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GM trial gets go-ahead
A genetically modified potato variety will be planted in Ireland as part of a Teagasc-led experimental trial, which has today got the 'green-light' from Ireland's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
This post also appears on the Cork Independent Blog.
The field trials were allowed to proceed after an assessment of the experimental plans and designs by the EPA and a broad-ranging consultation process. The EPA also received 83 representations from interested parties - all objecting to the proposed trials. I've previously written about why, I think, this trial is needed.
Teagasc applied for a liscence to plant the potatoes back in January. These plants contain a gene which makes them resistant to late blight (Phytophthora infestans) - the organism which caused the Irish potato famine. This gene has been taken from a wild, related potato variety and inserted into the cultivated potato using GM technology.
The EPA have given their consent to the trials subject to eight conditions, saying in their decision: "The agency believes that the risk to human health and the environment from the deliberate release of these GM potatoes is negligible".
The conditions include a requirement of Teagasc to monitor the experimental site for at least four years after planting. They also require Teagasc to report to the EPA every two months on the progress of the experiments and to set up a 40m exclusion zone around the site where no commercial potato planting can take place.
This trial will ensure that we can have real experimental data, based on Irish conditions, so that we can sensibly assess the impact of GM potato planting on the environment under closely monitored and controlled conditions. From reading through the large number of submissions, it is clear that a large number of those objecting are calling for "more information" before such planting takes place. They seemingly fail to see that this trial is specifically design to provide that information they crave; and to do so in a safe, controlled and carefully-monitored fashion.
There will be a large amount of hyperbole written and spoken about this decision in the next few days. Already, the Organic Trust has warned of "grave ramifications" and a Green party spokesman has suggested it will do "untold damage to Irish farming". On the other hand, those welcoming the decision may talk of feeding the world and food security. In reality, the product of this decision will be far less clear-cut. We will hopefully learn more about how GM plants work in the Irish environment and those who support or oppose GM will continue to argue their own side of the debate.
I believe this is a positive step forward however. This experiment will provide real results which can only add to, enrich and enlighten what is an already heated debate. I look forward to seeing the results of this experiment.
Labels: EPA, food, GM, plants, potato, teagasc
Imagine Science
Here's a promotional video for the Imagine Science Film Festival 2012. Shot by Rory Gavin over two days around Dublin, we think it's pretty cool. Producers of It's a Girl Thing: please take note.
The festival takes place from November 9-16 and you can find further information on their website.
Labels: art, Culture and Science, film, imagine science film festival, scicomm, The Cradle
London Calling: Performing under pressure
When Olympians line out for their countries next week they will have years, even decades of training and preparation behind them. Despite this, they will be under immense pressure to perform at a world-class level. The ability to handle that pressure - the competitors 'mental toughness' may well provide lessons for those of us in other walks of life and how we deal with pressure.
>>This is the first in the London Calling series of Olympic-themed posts in the run-up to the start of London 2012. <<
Serryth Colbert, himself a Commonwealth gold medalist rower, and colleagues found that members of the Great Britain Olympic Rowing Team were 12% more "mentally tough" than a group of surgeons surveyed.
This "mental toughness" describes the psychological attributes to perform at the highest level and was measured by a number of broad themes. These included "having an insatiable desire and internalised motives to succeed" and "thriving on the pressure of competition". A total of six themes were measured by a survey of the rowers and the surgeons.
The results of the survey, published in the British Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery show that the average scoring for positive responses when asked about 'comeback mentality' - the ability to overcome previous failure ranged from 53% for rowers to 40% for surgeons.
When queried about the the ability to thrive under the heat of competition, 74% of rowers responded positively compared to just 58% of surgeons.
Olympic flame at Kew Gardens (Image: LOCOG)
The whole area of sports psychology will have a huge impact on athletes at this years games. Writing for the Association for Applied Sport Psychology, Dr. Daniel Gould, who has conducted a series of research projects for the US Olympic Commission (USOC), has said that a whole range of "behind-the-scenes" factors can influence performance.
"These can range from athletes from less popular sports meeting some of the most visible athletes in the world in the Olympic village dining hall to traffic problems that disrupt an athlete's normal training time" said Gould.
"Other distractions include having a roommate that snores or having an event scheduled towards the end of the Games but living in a village where most athletes are finished competing and are in celebration mode".
Training at the Olympic rowing venue (Image: LOCOG)
With all eyes now on the spectacular opening ceremony on Friday night, produced and directed by Oscar-winner Danny Boyle, Gould had some advice for athletes making the decision to attend or not.
"Deciding whether to attend Opening Ceremonies can be very a difficult decision for Olympic athletes if they are going to perform within 24 to 48 hours of those ceremonies. Our research revealed that it could be a wonderful, exhilarating experience and worked to motivate some athletes. Others, however, found all the standing around zapped their energy and resulted in lack luster performance. It should be discussed with the athletes, taking care to examine the potential positive versus negative consequences," said Gould.
As one of the Olympic rowers noted: "Mental toughness is not being affected by anything but what's going on in the race. It's being able to block out what's not important".
Colbert et al., 2012. Performing to a world class standard under pressure—Can we learn lessons from the Olympians? British Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery 50(4): 291-297. Link.
Posted by Eoin Lettice at 11:44 PM 0 comments
Labels: London Calling, Olympics, psychology, sport
How to "downplay the achievements of science"
An opinion piece by Joe Humphreys, assistant news editor of the Irish Times has caused a bit of a stir amongst those in the science and humanities spheres over the last few days.
The essay, entitled Scientists not giving human life its meaning, was published on Tuesday and seemed (at least by my interpretation) to attack science as a process which sees people as "just means to an end".
Perhaps the most surprising element of the essay was Humphreys wishing "good riddance to ESOF 2012". Indeed, that may well have been a major factor in the strong disapproval amongst scientists. Here we had a hugely successful conference. A conference which was the highlight of the European science year and which put the worldwide spotlight on Irish science like never before. Despite this, and despite the Irish Times' excellent coverage of the conference, you had a writer poking holes in the conference and science itself out of some sort of misguided sense of striking a balance.
The author himself confesses that his article was "a deliberate, and I thought fairly transparent, counterbalancing exercise in the context of a week-long coverage of ESOF2012".
Reading the piece again, I genuinely get the impression that the author was struggling to find fault with the conference. Was there an editorial meeting at which it was decided: 'Look, all these smiling scientists, pop stars and balloons is all well and good, but we really need to strike some sort of balance here. Anybody got a beef with science?'
My own major problem with the essay, and Humphreys subsequent attempt to explain it, is something that I have noticed more and more in recent times. It is an attempt, consciously or not, to paint a picture of a scientist as somewhat removed from the rest of human society; as some amoral, unethical, faithless "wise man".
I'm a scientist and I would certainly never argue, as Humphreys suggests I might, that "there is no meaning to life" or that "talking about meaning debases science". As a scientist and a human, I also struggle to make the sort of moral, ethical, religious and scientific decisions Humphreys refers to.
At this point, I'm reminded of the controversy surrounding an article by Tony Humphreys (I presume, no relation to Joe) in the Irish Examiner earlier this year in which the author made some controversial comments on autism. As I argued at the time, that author also tried to paint a picture of scientists and engineers as lacking in "heart qualities" and of being somehow, morally, ethically and emotionally different than the rest of society.
By-the-by, Tony Humphreys' article on autism was offensive and caused offence to a large number of people living with autism and living with people with autism. I'm not trying to equate Joe Humphreys' recent article with it. He has views with which I strongly disagree, but he did not set out to offend anyone and science (and scientists) can argue the toss with the best of them.
I note that colleagues in the humanities have also been disturbed by the content of Humphreys' Irish Times article. It would be unfortunate if this essay contributed to or gave the impression that there was a wide gulf between scientists and those working in the humanities.
As Humphreys noted in his original article: "I studied humanities and feel more at home in that camp and am therefore prone to downplaying the achievements of science". What an understatement!
UPDATE (23/07/2012): Thanks to Joe Humphreys who has taken the time to respond to this (and other) criticism of his article. You can read Joe's response in the comments section of this post.
