anytime burgeon: February 2013

Thursday, February 28, 2013

Samsung Shores Up Security to Pluck BlackBerry Biz Users

Having established its credentials as a key player in the consumer smartphone world, Samsung is bolstering security to take a stab at business users, a demographic traditionally dominated by BlackBerry. For the past year, Samsung has been beefing up the Android software that powers its smartphones to protect it against malware.

Source: http://ectnews.com.feedsportal.com/c/34520/f/632000/s/2911ba3e/l/0L0Stechnewsworld0N0Crsstory0C774170Bhtml/story01.htm

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Wolf in sheep's clothing: Uncovering how deadly bacteria trick the immune system

Feb. 28, 2013 ? An outbreak of tuberculosis in the skid row area of downtown Los Angeles may have exposed up to 4,500 individuals to the bacterium that causes the deadly disease and has left federal officials scrambling to intervene.

The outbreak is occurring during winter, when homeless individuals are driven to crowded shelters, when influenza is peaking and when people's vitamin D levels, typically boosted by sunlight exposure, are low. A new UCLA study offers critical insight into how various bacteria may manipulate such factors to their advantage.

In a study published online Feb. 28 in the journal Science, UCLA researchers demonstrate that certain cunning bacteria -- including the type that causes tuberculosis -- can pretend to be viruses when infecting humans, allowing them to hijack the body's immune response so that they can hide out, unhindered, inside our cells. The findings may also help explain how viral infections like the flu make us more susceptible to subsequent bacterial infections such as pneumonia.

The study is particularly relevant to tuberculosis, which kills 1.4 million people worldwide each year. In the case of the recent Los Angeles outbreak, the findings could provide clues as to how the flu and a lack of vitamin D may have given the tuberculosis bacterium an edge.

"With 8.7 million in the world falling ill with tuberculosis each year, a better understanding of how these bacteria avoid our immune system could lead to new ways to fight them and to better, more targeted treatments," said senior author Dr. Robert L. Modlin, chief of dermatology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a professor of microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics in the UCLA Division of Life Sciences.

The protection our immune system provides against bacteria-based diseases and infections depends on the critical response of T cells -- white blood cells that play a central role in fighting infections -- and in particular on the release of a protein called interferon-gamma. Interferon-gamma utilizes the vitamin D hormone to alert and activate cells to destroy invading bacteria.

The research team found that bacteria can pretend to be viruses, triggering the immune system to launch an attack with a different protein, called interferon-beta, which is designed to fight viruses, not bacteria. Not only is interferon-beta ineffective against bacteria, but it can also block the action of interferon-gamma, to the advantage of bacteria. Further, if a real virus were to infect the body, triggering interferon-beta, it would divert the attention of the immune response, preventing an attack on the bacterial invader. The researchers say this may explain why the flu can lead to a more serious bacteria-based infection like pneumonia.

"Like a wolf in sheep's clothing, the bacteria can fool the immune system into launching an attack against the wrong type of infection, thus weakening the response against the bacteria," said first author Rosane M. B. Teles, a researcher in the dermatology division at the Geffen School of Medicine.

For the study, the team examined the mechanisms by which the virus-fighting interferon-beta protein suppresses the interferon-gamma defense response to bacterial infections, tricking the immune system into make the wrong defense choices.

The researchers studied leprosy as a model and then applied what they learned to understand tuberculosis, given that leprosy and tuberculosis are caused by related bacteria. Modlin noted that leprosy is an outstanding model for studying immune mechanisms in host defense since it presents as a clinical spectrum that correlates with the level and type of immune response of the pathogen.

The scientists first compared the genetic expression of the virus-fighting interferon-beta protein and the bacteria-fighting interferon-gamma protein in skin lesions from leprosy patients. They found that interferon-gamma was expressed in patients with the milder form of the disease and that interferon-beta was significantly increased in those with the more serious, progressive form of leprosy.

The researchers then compared the genes triggered by interferon-beta in these leprosy skin lesions with those found by two other groups of investigators in the blood of tuberculosis patients. Remarkably, there was a significant overlap. The interferon-beta genes were more frequent in both the skin lesions of leprosy patients with extensive disease and the blood of tuberculosis patients with more severe disease.

"We found this common interferon-beta gene pattern correlated with the greater extent of disease in both leprosy and tuberculosis, which are two very distinct diseases," Teles said.

Previous work by the UCLA team demonstrated that the interferon-gamma defense pathway relies on a specific mechanism involving vitamin D, a natural hormone that plays an essential role in the body's fight against infections. The current study found that interferon-beta suppressed elements involved in the interferon-gamma-triggered vitamin D pathway, preventing the immune system from killing the bacteria.

"The study raises the possibility that a decrease or increase of one of these two interferon proteins could shift the balance from mild to more serious disease," Modlin said. "We may find that therapeutic interventions to block or enhance specific interferon responses may be an effective strategy to alter the balance in favor of protection against bacterial diseases."

The new findings may indicate why, in winter, Los Angeles skid row residents are at an added disadvantage in dealing with tuberculosis -- for at least three reasons. First, because of colder weather at night, indigent homeless people tend to stay in shelters, where they live in close proximity with others, facilitating the spread of the infection. Second, due to the seasonal rise in influenza, the body's immune system could be diverted by the flu virus to produce interferon-beta, blocking an effective immune response to the tuberculosis bacteria. And finally, the drop in vitamin D levels associated with a decrease in exposure to sunlight during the winter months could diminish the ability of individuals' immune systems to kill the tuberculosis bacteria.

"With TB on the rise, this scenario could play out not only in cities in the United States but all over the world," Modlin said. "We hope that our findings may provide insight into harnessing new methods to combat TB and other bacterial infections as well."

Modlin noted that 8.7 million people become ill with tuberculosis each year and 1.4 million die from the disease. He said that an increase or decrease in one of the two interferon proteins could help explain why some people may be more resilient against, or susceptible to, the infection or have a more serious course of the disease.

The next step, according to Teles, is to further understand the mechanisms that bacterial pathogens use to activate interferon-beta and how bacteria can manipulate the immune system to block the potent interferon-gamma host antimicrobial responses in human infections.

The study was funded by the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal Skin Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH P50; ARO63020; RO1s AI022553, AR040312 and AI047868; and CTSA Grant UL1TR000124).

