One of Tucson?s own was awarded the Military Spouse of the Year by Military Spouse Magazine.
Marcelina Chambers won Spouse of the Year honors for?Davis-Monthan this year, and she will go on to compete in an Air Force wide vote for Spouse of the Year, on February 5.?
Chambers is not only a member of the Junior League of Tucson, but an attorney who works hard for the Military Spouse JD Network; an organization that is working to eliminate licensing barriers for military spouse attorneys and to create better access to justice for military families.?
For more on the Military Spouse JD Network go online to www.MilitarySpouseJDNetwork.org.?
Also take a moment to go online and vote at http://militaryspouse.com
My name is Albert0V,but you can call me A.V.! I recently Joined this Forum Looking for some fun Roleplayers and A friendly Community! now,let's move to the questions.
1) What's your username? Why'd you pick that username? I picked this username,'cause i hoped this would be easy to remember. i use it very much in my new account. Next question.
2) How'd you find this place? Google? Why'd you look it up on Google or whatever? I found this place by Google. I was looking for a good website for roleplaying,and then i found it searching "RP forum" Next question.
3) How long have you roleplayed on forums or chat? On what sites? Did you start with tabletop games or such? I started my first RP on the Minecraft Forums about a zombie apocalypse. and NOPE. no tabletop games. Next question:
4) In coming to RPG, what've you been looking for specifically? A new home for roleplay? Better roleplay? I was looking for A forum with a BIG amount of Roleplays,and an specifically Roleplay one. Next question.
5) What kinds of roleplay are you interested in? Fantasy? Sci-fi? Go in-depth about it if you want. Sci-Fi,Sandbox,Adventures,Fantasy,Post-Apocalypse,i don't know how many to name. Next question.
6) What're your hobbies? Do you collect rocks or mount insects? Internet. Friends. Internet. Eating. Internet. Drawi- Did i mention Internet? Next question.
7) What's something you're good at besides writing? Maybe you're on the volleyball team or you're a quick learner? Maybe you play the flute or can fold up chairs amazingly fast? xD Drawing. Next question.
8) Do you have any friends here at RPG that invited you here? Would you want to make more friends while you're here? What...frien..d...s........i..--------erhhg---- Zzz....
9) Do we get cookies for looking through your thread and saying hello? zzz...eerh? Oh Yea. you get electronic cookies. so...errrhhh...bye...?
'Dateline NBC,' the signature broadcast for NBC News in primetime, premiered in 1992. Since then, it has been pioneering a new approach to primetime news programming. The multi-night franchise, supplemented by frequent specials, allows NBC to consistently and comprehensively present the highest-quality reporting, investigative features, breaking news coverage and newsmaker profiles.
Iran has reached a milestone goal in its quest to send human astronauts into space, by successfully launching a monkey into orbit and returning it safely to the Earth.
Iranian state television reported Monday that a rocket named Pishgam, meaning Pioneer in Farsi, traveled straight upward into the thermosphere to reach a height of 75 miles before returning to the planet?s surface. Hamid Fazeli, the director of the Iran Space Agency, said that ?because of biological similarities between humans and monkeys, the latter were selected for the space mission.? He went on to predict that Iran would possess the capabilities to send a human into space within the ?next five to eight years.?
Last year Tehran announced plans to build a new space center, following the reported launch of a mouse, turtle, and worms into space in 2010 on the back of an Explorer rocket. While security officials in the United States and Europe worry that Iran?s swiftly-developing space technology could serve a dual purpose of sending nuclear warheads aboard long-range missiles, experts said the recent experiment does not appear to have military implications.
Read more
This article was posted: Wednesday, January 30, 2013 at 1:36 pm
De Socio, Antonio and Nigro, Valentina, Does Corporate Taxation Affect Cross-Country Firm Leverage? (November 29, 2012). Bank of Italy Temi di Discussione (Working Paper) No. 889. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2206357
Abstract:
"We evaluate the relation between firm leverage and taxation of corporate income using a dataset of mostly unlisted European corporations, highly representative of medium-sized and large firms. We use a correlated random effect approach in order to take into account unobserved heterogeneity and to assess the contribution of cross-sectional variation of the regressors. We also apply quantile regressions to evaluate a possible differential impact of taxation on leverage across firms. Our results suggest that corporate income taxation is positively related to leverage and explains part of the cross-country variability, showing a stronger effect for less levered firms. In accordance with the theory of the debt tax shield, the relation between debt and taxation is stronger for highly profitable firms. These findings are robust to the inclusion of different measures of the financial development and characteristics of the legal system of the country where firms are located."
Keywords: Firm Leverage, Leverage, Corporate Taxes, Capital Structure
RIM? RIM. RIM RIM RIM, RIM RIM RIM RIM. RIM RIM. Some other stuff happened this week, too, but let's be honestly, we're going all RIM all the time. If you've been playing a BlackBerry-based Engadget Podcast drinking game, you're going to sit this one RIM. Out, sorry, we meant to say out. Oh, and it looks like we'll never say "RIM" again. So there's that.
Update: Sorry, guys, looks like our chat client is having some issues. We're gonna have to rely on the comments for now...
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Qualcomm Inc, the world's leading supplier of chips for cellphones, reported quarterly earnings and revenue that beat Wall Street expectations and raised its financial targets for 2013 due to growing demand for smartphones and high-speed wireless services.
Qualcomm shares rose 6.4 percent in late trade on Wednesday as its outlook wowed investors, in contrast to sluggish demand at other chip makers such as Texas Instruments and Broadcom Corp .
The company, which also announced the retirement of its chief financial officer on Wednesday, said it was seeing strong growth in emerging markets such as China and Latin America.
But the outgoing CFO, Bill Keitel, 59, warned of the impact of macro economic weakness on the company's conference call with analysts.