Labels: ESOF2012, Irish Times, Joe Humphreys, science and humanities
A Giant Controversy
Finn McCool and Benandonner fight it out on the Giants Causeway (Image: National Trust)
The new Giant's Causeway Visitor Centre will make reference to creationism as an alternative viewpoint on how the geological feature was formed.
The centre, which cost £18.5 million to build, opened on July 3rd after a rebuild necessitated after a fire destroyed the old centre. However, the National Trust has had to issue a statement [pdf] regarding the information presented at the centre and to confirm that the trust is "entirely unequivocal in its acceptance of scientific consensus".
The National Trust issued their statement after criticism of the new educational tours and a statement from a Northern Ireland creationist organisation welcoming the National Trust's acknowledgement "both of the legitimacy of the creationist position on the origins of the unique Causeway stones and the ongoing debate around this".
The Caleb Foundation said that it had engaged with the National Trust "over many months" on the issue. However, the National Trust statement was clear: "All of the information presented to visitors in relation to how the Giant's Causeway was formed, and how old it is, clearly reflects scientific consensus that the Causeway stones were formed 60 million years ago".
A National Trust spokesperson said: "We reflect, in a small part of the exhibition, that the Causeway played a role in the historic debate about the formation of the earth, and that some people hold views today which are different from scientific consensus. However, the National Trust is entirely unequivocal in its acceptance of scientific consensus".
The Caleb Foundation would seem to have form for this sort of thing. According to their website, they led a campaign in 2010 to get the then NI Minister of Culture, Arts and Leisure, Nelson McCausland to change the Ulster Museum's 'Nature Zone' to reflect creationist ideas and to remove what it called "wholly misleading propaganda" regarding evolution. In a letter to the Minister, the group noted: "the very clear assertion is made across the entire "Nature Zone", that evolution is a fact. This gross and arrogant falsehood is further compounded by the complete absence of even the merest mention of any other theory of origins such as the Biblical account of creation."
A Press Association report says that the interactive exhibition in question at the Causeway includes an audio package in which historic figures debate the origin of the basalt columns. The end of the package includes:
"This debate continues today for some people, who have an understanding of the formation of the earth which is different from that of current mainstream science.
"Young earth creationists believe that the earth was created some 6,000 years ago. This is based on a specific interpretation of the Bible and in particular the account of creation in the book of Genesis.
"Some people around the world, and specifically here in Northern Ireland, share this perspective.
"Young earth creationists continue to debate questions about the age of the earth. As we have seen from the past, and understand today, perhaps the Giant's Causeway will continue to prompt awe and wonder, and arouse debate and challenging questions for as long as visitors come to see it."
The National Trust has attempted to further explain their position on their press office blog.
This is all a very interesting debate. The Caleb Foundation seems to be using Northern Ireland's disturbed past to argue for equality for all points of view. Regarding its Ulster Museum campaign, the group said: "If Northern Ireland is to move towards a shared future on a genuine basis of equality and inclusivity, then it is only right that a publicly funded institution such as the Ulster Museum is fully and sensitively reflective of the various views of society as a whole - including those of evangelical Christians."
The new Giants Causeway Visitor Centre (Image: National Trust)
In reality though, all viewpoints on all topics are not equal and should not require representation, particularly in a scientific and educational setting. Even TV presenter Brian Cox has waded into the argument, tweeting: "to suggest there is any debate that Earth is 4.54 billion years old is pure shit".
The fact is, the arguments of the Caleb Foundation and other 'Young Earth' Creationist advocates have been disproved for years. For example, scientifically informed and enlightened Christians have accepted evolution as fact for a long time. Even the Vatican and the current Pope has accepted evolution as scientific fact and argued that evolution did not exclude a faith in God.
For the NI government and the National Trust to pander to these notions espoused by creationists is disappointing. The Trust seems to argue that mentioning the supposed ongoing debate will do no harm given their commitment to the scientific explanation of how the causeway was formed. Perhaps not - the Irish myth that the 40,000 basalt columns were constructed by legendary hero Finn MacCool also finds a place in the visitor centre. However, nobody is arguing for Finn MacCool to find a place on the science curriculum.
UPDATE 18/07/2012: A spokesperson for the National Trust has said that "having listened to our members' comments and concerns, we feel that clarity is needed...To ensure that no further misunderstanding or misrepresentation of this exhibit can occur, we have decided to review the interpretive materials in this section."
Labels: creationism, evolution, geology, Giants Causeway, Ireland, Northern Ireland, religion
The Forgotten Botanical Gardens
On the south side of Cork City, between Turners Cross football stadium and Munster Rugby's Musgrave Park, lies the remnants of the southern city's long lost botanical garden.
It's so long ago since the site was used as a botanical gardens and the duration of its existence so short, that the memory of it is almost gone from the public consciousness.
To find the site today, you need to look for Saint Joseph's Cemetery. Once the short-lived gardens were closed, the site became one of the largest public cemeteries in the city.
The Cork Botanical Gardens were established in 1808 by the Royal Cork Institution, which itself had been founded in 1803. The RCI had a huge influence on educational matters in Cork, supportive of the establishment of Queen's College Cork (now UCC) and the institution itself was a forerunner of Cork Institute of Technology. The gardens were themselves just one element of the RCI's plan to promote scientific and cultural matters in Cork.
James Drummond with one of his grandchildren
The Scottish botanist James Drummond (1786-1863) was chosen to curate the new gardens and he continued to do so until its closure, due to lack of funds, in 1828. Drummond was just 22 when he arrived in Cork from Scotland. On the closure of the park, Drummond, his wife (Sarah Maxwell Mackintosh) and six children travelled to the Swan River Colony (Western Australia) where he took up various roles as Government Naturalist, farmer, and plant collector. A hill and nature reserve in Australia, as well as over 100 plants have been named in his honour. A memorial to Drummond stands in Pelham Reserve, overlooking the family farm at Toodyay, Western Australia.
Drummond's father, Thomas, was a noted bryologist (collector of mosses) in Scotland and his grandfather, also Thomas, was a gardener.
Pinguicula grandiflora
The gardens in Cork had their beginnings when the RCI leased the 5.5 acre site at 'Lilliput', Ballyphehane in 1807. Once Drummond arrived in 1808, he laid out the site with a walled enclosure of about 1-acre at its centre with a glasshouse. As well as his work in the gardens, Drummond botanised widely across the Co. Cork and was elected an associate of the Linnean Society in 1810. He discovered Spiranthes gemmipara near Castletown Berehaven in 1810 and the insectivorous Pinguicula grandiflora at Macroom in 1809.
Hogan's reclining angel atop the Murphy tomb. The inner wall of the cemetery and botanical gardens is visible in the background.
Once government funding was withdrawn, the garden became untenable and Fr. Theobald Mathew, the 'Apostle of Temperence' purchased the site for use as a public cemetery for Cork's poor. An 1837 description in A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland says the botanical garden/graveyard was "in the style of the Pere la Chaise, at Paris: the graves are distributed over the greater part amid the shrubs, plants, and flowers brought hither at a very great expense by the original proprietors; the ground is intersected by broad gravel walks, and there are several handsome monuments. Among these, one of the most remarkable is that erected over a vault belonging to Messrs. Murphy and O'Connor: it consists of a sarcophagus of Portland stone resting on a base of limestone. On the sarcophagus is the figure of a mourning angel, as large as life, of white Italian marble, wrought in Rome by Mr. John Hogan, a native of Cork". Fr. Mathew was buried at the centre of his own cemetery in 1856.
Grave of Fr. Theobald Mathew
For many years after the closure of the gardens and the opening of the cemetery, it was common for the place to be referred to as the 'Botanic Gardens Cemetery'. A death notice in the Cork Examiner on 31st October 1898 concludes: "Funeral from the South Parish Chapel for the Botanic Gardens on Tuesday (Nov. 1st), at 3 o'clock. R.I.P."
Now, all that remains of the gardens is the inner stone wall which once housed Drummond's glasshouse and which is now crowded with headstones and monuments. No significant planting remains. The street opposite the main gates to the cemetery is still however called Botanic Road. Unfortunately, nothing else marks the site of Cork's first Botanic Garden. Although further public and private botanic gardens were to be established, including that associated with University College Cork, this site at Ballyphehane has a unique place in the cultural and scientific heritage of the City. A place which has been all but forgotten by the general public.
