How to fix eyepokes? Cagereaders weigh in

After eyepokes were a huge problem at UFC 159, the UFC said they will propose a rule change to have doctors decide if fights should end because of an eyepoke. On Cagewriter's Facebook page, we asked readers what could be done in fights to reduce this foul that has messed up too many bouts.

One reader thinks fighters should have to take more responsibility for when certain kind of strikes go awry.

Fine Michael Bisping for sure. You shouldn't be allowed to throw a punch with your index finger extended and say sorry, it was an accident. When there is a disincentive to pawing at eachothers faces openhanded they will stop doing it and eye pokes will go down. -- Knowa Metcalf

Bisping's eyepoke is what ended his bout with Alan Belcher. Fining athletes to change their behavior has a precedent. The NFL has levied fines for certain types of hits, though inconsistency in enforcement has been a problem.

Changing up the equipment used in fights could also be a solution.

It's simple, extend an individual finger pad with a slightly cupped angle to it that still allows the fingers to be open and closed, but the tips of the fingers would be slightly covered and the hands would not open 100%... But more like 90-95%, thereby reducing the ability for the fingers to completely extend and poke the opponent in the eye. Finger straps would hold the pads to the fingers. -- Michael Carter

As far as eye pokes, the best solution may not be in the gloves but rather in the design of an ultra thin goggle. Something that won't interfere with sight, can be vented to avoid fogging, but also very streamlined and as unobtrusive as possible. -- Al Lamp

But inadvertent eyepokes, like groin shots, are going to happen.

I see eye pokes like I see groin shots, they are gonna happen. Designing a different glove may help a little, but even boxers get thumbs in the eyes and their whole hand is covered. I say treat eye pokes as a foul, a warning on the first one and take points away for any after the warning. Give the person who got poked 5 minutes to recover just like a groin shot. If they dont recover then stop the fight after a doctor looks at it. -- Bruce Leighty

Like every other problem that comes up in a sport where two people are fighting each other, eyepokes will likely never go away completely. Being open to innovation will help MMA reduce this annoying way to end fights.

Thank you to everyone who responded. You can join in the fun by liking Cagewriter on Facebook.

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mma-cagewriter/fix-eyepokes-cagereaders-weigh-155318245.html

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Fight expected in House on online sales tax

By Kim Dixon and Patrick Temple-West

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Senate voted overwhelmingly on Monday to give states the power to enforce their sales tax laws on online purchases, but the legislation faces a tougher fight in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.

The Democratic-controlled Senate voted 69 to 27 to back the measure, which pits brick-and-mortar stores like Wal-Mart Stores Inc and cash-hungry state governments against such Web retailers as eBay Inc and Republicans wary of new tax measures.

"Call me a conservative, but I believe the right approach to tax fairness is to reduce rates ? not force higher rates onto others," said Tom Graves, a House Republican from Georgia.

House Speaker John Boehner plans to send the bill to the House Judiciary Committee, a senior Republican aide said. That will mean hearings ahead. The Senate uncharacteristically bypassed this step.

Judiciary Committee Chairman Robert Goodlatte, a Republican, has reservations about the legislation, including its complexity and potential impact on small businesses, a spokeswoman said.

Goodlatte has yet to schedule any hearings on it, she said.

Backers of the measure include major traditional retailers Wal-Mart and Best Buy Co Inc, as well as e-tailing giant Amazon.com Inc, which wants to simplify its U.S. state sales tax payments.

Opponents include many other online merchants such as eBay, Overstock.com Inc and anti-tax activist Grover Norquist. Lawmakers from states without sales taxes - like Montana, Oregon and New Hampshire - largely oppose the measure.

States that charge sales tax have largely been unable to require e-tailers to collect it from purchasers unless the e-tailer had a physical presence in the state. Otherwise, consumers are supposed to pay the tax, but very few do.

Some states have made separate arrangements with Amazon on the issue, while others have not.

The bill would let states require out-of-state retailers to collect sales tax on purchases made over the Internet, even if the e-tailer has no physical presence in the purchaser's state.

The bill would allow states to do this but not require them to do so. It would also exempt merchants with online annual out-of-state sales of $1 million or less.

"We place a 30 percent probability that the bill is signed into law by the end of the year" primarily due to opposition in the House, said Guggenheim Securities analyst Chris Krueger.

"Our odds will increase following passage of this bill in the Senate provided it receives a big vote of support," he said.

The online sales tax bill debate is moving on a separate track from efforts in Congress on a broader tax overhaul.

The main obstacle on that front remains the dispute between Republicans who refuse to consider new federal revenue from ending tax breaks that would be part of tax reform, and Democrats who insist that such new revenue is vital.

(Reporting By Kevin Drawbaugh, Patrick Temple-West, Kim Dixon and Nanette Byrnes; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh, Steve Orlofsky and Eric Walsh)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fight-expected-house-online-sales-tax-000742412.html

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Global highways of invasive marine species calculated

May 5, 2013 ? Globalisation, with its ever increasing demand for cargo transport, has inadvertently opened the flood gates for a new, silent invasion. New research has mapped the most detailed forecast to date for importing potentially harmful invasive species with the ballast water of cargo ships.

