Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.
Source: http://www.facebook.com/MainLineMediaNews/posts/727572113211
fourth of july Happy 4th of July Laura Elizabeth Whitehurst Armie Hammer Aaryn Gries Cop Shoots Dog independence day
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
Reference Department, Albright Memorial Library, Scranton, PA ...
We are pleased to share that we have three new online resources to help you with your research and studying!?
Fold3 is our newest genealogy and history resource. You can search old newspapers, naturalization records, Censuses for information on your family. ?You can even look at digitized versions of milestone documents like the Declaration of Independence and the Gettysburg Address! Try it out today!?
Fold3 is our newest genealogy and history resource. You can search old newspapers, naturalization records, Censuses for information on your family. ?You can even look at digitized versions of milestone documents like the Declaration of Independence and the Gettysburg Address! Try it out today!?
Legal Information Reference Center a new resource that provides how to's and tools for legal forms and legal reference books. ?You can browse by topic or search for specific legal topics. ?Try it for free with your library card.?
Let us know what you think or if you need help navigating these new services!?
Source: http://albrightreference.blogspot.com/2013/10/new-resources.html
alternative minimum tax modeselektor gran torino gloria steinem war of the worlds rock and roll hall of fame severe weather
Saturday, October 5, 2013
Russian ?space troops? are ?not yet ready to fight aliens?, warns official
Even with years of training and the nickname of ?space troops?, Russia?s?Aerospace Defence Troops would lack the ability to handle an extra-terrestrial attack, a Russian defense official has warned.
Russia?s Aerospace Defense Troops are ?not yet ready to fight aliens?, an official warned Wednesday during a media conference.
The official?s warning came in response to a question asked by a journalist at a media conference at?the Titov Main Test and Space Systems Control Center, located 25 miles outside of the Russian capital, Moscow.
Sergey Berezhnoy, the?center?s deputy chief, responded to the unexpected question with a short statement.
?We are unfortunately not ready to fight extraterrestrial civilizations, our center was not tasked with it. There are too many problems on Earth and near it.?
The Russian Space Forces were founded shortly after the break-up of the Soviet Union, but were replaced by the?Russian Aerospace Defense Forces in 2011. The military branch controls approximately 80% of the country?s satellites, and is mainly responsible for both air and missile defense, but its duties notably also include the protection of Russia from ?potential threats to the Russian Federation in space and from space?.
Amongst the center?s facilities are a ?ballistic missile launch warning center?, ?a center for space surveillance? and a ?strategic missile testing range.?
Despite this ominous warning from a defense official, Russia Today ? the first agency to report the news of this comment ? were very quick to reassure their readers that ?while they may not as yet be able to deal with an alien attack, Russia?s space troops at least have extremely effective and high-tech means for dealing with terrestrial issues and threats.?
Callum is a physics and computer science student from the English midlands. He is fascinated by technology, physics and philosophy, and the curious ways in which they intertwine and battle.
pujols watchmen hitch justin beiber perfect game jon jones vs rashad evans results rashad evans
Sunday, September 15, 2013
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
British broadcaster David Frost dies aged 74
British TV giant David Frost, who interviewed the world's great and good in a half-century broadcasting career, has died aged 74 of a heart attack on board the Queen Elizabeth cruise liner, his family said Sunday.
Frost, celebrated for his 1977 talks with Richard Nixon that extracted an unexpected apology from the disgraced US president over the Watergate scandal, died Saturday.
Operator Cunard said the ship left its British home port of Southampton on Saturday on a 10-day Mediterranean.
"Sir David Frost died of a heart attack last night aboard the Queen Elizabeth where he was giving a speech," his family said in a statement.
"His family are devastated and ask for privacy at this difficult time," the statement said. "A family funeral will be held in the near future and details of a memorial service will be announced in due course."
Frost's interviewees read like a who's who of the rich and famous, from big names in show business to world leaders, including South African anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela.
Frost was the only person to have interviewed the last eight British prime ministers and the last seven US presidents before Barack Obama, and the last person to have interviewed the last shah of Iran, the Mohammed Reza Pahlavi.
Other subjects included Mikhail Gorbachev, Vladimir Putin, Yasser Arafat, F. W. de Klerk, Jacques Chirac and Benazir Bhutto.
"Hello, good evening and welcome" became his catchphrase, starting off interviews with a friendly veneer that belied a blunt determination to extract information.
"His scrupulous and disarming politeness hid a mind like a vice," said Menzies Campbell, former leader of Britain's Liberal Democrats. "David Frost could do you over without you realising it until it was too late."
The lengthy interviews with Nixon were crucial for both men -- Nixon was hoping to salvage his reputation for history, while Frost wanted to add another feather to his cap of famous interviews .
In the end, Frost wrung a mea culpa from Nixon over Watergate, the dirty tricks scandal which prompted his resignation in 1974 and left a lasting scar on the US political landscape.
"I let down my friends, I let down the country," the former president said.
Frost told BBC television in 2009: "We knew what we were trying to do ... and in the end his 'mea culpa' went further than even we had hoped.
"At the end of that I think we were aware that something sort of historic had happened and we'd gone further than expected."
The encounter was turned into a play entitled "Frost/Nixon", which was adapted into a 2008 film with Michael Sheen playing Frost and Frank Langella as Nixon. It was nominated for five Oscars.
Outside world affairs, Front's roster included Orson Welles, Tennessee Williams, Noel Coward, Elton John, Woody Allen, Muhammad Ali, the Beatles, Clint Eastwood, Anthony Hopkins, John Gielgud, Norman Mailer, Warren Beatty among countless others.
British Prime Minister David Cameron hailed Frost as "an extraordinary man -- with charm, wit, talent, intelligence and warmth in equal measure.
"He made a huge impact on television and politics. The Nixon interviews were among the great broadcast moments -- but there were many other brilliant interviews," Cameron said in a statement.
"He could be -- and certainly was with me -- both a friend and a fearsome interviewer."
The son of a Methodist minister, David Paradine Frost was born in Kent, southeast England, on April 7, 1939.
Fresh out of Cambridge University, he presented the BBC's groundbreaking "That Was The Week That Was", which took an unprecedented satirical look at the week's news between 1962 and 1963.
A globetrotter, Frost revelled in the Concorde jet-set high life, presenting five programmes a week in the United States and three in Britain.
In 1983, he married Lady Carina Fitzalan-Howard, second daughter of the Duke of Norfolk -- the premier duke in the English nobility. They had three sons.
A successful businessman, Frost was knighted in 1993, becoming Sir David.
The broadcaster wrote 17 books, produced several films and started two British television networks, London Weekend Television and TV-am.
He began working for Al Jazeera in 2006.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/british-broadcaster-david-frost-dies-aged-74-family-104553691.html
indicted Big Brother 15 VMAs Chelsea Manning nasdaq Ichiro Suzuki powerball winning numbers
Thursday, August 29, 2013
Dealzmodo: 4TB Thunderbolt External, Touchscreen Desktop, iTunes Money
If you're ready to take your storage to the next level and actually take advantage of that Thunderbolt port on your Mac, then this 4TB Western Digital RAID Supported Thunderbolt External Hard Drive is for you. It's available today for $350, which is almost half of what it's going for everywhere else. [CowBoom]
Source: http://gizmodo.com/dealzmodo-4tb-thunderbolt-external-touchscreen-deskto-1215235243
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Librarians throw book at 'em in Beastie Boys spoof
Music 
40 minutes ago
The 1994 video for the Beastie Boys' song "Sabotage" is regarded as one of the greatest music videos of all time. If you're skeptical that it could be re-imagined with librarians as the central characters, just give it a look.
The spoof video, created at Chicago's Francis W. Parker School, is going viral after after being shared on the New York Public Library Tumblr page, among many other places. The work is the creation of comedians Mike Ferbrache and Duane Freeman. Freeman is a middle school counselor and Ferbrache is a third grade teacher at Parker. The two run a Vimeo page called the Mike and Duane Show.
"We have been doing this for 10 years as part of a variety show and have a lot of parodies that involve administration, faculty, students, and staff," Freeman told TODAY.com on Tuesday.
It all pays respect to the Spike Jonze-directed video in which the hip-hop trio of Mike D, MCA and Ad Rock portray 1970s-era detectives. In that classic, the Beasties sport fake mustaches and aviator shades as they race after bad guys, jump over the hood of their cop car, and eat donuts ? among other police-related pursuits.
The remake features real librarians from the Francis W. Parker School giving chase among the bookshelves. It has the same look and feel of the original, and even uses a camera mounted on a book cart to mimic the view from the top of a cop car in the Beastie Boys' version.?
The featured librarians get mock names, too. Anne Duncan is "Story Time," Cathy Connelly is "The Techie," and Stephanie McMurray stars as "Late Fee."
"Sabotage" was nominated for five awards at the 1994 MTV Video Music Awards. It lost in every category: three times to Aerosmith's "Cryin," and twice to R.E.M.'s "Everybody Hurts." MCA, dressed as Nathaniel Hornblower,?famously rushed the stage during Michael Stipe's acceptance speech to protest the shutout. In 2009, the video was honored at the VMAs with Best Video (That Should Have Won a Moonman).
alshon jeffery stephen hill draft tracker california earthquake california earthquake tyson chandler tyson chandler
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Dayton no lock for NCAA tournament First Four
'); handlers.failure(); } else{ removeLfError(); handlers.success(); } }; function updateAuthorLinks(){ $('.fyre-comment-username').each(function() { $(this).click(function() { window.location.href = $(this).attr('href'); }); }); $('.fyre-comment-author').each(function() { $(this).click(function() { window.location.href = $(this).attr('href'); }); }); } function updateOneLineComments(){ //console.log("Checking Comments"); $(".fyre-comment-wrapper").each(function() { if ($(this).find(".fyre-comment").css('display') != 'none'){ var commentText = $(this).find(".fyre-comment").html(); if (commentText != null){ var loopCtr = 0; // for IE8 while ( (commentText.indexOf("
") !== -1) && (loopCtr ",' '); commentText = commentText.replace("
",' '); loopCtr++; } //for other browsers while ( (commentText.indexOf("
") !== -1) && (loopCtr ",' '); commentText = commentText.replace("
",' '); loopCtr++; } //console.log(commentText); $(this).find(".fyre-comment").css('display','none'); $(this).find(".fyre-comment-head").append(commentText); } // end check for blank text } //console.log("Checking Height"); cntHeight = $(this).find(".fyre-comment-head").height(); if (cntHeight > 0){ //console.log("Setting Height"); cntHeight = -1 * ((cntHeight / 2) + 12); $(this).find(".fyre-flag-link").css('top',cntHeight); } }); } function change_profile_link(){ $(".fyre .fyre-box-list .fyre-edit-profile-link a").attr("href",'#'); $(".fyre .fyre-box-list .fyre-edit-profile-link a").attr("alt",''); $('.fyre .fyre-box-list .fyre-edit-profile-link a').click(function() { return false; }); $('.fyre .fyre-box-list .fyre-edit-profile-link').remove(); $(".fyre .fyre-comment-head .fyre-comment-username").attr("href",'#'); $(".fyre .fyre-comment-head .fyre-comment-username").attr("target",''); $(".fyre .fyre-comment-head .fyre-comment-username").attr("alt",''); $('.fyre .fyre-comment-head .fyre-comment-username').click(function() { return false; }); $('.fyre .fyre-comment-head').each(function() { var alltxt = $(this).html(); var nickname = $(this).find('.fyre-comment-username').html(); if (!(nickname == null)){ alltxt = "
" + nickname + '' + alltxt.replace(/
]*)>[\s\S]*?/gi,''); $(this).html(alltxt); } }); $('.fyre .fyre-comment p').each(function() { var alltxt = $(this).html(); var mention = $(this).find('.fyre-mention').html(); if (!(mention == null)){ alltxt = alltxt.replace(/]*)>[\s\S]*?/gi,''); $(this).html(alltxt); } }); } function open_profile(profile_link_url){ window.open(profile_link_url); } $(document).ready( function () { // Log in the user if we got a token for them // Change the DOM after login since things get re-rendered //console.log("== LF Calling Load =="); var conv = fyre.conv.load({"network": "cbssports.fyre.co", 'strings': customStrings, authDelegate: authDelegate}, lf_config, function(widget) { //console.log("== LF in Load =="); widget.on('initialRenderComplete', function () { //console.log("== LF Render Complete =="); $('#lf_comments_label').show(); loggedin = readCookie('pid'); //CBSi.log(loggedin); if ((typeof loggedin == "string") && (loggedin.match(/^L:/))) { isLoggedIn = 1; if (typeof userObj.token != 'undefined'){ if (userObj.token) { hasProfile = 1; document.cookie = "lf_social_info=; expires=0; path=/"; doLivefyreAuth(userObj); } } changeDOM(); } var loggedSocially = new String(readCookie('lf_social_info')); if ((loggedSocially == "|FB|") && (isLoggedIn == 0)){ isLoggedIn = 1; hasProfile = 1; callFBApi(); } if ((loggedSocially.indexOf("|GP|") >= 0) && (isLoggedIn == 0)){ isLoggedIn = 1; hasProfile = 1; callGPApi(); } updateCommentCounts('.commentsBubble',$('.fyre-stream-stats .fyre-comment-count span').html()); updateAuthorLinks(); setTimeout(function(){},2000); change_profile_link(); setTimeout(function(){change_profile_link()},2000); }); widget.on('userLoggedIn', function () { //CBSi.log("== LF Logging In User =="); changeDOM(); removeLfError(); //console.log("Logged in changing comment format"); setTimeout(function(){change_profile_link()},2000); }); widget.on('userLoggedOut', function () { //CBSi.log("== LF Logging Out User =="); if (document.cookie.indexOf("|GP|") > 0){ disconnectGPUser(globalGPaccessToken); } document.cookie = "lf_social_info=; expires=0; path=/" document.cookie = "lf_login_info=; expires=0; path=/" setTimeout(function(){FB.XFBML.parse();},500); }); widget.on('commentCountUpdated', function (countData) { //CBSi.log("== LF Comment Added =="); updateCommentCounts('.commentsBubble',countData); change_profile_link(); setTimeout(function(){change_profile_link()},2000); }); widget.on('commentPosted', function (countData) { updateAuthorLinks(); change_profile_link(); setTimeout(function(){change_profile_link()},2000); }); }); });?
College Basketball Video
Latest
ray lewis alicia keys Harbaugh brothers superbowl commercials randy moss randy moss OJ Brigance
Tuesday, June 18, 2013
Ed Hardy: Jon Gosselin 'tanked' my brand
Pop culture 
11 hours ago
Michael Buckner / Getty Images file
Jon Gosselin at a Virgin America party in Los Angeles in April 2012, sans Ed Hardy shirt.
Having a celebrity wear your clothing brand is usually good for business -- get your dress on Kate Middleton, for instance, and you can pretty much expect sales to shoot through the roof. But if your brand is sported by a less-liked celebrity, it can turn into a brand catastrophe.
Just ask Ed Hardy, who said having reality personality Jon Gosselin photographed in his clothing led to the brand's demise.
?That Jon Gosselin thing was the nail in the coffin,? the tattoo artist told the New York Post. ?That?s what tanked it. Macy?s used to have a huge window display with Ed Hardy, and it filtered down and that?s why Macy?s dropped the brand.?
Gosselin was frequently snapped by the paparazzi wearing the tattoo-inspired clothing brand during a 2009 yachting trip to Cannes. Sure, bonafide celebs such as Madonna had also publicly sported Hardy's clothing, but that apparently wasn't enough to combat the negative association brought on by the star of "Jon & Kate Plus 8."
However, Hardy doesn't blame only Gosselin for sinking his clothing empire. He also points the finger at Christian Audigier, the French fashion designer who was responsible for getting Hardy's ink-inspired artwork onto clothing and other products.
?Christian worships celebrities so much, he will get next to anyone who is famous for anything,? Hardy told the Post. ?If he could have gotten Charles Manson in a shirt, he would have.?
Source: http://www.today.com/entertainment/ed-hardy-jon-gosselin-tanked-my-clothing-brand-6C10355298
photoshop cs6 beta cate blanchett nfl news tebow jets romney etch a sketch jeb bush sherry arnold
Friday, May 17, 2013
Obama picks budget official to run troubled IRS
President Barack Obama speaks on the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups for extra tax scrutiny in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Wednesday May 15, 2013. Obama announced the resignation of Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, the top official at the IRS. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
President Barack Obama speaks on the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups for extra tax scrutiny in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Wednesday May 15, 2013. Obama announced the resignation of Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, the top official at the IRS. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
President Barack Obama speaks on the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups for extra tax scrutiny in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Wednesday May 15, 2013. Obama announced the resignation of Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, the top official at the IRS. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? President Barack Obama picked a senior White House budget official to become the acting head of the Internal Revenue Service on Thursday, the same day another top official announced plans to leave the agency amid the controversy over agents targeting tea party groups.
Obama named longtime civil servant Daniel Werfel as the acting IRS commissioner. Werfel, 42, currently serves as controller of the Office of Management and Budget, making him a key player in implementing recent automatic spending cuts known as the sequester.
"Throughout his career working in both Democratic and Republican administrations, Danny has proven an effective leader who serves with professionalism, integrity and skill," Obama said in a statement. "The American people deserve to have the utmost confidence and trust in their government, and as we work to get to the bottom of what happened and restore confidence in the IRS, Danny has the experience and management ability necessary to lead the agency at this important time."
Werfel replaces Steven Miller as acting IRS commissioner. Miller was forced to resign Wednesday amid the growing scandal, though he is still scheduled to testify Friday at a congressional hearing.
Also Thursday, Joseph Grant, one of Miller's top deputies, announced plans to retire June 3, according to an internal IRS memo. Grant is commissioner of the agency's tax exempt and government entities division, which includes the agents that targeted tea party groups for additional scrutiny when they applied for tax-exempt status.
Grant joined the IRS in 2005 and took over as acting commissioner of the tax exempt and government entities division in December 2010. He was just named the permanent commissioner May 8.
When asked whether Grant was pressured to leave, IRS spokeswoman Michelle Eldridge said Grant had more than 31 years of federal service and it was his personal decision to leave.
Before he joined the IRS, Grant was a top official at the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation.
Grant's predecessor at the IRS was Sarah Hall Ingram, who is now director of the agency's Affordable Care Act Office. Ingram was in charge of the tax exempt division when IRS agents first started targeting conservative groups.
The IRS said Ingram was assigned to help the agency implement the health care law in December 2010, about six months before an inspector general's report said her subordinate, the director of exempt organizations, learned about the targeting.
Still, the fact that she was in charge of the division when the targeting first started is sure to give Republicans fodder in their fight against Obama's health care law. The Republican-led House voted 229-195 Thursday to repeal the health care law.
Werfel agreed to head the IRS through the end of September, the White House said. Presumably, Obama will nominate a new commissioner by then.
IRS commissioners serve five-year terms and must be confirmed by the Senate. Werfel won't need Senate approval because he is a temporary appointment. The Senate, however, confirmed Werfel for his current position without opposition in 2009.
Werfel has had several jobs at the Office of Management and Budget and worked there during President George W. Bush's administration. He has also been a trial attorney in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division.
"He is an immensely talented and dedicated public servant who has ably served presidents of both parties," Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said in a statement. "Danny has a strong record of raising his hand for ? and excelling at ? tough management assignments."
Former Bush chief of staff Joshua Bolten said Werfel was highly regarded by the Bush White House and that departing Bush budget officials recommended Werfel for controller to the incoming Obama camp after the 2008 election.
"He was consummately professional, well organized and effective," said Bolten, who also served as Bush's budget director from 2003 to 2006.
Werfel takes over an agency in crisis and under investigation. The IRS apologized last week for improperly targeting conservative political groups for additional, sometimes burdensome scrutiny when they applied for tax-exempt status. The practice went on more than 18 months, diminishing the ability of these groups to raise money during election cycles in 2010 and 2012, said an inspector general's report released this week.
The report did not indicate that Washington initiated the targeting of conservative groups. But it did blame ineffective management in Washington for allowing it to happen.
On Thursday, Obama dismissed the idea of a special prosecutor, saying probes by Congress and the Justice Department should be able to figure out who was responsible.
"Between those investigations I think we're going to be able to figure out exactly what happened, who was involved, what went wrong, and we're going to be able to implement steps to fix it," Obama said at a Rose Garden press conference.
Obama promised to work with Congress in its investigations, and he reiterated that he did not know that conservative groups were targeted until it became public last Friday.
"I promise you this, that the minute I found out about it, then my main focus was making sure that we get the thing fixed," Obama said.
Don't look for the controversy to subside.
Three congressional committees are investigating, and the FBI has launched a criminal probe.
On Friday, Miller is scheduled to testify before the House Ways and Means Committee. Also testifying is J. Russell George, the Treasury inspector general for tax administration.
Ways and Means Committee members are expected to grill Miller over why he failed to tell lawmakers that conservative groups were targeted, even after the agency said he was briefed in May 2012.
"The IRS has demonstrated a culture of cover up and has failed time and time again to be completely open and honest with the American people," said Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. "The committee and the American people deserve honest answers from Mr. Miller at our hearing this Friday."
Miller, a 25-year career civil servant at the IRS, took over the agency in November, when the five-year term of Commissioner Douglas Shulman ended. Shulman was appointed by President George W. Bush.
At the time when tea party groups were targeted, Miller was a deputy commissioner and Grant's supervisor.
The Senate Finance Committee said it will hold a hearing on the matter Tuesday. The House Oversight Committee is to hold a hearing Wednesday.
On Thursday, Senate Republicans called for yet another investigation into whether agents in the same Cincinnati office that targeted conservative groups released confidential taxpayer information from some of those groups.
The Journalism website ProPublica reported this week that the IRS had released nine pending confidential applications of conservative groups to ProPublica late last year.
The IRS said in a statement that the inspector general already had investigated the matter, and "found these instances to be inadvertent and unintentional disclosures by the employees involved."
___
Associated Press writer Jim Kuhnhenn contributed to this report.
___
Follow Stephen Ohlemacher on Twitter: http://twitter.com/stephenatap
Associated Pressnorad 12/21/12 winter solstice Jabari Parker 2012 australia Brothers Grimm
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
Billion-year-old water could hold clues to life on Earth and Mars
May 15, 2013 ? A UK-Canadian team of scientists has discovered ancient pockets of water, which have been isolated deep underground for billions of years and contain abundant chemicals known to support life.
This water could be some of the oldest on the planet and may even contain life. Not just that, but the similarity between the rocks that trapped it and those on Mars raises the hope that comparable life-sustaining water could lie buried beneath the red planet's surface.
The findings, published in Nature today, may force us to rethink which parts of our planet are fit for life, and could reveal clues about how microbes evolve in isolation.
Researchers from the universities of Manchester, Lancaster, Toronto and McMaster analysed water pouring out of boreholes from a mine 2.4 kilometres beneath Ontario, Canada.
They found that the water is rich in dissolved gases like hydrogen, methane and different forms -- called isotopes -- of noble gases such as helium, neon, argon and xenon. Indeed, there is as much hydrogen in the water as around hydrothermal vents in the deep ocean, many of which teem with microscopic life.
The hydrogen and methane come from the interaction between the rock and water, as well as natural radioactive elements in the rock reacting with the water. These gases could provide energy for microbes that may not have been exposed to the sun for billions of years.
The crystalline rocks surrounding the water are thought to be around 2.7 billion years old. But no-one thought the water could be the same age, until now.
Using ground-breaking techniques developed at the University of Manchester, the researchers show that the fluid is at least 1.5 billion years old, but could be significantly older.
NERC-funded Professor Chris Ballentine of the University of Manchester, co-author of the study, and project director, says:
'We've found an interconnected fluid system in the deep Canadian crystalline basement that is billions of years old, and capable of supporting life. Our finding is of huge interest to researchers who want to understand how microbes evolve in isolation, and is central to the whole question of the origin of life, the sustainability of life, and life in extreme environments and on other planets.'
Before this finding, the only water of this age was found trapped in tiny bubbles in rock and is incapable of supporting life. But the water found in the Canadian mine pours from the rock at a rate of nearly two litres per minute. It has similar characteristics to far younger water flowing from a mine 2.8 kilometres below ground in South Africa that was previously found to support microbes.
Ballentine and his colleagues don't yet know if the underground system in Canada sustains life, but Dr Greg Holland of Lancaster University, lead author of the study says:
'Our Canadian colleagues are trying to find out if the water contains life right now. What we can be sure of is that we have identified a way in which planets can create and preserve an environment friendly to microbial life for billions of years. This is regardless of how inhospitable the surface might be, opening up the possibility of similar environments in the subsurface of Mars.'
Professor Ballentine, based in Manchester's School of Earth, Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, adds:
'While the questions about life on Mars raised by our work are incredibly exciting, the ground-breaking techniques we have developed at Manchester to date ancient waters also provide a way to calculate how fast methane gas is produced in ancient rock systems globally. The same new techniques can be applied to characterise old, deep groundwater that may be a safe place to inject carbon dioxide.'
David Willetts, Minister for Universities and Science, says:
'This is excellent pioneering research. It gives new insight into our planet. It has also developed new technology for carbon capture and storage projects. These have the potential for growth, job creation and our environment.'
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/xolmr4IPKJ4/130515131550.htm
Fox News Suicide Google Ryder Cup Standings Dexter Season 7 Ryder Cup 2012 Johnny Lewis yom kippur
Saturday, May 4, 2013
Boston bomb suspect died of gunshots, blunt trauma
BOSTON (AP) ? A suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings died from gunshot wounds and blunt trauma to his head and torso, a funeral director said Friday.
Worcester funeral home owner Peter Stefan has 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev's body and read details from his death certificate. The certificate cites Tsarnaev's "gunshot wounds of torso and extremities" and lists the time of his death as 1:35 a.m. on April 19, four days after the deadly bombing, Stefan said.
Tsarnaev died after a gunfight with authorities who had launched a massive manhunt for him and his brother, ethnic Chechens from Russia who came to the United States about a decade ago. Police have said he ran out of ammunition before his younger brother dragged his body under a vehicle while fleeing.
Tsarnaev's family on Friday was making arrangements for his funeral as investigators searched the woods near a college attended by 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who was captured less than a day after his brother's death.
The funeral parlor in Worcester is familiar with Muslim services and said it will handle arrangements for Tamerlan Tsarnaev, whose body was released by the state medical examiner Thursday.
The body initially was taken to a North Attleborough funeral home, where it was greeted by about 20 protesters. Stefan, owner of Graham Putnam and Mahoney Funeral Parlors in Worcester, an hour's drive west of Boston, said everybody deserves a dignified burial service no matter the circumstances of his or her death and he is prepared for protests.
"My problem here is trying to find a gravesite. A lot of people don't want to do it. They don't want to be involved with this," said Stefan, who said dozens of protesters gathered outside his funeral home, upset with his decision to handle the funeral. "I keep bringing up the point of Lee Harvey Oswald, Timothy McVeigh or Ted Bundy. Somebody had to do those, too."
Meanwhile, two U.S. officials said Dzhokhar Tsarnaev told interrogators that he and his brother initially considered setting off their bombs on July Fourth.
Boston police said they planned to review security procedures for the Independence Day Boston Pops concert and fireworks display, which draws a crowd of more than 500,000 annually and is broadcast to a national TV audience. Authorities plan to look at security procedures for large events held in other cities, notably the massive New Year's Eve celebration held each year in New York City's Times Square, Massachusetts state police spokesman David Procopio said.
Gov. Deval Patrick said everything possible will be done to assure a safe event.
"I think the most important thing is that we got them, and there's investigation continuing about where the other leads may lead," he said. "I can tell you, having been thoroughly briefed, that the law enforcement at every level is pursuing everything."
As part of the bombing investigation, federal, state and local authorities were searching the woods near the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth campus, where Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was a student. Christina DiIorio-Sterling, a spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz, could not say what investigators were looking for but said residents should know there is no threat to public safety.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who was found hiding in a tarp-covered boat in a suburban Boston backyard, faces a charge of using a weapon of mass destruction to kill. Three of his college classmates were arrested Wednesday and accused of helping after the bombing to remove a laptop and backpack from his dormitory room before the FBI searched it.
The April 15 bombing, using pressure cookers packed with explosives, nails, ball bearings and metal shards, killed three people and injured more than 260 others near the marathon's finish line.
The brothers decided to carry out the attack before Independence Day when they finished assembling the bombs, the surviving suspect told interrogators after he was arrested, according to two U.S. officials briefed on the investigation. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the ongoing investigation.
Investigators believe some of the explosives used in the attack were assembled in Tamerlan Tsarnaev's home, though there may have been some assembly elsewhere, one of the officials said. It does not appear that the brothers ever had big, definitive plans, the official said.
The brothers' mother insists the allegations against them are lies.
Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security ordered border agents to immediately begin verifying that every international student who arrives in the U.S. has a valid student visa, according to an internal memorandum obtained Friday by The Associated Press. The new procedure is the government's first security change directly related to the Boston bombings.
The order from a senior official at U.S. Customs and Border Protection, David J. Murphy, was circulated Thursday and came one day after President Barack Obama's administration acknowledged that one of the students accused of hiding evidence, Azamat Tazhayakov, of Kazakhstan, was allowed to return to the U.S. in January without a valid student visa.
Tazhayakov's lawyer has said he had nothing to do with the bombing and was shocked by it.
A benefit concert featuring Aerosmith, James Taylor and Jimmy Buffett is scheduled for May 30 at the TD Garden in Boston. The proceeds will go to The One Fund, which has taken in more than $28 million for those injured and the families of those who were killed.
The fund's administrator, Kenneth Feinberg, said Friday he plans to hold meetings with victims next week and begin cutting checks by the end of June.
___
Associated Press writers Bridget Murphy and Mark Pratt in Boston and Pete Yost, Eileen Sullivan and Alicia A. Caldwell in Washington contributed to this report.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/boston-bomb-suspect-died-gunshots-blunt-trauma-000018135.html
nfl combine 84th annual academy awards beginners 2012 oscars the shore meryl streep oscar wins sasha baron cohen oscars
Breeze Through Grade School With Multiplication Cheat Sheet Socks
They say cheaters never prosper, but those people obviously never managed to score an A+ by looking at someone else's exam. So if you're having a bit of a rough time mastering your multiplication tables, just grab a pair of these Cheat Feet socks and don't sweat your next test.
     |
wes welker finish line Conclave tmz Sizzurp the bachelor earthquake
Friday, May 3, 2013
Lindsay Lohan Flees Court-Ordered Rehab Just Minutes After Arrival
Actress reportedly said she didn't feel safe at first rehab and checked into Betty Ford on Friday.
By Gil Kaufman
Lindsay Lohan
Photo: Valerie Macon/ Getty Images
Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1706750/lindsay-lohan-rehab--flees-leaves.jhtml
iPhone 5 9-11 Chris Brown Tattoo Innocence of Muslims Clara Schumann Jael Strauss Alison Pill
More than a game: Exploring new digital frontiers
![[ Back to EurekAlert! ]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_v2ZiilwcVZOoOO-rXg1PA49XH1nS8vWpwYnpMgIRb50wFwIRTlPHZQlLlqZPgu74KdHHAcvxcAzW2GLF6_5oSQUxYODTmcrYaTEW1lkWI=s0-d){kind=small}
Public release date: 3-May-2013[ | E-mail |
Share ] Contact: David Garner
caron.lett@york.ac.uk
44-077-953-15029
University of York
A groundbreaking new initiative led by the University of York, with partners at Cass Business School, part of City University London and Durham University Business School, aims to unlock the potential for scientific and social benefits in digital games.
The 1.2 million project aims to bring the UK digital games industry closer to scientists, teachers and healthcare workers to harness their ingenuity and innovation to contribute to advances in science and society.
Researchers will work with games companies and industry network associations to explore ways to promote the production of more games with a social and scientific purpose.
The New Economic Models and Opportunities for digital Games (NEMOG) initiative, funded jointly by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and the Economic and Social Research Council, will employ three post-doctoral researchers. It also has an advisory board reflecting the support of more than a dozen games companies and nine creative industries network organisations.
Principal investigator Peter Cowling, an Anniversary Professor based in the York Centre for Complex Systems Analysis (YCSSA), said: "Every action in an online game, from an in-game purchase to a simple button push, generates a piece of network data. This is a truly immense source of information about player behaviours and preferences. We will develop new algorithms to "mine" that data to better understand game players as an avenue for making better games, societal impact and scientific research."
Researchers will investigate sustainable business models for digital games, particularly those with scientific and social goals. This will help to guide how businesses can start up and grow to develop a new generation of games with the potential to improve society.
They will also build simulation models to investigate what might happen if, for example, Government policy were to encourage the development of games with scientific and social benefits.
Professor Cowling added: "The numbers of games sold and the numbers of game hours played mean that we only need to persuade a small fraction of the games industry to consider the potential for social and scientific benefit to achieve a massive benefit for society. Potentially this will start a movement that will lead to mainstream distribution of games aimed at scientific and social benefits.
Professor Nicola Spence, the chief executive of Science City York, who chairs the NEMOG Advisory Board, added: "It is an ambitious programme, but the potential benefits if we are even partially successful could have a huge impact on children, science and wider society, as well as the digital economy."
The NEMOG research team consists of Professor Peter Cowling, Dr Ignazio Cabras and Dr Daniel Kudenko of the University of York, Professor Feng Li, of Cass Business School, and Professor Kiran Fernandes, of Durham University Business School, with three postdoctoral researchers to be appointed and a wide range of games companies, network organisations and potential users of games for scientific and social purposes.
The digital games manufacturers supporting the project are: 4 Door Lemon, AI Factory, Albino Pixel, Complex City Apps, Creative Assembly, Introversion, LimbsAlive, MiniMonos, Playgen, Red Kite Games, Revolution, WeR Interactive, ZumFun.
Network organisations supporting the project are: AIGameDev.com, the Creative Industries Knowledge Transfer Network, City of York Council, Digital Shoreditch, Game Republic, Science City York, the SiDE Social Inclusion through the Digital Economy Hub, Tech City, TIGA.
###
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public release date: 3-May-2013[ | E-mail |
Share ] Contact: David Garner
caron.lett@york.ac.uk
44-077-953-15029
University of York
A groundbreaking new initiative led by the University of York, with partners at Cass Business School, part of City University London and Durham University Business School, aims to unlock the potential for scientific and social benefits in digital games.
The 1.2 million project aims to bring the UK digital games industry closer to scientists, teachers and healthcare workers to harness their ingenuity and innovation to contribute to advances in science and society.
Researchers will work with games companies and industry network associations to explore ways to promote the production of more games with a social and scientific purpose.
The New Economic Models and Opportunities for digital Games (NEMOG) initiative, funded jointly by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and the Economic and Social Research Council, will employ three post-doctoral researchers. It also has an advisory board reflecting the support of more than a dozen games companies and nine creative industries network organisations.
Principal investigator Peter Cowling, an Anniversary Professor based in the York Centre for Complex Systems Analysis (YCSSA), said: "Every action in an online game, from an in-game purchase to a simple button push, generates a piece of network data. This is a truly immense source of information about player behaviours and preferences. We will develop new algorithms to "mine" that data to better understand game players as an avenue for making better games, societal impact and scientific research."
Researchers will investigate sustainable business models for digital games, particularly those with scientific and social goals. This will help to guide how businesses can start up and grow to develop a new generation of games with the potential to improve society.
They will also build simulation models to investigate what might happen if, for example, Government policy were to encourage the development of games with scientific and social benefits.
Professor Cowling added: "The numbers of games sold and the numbers of game hours played mean that we only need to persuade a small fraction of the games industry to consider the potential for social and scientific benefit to achieve a massive benefit for society. Potentially this will start a movement that will lead to mainstream distribution of games aimed at scientific and social benefits.
Professor Nicola Spence, the chief executive of Science City York, who chairs the NEMOG Advisory Board, added: "It is an ambitious programme, but the potential benefits if we are even partially successful could have a huge impact on children, science and wider society, as well as the digital economy."
The NEMOG research team consists of Professor Peter Cowling, Dr Ignazio Cabras and Dr Daniel Kudenko of the University of York, Professor Feng Li, of Cass Business School, and Professor Kiran Fernandes, of Durham University Business School, with three postdoctoral researchers to be appointed and a wide range of games companies, network organisations and potential users of games for scientific and social purposes.
The digital games manufacturers supporting the project are: 4 Door Lemon, AI Factory, Albino Pixel, Complex City Apps, Creative Assembly, Introversion, LimbsAlive, MiniMonos, Playgen, Red Kite Games, Revolution, WeR Interactive, ZumFun.
Network organisations supporting the project are: AIGameDev.com, the Creative Industries Knowledge Transfer Network, City of York Council, Digital Shoreditch, Game Republic, Science City York, the SiDE Social Inclusion through the Digital Economy Hub, Tech City, TIGA.
###
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-05/uoy-mta050313.php
?Creepy? geometry homework assignment references serial killer Ted Bundy, peeping Tom
May 1 (Reuters) - Post position for Saturday's 139th Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs after Wednesday's draw (listed as barrier, HORSE, jockey, trainer) 1. BLACK ONYX, Joe Bravo, Kelly Breen 2. OXBOW, Gary Stevens, D. Wayne Lukas 3. REVOLUTIONARY, Calvin Borel, Todd Pletcher 4. GOLDEN SOUL, Robby Albarado, Dallas Stewart 5. NORMANDY INVASION, Javier Castellano, Chad Brown 6. MYLUTE, Rosie Napravnik, Tom Amoss 7. GIANT FINISH, Jose Espinoza, Tony Dutrow 8. GOLDENCENTS, Kevin Krigger, Doug O'Neill 9. OVERANALYZE, Rafael Bejarano, Todd Pletcher 10. PALACE MALICE, Mike Smith, Todd Pletcher 11. ...
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/creepy-homework-ted-bundy-peeping-tom-143345112.html
wanderlust gone tyler perry good deeds pretty in pink shark tank john wall gordon hayward
It Is ?Anti-Choice? And We Should Be Blunt With Language (OliverWillisLikeKryptoniteToStupid)
Printable functional 'bionic' ear melds electronics and biology
May 1, 2013 ? Scientists at Princeton University used off-the-shelf printing tools to create a functional ear that can "hear" radio frequencies far beyond the range of normal human capability.
The researchers' primary purpose was to explore an efficient and versatile means to merge electronics with tissue. The scientists used 3D printing of cells and nanoparticles followed by cell culture to combine a small coil antenna with cartilage, creating what they term a bionic ear.
"In general, there are mechanical and thermal challenges with interfacing electronic materials with biological materials," said Michael McAlpine, an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton and the lead researcher. "Previously, researchers have suggested some strategies to tailor the electronics so that this merger is less awkward. That typically happens between a 2D sheet of electronics and a surface of the tissue. However, our work suggests a new approach -- to build and grow the biology up with the electronics synergistically and in a 3D interwoven format."
McAlpine's team has made several advances in recent years involving the use of small-scale medical sensors and antenna. Last year, a research effort led by McAlpine and Naveen Verma, an assistant professor of electrical engineering, and Fio Omenetto of Tufts University, resulted in the development of a "tattoo" made up of a biological sensor and antenna that can be affixed to the surface of a tooth.
This project, however, is the team's first effort to create a fully functional organ: one that not only replicates a human ability, but extends it using embedded electronics.
"The design and implementation of bionic organs and devices that enhance human capabilities, known as cybernetics, has been an area of increasing scientific interest," the researchers wrote in the article which appears in the scholarly journal Nano Letters. "This field has the potential to generate customized replacement parts for the human body, or even create organs containing capabilities beyond what human biology ordinarily provides."
Standard tissue engineering involves seeding types of cells, such as those that form ear cartilage, onto a scaffold of a polymer material called a hydrogel. However, the researchers said that this technique has problems replicating complicated three dimensional biological structures. Ear reconstruction "remains one of the most difficult problems in the field of plastic and reconstructive surgery," they wrote.
To solve the problem, the team turned to a manufacturing approach called 3D printing. These printers use computer-assisted design to conceive of objects as arrays of thin slices. The printer then deposits layers of a variety of materials -- ranging from plastic to cells -- to build up a finished product. Proponents say additive manufacturing promises to revolutionize home industries by allowing small teams or individuals to create work that could previously only be done by factories.
Creating organs using 3D printers is a recent advance; several groups have reported using the technology for this purpose in the past few months. But this is the first time that researchers have demonstrated that 3D printing is a convenient strategy to interweave tissue with electronics.
The technique allowed the researchers to combine the antenna electronics with tissue within the highly complex topology of a human ear. The researchers used an ordinary 3D printer to combine a matrix of hydrogel and calf cells with silver nanoparticles that form an antenna. The calf cells later develop into cartilage.
Manu Mannoor, a graduate student in McAlpine's lab and the paper's lead author, said that additive manufacturing opens new ways to think about the integration of electronics with biological tissue and makes possible the creation of true bionic organs in form and function. He said that it may be possible to integrate sensors into a variety of biological tissues, for example, to monitor stress on a patient's knee meniscus.
David Gracias, an associate professor at Johns Hopkins and co-author on the publication, said that bridging the divide between biology and electronics represents a formidable challenge that needs to be overcome to enable the creation of smart prostheses and implants.
"Biological structures are soft and squishy, composed mostly of water and organic molecules, while conventional electronic devices are hard and dry, composed mainly of metals, semiconductors and inorganic dielectrics," he said. "The differences in physical and chemical properties between these two material classes could not be any more pronounced."
The finished ear consists of a coiled antenna inside a cartilage structure. Two wires lead from the base of the ear and wind around a helical "cochlea" -- the part of the ear that senses sound -- which can connect to electrodes. Although McAlpine cautions that further work and extensive testing would need to be done before the technology could be used on a patient, he said the ear in principle could be used to restore or enhance human hearing. He said electrical signals produced by the ear could be connected to a patient's nerve endings, similar to a hearing aid. The current system receives radio waves, but he said the research team plans to incorporate other materials, such as pressure-sensitive electronic sensors, to enable the ear to register acoustic sounds.
In addition to McAlpine, Verma, Mannoor and Gracias the research team includes: Winston Soboyejo, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton; Karen Malatesta, a faculty fellow in molecular biology at Princeton; Yong Lin Kong, a graduate student in mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton; and Teena James, a graduate student in chemical and biomolecular engineering at Johns Hopkins.
The team also included Ziwen Jiang, a high school student at the Peddie School in Hightstown who participated as part of an outreach program for young researchers in McAlpine's lab.