The site should be marked with a suitable and modest marker to celebrate the vision of the Royal Cork Institution and the hard work of James Drummond.
Labels: botanical garden, botany, Cork, history of science, James Drummond, Royal Cork Institute
ESOF 2012 opens in Dublin
Dara O'Briain at the launch of Dublin City of Science (image: Dublin2012)
Today marks the opening of ESOF2012 - the Euroscience Open Forum - taking place, this year, in Dublin.
The event is Europe's largest, general science meeting and is held every two years, this year from July 11th-15th. The forum aims to showcase advances in science and technology; to promote a dialogue between science and society; and to stimulate interest, excitement and debate about science.
President Higgins at ESOF2012 (image: @COSToffice)
President of Ireland, Michael D Higgins opened the event, pointing out that the achievements and reputation of Ireland in the arts is often mentioned by commentators but that "unfortunately not really all of them would mention prominent parts of the Irish intellectual achievement which is just as important, older and maybe even more central: Bell's Theorem, the development of fibre optics, the splitting of the atom, the Beaufort scale or the effectiveness of the mariner's compass or the many other inventive and forward-thinking achievements which owe their success to the innovation, creativity and above all, original thinking of talented Irish scientists".
The President name-checked a number of notable Irish scientists such as Ernest Walton, Robert Boyle, John Tyndall, Agnes Mary Clerke and Lucy Everest Boole who, he said, had laid the groundwork on which today's scientists build.
"Science", the President said "is being re-imagined in an era of new and global cultural context that sees it in a far more engaged and challenged way than any functional narrowness of recent times might suggest".
President Higgins welcomed the focus on ethical issues: "The moral challenge is ever greater now.... our new responsibilities are to a planet already made fragile and a global population of which so many, a great proportion, has been excluded".
"As a nation, we continue to have much to offer to the world of science and technology", the president noted.
Attracting scientists and those interested in science from around the world, a number of distinguished scientists and policy makers will deliver keynote addresses, including synthetic biology advocate and pioneer Craig Venter; Nobel Prize winner and co-discoverer of the DNA double helix, James Watson; European Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science Maire Geoghegan-Quinn; Former President, UN High-Commissioner and climate justice advocate Mary Robinson; astrophysicist Jocelyn Bell Burnell; and Director General of CERN Rolf-Dieter Heuer.
There's much more to see and hear at CERN and one-day passes are still available for the Dublin Conference Centre. For those who can't make the event in person, you can watch the keynote addresses live via webcast.
To celebrate the arrival of ESOF2012, the Science in the City programme has been running as part of the Dublin City of Science year-long festival.
Labels: dublin, Dublin2012, ESOF2012, Ireland, scicomm
Stamp of approval
An Post (the Irish postal service) has launched two new stamps to mark two significant science milestones: Dublin City of Science 2012 and the 350th anniversary of the formulation of Boyle's Law.
The City of Science stamp shows a photograph of Dublin's Convention Centre - the venue hosting the Euroscience Open Forum 2012 (ESOF2012) from 12th-15th July - alongside a graphic of DNA's molecular structure, representing people and their individuality. A second stamp shows an image of Boyle, his infamous formula, with an explanatory diagram alongside.
Commenting on the launch of the Stamps, Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation Richard Bruton, TD said, "Down through the years stamps have told the story of important historical and cultural Irish events, and the launch today of these two significant stamps marks two key milestones – Dublin City of Science 2012 and the 350th anniversary of the formulation of Boyle's Law."
Minister Bruton continued, "Science is hugely important to Ireland in many ways – not least for economic growth and job-creation. 2012 is a historic year for science in Ireland, as with the support of my Department Dublin is the City of Science for 2012. We are hosting the largest Science event in Europe, ESOF 2012, in the capital this July, and throughout 2012 Ireland will be showcasing its rich scientific heritage on the world stage."
The stamps were created by Dublin's Zinc Design.
The Dublin City of Science year long programme was developed to mark the honour of hosting one of the most prestigious international science events, the Euroscience Open Forum (ESOF) 2012. As the City of Science 2012, Dublin will host over 160 events showcasing the best of Irish Science, Culture and Arts.
Robert Boyle (1627-1691) was born in Lismore, Co Waterford. Often referred to as 'The Father of Modern Chemistry', he first formulated Boyle's Law in 1662. Boyle's Law states that the pressure exerted by a gas held at a constant temperature varies inversely with the volume of the gas. For example, if the volume is halved, the pressure is doubled; and if the volume is doubled, the pressure is halved.
Robert Boyle will also be commemorated at the Robert Boyle Summer School from July 15-18 at Lismore, Co. Waterford.
You can find out more about the Summer School here.
Labels: art, Culture and Science, Dublin2012, ESOF2012, Robert Boyle, Robert Boyle Summer School, Stamps, The Cradle
Still confused about the Higgs Boson?
This may or may not help:
The CERN choir, live in CERN control centre.
Posted by Eoin Lettice at 12:28 AM 0 comments
Labels: CERN, Culture and Science, Higgs, Music, Physics, The Cradle
I'm a Scientist - GM Food
Regular readers will know that I'm a fan of I'm a Scientist, Get me out of here and that I've previously taken part in the unique science outreach project.
I'm a Scientist (IAS) allows school children to ask real scientists what ever comes to mind. The questions generally range from the well-informed and well-thought-out to the truly bizarre and firmly tongue in cheek. No matter the question, it allows students to get to know what scientists really do and the project even allows the students to vote out scientists until one winning scientist remains.
This time round, along with a range of specialist and general zones, the organisers have introduced a GM Food Zone to deal with some of the issues which have hit the headlines again recently. This zone is also unique, in that everyone can take part - not just school students.
Regarding the motivation between such an event, the organisers have said: "We simply got fed up with accusations being slung around the media in articles, in opinion pieces and in comments. We wanted to create a space where experts in all relevant areas could answer questions from the public and be able to give their points of views alongside each other.
For most people this is not a black and white issue (GM good or GM bad). We'd like to create a space for a discussion with a bit more nuance. Whatever ends up happening with GM Foods we all of us on the planet will have to deal with the consequences. It may be difficult at times, but we believe it's worth all trying together to explore the issues and consider other points of view."
To take part and to ask a question of the expert panel, you'll need to register, but you can read the questions and comments without registering. The event continues this week and concludes on the 6th July.
In more IAS news, the event will be coming to Ireland in the Autumn, running up to 5 zones during Science Week (11-18th November). The event will be part of Dublin 2012.
Labels: GM, I'm a scientist, IAS, IASIreland, scicomm


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Dianne Tarantino Macioce, 74, passed away at home with her family by her side on February 2, 2018. Her beautiful life will forever be cherished by her siblings Patricia, MaryAnne and husband Harold, Suzanne and husband Edward, John, her children Patrick and girlfriend Michelle, Anthony and wife Karen, Diane, John and fiancé Jeanette, her grandchildren Angela and husband Ian, Anthony and wife Kristen, Rachael and fiancé Matthew, Nicole and boyfriend Adam, Edward, Taryn, and Michayla, her great grandchildren Paisley, Abigail, and one due in August as well as countless family and friends.
She was born on February 26, 1943 to Anthony J. Tarantino and Geraldine M. Tarantino. She graduated from Midwood High School in Brooklyn in 1961. After high school she moved from Brooklyn to Deer Park and eventually settled with her husband and four children in Campbell Hall in 1972. She pursued a career in nursing, graduating from Orange County Community College in 1977. After her graduation she began working for the VA Hospital in Castle Point before moving on to Columbia Presbyterian's Allen Pavilion in Manhattan where she stayed for 20 years until her retirement in 2008.
She was an extremely passionate and giving woman who loved to garden, travel, paint, and decorate her home. Time spent with her was always filled with laughter and her memory will forever bring happiness to anyone who was blessed to have known her.