Scientists from the Universities of Bristol, UK, and Oldenburg, Germany, have examined ship traffic data and biological records to assess the risk of future invasions. Their research is published in the latest issue of Ecology Letters.

Animals and plants can hitch a ride on cargo ships, hiding as stowaways in the ballast tanks or clinging to the ship's hull. Upon arrival in a new port, alien species can then wreak havoc in formerly pristine waters. These so-called invasive species can drive native species to extinction, modify whole ecosystems and impact human economy.

Some regions, such as the San Francisco Bay or Chesapeake Bay, have even reported several new exotic species per year. The knock-on effects to fishermen, farmers, tourism and industry create billions of US dollars in damage every year. Conservationists and ship engineers are now trying to prevent the next big invasion. But without knowing when and where it may occur, their possibilities remain limited.

As part of the research project, funded by the Volkswagen Foundation, the team obtained detailed logs of nearly three million ship voyages in 2007 and 2008. Depending on the particular route travelled by each ship, the researchers estimated the probability that a species survives the journey and establishes a population in subsequent ports of call. Although this probability is tiny for any single voyage, the numbers quickly add up because modern cargo traffic volumes are enormous.

Professor Bernd Blasius from the University of Oldenburg and one of the researchers involved in the study, said: "Our model combines information such as shipping routes, ship sizes, temperatures and biogeography to come up with local forecasts of invasion probabilities."

The final tally reveals the hotspots of bioinvasion. Large Asian ports such as Singapore and Hong Kong but also US ports like New York and Long Beach are among the sites of highest invasion probability. These waterways are notoriously busy, but, traffic is not the only important factor.

The North Sea, for example, does not rank among the top endangered regions despite intense shipping. Temperatures here are lower, making it more difficult for alien species to survive. However, arrivals from the other side of the Atlantic pose a serious threat to the North Sea. Most invaders are predicted to originate from the North American east coast.

Hanno Seebens from the University of Oldenburg said: "We also compared our model results to field data. And, indeed, most of the alien species actually do originate from there."

As severe as the risk of future invasions may be, the study also contains a hopeful message. If ship engineers could prevent at least some potential invaders from getting on board, the total invasion risk could be substantially mitigated.

By successfully removing a species from 25 per cent of the ballast tanks arriving at each port (eg with filters, chemicals or radiation), the overall invasion probability decreases by 56 per cent. The reduction is so disproportionately large because the effect of ballast water treatment multiplies at successive stopovers.

Bioinvasion is, as the researchers admit, a complex process, and records of past invasions are far from comprehensive. Facing these uncertainties, they simulated various different scenarios. Interestingly, the key results are comparable for different models, predicting the same hotspots and global highways of bioinvasion. The traffic on the main shipping routes plays the greatest role for the calculation.

Dr Michael Gastner, Lecturer in Engineering Mathematics at the University of Bristol, added: "Ship movements in the past few years are well documented, but there are many unknowns about future trade routes."

For example, the future of the world economy remains uncertain, and Arctic passages may become navigable as a consequence of global warming. Future simulations will also have to take into account which engineering solutions for ballast water treatment will eventually be adopted by port authorities.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Bristol.

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Journal Reference:

1. H. Seebens, M. T. Gastner, B. Blasius. The risk of marine bioinvasion caused by global shipping. Ecology Letters, 2013; DOI: 10.1111/ele.12111

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/bt8lG2eo6HE/130505073750.htm

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More Kids Diagnosed With Mental Health Disabilities, Study Finds ...

By Serena Gordon
HealthDay Reporter

SUNDAY, May 5 (HealthDay News) ? Significantly more U.S. children have a neurodevelopmental or mental health disability than did a decade ago, according to new research.

Disabilities that impair a child?s day-to-day living have risen 16 percent, with the greatest increase seen in richer families, according to the study. Conditions such as autism or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder appear to lie behind the increase, experts said.

But the surveys of parents in 2001-?02 and 2009-?10 also revealed some good news: The rate of disability due to physical conditions went down, according to the study, which is scheduled for presentation Sunday at the Pediatric Academic Societies? annual meeting in Washington D.C. Data and conclusions presented at meetings are typically considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed medical journal.

?This may mean there are differences in people getting early access to care,? said study lead author Dr. Amy Houtrow, vice chairwoman of pediatric rehabilitation medicine at Children?s Hospital of Pittsburgh. For example, medications for children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis, a potentially debilitating inflammatory arthritis, have improved significantly in recent years, she said.

?For some conditions, it may be that medical care has improved so much that children may have a diagnosis but not a disability,? she said, adding that this particular example is from what she has seen in her practice, not from the study data.

For the study, Houtrow and colleagues reviewed data from two National Health Interview Surveys conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). They included more than 102,000 parents of children from infancy through 17 years of age.

Parents were asked if their children had any limitations in play or activity, received special education services, needed help with personal care, had difficulty walking without supports, had trouble with memory or had any other limitation.

?It?s not enough to just have something like ADHD,? she said. ?You have to be limited somehow by that diagnosis.?

The researchers found that nearly 6 million children were considered disabled at the end of the study. Children living in poverty had the highest rates of disability, although poor children didn?t experience the largest increases in the incidence of disability during the study period.

