"In rewriting these applications, some features from iWork '09 were not available for the initial release," says Apple's support document. "We plan to reintroduce some of these features in the next few releases and will continue to add brand new features on an ongoing basis."
Many of the most common complaints from users of iWork '09 are addressed in the document, including improvements to AppleScript support for Numbers and Keynote, more presenter display options in Keynote, keyboard shortcuts for styles in Pages, and many more.
If you've been holding off upgrading to iWork '13, remember that the installers do not replace your current iWork '09 versions, so you can continue to rely upon those for any features that Apple hasn't yet integrated. As to whether subsequent upgrades will return all the missing features, it's too early to say, but it seems likely that Apple is looking to make sure that its productivity suite helps make its customers, well, productive.
FILE - In this Oct. 30, 2013, file photo, President Barack Obama speaks at Boston's historic Faneuil Hall about the federal health care law. Obama says he's sorry Americans are losing health insurance plans he repeatedly said they could keep under his signature health care law. But the president stopped short of apologizing for making those promises in the first place. "I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he said in an interview Thursday, Nov. 7 with NBC News. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia, File)
FILE - In this Oct. 30, 2013, file photo, President Barack Obama speaks at Boston's historic Faneuil Hall about the federal health care law. Obama says he's sorry Americans are losing health insurance plans he repeatedly said they could keep under his signature health care law. But the president stopped short of apologizing for making those promises in the first place. "I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he said in an interview Thursday, Nov. 7 with NBC News. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama says he's sorry Americans are losing health insurance plans he repeatedly said they could keep under his signature health care law. But the president stopped short of apologizing for making those promises in the first place.
"I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he said in an interview Thursday with NBC News.
He added: "We've got to work hard to make sure that they know we hear them, and we are going to do everything we can to deal with folks who find themselves in a tough position as a consequence of this."
The president's apology comes as the White House tries to combat a cascade of troubles surrounding the rollout of the health care law often referred to as "Obamacare." The healthcare.gov website that was supposed to be an easy portal for Americans to purchase insurance has been riddled by technical issues. And with at least 3.5 million Americans receiving cancellation notices from their insurance companies, there's new scrutiny aimed at the way the president tried to sell the law to the public in the first place.
Much of the focus is on the president's promise that Americans who liked their insurance coverage would be able to keep it. He repeated the line often, both as the bill was debated in Congress and after it was signed into law.
But the measure itself made that promise almost impossible to keep. It mandated that insurance coverage must meet certain standards and that policies that fell short could no longer be sold except through a grandfathering process, meaning some policies were always expected to disappear.
The White House says under those guidelines, fewer than 5 percent of Americans will have to change their coverage. But in a nation of more than 300 million people, 5 percent is about 15 million people.
Officials argue that those people being forced to change plans will end up with better coverage and that subsidies offered by the government will help offset any increased costs.
"We weren't as clear as we needed to be in terms of the changes that were taking place," Obama told NBC. "And I want to do everything we can to make sure that people are finding themselves in a good position, a better position than they were before this law happened."
The president's critics have accused him of misleading the public about changes that were coming under the law, which remains unpopular with many Americans and a target for congressional Republicans.
Obama dismissed that criticism, saying "I meant what I said" and insisting that his administration was operating in "good faith." He acknowledged that the administration "didn't do a good enough job in terms of how we crafted the law" but did not specify what changes might be made.
Sign-ups for the new health care marketplaces opened Oct. 1. People have six months to enroll before facing a penalty.
Some lawmakers — including Democrats — have called on the White House to delay the penalty or extend the enrollment period because of the website woes that have prevented many used from signing up. Obama said he remains confident that anyone who wants to buy insurance will be able to do so.
"Keep in mind that the open enrollment period, the period during which you can buy health insurance is available all the way until March 31," he said. "And we're only five weeks into it."
Bloomberg Businessweek has an in-depth report today alleging that electronics supplier Flextronics used recruiters who charged workers exorbitant fees to place them in Malaysian plants, confiscating their passports and deserting them in employee housing without food when production idled.