Visitation will be held on Monday, February 5th 2018 from 4:00pm – 7:00pm at Doulin Newburgh Funeral Home on 318 North Montgomery St Newburgh NY 12550. A Funeral Mass will be held at 10:00am on Tuesday, February 6th 2018 at St. Francis Assisi Catholic Church, 145 Benkard Ave Newburgh with burial to follow at Cedar Hill Cemetery and Mausoleum, 5468 Route 9w Newburgh.


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New Vitae Wellness and Recovery Leaders Meet Former New Jersey Governor
On June 27, 2018, New Vitae Wellness and Recovery's Adam Devlin, Board Chair, and Donna Devlin, Executive Administrator, were honored to meet local political leaders at a book signing event for former New Jersey Governor James Florio. Mr. Florio's memoir, entitled, "Standing on Principle: Lessons Learned in Public Life," reviews the challenges associated with public service and the personal values Mr. Florio found to be most critical to his campaign.
The Devlins welcomed the opportunity to have their book copy signed by Mr. Florio; the couple also met with former Philadelphia Mayor and Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell, who engaged in a fireside chat with Mr. Florio. Both former governors discussed their personal stories of accomplishments and challenges while in office. Adam and Donna also had the opportunity to catch up with Charles Horton, the Executive Director of the Mayor's Office on People with Disabilities, on which Adam serves as the chair of the Behavioral Health Committee. Adam was able to share details on our new residential behavioral health options available for veterans. Overall, it was a wonderful night to learn more about the challenges associated with public office and to support a variety of local elected officials!
"I have been living here at Quakertown House for almost 23 years and to me Quakertown House is home, that kind of sums it up."
- Dave P. (resident)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Advances in personalized medicine allow doctors to select the most promising drugs for certain types of malignant tumors. But what if before initiating treatment, they could go a step further and use a mini-model of the human body to see how each patient's actual tumor responds to the drugs and learn if and where the tumor is likely to spread?
That's the idea behind a new invention by scientists at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center's Institute for Regenerative Medicine. In the journal Biotechnology Bioengineering, the team reports on its "metastasis-on-a-chip" system believed to be one of the first laboratory models of cancer spreading from one 3D tissue to another.
The research team is working to further develop the system in hopes that it can one day be used to quickly reveal the best way to treat an individual patient's cancer.
"We believe the metastasis-on-a-chip system has potential for making meaningful advances in cancer investigation and drug discovery," said Aleks Skardal, Ph.D., lead author and an assistant professor of regenerative medicine.
To test the system's potential for screening drugs, the team introduced Marimastat®, a drug used to inhibit metastasis in human patients, into the system and found that it significantly prevented the migration of metastatic cells over a 10-day period. Likewise, the team also tested 5-fluorouracil, a common colorectal cancer drug, which reduced the metabolic activity of the tumor cells.
The system also gives scientists the opportunity to study the microenvironment, or environment in which the tumor exists. This is a relatively new focus of cancer research. For example, the scientists learned that a "stiffer" tumor was more apt to metastasize, suggesting the possibility of using drugs to alter the mechanical properties of a tumor to reduce its likelihood of spreading.
The system has the potential to address some of the shortcomings of current research methods. For example, the results from traditional 2D studies in laboratory dishes as well as studies in animals often are not applicable to human patients. Often, seemingly promising drug candidates may fail when they reach studies in humans.
"We are trying to make it as realistic as we can," said Skardal.
The research was supported by the Golfers Against Cancer, the Comprehensive Cancer Center at Wake Forest Baptist, and the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine Promoting Discoveries Award.
Co-authors are: Mahesh Devarasetty, B.S., Steven Forsythe, B.S., Anthony Atala, M.D., and Shay Soker, Ph.D., of Wake Forest Baptist.


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Tag: communist party of china
Extremely canny leadership is a must for Hong Kong's Umbrella Revolution movement
October 1, 2014 March 11, 2017 Niall : Two roads diverged in a wood, and I...
Ominous People's Daily editorial of 1st October 2014 concerning "… Hong Kong's prosperity and stability…"
Today's very hard-line editorial in the Chinese Communist Party propaganda mouthpiece, the People's Daily (http://paper.people.com.cn/rmrb/html/2014-10/01/nw.D110000renmrb_20141001_5-04.htm?_ga=1.54034152.1995103149.1412169452) on this 65th China National Day reminds me that the Zhongnanhai (central headquarters for the Chinese Communist Party and the State Council (Central government)) script for dealing with Hong Kong's "radicals", "reactionaries", "extremists" and "sinister elements" (a.k.a. counter-revolutionaries) was written in June 1989 by former Paramount Leader Deng Xiaoping, whose ideas are currently the focus of a Party inspired nationwide renaissance.
The editorial's threat that those who continue to participate in the protests should expect dire consequences has the same ominous undertone as a People's Daily editorial released in the run up to the Tiananmen crackdown in Beijing, the latter being widely regarded as having prompted the ensuing slaughter. (http://wp.me/p15Yzr-r)
Certainly China's new Paramount Leader Xi Jinping's line of attack – an approach unreservedly endorsed by Hong Kong's ever more authoritarian, government – will be "no contact, no negotiation, no compromise", all the while pouring scorn on Hong Kong's 'Occupy Central' and 'Scholarism' protest movements, blaming American and UK "black hands" for stirring up trouble, and making use of pro-Beijing media and agent provocateurs to drive a wedge between the protesters and Hongkongers inconvenienced by the knock-on effect.
Adopting an attitude that the protests will die a natural death was precisely the same pigheaded mindset embraced by Chinese Premier Li Peng and the Chinese leadership back in 1989. When the leadership realised that the Tiananmen Square protest movement was actually growing they knew that the very heart of the Chinese Communist Party was under threat like never before… Martial law was subsequently introduced on 19th May 1989. The rest is history (a history that has been completely air-brushed away in China).
Embedded: Hong Kong's Yellow Umbrella Movement occupying Connaught Road Central
Dealing with an opponent like the Chinese Communist Party will require very shrewd leadership.
While Hong Kong's political landscape will never be the same again, the Chinese Communist Party, as plainly demonstrated by its hardnosed actions in Beijing in June 1989 and in the outer regions of Tibet and Xinjiang, is not for turning.
As June 1989 showed China's leadership would not give a second thought to spending years in international isolation so long as the Party's complete domination of the state levers of power continues. Nothing else matters.
Meanwhile, Beijing has at least 6,000 well-trained People's Liberation Army troops stationed in various barracks around Hong Kong, a useful deployment if over the next few weeks and months the Hong Kong Police Force proves incapable of quelling umbrella revolution protesters, with an increased possibility of the "turmoil" (another favourite word of China's omnipotent propaganda machine likely to be tossed into the fray in the days and weeks ahead) spreading over the border into mainland China.
Unfortunately for Beijing's rulers, Hong Kong's free press, independent judiciary and generally unimpeded education system have given rise to a new breed of unwavering Chinese activists who, brought up to think independently and critically, are determined not only to zealously defend Hong Kong's basic freedoms of speech, press, assembly, religion – as guaranteed in the Basic Law and related international conventions – but also, confronted with economic marginalisation and assimilation with mainland China, to fight for their own economic survival.
This is just the beginning of the struggle to defend Hong Kong's distinctiveness, otherwise 'Asia's World City' is in danger of becoming just like any other city in China.
Ich bin ein hongkonger.
Chinese People's Liberation Army Forces Hong Kong Building in Central, Hong Kong, the heart of the Umbrella Revolution
China, Hong Kong, Politics #hongkong, #occupycentral, #umbrellarevolution, agent provocateur, Basic Law, China, China dream, communist party of china, Deng Xiaoping, hong kong, Hong Kong dream, Hong Kong Garrison, ich bin ein hongkonger, June 4th 1989, Li Peng, people's liberation army, pro-democracy movement, propaganda, scholarism, Tiananmen Square Massacre, Xi Jinping, Zhongnanhai Leave a comment
New leaders of the Catholic Church and China, Pope Francis and Xi Jinping, have much in common, but little prospect of reconciliation
March 14, 2013 May 3, 2017 Niall : Two roads diverged in a wood, and I...
Habemus Papam (We have a Pope!) 我们有一个新主席 (We have a new President!)