Families with incomes 300 percent above the federal poverty level ? around $66,000 for a family of four ? had a 28 percent increase in children with disabilities. Families whose income levels exceeded the poverty level by 400 percent ? about $88,000 ? saw a 24 percent increase in the number of children with disabilities.

Houtrow said it wasn?t clear exactly why this was the case, and the researchers suspect increases in neurodevelopmental disorders may be behind the rise.

In children under 6 years old, the trend was most evident, with almost double the rate of neurodevelopmental disorders ? 36 cases per 1,000 children up from 19 a decade earlier.

The increased prevalence of autism spectrum disorders is likely one of the explanations, said Dr. Andrew Adesman, chief of developmental and behavioral pediatrics at the Steven and Alexandra Cohen Children?s Medical Center of New York, in New Hyde Park.

Autism spectrum disorders involve impaired communication, social interactions and repetitive behaviors, and can range from mild, as in Asperger?s syndrome, to full-blown autism. The CDC estimates that one in 88 children now has a form of autism.

?Even though the study found some differences in disability rates for different socioeconomic status, I would urge any parent who has a concern about their children to discuss it with their child?s pediatrician,? Adesman said.

Houtrow agreed.

?The condition your child has matters, and how they function in their regular life matters,? she said. ?If they?re having trouble doing things that other children do, reach out to health professionals or to community resources to optimize your child?s life. We can help children adapt or get accommodations for them.?

Houtrow said the overall rise in neurodevelopmental disorders suggests that there may be changes in what is considered socially acceptable.

More information

Learn more about children?s disabilities from the National Dissemination Center for Children With Disabilities.

Source: http://news.health.com/2013/05/05/more-kids-diagnosed-with-mental-health-disabilities-study-finds/

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Could immigration bill set off another backlash?

WASHINGTON (AP) ? As a Senate committee prepares to begin voting this week on far-reaching immigration legislation, advocates are watching warily to see whether opposition, thus far subdued, builds into the same kind of fierce backlash that shut down Congress' last attempt to remake the nation's immigration system.

That time around, in 2007, angry calls overwhelmed the Senate switchboard and lawmakers endured raging town hall meetings and threats from incensed constituents. The legislation ultimately collapsed on the Senate floor.

"I've been through this battle, and it's ugly," said former Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., who supported the bill. "My phones were jammed for three weeks and I got three death threats, one of which I turned over to the FBI. So it's rough business."

Supporters of the immigration bill, released last month by a group of four Republican and four Democratic senators, have been cautiously optimistic about their prospects because of factors including public support for giving citizenship to immigrants, a large and diverse coalition in support of the bill, and a growing sentiment among Republican leaders that immigration must be dealt with if they are to regain the backing of Hispanic voters. Backers have been working hard to build alliances and strategies aimed at avoiding the mistakes of 2007, when critics largely defined the bill and some supporters ended up turning against it.

Opponents acknowledge that supporters started out better organized and mobilized than last time around, and they also anticipate that outside groups pushing the legislation ? including efforts headed by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg ? will outspend them. Supporters include large and influential groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, AFL-CIO and the Catholic Church, while opponents include lesser-known think tanks or advocacy organizations such as NumbersUSA, the Federation for American Immigration Reform and the Center for Immigration Studies. Both sides have already begun running ads.

But critics also have important grass-roots influence, including from talk radio hosts who were instrumental in defeating the bill in 2007, and opponents argue that as the public absorbs the content of the legislation, the tide will turn against it. They say that there are already signs that it's happening. Although conservative commentators on Fox News Channel and elsewhere have been more muted so far than in 2007, some talk radio hosts including Mark Levin and Rush Limbaugh have begun to voice deep unease about the bill despite the efforts of its conservative standard bearer, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., to sell the legislation to them and other conservative opinion leaders.

"The supporters promoted the bill aggressively before anybody saw the language, and certain Republicans and conservative voices sort of held their fire, but that's beginning to change," said Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., who was a leading voice in the Senate against the bill in 2007 and is reprising that role this time around, making floor speeches, issuing press releases and holding briefing calls with reporters to argue that the bill would unlock a much larger volume of immigration into the U.S. than advertised, to the detriment of U.S. workers and jobs.

"It's going to be like that mackerel in the sunshine ? the longer it's out there the worse it smells," Sessions said.

The bill would aim to boost border security, fix legal immigration and worker programs, require all employers to check their workers' legal status and offer eventual citizenship to the estimated 11 million immigrants already living in the country illegally.

Joyce Kaufman, a host on a Florida radio station, WFTL, said that opposition to the bill was soft at first but grows daily.

"Yes, we believe this is amnesty," Kaufman said. "Citizen activists are outraged."

Lott said that supporters of the legislation still haven't come up with an argument as concise and effective as that one word ? "amnesty" ? from opponents. He said he's spoken with Rubio, among others, to make clear that supporters of the bill need to hone their arguments.

"Last time our explanation was three paragraphs. Theirs was a word," Lott said. When that happens, he said, "You're dead."

The Democratic-led Senate, where the Judiciary Committee takes up the bill on Thursday, is already going to be a tough challenge. But if the bill does pass the Senate, opponents are betting it gets stopped in the Republican-led House. A bipartisan group of House lawmakers has been promising for months to release their own bill mirroring elements of the Senate legislation but taking a tougher tack. So far they haven't delivered.