"Given continued global macroeconomic uncertainties, we are continuing to maintain a cautious outlook for the year ahead," said Keitel, who will be replaced by George Davis, currently CFO of Applied Materials , on March 11.
San Diego-based Qualcomm is benefiting from strong demand for smartphones and a move by network operators around the world to a high-speed wireless technology known as long term evolution (LTE), where Qualcomm is ahead of rivals.
"That trend is continuing to work in Qualcomm's favor. They're the only viable option for LTE right now," said MKM Partners analyst Daniel Berenbaum. "It's a very strong quarter and the guidance is very strong."
In addition to revenues from chip sales, Qualcomm receives royalty payments from phone makers with technology license agreements with the company.
"It looks like in the quarter, a little bit of the upside came from chipsets," said Berenbaum. "In the guidance, chipsets came in around expectations. It looks like royalties are the upside to guidance."
Qualcomm raised its full-year revenue guidance to a range of $23.4 billion to $24.4 billion, from its previous target of $23 billion to $24 billion.
It raised its earnings per share target to a range of $4.25 to $4.45 from a previous outlook of $4.12 to $4.32.
Bernstein analyst Stacy Rasgon said the outlook was "massively conservative" compared with his estimate of actual growth prospects, but said the caution could make sense given the economic environment.
For the fiscal first quarter ended December 30, Qualcomm posted a profit of $1.91 billion, or $1.09 per share, compared with a profit of $1.4 billion, or 81 cents per share, in the year-ago quarter.
Excluding unusual items, the San Diego-based company reported earnings per share of $1.26 compared with Wall Street expectations of $1.13, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Revenue rose to $6.02 billion from $4.68 billion in the year-ago quarter and compared with Wall Street expectations for $5.9 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Following his retirement, Keitel, who joined Qualcomm in 1996 and has been CFO for 11 years, will act as special adviser to Qualcomm's chief executive, Paul Jacobs, for the rest of the calendar year 2013.
Davis has been CFO at Applied Materials, the chip manufacturing equipment supplier, for more than six years. In his nearly 13 years at Applied Material, he has also been corporate treasurer and head of the business development responsible for mergers and acquisitions, strategic planning, and management of venture investments.
Qualcomm shares rose to $67.60 in late trade after closing at $63.53 in the regular Nasdaq session. The last time its shares reached this level in regular Nasdaq trading was in early April 2012. The shares are near their post-dotcom bubble high of $68.87 hit late last March.
(Reporting By Sinead Carew; Editing by Leslie Gevirtz and Leslie Adler)
SUBJECT: Introducing MobileTrans (One-click to Transfer Data between Android, iOS & Symbian Phones) - Youtube KEYWORDS: phone transfer, android phone transfer, symbian phone transfer, phone to phone transfer
Watch the Video Demo : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGV_9I75_6o
Free Download MobileTrans (Phone to Phone Data Transfer):
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Have bought a new mobile phone and want to copy the contacts, music, etc. from the old one to the new one?
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MobileGo for iOS (Windows) - http://www.iphone-manager.com/
As an Apple devices manager, it enables you to manage iOS devices at ease. It can help you to transfer songs, videos, playlists, iTunes U, Podcasts to iTunes/PC and manage photos.
MobileGo for Android (Windows & Mac) - http://www.android-manager.net
The one-stop Android manager can help you manage your Android videos, music, photos, contacts, SMS, apps, etc. effectively on your PC & Mac
Justin Timberlake is teaming up with his favourite designer Tom Ford to create a collection of suits inspired by his new album.
The sharp-dressed singer is creating a line of shirts, ties and shoes with the former Gucci boss to accompany the release of his comeback album The 20/20 Experience in March.
The duo's clothes and accessories will feature in videos and visual campaigns for the album.
Ford worked with Timberlake on the snazzy outfits in the video for his latest song Suit & Tie, and also created the artwork for the single - which features a close-up of a Tom Ford tuxedo and bow-tie.
It's not the first time the stylish pair has collaborated - Ford made Timberlake's wedding outfit with input from the groom himself.
There is no doubt that ecommerce is the entrepreneurial frontier for the future. Entrepreneurs are trooping to the web hoping to strike a rich vein but many have found ecommerce success very elusive and gotten discouraged. A lot has been written about ecommerce, with many gurus advising readers n the best strategies for internet business success. These strategies have worked for many people but many more have continued to languish in failure, wondering just what it is they are missing.
One of the things that could be slowing down your accent to the top of Ebusiness is poor web design. It may sound ironical to blame failure in ecommerce on poor Hilton head web design considering the manner in which modern websites are splashed with color and enhancements, and all sorts of other bells and whistles. Many entrepreneurs don't realize how futile and counterproductive all these things are and so they continue investing in them with no discernible benefit to their overall business.
If you are aspiring to succeed in ecommerce you should realize that your website is your primary marketing tool and begin to see it as such. Unless you are really good with Hilton head web design, the expert advice of a Jacksonville web design guru will do a lot of good for your business. Your web design guru of choice should build a proper website devoid of useless enhancements yet designed to attract customers, hold their attention, and entice them into making a purchase or signing up for whatever it is you are offering them. What should you expect from your web designer?
To begin with, all the useless clutter must go because it adds no value and also because it distracts and irritates people visiting your website. It is immensely annoying, for instance, when you open a page and then a video begins playing automatically or pop-ups appear exhorting you to sign up for this or that. An expert web designer will omit such irritating stuff and implement a very neat intuitive design instead. Your web designer should give your website a look and feel that is most appropriate for its purpose. If you are selling healthy organic veggies, for example, your website should have brilliant colors associated with fresh produce and perhaps enticing images of fresh fruits and vegetables carefully displayed to entice without clouding out the important content on the site's pages.