FILE - In this May 31, 2002 file photo, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat pauses during the weekly Muslim Friday prayers in his headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Al-Jazeera is reporting that a team of Swiss scientists has found moderate evidence that longtime Palestinian leader Arafat died of poisoning. The Arab satellite channel published a copy of what it said was the scientists' report on its website on Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013.(AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis, File)
FILE - In this May 31, 2002 file photo, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat pauses during the weekly Muslim Friday prayers in his headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Al-Jazeera is reporting that a team of Swiss scientists has found moderate evidence that longtime Palestinian leader Arafat died of poisoning. The Arab satellite channel published a copy of what it said was the scientists' report on its website on Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013.(AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis, File)
Swiss professor Francois Bochud, left, director of the Chuv Radiophysics Institute, IRA, and Swiss professor Patrice Mangin, right, director of the University Center of Legal Medicine in Lausanne, CURML, speak on a forensics report concerning the late President Yasser Arafat during a press conference at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, CHUV, in Lausanne, Switzerland, Thurday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss, French and Russian teams took samples of the remains after exhuming Arafat's body in Ramallah, and submitted results to the Palestinian Authority on Nov. 5. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)
Swiss professor Francois Bochud, left, director of the Chuv Radiophysics Institute, IRA, and Swiss professor Patrice Mangin, right, director of the University Center of Legal Medicine in Lausanne, CURML, pose with a forensics report concerning the late President Yasser Arafat during a press conference on of the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, CHUV, in Lausanne, Switzerland, Thurday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss, French and Russian teams took samples of the remains after exhuming Arafat's body in Ramallah, and submitted results to the Palestinian Authority on Nov. 5. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)
A forensics report concerning the late President Yasser Arafat is presented during a press conference of the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, CHUV, in Lausanne, Switzerland, Thurday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss, French and Russian teams took samples of the remains after exhuming Arafat's body in Ramallah, and submitted results to the Palestinian Authority on Nov. 5. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)
Palestinian Hanadi Kharma, paints a mural depicting the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in the West Bank city of Nablus, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2013. Swiss scientists have found evidence suggesting Yasser Arafat may have been poisoned with a radioactive substance, a TV station reported on Wednesday, prompting new allegations by his widow that the Palestinian leader was the victim of a "shocking" crime. (AP Photo/Nasser Ishtayeh)
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Yasser Arafat's mysterious 2004 death turned into a whodunit Thursday after Swiss scientists who examined his remains said the Palestinian leader was probably poisoned with radioactive polonium.
Yet hard proof remains elusive, and nine years on, tracking down anyone who might have slipped minuscule amounts of the lethal substance into Arafat's food or drink could be difficult.
A new investigation could also prove embarrassing — and not just for Israel, which the Palestinians have long accused of poisoning their leader and which has denied any role.
The Palestinians themselves could come under renewed scrutiny, since Arafat was holed up in his Israeli-besieged West Bank compound in the months before his death, surrounded by advisers, staff and bodyguards.
Arafat died at a French military hospital on Nov. 11, 2004, at age 75, a month after suddenly falling violently ill at his compound. At the time, French doctors said he died of a stroke and had a blood-clotting problem, but records were inconclusive about what caused that condition.
The Swiss scientists said that they found elevated traces of polonium-210 and lead in Arafat's remains that could not have occurred naturally, and that the timeframe of Arafat's illness and death was consistent with poisoning from ingesting polonium.
"Our results reasonably support the poisoning theory," Francois Bochud, director of Switzerland's Institute of Radiation Physics, which carried out the investigation, said at a news conference.
Bochud and Patrice Mangin, director of the Lausanne University Hospital's forensics center, said they tested and ruled out innocent explanations, such as accidental poisoning.
"I think we can eliminate this possibility because, as you can imagine, you cannot find polonium everywhere. It's a very rare toxic substance," Mangin told The Associated Press.
Palestinian officials, including Arafat's successor, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, had no comment on the substance of the report but promised a continued investigation.
The findings are certain to revive Palestinian allegations against Israel, a nuclear power. Polonium can be a byproduct of the chemical processing of uranium, but usually is made artificially in a nuclear reactor or a particle accelerator.
Arafat's widow, Suha, called on the Palestinian leadership to seek justice for her husband, saying, "It's clear this is a crime."
Speaking by phone from the Qatari capital Doha, she did not mention Israel but argued that only countries with nuclear capabilities have access to polonium.
Israel has repeatedly denied a role in Arafat's death and did so again Thursday. Paul Hirschson, a Foreign Ministry official, dismissed the claim as "hogwash."
"We couldn't be bothered to" kill him, Hirschson said. "If anyone remembers the political reality at the time, Arafat was completely isolated. His own people were barely speaking to him. There's no logical reason for Israel to have wanted to do something like this."
In his final years, Arafat was being accused by Israel and the U.S. of condoning and even encouraging Palestinian attacks against Israelis instead of working for a peace deal. In late 2004, Israeli tanks no longer surrounded his compound, but Arafat was afraid to leave for fear of not being allowed to return.
Shortly after his death, the Palestinians launched their own investigation, questioning dozens of people in Arafat's compound, including staff, bodyguards and officials, but no suspects emerged.
Security around Arafat was easily breached toward the end of his life. Aides have described him as impulsive, unable to resist tasting gifts of chocolate or trying out medicines brought by visitors from abroad.