Meanwhile, to the dismay of immigration advocates, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee has announced plans to move forward with individual, single-issue immigration bills, rejecting the comprehensive approach in the Senate that's backed by President Barack Obama, who's made immigration legislation a top second-term priority. The legislation was also a priority in 2007 for then-President George W. Bush, but he was unsuccessful in persuading Republican lawmakers to get behind the bill, and Democrats who at the time controlled Congress were divided, too.

In the 2007 debate, a turning point came when the conservative Heritage Foundation released a report saying that the legislation would cost taxpayers $2.6 trillion, including benefits to immigrants and other expenditures. Although the analysis was disputed it carried weight with GOP lawmakers. Now under the leadership of former Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., another lead opponent of the legislation in 2007, Heritage is preparing to release an updated version of that report.

In a sign of how supporters of the bill are working hard not to repeat mistakes from the past, conservative groups that support the legislation have already sought to pre-empt the Heritage report, with the Cato Institute deriding it ahead of time as "fatally flawed," and Cato and others arguing that immigration reform would boost the economy by growing the labor market. Nonetheless officials with Heritage argue their report could have the same impact this time around as in 2007.

"There's been a lot of posturing, a lot of talk. We haven't really gotten to the heart of the debate yet," said Dan Holler, communications director for Heritage Action for America, the Heritage Foundation's activist arm. "We have the right policy, the numbers are going to be there, and the debate is going to shift. And no amount of ads will be able to shift it back."

___

Follow Erica Werner on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ericawerner

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/could-immigration-bill-set-off-another-backlash-074649827.html

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You Can Now Get a Nook HD For $150

Following last week's decision to make its tablet actually useful with the addition of Google Apps, Barnes & Noble has now slashed the price of its NookHD range.

Until the 12th May?yes, this is a Mother's Day offer?the price of the Nook HD line is cut both online and in-store. So, a 8GB 7-inch Nook HD will set you back $150, down from its usual $200, and a 16GB version is $180, down from $230. If you need something bigger, the 9-inch Nook HD+ is $180 for a 16GB version (usually $270) or $209 for a 32GB one (normally $300).

The Nook HD sure isn't perfect?its biggest crime is that it's a bit slow?but with Google Apps and a healthy discount, it might be worth considering if you're on a tight budget. [Barnes & Noble via Verge]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/you-can-now-get-a-nook-hd-for-150-493085821

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Celebrate Star Wars Day By Blinding General Grievous, Losing R2

Beep boop boop bee squeee! Happy May 4th a k a Star Wars Day (say the date out loud and you'll figure out why). In celebration, quite a few hardware vendors have released special gear for the day, thereby allowing you to celebrate the magic of George Lucas in proper Mandalorian fashion.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/U5hWPo-Ov-A/

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Calif. wildfire grows, but weather may aid fight

CAMARILLO, Calif. (AP) ? A wildfire tearing through a coastal region in Southern California nearly tripled in size as high temperatures fueled the flames, but an expected weekend change in the weather will likely give crews manning the fire lines much-needed assistance.

The fire 50 miles northwest of Los Angeles mushroomed to 43 square miles Friday as 900 firefighters used engines, aircraft, bulldozers and other equipment to battle the flames.

Forecasters said a weekend of increased humidity should help teams fighting the early-season blaze make gains Saturday.

"It's a total turnaround from what we had," said Kurt Kaplan, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Oxnard. "It should be a much better day for firefighters tomorrow."

Despite its size and speed of growth, the fire that broke out Thursday and quickly moved through the Camarillo Springs area has caused damage to just 15 structures, though it's threatening 2,000 homes.

Residents were grateful so many homes were spared.

"''It came pretty close. All of these houses ? these firemen did a tremendous job. Very, very thankful for them," Shayne Poindexter said. Flames came within 30 feet of the house he was building.

Ventura County Fire Department spokesman Bill Nash said parts of the Newbury Park community of Thousand Oaks were under mandatory and voluntary evacuations. Overnight, he said firefighters planned to stockpile resources along a road that lies between the fire and Malibu, protecting homes on the fire's eastern front. Its cause of the fire is under investigation.

The good fortune of the Camarillo Springs area wasn't the result of luck or clairvoyance by firefighters. It came after years of planning and knowing that sooner or later just such a conflagration was going to strike.

Camarillo Springs, which was nothing more than rugged backcountry when homes began to go up there 30 years ago, was well prepared.

Its homes were built with sprinkler systems and fireproof exteriors from the roofs to the foundations. Residents are required to clear brush and other combustible materials to within 100 feet of the dwellings, and developers had to make sure the cul-de-sacs that fill the area's canyons were built wide enough to accommodate the emergency vehicles seen on TV racing in to battle the flames.

Residents in the area are also particularly vigilant about clearing brush from the hillsides next to their yards, Kruschke said. Normally, firefighters remind people in such areas to do that every June, but in Camarillo Springs people do it every few months. The work paid off this week.

The type of blaze that hit the area usually doesn't strike Southern California wild-land until September or October, after the summer has dried out hillside vegetation. But the state has seen a severe drought during the past year, with the water content of California's snowpack only 17 percent of normal.

