Study: Orange Juice Drinkers 36% More Likely to Develop Skin Cancer
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I know many of us enjoy a grapefruit or a large glass of orange juice for breakfast each morning, but a recent study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology found that those who consume high amounts of grapefruit or orange juice are more than a third more likely to develop melanoma, a deadly form of skin cancer.
Most types of melanoma typically begin in or near an existing mole or dark spot—even some birthmarks (known as congenital moles) can turn into melanomas. Melanoma is generally caused by excessive UV exposure, although some people are genetically predisposed to it. If melanoma is not treated early, the cancer can spread throughout the body and potentially be fatal. Here are a few more melanoma facts:
- The American Cancer Society estimates that more than 135,000 new cases of melanoma are reported each year. In 2015, 73,870 cases of melanoma will be invasive—42,670 cases involving men and 31,200 cases involving women. Melanoma rates have been increasing in the U.S. over the past 30 years; the average age of diagnosis is 62 years old.
- Caucasians are 20 times more at risk to develop melanoma than African Americans.
- On an annual basis, melanoma kills an estimated 9,940 Americans.
The Study: Can Consuming Grapefruits and Orange Juice Increase Your Melanoma Risk?
The study, recently published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, suggests that people who consume high quantities of grapefruit or orange juice are more likely to develop melanoma, compared to those who don't.
Researchers analyzed data of 63,810 women who were part of a Nurses' Health Study conducted between 1984 and 2010; and 41,622 men that took part of the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, conducted between 1986 and 2010.
To monitor each participant's citrus fruit intake, researchers issued a dietary questionnaire once every four years. For the study, one serving of citrus fruit was equivalent to one orange, half a grapefruit, or one six-ounce glass of orange or grapefruit juice.
Participants also had to complete a questionnaire once every two years, which focused on their lifestyle factors, including smoking habits, physical activity, and medical history. Researchers discovered:
- During the 24- to 26-year follow-up, 1,840 participants developed melanoma.
- Researchers found that participants who consumed more servings of oranges, grapefruits, or their juices had a higher risk of melanoma. Participants who consumed the fruits or their juices at least 1.6 times a day had a 36% higher risk of developing melanoma.
- Consuming whole grapefruit was also associated with a higher risk of developing melanoma; however, the risk was not associated with any lifestyle factors, such as age, smoking status, alcohol, and coffee intake.
- Those who were prone to sunburns as a child and consumed high amounts of whole grapefruit were at the highest risk of developing melanoma.
Researchers were more concerned about what is in orange juice and grapefruit that may aid in the development of melanoma. They speculate that because the fruits are rich inpsoralens and furocoumarins, it may make the skin more sensitive to the sun and more susceptible to sunburns. Both substances are potential carcinogens that are found in both mice and humans. They will both interact with UV rays to trigger melanoma cells to proliferate.
This study doesn't necessarily mean you should stop your morning citrus consumption—researchers still stress the need for further research. So if you enjoy a morning glass of orange juice, don't stop for fear of getting melanoma. There are other risk factors that increase your chances of getting melanoma.
Melanoma Causes
Sun exposure: Excessive exposure to UVA and UVB rays and blistering sunburns are not good for the skin and can potentially result in developing skin cancer, including melanoma.
Moles: There are two types of moles that can appear on the skin: normal moles, which are small blemishes or beauty marks that surface in the earlier stages of an individual's life, and atypical moles, which can increase an individual's risk of developing melanoma.
Personal history: If you had melanoma in the past, there's a higher risk of it reoccurring.
Melanoma Risks
Keep an eye on your mole and consult your doctor immediately if you notice any of the following:
 - The mole becomes larger
 - The mole changes shape
 - The mole changes color
 - The mole begins to bleed or become crusty
 - The mole becomes itchy or painful
Melanoma Prevention Tips
1. Stay in the shade: The sun's UV rays are the strongest between the hours of 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. If you are outside during those hours, seek shade.
2. Cover up and wear sunscreen: If you are going to expose yourself to the sun, figure out how long you can stay in the sun before you begin to burn. Wear an SPF 30 sunscreen, UV protected sunglasses, and a broad-brimmed hat.
3. Keep newborns and young children out of the sun: Blistering sunburns at a young age can increase one's risk of developing melanoma in later years.
4. Visit your doctor once every year: Visiting your doctor at least once a year for a professional skin exam can help diagnose melanoma early if it develops.
If you discover a mole or a dark spot on your body, consult your doctor first before taking any other precautions.
Whiteman, H., "Skin cancer risk linked with grapefruit and orange juice," Medical News Today web site, June 30, 2015;
Davies, M., "Is there a link between orange juice and SKIN CANCER? Citrus fruits may increase the risk of melanoma, studies declare," Daily Mail web site, June 30, 2015;
"Melanoma Causes and Risk Factors," Skin Cancer Foundation web site;, last accessed July 10, 2015.
"Melanoma Prevention Guidelines," Skin Cancer Foundation web site;, last accessed July 10, 2015.
This article was republished with permission from
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Sunday, 24 January 2021
THE MUSIC BETWEEN US: Memoir of a Bedside Musician
I am always fascinated by stories of personal transformation. How does anyone achieve redemption, wisdom, grace and meaning after experiencing or witnessing prolonged suffering? I'm especially interested when those stories come from caregivers.
Steve Litwer is a volunteer guitarist for patients in hospice care. His book, The Music Between Us: Memoir of a Bedside Musician isn't just about the music he plays for dying patients, though. It's a story of growing up with a mother who had severe mental illness and a father who was incapable of protecting his children from the ensuing neglect and abuse. It's a story about music, memory, healing and intimacy - against all odds.
The author weaves harrowing descriptions of his early home life with riveting and sometimes delightful narratives of patients he plays for. Litwer observes, "I had never thought about my bedside performances like this - as acts of divine grace."
Anyone whose own childhood was poisoned by a parent's terrible demons will identify with the author when he says, "Rationally, I new her mental illness was not her fault and that she simply needed more companionship. But that logic was not enough to overcome my bitter feelings towards her for what I endured as a kid." Litwer himself was for many years, unable to experience intimacy with others, including his own wife and daughter. But slowly, succumbing to the stillness and awe of being present with music throughout the dying process of many in hospice care, Litwer began to experience forgiveness, love and self-acceptance. Through the combination of music, memory and profound friendship with the dying, the author describes how it felt to be healed.
A non-practicing Jew, Litwer discovers Christianity almost by accident. He describes visiting a dying nun in a religious order, the Sisters of Charity. In the course of their gentle spiritual teachings, the elderly nuns invite Litwer to answer the call to accept divine love. Litwer answers, "Yes, I accept. I surrender. Please take me." This passage left me wondering if our challenge as caregivers is similar: to embrace love, abandon judgement of ourselves and simply accept what we cannot control.
For some, the personal pain of caring over time can transform into a sort of superpower. At the end of his memoir, Litwer quotes the author Anthony Goulet, "Count your scars as the number of times you've been healed, not wounded" and observes, "Thank God for my scars."
Steve Litwer's book, The Music Between Us: Memoir of a Bedside Musician is available from all online major booksellers.
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Reinventing the Republic 1st edition
Gender, Migration, and Citizenship in France
Reinventing the Republic 0 9780804757621 _PHONE_
Details about this item
Reinventing the Republic: Early one morning in 1996, the sanctuary of a Parisian church was suddenly disrupted by a police raid. A group of undocumented immigrant families had taken refuge in the church under threat of deportation due to the French state's increasingly restrictive immigration policies. Rather than disperse and hide, these sans-papiers—people literally without papers— came together to bring to light the deep contradictions in the French state's immigration policies and practices.
Reinventing the Republic chronicles the struggle of the sans-papiers to become rights-bearing citizens, and links different social movements to reveal the many ways in which concepts of citizenship and nationality intersect with debates over gender, sexuality, and immigration. Drawing on in-depth interviews and a variety of texts, this disquieting book provides new insights into how exclusion and discrimination operate and influence each other in the world today.
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text:
Relax yourself with this coloring page of a strange flower containing a Yin & Yang symbol in its middle
This rocket travels the interstellar space of the galaxy. Color the planets, meteorites, shuttles and stars she meets on her course.
Find inner peace with this coloring page featuring various Zen symbols, including the "Om". "Om" is a sacred sound and a spiritual symbol in Hinduism, that signifies the essence of the ultimate reality, consciousness or Atman. It is a syllable that is chanted either independently or before a mantra in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism.
Girl dreaming of a journey in space with her cat. Through the porthole of her shuttle, she sees : a rocket, the moon, the Earth, an asteroid, Saturn, an Astronaut, and pretty bright stars