The investigation was dormant until the satellite TV station Al-Jazeera persuaded Arafat's widow last year to hand over a bag with her husband's underwear, headscarves and other belongings. After finding traces of polonium in biological stains on the clothing, investigators dug up his grave in his Ramallah compound earlier this year to take bone and soil samples.
Investigators noted Thursday that they could not account for the chain of custody of the items that were in the bag, leaving open the possibility of tampering.
However, the latest findings are largely based on Arafat's remains and burial soil, and in this case, tampering appears highly improbable, Bochud said.
"I think this can really be ruled out because it was really difficult to access the body," he said. "When we opened the tomb, we were all together."
Polonium-210 is the same substance that killed KGB agent-turned-Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006.
"It's quite difficult to understand why (Arafat) might have had any polonium, if he was just in his headquarters in Ramallah," said Alastair Hay, a professor of environmental toxicology at the University of Leeds who was not involved in the investigation.
"He wasn't somebody who was moving in and out of atomic energy plants or dealing with radioactive isotopes."
___
John Heilprin reported from Lausanne, Switzerland. Associated Press writers Daniel Estrin in Jerusalem and Lori Hinnant in Paris and AP Medical Writer Maria Cheng in London contributed to this report.
The old-model college professor could afford to write for free. Times have changed.
Photo by Shutterstock
Should writers work for free? What if those writers are academics?
That is a real question up for debate in several media outlets this past week. But I’d like to ask why we work for free and why we don’t shame organizations that expect us to.
The Internet has created a bottomless void that requires content. In a classic case of how expansion breeds stratified access, an increase in platforms that require writing has resulted in fewer outlets that pay writers to write. In the New York Times recently, Tim Kreider argued that he cannot afford to write for free. He encourages other writers to reject the freemium culture for the benefit of all who make a living by penning the word. In a column for the Chronicle of Higher Education, Sarah Kendzior says that journalists may find it beneficial to write for free occasionally, but that academics should never do the same, even though “[p]ublishers like to evoke academics’ professional status to justify not paying them.”
Kendzior’s argument might seem like backward logic: Why shouldn’t privileged elite academics give back to the public good by writing for free? Her larger point is about the profit structure of academic publishers, and it is a good one; but there is another argument to be made that’s more specific to the structural change of labor occurring in higher education. It is a reality largely hidden in plain sight as wars, government spying, and rising inequality dominate our national attention span, but the life of the mind is not the elite gig it once was.
Nearly two-thirds of all those teaching in colleges and universities aren’t the tenured professors in corduroy sports coats familiar from pop culture, inoculated from layoffs and depressed wages. They are instead adjuncts—who work on piecemeal teaching contracts for an average of $2,700 per class, per semester/quarter—and other non-tenure-track instructors. Even among the less precarious professoriate, there’s a push to dismantle tenure and replace it with term-limit contracts. Academics who write for free under these conditions are not doing it to prove their superstar bona fides. Many are writing for free hoping to build a career path where increasingly there is not one, doing work for which they have trained for a decade or more only to find an economy that isn’t much interested in paying a premium for expertise.
Withholding our creative contributions from causes and organizations that reflect our values does little to challenge systematic abuse.
Let’s get this out of the way: I have written for free. My membership in the club of Real Academics is constantly being negotiated, but early in my doctoral career I wrote for outlets without payment. Like Atlantic writer Ta-Nehesi Coates, I made my calculation relative to how I understood my social position. I am a black woman with a non-elite higher-education pedigree. When you are at Harvard or Yale, you do not need much else to be considered an expert on anything, really, whether you have studied it or not. You are at an Ivy League institution. We assume you can comment with gravitas on everything from global warming to Michelle Obama’s fashion choices. Without those types of Ivy League status baubles, it is hard to cultivate gravitas. Contributing to public discourse is even more complicated for women and minorities, both of whom are underrepresented in both old and new media. The op-ed pages of major news outlets, which are overwhelmingly white and male, are gatekeepers to Sunday news shows where experts influence public opinion. With the recent exception of Up With Chris Hayes on MSNBC, the Sunday-establishment television punditry has been a near whitewash, with a minority view of white men representing the views of an America that gets browner every year.
Like many minority scholars, I accept responsibility for countering this imbalance in who is deemed “expert.” But, like money, it takes status to make status. And there are few mainstream venues that invite women and people of color to speak on more than “women’s issues” or “race issues” but on issues germane to their actual expertise in a field of study. In many ways, gender, race, and class issues in academia become pipeline issues for media gatekeepers and the professional pundit class. How can academics who already exist at the margins shape discourse that always comes first for women and minorities, and also buck the structural trend of publishers expecting them to write for free? There is no easy answer.
The economics of demanding free content, in a field flush with more producers than paying outlets, is a formidable barrier. So are the economics of higher education, which produces more experts than dignified, full-pay work for experts. Working for prestige without accompanying cash is, in the end, a Faustian bargain. But so too is hunkering down amid the crumbling academic labor structure, especially for minority scholars who have long been underrepresented and systematically denied tenure. For them, public scholarship can be less about exposure than indemnity. How do we expand access to these voices without further marginalizing them?
I no longer write for free … unless I do. After a solid track record of payment for my content, a local alternative newspaper approached me a few months ago. It is a nonprofit that raises hell in a conservative Southern media market. I like hell-raisers. I have, on occasion, raised a little myself. I also like insurgent media. This newspaper could not afford to pay me, something the editor said upfront. I gladly gifted the paper the content. I had published the original essay at my own website first, making my ownership of it clear. The editor asked for the content, rather than assuming that because it was on the Internet it could be borrowed without my explicit permission. He explicitly expressed an understanding of the value of the work and that he was unable, not unwilling, to compensate me for it. In short, he respected my professionalism and my work. That the outlet also shares my values made the contribution a no-brainer for me. Judging by the reader mail I received after the paper published the essay, it sparked a meaningful conversation about an emotionally laden subject.
My choice to publish that essay for free is not the same as writing for free. I had choice and control. How do we give other academics and writers that same kind of choice and control? Individually, we can manage our own spaces. Be it in the form of blogs or e-books, the adjunctification of academic labor and media means exerting control over what we write. And, as Kendozier argues, we should demand respect for our work, even if respect is not always indicated as payment. Withholding our creative contributions from causes and organizations that reflect our values does little to challenge systematic abuse. However, expecting that our work be respected and only valuing gatekeepers that respect us can resist exploitation. More than writing for free, it is the assumption by gatekeepers that one should write for free that needs to be disrupted. The editor at that alternative newspaper could not afford to pay me, but that he expected that I should be paid worked very much in favor of my decision to write for free.
Ultimately, though, systematic abuses require systemic change. With the economics of labor against us, we have to appeal to cultural norms. Children working in factories can absolutely maximize profit returns, but we’ve (mostly) decided that child labor is a moral violation. In the same way, for-profit organizations that abuse labor to maximize profits should pay a price in legitimacy. That requires organizing, agitating, and writing about the hard choices faced by so many—even if, on occasion, we write about it for free.
FILE - This Sept. 7, 2012 file photo shows Kanye West at the Alexander Wang collection during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York. West pleaded not guilty through his attorney to misdemeanor battery and attempted grand theft charges in a Los Angeles court on Thursday Nov. 7, 2013. (Photo by Dario Cantatore/Invision/AP, File)
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Kanye West has pleaded not guilty to misdemeanor battery and attempted grand theft in a case filed over a scuffle with a celebrity photographer earlier this year.
Attorney Blair Berk entered the plea on the rapper's behalf Thursday in a Los Angeles court. West was charged with two misdemeanors in September over a July altercation with paparazzo Daniel Ramos at Los Angeles International Airport.
Prosecutors declined to file felony charges against West, but decided to pursue the misdemeanors. Each carries a penalty of up to six months in jail or a $1,000 fine.
Ramos claims West punched him in an unprovoked attack and wrestled his camera to the ground on July 19.
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The father of Bristol Palin's son is seeking at least equal custody.
Levi Johnston filed a petition for custody last month saying he wants 4-year-old Tripp to be in his mother's and father's lives equally.
The couple had agreed in 2010 that Palin would have primary physical custody and the two would share legal custody, according to Thomas Van Flein, Palin's attorney at that time. Johnston was given visitation and had agreed to pay child support.
Palin's current attorney, John Tiemessen, said that as of Oct. 15, the Child Support Services Division reported that Johnston owed about $66,000 in back support.
Palin and Johnston were thrust into the national spotlight as expectant, unwed teenagers in 2008, when Palin's mother, Sarah Palin, was tapped as the Republican vice presidential candidate.
Johnston and Bristol Palin had an on-off relationship before splitting for good. He has since married and has a daughter.
Bristol Palin has appeared in several reality series, including one for Lifetime that documented her life as a single mom.
Informal elite network changed international politics in the 1970s
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
7-Nov-2013
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Contact: Dino Knudsen dinoknudsen@hum.ku.dk 45-28-14-44-38 University of Copenhagen
In the 1970s, a network of businessmen, politicians, and academics from the US, Europe, and Japan, also known as the Trilateral Commission, changed the way international politics was conducted. Informal links between Commission members, governments, and organisations paved the way for recognition of the new economic superpower Japan as an equal partner in international politics, concludes University of Copenhagen historian Dino Knudsen, who is the first researcher to get access to the Commission's own archives.
In 1973, American financier David Rockefeller formed the Trilateral Commission out of fear that the world's three industrial centres the US, Europe, and Japan were drifting apart. The aim of the Commission was to ensure that particularly the American government understood that it had to collaborate and negotiate with Europe and new economic superpower Japan. The Trilateral Commission is still active and has headquarters in Washington, Tokyo, and Paris.
"The Trilateral Commission must be credited with the inclusion of Japan as an equal partner of Europe and the US; the launch of the G7 meetings, which Japan took part in, was in many respects merely a formalisation of the Commission's informal political and diplomatic efforts," explains PhD Dino Knudsen, the first historian who has gained access to the Trilateral Commission's own hitherto closed archives.
He has just published the results of his extensive archival research in the PhD dissertation 'The Trilateral Commission The Global Dawn of Informal Elite Governance and Diplomacy', which he defended at University of Copenhagen 4 November 2013.
Hidden elitist governance
In the beginning of the 1970's, in the context of the Vietnam War, many Americans began to voice demands for a democratisation of foreign policy decision-making processes. But with the foundation of the Trilateral Commission, elite circles got a refuge from public scrutiny, where they could seek influence on foreign policy without being held accountable.
"The Commission's modus operandi constitutes an obvious democratic dilemma; it is an exclusive, elitist organisation that attempts to exert influence on the political sphere but secretly," Dino Knudsen points out and adds:
"It is important for the Commission to strike a balance between being independent from state bodies but at the same time having strong ties to formal political power. Many members hold or have held political office or top positions in businesses, and many are influential opinion makers with important networks in formal political circles, e.g. Henry Kissinger, Jimmy Carter, George W. H. Bush, Mario Monti, and Romano Prodi.""
Dino Knudsen concludes that we need to reconsider the way we think of decision-making in international politics in light of the Trilateral Commission's work. Today, politics and diplomacy are, thanks to the Trilateral Commission and similar organizations, the results of collaborative processes in transnational elite networks. And these networks are informal but highly influential actors on the political stage.
###
Contact
PhD Dino Knudsen
University of Copenhagen
Phone: + 45 28 14 44 38
Mail: dinoknudsen@hum.ku.dk
Press officer Carsten Munk Hansen
Faculty of Humanities
Phone: + 45 28 75 80 23
Mail: carstenhansen@hum.ku.dk
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Informal elite network changed international politics in the 1970s
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
7-Nov-2013
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Contact: Dino Knudsen dinoknudsen@hum.ku.dk 45-28-14-44-38 University of Copenhagen
In the 1970s, a network of businessmen, politicians, and academics from the US, Europe, and Japan, also known as the Trilateral Commission, changed the way international politics was conducted. Informal links between Commission members, governments, and organisations paved the way for recognition of the new economic superpower Japan as an equal partner in international politics, concludes University of Copenhagen historian Dino Knudsen, who is the first researcher to get access to the Commission's own archives.
In 1973, American financier David Rockefeller formed the Trilateral Commission out of fear that the world's three industrial centres the US, Europe, and Japan were drifting apart. The aim of the Commission was to ensure that particularly the American government understood that it had to collaborate and negotiate with Europe and new economic superpower Japan. The Trilateral Commission is still active and has headquarters in Washington, Tokyo, and Paris.
"The Trilateral Commission must be credited with the inclusion of Japan as an equal partner of Europe and the US; the launch of the G7 meetings, which Japan took part in, was in many respects merely a formalisation of the Commission's informal political and diplomatic efforts," explains PhD Dino Knudsen, the first historian who has gained access to the Trilateral Commission's own hitherto closed archives.
He has just published the results of his extensive archival research in the PhD dissertation 'The Trilateral Commission The Global Dawn of Informal Elite Governance and Diplomacy', which he defended at University of Copenhagen 4 November 2013.
Hidden elitist governance
In the beginning of the 1970's, in the context of the Vietnam War, many Americans began to voice demands for a democratisation of foreign policy decision-making processes. But with the foundation of the Trilateral Commission, elite circles got a refuge from public scrutiny, where they could seek influence on foreign policy without being held accountable.
"The Commission's modus operandi constitutes an obvious democratic dilemma; it is an exclusive, elitist organisation that attempts to exert influence on the political sphere but secretly," Dino Knudsen points out and adds:
"It is important for the Commission to strike a balance between being independent from state bodies but at the same time having strong ties to formal political power. Many members hold or have held political office or top positions in businesses, and many are influential opinion makers with important networks in formal political circles, e.g. Henry Kissinger, Jimmy Carter, George W. H. Bush, Mario Monti, and Romano Prodi.""