Your Hilton head web design consultant should then create a navigation system that'll permit users to locate whatever information they want as easily as possible. People neither like it if they have to struggle to find information, nor are they pleased if they can't find the checkout section of your website easily. Many times potential customers abandon websites if they can't find their way around even if good products have been availed on sale. If this doesn't click, visualize yourself lost in a labyrinthine mall without a single sign to direct you - you'll certainly not want to return to such a place again.
Finally, your Jacksonville web design expert should design an appropriate contact page and order form. If you hope to build a loyal customer base, it is essential that customers are easily able to reach you with their queries and/or complaints. If people hit a brick wall each time they try to reach you, they will simply start shopping elsewhere.
For more information about Hilton head web design please visit http://robmarkinteractive.com
Just a few weeks after Nissan dropped the price of the Leafin the US, eco-minded car buyers across the pond will be able to snag theirs for a little less as well. Indeed, the popular Japanese EV is now £23,490 ($37,115), which is £2,500 less than the initial sticker price. As with the stateside version, some of the cost reduction stems from local manufacturing -- Nissan hopes to start churning out the latest Leafs from its Sunderland UK factory in a few months. The company has also introduced a 6.9 percent financing rate, plus a lease option of around £239 ($375) a month to sweeten the pot. If that sounds like an enticing proposition, then check out the press release below for more details.
Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.?~ Leo Tolstoy ~
As Financial Coaches, we meet with many people who think that they are on a budget, because they know how much they spend each month. They can tell you how much was spent on groceries or the dentist. They just check the credit card bill or the bank statement. Then there are people?who use tools like mint.com This is a free service to track your spending and look at current balances on all your financial accounts. They will send you bill reminders and suggest where you can save or cut expenses. This is a great tracking tool, bit it is not a budget. Tracking your expenses and savings after the month is over will give you valuable information about where your money went. Keeping receipts for cash expenses and itemizing bills and bank statements will give you a better idea. But is this not budgeting.
What is a budget?
A budget is a tool to?help you determine where your money will be spent, before?you spend it. A large portion of our monthly expenses are either fixed or stay roughly the same each month. There are always miscellaneous spending items that will come up such as soccer pictures, gifts or a flat tire. A budget gives you a way to plan for theses expenses without overspending. A budget is built each month before the month begins. You put your income at the top and categorize your spending until you have spent all of your income for the month either on expenses or savings.
Advantages to cash
Building a budget and assigning cash categories can make a big difference in how you spend. We use cash for groceries, restaurants, household products, miscellaneous expenses and personal spending (AKA blow money). It registers in your brain a lot more when hand the wait-staff at a restaurant $100.00 bill than it does to just put it on a credit or debit card. If makes you think first before ordering appetizers or before even?setting foot into a restaurant at all! Cash is visual. You can see how much you have left in your spending category as the month progresses. It helps keep you from going over your budget. If you run low in a category, you need to revisit your budget and adjust numbers to take money away from on category and add to another. Make sure that you write down your changes so that you can apply them if they apply again the next month.
In the world of personal finance there is room for both tracking and budgeting. In fact, everyone, no matter what your income level, should be?doing both. It can be?as simple as a yellow pad or computer based. In order to be?pointed in the right direction for long term gains, you need to put these systems in place.
We welcome your comments. Here are some things to think about:
What type of tracking system works for you?
Do you make a new budget each month using a computer spread sheet or a yellow pad?
Tim and Kathryn Gerken are Financial Coaches in Newcastle, WA. They do a monthly budget and track spending on an excel spread sheet. If you would like a copy of the form, please contact us and we will email it to you!
Spillover from Mexico's violent drug war is prompting the Harper government and the Canadian military to become more involved in helping defend the tiny, Central American country of Belize.
A series of internal reports, obtained by The Canadian Press under the access to information law, show the government has quietly increased co-operation with the Commonwealth nation, formerly known as British Honduras.
Canada is providing non-lethal equipment for security services and helping with strategic planning and the training of soldiers.
The documents, all dated from the spring of last year, describe the situation in Belize as deteriorating in the face of ultra-violent drug cartels that are battling not only Mexican and U.S. law enforcement, but each other as well
"Belize is of growing importance to the Canadian government due to the increasingly precarious security situation in Central America, particularly along the Belize-Mexico border," said a March 23, 2012, briefing note prepared for Defence Minister Peter MacKay.
"Following increasing success to counter transnational criminal organizations in Mexico, these organizations have advanced into Belize, bringing with them violence and public insecurity."
'You can count on Canada to continue working with its partners throughout the Americas to continue to come to terms with that problem, prevent drugs from coming into Canada but also prevent these groups from destabilizing regimes.'?Chris Alexander, parliamentary secretary to the minister of defence
Chris Alexander, the parliamentary secretary to the minister of defence, said today that he wasn't aware of any "new forms of engagement" but that Canada had "an agenda of partnership with many countries."
"You can count on Canada to continue working with its partners throughout the Americas to continue to come to terms with that problem, prevent drugs from coming into Canada but also prevent these groups from destabilizing regimes," he said.
The long coastline, coral inlets and dark, gnarled jungles have been a mecca for tourists over the years, but also perfect cover for cocaine smugglers in fast boats coming up from Colombia.
The increasing cartel focus on Belize prompted U.S. President Barack Obama added the country to the so-called "black list" of countries considered major drug-producing states or transit nations for narcotics.
Pressure on police
Both the internal Defence Department reports and U.S. experts on the drug war in Central America say the small Caribbean Sea nation has become an important thoroughfare for South American drug cartels.
"Many of the countries in Central America and the Caribbean are facing increasing worries and in some cases documented pressure on their law enforcement and justice systems from transnational organized crime groups," said Shannon O'Neil, an adjunct fellow for Latin American studies at the U.S.-based Council on Foreign Relations.