Within 24 hours of each other two men assumed centre stage as leaders of the two greatest populations on our planet: In the Sistine Chapel Pope Francis – Jesuit Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Buenos Aires – was elected the 266th pope and head of 1.2 billion Catholics (and Sovereign of the Vatican State), while inside Beijing's Great Hall of the People Chinese Communist Party (CPC) leader Xi Jinping became the seventh President of the People's Republic of China, ruling over 1.4 billion people.
China and the Vatican have had no official relations since 1951 – for 71 years, the Vatican has maintained diplomatic relations with the Republic of China, as Taiwan is formally known – and yet even with the uneasy relationship between China and the Catholic Church both newly appointed leaders actually have quite a bit in common. For instance:
Pope Francis and President Xi JinPing will rule over populations experiencing remarkable transformation, in which '21st century'-minded reformists and historical followers are losing faith – growing increasingly skeptical and critical of what they view as obsolete and outmoded traditional methods of governance and doctrine. However, there are still many conservatives within the Catholic Church and China who for the most part are opposed to reform, preferring to maintain the status quo and keep things the way they are.
Pope Francis and President Xi JinPing will lead hugely powerful and rich institutions whose very raison d'êtres are concern for the marginalised and disadvantaged, but whose supporting structures benefit from levels of advantage undreamed of by most of those they are meant to be serving. Both therefore want to be seen as thrifty, humble and genuinely concerned with the plight of the vulnerable and tackling the causes of poverty.
– By choosing the name synonymous with the self-denial and poverty of the revered 13th Century preacher and friar, Italy's patron saint Saint Francis of Assisi, Pope Francis, the son of an immigrant railway worker, already known for his humility, selflessness, and championing of the poor and vulnerable, signaled his intention to place the plight of the poor and marginalized at the heart of his papacy.
– Despite his celebrated family ties to the CPC hierarchy, being the son of veteran revolutionary Xi Zhongxun (the reforming architect of China's Special Economic Zones), at the age of 15, during the tumultuous Cultural Revolution he was part of a work brigade sent down by the CPC to the countryside village of Liangjiahe, an insignificant cave dwelling community located in remote and desolate yellow soiled mountains of Shaanxi province in northern China, to serve and learn from the grassroots. There he made a cave his home, patiently "ate bitterness (吃了苦头) like the rest of us (villagers)" Source: http://articles.latimes.com/2012/feb/11/world/la-fg-china-xi-20120212 , and laboured the yellow earth for seven years. Aligned with his rise as paramount leader, Xi Jinping has gone to considerable lengths to reconnect with such formative years by cultivating an image as a man of the grassroots who prefers frugality, humility and self-reliance. Recently, in the run-up to his inauguration as President he vehemently spoken out against extravagance while underlining the need to close China's yawning income disparities and pull its poor people out of poverty.
Pope Francis I – Back to core values: Emphasis on the poor and doctrinal conservatism
Pope Francis and President Xi JinPing both need to address damaging scandals caused by abuses of power and discord among their membership ranks that threaten the very fabric of their organisations. Pope Francis needs to tackle the series of detrimental moral and financial disgraces involving the Vatican administration, Cardinals and other clerics that have afflicted the Catholic Church for years. Xi Jinping's pressing task is to tackle unchecked corruption among officials that is eroding trust and belief in the CPC. Leadership changes at the top of Catholic Church and CPC have raised the hope that at last meaningful reform and revitalization is on the way. The future cohesiveness of both organisations lies in whether Pope Francis and Xi Jinping can successfully reverse the rot.
Pope Francis and President Xi JinPing are both known to be unwavering traditionalists on key issues.
– Moderate Catholics hoping the church under the guidance Pope Francis will modify its social views in accordance with their own beliefs will have to wait much longer. The new Pontiff is an explicit opponent of contraception, women priests, clerical celibacy, and gay marriage, the latter which he considers "an attempt to destroy God's plan". Source: http://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/religion-and-beliefs/first-pope-from-the-americas-francis-raises-hopes-of-change-among-faithful-1.1324325
– Those amongst the burgeoning middle classes in China who like to think that Xi Jinping's accession to the seat of power is going to result in a wave of political reforms will be sorely disappointed. Holding a doctorate in Marxist theory and ideological education from Tsinghua University's School of Humanities and Social Sciences, and as a former President of the CPC Central Party School, Xi Jinping is believed to hold much more conservative views than his father Xi Zhongxun (who expressed his opposition to the nature of the Tiananmen Square massacre of 4th June 1989), a supporter of former 'liberal' CPC General Secretary Hu Yaobang. In speeches Xi has frequently called on rising cadres to immerse themselves in Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought, declaring that political morality, "Marxist rectitude" and loyalty to the CPC are more important than professional competence. Source: "PLA Gains Clout: Xi Jinping Elevated to CMC Vice-Chairman," China Brief, October 23, 2010. He was also an avowed supporter of the 'Chongqing Model' for upholding "core socialist norms". Source: People's Daily, December 13, 2010; Sina.com, December 10, 2010. [Note: The Chongqing Model was the series of social and economic policies adopted by Bo Xilai, the Chongqing CPC Chief, which epitomised increased state control and the promotion of a neo-leftist ideology. Following Bo's removal in March 2012 the policies were either discontinued or scaled back.]
Pope Francis and President Xi JinPing were appointed to power through a guarded process in which the only persons who were allowed to participate were old men who are fully dedicated to the cause they stand for.
In terms of the likelihood of the Vatican one day switching its affiliation to Beijing, the similarities between the two established leaders as described above are cosmetic at best. Despite the growing appetite for spiritual values within mainland China's officially atheist population, there is little prospect the CPC will recognise a foreign pope, rather than the secular Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, as the leader of all Chinese Catholics. Besides faced with momentous internal challenges both the Pope Francis and President Xi Jinping will be too focused on ensuring the survival and prosperity of their own increasingly unmanageable institutions to care.
Source: http://www.accuratelimited.com/blog.view.php?id=7Mnfy0l093k=
Follow @accuratechina
Additional source: https://nialljoreilly.wordpress.com/2008/06/29/hangzhou-reflections-the-hangzhou-catholic-church-the-most-church-beautiful-in-china/ is an article about the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association and the Catholic Church of Our Lady Of The Immaculate Conception in Hangzhou.
President Xi Jinping – Back to core values: Emphasis on the poor and doctrinal conservatism
Accurate China Insight, Catholic Church, China, Politics, Religion, Taiwan, writing 266th pope, 7th president of China, abuse of power, an attempt to destroy God's plan, argentina, ate bitterness, beijing, bo xilai, buenos aires, catholic church, cave dwellings, China, Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, chongqing, chongqing model, clerical celibacy, communist party of china, conservatism, contraception, corruption, cpc, CPC Central Party School, cultural revolution, diplomatic relations, doctrine, eat bitterness, 陕西梁家河, gay marriage, great hall of the people, Habemus Papam, Holy see, hu yaobang, jesuit, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, June 4th 1989, latin america, liangjiahe, Mao Zedong Thought, Marxism-Leninism, Marxist rectitude, marxist theory, neo-leftist, people's republic of China, pope francis, poverello, reconciliation, republic of china, scandal, School of Humanities and Social Science, sistine chapel, special economic zones, St. Francis of Assisi, Taiwan, The vatican, Tiananmen Square Massacre, Tsinghua schoolSchool of Humanities and Social Sciences, Tsinghua university, women priests, Xi Jinping, xi zhongxun, yellow earth, 吃了苦头, 我们有一个新主席, 习近平 2 Comments
China – Under The Hood: Would you dine at this Chinese restaurant?
January 20, 2013 March 10, 2017 Niall : Two roads diverged in a wood, and I...
Dandong Arirang Chinese Restaurant Customer Charter
RESTAURANT MANAGEMENT AND STAFF WILL NOT BE HELD LIABLE FOR ANY PHYSICAL, EMOTIONAL, OR MENTAL HARM CAUSED TO CUSTOMERS ARISING FROM CUSTOMER COMPLAINTS ABOUT FOOD OR SERVICE.
DO NOT COMPLAIN ABOUT THE FOOD.