source: openbmb/Ultra-FineWeb


PLEASE, please leave comments so I feel more motivated to post XD. Lots of love!
Friday, 7 December 2018
Kurokami sama
What is Kurokami Sama?
It is the name of a ritual as well as of a god.*1
This ritual can be done when you have received unfair treatment, such as bullying and power harrassment*2, from others.
How to do it
1. Pull out a strand of your hair.
2. Holding the strand of your hair in your hand, intone the name of the person you want to get revenge on and what deeds this person has done to you. And say, "May my wrongs be avenged."
3. Go up to a high place like the top of a building, and say "Kurokami sama, please avenge my wrongs," and let go of the strand of the hair.
Make sure you tell no one about the ritual
There was once a girl called K who was being bullied at school. As soon as she performed the ritual, those who were bullying her met with misfortunes one by one; some had their families broken up, some fell victims to incurable disease, and others suffered severe mental breakdown. The bullying to her stopped, but one day K came across another bullying done to another girl, and she taught the girl about Kurokami sama ritual. Right after that, the fortunes of K's bullies gradually began to rise, and instead K's fortune quickly declined. K eventually disappeared. No one knows where she is now.
When is Kurokami sama active?
It is said that Kurokami sama begins to be active around two after midnight to fulfil the wish of those who seek the god's help. Kurokami sama appears in the form of "something that is covered competely by hair." If a "good person" happens to encounter Kurokami sama, it will bring luck to the person, but if a "bad person" encounters Kurokami sama, it will bring misfortune to the person. There has been sporadic reports of sightings of Kurokami sama in Kanto region. *3
*1Kurokami sama - Kuro (黒) means black, kami (髪) means hair and sama is a horonific for someone of a higher rank than yourself or for deities (Wikipedia).
*2 5 facts about Power Harassment: Workplace Bullying in Japan
*3 Kanto Region - an area encompasing Tokyo (Wikipedia)
Friday, 30 November 2018
Announcement from Saya (AGAIN)
Thank you everyone for your kind messages yesterday.
I'm not trying to create a confusion here, but yesterday I had a very, very, VERY bad day.
But today I feel better and I realise I want to keep this blog going and it's not such a good idea to leave it unupdated for too long.
So I have decided to update something next week.
I'm sorry to have confused you.
I love you all,
(P.S. I will reply to your comments soon)
Thursday, 29 November 2018
Announcement from Saya
Hi everyone! Thank you always for your support!
I would just like to let you know that I may not be updating the blog until Christmas.
I'm too busy and too tired right now. If I change my mind, I will let you know!
Take care and be happy! :)
Much Love,
Tuesday, 27 November 2018
Notsuke Peninsula, Hokkaido
Notsuke Peninsula in Hokkaido is Japan's longest sandspit, extending for 26 km (about 16 miles) in length. Withered pine trees stand all around on the wetland, giving the landscape a bleak and otherworldly appearance.
Todowara, Notsuke Peninsula, aka "The End of the World"
But it is rumoured that on a foggy day, this place truly becomes a gateway of anotherwold.
On such a day, people are warned not to walk towards the direction from which the sound of bells comes, or not to follow after a little girl wearing red dress.
Sunday, 25 November 2018
Emergency Shelter
(Translated by Saya)
This is a cryptic story! :)
A certain countryside region was hit by earthquake.
I headed to the nearest elementary school building, which was a designated emeregency shelter, and decided to spend a night in there; but as turned out, it was too crowded and therefore too noisy and too warm.
When I went outside to get some fresh air, I noticed there was another building with the lights out on the same premises.
I walked over to it and went inside. It was cool, quiet and a lot of people were lying down on the floor.
I felt so lucky to have found the place and lay down in the same way as the others to go to sleep. But after a while I realised there was something wrong with the place. It was far too quiet.
I dashed out of the building.
Monday, 19 November 2018
Yokai or Ghost? A Creepy Woman Appears in Hokkaido, Japan
 A creepy woman appears in Sapporo, Hokkaido, who stands in the middle of a pedestrian crossing and keeps staring ahead even after traffic lights have changed.
(Translated by Saya)
1: Anonymous 2018/11/11(Sun) 23:12:14.45 ID:jBrM7swNd
Pure horror
3: Anonymous 2018/11/11(Sun) 23:12:55.85 ID:HwScmoOB0
OK scary
6: Anonymous 2018/11/11(Sun) 23:13:31.28 ID:PPuJ216O0
Frightened the living daylights out of me!
8: Anonymous 2018/11/11(Sun) 23:13:53.64 ID:8D5sQ8j50
This is like a materialised ghost
12: Anonymous 2018/11/11(Sun) 23:14:21.56 ID:bQohlaqe0
I thought she was going to attack the car, but she just keeps standing there. That makes it even creepier.
Wednesday, 14 November 2018
The Suspension Bridge
(Translated by Saya)
This is a true story that really happened to my friend, although he never told me the exact location where it took place.
The incident caused two deaths, and he himself had to be quesitoned by the police over and over again.
I heard the story in question from my friend while we were still at college...
It happened when my friend and his six coworkers at his part-time job went for a drive to a suspension bridge in a certain prefecture in the Chugoku region.*1
They split off and drove separately in two cars.
My friend was the driver of the second car.
In the first car which drove ahead of him, there were the manager and a couple, and in his own car there were the remaining four people including himself.
Although they set off in the morning, due to the many stops they made on the way, the sun was already setting when they arrived at the suspension bridge.
The suspension bridge ran across a deep valley in the middle of a mountain.
As they approached the bridge, it began to drizzle, and fog started swirling around them.
There was an open space in front of the bridge, and if the weather were fine, they would have parked their cars in there and crossed the bridge to the other side on foot and come back.
(The other side of the bridge was a dead end. The bridge was left there for sight-seeing.)
However, the moment they reached the open space, the first car came to an abrupt halt.
"What are they doing...?"
The four people, who were inside the second car which also stopped about 10 metres behind the first car, had no clue as to why the manager stopped his car. For some minutes, those in the second car just sat there looking on.
Sunday, 11 November 2018
Full Moon
(Translated by Saya)
The following is the account of my mother's experience...
Five years ago, my mother was working for my father's business partner.
Her boss, the company director, would become very irritable at times, and lose his temper at the slightest provacation.
Someone would tell him, "please make sure you look through these documents," and he would somehow blow up, and start taking his anger on the objects around him, and sometimes even start throwing them around.
One day, my mother was on her way home thinking "he was in a bad mood today too," when she noticed the full moon in the sky.
The same thing happened the following month, and the month after that; and she realised that when her boss became irritable it was invariably on a full moon day.
In time, she started thinking, "I don't want to go to work tomorrow because it's a full moon day."
But the boss died suddenly, and it was not because of illness or an accident. He had seemed perfectly robust and healthy up until the time of his death.
Apparently, he had a heart attack. People conjectured that perhaps he had been working too hard.
Friday, 9 November 2018
(Translated by Saya)
When I told this to a friend, he froze for a second, and then burst out laughing...
But to me, it was a quite creepy experience.
This story involves my daughter, who turned three last June.
My daughter has some


text:
From the hereditary title of the queens of Ethiopia, as mentioned in Acts in the New Testament
. It is apparently derived from Cushitic kdke
meaning "queen mother". In some versions of the Bible it is spelled Kandake
, reflecting the Greek spelling Κανδακη
. It was used as a given name by the Puritans
after the Protestant Reformation
. It was popularized in the 20th century by a character in the movie 'Meet the Stewarts' (1942).