Dino Knudsen concludes that we need to reconsider the way we think of decision-making in international politics in light of the Trilateral Commission's work. Today, politics and diplomacy are, thanks to the Trilateral Commission and similar organizations, the results of collaborative processes in transnational elite networks. And these networks are informal but highly influential actors on the political stage.
###
Contact
PhD Dino Knudsen
University of Copenhagen
Phone: + 45 28 14 44 38
Mail: dinoknudsen@hum.ku.dk
Press officer Carsten Munk Hansen
Faculty of Humanities
Phone: + 45 28 75 80 23
Mail: carstenhansen@hum.ku.dk
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Share
]
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Lyoto Machida made a huge impact in the middleweight division with his first-round knockout over Mark Munoz at UFC Fight Night 30 in London. "The Dragon" returns to the Octagon on Feb. 8 in Jaragua do Sul, Brazil, against Gegard Mousasi, and he needs a win to keep chasing the middleweight title.
"Mousasi is a tough fighter, I’ve seen his fights before and he won titles in other promotions, but I will only focus on his game in my last four or five weeks of camp," Machida said during a Q&A with the fans in Goiania, Brazil on Wednesday.
"He is right below me in the UFC rankings and a win over him would make me achieve even more in this division. But if I lose this fight, it would be complicated. I would fall from fifth place to hell [laughs]," Machida said.
Machida believes he could earn a shot at the middleweight title with a win over Mousasi, a former DREAM and Strikeforce champion who returns to the middleweight division after going 7-1-1 as a light-heavyweight.
"I'm ready (to fight for the title) already, but I have to follow the rankings," he said. "I don’t like to rush things. The right moment will come. I want to keep fighting because it's important for me to keep this rhythm. I want to feel well in this division, this is my place."
Anderson Silva, Machida’s teammate, fights Chris Weidman on Dec. 28 for the middleweight belt at UFC 168, and "The Dragon" doesn’t plan to fight another friend inside the Octagon.
"He said he would never fight me, that we are like brothers," Machida said. "Anderson told me he has other goals, that he was the champion for a long time and he's focused on other goals now, like superfights. He said he would even leave the title to not fight me.
"But we’ll see what happens. I still have to fight Gegard Mousasi in Jaragua do Sul, in February, and I want to think on this fight first. One step at a time."
Robots from space lead to 1-stop breast cancer diagnosis treatment
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
6-Nov-2013
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Contact: Jessica Eagan Jessica.W.Eagan@nasa.gov 256-544-3749 NASA/Johnson Space Center
We may not be driving flying cars to work yet, but that doesn't mean we don't have a lot to be excited about from technology advances related to the space age. Instead of zipping past traffic jams, International Space Station-derived robotic capabilities are giving us a fast pass to life-saving surgical techniques with cancer-fighting finesse.
According to the National Cancer Institute, an estimated 232,340 women and 2,240 men will be diagnosed with breast cancer by the end of 2013 alone. From that, about 39,620 women and 410 men will not survive.
The goal for a team of collaborative researchers with the Centre for Surgical Invention and Innovation (CSii) in Canada is to reduce those numbers significantly. They are scheduled to enter an advanced platform into clinical trials this fall for use in the early diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer.
The main player besides the medical staff is a robot. But not just any robot. This one's technology was designed for use aboard the International Space Station by MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) for the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
Researchers created the Image-Guided Autonomous Robot (IGAR) from a long line of computerized heavy lifters and maintenance performers for the space shuttle and space station: CSA's Canadarm, Canadarm2 and Dextre. In dealing with breast cancer, IGAR is expected to provide increased access, precision and dexterity, resulting in highly accurate and minimally invasive procedures.
"The IGAR platform moves the use of robotics in surgery to a new dimension, allowing the robot to act in an automated fashion after programming by a physician," said Dr. Mehran Anvari, chief executive officer and scientific director at CSii. "This technology has been practiced in manufacturing and in space, but is new to medicine."
IGAR is designed to work in combination with an MRI scanner, which is highly sensitive to early detection of suspicious breast lesions before they possibly turn into a much larger problem. The radiologist uses specially designed software to tag the potential target and tell IGAR what path to take. The software then helps the radiologist to make sure he or she is accurately hitting the right area. IGAR has a special tool interface that can be used to define adaptors for any needle-based biopsy device or a wide range of instruments that remove body tissue, known in the medical world as needle-based ablation devices.
"Our automated robot is capable of placing the biopsy and ablation tools within 1 mm (about three-tenths of an inch) of the lesion in question with a high degree of targeting accuracy, improving sampling, reducing the morbidity and pain of the procedure, reducing time in the MRI suite and saving significant dollars as a consequence," said Anvari. "It also will allow all radiologists to perform this procedure equally well, regardless of the number of cases per year and move the site of treatment from operation room to radiology suite for a significant number of patients."