DO NOT COMPLAIN ABOUT THE SERVICE.
DO NOT COMPLAIN.
Would you eat at this Chinese restaurant?…. These are just the waitresses preparing for another grueling day waiting tables. After watching this video.
If I still had an appetite, I'd probably do Take Away!
[The Dandong Arirang Restaurant, is located in the city of Dandong in north east China's Liaoning Province. Dandong, a riverside city provides revealing views of North Korea from across the Yalu River]
It is not an uncommon sight to witness pre-work team-building on the streets outside hairdressers and restaurants all over China, such as shown in this video clip of a Shanghai hairdresser's attempt to build an efficient, harmonious and productive work group.
Team-building outside Shanghai hairdresser salon
However, what the Dandong Arirang Restaurant video reveals is a glimpse of 'China – Under the Bonnet'. Scratching not far below the surface, particularly in north east China among traditional Communist die-hards, will expose political aspirations harking back to the days of Maoist-era social morals. Doubtless Bo Xilai, the son of BoYibo (one of the Eight Elders of the Communist Party of China), the deposed Communist Party chief of Chongqing would have considered the Dandong Arirang Restaurant employee work out as being very much in the spirit of his neo-leftist red culture movement.
China, Chinese, Culture, Food bo xilai, bo yibo, China, chinese restaurant, chinese restaurant customer charter, chinese waitresses, communist party of china, cultural conservatism in China, dandong arirang restaurant, eight elders, hairdresser, neo-leftist, North Korea, red culture, shanghai, under the bonnet Leave a comment


Tory Burch found inspiration in a hopeful place for the 2016 pre-fall season. She discovered poet and artist Etel Adnan, a woman who began her fame in her late '80s. Adnan has been an artist her whole life, and Burch tapped into her free landscapes, which are simple in nature.


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Abu Dhabi University Organizes Sixth Annual National Mathematics Competition
Abu Dhabi – UAE: 4 February, 2018 – College of Arts and Sciences at Abu Dhabi University (ADU) organized the sixth edition of the annual National Mathematics Competition. The competition aims to highlight the importance of mathematics and its applications in our practical life.
Held at ADU Al Ain campus, the competition attracted 150 high school students representing 40 schools across the UAE. Divided upon 75 teams, students compete to solve mathematics problems applied in real life situations over two rounds. All participating teams took part in the first round competing against each other, after which only the top teams qualified to the second and final round.
Commenting on the competition, Dr. Hamdi Sheibani, ADU's Dean of College of Arts and Sciences said: "The increased turnout of student participants, year after year, is a testament to the competition's success. Abu Dhabi University is always keen to discover talented students with scientific and mathematical skills to encourage them to think outside the box and face the challenges of the future."
Students from Al Andalous Private School won the first place, while Meryland International School took second place and third place was the Al Dhafra Private School. Dr. Sofiane Grira, chairman of the Organizing Committee of the National Mathematics Competition, accompanied by Dr. Mohamed Fteiha, Acting Campus Director, awarded the winners with certificates of appreciation and prizes.
Commenting on the occasion, Dr. Sofiane Grira said: "Abu Dhabi University has been always committed to contributing to the empowerment of younger generations in the UAE as well as providing them with opportunities to showcase their intellectual potential along with scientific knowledge in various fields. Abu Dhabi University's strategy has always been aligned with the government directions and in line with the objectives of the Youth Empowerment Strategy. This competition is one of many academic activities that the department is keen on organizing annually as it serves the community and translates ADU's interest in disseminating knowledge and exporting experiences to aid the academic community."


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Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 review
Episode X: The GeForce Awakens
By Jarred Walton 2016-05-17T13:00:33.137Z Review
Pascal and the GTX 1080 deliver more performance and features, with greater efficiency.
Fastest single GPU
Impressive efficiency
Useful new features
Founders Edition pricing
Limited stock right now
Earlier this month, Nvidia officially revealed the name and a few core specs for their next generation GPU, the GTX 1080. They invited a bunch of press and gamers to the unveiling party, showed off the hardware, claimed performance would beat the Titan X by about 30 percent, and then told us the launch date of May 27 and the price of $599. Then they dropped the mic and walked off the stage. Or at least, that's how it could have gone down.
What really happened is that we had several hours over the next day to try out some demos and hardware, all running on the GTX 1080. We were also given a deep dive into the Pascal GP104 architecture at the heart of the graphics card, and we left for home with a shiny new GTX 1080 box tucked safely in our luggage. And then we waited a few days for Nvidia to ship us drivers, benchmarked a bunch of games, and prepared for today, the day where we can officially talk performance, architecture, and some other new features.
Read more: GeForce RTX 2070 Founders Edition is only 12 percent faster than a GTX 1080 but costs 33 percent more
If you're not really concerned about what makes the GTX 1080 tick, feel free to skip down about 2000 words to the charts, where we'll show performance against the current crop of graphics cards. Here's a spoiler: the card is damn fast, and even at the Founders Edition price of $699, it's still extremely impressive. For those who want more information, we've previously discussed the initial details of the GTX 1080, some of the new features and software, and explained the Founders Edition. Here's the 'brief' summary.
Let's get technical, technical…
GTX 1080 Core Specs
Transistors: 7.2 billion
Die size: 314 mm^2
Process: TSMC 16nm FinFET
CUDA cores: 2560
Texture units: 160
Memory capacity: 8GB
Memory bus: 256-bit
GDDR5X clock: 10000MHz
L2 cache: 2048KB
TDP: 180W
Texel fill-rate: 277.3 GT/s
Base clock: 1607MHz
Boost clock: 1733MHz
GFLOPS (boost): 8873
Bandwidth: 320GB/s
The GTX 1080 uses Nvidia's new Pascal GP104 architecture, which is not to be confused with the previously announced GP100 architecture—that's currently slated for HPC (high-performance computing) and artificial intelligence applications, and it's currently only available via pre-order of Nvidia's DGX-1 server, which comes with eight Tesla P100 graphics cards. The GP104 in contrast is a lot more like a die shrink and enhancement of Maxwell GM200 and GM204, the chips at the heart of the GTX Titan X and 980. And that's not a bad thing.
Where GP100 moves to 64 CUDA cores per SMM cluster (the smallest functional block in an Nvidia GPU that can be disabled), GP104 stays at Maxwell 2.0's 128 cores per SMM. GP104 also goes light on the FP64 functionality, running at 1/32 the FP32 rate, compared to GP100 running FP64 at half the rate of FP32. Finally, GP104 also dispenses with HBM2 memory, instead using the new Micron GDDR5X memory that ends up being a lot like a higher clocked version of GDDR5.
If you're wondering about these differences, the main goal appears to be reducing cost and improving efficiency. GP100 is a large chip, HBM2 is far more expensive than GDDR5/GDDR5X, and FP64 isn't something that's used or needed for gaming. The result is a chip that has 2560 FP32 CUDA cores, uses 7.2 billion transistors, and it outperforms the previous king, the GTX Titan X by a sizeable margin. Oh, and it also uses less power, at just 180W, while carrying an MSRP of $600. If that's still too much, the upcoming GTX 1070, slated to launch on June 10, should roughly match the Titan X performance with an MSRP of $380.
Let's quickly talk prices, since we're on the subject. Nvidia will work with their usual AIB (add-in board) partner cards—Asus, EVGA, Gigabyte, MSI, PNY, Zotac, etc.—to offer GTX 1080 and GTX 1070 graphics cards. However, Nvidia will also offer their traditional blower cooler design (with some updates), but instead of calling it the "reference card," these will now be sold as Founders Edition cards. Nvidia will continue to produce these cards as long as they're manufacturing the GP104, and they'll even sell the cards under their own brand. That would be a problem for the AIB partners, however, so Nvidia is "kindly" bumping up the price on the Founders Edition to $700 and $450. It doesn't put them into direct competition, and it allows them to sell what is otherwise a high quality graphics card to users who prefer the blower design. Nvidia says their partners will produce a variety of cards, both at and above MSRP, with some even costing more than the Founders Edition. Hmmm….