Also referred to as Bubble and Squeek for the effect this dish has on the digestive system - this dish is an excellent way to dispose of holiday leftovers.
You need
You should
 1. Cook bacon in pan. When bacon fat is released, add onions.
 2. When onions begin to brown, add potato and turnip leftovers.
 3. Cook till leftovers are hot.
 4. Share and enjoy!
Yeah, it's no sensei receipe. /me misses him too.
In my experience, neeps and tatties refers to the Scottish dish of mashed turnip (neep = swede or swedish turnip, the big yellow ones usually served to cows, not the little white ones) and mashed potatoes. It is most famously served with haggis, the much-maligned "national dish" of my homeland.
In England, which is near Scotland, "bubble and squeak" (note spelling) refers to fried leftover cabbage and potatoes (optionally with onion).
Re: Bubble and squeak gaining its name from the sound of the digestive system, have you ever had rumbledethumps? This is the Scottish version of bubble and squeak, the difference being that it is baked in the oven with lots of cheese. Parp!!
Briefly trawling the Web tends to confirm me in my opinions.
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- News Feeds
Page last updated at 08:43 GMT, Tuesday, 24 November 2009
What's my brain's motivation?
By Nick Higham
Today programme
Coloured CT scan of a healthy brain
For an actor, the performance conditions weren't exactly ideal: flat on her back in a large machine, under strict instructions to lie as still as possible, speaking in short bursts interspersed with the shrill sound of a magnetic resonance imaging scanner.
But last week Fiona Shaw, one of Britain's leading actresses - who has in her time played everything from the tragic heroine Medea to Shakespeare's Richard II - volunteered in the cause of science to spend an hour having her brain scanned while "acting".
Fiona Shaw
Fiona Shaw's brain appears to be adapted to acting
Professor Sophie Scott of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London wanted to know what happens physically in an actor's head when they pretend to be someone else.
She hoped that scanning Fiona's brain in action would be able to tell us.
The scanner works by measuring blood flow to different parts of the brain. The harder a part is working, the more blood flows into it.
The parts of the brain that control speech are well known: what Prof Scott wanted to know was whether other parts of the brain would also "light up" when actors speak in character rather than as themselves.
The results of the experiment will be on display as part of the Wellcome Collection's new exhibition on identity.
Prof Scott, who is also a Wellcome senior fellow, says our speech and the way we use language are important components of our identity - and one of the ways actors seek to convince their audience that they are another person is of course by changing their voice.
For the experiment, Fiona Shaw performed snatches of T S Eliot's poem The Waste Land. (Appropriately enough, given the circumstances, Eliot's original title for the poem was He Do the Police in Different Voices.)
Fiona's right brain while counting
The poem's second section, A Game at Chess, includes a dialogue between a married couple, and a passage in which a Cockney woman gossips in a pub near closing, interrupted by the voice of the landlord shouting "Hurry up please it's time!".
The text was cut up into sections lasting just a few seconds each. Fiona read them in character, then stopped while the machine scanned her brain.
Then she'd do some counting, so the machine could register what her brain was doing when she was merely speaking; and then she'd do nothing, so the machine could scan her brain at rest.
Fiona Shaw herself says that when performing she uses visual images to help conjure up a character. And sure enough, when the results of the scan were analysed, several parts of her brain were "recruited" to help with her performance beyond those employed when she was speaking neutrally.
One of the accompanying animations shows, in green, the three main parts of her brain which Fiona used when she was simply counting: they are the part which controls the movement of the lips and tongue, the part associated with hearing and a third part involved in planning what she was going to say.
Fiona's right brain while acting
The second animation shows the parts, in yellow, which she also employed when "performing". Towards the front of the brain there is a part associated with "higher order" control of behaviour. Towards the top of the brain is a section which controls the movement of the hands and arms - even though she wasn't waving her arms about, she was apparently thinking about doing so.
And towards the back of the head is an area associated with complex visual imagery, even though she wasn't performing a complex visual task.
The scan backs up work Sophie Scott has done with professional impressionists, whose brains also conjure up visual images of the people they're imitating. What's significant is that a serious actor uses the same technique, even when she's not trying to imitate a real person.
Quite what all this tells us about our identity I'm not so sure. Perhaps it's just this: that convincing people you're someone you're not by changing your voice is hard work - a lot harder than simply being yourself.
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text:
Oct. 13, 2010 -- The idiom "a dog's life" suggests that pooches have it made when it comes to happiness, but new research indicates that the emotional states of dogs can be as varied as the moods of their owners.
Dogs can see their food bowls as half empty rather than half full, just as human pessimists see a glass of water as half empty instead of half full.
British researchers who tested separation reactions of dogs say they found that some dogs are more likely than others to become depressed and anxious when left alone, causing them to bark, scratch at doors, chew on furniture, and generally misbehave.
On the other hand, optimistic dogs are more likely to behave better and become more relaxed when left alone.
Mike Mendl, PhD, head of animal welfare and behavioral research at the University of Bristol, and colleagues, studied 24 dogs, males and females, that had been sent to two animal centers.
Each dog was tested beforehand for separation anxiety-related behaviors. A researcher played with each dog in an isolated room for 20 minutes.
The next day the dogs were taken back to their rooms and left alone for five minutes while video cameras recorded their behavior.
Some of the dogs barked, jumped on furniture, and scratched at the door, but the "optimistic" ones did not -- or didn't do it as much.
To study optimistic or pessimistic tendencies, the dogs were trained so that when a bowl was placed at one location in a room, it contained food, but when put somewhere else, it didn't. Then the bowls were placed at ambiguous locations between the positive and negative positions.
"Dogs that ran fast to these ambiguous locations as if expecting the positive food reward were classed as making relatively 'optimistic' decisions," Mendl says in a news release. "Interestingly, these dogs tended to be the ones who also showed least anxiety-like behavior when left alone for a short time."
He says about half of dogs may at some point engage in behaviors related to separation anxiety, such as barking, scratching, or tearing things up when separated from owners.
"Our study suggests that dogs showing these types of behavior also appear to make more pessimistic judgments generally," he says.
"We all have a tendency to think that our pets and other animals experience emotions similar to our own, but we have no way of knowing directly because emotions are essentially private," he says. "However, we can use findings from human psychology research to develop new ways of measuring animal emotion."
It's known that the emotional states of people affect their judgments, and that happy people are more likely to judge an ambiguous situation in a positive way. And it's apparently the same with dogs.
"What our study has shown is that this applies similarly to dogs -- that a 'glass-half-full' dog is less likely to be anxious when left alone than one with a more pessimistic nature," Mendl says.

source: HuggingFaceFW/fineweb-edu


text:
The REVEST Program will offer the following program options free of charge
(Including the cost of tuition and books):
Program Training Options:
1) Vocational English for Speakers of Other Languages (VESOL) Program
2) Employability Skills Seminars
3) Vocational Credit Certificate Programs & Continuing Workforce Education Courses
4) Vocational Skills Labs
5) Citizenship, language and civics instruction
Vocational English for Speakers of Other Languages (VESOL) Classes:
- The REVEST Program offers various levels of VESOL.
- All students must take the CASAS test (an English placement test) before registering for classes to determine the appropriate level of instruction.
- Each level of VESOL lasts 16 weeks and includes one week of the Employability Skills Seminar.
- Books are distributed to students free of charge. Students may keep their books if they complete the class. If a student withdraws from class, s/he must return the books to the REVEST Program.
- Each level of VESOL has a CASAS test and a departmental final exam.
- Students completing VESOL Level Three and who are interested in PSAV courses must take the Test of Adult Basic Education (TABE). Students will be informed of test dates and times by their instructors.
Career Technical Education (Formerly PSAV) & Continuing Workforce Education Courses:
The REVEST Program offers a limited number of short-term vocational training programs in high-demand fields. Students who complete the Career Technical Education Program graduate with a Certificate of Completion.
Citizenship Program (CP):
The REVEST Program offers citizenship, English language skills and Civics instruction for lawful permanent residents who reside in Miami-Dade County. Classes meet three times a week for 2 hour sessions. Courses last 16 weeks, Students who successfully complete the course receive a Certificate of Completion.
Back to REVEST Home Page
Back to REVEST English Page


Periodic function
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
The sine function is an example of a periodic function.
In mathematics, a periodic function is a function which has a repeated pattern (a period) which is continued infinitely.
Examples of periodic functions are the trigonometric functions sine and cosine, which both have a period of.


text:
Volcanic Hazards - Japan
Most of active volcanoes in Japan formed stratovolcanoes or complex volcano. These volcanoes potentially produce the volcanic hazards such as pyloclastic flows, laha, volcanic bombs, ash falls potentially that travel faster and longer distances. Because Japan volcanic-arc is linked to the Cascade Volcanic-arc by the Ring of Fire, the volcanic hazrds in Japan are very similar to the hazards in the Cascade volcanoes, for example Mt. St. Helens eruption in1980 (1). Some of those volcanoes are located near highly populated areas. People in areas often face to the serious volcanic hazards when the volcanoes erupt, for example Unzen and Sakura-jima volcanoes.
Map of major volcanoes in Japan (USGS)
(1) R S Bernstein, P J Baxter, H Falk, R Ing, L Foster, and F. "FrostImmediate public health concerns and actions in volcanic eruptions: lessons from the Mount St. Helens eruptions, May 18-October 18, 1980."Am J Public Health. 76(Suppl): 25–37, 1986 March.
(2) Map courtesy of the USGS "Major Volcanoes in Japan." May 13, 2003.


Synonyms for northwestpassage |
Synonyms and antonyms for northwestpassage
1. Northwest Passage (n.)
a water route between the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean along the northern coast of North America; Europeans since the 16th century had searched for a short route to the Far East before it was successfully traversed by Roald Amundsen (_PHONE_)


text:
Glimpses of Medieval Birmingham
A medieval oven was found in Sutton Coldfield town centre during a dig before an office on Coleshill Street near Holy Trinity church was extended. It is oval, about 1.2 metres across, and was constructed in a hollow by building up a clay wall into a dome on a framework of twigs. The clay was hardened by firing. The oven had collapsed but still contained charred rye grains. Pottery fragments show that the oven dates to the 13th or 14th centuries. The oven would have been in the back yard of a house. The house would have been timber, so there was always a fire risk and it made a lot of sense to have the oven outside. The oven could have been used for baking bread, drying grain or malting grain to make ale.
Primrose Hill Farm in Meadowsweet Road is a 15th century timber framed building consisting of a hall with a cross-wing running at right angles to its east end. A small excavation to the east of the hall revealed a stone sill wall constructed of large sandstone blocks, which could have been the base for a former timber cross-wing to the house matching that at the other end, resulting in an H plan.
At Maxwell Avenue in Handsworth a small excavation investigated a medieval moat shown on 18th century maps. Although the moat itself was not found, pieces of sandstone reused in a more recent structure are from a low wall under a timber building, to keep the timbers off the ground and prevent rotting. There were also a few pieces of medieval pottery.
The present Pool Hall, in Sutton Coldfield near the city boundary and in the medieval hamlet of Over Green, is a 19th century building, but Pool Hall was first mentioned in the 17th century. It may originally have been surrounded by a moat, like Hermitage Farm nearby. Excavations in advance of construction of an extension revealed that the present building overlay a medieval building, whose remains consisted of the dressed sandstone footing for a timber-framed wall. A ditch, presumably a field or property boundary, ran up to the wall footing. Pottery found on the site ranges in date from the 12th to 19th centuries. The medieval pottery was made in the Coventry and Nuneaton areas.
.Medieval Acocks Green
Trenches were dug in a car park on Warwick Road to investigate a medieval moated site as part of an upcoming planning application. Part of the moat is indicated by an L-shaped pond on 19th century maps, but nothing is now visible above ground. Further information about moated sites can be found in the leaflet below.
The trenches revealed a pebble surface which may have been a yard or path, a pit and part of the moat, which had a channel leading into it to keep it water-filled. Further excavation will take place before development of the site.
Last Updated: 16th August 2012