The radiologist can operate in the challenging magnetic environment of the MRI, providing access to leading tumor-targeting technology. The robot fits on the patient bed, so it can travel in and out of the MRI opening easily. This in turn simplifies the flow of patients in the department, which can be challenging to many radiologists, optimizing patient time to diagnose.
IGAR removes most of the "manual" aspects of the procedure and reduces user-dependence and the level of training required. This allows for a standard process regardless of experience. An expert will program remotely once the patient is in the MRI suite. A physician will then supervise only to make sure the patient is comfortable and there are no complications, even if he or she has limited knowledge of the procedure.
"I've been teaching MRI-guided breast biopsy for years and there are many steps in the procedure that are operator-dependent," said Dr. Nathalie Duchesne, co-investigator on the clinical study and breast radiologist at the Hospital Saint-Sacrement in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. She will be performing the first of three clinical trials. "These steps may prevent good sampling of the lesions if it's not done properly. I believe IGAR will take care of this. It will subsequently decrease the time of the exam, ensure good sampling and increase patient's comfort during the exam. We think that IGAR will improve sample collection because it will be less operator dependent and it will be constant from one doctor to another, from one patient to the other, from one lesion to the other."
"This technology lays the foundation for a family of telerobotic systems," said Anvari. "It has the potential to change the way we think about performing these interventions and ensures that specialized, highly-trained doctors are focusing on the activities to which their training is best suited. We believe this technology will improve efficiency in the health care system by streamlining clinical workflow and allowing highly-skilled radiologists to extend their care to a wider population through teleoperation."
This robotic technology is not limited only to biopsies. "I think IGAR is paving the way for the minimally-invasive excision and treatment of small tumors that are often found incidentally during pre-op MRI," said Duchesne.
The trend toward breast preservation has brought on the importance of lumpectomies. For tumors that may require this procedure because they are invisible to ultrasound and X-ray mammography, researchers are currently developing the ability for IGAR to deploy a radioactive seed -- smaller than a grain of rice -- near the area of interest. During surgery, the seed can be located with a detector, allowing the doctor to identify the lesion and remove it with increased accuracy and patient comfort. It's expected that follow-up surgeries also will be greatly reduced.
So, from the space station to the ground, robotic arms lend a hand, whether it be to grab an arriving resupply vehicle or to help save more lives.
Sandra Kay Yow, head coach of the North Carolina State Wolfpack women's basketball team from 1975 to 2009 and an advocate of breast cancer awareness, once said before she lost her battle in 2009, "When life kicks you, let it kick you forward." With researchers taking to the International Space Station and then bringing their beneficial technologies back down to help lives on Earth, we are on a journey forward hopefully to one day make cancer history.
###
By Jessica Eagan
International Space Station Program Science Office
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center
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Robots from space lead to 1-stop breast cancer diagnosis treatment
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
6-Nov-2013
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Contact: Jessica Eagan Jessica.W.Eagan@nasa.gov 256-544-3749 NASA/Johnson Space Center
We may not be driving flying cars to work yet, but that doesn't mean we don't have a lot to be excited about from technology advances related to the space age. Instead of zipping past traffic jams, International Space Station-derived robotic capabilities are giving us a fast pass to life-saving surgical techniques with cancer-fighting finesse.
According to the National Cancer Institute, an estimated 232,340 women and 2,240 men will be diagnosed with breast cancer by the end of 2013 alone. From that, about 39,620 women and 410 men will not survive.
The goal for a team of collaborative researchers with the Centre for Surgical Invention and Innovation (CSii) in Canada is to reduce those numbers significantly. They are scheduled to enter an advanced platform into clinical trials this fall for use in the early diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer.
The main player besides the medical staff is a robot. But not just any robot. This one's technology was designed for use aboard the International Space Station by MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) for the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
Researchers created the Image-Guided Autonomous Robot (IGAR) from a long line of computerized heavy lifters and maintenance performers for the space shuttle and space station: CSA's Canadarm, Canadarm2 and Dextre. In dealing with breast cancer, IGAR is expected to provide increased access, precision and dexterity, resulting in highly accurate and minimally invasive procedures.
"The IGAR platform moves the use of robotics in surgery to a new dimension, allowing the robot to act in an automated fashion after programming by a physician," said Dr. Mehran Anvari, chief executive officer and scientific director at CSii. "This technology has been practiced in manufacturing and in space, but is new to medicine."
IGAR is designed to work in combination with an MRI scanner, which is highly sensitive to early detection of suspicious breast lesions before they possibly turn into a much larger problem. The radiologist uses specially designed software to tag the potential target and tell IGAR what path to take. The software then helps the radiologist to make sure he or she is accurately hitting the right area. IGAR has a special tool interface that can be used to define adaptors for any needle-based biopsy device or a wide range of instruments that remove body tissue, known in the medical world as needle-based ablation devices.
"Our automated robot is capable of placing the biopsy and ablation tools within 1 mm (about three-tenths of an inch) of the lesion in question with a high degree of targeting accuracy, improving sampling, reducing the morbidity and pain of the procedure, reducing time in the MRI suite and saving significant dollars as a consequence," said Anvari. "It also will allow all radiologists to perform this procedure equally well, regardless of the number of cases per year and move the site of treatment from operation room to radiology suite for a significant number of patients."
The radiologist can operate in the challenging magnetic environment of the MRI, providing access to leading tumor-targeting technology. The robot fits on the patient bed, so it can travel in and out of the MRI opening easily. This in turn simplifies the flow of patients in the department, which can be challenging to many radiologists, optimizing patient time to diagnose.
IGAR removes most of the "manual" aspects of the procedure and reduces user-dependence and the level of training required. This allows for a standard process regardless of experience. An expert will program remotely once the patient is in the MRI suite. A physician will then supervise only to make sure the patient is comfortable and there are no complications, even if he or she has limited knowledge of the procedure.
"I've been teaching MRI-guided breast biopsy for years and there are many steps in the procedure that are operator-dependent," said Dr. Nathalie Duchesne, co-investigator on the clinical study and breast radiologist at the Hospital Saint-Sacrement in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. She will be performing the first of three clinical trials. "These steps may prevent good sampling of the lesions if it's not done properly. I believe IGAR will take care of this. It will subsequently decrease the time of the exam, ensure good sampling and increase patient's comfort during the exam. We think that IGAR will improve sample collection because it will be less operator dependent and it will be constant from one doctor to another, from one patient to the other, from one lesion to the other."
"This technology lays the foundation for a family of telerobotic systems," said Anvari. "It has the potential to change the way we think about performing these interventions and ensures that specialized, highly-trained doctors are focusing on the activities to which their training is best suited. We believe this technology will improve efficiency in the health care system by streamlining clinical workflow and allowing highly-skilled radiologists to extend their care to a wider population through teleoperation."
This robotic technology is not limited only to biopsies. "I think IGAR is paving the way for the minimally-invasive excision and treatment of small tumors that are often found incidentally during pre-op MRI," said Duchesne.
The trend toward breast preservation has brought on the importance of lumpectomies. For tumors that may require this procedure because they are invisible to ultrasound and X-ray mammography, researchers are currently developing the ability for IGAR to deploy a radioactive seed -- smaller than a grain of rice -- near the area of interest. During surgery, the seed can be located with a detector, allowing the doctor to identify the lesion and remove it with increased accuracy and patient comfort. It's expected that follow-up surgeries also will be greatly reduced.
So, from the space station to the ground, robotic arms lend a hand, whether it be to grab an arriving resupply vehicle or to help save more lives.
Sandra Kay Yow, head coach of the North Carolina State Wolfpack women's basketball team from 1975 to 2009 and an advocate of breast cancer awareness, once said before she lost her battle in 2009, "When life kicks you, let it kick you forward." With researchers taking to the International Space Station and then bringing their beneficial technologies back down to help lives on Earth, we are on a journey forward hopefully to one day make cancer history.
###
By Jessica Eagan
International Space Station Program Science Office
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center
[
| E-mail
Share
]
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them. Or something like that. Anyway, awesome news for fans of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, as the tie-in title with Lego is now finally available on the App Store for the iPhone and iPad. Take the precious to Mordor and cast it into the fires of Mount Doom as you follow the story through all three chapters in the series.
Follow the epic storylines of the original The Lord of the Rings trilogy reimagined with the humor and endless variety of LEGO gameplay. Relive the legend of The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King through LEGO minifigures, as they explore wonders and solve timeless riddles. Orcs and fouler things await on this perilous path to Mount Doom but a Fellowship will be formed — Aragorn the Ranger, Gandalf the Wizard, Legolas the Elf, Gimli the Dwarf, Boromir Man of Gondor, and Frodo’s Hobbit friends Sam, Merry and Pippin all join in to help along the quest to destroy the Ring and return peace to the land.
Be advised, this is a huge download. 1.5GB to be precise, though if you're downloading over WiFi that needs to be 3GB – so it can first download, then install. If you download it via iTunes on the desktop you only need the 1.5GB. The Lego series of games haven't let us down so far for enjoyment and all round quality gaming in the touchscreen environment. So, if you're a fan of Lego, Lord of the Rings, or just good quality games grab it for $4.99 at the App Store now. There goes the weekend.
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