That created late-summer conditions by May, and when hot Santa Ana winds and high temperatures arrived this week, the spring flames that firefighters routinely knock down once or twice a year quickly roared up a hillside ? out of control.

On Friday, the wildfire stormed back through canyons toward inland neighborhoods when winds reversed direction.

After jumping Pacific Coast Highway 20 miles north of Malibu, the fire burned for a time on a beach shooting range at the Point Mugu Naval Air Station.

The blaze is one of more than 680 wildfires in the state so far this year ? about 200 more than average.

In Riverside County, a 4 1/2-square-mile fire that destroyed a home burned for a third day in mountains north of Banning. It was 75 percent contained.

Fifty-five miles away from Camarillo, in the hills above Glendale, a blaze broke out Friday afternoon, prompting evacuations and closure of a freeway as it quickly charred 75 acres.

In Tehama County in Northern California, the size of a wildfire north of Butte Meadows was revised down from more than 15 square miles to 10 square miles, state fire spokesman Daniel Berlant said.

The fire, which was 20 percent contained, was burning in a remote area and wasn't posing an imminent threat to any structures.

___

Associated Press writers Shaya Tayefe Mohajer and Robert Jablon in Los Angeles contributed to this story.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/calif-wildfire-grows-weather-may-aid-fight-071128755.html

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Vega rocket poised for second launch

3 May 2013 Last updated at 07:10 ET By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

Europe's new small satellite launcher, Vega, is about to make only its second outing from the Kourou spaceport.

Lift-off from French Guiana is scheduled for 23:06 local time on Friday (02:06 GMT, Saturday).

The mission is part of series planned by the European Space Agency (Esa) to demonstrate the rocket's capabilities.

Vega will loft the Proba-V satellite, which will collect data on land cover and vegetation changes over the entire globe every couple of days.

It will also drop off two secondary "passengers" - an Earth observation spacecraft for Vietnam and a "nanosatellite" built by students in Estonia.

"Esa continues to offer European states easy access to space. Last time, we had the first Polish satellite launched into orbit," said Antonio Fabrizi, who is the director of launchers at the European Space Agency. "This time it will be the case for Estonia to have a satellite in orbit."

Telemetry fix

To get the three satellites into their correct orbits, Vega will have to initiate a number of burns of its Avum fourth-stage.

Esa believes this flexibility of handling multiple missions at once will prove attractive to future commercial customers, not least because sharing a rocket ride helps to constrain costs for all the payloads onboard.

The agency's member states, together with their industries, are investing about a billion euros in the introduction of Vega.

The maiden outing in February last year was all but flawless, but some changes have been made for this second launch.

Engineers have written new flight software for the rocket. They have also had an additional ground station built in the north of French Guiana to improve the reception of telemetry sent down from the vehicle. Drop-out was experienced for a short period during the first launch.

"There are no modifications on the rocket design that resulted from the first flight," explained Stefano Bianchi, Esa's Vega programme manager.

"The only point we noticed during the first flight was that we had a problem with the link between the launcher and the ground during the operation of the second stage and the start of the third stage. It was a temporary shielding due the physical effect of the [rocket] plume, which has a high aluminium content."

Debris limitation

The 30m-tall Vega comprises four stages.

The first three burn a solid fuel. Its fourth and final stage uses liquid propellants.

It is the re-startable capability of this fourth segment that allows Vega not only to put several spacecraft in different orbits, but enables the rocket segment also to bring itself out of the sky at the end of the mission.

This ensures Vega does not add to the growing population of redundant objects that now litter the space environment.

Friday's launch is part of what Esa calls the Vega Research and Technology Accompaniment (Verta) programme - a series of flights designed to test all the new systems and move the rocket towards full commercial service.

VNREDSat-1, which is being launched for the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology, represents the first fee-paying payload on Vega.

The spacecraft will return images of the Earth at a best resolution of 2.5m for environmental monitoring purposes in the Asian country.

Flight rate

The main payload, Proba-V, is an Esa mission. It carries a vegetation imager that will provide continuity of data for the researchers who have been using the French Spot 4 and 5 satellites. The Proba instrument is smaller than its predecessors.

"For scientists, it's very important to have continuity and long time-series, and to carry on beyond Spot 5's vegetation observations. But for the requirements of our Proba missions, there has to be some additional performance," said Frederic Teston, Esa's Proba programme manager.

As part of Proba's aim to push satellite equipment in new directions, the 140kg platform will demonstrate a number of technologies that are likely to fly on future missions. These include space radiation monitors, fibre-optic wiring, and an instrument to track aircraft from orbit.

Vega is now one of three rockets launching out of French Guiana. The South American country already hosts Europe's workhorse heavy-lift vehicle, Ariane-5, and the medium-class Russian-built Soyuz rocket.

The Kourou spaceport is managed by Arianespace. Speaking about Vega's potential to win business on the international launch market, Louis Laurent, a senior vice president with the company, said: "The core of this market is Earth observation, but we have also opportunities in telecommunications and science.

"Our target, and we think it is feasible, is to increase the launch rate of Vega up to three launches per year."