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SECOND EDIT: This question is now essentially answered. See this blog entry for details. Thanks to everyone who commented and answered here.
EDITED TO ADD: I asked a (hopefully more pointed and understandable) version of this question on CSTheory, and got some interesting partial answers, including a connection between this discrete combinatorial problem and the Chebyshev polynomials of the second kind. Thanks to everyone here for your help.
In trying to design an error-correction mechanism for self-assembling systems, I have "invented" a combinatorial object that seems natural enough that it must have appeared in the literature somewhere before. However, I don't know the keywords to search on to find it. So I'm hoping someone here can point me in the right direction.
Basic idea: a subword is prohibited from appearing in a future word if it is of form a---b, where a and b appeared earlier, with the same number of letters between them.
An example on a five-letter alphabet is this:
abcd (e)
aceb (d)
beca (d)
... etc...
The set of four-letter words, where each of the four letters is chosen from the five-letter alphabet. The words are ordered as the first one, the second one, etc. For letters $a,b$ in the alphabet, once the substring $a -^i b$ appears, it can never appear again, where $-$ is a wildcard for any letter(s), and $i \geq 0$ (so $-^0$ is the empty string).
So if axyb appears anywhere on one line, where x and y are any two letters (maybe x=y, maybe not) then for all x,y axyb is prohibited to appear on any future line.
A single line like "aaaa" would be ok in some scenarios and not in others.
I'm interested if we allow letters to appear multiple times in a word, if we require each letter appear at most once, and both in results that are existential, and also algorithmic (finding lists of such words), and other properties.
What is the name of this and/or related objects? What is a standard and/or state-of-the-art reference?
Thanks very much.
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You seem to be missing the example of the five-letter alphabet, but presumably $\{a,b,c,d,e\}$ will do? – j.c. Aug 12 '11 at 15:59
Your example is not clear. However, my interpretation implies that any ordered pair of two consecutive letters appears at most once in a word, which implies that any such word must have at most $n^2+1$ letters in it from an $n$ letter alphabet. While rewriting your example, using specific words that are allowed and disallowed, you might look up Debruijn sequences, which have some of the flavor of what you suggest. Gerhard "Ask Me About System Design" Paseman, 2011.08.12 – Gerhard Paseman Aug 12 '11 at 18:23
If we take the word "official" literally, then there's no such thing as official names for concepts in mathematics. There are conventional or standard names. I think in some fields (astronomy? chemistry?) there is such a thing as official nomenclature, but not in mathematics. – Michael Hardy Aug 12 '11 at 21:49
_USER_, could you provide explicit examples? For example, in the example you gave, for the alphabet $\{a,b,c,d,e\}$, I take it that the word $abab$ is not part of the set. Do the letters $a$ and $b$ in your description have to be distinct? For example, is the first four-letter word in the set you describe $aaaa$? – Joel Reyes Noche Aug 13 '11 at 1:22
Thank you for the link to your writeup, as well as the MathOverflow acknowledgment. As part of the cleanup, I request you post an answer including the link and the phrase "Costas arrays", and then accept that answer. I don't think anyone cares about the reputation you get that way, but if you do, you can make the answer community wiki before accepting it to decline the reputation points. Gerhard "Ask Me About System Design" Paseman, 2011.10.10 – Gerhard Paseman Oct 10 '11 at 15:17
4 Answers 4
I recommend looking at Balanced Incomplete Block Designs. They have some features which resemble (my interpretation of) your scenario.
Each block maps to a word (usually a block is a set, so order of elements does not matter; in the case of duplicated letters, color each a with a different color for now, and consider washing off the paint at the very end).
Pairs of elements are supposed to occur lambda many times among all blocks (usually 2 or more is considered, but you could have lambda 1 or have ab as part of one block and ba as part of another.)
It is rare, and sometimes prohibited, to have the same triplet abc appear in more than one block.
It would be nice to know more of the application. Without it, I make the following rash (and perhaps wrong) suggestion: maybe your words are not supposed to be words. Maybe they are blocks or multisets which are part of a BIBD or some generalized combinatorial design. Dinitz and Colbourn edited a handbook which you might find, well, handy, for researching your situation. Handbook of Combinatorial Designs is the title, if I recall correctly.
Gerhard "Ask Me About Block Designs" Paseman, 2011.08.13
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I should retract the word "rare"; Hadamard matrices correspond to BIBDs in which many triplets occur in more than one block. Even so, my rash suggestion may still be useful. Gerhard "Ask Me About System Design" Paseman, 2011.08.13 – Gerhard Paseman Aug 13 '11 at 18:48
This doesn't answer your specific question but might be of interest to people as background
Here's a not very specific search phrase:
permutations OR words "forbidden subsequences" OR "restricted subsequences" OR "avoidable patterns" OR "avoiding patterns" OR "pattern avoidance" OR "restricted permutations" OR "restricted words"
Some wikilinks:
and a forthcoming book:
Patterns in Permutations and Words:
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Thanks very much for these. A couple I already looked at, both the others no. – Aaron Sterling Aug 13 '11 at 14:30
I just had a helpful email correspondence with Sergey Kitaev, author of the book you linked. So thanks for pointing me in that direction. – Aaron Sterling Aug 17 '11 at 14:34
up vote 1 down vote accepted
I found a solution in the literature (Latin Squares which Contain no Repeated Digrams by E.N. Gilbert, 1965), obtained by producing a special kind of Latin square (an addition square) using two permutations that are Costas arrays. Please see a blog entry I wrote for more details.
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Even though this is an indirect approach to answering your question, it might reveal something useful.
For a word of length k on n letters, there are k choose 2 pairs of letters, not necessarily distinct, that appear in that word; one would thus expect a collision (a repeated substring of the form $a-^jb$, for example) in most lists of n^2/(k choose 2) words. The list might be shorter because this assumes collisions occuring at the same offset, whereas your condition does not require the repeat to occur in the two words at the same position inside each word. If you can, try to compute the length of longest possible word list meeting your constraints for some small n and k, and use the Online Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences to help.
This suggests to me a picture of certain kinds of designs: a sort of projective geometry where each point may be replaced by a multiset, as well as orthogonal array designs. If you temporarily consider the condition that collisions may occur at the same offset, I think you will have something resembling an orthogonal design, and (if I am right; check with an expert on orthogonal designs because I am NOT one) your list will be a very special kind of orthogonal design.
Gerhard "Ask Me About System Design" Paseman, 2011.08.30
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5 Most Important Lessons from "Cosmos"
"Cosmos" may end on Sunday, but its lessons will keep us thinking for a long time to come.
Photo Credit: Vadim Sadovski/Shutterstock.com
Sunday marks the finale of Neil deGrasse Tyson's "Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey." Though the wonderful hours of being dazzled, stunned and educated by Tyson and his "Ship of the Imagination" are coming to a close, there is still plenty about our cosmos left to ponder. (Let's face it, we'll probably rewatch the series and learn something new with each subsequent viewing.)
Here are the most important scientific lessons from our astrophysicist pal, Neil deGrasse Tyson.
1) It's okay not to know all of the answers.
While it isn't an eye-opening, earth-shattering revelation, knowing it's okay not to have all the answers may be one of the most important lesson from "Cosmos." If humans say "I don't know," then scientists can work on asking, "Why?" and then testing to solve the mystery.
"It's OK not to know all the answers," Tyson explains to the audience. "It's better to admit our ignorance, than to believe answers that might be wrong. Pretending to know everything, closes the door to finding out what's really there."
2) Climate change is happening, and it's manmade.
Climate change is a topic Tyson tackles in several episodes. His most shocking and thorough admonition comes in Episode 12, "The World Set Free," which tells the tale of two planets, Venus and Earth.
Though its sweltering climate was not caused by manmade forces, Venus is still a cautionary tale of a greenhouse-gas overload. The amount of carbon dioxide in Venus' atmosphere has turned the planet into an inferno. Even lead (melting point: 621.5°F) is a liquid on Venus. Tyson explains how, on Earth, humans have added 400 billion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere since Carl Sagan's original "Cosmos." While a climate as extreme as Venus' is unlikely in Earth's near future, we're certainly doing everything we can to catch up to our cosmic neighbor.
Tyson then refutes many arguments made by climate deniers:
Q: Could the carbon dioxide be coming from volcanoes?
A: A very small portion is, but this gas is slightly different than that of burning coal or fossil fuels, so scientists can recognize that most comes from man-made causes.
Q: But this winter was so cold. If scientists can't even predict the weather, how can they predict climate change?
A: Well, climate and weather are two different things. Weather events are short-term patterns in the atmosphere, and climate is a long-term trend.
Watch the clip here.
3) Evolution: How did we get here?
This lesson may seem like an obvious one. However, with creationists up in arms over the show's depiction of evolution, it turns out it was an important one.
From the first episode of "Cosmos," Tyson addresses evolution, and he continues to throughout the series. Evolution as a scientific theory is often vilified by religious groups who advocate for a strict interpretation of the Bible. However, it is important to Earth's future that folks understand the planet's past — patterns of climate, examples of extinction, natural selection and how humans came to be. Life today could not have happened without the evolution that happened slowly over the 4.5 billion years of Earth's history.
The future of our planet relies on understanding how genes changed and mutated to fit their surroundings. An example comes from Episode 9, " The Lost Worlds of Planet Earth." This episode took viewers through the history of our Earth, preserved through fossils, and layers of rock. Tyson explains the evolution of plants: A new material "lignin," allowed plants to grow taller and brought about the rise of the trees. Unfortunately, it took much longer for organisms to evolve to be able to decompose lignin, and the solidification and burying of non-decomposed trees is why the planet has coal.


