University of Illinois' Blue Waters supercomputer now running around the clock

Things got a tad hairy for the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's Blue Waters supercomputer when IBM halted work on it in 2011, but with funding from the National Science Foundation, the one-petaflop system is now crunching numbers 24/7. The behemoth resides within the National Center for Supercomputing Application (NCSA) and is composed of 237 Cray XE6 cabinets and 32 of the XK7 variety. NVIDIA GK110 Kepler GPU accelerators line the inside of the machine and are flanked by 22,640 compute nodes, which each pack two AMD 6276 Interlagos processors clocked at 2.3 GHz or higher. At its peak performance, the rig can churn out 11.61 quadrillion calculations per second. According to the NCSA, all that horsepower earns Blue Waters the title of the most powerful supercomputer on a university campus. Now that it's cranking away around-the-clock, it'll be used in projects investigating everything from how viruses infect cells to weather predictions.

Filed under: Science, Alt

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Source: National Center for Supercomputing Application

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Tracking 'John Doe': Investigators hunt child pornography's Public Enemy No. 1

By By Erika Gonzalez, NBCWashington.com

John Doe?is believed to have produced some of the most widely viewed child porn but authorities have only one image of him.

"Once that image is taken of the child and the abuse that's occurring, it's on the Internet forever,? Child Exploitation Investigation Unit Chief Patrick Redling said.

Investigators with the Department of Homeland Security's Cyber Crimes Center?have been after the man for more than a decade. The group based in Fairfax County works with global law enforcement allies to capture child predators anywhere.

"You can't work this crime alone,? said Ian Quinn, head of the HIS Cyber Crimes Center. ?You need your international partners in order to even conduct these investigations.?

Detectives navigate through chat rooms and websites where child pornography is traded and then use state-of-the-art technology to zero in on the smallest of clues.

?We look for items, maybe it could be the plug on the wall that helps us identify that it's in North America,? Redling said.

More news from NBCWashington.com

In 2010, Homeland Security arrested 912 child predators. That increased to 1,335 in 2011 and 1,655 in 2012.

Among several hundred arrests this year was?Letha Mae Montemayor, who was arrested in California in January as part of?Operation Sunflower. Detectives say she?s?John Doe's counterpart.

The arrest warrant for?John Doe?is out of California, but Investigators say he could be anywhere in the country or the world.

Anyone with information about this case should call 866-347-2423 or visit?www.ICE.gov/tips. Tips may be reported anonymously.

Visit the?Virtual Global Taskforce?for more information about combating online child sexual abuse.

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NASA's hold on outreach sparks outcry; Uwingu aims to help fill gap

L. Calcada / N. Risinger / ESO

An artist's conception shows the planet Alpha Centauri Bb, orbiting one of the stars in a nearby triple-star system. A commercial venture known as Uwingu says it will use proceeds from a contest to give Alpha Centauri Bb a new name to support endangered educational and public outreach efforts.

By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

NASA's plan to suspend educational and public outreach activities due to budget sequestration?has sparked protests from some of the space agency's biggest fans, and a commercial venture known as Uwingu wants to help fill the gap. Uwingu says it will?direct proceeds from its contest to name the closest exoplanet toward projects that are facing budget cuts.

The venture was set up last year to offer space-themed entertainment that would raise money for education and space science. Just last week, Uwingu kicked off an effort to come up with a "people's choice" name for Alpha Centauri Bb, an Earth-sized planet that was detected last year just 4.3 light-years away.

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It takes $4.99 to nominate a name, and 99 cents to cast a vote. The contest closes on April 15, and the winner will be announced the next day. Some of the proceeds will go toward paying the company's expenses, but the target is to put at least half of the money into a fund to support research and education.?

Rough patch for NASA
When the company made its public debut, the founders said the Uwingu Fund could serve as a lifeline for scientists and educators if NASA's budget ran into a rough patch. Sequestration certainly qualifies as a rough patch: The automatic spending cuts will force NASA to scale back its budget by roughly $900 million for the fiscal year.

As part of its plan to comply with sequestration, NASA officials on Friday ordered the suspension of?educational and public outreach activities, also known as EPO. Planetary scientist Alan Stern, Uwingu's CEO and a former NASA associate administrator, said the suspension has put educational and public outreach programs "under severe and sudden stress."

"At Uwingu, we believe that private and commercial funding of space-based initiatives ? including research and EPO ? is more important now than ever," Stern said in a statement Monday. "That's the purpose of The Uwingu Fund, which is fueled from people participating in the naming contest for Alpha Centauri's planet. Today we're announcing that Uwingu is taking action to combat the severe, adverse impact of sequestration on NASA EPO by directing all Uwingu Funds proceeds raised through this contest to grants to EPO professionals and projects."

In the grand scheme of things, education and public outreach aren't the most expensive things that NASA does. The continuing resolution that governed spending for the current fiscal year set aside $137 million for the agency's education account, and sequestration would trim that figure by $7 million. NASA budgets additional funds for public outreach on a mission-by-mission basis, but the expense is still a small proportion of NASA's $17.8 billion budget.

Outcry over outreach
Friday's move nevertheless sparked an outcry from many who rank education and public outreach among NASA's strongest suits. Over the weekend, more than 4,500 people signed onto an?online?petition urging the White House to "repeal" the EPO spending cuts.