"All of these countries will benefit from strengthening their law enforcement institutions ? police, courts, and the like ? in the face of these threats."
Eric Olson, associate director of Latin American programs at the Washington-based Wilson Centre, agreed and said the success of anti-drug operations in both the U.S. and Mexico has been overplayed.
To some extent, the shift in drug routes has almost as much to do with cartels battling each other and smugglers looking for easier laneways than with better law enforcement, he said.
"The Belizean security forces are over-matched when it comes to the kind of firepower and capacity that the traffickers have," Olson said.
Help with defence review
The coast guard in that country should be a priority for modernization, given the way smuggling patterns have unfolded, he added.
Engagement in the Americas has been an evolving economic and security priority for the Harper government, said defence officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
The country's minister of defence requested help from Canada when conducting a strategic defence review in 2011 involving the country's more than 1,050 military, coast guard and national police forces, say the internal documents.
Canada's special forces recently delivered a batch of military equipment, including binoculars, combat clothing, helmets, boots, gloves and other gear.
What's that intriguing shape poking out from underneath the curtain? Rimac Automobili assures us all via its Facebook account that there's a Concept_One in there -- or, at least, a "one-off car based [on it]," marking the delivery of the company's much discussed and sometimes questioned 1,088 horsepower electric supercar. So, why the secrecy? According to the company's namesake executive, Mate Rimac, "the customer wished to control what will be published about the project." Hopefully the wind will blow away that curtain soon enough.
Windows Phone 8 hasn't exactly transformed the smartphone space, and the Samsung Ativ Odyssey for Verizon Wireless probably won't change that. The $49.99 Ativ Odyssey is Samsung's first U.S. smartphone to run Windows 8, so it's surprising that it's a generic, middle-of-the-road handset. It's small and comfy, and Windows Phone 8 is as slick and speedy as ever, but the Ativ Odyssey doesn't bring anything new to the table. It's a decent phone, it just isn't exciting.
Design and Call Quality One of my favorite traits about the current crop of Windows Phones is their fun, playful design. The Nokia Lumia 920, for instance, comes clad in a number of different gorgeous polycarbonate colors. Ditto the HTC Windows Phone 8X, which also stands out thanks to its "pyramid" design. Even the inexpensive Nokia Lumia 822?creates some visual interest with its white, rounded form. The Samsung Ativ Odyssey, on the other hand, can pass for any number of faceless, nameless smartphones out there.
The phone is made from the same shiny, cheap-feeling plastic you'll find on most Samsung smartphones, with the same faux-textured back panel as the Samsung Galaxy S III. On the bright side, the phone is relatively small and comfortable to hold, especially when compared with monsters like the 6.53-ounce Lumia 920. By comparison, the Odyssey weighs just 4.38 ounces and measures 4.82 by 2.52 by 0.44 inches (HWD). There's a Camera and Power button on the right side of the phone, a 3.5mm headphone jack on top, and a volume rocker and microSD card slot on the left.
The Ativ Odyssey has a 4-inch Super AMOLED display with 800-by-480-pixel resolution. That makes it look a little tighter than the Lumia 822, which has the same resolution spread out over 4.3 inches, but it still fails to impress. While Super AMOLED makes for very rich, vibrant colors, the PenTile pixel arrangement lends a fuzzy, pixelated look to everything, especially brighter colors. There are three backlit touch buttons below the display, and typing onscreen feels fine, despite the relatively small screen size.
The Odyssey is a world phone that supports dual-band EV-DO Rev. A (850/1900 MHz), quad-band GSM (850/900/1800/1900MHz), and quad-band UMTS (850/900/1900/2100MHz), as well as 4G LTE and 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi on the 2.4 and faster 5GHz bands. 4G LTE data speeds were fine in Manhattan, though unimpressive. The Phone averaged 3.1Mbps down and 2.5Mbps up, which have become pretty typical results for the network in this part of the city.
Reception is merely average, but voice quality is quite strong, especially through the phone's earpiece. Volume gets extremely loud, and can sound harsh at top volume, but if you keep it set to a more listenable level voices sounds excellent?crisp, clear, and natural. Calls made with the phone sound rather rich and bass-y, though background noise cancellation isn't great. The speakerphone is loud enough to use outside, and calls sounded fine over a Jawbone Era?Bluetooth headset; I had no trouble using the headset to control voice dialing.
You get a big 2100mAh battery, which was good for a solid 13 hours and 39 minutes of talk time in my tests. It's also removable, so you can always bring a spare.
WP8 and Apps There are still relatively few phones running Windows Phone 8 out on the market?this is only Verizon's third. Windows Phone 8 is a spare, fast OS, built around a series of live tiles on your home screen. These tiles continuously pull information from social networks, the Internet, messages, and local content stored on your phone, which is both useful and fun. In WP8, live tiles come in different sizes, which lends even more configurability.
Unlike Google's Android, Microsoft keeps pretty close tabs on the OS, so you're guaranteed a similar experience no matter which phone you use. For a closer look at WP8, you can read our full review.
Windows Phone is very fast in general, but the Samsung Ativ Odyssey is powered by a 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 MSM8960 processor, which is no slouch. It's the same processor you'll find in the higher-end Lumia 920 and HTC 8X, and the lower screen resolution here actually makes the Odyssey feel faster. Benchmarks scores are similar across the board, but you're definitely getting a lot of power for your money.
Munich, January 28, 2013 - Elsevier, a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services, is pleased to announce the launch of Molecular Metabolism in affiliation with the German Research Center for Environmental Health (Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen, Munich, Germany) and the German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD, Germany). Molecular Metabolism is a new, open access journal devoted to the rapid publication of breakthroughs in mechanistic metabolism research.
