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NI FEATURE: THE QUEST - COMMENTARY
How to recognize and treat metabolic encephalopathy in Neurology intensive care unit
Ivana I Berisavac, Dejana R Jovanović, Višnja V Padjen, Marko D Ercegovac, Predrag D J Stanarčević, Maja S Budimkić-Stefanović, Milan M Radović, Ljiljana G Beslać-Bumbaširević
January-February 2017, 65(1):123-128
DOI:10.4103/0028-3886.198192 PMID:28084256
Metabolic encephalopathy (ME) represents a syndrome of temporary or permanent disturbance of brain functions that occurs in different diseases and varies in clinical presentation. It can be manifested in a range from very mild mental disorders to deep coma and death. Clinically, it is characterized by a variety of psychiatric and neurological symptoms and signs. The most common causes of ME are: hypoxia, ischemia, systemic diseases and toxic agents. ME is the most frequent in elderly people who have previously been exhausted by chronic illnesses and prolonged stay in bed. ME is a very common complication in patients treated in intensive care units. Treatment and prognosis of the disease are varied and depend on aetiology, as well as on the type and severity of clinical presentation. Mortality of patients with septic encephalopathy ranges from 16-65%, while the one-year survival of patients with encephalopathy and liver cirrhosis is less than 50%.
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NI FEATURE: CITADELS SCULPTING FUTURE - COMMENTARY
Bangur Institute of Neurosciences: A premier neurosciences institute of Eastern India
Samarendranath Ghosh, Shubhamitra Chaudhuri
Bangur Institute of Neurosciences is one of India's oldest teaching institutions in the field of neurosciences. It has contributed richly over four decades in training and research in Neurology and Neurosurgery. Situated in Kolkata, the City of Joy and the Cultural Capital of India, and run under the aegis of the Government of West Bengal's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, it remains one of the highest-volume neurological and neurosurgical centers in the country. This is a humble attempt to illustrate the history of this Institute and to provide a vignette of the many illustrious neurologists and neurosurgeons who were intimately involved in the setting up practice of Clinical Neurosciences in Eastern India.
Parkinson's disease: A review
Divya M Radhakrishnan, Vinay Goyal
March-April 2018, 66(7):26-35
Parkinson's disease is a common movement disorder seen in neurological practice, but the diagnosis and management is challenging. The diagnosis is clinical and sometimes difficult, considering a large number of motor and non-motor symptoms in PD patients. The medical management of PD patients is difficult, as choices of drugs are limited and levodopa is the mainstay of treatment. However, levodopa-induced dyskinesia (LID) is commonly seen in Parkinson's disease patients treated with levodopa. This side effect is usually encountered after a long duration of treatment, but occasionally, this may be seen even after a few days or months of treatment. Different types of surgical approaches, including unilateral pallidotomy and deep brain stimulation, have given very good results in PD patients, who cannot be managed by medications alone.
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The Babinski sign--a reappraisal.
SP Kumar, D Ramasubramanian
October-December 2000, 48(4):314-8
In 1896, Joseph Babinski, a French neurologist, first described the best known neurologic eponym 'the Babinski sign'. This sign is characterised by dorsiflexion of the big toe and recruitment of the extensor hallucis longus muscle, on stimulating the sole of the foot. He has emphasised from the outset, the intimate relationship between this sign and the shortening movement in other leg muscles, which form the flexion synergy of the lower limb. The Babinski sign is not a new reflex, rather it is released as a result of breakdown of the harmonious integration of the flexion and extension components of the normal defence reflex mechanism, due to pyramidal tract dysfunction. A pathological Babinski sign should be clearly distinguished from upgoing toes that may not always be a part of the flexion synergy. This article reviews the Babinski sign in detail, focusing on the historical perspectives, role of pyramidal tract dysfunction and art of elicitation and interpretation. The significance of assessing this phenomenon in the entire leg, and the clinical clues that will help to dispel the myths regarding the Babinski sign, have been emphasised.
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Neurological syndromes following organophosphate poisoning.
S Singh, N Sharma
October-December 2000, 48(4):308-13
Organophosphorous compounds, the anticholinesterases, produce significant morbidity and mortality in India. Although exact estimates are not available, hospital based statistics suggest that nearly half of the admissions to emergency with acute poisoning are due to organophosphates. Following accidental or suicidal exposure, these anticholinesterases lead to three well defined neurological syndromes i.e. initial life threatening acute cholinergic crisis which often requires management in intensive care unit, intermediate syndrome in which cranial nerve palsies, proximal muscle weakness and respiratory muscle weakness are common and patients often require respiratory support and delayed organophosphate induced polyneuropathy. In addition to these three classical neurological syndromes following acute exposure and in some following low dose chronic exposure, several neurobehavioural changes have been observed and these have been termed together as 'chronic organophosphate induced neuropsychiatric disorders' (COPIND). Organo-phosphate compounds produce significant pesticide related illness in developing countries. There is, thus, a need to determine exact extent of the problem and to develop appropriate strategies to manage these cases with available resources in these countries.
The Department of Neurosurgery, G. B. Pant Hospital, New Delhi
Anita Jagetia, Daljit Singh, Arvind K Srivastava, AK Singh
November-December 2017, 65(6):1366-1377
The history of the prestigious Department of Neurosurgery, Gobind Ballabh Pant Institute of Medical Education Institute and Research, New Delhi, a leading tertiary care centre, is presented. Its eminent faculty and outstanding patient care attracts patients and students from all over the country.The patients opt for this institution to get a standard of care that may be comparable with the highest standards prevalent; and, the students achieve their goal of getting excellent education in Neurosurgery at par with the best institutes of the world. The department has, therefore, over the years, established its place in the country as a premier training facility and an epitome of medical excellence.
Drug treatment of vertigo in neurological disorders
Ivana I Berisavac, Aleksandra M Pavlović, Jasna J. Zidverc Trajković, Nadežda M. čovičković Šternić, Ljiljana G. Beslać Bumbaširević
November-December 2015, 63(6):933-939
Vertigo is a common symptom in everyday clinical practice. The treatment depends on the specific etiology. Vertigo may be secondary to inner ear pathology, or any existing brainstem or cerebellar lesion but may also be psychogenic. Central vertigo is a consequence of a central nervous system lesion. It is often associated with a focal neurological deficit. Peripheral vertigo is secondary to dysfunction of the peripheral vestibular system and is usually characterized by an acute vertigo with loss of balance, sensation of spinning in the space or around self, and is exaggerated with changes of the head and body position; no other neurological deficit is present. Some medications may also cause vertigo. Depending on the cause of the vertigo, drugs with different mechanisms of action, physical therapy, psychotherapy, as well as surgery may be used to combat this disabling malady. Symptomatic treatment has a particularly important role, regardless of the etiology of vertigo. We reviewed the current medications recommended for patients with vertigo, their mechanisms of action and their most frequent side effects.
Post-traumatic subarachnoid hemorrhage: A review
Nikhilkumar J Modi, Manish Agrawal, Virendra Deo Sinha
March-April 2016, 64(7):8-13
Head injury has been the leading cause of death and disability in people younger than 40 years and the incidence is rising continuously. Anticipation of the pathological consequences of post-traumatic subarachnoid hemorrhage (tSAH) and an outcome-oriented management are very important in these cases. To encounter the complications pertaining to traumatic brain injury (TBI) and tSAH, various classifications have been proposed and goal-oriented screening strategies have been offered. The role of serial computed tomography (CT) scans, perfusion studies, transcranial Doppler, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and angiographic studies as diagnostic tools, has been described. Recently, MRI fluid-attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR), gradient reversal echo (GRE), and susceptibility weighted imaging (SWI) have emerged as excellent complimentary MRI sequences, and the authors of this article have evaluated their role in the diagnosis and prognostication of patients with tSAH. Numerous studies have been conducted on the various complications associated with tSAH such as vasospasm, hydrocephalus, and electrolyte disturbances and their management. This article discusses these aspects of tSAH and their management nuances.
Botulinum toxins: Pharmacology and its current therapeutic evidence for use
UB Muthane, JN Panikar
October-December 2003, 51(4):455-460
Botulinum toxins are, as a group, among the most potent neuromuscular toxins known, yet they are clinically useful in the management of conditions associated with muscular and glandular over-activity. Botulinum toxins act by preventing release of acetylcholine into the neuromuscular junction. While botulinum toxin type A is commonly available, different manufacturers produce specific products, which are not directly interchangeable and should not be considered as generically equivalent formulations. Type B is also available in the market. Each formulation of botulinum toxin is unique with distinct dosing, efficacy and safety profiles for each use to which it is applied. Botulinum toxin type A is the treatment of choice based on its depth of evidence in dystonias and most other conditions. Botulinum toxin type A is established as useful in the management of spasticity, tremors, headache prophylaxis and several other neurological conditions. Active research is underway to determine the parameters for which the type B toxin can be used in these conditions, as covered in this review. Botulinum toxin use has spread to several fields of medicine.
Acute disseminated encephalomyelitis.
JM Murthy
July-September 2002, 50(3):238-43
Acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) is an uncommon inflammatory demyelinating disease of the central nervous system. The true incidence of the disease in India is undetermined and is likely to be more frequent than reported, as the common antecedent events, exanthematous fevers and Semple antirabies vaccination, which predispose to ADEM, are still prevalent. The existing evidence suggests that ADEM results from a transient autoimmune response towards myelin or other self-antigens, possibly via molecular mimicry, or by non-specific activation of auto-reactive T cell clones. ADEM is a monophasic illness with favourable long-term outcome. Involvement of neuroaxis is variable and can be diffuse or multifocal and site restricted. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is highly sensitive in detecting white matter lesions and the lesions described are rather extensive and subcortical in location. Involvement of the deep gray matter, particularly basal ganglia, is more frequent. Oligoclonal bands in CSF are usually absent. No therapy has been established by controlled trials in ADEM. Use of high-dose methylprednisolone, plasma exchange, and IVIG are based on the analogy of the pathogenesis of ADEM with that of multiple sclerosis (MS). Differentiation of ADEM from the first attack of MS is important from prognostic as well as therapeutic point of view. However, in the absence of biological marker, at times differentiation of ADEM from the initial presentation of MS may not be possible even by combination of clinical, CSF analysis, and MRI. This differentiation is more relevant to India where the incidence of MS is low.
Childhood Ataxia with Cerebral Hypomyelination (CACH) syndrome: A study of three siblings
Sachin R Vaidya, Shrinivas B Desai, Satish V Khadilkar, Neeta A Mehta
July-September 2004, 52(3):372-374
We report a family of three siblings with Childhood Ataxia with Cerebral Hypomyelination. All the siblings presented with early onset cerebellar ataxia beginning around five years of age with mild mental retardation. MRI showed diffuse white matter signal changes in all three patients with cerebellar atrophy while the spectroscopy was abnormal only in the eldest who was the most severely affected. The cases are reported for their rarity as well as for an opportunity of observing this uncommon disease in its stages of evolution in three siblings.
History of neurosurgery at Christian Medical College, Vellore: A pioneer's tale
Vedantam Rajshekhar
March-April 2016, 64(2):297-310
The Department of Neurological Sciences at Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore was the first department to start neurosurgical and neurological services in India. Jacob Chandy started the department in 1949 against several odds. He started a formal training program in neurosurgery in 1958, for the first time in India, and went on to qualify several neurosurgeons, who in turn pioneered neurosurgical departments all over India. After 1970, K V Mathai and Jacob Abraham guided the department through some difficult times when there was a severe shortage of personnel and no faculty in the neurology section. Through their commitment and hard work, they continued not only the neurosurgery service but also looked after patients with neurological disorders. Mathew J Chandy, son of Jacob Chandy, joined them in 1980 and introduced micro-neurosurgery and several other neurosurgical techniques. Training of residents in micro-neurosurgery began in the early 1980s. The last quarter of a century has been a period of rapid progress for neurosurgery at CMC. There has been an exponential rise in the number of surgeries, number of residents and number of publications. Research has always been an integral part of the activities of the department and several high impact articles have been published by the faculty and residents. The neurosurgical faculty at CMC has also contributed significantly to organized neurosurgery in India and internationally, with five of them serving as President of the Neurological Society of India, a society which had Jacob Chandy as its founder President. With this heritage, the neurosurgery section at CMC, Vellore is likely to continue to provide high quality ethical neurosurgical care to patients from all over India and overseas.
Sacral nerve root cysts : A review on pathophysiology.
MJ ArunKumar, S Selvapandian, MJ Chandy
January-March 1999, 47(1):61-4