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...Movement's 90 Tracts for the Times, which were intended to rouse the Anglican clergy against the theory of a state-controlled church and which caused the movement's advocates to be known as Tractarians. The Tractarians encouraged study of the early Church Fathers, edited their works, and arranged for their translation. When John Henry Newman's conversion to Roman Catholicism in 1845...
...Tracts for the Times (1833–41), 24 of which were written by Newman, who edited the entire series. Those who supported the Tracts were known as Tractarians who asserted the doctrinal authority of the catholic church to be absolute, and by "catholic" they understood that which was faithful to the teaching of the early and...
What made you want to look up "Tractarian"? Please share what surprised you most...


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LeSS has a big impact on the management style in organizations. It requires a different type of management than the traditional management by controlling subordinates. It is much more aligned to the "Managers as Teachers" principle promoted in Lean Thinking
Two big impacts on the role of management:
- Self-managing teams delegates a lot of responsibilities to the team.
- Product Owners decide on what the work is that the team works on.
Both these dramatically change the role of managers in a LeSS organization.
Theory X and Theory Y
One important concept for understanding management in LeSS is the two extreme management styles also called Theory X and Theory Y (first coined by Douglas McGregor in The Human Side of Enterprise.
McGregor defined Theory X management as being based on the following assumptions:
- Average humans dislike work and will try to avoid working.
- Because of this, people will need to be coerced, controlled, directed and threatened so that the maximum amount of effort can be extracted out of them.
- People want to be directed as they have little ambition and avoid taking responsibility.
McGregor offers Theory Y assumptions, which are:
- Peoples spend effort to work as natural as they do to play and rest.
- People will use self-direction and self-control for goals that he is committed to. Commitment comes most strongly from the intrinsic rewards related to the achievement itself. That is the challenge, the learning, and the sense of purpose.
- Provided the right environment, humans seek responsibility rather than avoiding it.
LeSS requires management styles that are more on the Theory Y side.


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Continuous verb forms in English
All continuous verb forms (sometimes called progressive or durative)
- Present Continuous
- Past Continuous
- Present Perfect Continuous
- Past Perfect Continuous
- Future Continuous
- Future Perfect Continuous
and their Passive forms:
- Present Continuous Passive
- Past Continuous Passive
- Present Perfect Continuous Passive
- Past Perfect Continuous Passive
- Future Continuous Passive
- Future Perfect Continuous Passive
are usually concerned with an action that is taking place at a certain moment in time. We put more emphasis on the action itself rather than if it is completed or not.
The Present Continuous
for example tells us about something that is temporary at a certain moment that includes now.
(Note: it is also used to talk about an arrangement for the future)
- I am writing this article about Continuous verb forms at the moment
- It is raining a little but the sun is shining.
- The people outside are talking about yesterday's football match
- Leonard is an architect, he works in a big office in London
- This month he is working in Paris, he is supervising a new construction.
Both of the sentences above (1 and 2) are correct at the same time. In (1) we use the Present Simple to explain Leonard's normal, habitual situation. In (2) we use the Present Continuous to explain a temporary situation. He is in Paris but his permanent office is in London
The Past Continuous is used to talk about an action at one moment in the past or the general situation.
- When I woke up yesterday I looked out of the window and I saw that the sun was shining, two people were sitting on a bench, they were eating a sandwich and some dogs were playing.
We don't know when the sun started shining, or when the people went to sit on the bench, or when the dogs started playing. But we do know that, at the moment I looked out of my window, that was the situation.
- – What were you doing yesterday at 8.05pm?
- – I was walking home from work.
Was/were going to, for incompleted intentions:
- John was going to come for supper yesterday but he had to stay at work to prepare a meeting for today
The Future Continuous:
We use the Future Continuous to talk about an action at a moment in the future.
- At 2.00pm on Friday I'll be sitting on the plane on my way to New York
If we want to speak English well, understand English well, write English well it is necessary to find out how to understand English grammar. How we use English verb forms (tenses) is essential to developing good communication in English.
This is part of a series about how we use English grammar correctly. I want to give the basic concepts of how these grammatical forms are used by native English speakers. If you want to see my advice and tips of how to construct English verb forms see here


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What comes to your mind when you hear the word hacker? Most of us think hackers are hacking computer security systems to steal important and confidential information. It is only partially true, since there are hackers who contribute real solutions to social problems such as corruption.
When we asked participants of the global Transparency International hackathon that took place on the first weekend of October who considered themselves a hacker, many raised their hands, explaining that they did not see "hacker" as a bad word, and that their role is often misunderstood.
One said, "Wikileaks is a collection of hackers who disclose hidden information to the public. It helps people to have access to better information."
Responding to the "problem statements" presented by seven participants, our friendly hackers were extremely excited to contribute their skills to provide a technological platform that would address corruption problems. He hopes it will rectify public misperceptions about hackers.
The hackers know better than anyone that for social media to help fight corruption, we need to create additional applications that people can use to communicate with each other directly. Twitter has already served as a powerful communication tool has already happened in Egypt.
Teten Masduki, secretary general of Transparency International Indonesia argues that Wikileaks developed as a form of disclosure to dismantle some of the control over information held byelites. "In Indonesia, Facebook and Twitter are a way to curb corruption," he explained.
Teten observes that ministries and state agencies have not provided enough information for the public. They provide very limited basic information. "This has little benefit for the community," he said.
South Asian presence in Jakarta
Programmers, developers, graphic and interface designers and anti-corruption activists joined us in Jakarta from South Korea, Cambodia, Fiji, Indonesia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam. Participants from Indonesia also came from various areas such as Jakarta, Semarang, Batang, Yogyakarta, Bandung, Bekasi, Balikpapan and Makassar. They submitted 12 "problem statements" – challenges in our daily efforts to fight corruption that we want technology to help with:
- TI Indonesia wanted a Corruption Court Decisions Index. This tool is expected to gauge public perception of fairness judgments of national and local level. We crave a site that shows information about the corruption proceedings, a little like our name and shame site for corruption offenders.
- Our Malaysian colleagues wanted to enhance their Forest Watch illegal logging site where people can tag areas affected by illegal logging. Likewise, there is a clear demand for a system that can measure the performance of public institutions as well as reporting public services using photos and comments to the local council.
- Much of the requests of Transparency International staff to the hackers related to areas they are already working in. Awareness raising is a priority for TI Sri Lanka, who regularly hold public exhibitions. TI Vietnam, whose recent study showed 30% of people facing bribes in the health sector, concentrated on the assessment of public health services.
- An online platform for corruption reporting is also vital for TI South Korea, which the public would be able to access through smartphones, either as victims, witnesses or whistleblowers. Previously, their site has provided anti-corruption education in the form of a quiz.
- TI Fiji wanted online campaign tools to engage youth in the fight against corruption and a platform to monitor intimidation, violence and irregularity during elections.
The Hackathon was held in 5 countries simultaneously. Beside Jakarta, Transparency International organised the same event in Moscow (Russia), Bogota (Columbia), Budapest (Hungary), and Vilnius (Lithuania). The activity was streamed worldwide from each location so that participants can exchange reports and share the atmosphere.
The above was adapted from an article written by M.A. Maulidin, Editor of klikmagz.com.


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Finland's climate policy encompasses many different actors and levels. At international level, negotiations are conducted within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), where Finland negotiates in the capacity of an EU Member State. At national level, the preparation of Finland's climate policy is divided among various ministries, while decision-making power rests with the Government and Parliament.
Division of labour between ministries
The Ministry for Foreign Affairs is responsible for duties vested in foreign service and participates in international climate negotiations in this role.
The issues for which the Ministry for Foreign Affairs is responsible include the following:
- international financing for climate affairs
- adaptation issues in developing countries
- improving the preparedness of developing countries to take action
- preventing deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries (REDD+)
- clean development mechanism (CDM)
- assessment of the impact of climate change on foreign policy
- trade policy
- contractual issues.
The Ministry for Foreign Affairs serves as the Finnish national authority for the clean development mechanism and monitors the implementation of CDM projects.
The Ministry of the Environment bears the main responsibility for the preparation and coordination of Finnish stands in climate issues. This is done in cooperation with other ministries.
The Ministry of Employment and the Economy is responsible for the preparation of Finnish national climate targets and for emissions trading in the EU.
The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the Ministry of Transport and Communications are responsible for climate affairs in their own administrative sectors.
- Ministry of the Environment: Climate change
- Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry: Finland's National Strategy for Adaptation to Climate Change
- Ministry of Employment and the Economy: National Climate and Energy Strategy
- Government Foresight Report on Long-term Climate and Energy Policy: Towards a Low-carbon Finland
Content administrator Unit for International Environment Policy


