New Direction Increase

Among opinion leaders on both the right and left, an acute divide has emerged between status quo supporters of the standards and testing mandates and those who are calling for a different direction.

In the conservative community, the controversy mostly centers on the Common Core standards. While factions allied with the tea party have flared into vocal opposition to the standards, establishment right-wingers have generally promoted a ?stay the course? message.

For people who lean left, the divide on education policy is a more nuanced one where disciples of the standards-and-testing approach are now being called into question by those who want to see a transition from the status quo to supports-based policies focused on ensuring students have the opportunities and resources they need to reach the higher standards.

The divide among progressives was acutely evident at the most recent Netroots Nation conference during a panel on Mis-Education of Bloggers: What You Don?t Know About Education Reform and Communities of Color.

During the presentation, as can be seen on a video here, one panel member, Rufina A. Hern?ndez, executive director of the Campaign for High School Equity, likened the standards-and-testing approach for education to a civil rights cause, declaring new Common Core Standards to be ?Brown 2.0? for education, a reference to Brown vs. Board of Education, the landmark Supreme Court case mandating racial integration in public schools. (Her comment begins at the 26:00 mark.)

Responding to Hern?ndez?s statement, another panel member, Dr. John H. Jackson, President and CEO of The Schott Foundation for Public Education (disclosure: a funder of this site), retorted, ?Fine that we have the Common Core Standards. But we need common core supports to meet those common core standards.? (at the 36:30 mark)

Jackson called for a transition from the status quo emphasis on standards and testing to policies ensuring students have more opportunity to learn. And he called the audience?s attention to a new Education Declaration aligned with that policy transition.

Speaking to a more specific situation, Chicago public school activist Jitu Brown, explained the realities of how the standards and testing regime is playing out ? and has been playing out for nearly 20 years ? in his community (beginning at the 15:50 mark). What he described is a situation very much like what has now spread to communities across America, where policy mandates have resulted in resource deprivation, inequity, public disempowerment and the widespread perception that governing policies are driven by corruption.

Time For A Reset

Although the current pause in the high-stakes consequences of standards and testing has been called a ?hiccup? by some (see Hern?ndez above) or a ?flexibility? by others (Duncan?s words), those terms pale in comparison to the passion coming from American communities that want a new direction.

Instead of a rest, what?s needed is a reset for education that can transition us from the tumult of today to real progress for our children?s future.

Source: http://educationopportunitynetwork.org/time-to-reset-the-education-agenda/

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Monday, June 24, 2013

Robo-pets may contribute to quality of life for those with dementia

June 24, 2013 ? Robotic animals can help to improve the quality of life for people with dementia, according to new research.

A study has found that interacting with a therapeutic robot companion made people with mid- to late-stage dementia less anxious and also had a positive influence on their quality of life.

The pilot study, a collaboration led by Professor Wendy Moyle from Griffith University, Australia and involving Northumbria University's Professor Glenda Cook and researchers from institutions in Germany, investigated the effect of interacting with PARO -- a robotic harp seal -- compared with participation in a reading group. The study built on Professor Cook's previous ethnographic work carried out in care homes in North East England.

PARO is fitted with artificial intelligence software and tactile sensors that allow it to respond to touch and sound. It can show emotions such as surprise, happiness and anger, can learn its own name and learns to respond to words that its owner uses frequently.

Eighteen participants, living in a residential aged care facility in Queensland, Australia, took part in activities with PARO for five weeks and also participated in a control reading group activity for the same period. Following both trial periods the impact was assessed, using recognised clinical dementia measurements, for how the activities had influenced the participants' quality of life, tendency to wander, level of apathy, levels of depression and anxiety ratings.

The findings indicated that the robots had a positive, clinically meaningful influence on quality of life, increased levels of pleasure and also reduced displays of anxiety.

Research has already shown that interaction with animals can have a beneficial effect on older adults, increasing their social behaviour and verbal interaction and decreasing feelings of loneliness. However, the presence of animals in residential care home settings can place residents at risk of infection or injury and create additional duties for nursing staff.

This latest study suggests that PARO companions elicit a similar response and could potentially be used in residential settings to help reduce some of the symptoms -- such as agitation, aggression, isolation and loneliness -- of dementia.

Prof Cook, Professor of Nursing at Northumbria University, said: "Our study provides important preliminary support for the idea that robots may present a supplement to activities currently in use and could enhance the life of older adults as therapeutic companions and, in particular, for those with moderate or severe cognitive impairment.

"There is a need for further research, with a larger sample size, and an argument for investing in interventions such as PARO robots which may reduce dementia-related behaviours that make the provision of care challenging as well as costly due to increased use of staff resources and pharmaceutical treatment."

The researchers of the pilot study have identified the need to undertake a larger trial in order to increase the data available. Future studies will also compare the effect of the robot companions with live animals.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/strange_science/~3/jFB6Ff3OGnY/130624075748.htm

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Twinkies to make sweet comeback in 3 weeks

Twinkies expected to return to store shelves July 15 after a crippling strike and liquidation of the company last year. The new company making Twinkies and other Hostess products is operating a leaner, nonunion operation.

By Candice Choi,?AP Food Industry Writer / June 24, 2013

Twinkies will be back on shelves starting next month after its predecessor company went bankrupt after an acrimonious fight with unions last year. The brands have since been purchased y Metropoulos & Co. and Apollo Global Management.

Hostess Brands/AP/File

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Hostess is betting on a sweet comeback for its?Twinkies?snack cakes when they return to store shelves next month.

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The company that went bankrupt after an acrimonious fight with its unionized workers last year is back up and running under new owners and a leaner structure. It says it plans to have?Twinkies?and other snack cakes back on shelves starting July 15.

Based on the outpouring of nostalgia sparked by its demise, Hostess is expecting a blockbuster return next month for?Twinkies?and other sugary treats, such as CupCakes and Donettes. The company says the cakes will taste the same but that the boxes will now bear the tag line "The Sweetest Comeback In The History Of Ever."

"A lot of impostor products have come to the market while Hostess has been off the shelves," says Daren Metropoulos, a principal of the investment firm Metropoulos & Co., which teamed up with Apollo Global Management to buy a variety of Hostess snacks.

Hostess Brands Inc. was struggling for years before it filed for bankruptcy reorganization in early 2012. Workers blamed the troubles on years of mismanagement, as well as a failure of executives to invest in brands to keep up with changing tastes. The company said it was weighed down by higher pension and medical costs than its competitors, whose employees weren't unionized.

To steer it through its bankruptcy reorganization, Hostess hired restructuring expert Greg Rayburn as its CEO. But Rayburn ultimately failed to reach a contract agreement with its second largest union. In November, he blamed striking workers for crippling the company's ability to maintain normal production and announced that Hostess would liquidate.

The shuttering triggered a rush on Hostess snack cakes, with stores selling out of the most popular brands within hours.

About 15,000 unionized workers lost their jobs in the aftermath.

In unwinding its business, Hostess sold off its brands in chunks to different buyers. Its major bread brands including Wonder were sold to Flowers Foods, which makes Tastykakes. McKee Foods, which makes Little Debbie snack cakes, snapped up Drake's Cake, which includes Devil Dogs and Yodels.

Metropoulos & Co. and Apollo bought?Twinkies?and other Hostess cakes for $410 million.

Apollo Global Management, founded by Leon Black, is known for buying troubled brands then selling them for a profit; its investments include fast-food chains Carl's Jr. and Hardee's. Metropoulos & Co., which has revamped and then sold off brands including Chef Boyardee and Bumble Bee, also owns Pabst Brewing Co.

That could mean some cross-promotional marketing is in store.

"There is certainly a natural association with the two," Metropoulos said. "There could be some opportunities for them to seen together."

The trimmed-down Hostess Brands LLC has a far less costly operating structure than the predecessor company. Some of the previous workers were hired back, but they're no longer unionized.

Hostess will also now deliver to warehouses that supply retailers, rather than delivering directly to stores, said Rich Seban, the president of Hostess who previously served as chief operating officer. That will greatly expand its reach, letting it deliver to dollar stores and nearly all convenience stores in the U.S.

Previously, he said Hostess was only able to reach about a third of the country's 150,000 convenience stores.

Production was also consolidated, from 11 bakery plants to four ? one each in Georgia, Kansas, Illinois and Indiana. The headquarters were moved from Texas to Kansas City, Missouri, where Hostess was previously based and still had some accounting offices.

In the months since they vanished from shelves, the cakes have been getting a few touchups as well. For the CupCakes, the company is now using dark cocoa instead of milk chocolate to give them a richer, darker appearance.

Seban stressed that the changes were to improve the cakes, not to cut costs. Prices for the cakes will remain the same; a box of 10?Twinkies?will cost $3.99.

Looking ahead, Seban sees Hostess expanding its product lineup. He noted that Hostess cakes are known for three basic textures: the spongy cake, the creamy filling and the thicker icing. But he said different textures ? such as crunchy ? could be introduced, as well as different flavors.

"We can have some fun with that mixture," he said.

He also said there are many trendy health attributes the company could tap into, such as gluten-free, added fiber, low sugar and low sodium.

During bankruptcy proceedings, Hostess had said that its overall sales had been declining, although the company didn't give a breakout on the performance of individual brands. But Seban is confident?Twinkies?will have staying power beyond its re-launch.

As for the literal shelf-life, Seban is quick to refute the snack cake's fabled indestructibility.

"Forty-five days ? that's it," he said. "They don't last forever."