Additional authors are listed in the manuscript.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Health Sciences. The original article was written by Rachel Champeau.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Journal Reference:

Rosane M. B. Teles, Thomas G. Graeber, Stephan R. Krutzik, Dennis Montoya, Mirjam Schenk, Delphine J. Lee, Evangelia Komisopoulou, Kindra Kelly-Scumpia, Rene Chun, Shankar S. Iyer, Euzenir N. Sarno, Thomas H. Rea, Martin Hewison, John S. Adams, Stephen J. Popper, David A. Relman, Steffen Stenger, Barry R. Bloom, Genhong Cheng, and Robert L. Modlin. Type I Interferon Suppresses Type II Interferon?Triggered Human Anti-Mycobacterial Responses. Science, 2013; DOI: 10.1126/science.1233665

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

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/J-rp2dbYRaM/130228155440.htm

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Economy barely expands in fourth quarter, brighter days ahead

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The economy barely grew in the fourth quarter as the military slashed spending and companies restocked their shelves with less gusto, but growth already appears to be picking up.

The Commerce Department said on Thursday the economy expanded at a 0.1 percent annual rate in the last three months of 2012, scratching an earlier estimate that had showed a small decline.

The growth rate was the slowest since the first quarter of 2011 and fell short of the 0.5 percent economists had expected.

But consumer spending, while not stellar, was comparatively robust and economists see signs the factors that restrained growth late last year are already reversing in the first quarter. A month ago, the government had said the economy contracted at a 0.1 percent pace.

"The details of the report bode well for the beginning of this year," said Harm Bandholz, an economist at UniCredit in New York.

Indeed, other reports on Thursday showed a drop in new claims for jobless benefits last week and a sharp rise in factory activity in the Midwest, adding to a string of recent data that suggests the economy improved early this year.

The GDP report showed consumer spending expanded at a 2.1 percent annual rate in the fourth quarter. That suggests modest underlying momentum in the economy as it entered the first quarter, when a significant tightening of fiscal policy began.

Inventories subtracted 1.6 percentage points from the GDP growth rate during the fourth quarter, while defense spending plunged 22 percent, shaving 1.3 points off growth. Many economists expect both of those categories to add to growth in the first three months of the year.

The drag from inventories was actually greater late last year than initially estimated, suggesting an even sharper rebound is due in the first quarter.

Data on retail sales and on housing have suggested a tax hike enacted in January did not deal a big blow to households, and most economists think growth will pick up later this year despite a wave of federal spending cuts due to begin on Friday.

POCKETS OF STRENGTH

There were some relatively bright spots in the GDP data.

Imports fell 4.5 percent during the period, which added to the overall growth rate because it was a larger drop than in the third quarter. Buying goods from foreigners bleeds money from the economy, subtracting from economic growth.

At the same time, exports did not fall as much as the government had thought when it released its earlier estimate. Exports have been hampered by a recession in Europe, a cooling Chinese economy and storm-related port disruptions.

Excluding the volatile inventories component, GDP rose at a revised 1.7 percent rate, in line with expectations. These final sales of goods and services had been previously estimated to have increased at a 1.1 percent pace.

Business spending was revised to show more growth during the period than initially thought, adding about a percentage point to the growth rate.

Growth in home building was revised slightly higher to a 17.5 percent annual rate. Residential construction is one of the brighter spots in the economy and is benefiting from the Federal Reserve's ultra-easy monetary policy stance, which has driven mortgage rates to record lows.

JOBLESS CLAIMS FALL

A separate report showed the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell more than expected last week, suggesting some traction in the labor market recovery.

Initial claims for state jobless benefits dropped 22,000 to a seasonally adjusted 344,000, the Labor Department said.

Economists polled by Reuters had expected first-time applications to fall to 360,000.

While the level of jobless claims is near where it was in the early days of the 2007-09 recession, hiring has remained quite lackluster. Job gains have averaged 177,000 per month over the past six months.

High unemployment prompted the U.S. central bank last year to launch an open-ended bond buying program that it said it would keep up until it saw a substantial improvement in the outlook for the labor market.

In a separate report, the Institute for Supply Management-Chicago said the pace of business activity in the U.S. Midwest rose to its highest level in nearly a year in February as new orders increased.

(Additional reporting by Lucia Mutikani in Washington and Leah Schnurr in New York; Editing by Andrea Ricci and Tim Ahmann)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/economy-expands-weakest-pace-since-2011-133607190--business.html

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Google working on experimental 3.8 Linux kernel for Android

Kernel version

Google has opened a public kernel repository, marked as experimental, for the Linux 3.8 kernel. The kernel repo is built from the standard Linux kernel, with Android modifications added by the folks in Mountain View working on the Android project.

The reason this is good news? 3.8 includes three important and interesting changes for mobile devices -- support for open source NVIDIA Tegra and Samsung Exynos DRM drivers, support for the Flash-Friendly File-System, and a lower memory footprint -- in some cases much lower. Having native support means less development time by Google or anyone else building the kernel for Android, and everyone loves more memory for apps instead of the system.

It's important to realize that this is by no means official support. Currently, Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean ships with the 3.4 kernel on the Nexus 4, but versions 3.0 and 3.3 are supported as well for other Jelly Bean devices. Maybe we'll see 3.8 in the next version of Android.

Source: Phoronix

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/gVCFUSMK4e0/story01.htm

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Yahoo memo sparks debate on pros and cons of working at home

LONDON (Reuters) - An internal memo at Yahoo Inc introducing a ban on working from home has sparked a debate on whether remote working leads to greater productivity and job satisfaction or kills creativity and is just a chance to slack off.

Working remotely has become commonplace due to technology and has been welcomed particularly by people with young families or those facing long and expensive commutes.

Statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Labour show nearly 25 percent of full-time workers did some work at home in 2010.

A survey by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) found 59 percent of UK companies in 2011 offered some kind of teleworking, a jump from 13 percent in 2006, with small companies leading the trend to help cut office costs.

But Yahoo Chief Executive Marissa Mayer has ruled that staff can no longer work from home from June this year, as outlined in the widely leaked internal memo which appeared on newspaper websites and online forums on Tuesday.

"Some of the best decisions and insights come from hallway and cafeteria discussion, meeting new people, and impromptu team meetings. Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home," said the memo attributed to Yahoo human resources head Jacqueline Reses.

Asked about the memo, a Yahoo spokesman said the company does not comment on internal matters.

Mayer, 37, who returned to work two weeks after the birth of her first child last year, was brought to Yahoo from Google to revive the company's diminishing fortunes.

Her decision to clamp down on remote working met a wall of criticism from proponents of a flexible workplace to improve the work-life balance, boost motivation, and keep women at work.

"It's incredibly disappointing," said Jennifer Owens, spokeswoman for website Working Mother, adding most women were delighted when a pregnant Mayer took over the helm of Yahoo.

"Her plan ... is to lead her workforce back to the last century by banning work-from-home policies across the company."

STEP BACKWARDS

Richard Branson, head of Virgin Group, said the move by Yahoo! undermined the trust that staff would get their work done wherever, without supervision, as working is no longer 9-5.

"This seems a backwards step in an age when remote working is easier and more effective than ever," Branson wrote in a blog on the Virgin website.

"If you provide the right technology to keep in touch, maintain regular communication and get the right balance between remote and office working, people will be motivated to work responsibly, quickly and with high quality."

Britain's BT Group, one of the first UK companies to adopt teleworking, said about 69,000 of its 89,000 staff were equipped to work flexibly of which about 9,400 are home workers.

The company said this led to benefits like accommodation savings, increased productivity and reduced sick absence, adding 99 percent of women returned to BT after maternity leave.

"Our flexible working policies can also achieve a better balance between work and family commitments, which can be especially important for those with young families or caring responsibilities," a BT spokesman said.

Flexible working was cited in a careerbuilder.com survey released last month as one of the most important factors in job satisfaction and staying with a company.

The Harris Interactive survey of 3,900 U.S. workers between November 1 and 30 last year found 59 percent said flexible schedules were important and 33 percent cited the ability to work from home over having an office or a company car.

Guy Bailey, CBI's head of employee relations, said flexibility can be a real win-win for companies and their staff, acting as a recruitment and retention tool for businesses and letting staff balance their working and home lives.

"However, it needs to work for both parties, so home-working arrangements will understandably vary from company to company," he told Reuters.

A 2011 survey of 1,500 workers in 15 European nations commissioned by Microsoft Corp found only 52 percent of people trust colleagues to work productively away from the office.

This was reflected in comments by some former employees of Yahoo who backed Mayer, saying she was making the right call because many employees were abusing the system.

Several unnamed ex-employees told the website Business Insider that Yahoo's large remote workforce led to "people slacking off like crazy, not being available, and spending a lot of time on non-Yahoo projects."

(Reporting by Belinda Goldsmith, editing by Paul Casciato)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/yahoo-memo-sparks-debate-pros-cons-working-home-183104075--sector.html

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Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Exclusive: Juniper mulls next move after asset sale talks falter - sources

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Juniper Networks Inc is reviewing its enterprise-focused networking business after talks fell through late last year to sell assets, including security unit NetScreen Technologies, several sources close to the matter told Reuters.

The world's No. 2 networking gear maker is mulling options that could include acquisitions to bolster the security and enterprise business, with a longer-term view of a sale or spin-off, two of the sources said. For acquisition financing it could decide to raise cash through a private sale of equity, the sources familiar with the company's thinking said.

From summer to fall of 2012, San Jose, California-based Juniper discreetly contacted about half a dozen competitors to test the appetite for its assets that handle networking for enterprise clients, two sources close to the matter said.

At the time, rumors were rife that major storage provider EMC Corp was also in talks to buy Juniper, though EMC CEO Joe Tucci has since dismissed any interest in buying a networking company.

Investment banks have not been hired by Juniper to assist in the review, the sources said. Goldman Sachs has helped the company on prior deals.

A spokesman for Goldman declined to comment.

Among the assets pitched last fall was NetScreen, a maker of firewall technology that Juniper bought in 2004 for $4 billion. But the interest was underwhelming, with parties walking away after concluding that Juniper's enterprise-oriented assets lacked innovation and growth, the sources said.

The company, which in October announced a 5 percent cut in its workforce, declined to comment on what a spokeswoman called rumors and speculation.

Asked at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Tuesday whether the company has plans to sell NetScreen or other parts of the business, Chief Executive Kevin Johnson said: "No, if you look at the acquisitions we have done, we're a buyer not a seller."

(Reporting By Nadia Damouni and Nicola Leske; Additional reporting Paul Sandle; Editing by Edwin Chan, Edward Tobin and David Gregorio)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/exclusive-juniper-mulls-next-move-asset-sale-talks-182934262--sector.html

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Right Wing Rages Uncontrollably at Michelle Obama: "Someone Put a Bullet in That Fat Pig" (Little green footballs)

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Wall Street Records Biggest Profit Since Before The Financial Crisis

WASHINGTON, Feb 26 (Reuters) - The U.S. banking industry in 2012 recorded its highest earnings since before the 2007-2009 financial crisis, according to data released on Tuesday by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
The FDIC said the industry's full-year earnings were the second-highest on record at $141.3 billion, an increase over 2011 of $22.9 billion, or 19.3 percent.
Bank earnings peaked in 2006 at $145.2 billion.
Much of the earnings growth in 2012 came from banks reducing the amount they set aside in case of losses on loans, the FDIC said. Banks also saw gains on loan sales and higher servicing income.
"While there is still room for further income growth, we don't expect the pace of earnings growth to continue at these levels," FDIC Chairman Martin Gruenberg said in a statement.
The report will likely be seen as a sign that the industry is healing after the financial crisis, although some bigger banks cut jobs last year to cope with persistent pressures such as declines in trading volume.
The industry's earnings for the fourth quarter of 2012 totaled $34.7 billion, up $9.3 billion, or 36.9 percent, from the same period in 2011, the FDIC said.
Net operating revenue during the fourth quarter was $169 billion, up $7.3 billion, or 4.5 percent, from a year earlier, the FDIC said. (Reporting By Emily Stephenson; editing by John Wallace)

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/26/bank-earnings-high-2012_n_2765354.html

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Monday, February 25, 2013

See the Chic Maternity Fashions Jamie-Lynn Sigler Scored at Calypso

On Feb. 19, Jamie-Lynn Sigler spent time at her fave store Calypso St. Barth in Los Angeles stocking up on maternity essentials.

Source: http://feeds.celebritybabies.com/~r/celebrity-babies/~3/2voONHJy8KM/

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Lowe's 4Q net income tops expectations

NEW YORK (AP) -- Home improvement retailer Lowe's Cos. credits cleanup efforts after Superstorm Sandy and its new pricing strategy for fourth-quarter earnings that surpassed Wall Street expectations.

The results are a sign that people are beginning to feel better about spending money on their homes as the housing market slowly recovers. Analysts will be watching Lowe's larger rival Home Depot's earnings report on Tuesday to see if its results show a similar story.

Lowe's CEO Robert Niblock said the company is seeing a pickup in spending even in areas of the country hit hardest by the housing slump, like Florida, Arizona and California.

"Rising home values have given homeowners additional confidence in spending on their homes," Niblock said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Lowe's net income fell 11 percent from last year's quarter, which included an extra week of revenue. Its earnings forecast for the year was below expectations but its revenue projection beat the consensus.

Mooresville, N.C.-based Lowe's has revamped its pricing structure, offering what it says are permanent low prices on many items across the store instead of fleeting discounts. It has also focused on hiring more workers and improving its inventory. In January it said it planned to hire 45,000 seasonal workers ahead of its busy spring season and add 9,000 part time employees on a permanent basis.

In a call with analysts, Chief Customer Officer Greg Bridgeford said the pricing strategy helped spur strong sales of cabinets and countertops, tools and outdoor power equipment.

During the quarter, the number of transactions fell 6.9 percent, mainly due to the extra week in the quarter a year ago. But average ticket rose 2.1 percent to $62.37.

Lowe's net income totaled $288 million, or 26 cents per share, for the three months ended Feb. 1. That's down from $322 million, or 26 cents per share, a year ago. Analysts expected 23 cents per share, according to FactSet.

There were 11 percent fewer shares outstanding in the latest quarter than a year ago. That increases the value of each share. An extra week in the quarter last year had boosted year-ago earnings by 5 cents per share.

Revenue fell 5 percent to $11.05 billion from $11.63 billion. Analysts expected $10.85 billion. Revenue in stores open at least one year rose 1.9 percent. The measure is a key gauge of a retailer's fiscal health because it excludes stores that open or close during the year.

Morningstar analyst Peter Wahlstrom said the quarter was generally good and in line with his expectations, helped by better gross margins ? the amount of each dollar in revenue a company actually keeps ? and a lower share count.

Standard & Poor analyst Michael Souers kept his "Sell" recommendation on the stock.

"While we see a modest recovery in housing, we see rising interest rates as a threat to home refinancing, a key driver of remodeling," he said.

For the fiscal year, net income rose 7 percent to $1.96 billion, or $1.69 per share, from $1.84 billion, or $1.43 per share. Revenue edged up to $50.52 billion from $50.21 billion last year.

Lowe's, which operates 1,754 stores in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, expects fiscal 2013 net income of $2.05 per share. Analysts expect $2.10 per share.

The company expects revenue to rise 4 percent, implying revenue of $52.54 billion. Analysts expect $51.69 billion.

Shares fell $1.81, or 4.8 percent, to close at $35.86 Monday. They have traded in a 52-week range of $24.76 to $39.98.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/lowes-4q-net-income-tops-112632367.html

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AT&T LTE coming to GM's 2015 fleet

Ready to trade your old car in for a shiny new mobile hotspot? AT&T and GM are using the international platform that is Mobile World Congress to announce a partnership that'll bring the carrier's LTE network to "millions of cars" under the Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac umbrellas. The rollout is set to hit the 2015 models due out in 2014 in the US and Canada. The partnership with GM-owned OnStar will bring AT&T connectivity to a variety of services, including safety, diagnostics, infotainment and safety -- the carrier's president of emerging enterprises and partnerships, Glenn Lurie, told us that the latter was a chief concern for his company. "First and foremost is making the car safer," he explained, referencing the company's "It Can Wait," anti-driving-while-texting campaign. Such will certainly be a concern when the company realizes its dreams of turning GM vehicles into mobile hotspots.

Details of the partnership are forthcoming, though Lurie insists that AT&T will be "working on every aspect of what's going into the vehicle," including opening up SDKs and APIs for developers in an attempt to, "futureproof the car for things to come." As far as futureproofing after market vehicles, Lurie says, "we are working and looking at all opportunities in the after market space. We are absolutely working with partners on the after market." More info from GM and AT&T can be had after the break.

Daniel Cooper contributed to this report.

Filed under: Cellphones, Transportation, AT&T

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/KbfLIhK32hY/

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Sunday, February 24, 2013

Flipping the 'off' switch on cell growth: Protein uses multiple means to help cells cope when oxygen runs low

Feb. 22, 2013 ? A protein known for turning on genes to help cells survive low-oxygen conditions also slows down the copying of new DNA strands, thus shutting down the growth of new cells, Johns Hopkins researchers report. Their discovery has wide-ranging implications, they say, given the importance of this copying -- known as DNA replication -- and new cell growth to many of the body's functions and in such diseases as cancer.

"We've long known that this protein, HIF-1?, can switch hundreds of genes on or off in response to low oxygen conditions," says Gregg Semenza, M.D., Ph.D., a molecular biologist who led the research team and has long studied the role of low-oxygen conditions in cancer, lung disease and heart disorders. "We've now learned that HIF-1? is even more versatile than we thought, as it can work directly to stop new cells from forming." A report on the discovery appears in the Feb. 12 issue of Science Signaling.

With his team, Semenza, who is the C. Michael Armstrong Professor of Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine's Institute for Cell Engineering and Institute for Genomic Medicine, discovered HIF-1? in the 1990s and has studied it ever since, pinpointing a multitude of genes in different types of cells that have their activity ramped up or down by the activated protein. These changes in so-called "gene expression" help cells survive when oxygen-rich blood flow to an area slows or stops temporarily; they also allow tumors to build new blood vessels to feed themselves.

To learn how HIF-1?'s own activity is controlled, the team looked for proteins from human cells that would attach to HIF-1?. They found two, MCM3 and MCM7, that limited HIF-1?'s activity, and were also part of the DNA replication machinery. Those results were reported in 2011.

In the new research, Semenza and his colleagues further probed HIF-1?'s relationship to DNA replication by comparing cells in low-oxygen conditions to cells kept under normal conditions. They measured the amount of DNA replication complexes in the cells, as well as how active the complexes were. The cells kept in low-oxygen conditions, which had stopped dividing, had just as much of the DNA replication machinery as the normal dividing cells, the researchers found; the difference was that the machinery wasn't working. It turned out that in the nondividing cells, HIF-1? was binding to a protein that loads the DNA replication complex onto DNA strands, and preventing the complex from being activated.

"Our experiments answered the long-standing question of how, exactly, cells stop dividing in response to low oxygen," says Maimon Hubbi, Ph.D., a member of Semenza's team who is now working toward an M.D. degree. "It also shows us that the relationship between HIF-1? and the DNA replication complex is reciprocal -- that is, each can shut the other down."

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Johns Hopkins Medicine, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Journal Reference:

M. E. Hubbi, Kshitiz, D. M. Gilkes, S. Rey, C. C. Wong, W. Luo, D.-H. Kim, C. V. Dang, A. Levchenko, G. L. Semenza. A Nontranscriptional Role for HIF-1? as a Direct Inhibitor of DNA Replication. Science Signaling, 2013; 6 (262): ra10 DOI: 10.1126/scisignal.2003417

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

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/health_medicine/genes/~3/XQflXj1NWK4/130223111517.htm

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Insurgents launch 4 attacks in Afghanistan

An Afghan intelligence officer, center, tries to turn on a vehicle used by an insurgent, who was killed by security forces, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013. A series of early morning attacks hit eastern Afghanistan Sunday, with three separate suicide bombings in outlying provinces and a shootout between security forces and a would-be attacker in the capital city of Kabul. (AP Photo/Musadeq Sadeq)

EDS NOTE : GRAPHIC CONTENT - A security officer with the Afghan intelligence department, right, collects an insurgent's belongings, who was shot to death near an Afghan intelligence office in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013. A series of early morning attacks hit eastern Afghanistan Sunday, with three separate suicide bombings in outlying provinces and a shootout between security forces and a would-be attacker in the capital city of Kabul. (AP Photo/Musadeq Sadeq)

Explosive materials are seen in the back of a vehicle used by an insurgent at the site where he was shot to death in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013. A series of early morning attacks hit eastern Afghanistan Sunday, with three separate suicide bombings in outlying provinces and a shootout between security forces and a would-be attacker in the capital city of Kabul. (AP Photo/Musadeq Sadeq)

EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - A security officer with the Afghan intelligence department, right, photographs an insurgent's body, after he was shot to death near an Afghan intelligence office in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013. A series of early morning attacks hit eastern Afghanistan Sunday, with three separate suicide bombings in outlying provinces and a shootout between security forces and a would-be attacker in the capital city of Kabul. (AP Photo/Musadeq Sadeq)

EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - An insurgent's body lies at the site where he was shot to death near an Afghan intelligence office in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013. A series of early morning attacks hit eastern Afghanistan Sunday, with three separate suicide bombings in outlying provinces and a shootout between security forces and a would-be attacker in the capital city of Kabul. (AP Photo/Musadeq Sadeq)

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) ? A series of early morning attacks hit eastern Afghanistan Sunday, with three separate suicide bombings in outlying provinces and a shootout between security forces and a would-be attacker in the capital city of Kabul.

The deadliest attack was a suicide car bombing at a state intelligence site just after sunrise in the eastern city of Jalalabad. In that attack, a car approached the gate of a compound used by the National Directorate of Security and exploded, killing two guards and wounding three others, said regional government spokesman Ahmad Zia Abdulzai. The building was damaged in the attack, he added.

Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the bombing.

Shortly before the Jalalabad attack, an assailant detonated a van packed with explosives at a highway police checkpoint in Logar province, also in the east. That explosion wounded three police officers but no one was killed, said Deputy Police Chief Rais Khan Abdul Rahimzai.

In Kabul, meanwhile, police shot and killed a would-be suicide bomber who was trying to attack an intelligence agency office downtown, according to the city's deputy police chief, Gen. Mohammad Daud Amin. Intelligence agents spotted the bomber before he could detonate the explosives in his vehicle and shot him, Amin said.

The explosives in the vehicle were later defused, he added.

Later in the morning, a man wearing a suicide vest blew himself up outside the police headquarters for Baraki Barak district in Logar province. The man was stopped by police as he tried to force his way into the building, but still managed to detonate his vest, said Din Mohammad Darwesh, the provincial government spokesman.

One policeman was wounded in the Baraki Barak attack, Darwesh said.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-02-24-Afghanistan/id-7b337460147d4f5ab8321ac4ed99da10

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Iran announces uranium finds, days before nuclear talks

DUBAI (Reuters) - Days before resuming talks over its disputed atomic program, Iran said on Saturday it had found significant new deposits of raw uranium and identified sites for 16 more nuclear power stations.

State news agency IRNA quoted a report by the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran (AEOI) which said the reserves were discovered in northern and southern coastal areas and had trebled the amount outlined in previous estimates.

There was no independent confirmation. With few uranium mines of its own, Western experts had previously thought that Iran might be close to exhausting its supply of raw uranium.

"We have discovered new sources of uranium in the country and we will put them to use in the near future," Fereydoun Abbasi-Davani, head of the AEOI, was quoted as saying at Iran's annual nuclear industry conference.

The timing of the announcement suggested Iran, by talking up its reserves and nuclear ambitions, may hope to strengthen its negotiating hand at talks in Kazakhstan on Tuesday with the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany.

Diplomats say the six powers, known as the P5+1, are set to offer Iran some relief from international sanctions if it agrees to curb its production of higher-grade enriched uranium.

The West says Iran's enrichment of uranium to a fissile purity of 20 percent demonstrates its intent to develop a nuclear weapons capability, an allegation the Islamic republic denies.

FROM MINE TO CENTRIFUGE

The enriched uranium required for use in nuclear reactors or weapons is produced in centrifuges that spin uranium hexafluoride gas (UF6) at high speeds. The UF6 is derived from yellow cake, a concentrate from uranium ore discovered in mines.

Iran's reserves of raw uranium now stood at around 4,400 tonnes, taking into account discoveries over the past 18 months, IRNA quoted the report as saying.

In another sign that Iran is intent on pushing forward with its nuclear ambitions, the report also said 16 sites had been identified for the construction of nuclear power stations.

It did not specify the exact locations but said they included coastal areas of the Gulf, Sea of Oman, Khuzestan province and the Caspian Sea.

Iranian authorities have long announced their desire to build more nuclear power plants for electricity production. Only one currently exists, in the southern city of Bushehr, and that has suffered several shutdowns in recent months.

The announcements could further complicate the search for a breakthrough in Kazakhstan, after three unsuccessful rounds of talks between the two sides in 2012.

"We are meeting all of our obligations under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and we should be able to benefit from our rights. We don't accept more responsibilities and less rights," Saeed Jalili, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, was quoted as telling Saturday's conference.

In what Washington has called a provocative move, Iran is also installing new-generation centrifuges, capable of producing enriched uranium much faster, at a site in Natanz in the centre of the country.

Western diplomats say the P5+1 will reiterate demands for the suspension of uranium enrichment to a purity of 20 percent, the closure of Iran's Fordow enrichment plant, increased access for International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors and agreement to address concerns on existing uranium stockpiles.

In return, the latest embargoes on gold and metals trading with Iran would be lifted. Iran has criticized the offer and says its rights need to be fully recognized.

"If the P5+1 group wants to start constructive talks with Tehran it needs to present a valid proposal," said Jalili. "It needs to put its past errors to one side ... to win the trust of the Iranian nation."

In a statement issued before the Iranian announcement, German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said the six-power group wanted to enter a 'substantial negotiation process' over Tehran's nuclear program.

"The talks in Almaty are a chance which I hope Iran takes," he said.

(Additional reporting by Alexandra Hudson in Berlin; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/iran-announces-uranium-discovery-days-nuclear-talks-115843696.html

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Saturday, February 23, 2013

Palestinians Shot In Kusra Clash With Israeli Settlers

JERUSALEM ? Clashes erupted Saturday in the West Bank where Jewish settlers shot two Palestinian demonstrators in the northern village of Kusra, an Israeli military official and Palestinian residents said.

The clashes reflected mounting friction in the West Bank, where Palestinians have faced off against Israeli troops in recent weeks in a series of large demonstrations protesting Israel's control of the territory in general and in solidarity of four hunger-striking prisoners in Israeli jails.

Also Saturday, a Palestinian prisoner died in an Israeli jail, an event that is likely to intensify tension in the area.

In the West Bank skirmish, Helmi Abdul-Aziz, 24, was shot in the stomach by Jewish settlers, Palestinian demonstrators said. They said Jewish settlers also shot 14-year-old Mustafa Hilal in the foot.

An Israeli military official confirmed that two Palestinians were shot, but said the bullets appeared to have been fired by Jewish settlers because the Israeli forces were not using live ammunition. The official spoke on condition of anonymity, in line with military policy.

A Palestinian hospital official said Abdul-Aziz was in serious condition. The medic requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

Villagers said the clashes began when a group of Jewish settlers encroached on their village lands and fired guns. They said Jewish settlers chased a Palestinian farmer and his family off land, prompting the farmer to call on residents to confront the settlers, and men on both sides hurled rocks at each other.

The Israeli military official said about 200 Palestinians and 25 Jewish settlers took part in the clashes, and Israeli forces dispersed Palestinian protestors using "riot dispersal means."

Two Palestinian residents watching the clashes, Basem Nazal and Abdul-Azim Wadi, said Israeli forces fired tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets on demonstrators, and that a rubber bullet hit a 15-year-old Palestinian demonstrator in the eye. They also said the Israeli forces did not use live fire.

Nazal, a resident of Kusra, said groups of settlers were also uprooting their olive trees and vandalizing Palestinian homes close the wildcat Jewish outpost of Eish Kodesh.

Israel Radio reported that settlers from Eish Kodesh said the clashes began when Palestinians entered their outpost and began destroying their vineyards.

There are some 300,000 Israeli Jewish settlers living in the West Bank, which the international community condemns. Palestinians seek the West Bank, a hilly territory which Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war, for part of their future state. A hardline minority of Jewish settlers frequently attack nearby Palestinian villagers and their property.

The clashes come a day after widespread demonstrations took place throughout the West Bank in support of four Palestinian prisoners who are on hunger strikes in Israeli detention. Hundreds of Palestinians in Hebron and elsewhere in the West Bank Friday threw rocks at soldiers who responded with tear gas, and in Jerusalem, dozens of Palestinian worshippers threw rocks at Israeli officers at a key holy site. Earlier in the week, Palestinians clashed with Israeli soldiers at a pair of West Bank rallies in support of the prisoners.

In an Israeli jail Saturday, Palestinian prisoner Arafat Shalish Shahin Jaradat died of an apparent heart attack, according to Israeli prison services spokeswoman Sivan Weizman. She said Jaradat had not been on hunger strike. Still, his death is likely to enrage Palestinians at time when they have been stepping up demonstrations in protest of Israeli-held Palestinian prisoners, especially four long-time hunger-strikers, including one whose health is rapidly deteriorating.

Israel's domestic intelligence agency, the Shin Bet, said in a statement to reporters that Jaradat, 30, was arrested on Feb. 18 after residents in his West Bank village of Saeer said he was involved in a rock-throwing attack that injured an Israeli citizen. Jaradat admitted to the charge, as well to another West Bank rock-throwing incident last year, the Shin Bet said.

Jaradat suffered from back pain and had been injured in the past by a rubber bullet and tear gas canister, the Shin Bet said. But he was examined a few times by a doctor who detected no health problems, and his interrogation continued, the agency said.

After lunch on Saturday, Jaradat fell ill, and medics were unable to resuscitate him. A Shin Bet spokesman, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with protocol, said Jaradat was not beaten during his interrogation, nor did he experience any physical activities that might have led to a worsening of his health.

Israeli police have opened an investigation into the prisoner's death, the Shin Bet statement said.

The Palestinian prisoner rights group Addameer announced that Palestinian prisoners would go on a one-day hunger strike to commemorate their dead comrade.

Related on HuffPost:

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/23/palestinians-shot-kusra-israel_n_2749512.html

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NASA and JPL contribute to European Jupiter mission

Feb. 21, 2013 ? NASA has selected key contributions to a 2022 European Space Agency (ESA) mission that will study Jupiter and three of its largest moons in unprecedented detail. The moons are thought to harbor vast water oceans beneath their icy surfaces.

NASA's contribution will consist of one U.S.-led science instrument and hardware for two European instruments to fly on ESA's Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) mission. Jeffrey Plaut of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., will be the U.S. lead for the Radar for Icy Moon Exploration experiment. The radar experiment's principal investigator is Lorenzo Bruzzone of Universita degli Studi di Trento in Italy.

Under the lead of Bruzzone and the Italian Space Agency, JPL will provide the transmitter and receiver hardware for a radar sounder designed to penetrate the icy crust of Jupiter's moons Europa, Ganymede and Callisto to a depth of about 5 miles (9 kilometers). This will allow scientists to see for the first time the underground structure of these tectonically complex and unique icy worlds.

JUICE will carry 11 experiments developed by scientific teams from 15 European countries, the United States and Japan.

The spacecraft will orbit Jupiter for three years and travel past Callisto and Europa multiple times, then orbit Ganymede, a moon larger than the planet Mercury. JUICE will conduct the first thorough exploration of Jupiter since NASA's Galileo mission from 1989-2003.

By studying the Jupiter system, JUICE will look to learn more about the formation and evolution of potentially habitable worlds in our solar system and beyond.

"NASA is thrilled to collaborate with ESA on this exciting mission to explore Jupiter and its icy moons," said John Grunsfeld, NASA's associate administrator for science in Washington. "Working together with ESA and our other international partners is key to enabling future scientific progress in our quest to understand the cosmos."

The solar-powered spacecraft will carry cameras and spectrometers, a laser altimeter and an ice-penetrating radar instrument. The mission also will carry a magnetometer, plasma and particle monitors, and radio science hardware. The spacecraft is scheduled to arrive at the Jupiter system in 2030.

"The selection of JUICE's instruments is a key milestone in ESA's flagship mission to the outer solar system, which represents an unprecedented opportunity to showcase leading European technological and scientific expertise," said Alvaro Gimenez Canete, ESA's director of science and robotic exploration.

NASA invited researchers in 2012 to submit proposals for NASA-provided instruments for the mission. Nine were reviewed, with one selected to fly. NASA agreed to provide critical hardware for two of the 10 selected European-led instruments. NASA's total contribution to the JUICE mission is $100 million for design, development and operation of the instruments through 2033.

In addition to the radar team and instrument, the NASA contributions are:

-- Ultraviolet Spectrometer: The principal investigator is Randy Gladstone of Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. This spectrometer will acquire images to explore the surfaces and atmospheres of Jupiter's icy moons and how they interact with the Jupiter environment. The instrument also will determine how Jupiter's upper atmosphere interacts with its lower atmosphere below, and the ionosphere and magnetosphere above. The instrument will provide images of the aurora on Jupiter and Ganymede.

-- Particle Environment Package: The principal investigator is Stas Barabash of the Swedish Institute of Space Physics. The U.S. lead is Pontus Brandt of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Md. Under the lead of Barabash and the Swedish National Space Board, APL will provide instruments to this suite to measure the neutral material and plasma that are accelerated and heated to extreme levels in Jupiter's fierce and complex magnetic environment.

NASA's Science Mission Directorate conducts a wide variety of research and scientific exploration programs for Earth studies, space weather, the solar system and the universe. The New Frontiers Program Office at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., will manage the NASA contributions. JUICE is the first large-class mission in ESA's Cosmic Vision 2015-2025 Program.

For more information on NASA planetary programs, visit: http://www.nasa.gov .

For more information about the JUICE mission, visit: http://sci.esa.int/juice .

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/nasa/~3/vfUjp6hAClM/130221214216.htm

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How human language could have evolved from birdsong

Friday, February 22, 2013

"The sounds uttered by birds offer in several respects the nearest analogy to language," Charles Darwin wrote in "The Descent of Man" (1871), while contemplating how humans learned to speak. Language, he speculated, might have had its origins in singing, which "might have given rise to words expressive of various complex emotions."

Now researchers from MIT, along with a scholar from the University of Tokyo, say that Darwin was on the right path. The balance of evidence, they believe, suggests that human language is a grafting of two communication forms found elsewhere in the animal kingdom: first, the elaborate songs of birds, and second, the more utilitarian, information-bearing types of expression seen in a diversity of other animals.

"It's this adventitious combination that triggered human language," says Shigeru Miyagawa, a professor of linguistics in MIT's Department of Linguistics and Philosophy, and co-author of a new paper published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology.

The idea builds upon Miyagawa's conclusion, detailed in his previous work, that there are two "layers" in all human languages: an "expression" layer, which involves the changeable organization of sentences, and a "lexical" layer, which relates to the core content of a sentence. His conclusion is based on earlier work by linguists including Noam Chomsky, Kenneth Hale and Samuel Jay Keyser.

Based on an analysis of animal communication, and using Miyagawa's framework, the authors say that birdsong closely resembles the expression layer of human sentences ? whereas the communicative waggles of bees, or the short, audible messages of primates, are more like the lexical layer. At some point, between 50,000 and 80,000 years ago, humans may have merged these two types of expression into a uniquely sophisticated form of language.

"There were these two pre-existing systems," Miyagawa says, "like apples and oranges that just happened to be put together."

These kinds of adaptations of existing structures are common in natural history, notes Robert Berwick, a professor of computational linguistics at MIT who is also an author of the paper.

"When something new evolves, it is often built out of old parts," Berwick says. "We see this over and over again in evolution. Old structures can change just a little bit, and acquire radically new functions."

A new chapter in the songbook

The new paper, "The Emergence of Hierarchical Structure in Human Language," was co-written by Miyagawa, Berwick and Kazuo Okanoya, a biopsychologist at the University of Tokyo who is an expert on animal communication.

To consider the difference between the expression layer and the lexical layer, take a simple sentence: "Todd saw a condor." We can easily create variations of this, such as, "When did Todd see a condor?" This rearranging of elements takes place in the expression layer and allows us to add complexity and ask questions. But the lexical layer remains the same, since it involves the same core elements: the subject, "Todd," the verb, "to see," and the object, "condor."

Birdsong lacks a lexical structure. Instead, birds sing learned melodies with what Berwick calls a "holistic" structure; the entire song has one meaning, whether about mating, territory or other things. The Bengalese finch, as the authors note, can loop back to parts of previous melodies, allowing for greater variation and communication of more things; a nightingale may be able to recite from 100 to 200 different melodies.

By contrast, other types of animals have bare-bones modes of expression without the same melodic capacity. Bees communicate visually, using precise waggles to indicate sources of foods to their peers; other primates can make a range of sounds, comprising warnings about predators and other messages.

Humans, according to Miyagawa, Berwick and Okanoya, fruitfully combined these systems. We can communicate essential information, like bees or primates ? but like birds, we also have a melodic capacity and an ability to recombine parts of our uttered language. For this reason, our finite vocabularies can generate a seemingly infinite string of words. Indeed, the researchers suggest that humans first had the ability to sing, as Darwin conjectured, and then managed to integrate specific lexical elements into those songs.

"It's not a very long step to say that what got joined together was the ability to construct these complex patterns, like a song, but with words," Berwick says.

As they note in the paper, some of the "striking parallels" between language acquisition in birds and humans include the phase of life when each is best at picking up languages, and the part of the brain used for language. Another similarity, Berwick notes, relates to an insight of celebrated MIT professor emeritus of linguistics Morris Halle, who, as Berwick puts it, observed that "all human languages have a finite number of stress patterns, a certain number of beat patterns. Well, in birdsong, there is also this limited number of beat patterns."

Birds, bees ? and dolphins?

The researchers acknowledge that further empirical studies on the subject would be desirable.

"It's just a hypothesis," Berwick says. "But it's a way to make explicit what Darwin was talking about very vaguely, because we know more about language now."

Miyagawa, for his part, asserts it is a viable idea in part because it could be subject to more scrutiny, as the communication patterns of other species are examined in further detail. "If this is right, then human language has a precursor in nature, in evolution, that we can actually test today," he says, adding that bees, birds and other primates could all be sources of further research insight.

MIT-based research in linguistics has largely been characterized by the search for universal aspects of all human languages. With this paper, Miyagawa, Berwick and Okanoya hope to spur others to think of the universality of language in evolutionary terms. It is not just a random cultural construct, they say, but based in part on capacities humans share with other species. At the same time, Miyagawa notes, human language is unique, in that two independent systems in nature merged, in our species, to allow us to generate unbounded linguistic possibilities, albeit within a constrained system.

"Human language is not just freeform, but it is rule-based," Miyagawa says. "If we are right, human language has a very heavy constraint on what it can and cannot do, based on its antecedents in nature."

###

Massachusetts Institute of Technology: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice

Thanks to Massachusetts Institute of Technology for this article.

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Friday, February 22, 2013

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Leaking at Hanford nuclear site worse than thought

Mark Ralston / AFP - Getty Images file

The Hanford site in eastern Washington is considered one of the most contaminated locations on Earth.

By M. Alex Johnson, staff writer, NBC News

The leaking of radioactive liquids at the Hanford, Wash., Nuclear Reservation is more extensive than previously reported, with six storage tanks affected, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said Friday.

In a conference call with reporters Friday after a meeting with Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Inslee disclosed that six of the 177 tanks were leaking at the nuclear facility in Richland, in eastern Washington about 50 miles southeast of Yakima.?

Inslee said Chu told him that evaluation system of the tank levels wasn't used correctly, raising the prospect that there may be even more leaks. But he said he was told?that there was no immediate threat, a point the Energy Department reiterated in a statement Friday evening.

Hanford ? which houses millions of gallons of radioactive waste left over from plutonium production for nuclear weapons ? is already considered one of the most contaminated sites on Earth, the U.S. government says.

Last week, the U.S. Energy Department said that only one tank was leaking at Hanford.

"We need to get to the bottom of this," Inslee said. He called the disclosure "very disturbing news" and contended that the Energy Department needed a new plan to remove liquid from tanks that can't be repaired.

Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee and an outspoken critic of containment efforts at Hanford, toured the site this week ? before Friday's announcement ? and judged conditions there "an unacceptable threat to the Pacific Northwest for everybody," NBC station KING of Seattle reported.

An estimated 1 million gallons of waste has seeped out of the underground tanks and reached groundwater that will eventually reach the Columbia River, scientists say. The U.S. plans to build a plant to turn the waste into low-level radioactive glass for safe storage, but that facility is years behind schedule for its projected opening in 2019.

In a statement Friday evening, Inslee warned that the federal budget impasse ? which could lead to a "sequestration," or cuts, of?$1.2 trillion in federal spending over 10 years ? made the Hanford predicament even more alarming.

"Frankly, the state Department of Ecology is not convinced that current storage is adequate to meet legal and regulatory requirements," Inslee said.

"With potential sequestration and federal budget cuts looming, we need to be sure the federal government maintains its commitment and legal obligation to the cleanup of Hanford," he said. "To see Hanford workers furloughed at the exact moment we have additional leakers out there is completely unacceptable."

Graham Robertson of NBC News contributed to this report. Follow M. Alex Johnson on Twitter and Facebook.

Watch the most-viewed videos on NBCNews.com

Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/22/17060321-six-tanks-now-said-to-be-leaking-at-contaminated-hanford-nuclear-site?lite

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Spinning camera gives a ball's-eye view of the game

Hal Hodson, technology reporter

The drama of that final pass is about to get a whole lot closer. A video camera built into the side of an football would normally just provide a dizzying swirl of images as the ball spirals through the air, but computer scientists at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and the University of Electro-Communications in Tokyo, Japan, have found a way to turn that whirling world into a steady stream of video framed on the field of play.

Project leader Kris Katani got the idea after coming across a 1938 Popular Mechanics article, in which a 16-millimetre film camera was mounted inside a balsa-wood football to record a throw from the air. Katani's method gets a much better result, capturing video at 120 frames per second and turning the spinning footage into a solid stream in a couple of minutes.

To do this, the software in the ball recognises common features of the ground below in each new frame of video. Images of the sky are discounted. It then knits the individual frames together to create a smooth sequence.

In a paper describing the ball camera, due to be presented at the Augmented Human conference in Stuttgart, Germany, next month, the group writes that the end goal is to "extend the frontiers of the spectator experienceby capturing the excitement of being on the field through the ball's first-person point of view".

Katani is confident the technique could be miniaturised and streamlined to fit unobtrusively into a US National Football League football, but suspects that the NFL's strict standards will hold the technology back in the near future. "If professional hardware were to come in, you'd be able to separate the lens from the recording device," he says, allowing for the recording device to be stored securely within the ball. "The technology is there."