1. Introducing gen3sis
*gen3sis*: **gen**eral **e**ngine for **e**co-**e**volutionary **si**mulation**s**
gen3sis: general engine for eco-evolutionary simulations
In this vignette you will be introduced to gen3sis, an engine for simulating various spatial eco-evolutionary models. Here will create a virtual planet, biodiversify it and examine virtual species.
In particular, we will go through the following steps:
1. Set-up gen3sis package and check if we are set with all the necessary input data.
2. Run one simple example simulation
3. Visualize the outputs
4. Analyze the outputs
The first step for running a simulation consists of setting up the folder structure that should contain input data (i.e. config and landscape).
1. Set-up
First of all, load the gen3sis package.
From now on, if you run into problems, refer to gen3sis the for the full help documentation.
Let's check the version of the gen3sis package we are using
print(paste("gen3sis version:", packageVersion("gen3sis")))
#> [1] "gen3sis version: 1.3"
All gen3sis simulations need a landscape object which define the environment over which the simulation will take place and a configuration object which defines the mechanisms of speciation, dispersal, trait evolution and ecological interactions. Here we will use a published example1. We will consider the continent of South America with a time span from 65Ma to 0Ma (1 time-step = 1 myr) and a spatial resolution of 1°.
All the data we will use here (i.e. the landscape and the configuration object) is available in the simulation repository, so you need to download the data (i.e. landscape, configs and outputs) and set the correct datapath. For more information about these input data, please check the associated metadata.This is stored in the METADATA.txt file inside the landscape folder and, for the configuration, as a comment in the beginning of the config R script.
To access this dataset, define the path to the data contained inside the package.
The full landscape can be downloaded and stored locally for running the experiment. An experiment folder should look like this:
The landscape is the virtual environment in which the processes of speciation, dispersal, evolution and ecology take place (e.g. temperature and aridity data that might be spatially and temporally dynamic). Landscape objects used in gen3sis are generated based on temporal sequences of landscapes in the form of raster files, which are summarized in the form of two classes.
The first landscape class contains: (i) the geographic coordinates of the landscape site, (ii) the corresponding information on which sites are generally suitable for the organisms modeled (e.g. land or ocean), and (iii) the environmental conditions relevant for the species' ecology (e.g. temperature and aridity). The landscape may be simplified into a single geographic axis for theoretical experiments, or it may consider realistic configurations aimed at reproducing real local or global landscapes.
The second landscape class defines the permeability of the landscape for species movement between sites via dispersal. Connection cost between sites is computed for each time step from the gridded landscape data based on harvesine geographic distances modified by a user-defined cost function and stored as sparse distance matrices. Distance matrices, containing the connection costs, are provided at every time step as either: (i) a pre-computed full distance matrix, containing all habitable sites in the landscape (faster simulations but more storage required); or (ii) a local distance matrix, computed from neighboring site distances up to a user-defined range limit (slower simulations but less storage required).
NOTE the gen3sis landscape contains several files. The landscape.rds file contains the landscape changing over time with its environmental variables. The distances folder stores the information on how the landscape is connected (connections costs) which will interact with the disperal ability of the modeled organisms. To see how to create a landscape object, refer to design_landscape vignette and create_input_landscape vignette.
This figure shows the temperature and aridity of the lanscape used in this vignette at 65, 30 and 0Ma.
The configuration are the rules of our virtual planet, it is where we define all the ecological and evolutionary equations and parameters.
The configuration object includes information on the model initialization, the observer function and the biological functions, namely speciation, dispersal, evolution, and ecology. The possibility of the user to customize these functions confers the flexibility and generality of gen3sis. The initialization function creates the ancestor species at the start of the simulation. Users can define the number of species, their distribution within the landscape and their trait values. The observer function allows recording any abiotic or biotic information of the virtual world as it changes by defining the outputs that are saved at specified time-steps. The configuration further allows to define the speciation function, the dispersal function, the evolution function and the ecology function, which are defined in the section on core processes below. Altogether, those six functions are specified in the configuration object and interact with a set of core objects defined in the simulation engine. The configuration object further lists the ecological traits considered in the simulation, sets a random seed allowing simulation reproducibility, start and end times of the simulation, as well as simulation aborting rules including the limits for a total or local number of species.
In our example, we start our simulation with the 40\(^{th}\) time-step and end it a the latest available time-step of the landscape, i.e. 40 to 0Ma. We set ten different ancestor species, each colonizing one random cell in the landscape, with initial optimum temperature equal to the local temperature of the site. The dispersal of all species is the same and stochastic, following a Weibull distribution with shape 1.5 and scale 133. Speciation takes place after every second time-step (2 Myr) of isolation. Clustered populations (exchanging genes) had their trait homogenized and weighted by abundance, meaning that a temperature optimum of populations that are doing well in a site will contribute more to the average trait of a cluster. Temperature optimum evolves based on a normal distribution with standard deviation 0.001, possibly increasing or decreasing species optimum temperature. Abundances in a site are based on how close the species population optimum temperature is to the site temperature. We scale the values to avoid small numbers and apply a carrying capacity based on aridity and temperature corrected by the area. If abundances are below 1, species are considered extinct, if total abundance in a site (sum of all species in a site) is above the carrying capacity, small abundances are removed progressively and randomly distributed across the present species until total abundance is smaller or equal to the carrying capacity. For more details regarding the configuration used here and how to modify it, please refer to create_config vignette.
2. Run
Now that we have set up the general folder structure, the input data and configuration file, we can run a simulation using the run_simulation function. This function will:
 1. Read in the config and prepare the output directories, initial landscape and call create_ancestor_species from the user config to create the initial species for the simulation.
 2. Start the main loop over the time-steps. For every time-step it loads the appropriate landscape, removes all sites that became uninhabitable in the new time-step, and calls the main steps of any iteration.
 3. At the end of every time-step, if desired, the simulation saves the species, landscapes, species richness patterns, etc… by calling the end_of_timestep_observer from the user config. In this function the user can implement customized observer functions, for example calculating summary statistics or creating species patterns plots.
 4. When the simulation reaches the end, a phylogeny, runtime_information, the world starting conditions and the used config are saved at the output folder. If the output folder is not specified, it is deduced from the location of the landscape object. The function will return a summary object. In this vignette we will save it as sim.
Additionally to the main functions, the package provides several convenience functions to generate input data, configuration files, and plots. Moreover, all functions are accessible to the observer functions, which requests the variables for calculation during the model runs. This allows to transform the output of the simulation model into a format that can be readily analyzed.
To launch a simulation you need to call the run_simulation function. We only store one intermediate step between the starting and end time-steps by setting "call_observer=1", this means one time-step equally distributed between the starting and ending time-steps. By doing so, we will have a look at our virtual world at 40, 20 and 0 Ma.
# we set verbose to 0 to avoid a large console outputs of how the simulation is
# developing
sim <- run_simulation(config = file.path(datapath, "config/config_southamerica.R"),
 landscape = file.path(datapath, "landscape"), output_directory = tempdir(), call_observer = 1,
 verbose = 0)
After the simulation is finished, a plot is created inside the SouthAmerica folder to show the state of the initial world. They are automatically stored in a sub folder called output inside our SouthAmerica folder and inside another folder named after our configuration file (i.e. config). It should look like this:
3. Visualize
After having run the simulation, we