• Vega lifts off from a refurbished pad formerly used by the Ariane 1
• Its four stages and satellite payload are assembled on the launch site
• Satellites will weigh from a few 10s of kg up to a maximum of 2,500kg
• The "reference mission" is a 1.5t satellite in a 700km-high polar orbit

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22386621#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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Your Smartphone Just Diagnosed You with Postpartum Depression

Depending on your perspective, Twitter can either be a valuable source of breaking news, or a fire hose of miscellaneous, often dubious information. Microsoft researchers are investigating whether the microblogging service could serve another, more scientific function--to spot signs of postpartum depression in new mothers based on changes in how and what they tweet. The research is in its early stages and in some ways relies heavily on data that's easy to misinterpret. Yet the experiment is noteworthy both for its objective--to potentially identify and assist young families in distress--and for the idea that social media might be mined for the good of social science. An added benefit could be the development of apps installed on smartphones, tablets and computers that can monitor tweets, flag warning signs and discretely offer assistance to women who otherwise might suffer quietly. "What's exciting is that we could identify individuals potentially at risk for having an emotional downturn just by looking at streams of publically shared data," in this case Twitter feeds, says Eric Horvitz, managing co-director of the Microsoft Research lab. Horvitz and his colleagues presented the results of their efforts to predict postpartum emotional and behavioral changes via social media this week at an Association for Computing Machinery conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in Paris. This postpartum study is part of a larger effort to use social media as a sensor network for public health, Horvitz says. In the past, Microsoft Research has helped create systems that can predict the likelihood a patient will contract an infection while in the hospital or that a hospital patient being discharged will soon be readmitted. Another project demonstrated the ability to detect previously unknown drug interactions by analyzing anonymized Web-search logs that include tens of millions of queries sent to search engines by millions of users. (pdf) The researchers are not claiming they can diagnose postpartum depression. However, Microsoft's team does say it was able to identify 376 Twitter users as new mothers and use machine learning software to predict--with 71 percent accuracy--which of these women would exhibit significant changes in their postpartum use of the social network. "We studied the language the women used as well as how many re-tweets they were involved in, whether they were actively re-sharing different external links to other Web sites or whether they were engaging in one-to-one interaction with folks on Twitter," says Munmun De Choudhury, a postdoctoral researcher at Microsoft Research. "We also looked at the structure of their Twitter network--how many people they follow, how many people follow them and how much this changed following the birth of a child." To find women for their study, the researchers first created an automated process that sifted through thousands of tweets published between June 2011 and April 2012. The probramsearched phrases and keywords--height, weight and gender, for example--that suggested a woman had recently given birth. The software picked up on tweets describing labor andlisting the height and weight of a baby, for instance. After creating this initial pool of candidates, the researchers used a program to help identify the gender of the tweeter, discarding male names as well as those that could be either male or female. Then, to distinguish between tweets made by new mothers and those made by female family and friends, Microsoft Research turned to Amazon's Mechanical Turk digital labor marketplace, hiring workers to analyze a candidate's birth-announcement posting in the context of her tweets before and after the birth. Microsoft Research examined several months of tweets for each Twitter user they identified as a new mother. Not surprisingly, the new mothers didn't tweet as often (changing lots of diapers will do that), but the researchers also noted in some users a drop in positive expressions and an increase in negatives--words associated with anger, anxiety and sadness. Women that seemed to experience more profound behavior changes--compared with their prenatal selves on Twitter--also tended to use first-person pronouns more often in their tweets. This may be an indication of isolation and an increasing focus on themselves, says De Choudhury. The most interesting aspect of this project is yet to come, as Microsoft Research is now working with experts in postpartum depression at the University of Washington and elsewhere to see how their predictive modeling holds up in a population of women that includes those who have been professionally diagnosed with postpartum depression, Horvitz says. Acknowledging the limitations of this study (none of the new mothers were actually contacted to confirm any of the researchers' assessments, for example), Horvitz says the predictive models he and his team are testing could someday be used to help design new kinds of early warning systems for women at risk of postpartum depression, even though Microsoft itself would not necessarily develop such technology. "Postpartum depression is believed to be a very underreported condition," he says, adding that any efforts to help women recognize their situation and encourage them to seek help would be welcome. Image courtesy of Ambro at FreeDigitalPhotos.net Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs. Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
? 2013 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/smartphone-just-diagnosed-postpartum-depression-110000752.html

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Acorn image editor gets UI overhaul, non-destructive filters

Flying Meat Software (a.k.a. Gus Mueller) has released Acorn 4, the latest major update to its image editing software for OS X. Acorn 4 sports a new user interface, support for non-destructive filters, dramatically improved vector tools and enhancements to performance, among many other changes.

Acorn 4 is aimed at Mac users who need to edit images but don't necessarily need the extensive (and expensive) capabilities of Adobe Photoshop. It sports support for Macs with Retina displays, features masking, text tools, "Instant Alpha" for removing backgrounds and other content, multistop gradients, lots of nifty vector tools, PSD import and export and more.

To incorporate non-destructive filters, Mueller has merged layer styles and filters together. You can create chains of filters just like before, but you can remove them later if you change your mind, without altering the base image. And if you like to manipulate image tone and colors using curves, that's a new feature of Acorn 4 as well. New shape tools have been added, and a new filter HUD lets you manipulate radius and center points for filters.

Acorn 4 is normally $49.99, but Flying Meat is offering the app for $29.99 through May to give people an excuse to upgrade. The software's available both in the Mac App Store and direct from Flying Meat's web site.