Nerve root cysts of the sacral region are generally asymptomatic but are known to cause neurogenic claudication. In this paper we present an elderly lady who presented with claudication, whose MR imaging showed a sacral cyst. She underwent lumbo-sacral laminectomy, partial excision of the cyst wall with plication. A review of the possible pathophysiology of such a lesion is discussed.
[ABSTRACT] [FULL TEXT] [CITATIONS] [PubMed]
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Eppie M Yiu, Andrew J Kornberg
Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), an X-linked disorder, is the most common muscular dystrophy in children, presenting in early childhood and characterized by proximal muscle weakness and calf hypertrophy in affected boys. Patients usually become wheelchair-bound by the age of 12 years, and die of cardiorespiratory complications in their late teens to early twenties. Advances in the management of DMD, including treatment with corticosteroids and the use of intermittent positive pressure ventilation have provided improvements in function, ambulation, quality of life and life expectancy, although novel therapies still aim to provide a cure for this devastating disorder. The clinical features, investigations, and management of DMD are reviewed, as well as the latest in some of the novel therapies.
Kluver- Bucy syndrome - An experience with six cases
Sanjeev Jha, R Patel
The Kluver-Bucy syndrome (KBS) is a neurobehavioral syndrome and can be seen in association with a variety of neurological disorders. Case records of 6 patients with KBS seen during a period of 5 years in a university hospital were reviewed. During the study period 6 patients with KBS, aged between 4 and 14 years, were seen. Hyperorality, hypersexuality, and abnormal behavior were the most common manifestations. Of the 6 patients, 5 had recurrent unprovoked seizures. The associated neurological disorders included anoxia-ischemic encephalopthy (2), herpes simplex encephalitis (1), neurocysticercosis (NCC) (1), traumatic brain injury with gliosis (1 case) and tuberculous meningitis (1 case). Prognosis was poor in all the patients except in the patient with NCC.
Sacral perineural cyst presenting as chronic perineal pain : a case report.
SK Jain, S Chopra, H Bagaria, PP Mathur
We present an interesting case of sacral perineural cyst which caused chronic perineal pain. Perineural cyst is relatively rare, especially the sacral region. Chronic perineural pain is an often encountered problem that is difficult to evaluate and sacral perineural cyst may be the etiology of chronic perineal pain in many instances.
Parkinsonism plus syndrome – A review
K Mitra, PK Gangopadhaya, SK Das
April-June 2003, 51(2):183-188
Parkinsonism plus syndrome is a group of heterogeneous degenerative neurological disorders, which differ from the classical idiopathic Parkinson's disease in certain associated clinical features, poor response to levodopa, distinctive pathological characteristics and poor prognosis. Associated clinical features include symmetrical onset, infrequent or atypical tremor, prominent rigidity in axial musculature, bradykinesia, early postural instability, supranuclear gaze palsy, early autonomic failure, pyramidal affection, cerebellar involvement, alien limb phenomenon, apraxia and significant early cognitive dysfunction in some cases. Progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), multiple system atrophy (MSA) and dementia with Lewy body disease (DLB) are commoner disorders. Less frequent disorders are cortico-basal ganglionic degeneration (CBGD), frontotemporal dementia with chromosome 17 (FTDP-17), Pick's disease, parkinsonian-dementia complex of Guam, Pallidonigral degeneration, Wilson's disease and a rigid variant of Huntington's disease. During the last 3 decades, major progress has been made in understanding PSP, CBGD and FTDP-17, which are tau disorders. MSA and DLB together with idiopathic Parkinson's disease are called a-synucleinopathies. Recent studies show that the diagnosis of these Parkinsonism plus syndromes improves when strict diagnostic criteria are used. However, unusual presentations may pose a diagnostic challenge. The shortcomings of the current studies demand the need for further research to identify biologic markers that may allow earlier diagnosis, and understanding of the factors leading to a-synuclein or tau aggregation. Identification of therapeutic strategies that may prevent the aggregation of these proteins and rescue dysfunctional cells has been stressed. This review focuses on the advances in the clinical, neuroimaging, pathologic, genetic and management aspects of these disorders.
Vertebral artery dissection due to indirect neck trauma : an underrecognised entity.
S Prabhakar, R Bhatia, N Khandelwal, V Lal, CP Das
Vertebral artery dissection is an important cause of brain stem stroke, especially in the young. Dissections of carotid and vertebral arteries in neck account for about 20% of strokes in young compared with 2.5% in the elderly. Three patients of vertebral artery dissection related to indirect neck trauma are described. The first patient developed the symptoms while dancing, the second after a trivial fall and the third while he was on a dental chair. None of them had a direct severe neck trauma or concomitant risk factor like hypertension, connective tissue disease or migraine. Clinical symptomatology was similar in all the patients and included occipito-nuchal pain, headache and brain stem dysfunction chiefly in the posterior inferior cerebellar artery (PICA) territory. One of the patients also had associated ischaemic myelopathy. MRA and DSA confirmed dissection in all with a predominant steno-occlusive picture. Cases of so called trivial neck movement/torsion related dissection have been described previously but have not received any major importance. Usually classified as 'spontaneous' or 'traumatic', there is a possible ambiguity in literature about appropriate terminology. We emphasise that a history of such subtle precipitating events be taken while diagnosing young patients with brain stem strokes, to recognise this clinical entity. Although mechanisms are not absolutely clear, yet there seems to be an important relationship between arterial dissection and neck movements or minor trauma.
PGIMER, Chandigarh: A temple of holistic Neurology
Vivek Lal, Manoj K Goyal
History helps us to become better students, judge wisely, understand change, and most importantly, it tells us who we are. It helps us to understand what happened, why it happened and what its ramifications are. Winston Churchill once said: "Study history, study history. In history lie all the secrets of statecraft." Here, we take this opportunity to pay our gratitude to our esteemed teachers who worked relentlessly for uplifting of the department of Neurology, PGIMER, Chandigarh; and, narrate chronicles of all those people who made this department reach the heights where it stands today.
[ABSTRACT] [FULL TEXT] [PDF] [Mobile Full text] [EPub] [PubMed]
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SHORT REPORTS
Recurrent seizures: An unusual manifestation of vitamin B12 deficiency
January-March 2004, 52(1):122-123
The present report highlights an unusual presentation of vitamin B12 deficiency— recurrent seizures in a 26-year-old man. His symptoms responded to parenteral vitamin B12 therapy. The relevant literature is reviewed.
Management of symptomatic vertebral hemangiomas : review of 13 patients.
L Murugan, RS Samson, MJ Chandy
July-September 2002, 50(3):300-5
Thirteen consecutive cases with symptomatic vertebral hemangiomas, managed during a five year period from January 1995 at the Christian Medical College and Hospital, Vellore, were analysed. Twelve patients had lesions in the thoracic and 1 in the sacral region. Eight patients had multiple level involvement. Seven patients had laminectomy and soft tissue component excision, of which one had intraoperative injection of absolute alcohol and one had postoperative radiotherapy. One patient had vertebrectomy and stabilization with preoperative embolization. One patient underwent only endovascular embolization. However, the focus of this communication is on 4 patients who underwent a CT guided percutaneous transpedicular injection of absolute alcohol into the affected vertebral body. In the surgical group, 6 patients had cavernous type and 2 patients had mixed type of hemangiomas. Ten patients improved on the Ranawat grade by the time of discharge. On the MRC grade, 11 patients had improved, one was grade 5 pre and postoperative, while one did not improve. Several options are available for the management of symptomatic vertebral hemangiomas and multiple modalities may have to be used for a single patient. CT guided percutaneous transpedicular injection of absolute alcohol shows promising results. However, long term follow up is mandatory.
Prevalence of autism spectrum disorder in Indian children: A systematic review and meta-analysis
Anil Chauhan, Jitendra K Sahu, Nishant Jaiswal, Kiran Kumar, Amit Agarwal, Jasleen Kaur, Sukhmanjeet Singh, Meenu Singh
Background: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a developmental disability and is of public health importance. It affects not only the child and the family. It also has direct and indirect cost implications on the nation that are incurred in providing health care, support for education, and rehabilitative services. There is a lack of evidence-based estimate of the population prevalence of ASD in India. Therefore, this systematic review was aimed at determining the prevalence of ASD in the Indian population. Materials and Methods: We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis of the published studies evaluating the prevalence of ASD in the community setting. A search within the published literature was conducted from different databases (PubMed, OvidSP, and EMBASE). The analysis of data was done using STATA MP12 (StataCorp, College Station, TX, USA). Results: Four studies were included in this systematic review. Of the four included studies, one had studied both urban and rural populations, and the other three had studied the urban populations only. The study from the rural setting showed a pooled percentage prevalence of 0.11 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.01–0.20] in children aged 1-18 years; and, four studies conducted in the urban setting showed a pooled percentage prevalence of 0.09 (95% CI 0.02–0.16) in children aged 0-15 years. Conclusion: The scarcity of high-quality population-based epidemiological studies on ASD in India highlights an urgent need to study the burden of ASD in India. The proper acquisition of data related to the prevailing burden of ASD in India would lead to a better development of rehabilitative services in our country.
Spectrum of Neurological Manifestations in Covid-19: A Review
Ravindra K Garg
COVID-19, in most patients, presents with mild flu-like illness. Elderly patients with comorbidities, like hypertension, diabetes, or lung and cardiac disease, are more likely to have severe disease and deaths. Neurological complications are frequently reported in severely or critically ill patients with comorbidities. In COVID-19, both central and peripheral nervous systems can be affected. The SARS-CoV-2 virus causes the disease COVID-19 and has the potential to invade the brain. The SARS-CoV-2 virus enters the brain either via a hematogenous route or olfactory system. Angiotensin-converting enzyme two receptors, present on endothelial cells of cerebral vessels, are a possible viral entry point. The most severe neurological manifestations, altered sensorium (agitation, delirium, and coma), are because of hypoxic and metabolic abnormalities. Characteristic cytokine storm incites severe metabolic changes and multiple organ failure. Profound coagulopathies may manifest with ischemic or hemorrhagic stroke. Rarely, SARS-CoV-2 virus encephalitis or pictures like acute disseminated encephalomyelitis or acute necrotizing encephalopathy have been reported. Nonspecific headache is a commonly experienced neurological symptom. A new type of headache "personal protection equipment-related headache" has been described. Complete or partial anosmia and ageusia are common peripheral nervous system manifestations. Recently, many cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome in COVID-19 patients have been observed, and a postinfectious immune-mediated inflammatory process was held responsible for this. Guillain-Barré syndrome does respond to intravenous immunoglobulin. Myalgia/fatigue is also common, and elevated creatine kinase levels indicate muscle injury. Most of the reports about neurological complications are currently from China. COVID-19 pandemic is spreading to other parts of the world; the spectrum of neurological complications is likely to widen further.
INDIAN PERSPECTIVE
Management of hydrocephalus in patients with tuberculous meningitis
July-August 2009, 57(4):368-374
Hydrocephalus is one of the commonest complications of tuberculous meningitis (TBM) occurring in up to 85% of children with the disease. It is more severe in children than in adults. It could be either of the communicating type or the obstructive type with the former being more frequently seen. The Vellore grading system for clinical grading of patients with TBM and hydrocephalus with grade I being the best grade and grade IV being the worst grade has been validated by several authors. The management of hydrocephalus can include medical therapy with dehydrating agents and steroids for patients in good grades and those with communicating hydrocephalus. However, surgery is required for patients with obstructive hydrocephalus and those in poor grades. Surgery can involve either a ventriculo-peritoneal shunt or endoscopic third ventriculostomy (ETV). Complications of shunt surgery in patients with TBM and hydrocephalus are high with frequent shunt obstructions and shunt infections requiring repeated revisions. ETV has variable success in these patients and is generally not advisable in patients in the acute stages of the disease. Mortality on long-term follow up has been reported to vary from 10.5% to 57.1% in those with altered sensorium prior to surgery and 0 to 12.5% in patients with normal sensorium. Surgery for patients in Vellore grade IV is usually associated with a poor outcome and high mortality and therefore, its utility in these patients is debatable
TOPICS OF THE ISSUE-DENGUE NEUROLOGY-REVIEW ARTICLES
Encephalitis in the clinical spectrum of dengue infection
Aravinthan Varatharaj
Dengue viral infections are common worldwide. Clinical manifestations form a broad spectrum, and include uncomplicated dengue fever, dengue hemorrhagic fever, and dengue shock syndrome. Encephalopathy has been well reported and has classically been thought to result from the multisystem derangement that occurs in severe dengue infection; with liver failure, shock, and coagulopathy causing cerebral insult. However, there is increasing evidence for dengue viral neurotropism, suggesting that, in a proportion of cases, there may be an element of direct viral encephalitis. Understanding the pathophysiology of dengue encephalopathy is crucial toward developing a more effective management strategy. This review provides an overview of the clinical spectrum of dengue infection, and examines evidence supporting the existence of dengue encephalitis.