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WebMD Medical News
Louise Chang, MD
April 10, 2012 -- Getting frequent dental X-rays appears to increase the risk for a commonly diagnosed brain tumor, a new study finds.
Exposure to ionizing radiation -- the kind found in X-rays -- is the biggest known environmental risk factor for largely non-malignant meningioma brain tumors. Routine dental X-rays are among the most common sources of radiation for most healthy people in the U.S.
The new study suggests that performing frequent X-rays may expose patients to unnecessary risk.
"These findings should not prevent anyone from going to the dentist," says lead researcher and neurosurgeon Elizabeth B. Claus, MD, PhD, of Yale University School of Medicine and Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital. "But it appears that a large percentage of patients receive annual X-rays instead of every two to three years, which is the recommendation for healthy adults."
While the vast majority of meningiomas are non-malignant, they often grow to be very large and can cause a wide range of potentially serious symptoms, including vision and hearing loss, frequent headaches, memory loss, and even seizures.
They are the most frequently diagnosed brain tumors among adults in the United States, accounting for about a third of all primary brain and central nervous system tumors.
Several small studies have suggested a link between cumulative dental X-ray exposures and meningiomas, but the findings were inconclusive.
In the newly published study -- the largest ever to examine the question -- people who reported having "bitewing" X-rays at least yearly were found to have a 40% to 90% greater risk of meningioma.
The study shows an association but does not prove a cause-effect relationship.
The study included about 1,400 meningioma patients between the ages of 20 and 79 when they were diagnosed between the spring of 2006 and the spring of 2011.
When the patients' self-reported dental histories were compared to adults with similar characteristics who did not have the brain tumors, lifetime exposure to either bitewing or panoramic dental X-rays -- which include the upper and lower jaw -- was significantly associated with meningioma risk. This risk was higher in people who received panoramic X-rays when they were younger than 10.
The meningioma patients were more than twice as likely as the adults without brain tumors to have had dental X-rays at some point during their lives, Claus tells WebMD.
The study appears in the April 10 issue of the American Cancer Association journal Cancer.
The American Dental Association responded to the study in a written statement, noting that the group has long called on its members to order dental X-rays only when necessary. To minimize radiation exposure, the group recommends using protective aprons and collars and the use the fastest film speeds available or a digital X-ray.
"Many oral diseases can't be detected on the basis of a visual and physical examination alone, and dental X-rays are valuable in providing information about a patient's oral health such as early-stage cavities, gum diseases, infections or some types of tumors," the statement reads.
Claus tells WebMD that the American Dental Association recommends healthy adults receive routine mouth X-rays every two to three years. Dental X-rays are recommended every one to two years for children and every 1.5 to three years for teens. Children often require more X-rays than adults because of their developing teeth and jaws and increased likelihood for cavities.
Neurosurgeon Michael Schulder, MD, agrees that the newly published findings make a good case for limiting the frequency of dental X-rays whenever possible.
Schulder is vice chairman of the department of neurosurgery at the Cushing Neuroscience Institute, which is part of the North Shore-LIJ Health System in Manhasset, N.Y.
"The chance of these tumors arising in patients who were X-rayed yearly was low," he notes in a news release. "Nonetheless, dentists and their patients should strongly consider obtaining X-rays less often than yearly unless symptoms suggest the need for imaging."
SOURCES:American Dental Association.Claus, E.B. Cancer, April 10, 2012.Elizabeth B. Claus, MD, PhD, professor, department of epidemiology and public health, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Conn; attending neurosurgeon, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston.Michael Schulder, MD, vice chairman, department of neurosurgery, Cushing Neuroscience Institute, North Shore-LIJ Health System, Manhasset, N.Y.News release, Cancer.
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Tyre Deflators
TRAILHEAD Automatic Tyre Deflators will automatically reduce the air pressure in a tyre to a predetermined level and stop, preventing any further loss of air from the tyre. They will function properly whether your vehicle is stationery or traveling at speeds of around 30km per hour or less.
Trailhead Automatic Tyre Deflators
The shut off pressure on your tyres may vary due to several factors, especially the flow rate of your valve stems.
1. Turn adjusting screw with a 5/32" allen wrench counter clockwise until it is even with the end of the body tube. This will set pressure at the lowest end of the adjustment range. Every complete turn clockwise will increase pressure approximately 1.5psi for the 5-20psi
range, and 3psi for the 15-40psi range.
2. Turn the adjustment screw clockwise the desired number of turns and follow "OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS".
3. If tyres have not deflated to the proper value, make minor adjustments to the adjustment screw, re-inflate and re-test. Some experimentation may be necessary to find the exact setpoint. This process goes quickly if a small spare tire (i.e. wheel barrel tyre, ATV tyre, etc.) is for use during the adjustment process. This process should take about 15 minutes as opposed to over an hour using a full size off road tyre.
NOTE: In order for deflators to reliably begin operation, tyres must be inflated to a pressure approximately twice the setpoint, e.g. If the deflators are set to shut off at 10 psi, tyres must be inflated to approximately 20 psi or greater.
1. Remove valve caps and replace with one tyre deflator on each tyre.
2. Wait until deflators are finished deflating and remove them from the valve stems.
3. Check pressure and make any adjustments to tyre pressure or deflators setpoint as necessary.
Consistency is more important than accuracy. Usually it is more important to have both tyres on a given axle deflated to the same pressure than to be exactly at the setpoint. Be sure to make every measurement the same way, every time. Consistency and repeatability are greatly improved when the valves on all four tires are from the same manufacturer and lot. This will minimize differences in the rate of flow from tire to tire that cause inconsistent readings.
1. Remove adjustment screw & spring while noting the number of turns the adjustment screw was inserted. Remove ball valve by blowing air into the knurled end of the deflator. Keep one hand over the open end to catch the ball and prevent loss. Make every effort to keep the components of each deflator together for reassembly later.
2. Thoroughly clean inside the deflator's bore with a Q-tip and rubbing alcohol, then compressed air. Clean all components with rubbing alcohol and compressed air.
3. Apply a fine coating of a high quality, heavy silicone or teflongrease or Vaseline, or a similar lubricant to each ball valve.
4. Insert the stem of the ball valve into one end of the spring and slide this assembly into the deflator, ball end first.
5. Install adjustment screw (the same number of turns before it was disassembled).


ACCO Aerated Concrete Systems Plant
Built in 1969, General Electric opened a new factory as part of GE's lighting-systems division, manufacturing incandescent lamps. The factory operated until it closed in 1982. GE reopened the factory a year later as part of it's robotics operation. It is best to note that at the time, the robotics industry was doing poor as robots were relegated to marginal tasks and were nearly mothballed entirely. The industry's reputation suffered massively during the 80s and almost disappeared entirely.
GE designed and developed the software and central processing unit, or brain, for robotic welding sites. Automation Intelligence designs and manufactures industrial computer controls that sometimes are used in robotics.
The company, like some others in the automated-welding business, overestimated the size of the market. Citing the poor economic outlook for the robotics industry, in January 1987, General Electric closed it's robotics plant, putting 118 employees who manufacture computer-driven mechanical arms out of work. The land and factory were later sold.
In 1999, Florida Crushed Stone Co. reopened the plant as an aerated-concrete plant. Costing an estimated $10 million renovation, the project began back in 1987 when the robotics plant closed down. The project laid dormant for a few years before Orlando was seen as a great location from a sales standpoint and labor pool.
The aerated concrete process is explained below:
Unlike most other concrete applications, AAC is produced using no aggregate larger than sand. Quartz sand, lime, and/or cement and water are used as a binding agent. Aluminum powder is used at a rate of 0.05%–0.08% by volume (depending on the pre-specified density). When AAC is mixed and cast in forms, several chemical reactions take place that give AAC its light weight (20% of the weight of concrete) and thermal properties. Aluminum powder reacts with calcium hydroxide and water to form hydrogen. The hydrogen gas foams and doubles the volume of the raw mix (creating gas bubbles up to ⅛ inch in diameter). At the end of the foaming process, the hydrogen escapes into the atmosphere and is replaced by air.
When the forms are removed from the material, it is solid but still soft. It is then cut into either blocks or panels, and placed in an autoclave chamber for 12 hours. During this steam pressure hardening process, when the temperature reaches 374° Fahrenheit (190° Celsius) and the pressure reaches 8 to 12 bars, quartz sand reacts with calcium hydroxide to form calcium silica hydrate, which accounts for AAC's high strength and other unique properties. After the autoclaving process, the material is ready for immediate use on the construction site. Depending on its density, up to 80% of the volume of an AAC block is air. AAC's low density also accounts for its low structural compression strength. It can carry loads up to 1,200 PSI, approximately only about 10% of the compressive strength of regular concrete.
Explanation from Wikipedia.org
With the plant opening, it immediately became the largest supplier and producer of autoclaved aerated material. The plant operated with great success, causing Florida Crushed Stone Co. to be bought out by Rinker Materials, better known in Florida as CEMEX or Florida Materials. The plant operated until it's closure in 2007. The facility was later demolished in 2011.
 1. Hey guys,
 I live about 20 minutes from ACCO. My buddy and I explored it over 15 times, it never got old. Unfortunately, it was recently bought and almost completely demolished with the coming of the new 429 on/off ramp to US 441/Orange Blossom Trail. All that remains is the one large outside warehouse and the front office area. A car parts manufacturing company is slated to take its place. A truly awesome UrbEx site, may it rest in pieces.
 2. Damn, I used to live near there. Wish I had gotten to check it out before it was demolished.
 3. It's under construction now and they're starting all of it down.
 4. as of September 2015, its slated to be demolished.
 5. I worked on the construction crew during the refit by Florida Crushed Stone. I don't think the timeline above is correct though because I was there in either 1990 or 1991. In any event it definitely wasn't 1999, of that I'm sure. When we demoed the raised floor in the area where the trains actually pulled through the building, we found tens of thousands of old camera flash bulbs from the time when it was the GE lighting factory. They'd fallen through ventilation holes in the floor. It was a pretty cool old building and a fun job. We gutted the entire interior and rebuilt if for the aerated concrete plant. Good times!