"Ziwen Jiang is one of the most spectacular high school students I have ever seen," McAlpine said. "We would not have been able to complete this project without him, particularly in his skill at mastering CAD designs of the bionic ears."
Support for the project was provided by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, NIH, and the Grand Challenges Program at Princeton University.
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Princeton University, Engineering School, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
- Manu S Mannoor, Ziwen Jiang, Teena James, Yong Lin Kong, Karen A Malatesta, Winston Soboyejo, Naveen Verma, David H Gracias, Michael C. McAlpine. A 3D Printed Bionic Ear. Nano Letters, 2013; : 130501101451003 DOI: 10.1021/nl4007744
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Jacintha Saldanha pearl harbor japan earthquake thursday night football Butch Jones Star Trek Into Darkness Heisman watch
Pakistan's lead prosecutor in Bhutto case killed
ISLAMABAD (AP) ? Gunmen killed Pakistan's lead prosecutor investigating the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto as he was driving to court on Friday, throwing the case that also involves former ruler Pervez Musharraf into disarray.
Chaudhry Zulfikar was at the helm of a number of highly controversial cases, including the 2007 Bhutto assassination in which Musharraf is accused of involvement. He was also prosecuting militants linked to the 2008 terror attack in the Indian city of Mumbai.
Zulfikar was on his way to a court in Rawalpindi, next to Islamabad, when gunmen fired at him, hitting him in the head, shoulder and chest, and then fled in a taxi and on a motorcycle, said police officer Arshad Ali. The prosecutor was shot at least 13 times and his car was pockmarked with bullets and the windshield shattered.
He then lost control of his car, which hit a woman passer-by and killed her, said another police officer, Mohammed Rafiq.
Zulfikar's guard, Farman Ali, returned fire and is believed to have wounded at least one of the attackers, Rafiq said. Ali also was injured in the attack. Police have launched a search to find and apprehend the gunmen.
A motive for the killing was unclear, but Zulfikar's involvement in the two particularly high-profile cases will likely be scrutinized closely.
Government prosecutors have accused Musharraf of being involved in the Bhutto assassination and not providing enough security to Pakistan's first female prime minister. Musharraf, who was in power when Bhutto was killed, has denied the allegations. At the time of the attack, he blamed the assassination on the Pakistani Taliban.
The Bhutto case has lingered for years in the Pakistani court system. A number of alleged assailants are on trial but no one has been convicted. The case burst into the headlines when Musharraf returned in March after four years in exile.
The prosecutor told reporters that he had received death threats recently in connection with the case but would not say who from or what they said.
Zulfikar was also the government's lead prosecutor in a case related to the 2008 terrorist attack on the Indian city of Mumbai that killed 166 people. The attack was blamed on the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Pakistan has put seven men on trial on charges they assisted in the Mumbai siege, but the trial has made little progress. India has criticized Pakistan for not doing more to crack down on the militants blamed for the attack. Hafiz Saeed, the head of a group believed to be a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba, remains free, and many believe he enjoys the protection of the government. Lashkar-e-Taiba was founded years ago with the help of Pakistani intelligence to put pressure on India over the disputed territory of Kashmir.
Musharraf returned to Pakistan to make a political comeback despite Taliban death threats and a raft of legal cases against him. But his fortunes have gone from bad to worse since he arrived.
Judges barred him from running in the May 11 parliamentary election not long after he arrived because of his actions while in power. A court in the northwestern city of Peshawar went further this week and banned Musharraf from running for public office for the rest of his life ? a ruling the former military strongman plans to appeal.
Musharraf is currently under house arrest on the outskirts of Islamabad in connection with several cases against him, including the Bhutto case. He also faces allegations of treason before the Supreme Court.
Zulfikar was headed to a hearing related to Musharraf and the Bhutto case at a court in Rawalpindi when he was killed, said Ishaq, the police officer.
Musharraf seized power in a military coup in 1999 when he was serving as army chief and ruled for nearly a decade until he was forced to step down in 2008 because of growing discontent with his rule.
Though Pakistan has experienced repeated violence, it's rare for such an attack to happen in the capital, which is home to high-ranking government and military officials, diplomats and international aid workers.
Friday's killing comes at a sensitive time for Pakistan, which is preparing for nationwide elections. The vote will mark the first time that an elected civilian government has fulfilled its term and handed off power to another civilian government in the country.
Pakistan has experienced three coups, including the one led by Musharraf in 1999.
President Asif Ali Zardari strongly condemned the prosecutor's killing and called for a thorough investigation.
__
Associated Press writers Sebastian Abbot and Rebecca Santana contributed to this report.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/pakistans-lead-prosecutor-bhutto-case-killed-070558046.html
express kindle fire Jenny Johnson olivier martinez ny lottery Ohio Lottery Colorado Lottery
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Alpha Trainer | AppBrain Android Market
Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.
Source: http://www.appbrain.com/app/alpha-trainer/com.nidolabs.alphatrainer
mohamed sanu chris polk rueben randle mike trout ryan broyles st louis blues bulls
Understanding student weaknesses
Public release date: 2-May-2013[ | E-mail |
Share ] Contact: Peter Reuell
preuell@fas.harvard.edu
617-496-8070
Harvard University
Best science teachers can predict their pupils' misconceptions, study says
If you had to explain what causes the change in seasons, could you? Surprisingly, studies have shown that as many as 95 percent of people including most college graduates hold the incorrect belief that the seasons are the result of the Earth moving closer to or further from the sun.
The real answer, scientists say, is that as Earth's axis is tilted with respect to its orbit, when on its journey it is angled inward, the sun rises higher in the sky, and that results in more direct sunlight, longer days, and warmer temperatures. Distance plays no role; we are actually closest to the sun in the dead of winter, during the first week of January.
Why do so many people continue to hold the wrong idea? The answer, said Philip Sadler, the Frances W. Wright Senior Lecturer in the Department of Astronomy and director of the science education department at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA), may be found in what science teachers know.
As part of an unusual study, Sadler and colleagues tested 181 middle school physical science teachers and nearly 10,000 of their students, and showed that while most of the teachers were well-versed in their subject, those better able to predict their students' wrong answers on standardized tests helped students learn the most. The findings are described in a paper published last month in the American Educational Research Journal titled "The Influence of Teachers' Knowledge on Student Learning in Middle-School Physical Science Classrooms."
"What our research group found was that for the science that people considered factual, teacher knowledge was very important. If the teachers didn't know the facts, they couldn't convey them to the students," Sadler said. "But for the kinds of questions that measure conceptual understanding, even if the teacher knew the scientific explanation, that wasn't enough to guarantee that their students would actually learn the science."
Sadler pointed to the question of what happens to a lamp when the power cord is squeezed.
"Middle school students say if you squeeze hard you will see the light gets dimmer, even though they've stepped on that cord before, or they've put the corner of their chair on that cord before, and nothing has happened," he said. "Their theoretical understanding of the way the world works includes the idea that electricity is like water flowing through a garden hose. If you put some pressure on the cord, you will get less electricity out the other end. It turns out that for most major scientific concepts, kids come into the classroom even in middle school with a whole set of beliefs that are commonly at odds with what scientists, and their science teachers, know to be true."
If teachers are to help students change their incorrect beliefs, they first need to know what those are. That's where the standardized tests developed by Sadler and his colleagues come in. Multiple-choice answers were gleaned from hundreds of research studies examining students' ideas, particularly those that are common such as electricity behaving like water.
For the study described in their paper, Sadler and his colleagues asked teachers to answer each question twice, once to give the scientifically correct answer, and the second time to predict which wrong answer their students were likeliest to choose. Students were then given the tests three times throughout the year to determine whether their knowledge improved.
The results showed that students' scores showed the most improvement when teachers were able to predict their students' wrong answers.
"Nobody has quite used test questions before in this way," Sadler said. "What I had noticed, even before we did this study, was that the most amazing science teachers actually know what their students' wrong ideas are. It occurred to us that there might be a way to measure this kind of teacher knowledge easily without needing to spend long periods of time observing teachers in their classrooms."
To help teachers hone this knowledge, Sadler and his colleagues have made the kind of tests used in their study publicly available. More than a dozen tests covering kindergarten through grade 12 are downloadable here, after completing a tutorial on their development and interpretation.
Going forward, Sadler said he hopes to conduct similar studies in the life sciences, particularly around concepts such as evolution and heredity. He also plans to study what types of professional development and new teacher preparation programs help improve instructors' facility in knowing what their students know.
Ultimately, Sadler said, he hopes teachers will be able to use the tests to help design lessons that change students' incorrect ideas and help them learn science more quickly and easily. This is particularly important as states adopt the recently released Next Generation Science Standards.
"State certification for teaching science might well include making sure that new teachers are aware of the common student misconceptions that they will encounter, as well as being proficient in the underlying science," said Sadler. "Prior to this, there has never been an easy way to measure teachers' knowledge of student thinking, while we have probably been placing too much emphasis on testing for advanced scientific knowledge.
"Everyone has had a teacher or professor who is incredibly knowledgeable about their field, yet some of them are less-than-stellar teachers," he continued. "One of the reasons for this is that teachers can be unaware of what is going on in their students' heads, even though they may have had exactly the same ideas when they were students themselves. Knowledge of student misconceptions is a critical tool for science teachers. It can help teachers to decide which demonstration to do in class, and to start the lesson by asking students to predict what's going to happen. If a teacher doesn't have this special kind of knowledge, though, it's nearly impossible to change students' ideas.
"The best teachers base their lessons on what the American humorist-philosopher Will Rogers observed: It ain't what they don't know that gives them trouble, it's what they know that ain't so."
###
Funding for this research was provided by the National Science Foundation.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public release date: 2-May-2013[ | E-mail |
Share ] Contact: Peter Reuell
preuell@fas.harvard.edu
617-496-8070
Harvard University
Best science teachers can predict their pupils' misconceptions, study says
If you had to explain what causes the change in seasons, could you? Surprisingly, studies have shown that as many as 95 percent of people including most college graduates hold the incorrect belief that the seasons are the result of the Earth moving closer to or further from the sun.
The real answer, scientists say, is that as Earth's axis is tilted with respect to its orbit, when on its journey it is angled inward, the sun rises higher in the sky, and that results in more direct sunlight, longer days, and warmer temperatures. Distance plays no role; we are actually closest to the sun in the dead of winter, during the first week of January.
Why do so many people continue to hold the wrong idea? The answer, said Philip Sadler, the Frances W. Wright Senior Lecturer in the Department of Astronomy and director of the science education department at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA), may be found in what science teachers know.
As part of an unusual study, Sadler and colleagues tested 181 middle school physical science teachers and nearly 10,000 of their students, and showed that while most of the teachers were well-versed in their subject, those better able to predict their students' wrong answers on standardized tests helped students learn the most. The findings are described in a paper published last month in the American Educational Research Journal titled "The Influence of Teachers' Knowledge on Student Learning in Middle-School Physical Science Classrooms."
"What our research group found was that for the science that people considered factual, teacher knowledge was very important. If the teachers didn't know the facts, they couldn't convey them to the students," Sadler said. "But for the kinds of questions that measure conceptual understanding, even if the teacher knew the scientific explanation, that wasn't enough to guarantee that their students would actually learn the science."
Sadler pointed to the question of what happens to a lamp when the power cord is squeezed.
"Middle school students say if you squeeze hard you will see the light gets dimmer, even though they've stepped on that cord before, or they've put the corner of their chair on that cord before, and nothing has happened," he said. "Their theoretical understanding of the way the world works includes the idea that electricity is like water flowing through a garden hose. If you put some pressure on the cord, you will get less electricity out the other end. It turns out that for most major scientific concepts, kids come into the classroom even in middle school with a whole set of beliefs that are commonly at odds with what scientists, and their science teachers, know to be true."
If teachers are to help students change their incorrect beliefs, they first need to know what those are. That's where the standardized tests developed by Sadler and his colleagues come in. Multiple-choice answers were gleaned from hundreds of research studies examining students' ideas, particularly those that are common such as electricity behaving like water.
For the study described in their paper, Sadler and his colleagues asked teachers to answer each question twice, once to give the scientifically correct answer, and the second time to predict which wrong answer their students were likeliest to choose. Students were then given the tests three times throughout the year to determine whether their knowledge improved.
The results showed that students' scores showed the most improvement when teachers were able to predict their students' wrong answers.
"Nobody has quite used test questions before in this way," Sadler said. "What I had noticed, even before we did this study, was that the most amazing science teachers actually know what their students' wrong ideas are. It occurred to us that there might be a way to measure this kind of teacher knowledge easily without needing to spend long periods of time observing teachers in their classrooms."
To help teachers hone this knowledge, Sadler and his colleagues have made the kind of tests used in their study publicly available. More than a dozen tests covering kindergarten through grade 12 are downloadable here, after completing a tutorial on their development and interpretation.
Going forward, Sadler said he hopes to conduct similar studies in the life sciences, particularly around concepts such as evolution and heredity. He also plans to study what types of professional development and new teacher preparation programs help improve instructors' facility in knowing what their students know.
Ultimately, Sadler said, he hopes teachers will be able to use the tests to help design lessons that change students' incorrect ideas and help them learn science more quickly and easily. This is particularly important as states adopt the recently released Next Generation Science Standards.
"State certification for teaching science might well include making sure that new teachers are aware of the common student misconceptions that they will encounter, as well as being proficient in the underlying science," said Sadler. "Prior to this, there has never been an easy way to measure teachers' knowledge of student thinking, while we have probably been placing too much emphasis on testing for advanced scientific knowledge.
"Everyone has had a teacher or professor who is incredibly knowledgeable about their field, yet some of them are less-than-stellar teachers," he continued. "One of the reasons for this is that teachers can be unaware of what is going on in their students' heads, even though they may have had exactly the same ideas when they were students themselves. Knowledge of student misconceptions is a critical tool for science teachers. It can help teachers to decide which demonstration to do in class, and to start the lesson by asking students to predict what's going to happen. If a teacher doesn't have this special kind of knowledge, though, it's nearly impossible to change students' ideas.
"The best teachers base their lessons on what the American humorist-philosopher Will Rogers observed: It ain't what they don't know that gives them trouble, it's what they know that ain't so."
###
Funding for this research was provided by the National Science Foundation.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-05/hu-usw050213.php
Alison Pill Sam Bacile sprint britney spears At&t Wireless 9/11 Jerry Lawler
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)