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Rural California communities have better access to clean drinking water, thanks to Yoram Cohen
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UCLA engineers are making groundwater drinkable for tens of thousands of Californians
Written by Alison Hewitt
"It's just unimaginable that in California we have people without access to clean drinking water," says UCLA engineering professor Yoram Cohen.
Drought, climate change and intensive farming have all increased the amount of nitrates and pesticides in groundwater, making tap water undrinkable for tens of thousands of Californians. But Cohen, who is the director of UCLA's Water Technology Research Center, is devoted to correcting the problem.
"This isn't a developing country. We must demonstrate that there are solutions, and that in a state like California, we can all have equal access to clean water," he says. "The university has an obligation not just to develop new knowledge but also work with stakeholders to put that knowledge into solutions that make a real difference in people's lives."
A groundbreaking technology he invented for desalinating water is already being used in the San Joaquin Valley. Each day, it turns 60,000 gallons of brackish agricultural drain-off into safe, clean drinking water for 80,000 people. The Smart Integrated Membrane System, which fits in a container the size of a big-rig trailer, can be operated by UCLA personnel using their smartphones — an important feature because most small communities can't afford an on-site technician.
A water treatment station; Cohen and colleagues inside the facility A water treatment station; Cohen and colleagues inside the facility
Now, with the San Joaquin station up and running, he has turned his attention to a new initiative: installing compact, mobile water-treatment systems in a handful of the 700 small communities across California whose water is undrinkable because of groundwater pollution. Cohen's Flexible Low Energy Reverse Osmosis device, or FLERO, is powered by solar energy and uses filtration and reverse osmosis to clean any type of contaminated water so that 90 percent of it can be drinkable.
The new project is funded in part by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the California Department of Water Resources. If it succeeds, UCLA scholars will have brought potable water to people whose only other option has been bottled water — and, perhaps, created a model that can be used in remote communities around the world.
"Bottled water is not a solution; it's a coping strategy," Cohen says. "We believe FLERO will have a big impact on water purification for remote communities, and not just in California. This is an approach that can be adopted around the world."
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This installment continues a mini-series of articles, dedicated to the insights of payment gateway development. We continue to review different aspects, allowing to improve the efficiency of a payment gateway performance and the overall quality of its service.
Payment processing in today's world has become a necessary service for increasing numbers of emerging online businesses. One of the critical payment gateway quality factors is availability of the gateway 24/7.
However, issues occur from time to time, and the best thing you can do is to be aware of these issues as early as possible to be able to take action swiftly, minimizing potential downtime.
There are two strategies that we recommend when it comes to potential issue detection.
The first mechanism is the internal audit mechanism (self-diagnosing system). This mechanism is "responsible" for detecting any functional problems or errors within the system. Detection of errors can be performed in one of two ways: either through analysis for errors of logs, generated by different components of the system (in special log files or database tables), or through active health checks of various services (this can be accomplished by executing a kind of ping operation on every particular service to verify that it is functioning without errors). If any problems or errors are detected, the internal audit subsystem can notify the administrators about them (using e-mail alerts, SMS etc).
In some situations a problem may occur not within the system, but either somewhere along communication channels or on the customer's end. Instead of pushing the responsibility to other entities, most payment gateway systems try to resolve or at least detect the reason of such a problem. Consequently, a need for a special detection mechanism arises. The mechanism has to detect the situations when transaction flow from a particular client is interrupted, or changes its typical behavioral pattern.
The approach used for detection of such situations is called "transaction velocity tracking". The idea is to monitor transaction volumes usually received from a particular client during a certain period of time.
About a hundred transactions are usually processed through a particular MID within a 30-minute interval, but at some point this number suddenly falls below that level. Respective notifications are sent to administrators. Naturally, some of the notifications will be "false alarms", however, close monitoring of incoming transaction volumes allows to detect serious malfunctions on the merchant's end (POS system or e-commerce web-site).
Before you develop specific velocity tracking mechanism, you should define which criteria you are going to use to track the transaction volumes, i.e. how you are going to quantify them. While tracking by MID can seem the most obvious approach, sometimes it is not the best one. In many cases instead of tracking specific MIDs it might be more relevant to track specific integrations. Say, if a gateway is integrated with ten different POS systems, it might be appropriate to track each of them as opposed to their individual merchants.
MID-level tracking is more relevant for desktop applications and individual payment terminals. However if you are dealing with a web-application with a centralized server, which uses the same credentials for processing transactions on behalf of hundreds of merchants, tracking by MID is not justifiable. In such cases, it is better to introduce the notion into the gateway, represented by this integrated software package, and then track velocity based on that.
Obviously, the two mechanisms become absolutely critical to the payment gateway, and any malfunction in these mechanisms can cause significant impact. In order to ensure proper functioning of these audit mechanisms, an additional audit service might be required on top of them. This extra layer would allow some external monitoring services, such as Pingdom or Nagios, to do health verifications on the internal audit and velocity tracking mechanisms. Health verification system is going to ping the payment gateway every 5 minutes or so, verifying that the entire gateway system is functional and operational; as part of the process it will verify that audit and velocity tracking systems are functioning properly. While this mechanism is also not a bullet-proof one, it significantly reduces the possibility of something going wrong and you not knowing about it.
The architecture, described above, is suitable for large-scale enterprise systems. If you are dealing with a smaller-size payment system, you do not actually need such a high level of complexity. However, make sure that you do make some provisions, similar to the ones, we've mentioned, before you actually go live.