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/_aPZLmNmax0/Twinkies-to-make-sweet-comeback-in-3-weeks

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Powerful gene-editing tool appears to cause off-target mutations in human cells

June 23, 2013 ? In the past year a group of synthetic proteins called CRISPR-Cas RNA-guided nucleases (RGNs) have generated great excitement in the scientific community as gene-editing tools. Exploiting a method that some bacteria use to combat viruses and other pathogens, CRISPR-Cas RGNs can cut through DNA strands at specific sites, allowing the insertion of new genetic material. However, a team of Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers has found a significant limitation to the use of CRISPR-Cas RGNs, production of unwanted DNA mutations at sites other than the desired target.

"We found that expression of CRISPR-Cas RGNs in human cells can have off-target effects that, surprisingly, can occur at sites with significant sequence differences from the targeted DNA site," says J. Keith Joung, MD, PhD, associate chief for Research in the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Department of Pathology and co-senior author of the report receiving online publication in Nature Biotechnology. "RGNs continue to have tremendous advantages over other genome editing technologies, but these findings have now focused our work on improving their precision."

Consisting of a DNA-cutting enzyme called Cas 9, coupled with a short, 20-nucleotide segment of RNA that matches the target DNA segment, CRISPR-Cas RGNs mimic the primitive immune systems of certain bacteria. When these microbes are infected by viruses or other organisms, they copy a segment of the invader's genetic code and incorporate it into their DNA, passing it on to future bacterial generations. If the same pathogen is encountered in the future, the bacterial enzyme called Cas9, guided by an RNA sequence the matches the copied DNA segment, inactivates the pathogen by cutting its DNA at the target site.

About a year ago, scientists reported the first use of programmed CRISPR-Cas RGNs to target and cut specific DNA sites. Since then several research teams, including Joung's, have succesfully used CRISPR-Cas RGNs to make genomic changes in fruit flies, zebrafish, mice and in human cells -- including induced pluripotent stem cells which have many of the characteristics of embryonic stem cells. The technology's reliance on such a short RNA segment makes CRISPR-Cas RGNs much easier to use than other gene-editing tools called zinc finger nucleases (ZFNs) and transcription activator-like effector nucleases (TALENs), and RGNs can be programmed to introduce several genetic changes at the same time.

However, the possibility that CRISPR-Cas RGNs might cause additional, unwanted genetic changes has been largely unexplored, so Joung's team set out to investigate the occurrence of "off-target" mutations in human cells expressing CRISPR-Cas RGNs. Since the interaction between the guiding RNA segment and the target DNA relies on only 20 nucleotides, they hypothesized that the RNA might also recognize DNA segments that differed from the target by a few nucleotides.

Although previous studies had found that a single-nucleotide mismatch could prevent the action of some CRISPR-Cas RGNs, the MGH team's experiments in human cell lines found multiple instances in which mismatches of as many as five nucleotides did not prevent cleavage of an off-target DNA segment. They also found that the rates of mutation at off-target sites could be as high or even higher than at the targeted site, something that has not been observed with off-target mutations associated with ZFNs or TALENs.

"Our results don't mean that RGNs cannot be important research tools, but they do mean that researchers need to account for these potentially confounding effects in their experiments. They also suggest that the existing RGN platform may not be ready for therapeutic applications," says Joung, who is an associate professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School. "We are now working on ways to reduce these off-target effects, along with methods to identify all potential off-target sites of any given RGN in human cells so that we can assess whether any second-generation RGN platforms that are developed will be actually more precise on a genome-wide scale. I am optimistic that we can further engineer this system to achieve greater specificity so that it might be used for therapy of human diseases."

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/health_medicine/genes/~3/k3Z12VMmz6k/130623145102.htm

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China's Sinopec buys Marathon's Angola oil fields for $1.52 billion

(Reuters) - China's Sinopec Group has agreed to buy Marathon Oil Corp's (MRO.N) Angolan offshore oil and gas field for $1.52 billion, Asia's largest refiner producer said.

Sonangal Sinopec International Ltd, the group's subsidiary, will acquire Houston-based Marathon's 10 percent stake on the Angolan field called Block 31, it said in a statement late on Friday.

China's oil majors has been on an aggressive hunt for overseas assets to bulk up their energy reserves to meet future demand from the world's second-largest economy.

CNPC agreed in March to buy a $4.2-billion stake in a Mozambique offshore natural gas field and on Friday agreed to buy a 20 percent stake in Novatek's (NVTK.MM) $20-billion Yamal-LNG project in northwest Siberia.

The Angolan Block 31 field, operated by BP (BP.L), has estimated proved and probable reserves of 533 million barrels, Sinopec said, adding that it would hold a stake of 15 percent in the block when the transaction was completed.

The $1.52 billion due to be paid by Sinopec is part of a $3-billion asset disposal target set by Marathon in 2011 to shore up its balance sheet to fund further exploration and development projects.

The deal is subject to approval by the Chinese and Angolan governments.

(Corrects name of company in headline and text as Sinopec, not CNPC)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/chinas-sinopec-buys-marathons-angola-oil-fields-1-141010174.html

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