"This is something that hits extremely close to home, and not just because I may not have a position this summer as a result of this," Scott Lewis, an astronomer at Citrus College in California, said in a Google+ posting. "NASA's education and public outreach?is something that opens the eyes of thousands, if not millions of people, to the magnificence of science, technology, engineering and mathematics."

One of the ventures that could be affected by the budget cuts is?CosmoQuest, an online educational project that sponsors virtual star parties, citizen-science projects and similar activities with NASA support. Pamela Gay, a professor at Southern Illinois University who is CosmoQuest's project director, said the effect on funding is not yet clear?? but she's already preparing for cutbacks.

"I'm looking at multiple fundraisers," Gay, who is on Uwingu's board of advisers, said in a?Google+ posting?on Sunday. "While I'm less worried about CosmoQuest than I was yesterday, it is clear that many good people in the NASA EPO community are deeply in jeopardy. I continue to encourage you to help us seek donations so that I can recover as needed from any cuts we incur, and, as additional funding allows, work to contract people who do lose their jobs to help us build new and amazing things for CQX. I'm hoping you will help me build a safety net for our community."

More about sequestration's effects:?

---

Alan Boyle is NBCNews.com's science editor. Connect with the?Cosmic Log?community by "liking" the log's?Facebook page, following?@b0yle on Twitter?and adding the?Cosmic Log page?to your Google+ presence. To keep up with Cosmic Log as well as NBCNews.com's other stories about science and space,?sign up for the Tech & Science newsletter, delivered to your email in-box every weekday. You can also check out?"The Case for Pluto,"?my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.

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F.A.A. may soon allow iPads to be used during takeoff and landing

You may soon be able to use your iPad on flights during takeoff and landing, as the Federal Aviation Administration is considering loosening restrictions on devices that can be powered on during those times. The list of permitted devices would not include cellphones, and would be restricted to so-called ?reading devices? such as Kindles and iPads, and all devices would be required to be put in airplane mode. A working group is currently studying the issue and hopes to release its results by the end of July, according to Nick Bilton at the New York Times:

Last year, the agency announced that an industry working group would study the issue. The group, which first met in January, comprises people from various industries, including Amazon, the Consumer Electronics Association, Boeing, the Association of Flight Attendants, the Federal Communications Commission and aircraft makers. The group plans to introduce its findings by July 31.

What exactly is meant by ?reading device? isn?t quite clear apart from ereaders. Is an iPad a reading device? You can certainly read on it yes, but does it qualify? Given that airplane crew members are now able to use iPads during takeoff and landing to do their jobs, it seems reasonable that iPads would be on this list. But this raises other questions: what will I be allowed to do with my device? Can I play a game, listen to music, or watch a video? Hopefully this will become clear when the group releases its report in July.

Source: The New York Times

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/1bGkRrAInP4/story01.htm

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Study: You Facebook Likes Alone Reveal Gender, Ethnicity, Religion and More

Every little piece of information you give away online can reveal something about you—but it seems your Facebook likes could reveal rather more than you bargained for. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/PBi1t4e2M7A/study-you-facebook-likes-alone-reveal-gender-ethnicity-religion-and-more

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Goophone i5S KIRFs the iPhone 5S early, gives the iPhone 4S a run for its money (video)

Ah, Goophone. The company that made its name keepin' it real fake with eerily similar clones of other companies' devices, sometimes before the originals have even launched. It's clearly not dropping that tradition anytime soon, as it just previewed the i5S, an attempt to preempt the supposed iPhone 5S before even the rumor mill has produced anything tangible. As you'd almost expect, it's really a not-very-subtle imitation of the current iPhone 5 body and software that does its best to mask the use of Android (this time Jelly Bean) rather than iOS. Don't think that Goophone has learned any more about shadowing Apple on the technology front, however. The i5S is running hardware that would sometimes be trounced by a 2011-era iPhone 4S, including a dual-core 1GHz MediaTek processor, 512MB of RAM, an 854 x 480 screen and a 5-megapixel rear camera. The firm is mostly banking on absurdly low pricing to make up for the sleight-of-hand -- at its $150 launch price, the i5S costs a fraction of the real iPhone 5's price while undercutting the older yet somehow more sophisticated Goophone i5. Catch a video demo of the uncanny facsimile after the break.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Apple

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Via: Phandroid, GizmoChina

Source: Android-Sale.com

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/12/goophone-i5s-kirfs-the-iphone-5s-early/

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V-Moda Vamp Verza: The Fanciest Audio Accessory for Your Phone

Last Year, V-Moda made a specially designed headphone amp/DAC case for the iPhone. It was awesome, but way too expensive for what it did. V-Moda's new Vamp Verza is an infinitely more flexible product you can use with iPhones and Android phones and even your computer—but it might fall flat for exactly the same reason its predecessor did. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/LD0lQMEPwv8/v+moda-vamp-verza-the-fanciest-audio-accessory-for-your-phone

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Global greening as plant life moves northwards

Douglas Heaven, reporter

(Image: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio)

Across the entire northern hemisphere, ice and snow are retreating in front of an invading green army as warmer climates turn once-freezing tundras into temperate shrublands.

A new analysis of satellite data collected since 1982 has revealed a vigorous increase in vegetation growth between the 45th parallel north and the Arctic Ocean over the past 30 years. Based on NASA's Vegetation Index, this map shows areas where plant growth has increased in green and blue and areas where it has decreased in orange and red. Green quite clearly wins.

Vegetation in these regions now covers 9 million square kilometres, roughly the size of the US and over a third of the 21 million square kilometres that were analysed. In many places, the climate has shifted north by as much as 4 to 6 degrees of latitude and now resembles what was found 400 to 700 kilometres to the south in 1982. The researchers predict that by the end of this century northern Sweden could get temperatures more common to southern France, making it warm enough to grow grapes.

But the global greening might be only temporary, with the future looking brown. If temperatures continue to rise there could be a greater risk of fires, pest infestations, and drought. Indeed, the march of the plants may already be slowing - the researchers report more vigorous growth between 1982 and 1992 than between 1992 and 2011.

Journal reference: Nature Climate Change, DOI: 10.1038/nclimate1836

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MTV First: 'The Incredible Burt Wonderstone' Starts Now!

Are you ready for two of the funniest men in the world to share a couch for an exclusive 30-minute interview and present a clip from their new movie "The Incredible Burt Wonderstone"? If you're not, you better get ready because Steve Carell and Jim Carrey are taking over MTV and MTV.com starting at 7:56 [...]

Source: http://moviesblog.mtv.com/2013/03/12/incredible-burt-wonderstone-first/

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Melissa Joan Hart: A Sick Husband Is Worse Than Sick Kids

"Kids bounce back like that. Men ... not," the actress says of dealing with a family with the flu

Source: http://feeds.celebritybabies.com/~r/celebrity-babies/~3/zQy45Ax81yA/

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Good Omens: The Seven Sins

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Mark Rucker on Getting Fit: Tips, tricks that may help you with your ...

Throughout my day I wear many hats. I am a father, a husband, an attorney, a nonprofit board member, a Rotarian, a Red Cross volunteer, and a wannabe Ironman. As a result of my many roles that I play during the day, it is essential for me to be prepared in order to be successful. I?m sure many of you are also in the same situation and probably even have more obligations and responsibilities. It is essential for you to be prepared as well.
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Now I?m not going to throw down some impressive time-management routine that I?ve figured out, or refer you to some mapping software sight that will help you run your life directly from your iPhone. But as a person who has spent the past two years changing his life through diet and exercise, I will share with you some of the tips and tricks that I use to keep myself on a the health and fitness routine.
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As far as nutrition goes there are several things that I do to keep myself on track. I have discovered that as soon as I stop planning ahead, my nutrition suffers. I am quick to grab something that is easy and convenient and then rationalize, after the fact, that the grilled chicken sandwich really wasn?t that bad for me.
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One of the biggest things that I have done to keep myself on track for my nutrition is to make my grocery shopping trips twice a week. I will always be at the store on Sunday to make sure that I have the supplies that I need to get me through most of the week. I will then always go back to the store on Wednesday night to pick up those items that I run out of during the week.
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As you start to eat healthier foods you will find that they expire must faster than the processed foods. If you load up with a lot of perishable items once a week you will soon find out that you?ll be throwing a lot of money away. You will also spend a lot of time in the store if you?re going only once a week and nobody likes to spend a lot of time at the grocery store. So by going twice a week you can save time overall and save money.
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Another tip that I have is to find foods that you really enjoy and make them a staple of your diet. There is nothing wrong with having a routine with your eating. Actually I find it quite helpful to know that week after week I?ll be buying the same things when I go to the store. Now that?s not to say that you can?t mix things up once in a while and add new foods to the menu, but if you have a core group of foods that make up the base of your nutritional plan it will save you time each week in planning and preparation.
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I also make a grocery list before I go to the store. I spend a few minutes going through the refrigerator and the pantry to see what items I?m low on or out of. That helps me a couple of ways once I get to the store. I know exactly what I?m looking for so I?m not aimlessly wandering through the aisles. It also keeps me from impulse buying. I?m really a check the list kind of guy and if it?s not on my list chances are that it?s not going to end up in my cart. I highly recommend the app Grocery Gadget to help with your grocery shopping. You knew I had to throw out at least one app, right?
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As for food preparation, after I get back from the store I will chop up enough vegetables to make salads for lunch for a few days. I store the chopped veggies in plastic containers in the refrigerator so that in the morning I can just grab the containers and make a salad. It really saves me a lot of time and it helps me stay on track to eat healthy. Most of us are extremely pressed for time in the mornings and this can be a great way to save you time.
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Another good tip is to use an insulated lunch bag. This has been such a help to me because I travel a lot for my job. With the insulated bag I can throw my snacks and lunch in there and take them on the road with me. By keeping a healthy lunch and healthy snacks with me, I?m less tempted to hit a fast food restaurant, which is really easy to do when you?re on the road.
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Your training also requires planning. I have my kids every other weekend so I want to spend as much time with them as I can. A three-hour bike ride can easily interfere with that special time together. So I will plan accordingly and get up early on the weekend mornings to get my workouts completed before they get up. Yes, it stinks to have to get up early on your days off, but making time for my family is my most important priority. Try to find times that you can get your workouts in without interrupting your normal daily routine. That can be very difficult to do but it is very rewarding.
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I also will keep checklists for myself to make sure that I have everything with me for the day, especially if I?m working out immediately after work. I love riding with the Bluegrass Cycling Club, and twice a week we meet at 6 pm. I don?t have enough time after work in Georgetown to get back to Lexington to get all of my stuff and then get to the rides. Because of that I will pack everything up in the morning, including strapping my bike to my car, so that I can go straight to the ride.
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Maybe that sounds fairly simple, but when you have to pack shorts, shirt, socks, riding shoes, gloves, helmet, bike, pump, water bottles, sunglasses, RoadID, Garmin, towel, nutrition and whatever else it is important to make sure that you have it all, it can be mind-boggling. Making list helps me make sure I get all the things I need to have a great ride. Otherwise you could miss your ride because you don?t have what you need. Making lists ahead of time can be a lifesaver and keep you from being rushed when you?re trying to get out the door.
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This week I want to challenge you to look at your health and fitness routine. Is it where you want it to be? Do you find that you don?t eat as healthy as you should, or work out like you should, on some days simply because you ?don?t have the time?? If you developed some simple planning strategies could you overcome that excuse? I bet you could. Give it a shot this week.
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Have a great week, and happy training.
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Mark D. Rucker is an attorney from Lexington who spent the majority of his adult life struggling with weight issues. As a result of his unhealthy lifestyle and weight, he suffered from high blood pressure, sleep apnea and was borderline diabetic. In February of 2011, at the age of 42, Rucker weighed over 365 pounds. It was then that he decided it was time to change his life. He now hopes to use his experience to help inspire and encourage others to begin their own journey to health and fitness. By focusing on his ?small steps? philosophy, Rucker believes that anyone, at any age and in any physical condition, can change his or her life. Recently, he create a Facebook page called Get Moving Lexington to encourage the people of Lexington to get active.

Source: http://www.kyforward.com/our-health/2013/03/11/mark-rucker-on-getting-fit-tips-tricks-that-may-help-you-with-your-health-fitness-routine/

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Mind Plus Machine

A man wears a brain-machine interface, equipped with electroencephalography

Photo by Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP/Getty Images

Behind a locked door in a white-walled basement in a research building in Tempe, Ariz., a monkey sits stone-still in a chair, eyes locked on a computer screen. From his head protrudes a bundle of wires; from his mouth, a plastic tube. As he stares, a picture of a green cursor on the black screen floats toward the corner of a cube. The monkey is moving it with his mind.

The monkey, a rhesus macaque named Oscar, has electrodes implanted in his motor cortex, detecting electrical impulses that indicate mental activity and translating them to the movement of the ball on the screen. The computer isn?t reading his mind, exactly?Oscar?s own brain is doing a lot of the lifting, adapting itself by trial and error to the delicate task of accurately communicating its intentions to the machine. (When Oscar succeeds in controlling the ball as instructed, the tube in his mouth rewards him with a sip of his favorite beverage, Crystal Light.) It?s not technically telekinesis, either, since that would imply that there?s something paranormal about the process. It?s called a ?brain-computer interface.? And it just might represent the future of the relationship between human and machine.

Stephen Helms Tillery?s laboratory at Arizona State University is one of a growing number where researchers are racing to explore the breathtaking potential of BCIs and a related technology, neuroprosthetics. The promise is irresistible: from restoring sight to the blind, to helping the paralyzed walk again, to allowing people suffering from locked-in syndrome to communicate with the outside world. In the past few years, the pace of progress has been accelerating, delivering dazzling headlines seemingly by the week.

At Duke University in 2008, a monkey named Idoya walked on a treadmill, causing a robot in Japan to do the same. Then Miguel Nicolelis stopped the monkey?s treadmill?and the robotic legs kept walking, controlled by Idoya?s brain. At Andrew Schwartz?s lab at the University of Pittsburgh in December 2012, a quadriplegic woman named Jan Scheuermann learned to feed herself chocolate by mentally manipulating a robotic arm. Just last month, Nicolelis? lab set up what it billed as the first brain-to-brain interface, allowing a rat in North Carolina to make a decision based on sensory data beamed via Internet from the brain of a rat in Brazil.

So far the focus has been on medical applications?restoring standard-issue human functions to people with disabilities. But it?s not hard to imagine the same technologies someday augmenting capacities. If you can make robotic legs walk with your mind, there?s no reason you can?t also make them run faster than any sprinter. If you can control a robotic arm, you can control a robotic crane. If you can play a computer game with your mind, you can, theoretically at least, fly a drone with your mind.

It?s tempting and a bit frightening to imagine that all of this is right around the corner, given how far the field has already come in a short time. Indeed, Nicolelis?the media-savvy scientist behind the ?rat telepathy? experiment?is aiming to build a robotic bodysuit that would allow a paralyzed teen to take the first kick of the 2014 World Cup. Yet the same factor that has made the explosion of progress in neuroprosthetics possible could also make future advances harder to come by: the almost unfathomable complexity of the human brain.

From I, Robot to Skynet, we?ve tended to assume that the machines of the future would be guided by artificial intelligence?that our robots would have minds of their own. Over the decades, researchers have made enormous leaps in AI, and we may be entering an age of ?smart objects? that can learn, adapt to, and even shape our habits and preferences. We have planes that fly themselves, and we?ll soon have cars that do the same. Google has some of the world?s top AI minds working on making our smartphones even smarter, to the point that they can anticipate our needs. But ?smart? is not the same ?sentient.? We can train devices to learn specific behaviors, and even out-think humans in certain constrained settings, like a game of Jeopardy. But we?re still nowhere close to building a machine that can pass the Turing test, the benchmark for human-like intelligence. Some experts doubt we ever will: Nicolelis, for one, argues Ray Kurzweil?s Singularity is impossible because the human mind is not computable.

Philosophy aside, for the time being the smartest machines of all are those that humans can control. The challenge lies in how best to control them. From vacuum tubes to the DOS command line to the Mac to the iPhone, the history of computing has been a progression from lower to higher levels of abstraction. In other words, we?ve been moving from machines that require us to understand and directly manipulate their inner workings to machines that understand how we work and respond readily to our commands. The next step after smartphones may be voice-controlled smart glasses, which can intuit our intentions all the more readily because they see what we see and hear what we hear.

The logical endpoint of this progression would be computers that read our minds, computers we can control without any physical action on our part at all. That sounds impossible. After all, if the human brain is so hard to compute, how can a computer understand what?s going on inside it?

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=2ae0b3735d795fdc4cb1fc0b6ecb36cd

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Reebok Fitness shakes up stale exercise routines on Android and iOS (video)

Despite Reebok being a cornerstone of the athletic scene, it hasn't been as quick off the mark as Adidas and Nike in embracing mobile apps as coaching tools. It's making up for lost time with a low-key launch of Reebok Fitness for Android and iOS. The app skips active movement tracking in favor of creating a truly varied exercise program: athletes can customize the ratios of multiple activities over a given period and manually shift the schedule if they find themselves bored. The app also provides video guides for novices, and a mixture of achievements and reminders should hopefully keep us from retreating to the couch. We'd prefer a best-of-all-worlds app that can both plan our workouts and gauge our progress, but the diversity in Reebok Fitness will at least put yoga on an equal plane with a neighborhood run.

Filed under: Cellphones

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Via: Reebok

Source: App Store, Google Play

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/11/reebok-fitness-shakes-up-stale-exercise-routines-on-android-and-ios/

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Dems halt background check talks with Sen. Coburn

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Senate Democrats set aside their effort Wednesday to win support from conservative Sen. Tom Coburn for requiring federal background checks for nearly all gun purchases, at least temporarily hurting President Barack Obama's chances for pushing one of his top priorities through Congress.

Democrats' failure to resolve a final dispute with the Oklahoma Republican means they've lost a valuable ally, at least for now. Coburn has an A-rating from the National Rifle Association and could have prompted backing from other Republicans and from moderate Democrats from GOP-leaning states leery of alienating voters.

In addition, gun-curb supporters say the Senate will have to approve legislation with strong bipartisan support to boost their chances of success in the GOP-led House. Republican leaders there have said they won't act until the Senate produces legislation.

Senate Democrats instead will seek backing from other Republicans for what they still hope will be a bipartisan drive to expand the current background check system, said an aide to Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who has been leading the Democratic effort.

The aide, who spoke only on condition of anonymity because the talks were private, said conversations with Coburn would continue. But it was clear that Democrats' focus was shifting elsewhere.

Requiring nearly universal background checks is the foundation, and most popular part, of the proposals to curb firearms that Obama unveiled in January. That package came a month after the shooting massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., of 20 first-graders and six staffers.

Currently, the checks are required only for sales by the nation's 55,000 federally licensed gun dealers, not for private sales between individuals, like those at gun shows or online. An Associated-Press-GfK poll in January found 84 percent favored requiring background checks at gun shows.

The talks between Coburn and Schumer foundered because Schumer was insisting that records be kept of private gun sales, perhaps by the seller, the manufacturer or others. Negotiations had lasted weeks and the two sides were stuck on the issue for some time, so Wednesday's development was not a surprise.

Schumer argues that retaining such data is the only way to assure that private transactions include background checks, which are designed to keep guns from criminals, people with mental problems and others. Coburn says such checks could be a precursor to a federal registry of gun owners, which is vociferously opposed by the NRA, is illegal under current law and which the White House says will not happen.

"Dr. Coburn is still hopeful they can reach an agreement," Coburn spokesman John Hart said.

The government must quickly destroy records of background checks it conducts. But licensed gun dealers are required to keep paper records of firearms they sell for 20 years, and must turn them over to the government if they go out of business.

The Senate Judiciary Committee plans to begin voting Thursday on four gun control measures.

Lacking a deal with Coburn, one of the bills will be from Schumer, requiring nearly universal background checks resembling a measure he proposed two years ago. It will lack some of the provisions he tentatively had agreed to with Coburn, such as an appeals mechanism for veterans barred from obtaining guns because they have been formally declared to have serious mental difficulties.

The panel also plans to consider bills banning assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines, making gun trafficking and buying guns for people forbidden to own them federal crimes, and boosting aid to schools for security measures like installing video cameras.

All are expected to pass the committee, but their fate in the full Senate is less certain.

Schumer's bill could be amended to reflect any bipartisan agreement that is reached by the time gun legislation reaches the floor, probably in April.

Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Mark Kirk, R-Ill., also have been involved in the background check negotiations and said in a joint statement that they would continue looking for an agreement with other senators.

"It is clear that ultimately we will need bipartisan support," Dan Gross, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, said in an interview.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/dems-halt-background-check-talks-sen-coburn-215824567--politics.html

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Better living through mindfulness

Mar. 7, 2013 ? A new study from the University of Utah shows that individuals who describe themselves as being more mindful have more stable emotions and perceive themselves to have better control over their mood and behavior throughout the day. Higher mindful people also describe less cognitive and physiological activation before bedtime, suggesting that greater emotional stability during the day might even translate into better sleep.

The study results will be presented later this month at the annual meeting of the American Psychosomatic Society.

Prior studies of mindfulness -- paying attention in a particular way, on purpose in the present moment and non-judgmentally -- have typically been conducted with participants trained in mindfulness, for example meditation or other interventions. In contrast, this study examines naturally-occurring traits of mindfulness. Using a novel method for data collection, the participants wore a monitor that measured cardiac functioning and were prompted periodically throughout the day to rate their emotional state and mental functioning. Examining these processes during normal daily living builds on prior mindfulness research conducted in laboratory-controlled settings.

"This study gives us a better understanding of how mindfulness affects stress responses throughout the day," says Holly Rau, a graduate student involved with this research. "People who reported higher levels of mindfulness described better control over their emotions and behaviors during the day. In addition, higher mindfulness was associated with lower activation at bedtime, which could have benefits for sleep quality and future ability to manage stress."

How the study was conducted

A total of 38 subjects, recruited from the community and University of Utah undergraduate psychology courses, participated in the study. They ranged in age from 20 to 45, and one-third were male. On the first day of the study, each participant completed a baseline assessment that included standard questionnaires, resting physiological assessment, and cognitive testing before beginning two days of experience sampling.

In the daily life portion of the study, participants wore a cardiac impedance monitor and responded to questions about their emotional state several times a day for two days. At the end of each day, participants also completed questionnaires about their ability to regulate their emotions and behaviors and were asked to rate their level of cognitive and physical arousal before falling asleep.

Researchers found that greater emotional stability, better self-rated control of emotions and behaviors and lower pre-sleep arousal (a measurement of cognitive and physical symptoms of anxiety) were all significantly associated with higher trait mindfulness. Results suggest that mindfulness may be linked to self-regulation throughout the day, and that this may be an important way that mindfulness contributes to better emotional and physical well-being.

Future research will examine the link between moment-to-moment mindfulness, physiological markers of stress throughout the day and sleep quality. Examination of similar measures of mood, self-regulation and sleep quality in everyday life in the context of mindfulness intervention is another important direction for research.

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Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_health/~3/ZBOQX-SZyOw/130307124645.htm

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Tight vote expected on polar bears

6 March 2013 Last updated at 08:18 ET By Matt McGrath Environment correspondent, BBC News

An attempt to ban the international trade in polar bear parts has provoked a heated battle at the Cites conservation meeting in Bangkok.

Negotiators are split on the plan, with those in favour saying it is crucial for the survival of the species.

Canada's Inuit say the trade should continue as it is critical to their economic survival.

And some campaign groups are also opposing it, saying the ban isn?t scientifically justified.

There are about 25,000 polar bears left in the world with an estimated 16,000 living in the Canadian Arctic. Canada is the only country that permits the export of polar bear parts.

Each year around 600 polar bears are killed there, mainly by native hunters. According to Inuit representatives, the pelts from around 300 bears are sold for rugs. Other parts including fangs and paws are also exported.

The Inuit say they get an average of $4,850 per pelt. They argue that this is a critical economic resource for a people that don't have much else.

Unsustainable killing

Many countries, including the US, believe the killing of the bears in these numbers is unsustainable. They?ve tabled a proposal at Cites to ban the international trade in bear parts.

This is being supported by former cold war enemy Russia. They argue that the legal export trade from Canada is being taken advantage of by criminals who use false Canadian permits to export the pelts from around two hundred Russian bears each year.

The proposal has been stridently opposed by Canada. Their delegates at the Cites meeting said that trade was not detrimental to the bears and they argue that because they can adjust hunting quotas, the future of the species is protected.

The European Union has attempted to build a compromise - but their proposal has been roundly criticised by those in favour of the ban as a complete non-starter who say it does little more than impose a requirement to publish export quotas.

Speaking at a reception in Thailand, Dan Ashe, the head of the US delegation, called upon all the delegates to reject the EU compromise and asked them to support the American proposal. According to those in attendance he was robustly supported by Russian scientists.

Many campaigners believe that since the US and Russia are against the compromise, the EU might withdraw their proposal and abstain from the vote.

?If the US proposal is voted on and the EU abstains we think there?s a good change that it will succeed,? Mark Jones from Humane Society International told BBC News.

?But it is an uncertain outcome at this point.?

Price hike

Another delegate, Dr Colman O?Criodain from WWF agreed it was difficult to predict what would happen.

?I wouldn?t be betting one way or another at this stage ? though we are prepared for either scenario,? he said.

The campaign groups are themselves divided on the best approach to protecting the bears.

Many argue that the prices paid for polar bear skins have increased markedly in recent years. They say that hunting quotas have been raised in response.

As an example they point to the Western Hudson Bay area in Canada and say that hunting quotas were tripled there in 2012 against the advice of the Canadian government.

Mark Jones says that this is an issue that won?t go away.

?It will come up again and again until countries understand you can?t have a sustainable trade in a species that?s expected to precipitously decline over the coming decades.?

But Dr O?Criodain from WWF disagrees. He says the impact of international trade is negligible for the survival of the species.

He believes the main reason for opposing the ban is the credibility of Cites. Too often the convention has put vested interests ahead of science he says. And it is the same thing with the polar bear issue.

?If the vote on polar bears is swayed by what seems politically popular in some countries, it is the same vice, and that is damaging for the credibility of the Convention,? he said.

?We couldn?t be arguing that counties must follow the science on sharks and then saying we ignore it on polar bears.?

The vote in Bangkok has now been scheduled for Thursday.

Follow Matt on Twitter.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21688444#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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Redstone Federal Credit Union responds to budget cut crises

HUNTSVILLE, AL (WAFF)- A major financial name in the Tennessee Valley is trying to get ahead of the financial havoc sequestration is expected to cause here.

The Redstone Federal Credit Union (RFCU) shares more than its name with the Redstone Arsenal.

"I don't think any of us has encountered anything of this magnitude, of what we're seeing," said Joseph Newberry.

Newberry, the CEO of RFCU, estimates some 30,000 of its members work directly or indirectly for Redstone Arsenal and could be in for a financial hit.

"We know that some of them have gotten letters that they may be laid off or furloughed one day a week, so that will have an economic impact on the families," he said.

Since Friday, the credit union has been urging members to talk with its counselors.

It is pushing literature on financial first aid and surviving layoffs, and it has started offering a special low interest furlough loan.

Newberry said the credit union has gotten sporadic inquires so far from nervous customers and he hopes that those who may actually be facing trouble do not hesitate too long before asking for help, just as he hopes this entire sequestration drama turns out to be a short term, temporary affair.

"I do think that there will be a solution. ?My only wish, and I think everybody's wish, is that they don't solve it by a temporary solution by kicking the can down the road, just temporarily," said Newberry.

He said sequestration falls into the same category as the April 27th tornadoes, but he said the credit union has been responding to these personal crises since the start of the recession back in 2008.

Copyright 2013 WAFF. All rights reserved.

Source: http://northhuntsville.waff.com/news/news/93150-redstone-federal-credit-union-responds-budget-cut-crises

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Video: More Highs Tomorrow?

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Mental picture of others can be seen using fMRI, finds new study

Mar. 5, 2013 ? It is possible to tell who a person is thinking about by analyzing images of his or her brain. Our mental models of people produce unique patterns of brain activation, which can be detected using advanced imaging techniques according to a study by Cornell University neuroscientist Nathan Spreng and his colleagues.

"When we looked at our data, we were shocked that we could successfully decode who our participants were thinking about based on their brain activity," said Spreng, assistant professor of human development in Cornell's College of Human Ecology.

Understanding and predicting the behavior of others is a key to successfully navigating the social world, yet little is known about how the brain actually models the enduring personality traits that may drive others' behavior, the authors say. Such ability allows us to anticipate how someone will act in a situation that may not have happened before.

To learn more, the researchers asked 19 young adults to learn about the personalities of four people who differed on key personality traits. Participants were given different scenarios (i.e. sitting on a bus when an elderly person gets on and there are no seats) and asked to imagine how a specified person would respond. During the task, their brains were scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which measures brain activity by detecting changes in blood flow.

They found that different patterns of brain activity in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) were associated with each of the four different personalities. In other words, which person was being imagined could be accurately identified based solely on the brain activation pattern.

The results suggest that the brain codes the personality traits of others in distinct brain regions and this information is integrated in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) to produce an overall personality model used to plan social interactions, the authors say.

"Prior research has implicated the anterior mPFC in social cognition disorders such as autism and our results suggest people with such disorders may have an inability to build accurate personality models," said Spreng. "If further research bears this out, we may ultimately be able to identify specific brain activation biomarkers not only for diagnosing such diseases, but for monitoring the effects of interventions."

The study, "Imagine All the People: How the Brain Creates and Uses Personality Models to Predict Behavior," published online March 5 in the journal Cerebral Cortex and was coauthored by Demis Hassabis, University College London, Andrie Rusu, Vrije Univesiteit, Clifford Robbins, Harvard University, Raymond Mar, York University, and Daniel L. Schacter, Harvard University.

The research was supported in part by the Wellcome Trust and the National Institutes of Health.

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Journal Reference:

1. Demis Hassabis, R. Nathan Spreng, Andrei A. Rusu, Clifford A. Robbins, Raymond A. Mar, and Daniel L. Schacter. Imagine All the People: How the Brain Creates and Uses Personality Models to Predict Behavior. Cerebral Cortex, 2013; DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bht042

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Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/Cjlevpr9pn4/130305091000.htm

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Mourning in NY as baby dies after hit-and-run

FILE - In this file photo of March 3, 2013, mourners surround a casket outside the Congregation Yetev Lev D'Satmar synagogue at the funeral for two expectant parents who were killed in a car accident early Sunday, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. The baby of Nachman and Raizy Glauber, a boy, was delivered prematurely cesarean section and survived until the next morning but died around 5:30 a.m. on Monday, March 4, 2013. Police were searching for the driver of a BMW and a passenger who fled on foot after slamming into the livery cab that transporting the 21-year-old couple to a hospital. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

FILE - In this file photo of March 3, 2013, mourners surround a casket outside the Congregation Yetev Lev D'Satmar synagogue at the funeral for two expectant parents who were killed in a car accident early Sunday, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. The baby of Nachman and Raizy Glauber, a boy, was delivered prematurely cesarean section and survived until the next morning but died around 5:30 a.m. on Monday, March 4, 2013. Police were searching for the driver of a BMW and a passenger who fled on foot after slamming into the livery cab that transporting the 21-year-old couple to a hospital. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

This undated photo, provided by the New York City Police Department on Monday March 4, 2013, shows Julio Acevedo, 44, who police are looking for in connection with the death of an expectant couple that was killed in a car accident in Brooklyn early Sunday morning and their premature baby, who was delivered alive but did not survive. Police are searching for the driver of a BMW and a passenger who fled on foot after slamming into the livery cab transporting Nachman Glauber and his pregnant wife Raizy, both 21 years old. (AP Photo/NYPD)

In this March 3, 2013, photo provided by VosIzNeias.com, Orthodox Jewish mourners gather outside the Congregation Yetev Lev D'Satmar synagogue in Brooklyn's Williamsburg neighborhood for the funeral of two expectant parents who were killed in a car accident early Sunday, in New York. The baby of Nachman and Raizy Glauber, a boy, was delivered prematurely by cesarean section and survived until the next morning, but died around 5:30 a.m. on Monday, March 4. Police were searching for the driver of a BMW and a passenger who fled on foot after slamming into the livery cab that was transporting the 21-year-old couple to a hospital. (AP Photo/VosIzNeias.com, Eli Wohl)

NEW YORK (AP) ? A close-knit ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn was plunged into a new round of mourning Monday by the death of a baby who was delivered by cesarean section after his parents were killed in a grisly hit-and-run crash a day earlier.

Police hunted for the suspected driver, identified as Julio Acevedo, saying he was barreling down a residential street in a BMW at 60 mph, or twice the speed limit, on Sunday morning when he collided with a car hired to take the couple to the hospital.

The death of the newborn on Monday piled tragedy upon tragedy and compounded the community's grief. The infant was expected to be buried near the fresh graves of his parents, Nachman and Raizy Glauber, both 21. About a thousand community members turned out for the young couple's funeral a day earlier.

"The mood in the neighborhood is very heavy," said Oscar Sabel, a retired printer who lives near the scene of the accident. "We all hoped the baby would survive."

Brooklyn is home to the largest community of ultra-Orthodox Jews outside Israel, more than 250,000. The couple wed last year in a marriage arranged through a matchmaker and were living in the Williamsburg neighborhood.

They were members of the Satmar Hasidic sect, whose men dress in dark coats and hats, wear long beards like their Eastern European ancestors and have limited dealings with the outside world. Raizy Glauber grew up in a prominent rabbinical family. Her husband was studying at a rabbinical college; his family founded a line of clothing for Orthodox Jews.

Sabel, dressed in the traditional long black coat of the Satmar, said it was a terrible tragedy.

"But it's what God wants," he said. "Maybe the baby's death, and his parents', is not for nothing; God doesn't have to give us answers."

Shortly after midnight Sunday, Raizy Glauber, who was seven months pregnant, wasn't feeling well, so the couple decided to go to the hospital, said Sara Glauber, Nachman Glauber's cousin. They called a livery cab, a hired car that is arranged via telephone, not hailed off the street like a yellow cab.

The livery cab had a stop sign, but it's not clear if the driver stopped. Police said the collision with the BMW reduced the cab to a crumpled heap, and Raizy Glauber was thrown from the wreck. The engine ended up in the back seat, according to Isaac Abraham, who serves as a spokesman for the Satmar community.

Police said the driver of the BMW ran away.

The baby weighed only about 4 pounds when he was delivered, neighbors and friends said. He died of extreme prematurity, the city medical examiner's office said.

The driver of the livery cab, Pedro Nunez Delacruz, was knocked unconscious but was not seriously hurt. His vehicle should not have been sent to pick up the passengers because an application to use the Toyota as a livery cab had not yet been approved, the city Taxi and Limousine Commission said.

Acevedo, 44, was arrested last month on a charge of driving while under the influence, and the case is pending. He served about a decade in prison in the 1990s for manslaughter. No one answered the phone Monday at his last known address, in a public housing complex in Brooklyn.

"We in the community are demanding that the prosecutor charge the driver of BMW that caused the death of this couple and infant ... with triple homicide," Abraham said in a statement. "This coward left the scene of the accident not even bothering to check on the people of the other car."

How Acevedo came to possess the BMW is also under investigation. The registered owner, Takia Walker, was arrested on insurance fraud charges Sunday in a scam involving the car, police said. She was not involved in the crash. A telephone number registered to Walker rang unanswered.

A person familiar with the investigation said Walker bought the car legally, or allowed her identification to be used in the purchase, then gave the vehicle to a middleman who either lent or rented it out to the driver. The person was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

___

Associated Press Writer Jim Fitzgerald in Kiryas Joel, N.Y., contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-03-04-Expectant%20Parents%20Killed/id-87256845e0c440f0acdab2cc8031a27a

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