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Polypainted head, need some brush strokes in Photoshop on horns part.
Where is the city? I'm still working on it but after I watched Magnus making of, I decided to change the overall texture workflow to speed up the process, specially for that last wide shot.


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1265-1281 Kingsway rezoning application
This application has been approved Council at Public Hearing on December 2, 2020.
We would like your feedback on a rezoning application at 1265-1281 Kingsway. The proposal is to allow for the development of a 6-storey mixed-use building. The zoning would change from C-2 (Commercial) to CD-1 (Comprehensive Development) District. The proposal includes:
43 secured market rental residential units
Commercial use at grade
51 vehicle parking spaces and 89 bicycle parking spaces
The application is being considered under the Secured Rental Policy.
Given the adjacent rezoning application at 1247 Kingsway, and the small corner lot to the southeast, have city staff considered allowing these proposed, and potential developments to share one parkade entrance?
Silent_Echo asked 7 months ago
City staff and land owners discussed the potential of a shared parkade entrance between these sites. The owners did not want to pursue this option and have since proceeded with separate parkade entrances for each of the proposals. Where possible, the size and appearance of parkade entrances and loading bays have been minimized to allow for increased landscaping and opportunities for passive surveillance of the rear lane.
As city council is soon to consider allowing these forms outright in C-2 zones, why did the applicant feel the need to proceed with this lengthy review process?
This rezoning application was submitted to the City before details in the proposed C-2 zones had been finalized.
If approved by Council, the updated C-2 zones would become active later this year. Applicants could then choose to opt out of the rezoning process and progress straight to a development permit process.
What is planned for 1255-59 Kingsway, immediately adjacent to the west of the subject site? There is no signage at these addresses nor any reference on the City's web site yet the applicant's drawings show a 6(?) storey site at this location.
WhyKidOurselves asked 7 months ago
The adjacent site at 1247 Kingsway has a rezoning application that is currently under review by City staff.
A link to more information on this application is here: https://rezoning.vancouver.ca/applications/1247kingsway/index.htm
How does the height of this building compare to the existing condo building at the west end of the block (1207-1239 Kingsway)? I realize there are numbers given in the background report, but I don't know how to work with these to derive a comparison. Thank you.
The existing four-storey buildings to the west of the site at 1207 Kingsway are approximately 12 m tall (39 ft.).
If approved, the proposed six-storey building at 1265-1281 Kingsway would have a maximum height of 20.9 m (68.6 ft.).
re Commercial at grade: With so many small businesses in Vancouver already facing extinction because of high rents (even pre-COVID business loss), there seems a great likelihood that in all the new Kingsway developments, we will see empty storefronts. Has the Planning Dept considered some radical re-thinking such as ground floor spaces amenable to daycares or school classrooms (obviously in concert w/ VSB) -- or for that matter, why not have grade level residences?
In typical By-laws that would apply to sites such as this, there is flexibility to include a range of uses at the ground floor. Both daycare and education uses are permitted in many of the recent developments along Kingsway.
Residential uses are currently not permitted on the street frontage, but are allowed on the ground floor along the rear of the building.
re Commercial at grade: For years, the retail sector along Kingsway has been described as "Nails and Noodles". How many more salons and ethnic restaurants are sustainable in this area?
If approved, the proposed by-law that would apply to this site allows for a wide range of commercial uses at the ground floor level. Potential uses on this site are not restricted to salons and restaurants.
Is the developer required to make any contributions to the neighbourhood? (CAC, DAC) No doubt this information is included in the package but it's easier to ask (as I would at an in-person open house).
The applicant is required to pay a Development Cost Levy based on the commercial floor area of the proposal. In projects such as this where 100% of the residential floor space is rental, the applicant is not required to make Development Cost Levy payments on the residential floor area of the building. In order to waive this payment, the applicant must comply with maximum unit sizes and rental costs to assist with unit affordability.
More information can be found here:
https://bylaws.vancouver.ca/bulletin/bulletin-rental-incentive-programs.pdf
Why are there so many parking spaces when this location is close to downtown, is located along a bus route, and the bike routes in this neighbourhood have been touted as desirable in other applications?
Given the accessible location of this site, the applicant has been allowed to reduce the number of car parking spaces provided with submission of a Transportation Demand Management Plan. These plans require a set of strategies to be implemented that encourage sustainable transportation choices for residents.
More information can be found here: https://vancouver.ca/your-government/parking-bylaw.aspx
Considering that the Urban Design Panel has already supported a similar development at 1247 Kingsway, is it necessary for this project to face a similar review? To me that would feel like a waste of time and resources.
Tavia asked 7 months ago
This rezoning application will not be required to attend the Urban Design Panel. Feedback from the Urban Design Panel assessment of 1247 Kingsway on March 4 has been considered in the review of this proposal.
Are there plans to work with the school board to lobby for a new building at the in-catchment school? At this point, there aren't enough spaces at the school for the existing catchment residents. So while the rent in this new building would be affordable, families would not have access to the school. This is a problem with every new building in the city and in my opinion, no more buildings should be permitted unless the local school has been adjusted to accommodate the growing community.
Alison asked 7 months ago
The City of Vancouver shares information on rezoning applications with the Vancouver School Board to assist in producing forecasts for enrolment numbers. Where necessary, these forecasts then inform new school building projects.
The current school board forecast indicates that enrolment numbers at Dickens Elementary have peaked and will decline in the short term. As a result, there are currently no plans to expand Dickens Elementary.
Enrolment capacity does currently exist at the nearby locations of McBride Elementary and Selkirk Elementary.
June 15 → July 05 2020
Referral report
Site Plan and Project Statistics
Secured Market Rental Housing Policy (Rental 100).
Housing Vancouver Strategy
C-2 District Schedule
Adam Poole
Stuart Howard Architects Inc.
Email apoole@stuarthoward.com
Jim Spillane
Email jim.spillane@vancouver.ca


If you've been following along for a while, you'll recall my visit to Hill Country. Since that visit, the same guys opened up Hill Country Chicken in Flatiron. I joined a couple friends for lunch there a couple weeks ago.
They offer two different kinds of fried chicken, Hill Country Classic or Mama Els' Recipe. Classic is just how you'd expect and the Mama Els is fried chicken without the skin. I know that fried chicken without the skin sounds crazy. I definitely did.
I ordered a thigh of each kind. The classic was delicious with crispy, tasty skin and a juicy inside. The Mama Els was surprisingly great. It was so full of flavor that it didn't even need the skin. Of course, I'll probably choose the classic if I had to pick one though. In addition to the chicken, I got to try some of the pecan pie my friend got. Quite delicious as well. Did I mention that there was Maker's Mark in it?
Fried chicken fried without the skin? Interesting! It looks pretty good too.


We're back from the Scottish Highlands near Acharacle, where we stay in a family hunting lodge overlooking an ocean bay. The sunsets and sunrises are so beautiful I found myself photographing the sunsets every evening and woke up one morning at 4am to catch a sunrise. One of the nights I trekked up the mountain and after taking a few photos of the sunset, noticed the moon directly behind me. Without changing the settings on my camera left from the sunrise photos of the morning, I photographed the moon. The settings were a complete mistake and to my surprise, I was able to capture the moon. Sometimes a mistake can be a wonderful thing.
Categories: Photography, Scotland | Permalink.


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Morikawa Wins DP World Tour Championship
Posted by Leon Osamor on November 24, 2021
Collin Morikawa claimed the Race to Dubai title after winning the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai on Sunday.
Morikawa finished 17 under at six-under 66, cruising to victory after making five birdies in the last seven holes. Morikawa had entered the event poised to win the Race to Dubai title, only if he won the DP World Tour Championship. On the first day of the event, Irishman Rory McIlroy finished top of the leaderboard but finished the event on Sunday tied at sixth place with 12 under.
McIlroy began the day as the overnight leader with a one-shot lead, which he doubled at the second hole. But he suffered a bogey on the fourth then went on to make part on the remaining holes up to the ninth. Matt Fitzpatrick, who was also a close contender for the title, had a good run on the final day. He began six shots behind but was able to make birdies on the first two holes. By the 15th hole, Fitzpatrick took the lead but lost it at the 16th when his ball found water. He continued with a bogey at the 17th but was able to make a birdie at the 18th, putting him in second place.
Morikawa, who began the day three shots behind McIlroy, found luck starting from the 12th hole, where he made his first of his last five bogeys. He made back-to-back bogeys on the 14th and 15th hole, put a par on the 16th, and completed his round with birdies on the 17th and 18th.
By winning, Morikawa has now become the first American to win the Race to Dubai title. Speaking after the race, he said, "To be the first American to do that [win the money list], to put my name against many greats, hall of famers, it's special. To have this chance and close it out with a win in the DP World Tour Championship, what a great way to finish that."
Wake up, the football world has changed – Jamie Carragher slams Manchester United's 'naive' approach
Europa League: Spartak Moscow vs Napoli Preview


text:
Media Blackout in Egypt and the U.S.: Al Jazeera Forced Off the Air by Mubarak, Telecommunications Companies Block Its Expansion in the United States
StoryFebruary 01, 2011
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Mohamed Abdel Dayem
program coordinator for the Middle East & North Africa for the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Tony Burman
chief strategic adviser for the Americas, Al Jazeera Network.
Democracy Now!'s Complete Coverage of the Egypt Protests
Reporters from Al Jazeera, the Arabic-language news network, have been arrested and forced off the air by President Hosni Mubarak. "This regime, which couldn't find the time to protect Egypt's priceless relics in the National Museum in Cairo, found the time to drag journalists through the streets … and found time to shut down Al Jazeera," says Mohamed Abdel Dayem of the Committee to Protect Journalists. Meanwhile, Al Jazeera English is broadcast to more than 200 million homes around the world, but it's hardly available in the United States. Critics have called it a media blackout by U.S. cable and satellite providers. We speak to Tony Burman of Al Jazeera English. [includes rush transcript]
StoryJan 27, 2011Guardian Journalist Arrested and Beaten Alongside Protesters in Egypt Secretly Records Ordeal
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: Al Jazeera English, by the way, is now reporting up to two million people in and around Tahrir Square. And, of course, there are protests all over Egypt.
Speaking of Al Jazeera English, we turn now to our next guest. Al Jazeera English, the satellite network that's been providing on-the-ground coverage of the rebellion in Egypt, it's broadcast to more than 200 million homes around the world and throughout Canada, but just a handful of those homes are in the United States. Critics have been calling it a media blackout by U.S. cable and satellite providers. If you live in the U.S., you may have been one of the people driving up Al Jazeera's online traffic in the last week. Visits to their website with a live video stream jumped by more than two-and-a-half thousand percent. More than 60 percent of that traffic was from the United States.
Joining us to discuss Al Jazeera English and its struggle to expand in the United States is Tony Burman, Al Jazeera's chief strategic adviser for the Americas and the network's former managing director.
I wanted to start by saying there's been a lot made of a lot of information about Al Jazeera Arabic being shut down in Egypt, and yet very few people understand that Al Jazeera English, there is almost a media blackout on it here in the United States. Tony Burman, can you explain why?
TONY BURMAN: Well, I mean, it's an interesting comparison. I mean, as you mentioned, Al Jazeera English is available in more than — I think it's now 220 million households worldwide. It's now available, as of a year ago, across Canada, but in very few centers here in the United States. You know, I think there are commercial, there are political reasons for that. There was, I think, a resistance on the part of the cable and satellite companies at the launch of Al Jazeera English in 2006. This was pre-Obama, as one recalls. During the Bush administration, I think there was a fear on their part that Americans don't want more international news, that perhaps they'd lose more subscribers than they would gain. I think the events of the past week or so, and earlier, really put a lie to that. I mean, I think that there's a — I've always felt there's a real untapped appetite for international global coverage in America, and our hope is that people will call their cable and satellite companies and indicate that, because, you know, that is what needs to happen right now, is that Americans need, in my view, need to be given at least the opportunity to choose to watch it or not watch it.
AMY GOODMAN: Tony Burman, right now, it's where? In Burlington, Vermont, on a cable station. It's in Toledo, Ohio, and —
TONY BURMAN: Correct.
AMY GOODMAN: — in Washington, D.C.?
TONY BURMAN: Yeah, it's in Washington, D.C., which is our largest market, which is, I think, in more than two million households, the whole kind of Washington area, which is — which I think was really about a year and a half ago. It's a very — that's a significant city, you know, as [inaudible] to stress, in the sense that, you know, it's a political and kind of media capital, I guess, with New York. And I think what has been intriguing — and it's available in virtually every home in the Washington area. And what's intriguing to us is that the response — I mean, let's face it — and I'm speaking now from Washington — this is a city of news addicts, a city that probably per capita has more people globally engaged and interested than perhaps a lot of other places in America, and the response has really been really quite positive. We know senators, we know important people in the administration, you know, who regard Al Jazeera English — this is prior to Egypt and Tunisia — regard Al Jazeera English as their kind of default news channel, because it provides such global coverage. So, our goal, obviously, is, you know, to convince Americans to tell their cable and satellite companies that, you know, what is available in Washington, what's available in Burlington and Toledo should really be available nationwide in the United States.
AMY GOODMAN: It's also being broadcast on Link TV on DISH Network channel 9410 —
AMY GOODMAN: — and on DirecTV, channel 375.
TONY BURMAN: That's right, and Pacifica Radio, as well.
AMY GOODMAN: And Pacifica Radio stations around the country.
TONY BURMAN: Right, it's on Pacifica Radio. That's right.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to join this discussion with what's happening with Al Jazeera in Arabic language —
TONY BURMAN: Right.
AMY GOODMAN: — the government's attack on that. Last week, Egyptian authorities ordered Al Jazeera to stop operations after the street protests broke out. When the network refused to comply, the Egyptian government revoked its license, raided its Cairo office, temporarily arrested six journalists. Al Jazeera has denounced the censorship and continues to report from Egypt.
We are also joined in New York by Mohamed Abdel Dayem. He is the program coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa division of the Committee to Protect Journalists. We are with Tony Burman in Washington, D.C. Can you talk about what's happened with Al Jazeera and the shutdown and what it's meant for journalists?
MOHAMED ABDEL DAYEM: Well, basically, what you said is a very good and succinct summary of what happened. What's amazing is what the Egyptian people did in response to that. I was talking to people in Tahrir Square last night, and they said that dozens of people had left the square and were getting as many extension cords as they can find. And they went and brought extension cords and receivers and dishes and plugged Al Jazeera into street lights. They managed — found a way to plug Al Jazeera into street lights. And as we speak right now, with a million-plus people in Tahrir Square, people are watching Al Jazeera and Al Jazeera Mobasher, the two channels that Mubarak's regime, in a futile attempt to maintain power, tried to censor and tried to block from the Egyptian people. They said Al Jazeera was inciting. Clearly, the people in Tahrir Square feel differently about this. They are watching Al Jazeera now, as we speak.
AMY GOODMAN: And why is Al Jazeera targeted, in particular? What do people otherwise, except for plugging into streetlamps, get to see in Egypt?
MOHAMED ABDEL DAYEM: Al Jazeera is targeted primarily because it is the most frequently watched station. And the Egyptian government would like to censor everybody, if they could. They can't, and so they went for the biggest target, and the easiest target, because it's an Arab station, it's a station that broadcasts in Arabic, which is very different from CNN or the BBC or some of these other stations that are broadcasting in English or in other foreign languages that aren't being watched by as many people on the street. But Al Jazeera is the primary source of information for people in Egypt, and frankly, elsewhere in the Middle East. And the Egyptian government wanted to silence that.
This is not just happening in Egypt; this is happening in Yemen and in Sudan and elsewhere. All these leaders are saying, with a straight face, somehow with a straight face, saying that all this unrest in the streets has nothing to do with their failed policies, 50 years, 60 years, 70 years of failed policies. But somehow, a news station that is merely reporting the news and transmitting images of what is actually happening on the ground is inciting a million-plus Egyptians in Cairo and millions more elsewhere in the country to revolt against a brutal dictator. Frankly, it doesn't pass the laugh test. And the people in the square last night and this morning have illustrated that with their deeds rather than their words.
AMY GOODMAN: Tony Burman, I wanted to ask you about the difference between Al Jazeera in the Arabic language and in English language. But first, I wanted to turn to Wadah Khanfar, the director general of Al Jazeera. He talked about Al Jazeera's' mission as a news network when he came here to Democracy Now!
WADAH KHANFAR: Al Jazeera is a representation of, you know, diversity in the Arab world. In our newsroom, we have every single nationality, we have every single, you know, ideology, we have every single background. However, when it comes to the screen, we have one code of ethics and one code of conduct. All of us are proud of our commitment to our audience, and we will never betray them. We can never be, you know, an out — you know, we cannot be representing single view or ideology or party, or whatever like that. We cannot afford to do so. We are in a region that's undergoing transformation. How could we be pro-Muslim Brotherhood or pro-Arab nationalists or pro-whoever, since the Arabs have not yet discovered what kind of path they're going to go?
AMY GOODMAN: What is the relationship between Al Jazeera, overall, in Arabic, the much larger network, and Al Jazeera English here, Tony Burman?
TONY BURMAN: Well, it's a collaborative one. I mean, I spent more than two years, as you mentioned, as managing director of Al Jazeera English based in Doha. And we cooperate as best we can on a variety of stories. Television, as you know, is expensive, so, certainly, on the technical resource level. And I think there's certainly a sharing in terms of editorial ideas and resources. But, I mean, it is effectively — we're two separate channels, you know, because, let's face it, we serve two different audiences. I mean, the Al Jazeera English is an international channel.
AMY GOODMAN: Has Al Jazeera English been able to continue in Egypt?
TONY BURMAN: No, no, no, no, no. It's blocked. And in many ways, there's been a combined operation in Cairo. For example, the six people detained by the Egyptians yesterday, and eventually released, were actually with Al Jazeera English. But no, all of Al Jazeera has been blocked in Cairo.
AMY GOODMAN: Do you have an Al Jazeera English reporter at the White House questioning President Obama and the White House spokesperson?
TONY BURMAN: Yes, we do. I mean, we have several. I mean, we have several reporters in Washington that cover the Pentagon, cover the State Department, cover the White House. I think that we're in the process right now — as we increase our presence in the United States, I think we're in the process of increasing our reporting staff here. But we have a large broadcast center here in Washington. I think the worldwide interest, obviously, in the United States is certainly — since Obama came in, has been quite profound. And I think we do feel that we — again, consistent with what Wadah Khanfar said, I think we do feel that we bring a perspective on journalism that is distinctive from the BBC, for example, and certainly from — you know, from American commercial networks.
AMY GOODMAN: Mohamed, I don't think many people know about the crackdown on journalists. Can you talk about what you've been documenting at the Committee to Protect Journalists?
MOHAMED ABDEL DAYEM: Well, Egypt has a long history of censorship and a long history of harassment of journalists, going back really decades, even before the beginning of Mubarak's reign. But really, in the last week, we've seen something unprecedented in Egypt. And I've been following Egypt for well over a decade. And this last week, the Egyptian government, in its frantic attempts to latch onto power, have really done some outrageous things. They've dragged both Egyptian journalists and foreign journalists through the streets of Cairo and other cities throughout Egypt. They've confiscated equipment. On a single day, they detained 26 journalists, dragged them off of the steps of the Egyptian Journalists Syndicate. All that is documented in pictures and in video, frequently by Al Jazeera. And it's precisely that coverage by Al Jazeera and others that the Egyptian government was trying to silence.
And let me just remind your viewers and your listeners real quick that this regime, which couldn't find the time to protect Egypt's priceless relics in the National Museum in Cairo, found the time to drag journalists through the streets, found time to shoot its own people on the streets and massacre them, and found time to shut down Al Jazeera. So it really tells you a whole lot about this government's priorities.
AMY GOODMAN: Tony Burman, it's interesting that Al Jazeera English is not broadcast on almost any network. I think some of the excuses used are simply that they're very crowded, although we see new cable networks going on all the time. And yet, U.S. officials are always interviewed on Al Jazeera English.
TONY BURMAN: No, indeed. Indeed. And I really am hopeful. I mean, at the risk of sounding naive, I'm hopeful, you know, that this event has been a turning point. I mean, there are reviewers that are saying that, you know, perhaps this will be to Al Jazeera English in the United States what the First Gulf War was to CNN in the early '90s, in that it will — it, I think, has brought to the attention to a lot of Americans our existence, and I think it will encourage them to pressure cable companies. I mean, I think it's — I mean, it's absurd that in a democracy of over 300 million people that, you know, the United States is one of the few countries in the world where Al Jazeera English is not available. And I think — you know, I think that our hope is that over the next weeks and months, that that will change. I think the cable and satellite companies are hearing from Americans. We sense that. We have an ongoing kind of relationship with them. We intend, obviously, to accelerate that in the days and months ahead, and we're hopeful that there will be — and our experience, for example, whether it's in Burlington or whether it's in Ohio or whether it's certainly in Washington, our experience has been incredibly positive. The response in Canada, for example, where there were also some hesitations voiced by some groups about "Would the sun still shine if Al Jazeera English was available in Canadian homes?" well, that has completely turned around. You know, so I think — you know, it's been late, it's been belated, but I think the tide is turning, I think, in our favor here in the U.S.
AMY GOODMAN: Tony Burman, I want to thank you for being with us, chief strategic adviser for the Americas, Al Jazeera network. And also, Mohamed Abdel Dayem, thank you for being with us, from the Committee to Protect Journalists. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. Digital darkness, that's our next subject. We're going to talk about what was cut off in Egypt. We're going to talk also about the beginning of Twitter. And why did Vodafone comply with the Egyptian government's demand that they turn off the internet? Stay with us.
Next story from this daily show
Digital Darkness: U.S., U.K. Companies Help Egyptian Regime Shut Down Telecommunications and Identify Dissident Voices
NEXTDigital Darkness: U.S., U.K. Companies Help Egyptian Regime Shut Down Telecommunications and Identify Dissident Voices
Guardian Journalist Arrested and Beaten Alongside Protesters in Egypt Secretly Records Ordeal