Edwidge Danticat Essay - Danticat, Edwidge (Vol. 94)
Danticat, Edwidge (Vol. 94)
Edwidge Danticat 1969–
Haitian-born American novelist and short story writer.
Winner of a Pushcart Short Story Prize and a finalist for a National Book Award in 1995, Danticat has received positive critical attention for her first novel, Breath, Eyes, Memory (1994), and her short story collection Krik? Krak! (1995).
Biographical Information
Born in Haiti, Danticat was separated from her parents at the age of four when they emigrated to the United States. In 1981 she joined her family in Brooklyn, New York. Recognized for her depictions of the Haitian experience both in Haiti and the United States, Danticat has been described by Margaria Fichtner as a writer whose work "has much to say about what it is like to be young, black, Haitian and female wandering in a world too often eager to regard all of those conditions as less than worthwhile."
Major Works
Breath, Eyes, Memory, told through the eyes of Sophie Caco, details the lives of four generations of Haitian women as they struggle against poverty, violence, and prejudice in Haiti and the United States. Encompassing contemporary Haitian history, the novel portrays the country's recent upheavals at the hands of the Duvalier regime and its brutal secret police, the Tonton Macoutes. While the stories in Krik? Krak!—the title refers to a Haitian storytelling game in which one person's story is exchanged for another—employ a wide range of plot types and characters, each story is, as Ellen Kanner has explained, "part of the same tale. Women lose who and what they love to poverty, to violence, to politics, to ideals."
Critical Reception
Most commentators have found Danticat's works to be powerful fictions conveyed with sure-handed style. Breath, Eyes, Memory has been praised by many critics for its lyric language, which off-sets and counterpoints the novel's at times dire subject matter. Some reviewers of the novel suggested that Danticat did not display complete control of her material in this book, lavishing detailed descriptive passages on things and events that did not warrant them. But most point out that this is a flaw common to many first novels. Critics have lauded Krik? Krak! for the diversity of narrative voices and literary styles presented in the stories. Danticat is again praised for making potentially downbeat material readable and enjoyable through her skillful, lyrical use of language. Critics have noted that some of the stories reveal a too self-conscious manipulation of form and structure, a false note of "preciousness" that detracts from their realism. Most critics agree with Richard Eder, however, that the "best of [the stories], using the island tradition of a semi-magical folktale, or the witty, between-two-worlds voices of modern urban immigrants, are pure beguiling transformation."
Principal Works
Breath, Eyes, Memory (novel) 1994
Krik? Krak! (short stories) 1995
Mary Mackay (review date Fall 1994)
SOURCE: "Living, Seeing, Remembering," in Belles Lettres: A Review of Books by Women, Vol. 10, No. 1, Fall, 1994, pp. 36, 38.
[In the following positive review of Breath, Eyes, Memory, Mackay praises Danticat for her "extraordinary optimism," "vivid characterization," and "allusive language."]
Edwidge Danticat dedicates her powerful first novel [Breath, Eyes, Memory] to "The brave women of Haiti … on this shore and other shores. We have stumbled but we will not fall." Such optimism is extraordinary, given the everyday adversity faced by the women whose stories are interwoven with that of Sophie, the narrator.
Grandmother Ifé, mother Martine, aunt Atie, and daughter Sophie (and later Sophie's daughter, Brigitte) are rooted as firmly in their native Haitian soil as they are bound to one another, despite the ocean, experiences, and years that separate them. The ties to Haiti, the women's certainty of meeting there at the "very end of each of our journeys," affords their only apparent security. "Somehow, early on, our song makers and tale weavers had decided that we were all daughters of this land," Danticat writes. Structurally, the book reflects the centrality of Haiti: the longest of its four sections takes place there, although covering only a few days in a novel that covers years.
The story begins in Haiti. Through Sophie's 12-year-old eyes, the island seems a paradise of bougainvillea, poincianas, and the unconditional love of Tante Atie. Then Martine, the mother Sophie knew only as a photograph, sends for her from New York City. It seems a mean place that has worn out her mother: "It was as though she had never stopped working in the cane fields after all." Sophie is haunted by the hardships of immigrant life, together with the ghosts from the past and the burdens of womanhood in a hostile world. She describes herself as a frightened insomniac, but somehow survives the test. Her older, jazz-musician husband, Joseph, one of the novel's few male characters and certainly the most loyal and gentle, gives her some strength. She copes...
(The entire section is 877 words.)
Garry Pierre-Pierre (essay date 26 January 1995)
SOURCE: "Haitian Tales, Flatbush Scenes," in The New York Times, January 26, 1995, pp. C1, C8.
[In the following essay, based on discussions with Danticat, Pierre-Pierre examines her past in Haiti and her present life as a Haitian-American living in Brooklyn.]
It was the kind of dark, cold New York winter day that sundrenched people from the Caribbean dread. But Edwidge Danticat, a 25-year-old Haitian-American novelist who immigrated to Brooklyn a little more than a dozen years ago, would not let it dampen her spirits.
"You want some coffee, tea?" she said in a soft melodic voice, as if the liquids would warm the day. "The tea is cannelle."
So Ms. Danticat (her name is pronounced ed-WEEDJ dahn-tee-CAH), the author of Breath, Eyes, Memory, her first novel, which was published by Soho Press last spring and received respectful reviews, set small flowered, ceramic cups on a coffee table. She settled into a plastic-covered velour chair in the beige-carpeted living room of her parents' attached brick home in East Flatbush and explained that the cannelles, or cinnamon sticks, had been bought just blocks away, from Haitian street vendors.
"It's wonderful," she said, pouring the steamy light brown liquid into the cup. "It's like 'infusion' tea. Haitians think of tea as a cure-all."
While much is written about the troubled, mountainous island nation, Ms. Danticat's debut novel is probably the first to chronicle the Haitian-American experience. In the last decade, the number of Haitian-Americans has grown to more than a million; their communities are centered in New York and Miami.
The book is about four generations of Haitian women who struggle to overcome poverty, powerlessness and abuse. The story is told through the point of view of Sophie Caco, a teen-ager who, after spending years with her aunt in rural Haiti, is reunited with her mother in Brooklyn. Sophie feels compelled to return to Haiti after she learns that her birth resulted from her mother's rape there.
Critics have praised Ms. Danticat's vivid sense of place and her images of fear and pain, which have been compared to Alice Walker's.
The New York Times Book Review said the book "achieves an emotional complexity that lifts it out of the realm of the potboiler and into that of poetry."
Ms. Danticat has dared to probe into some of the most painful and hidden Haitian traditions, including "testing," a mostly rural practice in which a mother inserts her fingers in her daughter's vagina to ascertain that she is still a virgin.
"Haitian men, they insist that their women are virgins and have their 10 fingers," Sophie's aunt says after Sophie is tested, explaining to her the virtues of virginity and the reasons for testing.
Sitting in her living room, Ms. Danticat said that among Haitian-American women, "there is a great deal of rage toward the book." At readings across the country, she said, some of the strongest opposition comes from middle-class Haitian-American women who consider themselves modern and liberated. They are ashamed of things like testing, she said, and some, raised in cities, are shocked to learn that it is exists.
"I think a lot of people see Haiti as the good guys against the bad guys," she said. "It is so much more complex than that."
Ms. Danticat insisted that the story is not about herself, although she too was raised for several years by an aunt in Port-au-Prince after her parents—her father, André, is a cabdriver, and her mother, Rose, is a factory worker—left for Brooklyn in search of a new and better life. She said the most autobiographical aspect of the book is the heroine


text:
Hiking TraIl nearby Borgorose population.
The largest locality in the area is Borgorose
, with a population of 4,524 persons, at a distance of 4.928 kilometers from the center of the map.
The following indicators give us an idea of the difficulty of the route:
- Trail length: 16.097 kilometers.
- Min height: 884 meters above sea level.
- Max height: 2,110 meters above sea level.
- Average height: 1,435 meters above sea level.
- Average slope uphill: 28.163 %.
- Average slope downhill: -17.370 %.
- Mathematical difficulty index: 102.189.


text:
This shimmering, metallic structure isn't a new configuration of carbon nanotubes. It's actually a slime mold, which grows on dead plants. Not only does it look alien, but it has a very alien lifecycle. Individual slime mold cells can merge into one giant cell, up to 30 meters across. (Pics)
There are many types of slime mold, and they come in a variety of lurid colors. You can see several examples below, photographed by Russian researchers. You can see the two forms of slime mold in these pictures – the gooey collective form (the yellow grid/blob) and the more commonly-seen individuated form that looks like a stalk with a small sphere or lozenge on top.
Continue reading io9


text:
In search of El Dorado? the experience of migration to France in contemporary African novels /
Abstract (Summary)iii Literary criticism of recent novels about the theme of migration to France often fails to take into account both the reality and experiences of migrants. Worse, critics tend to minimize both the role of French imperialism and the strength of African cultures as they read these works. Their analyses raise the broad question of just how African migration literature can be interpreted to reflect the social realities which frame the action of the protagonists who are most vulnerable to France's contradictory immigration policies. Drawing on the concept of tragedy as both a genre and as a philosophical framework, I analyze four novels that convey the stories of francophone African immigrants to Europe. These are Fatou Diome's Le Ventre de l'Atlantique, Alain Mabanckou's Bleu Blanc Rouge, Bessora's 53 cm and Nathalie Etoké's Un amour sans papiers. The study reveals that the novels' characters, style and narrative progression indicate the authors' attempt to simultaneously articulate the suffering of poorer African migrants and appeal to the Republic to redress it. The search for a middle ground between Africa and France minimizes the Republic's pursuit of power at the cost of African lives. This result contradicts the tragic imperative that the powerful actors receive blame for the suffering of the most vulnerable members of society. The unsuccessful attempt at neutrality also reflects the paradoxical situation of Africans who use the French language to articulate the dilemmas in which the Republic is heavily implicated. This study thus proposes a model of criticism that acknowledges the role of iv migrant experiences, African traditions and critics' personal inclinations in the experience of and narratives about migration to France. It complements works by JeanPaul Sartre, Frantz Fanon and Lewis Gordon that call on intellectuals to accept their implication in pressing social issues and to situate events on a global stage. The study also emphasizes the need to include a range of social, historical and environmental factors in determining the causes of injustice. Above all, it presents reality based criticism as an alternative to literary criticism dominated by theoretical concerns that often minimize the challenges of every day life.
School Location:USA - Pennsylvania
Source Type:Master's Thesis
Date of Publication: