CSI: Ancient Egypt? Investigating the 'Gospel of Judas'

Scientists reveal how they verified that the text known as the 'Gospel of Judas,' which paints Judas and Jesus as collaborators, dates to about 280 A.D.

By Stephanie Pappas,?Live Science / April 8, 2013

The Gospel of Judas, a text dated to about A.D. 280, tells the story of Judas as a collaborator with Jesus instead of a betrayer. Scientists recently revealed how they authenticated the age of the text.

Joseph Barabe / McCrone / LiveScience.com

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A long-lost gospel that casts Judas as a co-conspirator of Jesus, rather than a betrayer, was ruled most likely authentic in 2006. Now, scientists reveal they couldn't have made the call without a series of far more mundane documents, including Ancient Egyptian marriage licenses and property contracts.

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The Gospel of Judas is a fragmented Coptic (Egyptian)-language text that portrays Judas in a far more sympathetic light than did the gospels that made it into the Bible. In this version of the story, Judas turns Jesus over to the authorities for execution upon Jesus' request, as part of a plan to release his spirit from his body. In the accepted biblical version of the tale, Judas betrays Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.

As part of a 2006 National Geographic Society (the Society) investigation of the document, microscopist Joseph Barabe of McCrone Associates in Illinois and a team of researchers analyzed the ink on the tattered gospel to find out if it was real or forged. Some of the chemicals in the ink raised red flags ? until Barabe and his colleagues found, at the Louvre Museum, a study of Egyptian documents from the third century A.D., the same time period of the Gospal of Judas.

"What the French study told us is that ink technology was undergoing a transition," Barabe told LiveScience. The Gospel of Judas' odd ink suddenly fit into place.?

CSI: Ancient Egypt

Barabe and his colleagues specialize in thorough investigations of old ? or supposedly old ? documents and artwork. The chemical composition of inks used can reveal the difference between something authentically ancient and a forgery. In 2009, Barabe helped expose a gospel called the "Archaic Mark," which some claimed was a 14th-century manuscript, as a modern forgery. He's also worked with the Federal Bureau of Investigation to detect forged paintings.

A call from National Geographic, however, was a "big deal," Barabe said. "It was both thrilling and an honor," he added.

The Society wanted to find out if the Gospel of Judas, discovered in the 1970s, really dated back to early days of Christianity or whether it was, like Archaic Mark, a fake. Barabe brought together a team of scientists with a variety of specialties, and they ran the Gospel through an intensive analysis of microscopy and spectroscopy. [See Images of the Ancient 'Gospel' Documents]

At first, their findings offered little hope that the Gospel of Judas was real. The document was written in two inks ? black and brown ? mixed together. The black was an ink called "lamp black," which was consistent with the inks used in Egyptian writings from ancient times and into the third century, Barabe said.

But the brown ink was more mysterious. It was an iron-rich ink called iron gall, but it lacked the sulfur usually found in inks of this sort. The pressure was on to explain the difference.

"One thing that made this a little bit more dramatic than we would have liked is, we did the sampling in the third week of January of 2006, and the press conference was already scheduled for the third week in April of that same year," Barabe said. "So we had three months to turn this critter around with a conclusion, and it really put an enormous amount of pressure on us, because we were faced with what was essentially a three-month rush project."

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/3DOPKcroTKQ/CSI-Ancient-Egypt-Investigating-the-Gospel-of-Judas

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Major depression: Great success with pacemaker electrodes, small study suggests

Apr. 9, 2013 ? Researchers from the Bonn University Hospital implanted pacemaker electrodes into the medial forebrain bundle in the brains of patients suffering from major depression with amazing results: In six out of seven patients, symptoms improved both considerably and rapidly. The method of Deep Brain Stimulation had already been tested on various structures within the brain, but with clearly lesser effect.

The results of this new study have now been published in the international journal Biological Psychiatry.

After months of deep sadness, a first smile appears on a patient's face. For many years, she had suffered from major depression and tried to end her life several times. She had spent the past years mostly in a passive state on her couch; even watching TV was too much effort for her. Now this young woman has found her joie de vivre again, enjoys laughing and travelling. She and an additional six patients with treatment resistant depression participated in a study involving a novel method for addressing major depression at the Bonn University Hospital.

Considerable amelioration of depression within days

Prof. Dr. Volker Arnd Coenen, neurosurgeon at the Department of Neurosurgery (Klinik und Poliklinik f?r Neurochirurgie), implanted electrodes into the medial forebrain bundles in the brains of subjects suffering from major depression with the electrodes being connected to a brain pacemaker. The nerve cells were then stimulated by means of a weak electrical current, a method called Deep Brain Stimulation. In a matter of days, in six out of seven patients, symptoms such as anxiety, despondence, listlessness and joylessness had improved considerably. "Such sensational success both in terms of the strength of the effects, as well as the speed of the response has so far not been achieved with any other method," says Prof. Dr. Thomas E. Schl?pfer from the Bonn University Hospital Department of Psychiatry und Psychotherapy (Bonner Uniklinik f?r Psychiatrie und Psychotherapie).

Central part of the reward circuit

The medial forebrain bundle is a bundle of nerve fibers running from the deep-seated limbic system to the prefrontal cortex. In a certain place, the bundle is particularly narrow because the individual nerve fibers lie close together. "This is exactly the location in which we can have maximum effect using a minimum of current," explains Prof. Coenen, who is now the new head of the Freiburg University Hospital's Department of Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery (Abteilung Stereotaktische und Funktionelle Neurochirurgie am Universit?tsklinikum Freiburg). The medial forebrain bundle is a central part of a euphoria circuit belonging to the brain's reward system. What kind of effect stimulation exactly has on nerve cells is not yet known. But it obviously changes metabolic activity in the different brain centers.

Success clearly increased over that of earlier studies

The researchers have already shown in several studies that deep brain stimulation shows an amazing and-given the severity of the symptoms- unexpected degree of amelioration of symptoms in major depression. In those studies, however, the physicians had not implanted the electrodes into the medial forebrain bundle but instead into the nucleus accumbens, another part of the brain's reward system. This had resulted in clear and sustainable improvements in about 50 percent of subjects. "But in this new study, our results were even much better," says Prof. Schl?pfer. A clear improvement in complaints was found in 85 percent of patients, instead of the earlier 50 percent. In addition, stimulation was performed with lower current levels, and the effects showed within a few days, instead of after weeks.

Method's long-term success

"Obviously, we have now come closer to a critical structure within the brain that is responsible for major depression," says the psychiatrist from the Bonn University Hospital. Another cause for optimism among the group of physicians is that, since the study's completion, an eighth patient has also been treated successfully. The patients have been observed for a period of up to 18 month after the intervention. Prof. Schl?pfer reports, "The anti-depressive effect of deep brain stimulation within the medial forebrain bundle has not decreased during this period." This clearly indicates that the effects are not temporary. This method gives those who suffer from major depression reason to hope. However, it will take quite a bit of time for the new procedure to become part of standard therapy.

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Journal Reference:

1. Thomas E. Schlaepfer, Bettina H. Bewernick, Sarah Kayser, Burkhard M?dler, Volker A. Coenen. Rapid Effects of Deep Brain Stimulation for Treatment-Resistant Major Depression. Biological Psychiatry, 2013; DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2013.01.034

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/mind_brain/mental_health/~3/xoNO4EMk4fg/130409105913.htm

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Public Land Battle Over Drakes Bay Oyster Draws Unlikely Allies

[unable to retrieve full-text content]The fate of a family-run business north of San Francisco has drawn the attention of a Louisiana senator, Tea Party supporters and Alice Waters, the owner of Chez Panisse.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/10/us/public-land-battle-over-drakes-bay-oyster-draws-unlikely-allies.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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APNewsBreak: Obama to nominate labor board members

WASHINGTON (AP) ? President Barack Obama is nominating three candidates for full terms on the National Labor Relations Board, which has been in limbo since a federal appeals court invalidated his recess appointments to the agency.

Obama on Tuesday urged the Senate to move swiftly in confirming the members ? two Republicans and one Democrat ? along with two other Democrats he nominated in February. That would fill all five seats on the board.

"By enforcing workplace protections, upholding the rights of workers and providing a stable workplace environment for businesses, the NLRB plays a vital role in our efforts to grow the economy and strengthen the middle class," Obama said in a statement.

The move comes as House Republicans prepare to vote this week on a measure that would effectively shut down the board until it has permanent members confirmed by the Senate.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled in January that Obama violated the Constitution when he bypassed the Senate to fill vacancies on the board. Since then, Republicans have claimed the board lacks any legitimacy to act.

The White House has insisted the appeals court decision is wrong and plans to appeal it to the Supreme Court. But the ruling has prompted more than 100 businesses to claim the board lacks authority to take action against them because two of its members are not there legitimately. It also has frustrated labor unions who worry the board can't crack down on unfair labor practices.

Obama is renominating board Chairman Mark Pearce, a Democrat, and nominating two Republicans ? management-side lawyers Harry I. Johnson, III and Philip A. Miscimarra.

The president nominated Democrats Sharon Block and Richard Griffin to full terms in February. They have been sitting on the board since January 2012, when Obama made the recess appoints after Senate Republicans vowed to block Obama's NLRB nominees. Republicans complained the board was issuing too many pro-union decisions.

The White House hopes that Senate Republicans will favor the five-member package nomination of two Republicans and three Democrats. Both Republican nominees have passed muster with GOP leadership.

The president claimed that he made the recess appointments while the Senate was on a break. But the appeals court panel ruled that a recess occurs only during the breaks between formal yearlong sessions of Congress, not just any informal break. It also ruled that a vacancy must come into being during a recess in order to be valid.

The White House says the first-of-its-kind ruling runs contrary to more than 150 years of practice.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-04-09-Obama-Labor%20Board/id-cacd026121a5435d854aadf29c508e8c

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Bernanke notes 'stress tests' show stronger banks

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Federal Reserve's annual "stress tests" of major U.S. banks have become better able to detect risks, Chairman Ben Bernanke said Monday night. He said the tests show that the banking industry has grown much healthier since the financial crisis.

Speaking in Atlanta, Bernanke noted that this year's tests showed that 18 of the biggest banks had collectively doubled the cushions they hold against losses since the first tests were run in 2009. He says the tests are providing vital information to regulators.

The latest test results were released last month. They showed that all but one of the 18 banks were better prepared to withstand a severe U.S. recession and an upheaval in financial markets. The tests are used to determine whether the banks can increase dividends or repurchase shares.

Bernanke's comments came in a speech to a financial markets conference sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. He said he viewed the first stress test conducted in 2009, months after the financial crisis struck, as "one of the critical turning points in the crisis."

"It provided anxious investors with something they craved: credible information about prospective losses at banks," he said.

Bernanke said that in the ensuing years, the Fed has worked to improve the stress tests so they could serve as a resource for banking regulators to monitor and detect threats to the financial system.

During a question period after the speech, Bernanke was asked what kept him up at night.

"Let me assure you, there are no major problems you haven't heard about," he said in response. He said his list of concerns include whether the recovery will gain momentum and when the country will get back to full employment.

He said the economic situation in Europe also remains complex, as that region struggles to deal with its debt crisis. He said in the United States, a major issue remains how to deal with high budget deficits without compromising the economic recovery.

Bernanke made no comments during his appearance that suggested he was ready to modify the low-interest rate policies the Fed is pursuing in an effort to boost economic growth and lower unemployment.

The stress tests have been criticized by some banks because the central bank has kept secret the full details of the computer models it is using to evaluate each bank. The Fed has defended this practice. It has argued that it is similar to teachers not giving students specific questions that will appear on a test to guard against students memorizing the answers.

"We hear criticism from bankers that our models are a 'black box' which frustrates their efforts to anticipate our supervisory findings," Bernanke said. He said that over time, the banks should better understand the standards the tests are measuring.

In this year's test, the Fed approved dividend payment plans and stock repurchase plans for 14 of the 18 banks outright.

Two of the banks, JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs, were told by the Fed that they could proceed with their plans but would need to submit new capital plans. Two other banks, Ally Financial and BB&T, were forbidden by the Fed to go through with their dividend increases and share buybacks.

Ally Financial, the former financing arm of General Motors, fared the worst on the stress test. The Fed's data showed that Ally's projected capital level was below the minimum the Fed thinks a bank would need to survive a severe recession. Ally officials said they believed the Fed's testing models were unreasonable.

BB&T, based in Winston-Salem, N.C., said it would resubmit its capital plan and that it believes that it will be able to address the factors which had led to the Fed's objections.

___

Associated Press reporter Ray Henry in Atlanta contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2013-04-08-Bernanke-Banks/id-4dd694fa9cd9422a996fb4a7694d6e26

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Egypt: Clashes outside Copt cathedral leave 1 dead

Egyptian Christian women pray during a funeral service at the Saint Mark Coptic cathedral in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, April 7, 2013. Several Egyptians including 4 Christians and a Muslim were killed in sectarian clashes before dawn in Qalubiya, just outside of Cairo on Saturday, April 6, 2013. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil)

Egyptian Christian women pray during a funeral service at the Saint Mark Coptic cathedral in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, April 7, 2013. Several Egyptians including 4 Christians and a Muslim were killed in sectarian clashes before dawn in Qalubiya, just outside of Cairo on Saturday, April 6, 2013. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil)

An Egyptian Christian holds a cross during a funeral service at the Saint Mark Coptic cathedral in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, April 7, 2013. Several Egyptians including 4 Christians and a Muslim were killed in sectarian clashes before dawn in Qalubiya, just outside of Cairo on Saturday, April 6, 2013. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil)

A tear gas canister is fired by Egyptian riot police into the compound of the Coptic Orthodox Cathedral after the funeral of four Christians killed in sectarian clashes near Cairo over the weekend in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, April 7, 2013. Attacks against Christians, who make up about 10 percent of Egypt?s estimated 90 million people, have increased since President Morsi?s Muslim Brotherhood came to power last year. (AP Photo/Mostafa El Shemy)

Egyptian Christians grieve during a funeral service at the Saint Mark Coptic cathedral in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, April 7, 2013. Several Egyptians including 4 Christians and a Muslim were killed in sectarian clashes before dawn in Qalubiya, just outside of Cairo on Saturday, April 6, 2013. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil)

Egyptian Christians chant anti-Muslim Brotherhood slogans following a funeral service at the Saint Mark Coptic cathedral in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, April 7, 2013. Several Egyptians including 4 Christians and a Muslim were killed in sectarian clashes before dawn in Qalubiya, just outside of Cairo on Saturday, April 6, 2013. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil)

CAIRO (AP) ? Christians angered by the killing of four Christians in weekend sectarian violence clashed Sunday with a mob throwing rocks and firebombs, killing one and turning Cairo's main Coptic cathedral into a battleground.

The clashes raised tempers in an already tense political atmosphere, as workers shut down the country's trains in a strike over wages and a dispute over the nation's chief prosecutor entered a new phase ? all signs of two years of unending turmoil.

Reacting to Sunday's violence, the Muslim Brotherhood's political party blamed "dubious" attempts by unnamed parties to broaden instability in Egypt by igniting sectarian violence and spreading chaos.

A liberal opposition group, the Popular Current, said the clashes were symptomatic of the failure of the state to protect its citizens, calling on Islamist President Mohammed Morsi and his government to resign.

Morsi said in a statement late Sunday that he spoke to Pope Tawadros II by phone. He gave orders to authorities to guard the cathedral and citizens in the area, adding that protecting the lives of Muslims and Christians was a state responsibility.

"I consider any attack on the cathedral as an attack on me, personally," he said, according to the statement from his office.

The clashes at the St. Mark Coptic Orthodox Cathedral began just after hundreds of angry Christians left the complex to stage an anti-government march following the funeral for the four Christians killed in sectarian clashes Saturday.

A mob, described by witnesses as residents of the area, pelted them with rocks and firebombs and fired birdshot, forcing them back inside the complex. Few police were present.

By the time police arrived in larger numbers, the church was the scene of clashes between those locked inside and the mob outside, as the two sides exchanged rocks and firebombs. Police fired tear gas, and gas canisters landing inside church grounds caused a panic among women and children. People outside the church cheered.

Tawadros was not in the cathedral, his headquarters, during the funeral and the violence that followed. In a statement carried by the state news agency, said he was "regretful" of the violence and called for calm.

"There was no security outside the church for such a large funeral," said Emad Thabet, a Coptic Christian who was among those locked up in the church for hours. "There is no such thing as Egyptians in Egypt. There are only Muslims and Christians," he said. Copts have complained for decades that the Christian minority suffers from discrimination.

Coptic Christians make up about 10 percent of Egypt's estimated 90 million people. Attacks against Christians have increased since the ouster two years ago of autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

The clashes took place alongside a development in another of Egypt's many crises ? questions surrounding the legitimacy of the country's top prosecutor. On Sunday, Egypt's highest judicial body urged him to step down less than five months after Morsi appointed him. A few days earlier, a court ruling declared his appointment void.

The statement from the Supreme Judiciary Council urged the chief prosecutor, Talaat Abdullah, "to express a wish" to return to his previous job as a judge for the sake of the unity of the judiciary.

There was no immediate comment from Abdullah. Officials in his office and in the government indicated before that he will appeal the court decision.

Abdullah's appointment in December set off demonstrations and protests by judges and fellow prosecutors. The protests forced him to tender his resignation, but then he withdrew it and stayed in office.

Removing Abdullah has been a key demand of the mostly liberal and secular opposition. Sunday's call by the council of the judiciary appeared aimed at offering him an honorable exit, a step toward ending the long-running crisis within the judiciary over the appointment.

During the past two weeks, Abdullah has issued summons against several media celebrities critical of Morsi, Egypt's first freely elected president. They included popular TV satirist Bassem Youssef, who was accused of insulting Morsi and Islam. The satirist was released on bail.

Alongside the sectarian and legal issues, the overriding economic crisis flared as Egypt's railway services came to a halt Sunday because of a strike by train drivers and conductors demanding better pay. The strike snarled inter-city transit, and thousands of angry passengers crowded train stations.

The most immediate issue was the specter of sectarian violence increasing and spreading to the rest of the country.

Sunday's clashes grew out of Khossous, a town north of Cairo, where five people, including a Muslim, were killed a day earlier. Renewed clashes erupted there later Sunday outside the local church, leaving 12 residents and one police officer injured.

At the cathedral on Sunday, witness Ibrahim Elsherif said the clashes began when angry Coptic protesters tried to stop traffic for an anti-government march. A street brawl turned quickly into an attack by local residents, who pelted the protesters with rocks from the roofs of nearby buildings, throwing firebombs and firing birdshot, he said. Some protesters smashed parked cars.

One Coptic Christian was killed in the violence, and at least 66 people were wounded, the Health Ministry said. Two local journalists were among those injured, one seriously, according to their newspapers.

Video aired live on the private ONTV network showed young men on the roof of a building next to the cathedral firing handguns toward the compound.

Inside the cathedral, several thousand mourners chanted slogans against Morsi, calling on the Egyptian leader to step down. They shouted "Leave!" and "This is our country, we will not leave."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-04-07-ML-Egypt/id-6fd907e8f02b408989b4e3f8b73a5c64

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How Hollywood Is Making Texting Look Dramatic

We all increasingly rely on non-verbal forms of communication—email, IM, texting—to let people know what's going on in our lives. That's great for us, but it's causing headaches in Hollywood when it comes to creating drama. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/hQ6rWhNKCZE/how-hollywood-is-making-texting-look-dramatic

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Hotel Tonight for iPhone and iPad review

Hotel Tonight is an iPhone and iPad app that offers awesome last-minute deals on hotels in 12 countries and over 80 destinations. It features a gorgeous design that does a great job of showing off the amenities of the hotels.

Instead of a boring list of locations with just text and maybe thumbnails, Hotel Tonight features long strips of beautiful photos to represent each location, and when you tap on a location, the list of available hotels are displayed as little stacks of photos.

When viewing a hotel, a collage of photos of the destination are displayed. You can scroll around indefinitely to view all the photos in different sizes, or tap on an image to view them full screen.

I recommend not browsing through Hotel Tonight unless you're actually in need of a hotel; otherwise, be warned that you may fall prey of the gorgeous presentation and plan a last minute getaway.

The good

• Gorgeous design
• Exclusive low prices on incredible hotels
• Same-day, fast and easy bookings until 2am
• Great deals each night in a growing list of cities
• Book for multiple nights
• Deal selection is limited so they can negotiate with hotels to get you the best rates possible
• 24/7 real-person customer support via phone or email.

The bad

• Crashes often

The bottom line

If you're planning a last minute trip somewhere, Hotel Tonight is a fantastic app for booking your hotel. They have a good range of average to upscale hotels to fit any budget.

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/7-7YYDFIhEg/story01.htm

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NASA taps the power of zombie stars in two-in-one instrument

Apr. 8, 2013 ? Neutron stars have been called the zombies of the cosmos. They shine even though they're technically dead, occasionally feeding on neighboring stars if they venture too close. Interestingly, these unusual objects, born when a massive star extinguishes its fuel and collapses under its own gravity, also may help future space travelers navigate to Mars and other distant destinations.

NASA recently selected a new mission called the Neutron-star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER) to not only reveal the physics that make neutron stars the densest objects in nature, but also to demonstrate a groundbreaking navigation technology that could revolutionize the agency's ability to travel to the far reaches of the solar system and beyond.

The multi-purpose mission, also known as NICER/SEXTANT (Station Explorer for X-ray Timing and Navigation Technology), consists of 56 X-ray telescopes in a compact bundle, their associated silicon detectors, and a number of other advanced technologies. Both NASA's Science Mission Directorate's Explorers Program and the Space Technology Mission Directorate's Game Changing Program are contributing to the mission's development.

"It's rare that you have an opportunity to fly a cross-cutting experiment," said Principal Investigator Keith Gendreau, a scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., who is leading NICER/SEXTANT's development. "The time is right for this experiment. This is one that we can do now."

In addition to NASA Goddard scientists and engineers, the mission team includes the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and commercial partners, who are providing spaceflight hardware. The Naval Research Laboratory and universities across the United States, as well as in Canada and Mexico, are providing science expertise.

Space Station Bound

Slightly larger than a typical college dormitory refrigerator, NICER/SEXTANT will be deployed on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2017. It will fly as an external attached payload on one of the ISS ExPRESS Logistics Carriers, unpressurized platforms used for experiments and storage.

The X-ray instrument's primary objective is to learn more about the interior composition of neutron stars, the remnants of massive stars that, after exhausting their nuclear fuel, exploded and collapsed into super-dense spheres about the size of New York City. Their intense gravity crushes an astonishing amount of matter -- often more than 1.4 times the content of the sun or at least 460,000 Earths -- into these city-sized balls, creating the densest objects known in the universe. Just one teaspoonful of neutron star matter would weigh a billion tons on Earth.

"A neutron star is right at the threshold of matter as it can exist -- if it were compressed any further, it would collapse completely in on itself and become a black hole," said Zaven Arzoumanian, a NASA Goddard scientist serving as the deputy principal investigator on the mission. "We have no way of creating or studying this matter in any laboratory. There are many theories about what it is and how it behaves, but the only way to test our models and understand what happens to matter under such incredible pressures is to study neutron stars," he added. "The closest we come to simulating these conditions is in particle accelerators that smash atoms together at almost the speed of light. However, these collisions are not an exact substitute -- they only last a split second, and they generate temperatures that are much higher than what's inside neutron stars."

Although the nuclear-fusion fires that sustained their parent stars are extinguished, neutron stars still shine with heat left over from their explosive formation, and from radiation generated by their magnetic fields that became intensely concentrated as the core collapsed.

Although neutron stars emit radiation across the spectrum, observing in the X-ray band offers the greatest insights into their structure, the ultimate stability of their pulses as precise clock "ticks," and the high-energy, dynamic phenomena that they host, including starquakes, thermonuclear explosions, and the most powerful magnetic fields known in the universe.

NICER's 56 telescopes will collect X-rays generated from its tremendously strong magnetic field and from hotspots located at the stars' two magnetic poles. At these locations, the intense magnetic field emerges from the surface. Particles trapped in the magnetic field rain down and generate X-rays when they strike the surface. As the hotspots rotate into and out of our line of sight, we perceive a rise and fall in X-ray brightness.

This subgroup of pulsating neutron stars, called pulsars, rotate rapidly, emitting from their magnetic poles powerful beams of light that sweep around as the star spins, much like a lighthouse. At Earth, these beams are seen as flashes of light, blinking on and off at intervals from seconds down to milliseconds.

Because of their predictable pulsations -- especially millisecond pulsars, which are the target of the navigation demonstration -- "they are extremely reliable celestial clocks" and can provide high-precision timing just like the atomic clock signals supplied through the 26-satellite, military-operated Global Positioning System (GPS), an Earth-centric system that weakens the farther one travels out beyond Earth orbit and into the solar system, Arzoumanian said. "Pulsars, on the other hand, are accessible in virtually every conceivable flight regime, from low-Earth orbit to interplanetary to deepest space," Gendreau added.

As a result, NICER/SEXTANT also will demonstrate the viability of pulsar-based navigation. "The hardware needed for neutron star science is identical to that needed for pulsar-based navigation," Gendreau said. "In fact, the mission's two goals share many of the same targets and the same operational concept. The differences are on the back end in terms of how the data will be used."

To demonstrate the navigation technology's viability, the NICER/SEXTANT payload will use its telescopes to detect X-ray photons within these powerful beams of light to estimate the arrival times of the pulses. With these measurements, the system will use specially developed algorithms to stitch together an on-board navigation solution.

If an interplanetary mission were equipped with such a navigational device, it would be able to calculate its location autonomously, independent of NASA's Deep Space Network (DSN), Gendreau said. DSN, considered the most sensitive telecommunications system in the world, allows NASA to continuously observe and communicate with interplanetary spacecraft. However, like GPS, the system is Earth-centric. DSN-supplied navigational solutions also degrade the farther one travels out into the solar system. Furthermore, missions must share time on the network, Gendreau said.

"We're excited about NICER/SEXTANT's possibilities," Gendreau added. "The experiment meets critical science objectives and is a stepping-stone for technology applications that meet a variety of NASA needs. It's rare that you get an opportunity to do a cross-cutting experiment like this."

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US Lawmakers Seek Details on Beyonce, Jay-Z Cuba Trip (Voice Of America)

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Google Fiber is officially coming to Austin, Texas

Hear that? It's Austin, being weird enough to add yet another reason to live within its city limits. As rumored, Google Fiber will be rolling down to one of Texas' most esteemed towns in the near future, joining the Kansas City, Kansas and Missouri metro as the only locales (so far) in the US of A offering the outfit's Fiber-based TV, phone and 1Gbps broadband services. Mum's the word on an exact rollout, but we'll update this post as we learn more.

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Source: Gig.U

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Cry me a river of possibility: Scientists design new adaptive material inspired by tears

Apr. 8, 2013 ? Imagine a tent that blocks light on a dry and sunny day, and becomes transparent and water-repellent on a dim, rainy day. Or highly precise, self-adjusting contact lenses that also clean themselves. Or pipelines that can optimize the rate of flow depending on the volume of fluid coming through them and the environmental conditions outside.

A team of researchers at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University and Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) just moved these enticing notions much closer to reality by designing a new kind of adaptive material with tunable transparency and wettability features, as reported yesterday in the online version of Nature Materials.

"The beauty of this system is that it's adaptive and multifunctional," said senior author Joanna Aizenberg, Ph.D., a Core Faculty member at the Wyss Institute and the Amy Smith Berylson Professor of Materials Science at SEAS.

The new material was inspired by dynamic, self-restoring systems in Nature, such as the liquid film that coats your eyes. Individual tears join up to form a dynamic liquid film with an obviously significant optical function that maintains clarity, while keeping the eye moist, protecting it against dust and bacteria, and helping to transport away any wastes -- doing all of this and more in literally the blink of an eye.

The bioinspired material is a continuous liquid film that coats, and is infused in, an elastic porous substrate -- which is what makes it so versatile. It is based on a core concept: any deformation of the substrate -- such as stretching, poking, or swelling -- changes the size of the pores, which causes the liquid surface to change its shape.

With this design architecture in place, the team has thus far demonstrated the ability to dynamically control -- with great precision -- two key functions: transparency and wettability, said Xi Yao, Ph.D, Wyss Institute and SEAS postdoctoral fellow, and lead author of the study.

Sitting at rest, the material is smooth, clear and flat; droplets of water or oil on its surface flow freely off of the material. Stretching the material makes the fluid surface rougher, Yao explained. The rough surface makes it opaque for one thing, and enables one to do something never possible before: It offers the ability to make every droplet of oil or water that is placed on it reversibly start and stop in their tracks. This capability is far superior to the "switchable wettability" of other adaptive materials that exist today, Yao said, which simply switch between two states -- from hydrophobic (water-hating) to hydrophilic (water-loving).

"In addition to transparency and wettability, we can fine-tune basically anything that would respond to a change in surface topography, such as adhesive or anti-fouling behavior," Yao said. They can also design the porous elastic solid such that it responds dynamically to temperature, light, magnetic or electric fields, chemical signals, pressure, or other environmental conditions, he said.

The material is a next generation of a materials platform that Aizenberg pioneered a few years ago called SLIPS. SLIPS stands for Slippery Liquid-Infused Porous Surfaces, and is a coating that repels just about anything with which it comes into contact -- from oil to water and blood.

But whereas SLIPS is a liquid-infused rigid porous surface, "the new material is a liquid-infused elastic porous surface, which is what allows for the fine control over so many adaptive responses above and beyond its ability to repel a wide range of substances. A whole range of surface properties can now be tuned, or switched on and off on demand, through stimulus-induced deformation of the elastic material," Aizenberg said.

"This sophisticated new class of adaptive materials being designed by the Institute's Adaptive Materials Technologies platform led by Joanna Aizenberg have the potential to be game-changers in everything from oil and gas pipelines, to microfluidic and optical systems, building design and construction, textiles, and more," said Wyss Founding Director Donald Ingber, M.D., Ph.D.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard.

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

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Journal Reference:

1. Xi Yao, Yuhang Hu, Alison Grinthal, Tak-Sing Wong, L. Mahadevan, Joanna Aizenberg. Adaptive fluid-infused porous films with tunable transparency and wettability. Nature Materials, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nmat3598

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

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

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/strange_science/~3/A0jhz_88ZzI/130408085127.htm

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Hillary Clinton's every public move generates buzz

NEW YORK (AP) ? Young supporters hold signs outside Hillary Rodham Clinton's speeches urging her to run for president. Audiences listen with rapt attention as she discusses the plight of women and girls in developing countries.

Even a long-expected book deal announcement generates lots of chatter.

Not long after Clinton stepped down as President Barack Obama's secretary of state, the "will she or won't she" question is already following her around like the activists who held dark blue "Ready for Hillary" signs outside speeches at the Kennedy Center in Washington and New York's Lincoln Center.

This past week, Clinton came off a two-month break with a soft roll-out of sorts. She gave her first two public speeches since leaving the State Department, released details of a book scheduled for June 2014 and plans to join an advisory board of the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition.

The mere makings of a pubic schedule for the runner-up of the 2008 Democratic presidential race is enough to get political tongues wagging over what it all means for the 2016 campaign. The speeches and news coverage offered an early indication of some of what awaits her as she considers whether to seek the White House again in three years: adoring supporters young and old, former political advisers to her husband, Bill, begging her to run, and potential rivals sizing her up.

Tina Brown, editor in chief of Newsweek and the Daily Beast, which sponsored the meeting where Clinton spoke Friday, captured the buzz when introducing her.

"Of course," Brown said, "the big question now about Hillary is, what's next?" That elicited loud cheers ? but no answer from the woman beside her on the stage.

Clinton avoided presidential politics, devoting a half-hour speech at the annual Women in the World conference in New York to the status of women across the globe.

Pointing to the U.S., she said America's position as a world leader demands that it devote full attention to empowering women to participate in the economy and society fully. She called for equal pay for women, allowing women to take advantage of family and medical leave from their jobs and encouraging women and girls to pursue careers in math and science.

"This truly is the unfinished business of the 21st century, and it is the work we are called to do," Clinton said. "I look forward to being your partner in all the days and years ahead. Let's keep fighting for opportunity and dignity."

The 65-year-old former first lady has said she has no plans to pursue the White House again but has refrained from ruling anything out. That's the standard disclaimer of people who very often decide to make such plans later, or sometimes don't.

Many Democrats view her as a worthy successor to Obama, with whom she waged a fierce struggle for the party's nomination in 2008. Her popularity soared as secretary of state, although that may have been in part because she cast aside the sharp brand of politics that made her a polarizing figure at times in the past, in favor of diligent diplomacy.

Some Clinton loyalists have tried to tamp down the speculation, noting that the last presidential election was only six months ago. But James Carville, a former adviser to Bill Clinton, signed on with the Ready for Hillary political action committee on Thursday, urging supporters to help lay the groundwork for a Clinton campaign. Carville said the "enthusiasm and hunger" for a Clinton presidency was "unlike anything I've ever seen."

"It isn't worth squat to have the fastest car at the racetrack if there ain't any gas in the tank ? and that's why the work that Ready for Hillary PAC is doing is absolutely critical," Carville said. "We need to convert the hunger that's out there for Hillary's candidacy into a real grassroots organization."

Clinton is not expected to make a decision anytime soon and has outlined plans to write a memoir about her time at the State Department, advocate on behalf of women and girls and give speeches. With her book due out in the middle of 2014, she'll have an opportunity to travel the country in the months before the midterm elections.

Her biggest splash was her video announcement in support of gay marriage last month, a move that put her in line with most Democrats. Clinton had limited her comments on domestic policy as secretary of state and her departure has freed her to speak more openly about the issues.

Yet for the first time in 20 years, Clinton's schedule is open-ended. Her first paid speech will be April 24 in suburban Dallas, a day before she joins her husband Bill, Obama and political luminaries at the dedication of President George W. Bush's presidential library. Another paid speech in Grand Rapids, Mich., is on the books for June 17.

What remains clear is that until she makes a choice, her every word, appearance and association will be scrutinized. And she'll get plenty of encouragement.

About 50 young supporters, including many George Washington University students, gathered outside Clinton's first post-State Department speech at the annual Vital Voices Global Leadership Awards on Tuesday at the Kennedy Center. About a dozen Hillary backers gathered along Amsterdam Avenue for the New York speech. One of them, Aaron James Darr, a 22-year-old actor, held a homemade sign that showed Clinton's image in front of yellow and orange beams and proclaimed "Hillary 2016."

"I've been waiting for five years ? all of us have been waiting for five years," said Darr. He recently formed a Broadway for Hillary 2016 group and said he wants to plan a "flash mob" in Times Square with supporters holding Hillary signs.

Democrats see Clinton in a uniquely powerful spot and are willing to wait ? for now.

"It's the most enviable position to be in because all you have to do is breathe the air every day," said Hank Sheinkopf, a Democratic strategist who advised her husband's presidential campaign. "What political figure has that luxury?"