Metabolic diseases including obesity, diabetes and related co-morbidities remain on the rise. Impaired cellular metabolism is emerging as an etiological factor for an increasing number of illnesses, such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases or neurodegenerative disorders. Molecular Metabolism aims to publish hypothesis-driven research from leading scientists, thus paving the way to a better understanding of metabolic physiology, and enabling progress toward the development of personalized medicines for preventing and curing these metabolism-related diseases.
Matthias Tschp (Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen and Technische Universitt Mnchen) founded the journal together with Jens Brning (University of Cologne), Tamas Horvath (Yale University), and Martin Myers (University of Michigan). Their vision for Molecular Metabolism is an open access journal with a fast track publication process aiming for peer review-based decisions within one week. Molecular Metabolism will be able to offer online publication of accepted manuscripts within 14 days of submission in order to be able to disseminate breakthrough discoveries in mechanistic and translational metabolism research with unprecedented speed.
"Translational research is an integral part of the research approach for investigators around the world. It enables the transformation of knowledge into medical progress and the realization of the translational potential of basic research findings for medical applications," said Matthias Tschp. "Molecular Metabolism has been launched to provide a home for translational metabolic disease research, and we welcome submissions from all metabolism researchers."
###
Articles published in Molecular Metabolism are freely available to anyone and are published online on ScienceDirect.
For more information or to submit an article, go to Molecular Metabolism.
About Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen
Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen is the German Research Center for Environmental Health. It investigates important common diseases, which develop from the interaction of lifestyle, environmental factors and personal genetic background, focusing particularly on diabetes mellitus and chronic lung diseases. The Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen has about 2,000 staff members and is headquartered in Neuherberg, in the north of Munich. Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen is a research institution of the Federal Republic of Germany and the Free State of Bavaria. It is a member of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers, a community of 18 scientific-technical and medical-biological research centers with a total of about 34,000 staff members.
About German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD)
The German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD) is a national network comprised of experts in the field of diabetes research that connects basic research, epidemiology and clinical applications. Members of the network are Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen, the German Diabetes Center in Dsseldorf, the German Institute for Human Nutrition in Potsdam-Rehbrcke, Paul Langerhans Institute of the Carl Gustav Carus University Hospital in Dresden and the Institute for Diabetes Research and Metabolic Diseases of the Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen at the University of Tbingen. The goal of the DZD is to find answers to unsolved questions in diabetes research via an innovative, integrative research approach and to make a major contribution to improving the prevention, diagnosis, and therapy of diabetes mellitus (www.dzd-ev.de/en)
Open Access Publishing at Elsevier
Elsevier has been providing open access publishing options since 2005. Today, researchers can choose to publish in over 1,500 hybrid journals as well as more than 30 full open access journals and these numbers will continue to grow rapidly. All of Elsevier's open access publications have been peer reviewed, ensuring that the broader community not only reads the latest research but that it is factual, original and of the highest quality and ethical standards. For more information about Elsevier's open access program, visit www.elsevier.com/openaccess
About Elsevier
Elsevier is a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services. The company works in partnership with the global science and health communities to publish more than 2,000 journals, including The Lancet and Cell, and close to 20,000 book titles, including major reference works from Mosby and Saunders. Elsevier's online solutions include ScienceDirect, Scopus, Reaxys, ClinicalKey and Mosby's Nursing Suite, which enhance the productivity of science and health professionals, and the SciVal suite and MEDai's Pinpoint Review, which help research and health care institutions deliver better outcomes more cost-effectively.
A global business headquartered in Amsterdam, Elsevier employs 7,000 people worldwide. The company is part of Reed Elsevier Group PLC, a world-leading provider of professional information solutions in the Science, Medical, Legal and Risk and Business sectors, which is jointly owned by Reed Elsevier PLC and Reed Elsevier NV. The ticker symbols are REN (Euronext Amsterdam), REL (London Stock Exchange), RUK and ENL (New York Stock Exchange).
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Elsevier launches new open access journal: Molecular MetabolismPublic release date: 28-Jan-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Munich, January 28, 2013 - Elsevier, a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services, is pleased to announce the launch of Molecular Metabolism in affiliation with the German Research Center for Environmental Health (Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen, Munich, Germany) and the German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD, Germany). Molecular Metabolism is a new, open access journal devoted to the rapid publication of breakthroughs in mechanistic metabolism research.
Metabolic diseases including obesity, diabetes and related co-morbidities remain on the rise. Impaired cellular metabolism is emerging as an etiological factor for an increasing number of illnesses, such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases or neurodegenerative disorders. Molecular Metabolism aims to publish hypothesis-driven research from leading scientists, thus paving the way to a better understanding of metabolic physiology, and enabling progress toward the development of personalized medicines for preventing and curing these metabolism-related diseases.
Matthias Tschp (Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen and Technische Universitt Mnchen) founded the journal together with Jens Brning (University of Cologne), Tamas Horvath (Yale University), and Martin Myers (University of Michigan). Their vision for Molecular Metabolism is an open access journal with a fast track publication process aiming for peer review-based decisions within one week. Molecular Metabolism will be able to offer online publication of accepted manuscripts within 14 days of submission in order to be able to disseminate breakthrough discoveries in mechanistic and translational metabolism research with unprecedented speed.
"Translational research is an integral part of the research approach for investigators around the world. It enables the transformation of knowledge into medical progress and the realization of the translational potential of basic research findings for medical applications," said Matthias Tschp. "Molecular Metabolism has been launched to provide a home for translational metabolic disease research, and we welcome submissions from all metabolism researchers."
###
Articles published in Molecular Metabolism are freely available to anyone and are published online on ScienceDirect.
For more information or to submit an article, go to Molecular Metabolism.
About Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen
Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen is the German Research Center for Environmental Health. It investigates important common diseases, which develop from the interaction of lifestyle, environmental factors and personal genetic background, focusing particularly on diabetes mellitus and chronic lung diseases. The Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen has about 2,000 staff members and is headquartered in Neuherberg, in the north of Munich. Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen is a research institution of the Federal Republic of Germany and the Free State of Bavaria. It is a member of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers, a community of 18 scientific-technical and medical-biological research centers with a total of about 34,000 staff members.
About German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD)
The German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD) is a national network comprised of experts in the field of diabetes research that connects basic research, epidemiology and clinical applications. Members of the network are Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen, the German Diabetes Center in Dsseldorf, the German Institute for Human Nutrition in Potsdam-Rehbrcke, Paul Langerhans Institute of the Carl Gustav Carus University Hospital in Dresden and the Institute for Diabetes Research and Metabolic Diseases of the Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen at the University of Tbingen. The goal of the DZD is to find answers to unsolved questions in diabetes research via an innovative, integrative research approach and to make a major contribution to improving the prevention, diagnosis, and therapy of diabetes mellitus (www.dzd-ev.de/en)
Open Access Publishing at Elsevier
Elsevier has been providing open access publishing options since 2005. Today, researchers can choose to publish in over 1,500 hybrid journals as well as more than 30 full open access journals and these numbers will continue to grow rapidly. All of Elsevier's open access publications have been peer reviewed, ensuring that the broader community not only reads the latest research but that it is factual, original and of the highest quality and ethical standards. For more information about Elsevier's open access program, visit www.elsevier.com/openaccess
About Elsevier
Elsevier is a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services. The company works in partnership with the global science and health communities to publish more than 2,000 journals, including The Lancet and Cell, and close to 20,000 book titles, including major reference works from Mosby and Saunders. Elsevier's online solutions include ScienceDirect, Scopus, Reaxys, ClinicalKey and Mosby's Nursing Suite, which enhance the productivity of science and health professionals, and the SciVal suite and MEDai's Pinpoint Review, which help research and health care institutions deliver better outcomes more cost-effectively.
A global business headquartered in Amsterdam, Elsevier employs 7,000 people worldwide. The company is part of Reed Elsevier Group PLC, a world-leading provider of professional information solutions in the Science, Medical, Legal and Risk and Business sectors, which is jointly owned by Reed Elsevier PLC and Reed Elsevier NV. The ticker symbols are REN (Euronext Amsterdam), REL (London Stock Exchange), RUK and ENL (New York Stock Exchange).
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Fire up Software Update: iOS 6.1 is available, and it contains a couple neat new features to make your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and Apple TV more useful. Here's what's new.
Straight from Apple's support pages, here's what you'll get in the new version:
This update contains improvements and bug fixes, including:
LTE support for more carriers (complete list of supported carriers here)
Purchase movie tickets through Fandango with Siri (USA only)
iTunes Match subscribers can now download individual songs from iCloud
New button to reset the Advertising Identifier
9to5Mac is also reporting that the update includes Bluetooth keyboard compatibility for the Apple TV, which could be pretty handy. Open up iTunes or head to Settings > General > Software Update on your device to get the new version. Of course, if you plan on jailbreaking, you may want to hold off just in case the new version isn't supported in the next jailbreak.
SOC TOOL
iOS 6.1 Software Update | Apple Support via 9to5Mac
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The S&P 500 edged lower on Monday as a four-week rally stalled, while a rebound in Apple shares helped buoy the Nasdaq.
Caterpillar shares helped cap losses in the Dow industrials even as the company posted a 55 percent drop in quarterly profit due to a charge connected with accounting fraud at a Chinese subsidiary and weak demand among its dealers. Caterpillar's shares, down 2.2 percent in the past three sessions, rose 1.5 percent Monday to $96.97.
The S&P 500 is coming off a streak of eight sessions of gains, the longest in eight years. On Friday, the major U.S. stock indexes closed a fourth straight week of gains with the S&P 500 ending the session above 1,500 for the first time in more than five years.
The rally has left the market vulnerable to a short-term pullback of up to 3 percent in the S&P 500 as bullish sentiment continues to rise, according to Richard Ross, Auerbach Grayson's global technical strategist.
"Still," Ross said, "we have a lot of momentum and nice seasonality, and technicals support the long-term bull market."
Data on Monday pointed to growing economic momentum as companies sensed improved consumer demand.
Thomson Reuters data showed that of the 150 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings so far, 67.3 percent have beaten analysts' expectations, which is a higher proportion than over the past four quarters and above the average since 1994.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> fell 9.02 points or 0.06 percent, to 13,886.96, the S&P 500 <.spx> lost 1.5 points or 0.1 percent, to 1,501.46 and the Nasdaq Composite <.ixic> added 8.46 points or 0.27 percent, to 3,158.17.
Bargain hunters lifted Apple after the tech giant's stock dropped 14.4 percent in the previous two sessions. With Apple's stock up 2.4 percent at $450.29, the iPad and iPhone maker regained the title as the largest U.S. company by market capitalization as Exxon Mobil fell 0.9 percent to $90.94 and slipped back to second place.
"I think there is more downside in Apple if you did get a broad market pullback," Auerbach Grayson's Ross said.
"I'd be patient unless you're a trader. It might not be the most attractive entry point."
U.S. durable goods orders jumped 4.6 percent in December, a pace that far outstripped expectations for a rise of 1.8 percent. Pending home sales unexpectedly dropped 4.3 percent. Analysts were looking for an increase of 0.3 percent.
Equities have also gained support from a recent agreement in Washington to extend the government's borrowing power. On Monday, Fitch Ratings said that agreement removed the near-term risk to the country's 'AAA' rating.