The problem is, we're currently ten days before the official retail launch—the Order of 10 is everywhere, it seems—which means we have no clear view on actual availability and pricing. We might see some cards at MSRP come May 27, or we may see mostly/only Founders Edition cards at significantly higher prices. More likely than not, the vast majority of cards at launch are going to carry a hefty price premium, at least for a few weeks, because like we said earlier: the GTX 1080 is incredibly fast. Even at $700, it's a much better value than the previous generation GTX 980 Ti. It has more VRAM, it includes some new features, and it's simply a significant jump in performance. At $600, it's an incredible bargain. How was this accomplished?
The GP104 chip is half the size of the GM200 in Titan X.
It goes back to the process technology, which has finally moved from 28nm planar to TSMC's 16nm FinFET. Reducing the feature size by 33 percent (give or take) typically allows ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) to cram twice as many transistors into a given area, since the transistors are shrinking in X, Y, and Z dimensions. 16nm ends up being a larger jump than normal—though after five years of using 28nm, it's not really surprising—giving a 43 percent shrink. In theory, that means potentially three times as many transistors in the same area…or slightly more transistors in a much smaller area.
It's the latter path that Nvidia has chosen with GP104, using 7.2 billion transistors compared to GP204 at 5.2 billion, and GP200 at 8 billion. But where the GM204 required a 398 mm^2 die size and GM200 used 601 mm^2, GP104 fits into a relatively dainty 314 mm^2. That makes it less expensive to manufacture (not counting all the R&D costs), improves yields, and FinFET also helps to curb power requirements. It's a trifecta of improvements, and together it allows Nvidia to offer a large generational improvement in performance while reducing price and improving efficiency.
Which also means you can basically mark your calendar for next spring, when Nvidia will release a larger consumer Pascal chip, probably with around 50 percent more transistors and performance. My guess? It won't be a straight up consumerized variant of GP100, but instead we'll see a GP102 with more FP32 cores, 1/32 FP64 performance, and a 384-bit GDDR5X interface. Or we'll see "Titan P" using GP100, but the cost of HMB2 and FP64 make that questionable. I'd also bet this fall will bring about the mobile launch of the GTX 1080M and 1070M, which will both be partially disabled GP104 cores—saving "GTX 1080 for notebook" for fall 2017. But I'm getting ahead of myself….
New hardware features
All of the above changes help make Pascal faster than Maxwell, but Nvidia has also updated many hardware features. We're not going to go into all the details right now, but here's the short rundown of changes.
Better memory compression
Pascal has enhanced memory compression, which allows it to make better use of the available bandwidth. With Maxwell 2.0, Nvidia introduced an improved delta color compression engine, and Pascal takes that a step further. 2:1 compression is more effective, there's a new 4:1 delta color compression mode, and there's also a new 8:1 delta color compression. In practice, Nvidia says they're able to improve compression by about 20% over Maxwell, so with 320GB/s compared to the 980's 224GB/s, the effective increase is around 70% (instead of the 43% you'd see without the compression improvements).
GPU preemption and dynamic load balancing
As GPUs have become more programmable and more powerful, the workloads they run have changed. Early programmable shaders had some serious limitations, but with DX11/DX12 and other APIs, whole new realms of potential are opened up. The problem is that GPUs have generally lacked certain abilities that still limit what can be done. One of those is workload preemption, and with Pascal Nvidia brings their hardware up to the level of CPUs.
Maxwell had preemption at the command level, and now Pascal implements preemption at the pixel level for graphics, thread level for DX12, and instruction level for CUDA programs. This is basically as far as you need to go with preemption, as you can stop the rendering process at a very granular level. When utilized properly, preemption requires less than 100us and allows effective scheduling of time sensitive operations—asynchronous time warp in VR being a prime example.
Pascal has also added dynamic load balancing (for when a GPU is running graphics plus compute), where Maxwell used static partitioning. The goal is to allow a GPU to run both graphics and compute, since Nvidia GPUs can only run graphics commands or compute commands in a specific block. With Maxwell, the developer had to guess the workload split; now with Pascal, when either workload finishes, the rest of the GPU can pick up the remaining work and complete it more quickly.
AMD has made a lot of noise about GCN's asynchronous compute capabilities. What Nvidia is doing with preemption and dynamic load balancing isn't the same as asynchronous shaders, but it can be used to accomplish the same thing. We'll have to see how this plays out in developer use, but the potential is here. If you're wondering, AMD's async compute relies on the GCN architecture's ability to mix compute and graphics commands without the need to partition workloads. Preemption is still needed for certain tasks, however, like changing from one application workload to another.
Simultaneous multi-projection
Simultaneous multi-projection (or SMP, as Nvidia cheekily calls it) is one of the potentially biggest hardware updates with Pascal. It allows much of the geometry setup work to be done a single time, but with multiple viewports (projections) all done in a single pass. This becomes particularly useful with stereoscopic rendering, as well as multiple displays—the former being particularly important for VR. SMP supports up to 16 pre-configured projections, sharing up to two projection centers, one for each eye in a stereoscopic setup.
For VR, Nvidia can use their SMP technology to enable developers to render both projections at the same time, which is something no previous architecture could do. Taking things a step further, SMP allows a different take on the multi-res shading Nvidia created for Maxwell 2.0—multi-res shading leveraged multi-viewport technology to render different viewports at lower resolutions. The net result is that in VR scenarios with titles that leverage SMP, GTX 1080 can be up to twice as fast as a Titan X (or 980 Ti), and it uses less power at the same time.
HDR output
High dynamic range (HDR) displays are the new hotness for high-end visuals, and Pascal includes hardware support for 12-bit color, BT.2020 wide color gamut, SMPTE 2084, and HDMI 2.0b/12b for 4K HDR. This is all technology previously available with Maxwell. Pascal also adds new features: 4K@60Hz 10/12b HEVC decode, 4K@60Hz 10b HEVC encode, and DisplayPort 1.4 ready HDR metadata transport. So if you happen to own one of the amazing HDR televisions (which is currently the only place you'll find HDR displays), Pascal is ready.
Changes to SLI
One final hardware aspect we want to quickly touch on concerns SLI. With Pascal, Nvidia is stepping away from 3-way and 4-way SLI configurations and explicitly recommending against them, instead stating that 2-way SLI as the best performance alternative with the fewest difficulties. There are many reasons for the change, but the net result is that the two SLI connectors on top of GTX 1080/1070 cards are now being used to increase the bandwidth for SLI mode, and you'll need new "high bandwidth" capable SLI bridges—the flimsy old ribbon cables will still work, but only in a "slower" mode.
The new SLI bridges are rigid, and they come in either two, three, or four slot spacing—which is a bit of a downer if you ever switch motherboards and end up needing different spacing, as you'd need to buy a new bridge (likely $20-$30). The bridges now run at 650MHz (compared to 400MHz on the old bridges), which explains the more stringent requirements, and they'll help with 4K, 5K, and surround gaming solutions.
But 3-way and 4-way SLI aren't totally dead—they're just not recommended. If you buy three GTX 1080 cards and want to run them in 3-way SLI, you can do so—or rather, you'll be able to do so. You need to unlock 3-way/4-way SLI first, however, by generating a special "key" for each GPU, using a tool and website Nvidia will provide at the retail launch on May 27. So for the 0.001% of gamers this affects, it will be a bit more difficult, and scaling in many games will still be questionable at best.
2-way SLI is the recommended configuration for multi-GPU.
Get on with it!
We've spent a lot of time collecting performance results, using an extensive test suite of games, including some recent releases along with some oldies but goodies. Our test system is the same i7-5930K 4.2GHz platform we've been using for over a year now, and we've gathered results from all the high-end graphics cards currently available to bring you this:
Everything you need to know in one little chart!