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Follow Ken Thomas on Twitter: http://twitter.com/AP_Ken_Thomas

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/hillary-clintons-every-public-move-generates-buzz-080718394--election.html

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Authorities: Escaped Texas inmates now in custody

SULPHUR SPRINGS, Texas (AP) ? Officials say someone trying to pawn stolen jewelry led them to the hideout of two inmates who escaped from an East Texas jail.

Capital murder suspect Brian Allen Tucker and admitted drug offender John Marlin King were returned Thursday to the Hopkins County Jail in Sulphur Springs.

Ricky Smith is the sheriff of nearby Delta County, where the arrests were made.

Smith says authorities were led to the men after a pawn shop clerk reported that someone had been trying to pawn jewelry left in a vehicle that had been stolen. Investigators believed the fugitives had stolen the vehicle.

Police then question the person who tried to pawn the jewelry. Smith says that person told them where the fugitives were hiding.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

A capital murder suspect and a convicted drug offender who escaped from an East Texas jail were captured Thursday, two days after they slipped past a fence only to be found in a neighboring county to the north.

Brian Allen Tucker and John Marlin King were captured in the town of Cooper, said Hopkins County sheriff's Deputy Alvin Jordan. He said they were being returned to the Hopkins County Jail in Sulphur Springs but had no other details.

Sheriff's officials said the inmates fled the jail Tuesday by scaling a fence or slipping through a gap in a perimeter fence in Sulphur Springs, about 75 miles northeast of Dallas. Officials said a maintenance person noticed a problem with the fence around a recreation yard used by female inmates. Hours later, deputies and other law enforcement were searching the woods and area east and northeast of the jail.

The men were found Thursday just 20 miles north of the jail, holed up in a barn behind a house, said Scott Cass, sheriff from nearby Lamar County, which helped in the capture.

Tucker was being held on $1 million bond in the 2011 death of Bobby Riley of Mahoney. Riley was found strangled in his home and some music instruments and firearms had been stolen. Jury selection in his murder trial was set to begin June 3. He previously was convicted of burglary and driving while intoxicated, and has been arrested several times for violating parole.

King was being held on several charges, including evading arrest, burglary and possession of a controlled substance. According to court documents, he pleaded guilty last month to the possession charge as a habitual offender and received a sentence of 40 years in prison.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/authorities-escaped-texas-inmates-captured-224431972.html

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'Mad Men' creator on criticizing Romney (CNN)

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UK's FTSE takes biggest weekly fall since Nov on U.S. jobs tally

Britain's top share index posted its worst weekly loss since November after falling for a third straight session on Friday when weak U.S. jobs data dampened expectations of steady recovery in the world's largest economy.

But traders said future market falls could be limited by sustained monetary stimulus from the U.S. Federal Reserve, which has been a key driver behind a 25 percent rally in the FTSE 100 since last summer.

The index of Britain's 100 largest shares, which derive around a quarter of their earnings from North America, fell 1.5 percent to 6,249 points, taking its weekly loss to 2.5 percent, on news that U.S. employers hired at the slowest pace in nine months in March.

The 88,000 new jobs created fell short of the lowest estimate in a Reuters poll of economists and of bearish trader expectations before the release.

"At first sight, it's very disappointing but with the Fed determined to keep (its stimulus programme) going until unemployment goes quite a lot lower, that should provide support," Richard Griffiths, associate director at Berkeley Futures, said.

The FTSE, which traded as low as 6,214 points after the data, cut losses in late trade. Traders said the Fed would have to keep pumping out money through its bond-buying programme, or quantitative easing (QE).

The Fed, which is buying $85 billion of Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities each month to boost growth and hiring, has said it will keep interest rates near zero until the unemployment rate falls to at least 6.5 percent, as long as

... contd.

Source: http://financialexpress.com/news/uks-ftse-takes-biggest-weekly-fall-since-nov-on-u.s.-jobs-tally/1098467/

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Obama said to pick mega-fundraiser Bruce Heyman for Canada (Washington Post)

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Visualized: Seattle Mariners unveil 'largest screen in Major League Baseball'

This week, the Seattle Mariners showed off a new 3,840 x 1,080, surface-mount LED display at Safeco Field -- one the team's PR department touts as the "largest in Major League Baseball and among the largest in all of sports." At 201.5 feet wide by 56.7 feet tall, its surface area of 11,425 square feet places it behind massive screens at Charlotte Motor Speedway (16,000 square feet) and Cowboys Stadium (11,520 square feet). That's good enough, the team said, to rank as the third-largest sports-venue display in North America and surpasses Kauffman Stadium's HD scoreboard as the largest in baseball. Roughly 1,200 individual panels make up the screen, offering a total of 4,147,200 pixels -- more pixels than the 2.6-megapixel Cowboys Stadium display, the team pointed out.

To feed their new HD beast, the team revamped its video control room and upgraded to high-def cameras throughout the stadium. A 64-bit operating system called VisionSOFT allows the team to mix in multiple video sources, from in-house animations and HD video feeds to out-of-town footage from broadcast partners. All told, the HD upgrade required about 3,000 each feet of power, video coax and Cat5 cables. Along with showing ads, stats and replays, the team will take advantage of the HD resolution to display social media updates from fans during games via Twitter, Google+ and other sources.

You can check out more shots of the new screen in action after the break.

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