Hess Corp shares shot up 5.3 percent to $62.02 after the company said it would exit its refining business, freeing up to $1 billion of capital. Separately, hedge fund Elliott Associates is looking for approval to buy about $800 million more in Hess stock.
Keryx Biopharmaceuticals Inc said a late-stage trial of its experimental kidney disease drug met the main study goal, and its shares soared 67 percent to $5.75.
Living in dense cities makes for certain efficiencies: being able to walk or take mass transit to work, living in buildings with (at least potentially) efficient HVAC systems, and more. That's why cities have been lauded in recent years for their (relatively) low environmental impact. But it seems at least one aspect of city life has an environmental effect felt at extreme distances from the cities themselves: waste heat. All those tightly packed sources of heat, from cars to banks of AC units, result in temperature changes not just directly (and locally) but by affecting weather systems surrounding the source city.
From the article: "The released heat is changing temperatures in areas more than 1,000 miles away (1609 kilometers). It is warming parts of North America by about 1 degree Fahrenheit (0.6 degrees Celsius) and northern Asia by as much as 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit (1 degree Celsius), while cooling areas of Europe by a similar amount, scientists report in the journal Nature Climate Change. The released heat (dubbed waste heat), it seems, is changing atmospheric circulation, including jet streams ? powerful narrow currents of wind that blow from west to east and north to south in the upper atmosphere. This impact on regional temperatures may explain a climate puzzle of sorts: why some areas are having warmer winters than predicted by climate models, the researchers said. In turn, the results suggest this phenomenon should be accounted for in models forecasting global warming."
GUIYANG, China (Reuters) - The trial of disgraced senior Chinese leader Bo Xilai, the central figure in the country's biggest political scandal in decades, will not be held on Monday as some media had reported, a court official in the southern Chinese city of Guiyang said.
"To date, the People's Intermediate Court of Guiyang has received no information whatsoever about the trial of Bo Xilai taking place in Guiyang," said Jiang Hao, a court official in the city, the capital of Guizhou province.
"If the next step is to hold the Bo Xilai trial in Guiyang's court, then, as according to rules, we will inform our media friends promptly," Jiang told reporters at the court.
A report last week by Hong Kong's Ta Kung Pao newspaper said Bo, the charismatic former Communist Party chief of the southwestern city of Chongqing, would be tried in Guiyang from Monday. The Beijing-backed newspaper has accurately reported issues close to the Chinese leadership in the past.
Asked if prosecutors had sent the case to the court, Jiang said: "According to information I have received, they have not."
It is still not clear where Bo's trial will take place. He has not been formally charged although he was expelled from the Communist Party in September and made the subject of a list of sordid allegations: bending the law to hush up a murder, taking huge bribes, and engaging in "improper sexual relations with multiple women".
Once a contender for China's top leadership, Bo, 63, was ousted from his post as Chongqing party chief last year following the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood, for which his wife Gu Kailai has been convicted.
Bo was widely tipped to be promoted to the party's elite inner core before his career unravelled. The downfall came after his former police chief, Wang Lijun, fled briefly to a U.S. consulate in February 2012 and alleged that Gu had poisoned Heywood. Wang and Gu are both serving prison sentences over the scandal.
The Bo issue is the most sensational case of domestic political turmoil in China since the fall of the "Gang of Four" after Mao Zedong's death in 1976, and is being closely watched for signs of openness in China's new leadership and how much of the party's inner workings they will allow to be revealed.
The trial will likely not be held until after China's national parliament holds its annual session in March, according to a report on Monday on the website of the Global Times, an influential tabloid published by the Communist Party's official People's Daily.
"The information in terms of the date and location for the trial will certainly be made public in advance, and it's unnecessary to make speculations", the paper quoted a source close to China's top judicial body as saying.
The paper did not further identify the source.
(Reporting by John Ruwitch in Guiyang and Beijing newsroom; Writing by Terril Yue Jones; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
Whenever something sketchy happens to your favorite social network's TOS, there are always folks who say they're packing up, taking their data and leaving. But backing up your social data doesn't have to be a last resort. After all, who knows what might happen to the cloud. More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon has approved a major expansion of its cybersecurity force to counter a growing threat of hacking and to conduct offensive operations against foreign foes, the Washington Post reported on Sunday, citing U.S. officials.
The officials, who were not named because the plan is not yet public, said the move would increase the cybersecurity force fivefold, from 900 personnel to a total of 4,900 troops and civilians.
It said senior Pentagon officials made the decision late last year amid a string of attacks, including one that wiped out more than 30,000 computers at a Saudi Arabian state oil company.
The increase in personnel was requested by the head of the Defense Department's Cyber Command.
A Pentagon spokesman had no immediate comment, but said he was aware of the report in the Washington Post.
The plan, the paper said, calls for creating three types of force under the Cyber Command.
"National mission forces," would protect computer systems that undergird electrical grids and other kinds of infrastructure. "Combat mission forces," would help commanders abroad execute attacks or other offensive operations, while "cyber protection forces," would focus on protecting the Defense Department's own systems.
(Reporting by Sarah Lynch; Editing by David Brunnstrom)
The car is all clean and packed and we are about to head away for a family holiday. Hubby doesn't have to return to work til mid February so we thought we'd take the chance to get off the farm and head to the beach. It certainly is a blessing having a swimming pool and an airconditioned home, as if not, I would have been itching to get to the coast?weeks ago.?
Whilst it is really nice to go with the flow and not have too many concrete plans for holidays, I like to be prepared and make a very rough outline for meals and a list of activities for our time away. I like to arrive at our self contained holiday accomodation knowing we have some supplies with us without having to rush off to the store and I find it much more budget friendly. Obviously we will be eating out or having takeaway a few times but not everyday or for every meal. Prior to leaving, I've stocked up on the follow items to take with us:
I've also been baking and have made mini quiche; muffins and chocolate snowballs to take with us. We take a small esky with us for the frozen BBQ meat; quiches; muffins; salad and fruit.?