GPU test bed hardware
CPU: Intel Core i7-5930K @ 4.2GHz
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-X99-UD4
RAM: G.Skill Ripjaws 16GB DDR4-2666
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO 2TB
PSU: EVGA SuperNOVA 1300 G2
CPU cooler: Cooler Master Nepton 280L
Case: Cooler Master CM Storm Trooper
Drivers: AMD Crimson 16.5.2 Hotfix, Nvidia 365.19 / 368.13
This is the high level overview, using the average performance across our entire test suite here. Individual games may favor one card or another, but what's it like in practice to use the GTX 1080? When Nvidia said it was faster than a Titan X—and by extension, every other single GPU configuration—they weren't blowing smoke. The GTX 1080 beats the reference GTX 980 Ti by over 35 percent…at our 1080p Ultra settings. Crank up the detail to 1440p Ultra or 4K High/Ultra, and the margin grows to 40 percent. The Titan X closes the gap, but only barely, losing by a considerable 30-35 percent.
Ah, but what about that GTX 980 SLI comparison—is the single GTX 1080 faster than two GTX 980 cards? Remember, these cards cost $1000 as recently as late March, and it's only with the pending release of Pascal that prices have finally fallen below $500 per card (and they continue to drop). And the verdict is…well, it's close enough to call it a draw. Which is another way of saying there are individual games where 980 SLI beats a single 1080 (usually not by much), and others where it loses—sometimes by a large margin. Never mind those cases (like Doom right now, along with most DX12 titles) where the second GPU isn't currently doing anything.
A similar point of comparison between the 1080 and R9 Nano CF shows that overall, two high-end GPUs from last year can still beat Nvidia's latest and greatest…except when CrossFire doesn't work very well, in which case the second GPU is effectively useless. R9 Nano CrossFire also tends to do worse overall when it comes to minimum frame rates, even though average frame rates are typically higher than GTX 980 SLI.
If you're already running a high-end SLI or CrossFire setup, a single GTX 1080 may not be enough to cause you to jump ship, but for users looking to get dual-GPU levels of performance without the hassle, this is a seriously tempting offer. Or if you're the sort of person that always has to have the best graphics setup possible, well, now you can start thinking about buying a pair of 1080 cards.
If you're interested in additional graphs showing how performance stacks up between today's high-end GPUs and the GTX 1080, we've included more charts at the end, but the above chart showing average framerates across a collection of games should tell you everything you need to know. The GTX Titan X and 980 Ti have been the kings of the gaming world for the past year, but Pascal is better in every way that matters. Not that you need to rush out and upgrade if you're already running a high-end GPU, but we wouldn't blame you for lusting after the 1080.
And then there's overclocking. Nvidia GPUs from the Maxwell generation have typically hit 20-25 percent overclocks with relative ease. Pascal is the new hotness, but that doesn't mean Nvidia has cranked the dial to eleven. Nvidia has left plenty of room for tweaking, and in fact they've opened up the full range of voltage controls to overclocking utilities.
EVGA PrecisionX 16 will support Pascal's new per-voltage step overclocking.
Using a new version of EVGA's Precision X16 software, you can let it run for about 25-30 minutes (at the default settings) and it will attempt to tune clocks to your particular card and GPU. If you add better cooling, it should pick up on that as well. Unfortunately, it's not quite as robust as we'd like in this early preview; any crashes during the test basically end up with you restarting the whole process, but EVGA and Nvidia are working to fine-tune the software.
For now, we ended up getting the Precision X16 OC Scanner to work by limiting the maximum overclock to 200MHz. It applied a static +200MHz across all voltages, which sort of defeats the point of tuning each voltage step in the first place. Again, this is beta software, and the drivers are still early on GTX 1080 as well, so things will hopefully improve by the time the retail launch comes around in 10 days. Also, the scanning doesn't do any tweaking of GDDR5X clocks, so we had to search for a good clock speed on our own.
With manual tuning, we settled on a +200MHz core overclock, +725MHz on the GDDR5X (11.45GHz), with the overvoltage set to "100%" (whatever that means—it's not a doubling of the voltage, just to be clear). In practice, looking at actual GPU Boost 3.0 clock speeds running stock vs. overclocked, we saw 2.0-2.1GHz on the core (vs. 1700-1733MHz), so we got a healthy 15 percent overclock on the core and memory. Results may vary, but our sample card looks to be a bit less impressive than other cards, so 2.0GHz and more looks attainable.
This is what performance looks like, running stock vs. overclocked:
1080p and 4K results not shown, but we have them, and they're similar to this chart.
Performance improves on average by 10-15 percent, except at 1080p where we start to hit CPU limits in a few titles. We'll likely see factory overclocked cards with aftermarket coolers at some point, and some of those will almost certainly exceed what we're able to achieve with the Founders Edition. Even better, many of the factory overclocked cards will likely cost less than the Founders Edition. But if the 30 percent jump in performance over Titan X wasn't enough to get you excited, perhaps tacking on another 15 percent with overclocking will do the trick.
Hail to the king, baby!
The rumblings from team green have indicated something big was coming for months now. Launching Pascal on professional devices in the form of GP100 effectively threw down the gauntlet: catch us if you can! GP104 is a different beast, but no less potent in its own right. It's about half the die size of the GM200 used in Titan X, uses 800 million fewer transistors, consumes 28% less power, and still delivers 30-40% better performance—and potentially twice the performance in VR, if the developer chooses to use Pascal's simultaneous multi-projection feature.
If you're a gamer looking for something that will handle 4K gaming at nearly maxed out quality, the GTX 1080 is the card to get. Or if you want a GPU that has at least a reasonable chance of making use of a 1440p 144Hz G-Sync display, or a curved ultrawide 3440x1440 100Hz display, again: this is the card to get. It delivers everything Nvidia promised, and there's likely room for further improvements via driver updates—this is version 1.0 of the Pascal drivers, after all.
There's only one small problem: you can't buy one, at least not yet. You'll have to wait for the official retail launch on May 27, which sort of stinks. And then more likely than not, you'll be looking at Founders Edition versions of the GTX 1080, which will set you back $700—and probably more, because even at those prices, they're likely to go out of stock for a few weeks. If you're in no rush, prices and availability will no doubt settle down by late June or early July, at which point the GTX 1080 is a killer card for "only" $600.
What about the GTX 1070? It's looking like a larger gap than the GTX 970/980, if only slightly, but you do get 8GB of full-speed VRAM this round. We're still waiting for actual cards and the full Monty on specifications, but judging by the GTX 1080, the 1070 should be a good "affordable" alternative to the GTX Titan X and 980 Ti. We'll know more in the next few week, but if the GTX 1080 is too rich for your blood, that's the one to watch.
So kick back and relax while we wait to see what 1070 has to offer—and whether AMD's Polaris 10 can steal any of Nvidia's thunder, as AMD has repeatedly stated those chips will launch in June. Nvidia has dropped the mic on the stage, but the show's not over quite yet. All indications are that Polaris 10 won't go up against the GTX 1080, but GTX 1070 may not be out of reach. For now, GTX 1080 is the new heavyweight champion of the world, and will likely go uncontested until AMD brings out Vega...or until Nvidia pulls out "Big Pascal" for a new Titan card or a "1080 Ti."
And make no mistake: as fast as GP104 is, Nvidia left plenty of room for future products to eclipse it. 30-40 percent gains are great to see, but those hoping for a doubling of performance will have to skip generations of hardware to get it.
Additional gaming benchmarks
Below are the individual results for the fifteen games we tested. It's been a long week of benchmarking, so if you notice any scores that seem wonky, please let us know and we can retest to verify the results. All of the games were tested at Ultra/Very High settings at 1080p and 1440p, while many of the more demanding titles (specifically: Ashes of the Singularity, The Division, GTAV, Hitman 47, and Rise of the Tomb Raider) were run at High settings for 4K.
1080p/1440p at Crazy; 4K at High.
All resolutions at maxed out 4xMSAA (without PhysX).
1080p/1440p at Ultra; 4K at High.
All resolutions at Ultra (not Nightmare).
All resolutions at Ultra.
1080p/1440p at max 4xAA; 4K at High (no MSAA).
1080p/1440p at max SMAA; 4K at High SMAA. AMD GPUs and Nvidia GTX 1080 used (and benefited from) DX12; all other GPUs used DX11.
All resolutions at max settings, without SSAA or enhanced PhysX.
1080p/1440p at Very High; 4K at High. No cards benefited in a meaningful way from DX12 in in our testing, so these are DX11 results.
All resolutions at Ultimate.
All resolutions at Ultra, with HairWorks turned off.