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Q: Jquery Tabs - Delay before fully rendered, detect when rendered I'm using the tabs in jQuery UI : http://jqueryui.com/demos/tabs/
I've actually a lot of data in those tabs, so when the page is loading the data are completely messed up before the tabs are fully processed/rendered.
So i'm looking for a way to detect when the tabs are finished rendering probably with a callback function will be my guess. Like this i will be able to show a waiting message before the tabs are fully rendered.
Thanks !

A: We had the same problem at work, to be honest it can be an evident problem in most JQuery if you have loads of it on the page. To ensure that it's only shown when it's actually ready we initially hide the parent tab container like so:

then in the document.ready function after we've called .tabs, we then make it visible, like so:
$(function () {
    $("#tabs").tabs();

    $("#tabs").css("display", "block");
});

A: Generally this is done by showing/hiding a div or two over the top of your content. You can get a fancy loading gif from http://www.ajaxload.info/ to get you started. Then you'll want to place a DIV on your page:

 Please Wait

You'll want this hidden by default, so you'd need to add this CSS:
#loading { display:none; }

You'd also want to setup the display for this too:
#loading { display:none; position:fixed; left:0; top:0; width:100%; height:100%;
           background-image:url("transparentbg.png"); }

The file transparentbg.png would be a 25x25 black PNG set to about 80% opaque. Next you would need a way to show and hide this with jQuery:
function showLoading() {
  $("#loading").show();
}

function hideLoading() {
  $("#loading").hide();
}

Now you can use this when you need to do something like querying an external page for data:
showLoading();
$.post("data.php", {var:"foo"}, function(results){
  $("content").append(results);
  hideLoading();
});

You can change out data.php for tab1.php, tab2.php, etc. linking to the appropriate php page for that tab.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


You may be surprised to learn coal is quite easy to manage and use, that's one of the benefits. There's two distinct types of units, stokers and hand fired stove. Stokers are the most convenient type because these are automatic. They are not much different than any conventional heating system, they are thermostatically controlled. Hand fired units are quite popular too and would be more like using a wood stove and requires manual adjustments. Each has their advantages and disadvantages.
The stokers internally pretty much haven't changed in years, they are time tested designs that work. If you're familiar with a pellet stove these would be similar to them except in production for much longer. Some designs have been around for more than half a century.
Keep your home at its ideal temperature at all times with a coal stove. Our coal stoves make it possible to achieve and maintain the warmth you desire while enjoying a cost-effective home heating solution.
Coal Stoker: The VertiFlow™ Stoker System burns each piece of coal thoroughly and completely—for amazing fire control, maximum heat and impressive burn times. Coal is fed from the bottom of the hopper and automatically controlled based on heating demands. This allows each piece of fuel to remain in intense heat throughout the burn cycle, resulting in less ash and greater heating efficiency.


text:
Cleveland Council approves urban farming, teardown of foreclosed homes
Updated: Mar. 28, 2019, 2:07 a.m. | Published: Feb. 03, 2009, 2:05 a.m.
By Ellen Jan Kleinerman, The Plain Dealer
CLEVELAND -- The City Council on Monday approved two measures aimed at reshaping the city's urban landscape.
One ordinance will allow residents to raise and keep farm animals and bees. It's a step, proponents believe, toward finding innovative uses for vacant land.
The other ordinance sets guidelines for how Mayor Frank Jackson will spend $25.5 million in federal neighborhood improvements funds. The bulk of the money will be used to tear down abandoned homes left behind by the foreclosure epidemic.
Both were passed after intense debate. The "chicken-and-bees" legislation, as it became nicknamed, generated the most buzz, with several council members objecting to the plan. They cited concerns about noise and other complaints urban farms bring.
Councilwoman Dona Brady, one of three no votes, said she believes the matter is a zoning issue and should not be addressed by blanket legislation. Councilmen Martin Keane and Kevin Kelley also voted against the measure.
Councilman Joe Cimperman, who sponsored the ordinance, said urban farming is a growing trend. He is aware of chickens living in his ward and has compared noise from chickens with noise from motorcycles, insisting that the latter draw more complaints.
"We want people to be able to grow their own food," Cimperman said. The ordinance allows residents to keep chickens, ducks, rabbits and beehives but not roosters, geese or turkeys. A typical residential lot could have no more than six small animals and two hives.
Those wishing to raise and keep animals and bees will have to apply to the city's Health Department for a license. Neighbors would be mailed a notice and could raise objections, Cimperman said.
The ordinance allowing Jackson to begin spending money granted by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development passed by a 20-1 vote.
The mayor's original plans for the Neighborhood Stabilization Program called for $14.5 million to go toward demolitions, with the rest of money going to home rehabilitations and other property improvements.