The little boys and I have also made a list of potential activities for us to do together whilst we away. Some of the ideas we came up with were:?
fish + chips at the beach?
indoor playground/play center?
picnic
play at the park?
milkshake dates
out for dinner
shop for school supplies?
beach scavenger hunt?
I have packed a small collection puzzles; games; colouring-in and DVD's for the boys too. I've tried to choose ones they've not played with for a while or are favourites that I know will hold their attention. We have also packed their scooters. I'm sure as they get older we will be taking their bikes but for now scooters are something they enjoy and bonus, they pack down small in the car.?
Very much looking forward to some family time away together and hope to have lots of lovely happy snaps to share with you soon.?
Scientists are using principles of natural selection to evolve a more efficient solar cell.
Engineers at Northwestern University wrote a computer program that "mates" design elements and assesses the fitness of their "offspring" to come up with the most efficient possible organic solar cell. Organic solar cells are made with the so-called organic elements ? carbon, oxygen and nitrogen ? and are cheaper to make, lighter and more flexible than the traditional silicon cells available in solar panels today.
Organic cells aren't as efficient at turning the sun's energy into electricity as silicon cells, however. Many research groups are working to improve organic solar cells' efficiency. If they work well, such cells could go into? electricity-producing windows ?or clothes.
In their work, the Northwestern researchers focused on the top layer of an organic solar cell, called the scattering layer, which traps photons from sunlight. They wanted a scattering layer that would hold photos for a greater amount of time.
"We wanted to determine the geometry for the scattering layer that would give us optimal performance," Cheng Sun, a mechanical engineer and one of the creators of the new organic solar cell,? said in a statement. "But with so many possibilities, it's difficult to know where to start, so we looked to laws of natural selection to guide us."
Sun and his colleagues' program simulated more than 20 generations of matings to come up with their final design. The program also mimicked the biological processes of mutation and an exchange of traits called crossing over.
The resulting design traps photons for three times as long as the Yablonovitch Limit, which describes how long a photon is likely to stay in a semiconducting material. Researchers have only been able to reach and break the Yablonovitch Limit in the last few years.?
The engineers? published their work ?Jan. 3 in the journal Scientific Reports.
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Tiger Woods will take a Monday stroll at Torrey Pines, where he'll finish up his final 11 holes on his way to a convincing PGA Tour season opening win.
There are still 11 holes to play, but on Monday afternoon, Tiger Woods will win the Farmers Insurance Open for the seventh time in his career. It will be his eighth win on the South Course at Torrey Pines, and his 75th career victory.
Woods carries a six-shot lead into Monday, when the final round will resume at 2:10 p.m. ET. But this tournament appeared over early in the third round on Sunday, when Woods started throwing darts at the flagsticks and everyone around him failed to make a move. It's been the classic path to victory for Woods -- get the lead heading into the weekend and then dominate the par-5s to extend the margin while the rest of the competition crumbles.
Tiger appeared vulnerable for one short stretch on Sunday afternoon, when he carded his first ever bogey on the par-5 18th hole and then got wild off the tee at the start of his fourth round. But even that wildness, in which he missed the first five fairways, didn't lead to dropped shots. Instead, Woods scrambled and actually made three birdies in his first six holes to add two more shots to his comfortable lead.
Track Tiger's progress at our Farmers Insurance Open section
This dominance comes after a week of mild concern when Woods made his 2013 debut with a missed cut in Abu Dhabi. The MC involved a bit of a technicality as Woods fell on the wrong side of the cut line after he was assessed a two-shot penalty at the end of his round. But he was still not sharp in his two-day stay in the Middle East.
Any concerns have been completely erased this week, with what is likely his most impressive performance since 2008. The short stretch on Sunday night notwithstanding, Woods has been relatively steady off the tee. Sure, he's missing fairways, but he's also had stretches where he's absolutely bombed it down the middle. The rough for this regular tour stop at Torrey is not particularly penal, either, and Woods is clearly comfortable playing in from either the short or long grass.
But the biggest reason why he'll start his PGA Tour season with a win for the sixth time in his career is his short game. Woods has been masterful with wedges in hand, playing from 130 yards and in. He started the week a perfect four-for-four in sand saves, highlighted by an eagle chip-in out of the bunker on No. 6 in his opening round. He bookended that last night with another chip-in for birdie on No. 4. Those two chip-ins will be part of the highlight reel, but there have been countless other wedge and sand shots that have nearly gone in, as Tiger repeatedly throws the ball into the middle of the green and spins it back inside five feet.
More: Can Tiger overcome recent weekend struggles?
The short-game work has resulted in multiple tap-in birdies this week, but he certainly hasn't been off with the putter, either. Woods is clinical on the California poa annua greens, which can be the most unpredictable and difficult to read on tour. He methodically lagged several putts on Sunday to avoid three-putt bogeys and keep the rest off the field at a multi-shot deficit.
Nick Watney and Brandt Snedeker, two of the other top players in the field, have bubbled up into second place. They would typically be worthy chasers of Woods, but with a six-shot lead, it's academic at this point. Tiger has three par-5s still ahead of him on Monday, which should add to the margin. The only drama left is whether or not he can exceed the eight-shot margin of victory he set here in 2008. CBS requested that the finish be pushed back to the afternoon, and Jim Nantz and crew will surely have the superlatives ready to fete Woods on his 11-hole march to victory. It could be just the beginning of a huge 2013 season.
For a live leaderboard from La Jolla, visit Golf.com.
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Public release date: 28-Jan-2013
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Fire up Software Update: iOS 6.1 is available, and it contains a couple neat new features to make your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and Apple TV more useful. Here's what's new. 