If you've given it a try, let me know how you think it compares to the previous version, and to other photo editors you've used.

• $29.99 - Download Now

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/c9WzlCPYXSE/story01.htm

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Celluloid meltdown inspired painter Nicole Mauser's works ...

New abstractions by Nicole Mauser at the Beggars Table Church and Gallery top the list of May?s First Friday attractions.

Mauser has been an active presence in the KC art world since she moved here in 2006, teaching in the Kansas City Art Institute?s continuing education program, co-founding Plug Projects and participating in the KC PAC plein air painting group?s weekly sessions.

Locally, Mauser has shown work at multiple venues, including Dolphin, Paragraph and the Kansas City Artists Coalition. Her new exhibit at Beggars Table coincides with a recently opened solo show at the Gladstone Community Center and follows two one-person shows in Chicago in 2010 and 2011.

Titled ?Lacuna,? Mauser?s Crossroads exhibit includes a series of collages inspired by a film meltdown. According to the artist, a projector malfunctioned during a screening of a Joseph Cornell film, causing the film to ignite and melting the celluloid as the audience, including Mauser, watched.

The visual spectacle fired her imagination. ?These works are an elegy for the frames lost, or lacuna, from the Cornell film,? she writes.

The colors in the collages, applied with a squeegee, allude to the colored gels sometimes used in the projection of Cornell?s films. The contrasting black-and-white passages come from snapshots she took in Berlin, which she photocopied and enlarged and extracted details. They also incorporate scans of the sheets of paper Mauser uses as palettes.

She wants that ?blurring,? she says, ?between painting and collage? and ?object and reproduction.? She also likes the way that collage enables her to ?flatten dimensionality.?

Mauser?s exhibit will feature roughly a dozen works. In small paintings developed from the collages, she builds up color fields by putting down long swipes of acrylic and then applying oil paint. ?I think of them as having different speeds,? she said. ?I want to play each material off the other.?

The most recent pieces are paintings on paper. Evidencing a greater sense of motion and compositional risk than the previous works, they also fully realize her drive to activate blank space as positive space.

Abstraction often critiques or converses with its antecedents. Mauser is aware of her artistic precedents, but she?s more interested in abstraction as a record of her own experiences and creative life. A recurrent touchstone of her works is that residue of strokes and forms left on the sheets of paper she uses as a palette.

Joe Bussell and Calder Kamin exhibits

It?s a big weekend for Joe Bussell and Calder Kamin. Both artists will show new Artboards at the Missouri Bank Crossroads Branch. Bussell?s west-facing boards feature whimsical abstract forms based on microscopic images of pollen, Hubble Telescope images from space and colorful beadwork presented on stark white backdrops.

Titled ?Invaders,? Kamin?s east-facing boards feature images of starlings ? one shows a few birds; the other depicts a swarm ? and refer to the astronomical growth of the species following their introduction to the United States in 1890 and 1891.

Bussell also has an opening at City Ice Arts Friday night. His exhibit, ?Spit,? includes new acrylic and tempera paintings on paper and canvas with colorful biomorpic forms.

On Saturday at the Lakeside Nature Center, 4701 E. Gregory Blvd., Kamin presents her ?Impact Proof? project of vinyl decals, which are designed to prevent birds from crashing into windows. As part of the center?s Urban Bird Day from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Kamin will hold a workshop to make preventative decals from paper. She will also introduce her line of greeting cards of birds, which help raise money for the center?s hospital.

Kemper at the Crossroads

It?s Jim Sajovic?s turn to speak in the ?Be Inspired? series at Kemper at the Crossroads, where the Kansas City artist and long-time Kansas City Art Institute professor has a large painting of local philanthropist Scott Francis on view.

The image is a composite of multiple photographs Sajovic took of Francis and is overlaid with words from a T.S. Eliot poem, ?Little Gidding.?

The poem is important to Francis, Sajovic said, and is ?about the passing of time, the shifting nature of reality and the temporary nature of life.? It is also the source of the painting?s title, ?The Fire and the Rose? (2011).

Sajovic?s talk will contextualize the painting within the evolution of his work. The museum?s purchase of the 49 1/2 by 45-inch canvas, created with pigmented inks and acrylic, was made possible by a gift from J. Scott Francis, Francis Family Foundation Discretionary Fund.

Richard Berkley photos

Berkley buffs, as in former Kansas City mayor Richard Berkley, know he?s a shutterbug, and now they can take in his portraits of politicians and celebrities at the Buttonwood Art Center.

The exhibit also includes images from his travels to more than 70 countries, as well as shots by other photographers of some of the celebrities that Berkley and his wife, Sandy, met over the years.

Beggars Table Church and Gallery

?Nicole Mauser: Lacuna?

When: Reception 6-10 p.m. Friday. Open by appointment through June 29.

Where: 2010 W. Baltimore Ave., second floor

Info: 816-807-6455

Blue Djinn Gallery

?David Olson?

When: Reception 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday through May 25.

Where: 1400 Union Ave.

Info: 816-518-4649

Buttonwood Art Space

?The Photograph Collection of Mayor Richard Berkley?

When: Reception: 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday through Friday, 10 a.m.-3 p.m. May 4 and by appointment through May 27.

Where: 3013 Main St.

Info: 816-285-9040

Centric Projects

Works by Kansas City Art Institute printmaking students

When: Reception and live printmaking event from 5-8 p.m. Friday. Open one night only.

Where: 2024 Main St., Suite One West.

Info: 816-802-3426

City Ice Arts

?Spit: New Paintings by Joe Bussell?

When: Reception: 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open noon-5 p.m. Friday and Saturday and by appointment through June 15.

Where: 2015 Campbell St.

Info: 816-820-4105

The Guild Event Space

Inaugural One Night Art Exhibition, a group show curated by Skyler Bieberly

When: Reception 6-9 p.m. Friday with live music from the Conquerors, Your Reflection and Danny ?Dan Matic? Staton. Open one night only.

Where: 1621 Locust St.

Info:816-471-8550

Hilliard Gallery

?Guinette Wise: Cold Beer and Steel?

When: Reception 6-10 p.m. Friday. Open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and noon-4 p.m. Saturday through May 27

Where: 1820 McGee St.

Info: 816-561-2956

Kansas City Artists Coalition

Nelson Smith, Eileen Thomas, Cathy Deuschle, John Hare and Todd Peterson

When: Artist talks at 6 p.m. and reception 7-8:30 p.m. Friday. Open 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday through May 31.

Where: 201 Wyandotte St.

Info: 816-421-5222

Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art

?Be Inspired!?

When: Conversation with Jim Sajovic at 6 p.m. Friday. Open noon-10 p.m. Friday through June 7.

Where: 33 W. 19th St.

Info: 816-753-5784

The Late Show

?Darwin Arevalo: New Work?

?Doug Schwietert: Assemblage?

When: Reception 6-10 p.m. Friday. Open 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday and by appointment through May 25.

Where: 1600 Cherry St.

Info: 816-474-1300

Leedy-Voulkos Art Center

?Jared Flaming: Parergon?

?Jared Green : A Coherent Story to Tell?

?Spring Group Show Highlighting: Angela Burson?

?Keith Young : Assemblage?

Continuing exhibits

?Ada Koch: La Piazza: Praising Architecture and a Balanced Life?

?Michael Stack: Eagleman & 9/11 Series?

When: Reception 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Thursday through Saturday through May 25. Flaming exhibit through June 29.

Where: 2012 Baltimore Ave.

Info: 816-474-1919

Locust Factory

First Friday Art Fair

When: 6-9 p.m. Friday and noon-4 p.m. May 5

Where: 504 E. 18th St. (west end of the building)

Info: 816-716-5940

Main Street Gallery

?Hookin? Is Hard Work: Hooked Yarn Portraits by Omaha artist Wanda Ewing?

When: Reception 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Monday through Sunday through May 31.

Where: 1610 Main St. (upstairs at Anton?s Tap Room & Restaurant)

Info: 816-210-6534

Mattie Rhodes Art Gallery

?Children?s Art Exhibition?

When: Reception 5-8 p.m. Open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday through May 23.

Where: 919 W. 17th St.

Info: 816-221-2349

Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art

?Tanya Hartman: We Write Ourselves Anew?

?Tracy Krumm: In the Making?

When: Reception 7-9 p.m. Friday. Open 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and by appointment through June 29.

Where: 2004 Baltimore Ave.

Info: 816-221-2626

Slap-n-Tickle Gallery

?Ceramics by Paul Mallory and Jewelry by Melissa Moore & Julia Pitt?

When: Reception 6-11 p.m. Friday. Open noon-4 p.m. May 4 and by appointment through May 19.

Where: 504 E. 18th St.

Info: 816-716-5940

Todd Weiner Gallery

?Michael Young: This Is My World?

When: Reception 5-10 p.m. Friday. Open 11 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Wednesday through Friday and 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday through June 1

Where: 115 W. 18th St.

Info: 816-984-8538

Red Star Studios

?Jessica Brandl?

When: Reception 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesday through Friday and 10 a.m.- 4 p.m. Saturdays through June 29.

Where: 2100 Walnut St.

Info:816-474-7316

Red Star Studios in Belger Crane Yard Studios

?Akio Takamori: Lust?

When: Reception 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open by appointment through Aug. 24.

Where: 2011 Tracy Ave.

Info: 816-474-7316

Spray Booth Gallery

?Lovely/Lonely: Molly Kaderka?

When: Reception 6-11 p.m. Friday. Open noon-6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and noon-3 p.m. Saturday through June 1.

Where: 130 W. 18th St., inside Volker Bicycles

Info: 816-471-5555

Vine Street Studio

?Cultures Without Borders?

When: Reception 5-8 p.m. Friday with music by Eddie Moore and the Outer Circle Jazz Group 8-9:30 p.m. ($5 requested donation). Open 3-5 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday, 4-6 p.m. Friday and by appointment through May 31.

Where: 2033 Vine St.

Info: 816-645-1052

1714 Holmes St.

?From Castles to Sand : Claire Bryant Senior Thesis Exhibition?

When: Reception 6-9 p.m. Friday. Open noon-4 p.m. May 4 and 5 and by appointment through May 10.

Where: 1714 Holmes St.

Info:512-636-3410

Source: http://www.kansascity.com/2013/05/01/4210613/may-first-friday-guide.html

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