text:
Schnipper's Restaurant to Open Location Near World Trade Center
By Liam La Guerre July 20, 2015 5:27 pm
120 Church Street. Liam La Guerre
Here's what's cooking Downtown.
American-style chain eatery Schnipper's Quality Kitchen is opening a Tribeca location two blocks from the World Trade Center site, Commercial Observer has learned.
SEE ALSO: UFT Relocating Bronx Office to 45K SF in Co-Op City
The restaurant known for its burgers, hot dogs, salads and shakes, signed a lease for a 3,300-square-foot ground-floor space at the 21-story mixed-use building at 120 Church Street between Park Place and Murray Street, which is owned by Brooklyn-based Clipper Equity.
The asking rent was $150 per square foot, according to Winick Realty Group, which handled the transaction for the tenant. The length of the lease was not disclosed, and the new location is set to open by the end of 2015.
A fast-growing rival to popular burger joint Shake Shack, it will be the fifth Schnipper's location in the city, as well as its second spot Downtown—its first being located at 1 New York Plaza in the Financial District.
"[The building at] 120 Church Street is a unique and dynamic location for Schnipper's, putting them in close proximity to Tribeca and the City Hall area, as well as just a few blocks from the World Trade Center," Winick's Steven Baker, who represented Schnipper's, said in prepared remarks. "I expect that they will be very successful here."
Brothers Jonathan and Andrew Schnipper opened the first Schnipper's restaurant in 2009 at the base of the New York Times Building on 41st Street and Eighth Avenue. There are also locations at 15 East 23rd Street where Credit Suisse is headquartered, and the Real Estate Board of New York headquarters at 570 Lexington Avenue.
Landlord Clipper Equity, which purchased the building for $262 million in December of last year, was represented by Ariel Schuster of RKF and colleagues Ross Berkowitz and Andrew Stern.
"The amount of energy and foot traffic in this location will make this a great spot for Schnipper's," Mr. Schuster said. "This New York City favorite will now be able to service Downtown visitors and office workers and become an integral part of the local dining landscape."
Other notable tenants at 120 Church Street include fitness club Equinox, Starbucks, Amish Market and Apple Bank.
Keywords: Clipper Equity, Food & Drink, Schnipper's Quality Kitchen, World Trade Center
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The first week back at work has been difficult for me, and it was not even a full week as I started on Wednesday. It was a shock to the system to have to get up, get ready and go sit in the office for eight hours. It was a little difficult to concentrate; I felt completely out of it. The office was very quiet and it felt odd and only added to the sense of unreality of it all. A Where am I and what on earth am I doing sort of feeling. I missed lazing in bed and eating too much and doing very little else besides.
Anyway, I was thinking of whether I should do a 2018 year in review or make some goals for 2019. In regard to the review, there is probably little point; I think 2018 passed somewhat in a depressed haze, with moments of joy such as my big trip back home (to South Africa) in February, my staycation in summer and a trip to Scotland with my dad too. (This I sadly forgot to blog about. We had limited connectivity there and I somewhat enjoyed switching off, enjoying nature and spending time with my father.) There were a few smaller things too, off the top of my head I think about a weekend spent looking after my sister's cat, fun weekends with my sister, and a lovely relaxed Christmas. But the whole being depressed and anxious thing followed me around and filled up the majority of the year, the empty spaces around holidays and fun weekends, the bit with real life and the daily grind, I struggled. I felt very stuck in my sad, anxious and self-critical mindset and am still working my way through that.
Continue to tackle my Anxiety and Depression – keep seeing my therapist, engage with my treatment, take my medication regularly, and do things that will make me calmer and feel more in control (read: less procrastination and panicky self sabotage).
Build my savings and pay off my credit card – continue to work on managing impulsive and emotional spending, basically. Also- continue to work on identifying the difference between need and want, and then really think through my purchases why do I want this and how will I use it. I want to have a proper emergency fund!
Buy a new bed – buy a double bed in particular. I have been sleeping on the same single bed since I was a child and I am also ready to move to a double bed, however I am having some trouble commiting to spending this much money on something I technically don't need (I have a functioning bed already!) and am also stuck on the logistics of it (Can I manage to make a bed up myself?) If I managed to succeed at the above savings goal though, I'd love to go ahead and get my new bed.
Carry on 'locally' travelling – this year I did go abroad once, to South Africa at the beginning of the year. However my other trips were a 'staycation' to Northumberland and I also spent a few days in Scotland with my dad. I would like to not go anywhere abroad this year, in line with above savings goal, but definitely still travel a bit. I am contemplating another staycation, am definitly going to Scotland with my dad again, and would like to explore my local area more – I started doing this but as depression took over I…stopped. I have a mental list of gardens, abbeys and areas of countryside I want to go to and I'd like to really commit to going out and seeing them this year. I can't keep hibernating indoors, wallowing in my depression, after all. And if I explore like this, it should hopefully help me not feel like I'm missing out by not going abroad.
Of course, nothing is set in stone. Who knows what 2019 will bring and if events will allow for the above to happen. But these are the things on my mind, and these are the intentions I'll start my year off with. If I start well, hopefully I can end well no matter what happens.
When I was looking at accommodation for uni I automatically drifted towards catered accommodation- it seemed more private, closer to uni, breakfast and dinner provided, £5.10 a day to spend at any uni food outlet, room and bathroom cleaned. It seemed great, and it wasn't much more expensive than self catered. So far its been fine. But this food thing? Bit not good.
I never really talk about this on the blog, and I'm not sure if I should, seeing so it may make seem a little crazy but here we go.
I have never had a good relationship with food. I don't like to eat- I'm really weird about food, like if I don't like the smell or the texture or the way it looks then I can't bring myself to eat it. My parents used to have to force me to eat when I was little, and spent years bargaining with me to finish just half of what's on your plate, Catherine. I'm sure I should of outgrown it but I never did. I still pick at my food, and my portion sizes are half the size, even the quarter the size of other peoples yet it takes me longer than them to eat. I also developed the tendency to associate food with comfort instead of nutrition. At one point when I was depressed I was eating so little, and at the same time so much of the wrong things (aka skipping supper and filling up on chocolate instead) that I ended up underweight. That was part of my wake up call and so I simply forced myself to eat- even if I didn't like it, even if I didn't want to. And I got good. I learned to eat and I put the weight back on. Last year, last academic year, I was eating three meals a day, I was having just one chocolate bar a week and one packet of crisps a week (that sounds bad but to go from one meal a day, if that, and to having one bar of chocolate a day, if not more, it makes you feel proud to end up at that place). Sure, it wasn't an amazing diet, but I was proud of where I had ended up. I was in control of my diet. I was doing well and I was going to keep progressing, getting better.
But last Semester I fucked up. I justified it- the first time living away from home, the stress of adjusting to uni. OK, I said, but I made a goal- I would do better this semester. Alas.
Now? Now I have completely lost that control, and it doesn't seem to be coming back any time soon. University catered meals are frankly, gross, especially for someone as fussy as me. I thought having meals provided for me would encourage me to eat, but it does the opposite- I skip supper at least three times a week, and often just substitute for snacking or nothing at all. I keep some food in my room but they're snacks, mostly, and I can't really get fresh fruit and veg easily- such things are expensive, and go off quickly. And that £5.10? Pure temptation and for someone as weak willed as me, especially when I'm stressed out or anxious, which is often, I end up spending it on things I shouldn't. In my effort to start working I have been going to the library again- and I'll end up buying a hot chocolate because I'm cold, and a brownie or a muffin just because I have some money left over. When I'm between lectures I need something quick to snack on because I'm hungry and I don't have time so I end up grabbing a packet of chips or a brownie or something else ridiculous. Its so easy to give in temptation when you have the means. Last year in an effort to save money every day I went into uni I made myself sandwiches, on whole wheat seeded bread , and packed a little something with that and that was lunch. No snacking, unless I'd brought one. My only treats would be the occasional pizza slice or ice cream. And of course I was at home, which meant I could cook for myself, or eat my parents cooking, and have access to whatever i wanted, including lots of good stuff. It was reasonably easy to keep myself in check.
I long to have that control back. But I feel like its out of my hands. A large part of the forcing myself to eat was learning to cook, making my own suppers, putting together my own lunches, so that I could see and track exactly what I was eating. How do I do that at uni? I am lazy and stressed and I have £5.10 to spend on what I want and so I do. This is problematic. I am currently anaemic, again.I don't feel good. I need to do something about this.I need to start forcing myself to eat things I hate again because I am not getting enough vitamins, minerals..anything. But I severely lack willpower. And I really like hot chocolate.
I read this blog post and it made me feel a lot better. In the end I need to accept that I have messed up but its not too late. I need to stop resisting, making all these excuses. I just need to do it because I can. I did it once and I can do it again. The diet may be failed now, but it doesn't have to stay that well. It goes back on my list of goals for this semester. I will start by taking baby steps- like working on cutting down the chips first- and then go from there.
I used to read a lot. My room back home is cluttered with books, and even when I came to uni I packed as many books as I could get away with. Sometimes I can easily read a book in a week, two weeks. But not much anymore. Over the past year I have barely read 10 books, if that. And it's not that I don't enjoy reading anymore, its just I can't seem to concentrate anymore. At least when I was commuting to uni last year I had the benefit of having that time to read without distractions. Now there seems to be so much else to do. I have university, and I have to study and between all this it seems so much easier to do far more mindless activities- like browsing the Internet or watching dramas. Not to mention how noisy halls are, especially late at night when I want to read (I love my hall :|). But nonetheless, I want to read more and I want to read like I used to. So I made this a goal for this year. I wrote out a list of 30 books and I'm going to read every single one this year. I know 30 books doesn't sound a lot, but for me this is going to be a challenge. So far I have made good progress though- I recently finished The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner, which was a nice quick, satisfying read and I'm left anticipating the next three books. I managed to finish this book in just under a week too- which is a testament to how good it is, or how much free time I have right now. Either way, I am left hopeful that I can do this.


text:
Хаїр Марруфо (, Ель-Пасо, 7 червня 1977) — футбольний арбітр США.

Кар'єра
Став футбольним арбітром завдяки своєму батькові, Антоніо Марруфо, який був мексиканським футбольним арбітром.

Обслуговував матчі Major League Soccer з 2002 року, а 1 січня 2007 року у віці 29 років отримав статус арбітра ФІФА. 2008 року був названий арбітром року у МЛС.

Його міжнародний дебют відбувся 17 жовтня 2007 на матч Кубка націй ОФК 2008 року між Фіджі і Новою Зеландією (0:2). Таким чином Марруфо дебютував у конфедерації ОФК будучи членом КОНКАКАФ.

У 2008 році він був обраний арбітром на футбольний турнір Олімпійських іграх у Пекіні, де обслуговував матч чвертьфіналу Нідерланди-Аргентина.

У жовтні 2009 року отримав запрошення на юнацький чемпіонат світу серед юнаків до 17 років в Нігерії. За кілька місяців до цього він обслуговував матчі Золотого кубка КОНКАКАФ, який проходив в США (в майбутньому також незмінно залучався до турнірів 2011 і 2013 років).

Його ім'я було включено в список з 38 попередньо відібраних ФІФА арбітрів до ЧС-2010, але в лютому 2010 року не потрапив у фінальну заявку.

У квітні 2012 року знову був включений ФІФА в список з 52 суддів і для наступного ЧС-2014, але і цього разу на турнір заявлений не був.

В жовтні 2013 року був включений у список арбітрів на Чюнацький чемпіонат світу серед юнаків до 17 років, відпрацювавши на двох матчах групового етапу та чвертьфіналі.

У 2016 році був арбітром Столітнього Кубка Америки, де обслуговував зустрічі групового етапу.

У 2018 році рішенням ФІФА обраний головним арбітром для обслуговування матчів чемпіонату світу в Росії,..

Примітки

Посилання
 Профіль на Professional Referee Organization
 Профіль  на worldreferee.com
 Профіль  на soccerway.com

Футбольні арбітри США
Арбітри чемпіонату світу з футболу 2018
Уродженці Ель-Пасо
Народились 7 червня
Народились 1977

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


The Seljuqs were a branch of the Turkic Oghuz tribe that had ruled a Central Asian empire in the 2nd/8th century. In the early years of the 5th/11th century, Seljuq tribal princes consolidated power in Persia. The character of Seljuq rule in the following decades would reflect Persian links forged during this period—the Seljuqs often endorsed Persian culture and language, even to the exclusion of their own Turkic roots and the Arab heritage so integral to the Islamic faith. In 447/1055, the Seljuq leader Tughril Beg replaced the last Shīʿī Būyid prince as military sovereign in Baghdad. As a Sunni partisan, at least in name, he was fêted with honorary titles by the ʿAbbāsid caliph. Thus, in the official propaganda, the illiterate Seljuq warlords had become heroes by freeing Sunni Islam from the clutches of its Shī'ī opponent.
Makdisi has argued that, contrary to the standard portrayal, Tughril Beg was no savior. In fact, the caliph did not need saving. Makdisi points out that the Shīʿī Būyid dynasty was fast disintegrating and harbored no animosity toward the caliphate. After all, the Būyids had refrained from molesting the caliph during their tenure in Baghdad (since 343/945). Nonetheless, Tughril Beg was more than a cynical tribal warlord tolerating the caliph in order to legitimize his conquest. The Sunni Seljuq tribal warriors that he commanded were better equipped than apathetic Būyid princes—in military and ideological terms—to defend the caliph against external threats, especially the Fatimid-backed Ismaʿīlī insurgents. In actuality, the Caliph al-Qāʾim chafed under the Seljuq warlords. They allowed him even less freedom than had the feuding Būyids. The Seljuqs officially recognized the primacy of the 'Abbāsid caliph, although they were firm in retaining coercive force for themselves. Despite its shortcomings, the Seljuq arrival in Baghdad created a theoretical opportunity for the caliph to resume his historical role as the head of the Islamic community. In fact, this reinstatement did not occur, forcing theorists like al-Ghazālī to reckon with an imperfect reality.
The Seljuq offensive did not flag after the conquest of Baghdad. Tughril Beg marched on Mosul in the next year, laying siege to Tikrīt along the way. The caliph was a convenient legitimizing accessory to these campaigns, receiving protection in exchange for his blessing. The Seljuqs maintained a strong military force to execute their ongoing operations. Unlike other Islamic powers, Seljuq leaders commanded fellow tribesmen. While this uniformity lent vertical cohesion to the Seljuq command, tribal traditions, especially those of succession, sometimes troubled the Seljuq state. In the Oghuz tribal heritage, an office did not pass from father to eldest son, but instead to the oldest male family member. The tension between this arrangement and the hereditary model prevalent in Sunni regions contributed to several upheavals that disrupted al-Ghazālī's life, notably in the years preceding his great crisis. These internecine conflicts disabused him of his intimacy with political power and deeply affected his thinking.
The Seljuq army was active not only in border regions, but also in territories already under firm Seljuq control. The court of the Seljuq rulers was primarily a military headquarters, though frequented by bureaucrats and ulamā. From his court, the sultan dispatched expeditions against enemies like the Ghaznavids in Persia, Byzantine Christians beyond Adharbayjān, and internal rebels. He also deployed troops within Seljuq territory in order to demonstrate his power. Nizām al-Mulk, vizier to Tughril Beg's successors, also favored this strategy of intimidation and preemptive suppression, which was especially effective in al-Ghazālī's homeland, the Seljuq East.
Hogga has laid heavy emphasis on this facet of Seljuq rule, arguing that a state of permanent war pervaded civil society.18 New garrisons were installed in the towns, and military replaced civilian police. In many cases, the soldiers that composed these detachments were Turkic tribesmen, an unfamiliar element in the urban social fabric. Their presence was not always welcome. The 7th/13th century Arab historian Ibn al-Athīr relates that when Tughril Beg entered Baghdad, local mobs rose against his soldiers and inflicted casualties. The Seljuq troops responded by looting in the city. "The people were sorely oppressed and in great terror." Citizens throughout Seljuq domains experienced similar traumatic events whenever tensions rose with their occupiers.
As they continued their conquests, the Seljuq sultans needed sustainable mechanisms for controlling their far-flung holdings. Administration lay not in the hands of the tribal leaders themselves, but with the ʿulamāʾ and the existing educated Persian administrative class. The great Seljuq viziers were eminent representatives of this class. They were often the real rulers of the Seljuq empire, even while paying lip service to the sultan and caliph. Nizām al-Mulk was only the most prominent of these men; he was not unique. His predecessor, the vizier of Tughril Beg, Amīd al-Mulk al-Kundūrī, gained fame and influence alongside his master. Before al-Ghazālī's day, the Ḥanafī al-Kundūrī decreed that Ash'arī theologians be denounced from the pulpits of mosques in Seljuq lands. His decree drove al-Ghazālī's famous teacher al-Juwaynī (d. 478/1085) from Khurasān, as well as al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072), perhaps al-Ghazālī's most direct Sufi forbear.
When Alp Arslan succeeded Tughril Beg in 455/1063 the vizierate passed to Niẓām al-Mulk, who had risen to prominence with Arslan. As Nizām al-Mulk consolidated his administration, it grew unclear which of the two was actually master. After the assassination of Alp Arslan in 465/1072 and the accession of Malikshāh, there was no doubt that Nizām al-Mulk held the reins of control. The story of Alp Arslan and Nizām al-Mulk closely parallels the life of al-Ghazālī. Nizām al-Mulk, like al-Ghazālī, hailed from the city of Ṭūs in Khurāsān; this commonality may have played a role in al-Ghazālī's appointment to the Baghdad Nizāmiyya. Alp Arslan had governed Khurāsān before his ascent to the Seljuq sultanate in 1063/453.
Niẓām al-Mulk used his position to promote the religious factions that al-Ghazālī would later adhere to: Shafīʿī fiqh and Ashʿarī kalām, both prominent in the Khurāsānī context. He also favored Sufism, of which Khurāsān was a hotbed. These correlations hint at partisanship. They also demonstrate that religious allegiances penetrated the political domain in medieval Islam via the regional sectarian affiliations of political leaders. When Ni'ām al-Mulk brought al-Ghazālī to prominence, he was privileging the young scholar's doctrinal convictions. These convictions could then be called upon to shore up the legitimacy of Seljuq control. Regional affinity was only one path by which religious knowledge entered the political scene. The proliferation of sectarian madrasas under the Seljuqs cannot be divorced from the influence of sponsors like Nizām al-Mulk, who had strong regional attachments that entailed doctrinal convictions.


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2011 final run in to commence at Motegi
The Grand Prix of Japan starts a sequence of three races in the space of three weeks in which Casey Stoner will attempt to secure his second premier class title, whilst Jorge Lorenzo tries to hold onto his crown.
The Grand Prix of Japan takes place this weekend as the 2011 MotoGP World Championship heads into a swift conclusion which will see three of the final four rounds – starting at Motegi – take place in the space of three weeks.
Taking a 44-point lead into this weekend's 15th round is Repsol Honda rider Casey Stoner, who with victory last time out at Aragón – his eighth of the season – extended his advantage at the top over defending World Champion Jorge Lorenzo. Stoner won last year's race at Motegi and a repeat of that result would put him in a position to be able to secure the 2011 title in the following round, his home race at Phillip Island.
The Australian knows that is purely hypothetical at the moment however and remains fully focused on taking each race as it comes. Likewise Lorenzo knows that whilst his chances of retaining his title are now slim, there is still everything to play for. The Yamaha Factory Racing rider was fourth in last year's Motegi race on his way to the 2010 title, but won the previous year so knows his way around the Japanese track well.
Consistency has been the cornerstone of Andrea Dovizioso's 2011 season and is the reason for the Repsol Honda rider's current position of third in the Championship, but the rarity of a DNF at Aragón – the first time he has failed to score points in a race this season – will have angered the Italian. He will be keen to put that right at a circuit at which he finished second in last year's race.
Close on the tail of Dovizioso after a third straight second-placed finish in the previous round, Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda) is looking to score wins as 2011 draws to a close and would be eager to do so at a track at which he sustained a broken collarbone in a practice crash last year. Yamaha Factory Racing rider Ben Spies would also dearly love to add to his win tally having taken a debut GP victory earlier in the year, as he chases a possible top-four Championship spot.
One of the protagonists of the battle of the season last year was Valentino Rossi, who fought then team-mate Jorge Lorenzo fiercely for the final podium position at Motegi. The Italian finds himself in a very different situation this year however as the search for an improvement in performance continues at Ducati, with Rossi and factory team-mate Nicky Hayden currently sixth and seventh respectively in the overall standings.
Marco Simoncelli (San Carlo Honda Gresini) scored a 250cc win at Motegi in his title-winning 2008 campaign and the Italian will be challenging to add to his single podium achieved at Brno this year, and Colin Edwards (Monster Yamaha Tech 3) and Hiroshi Aoyama (San Carlo Honda Gresini) currently complete the Championship top ten. For Aoyama the Motegi round presents the most important race of the year for the Japanese rider as he aims to reward the home fans with a solid result.
The MotoGP field will be expanded this weekend with the addition of two further names, with HRC test riders Kousuke Akiyoshi and Shinichi Itoh both participating in the Grand Prix of Japan. Akiyoshi, who rode at Assen earlier this year, will be on an LCR Honda with Itoh on an RC212V for the Honda Racing Team.
Honda announced during the Aragón weekend that the pair would bring the number of RC212Vs on the Motegi grid up to eight for Round 15.
Loris Capirossi will unfortunately not be able to ride this weekend after the Pramac Racing rider suffered a heavy crash at Aragón which aggravated an existing right shoulder injury. The Italian hopes to be fit for the following round in Australia.
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