Conferences & Meetings 10/31/12 | Against-the-Grain.com

Career development opportunities from LILAC; the University of Maryland; ALCTS and Digital Book World

?LILAC 2013 ? Call for papers is now open.

LILAC 2013 will be held at The University of Manchester from 25-27 March 2013.

Please submit your proposal by completing the LILAC abstract submission form.

All proposals are blind refereed by our panel of reviewers.? Applicants will be notified by 12th December 2012 if they have been successful or otherwise. If you have any queries please contact papers@lilacconference.com.

Deadline for proposals:

• Call for papers opens?28 September 2012
• Call for papers closes 16th November 2012 at 1700 GMT

Notes for presenters at LILAC 2013

We welcome proposals which address one or more of this year?s conference themes:

• IL and employability
• IL and the digital future
• Transliteracy
• Future-proofing the IL practitioner
• Collaboration and partnerships
• Active learning and creative pedagogical approaches

Please do not send us a full paper; we require a 500 or 300 word abstract which will be sent to a panel of reviewers. We also require a short description of your paper (max. 50 words) which will be displayed when delegates are choosing their parallel sessions.

Please note: all presenters will be expected to register as delegates. They are eligible for the discounted / early bird rate.

All presentations will be made available on the IL Group slideshare account following the conference. Presenters should contact papers@lilacconference.com if they do not wish their presentation to be made publicly available.

?

Foundations in Intellectual Property?Management and Leadership

The Foundations in Intellectual Property?Management and Leadership course and elective workshops?help participants develop the expertise needed to manage business and educational changes influenced by the digital environment.

1. An online Professional Development certificate offering from the Center for Intellectual Property at UMUC).

2. Elective Workshops?are noncredit and includes lectures, supplemental readings, and live discussions with guests who are experts or practitioners in the field.

3. Participants in the certificate program must also take one elective workshop, included in the registration fee.

4. Earn 24 Continuing Education?Credits.

Spring 2013 Certification Course:?Foundations in Intellectual Property Management and Leadership?- March 18-May 10, 2013
Elective workshops may also be taken individually, outside of the certification program. Separate tuition fees apply. All workshops are offered online.

IPNA 601 ? Open Access (2-week elective*) January 14-25, 2013. See website for the ?list of instructors.

IPNA 603 ? Fair Use (2-week elective*) January?28-February 8, 2013. See?website for the list of instructors.

Two-week workshop pricing*:
$200 individual member
$237.50 free member
$250 non-member

?ALCTS webinar: The Role of Long-Term Storage in Digital Curation

Date: November 14, 2012
All webinars are one hour in length and begin at 11am Pacific, noon Mountain, 1pm Central, and 2pm Eastern time.

Description: This webinar introduces considerations for the long-term storage of digital content selected for preservation. This content must be stored in ways that align with good practice. The session will address issues related to the development of storage management policies, including file formats for deposit and preservation, the preservation of multiple copies, the locations of those copies, the characteristics of those locations, and the means for meeting long?term storage requirements.

This is the second session of a two part series titled ?From the Digital Dark Ages to a Digital Renaissance.? ?Part 1, The Art of Selecting Digital Content to Preserve, ?was ?October 10, 2012.

Presenters:?Laura Osterhout, Member Services Librarian at the Rochester Regional Library Council in Fairport, NY, has presented sessions on virtual reference, the basics of digitization projects, metadata, CONTENTdm, and digital preservation basics to various audiences throughout New York State, at the New York Library Association conference, at the CONTENTdm Eastern Users Meeting, and at the Reference Renaissance conference.

Erin Rhodes, Digital Projects and Education Coordinator at Colby College Special Collections in Waterville, Maine, has presented informally on basic approaches to the digitization of archival and special collections materials; technical metadata; and on teaching and using primary sources in archives to various audiences, including archival colleagues, Colby faculty, and students.

? Digital Book World Conference + Expo 2013 happening January 15th ? 17th in New York City

?The Digital Book World Conference?+ Expo? brings together over 1,000 publishing professionals focused on developing, building and transforming their organization to compete in the new digital publishing environment.

Developed in partnership with Mike Shatzkin, Michael Cader and Publishers Launch Conferences, Digital Book World will help you learn how to build a better business model, hire or train the right staff, improve discoverability, identify new opportunities and, most importantly, improve the profitability of your overall publishing operation.

Digital Book World is ? the single largest gathering of senior-level digital publishing executives anywhere and puts you in the same room with presidents, CEO?s, editors, marketers, publishers of large and small houses as well as agents, authors, booksellers, librarians and technologists. In other words, everyone you need to meet to build and manage a successful digital publishing business.

If you want to meet the people who will help you succeed in the digital publishing market,? register today.?

Source: http://www.against-the-grain.com/2012/10/conferences-meetings-2/

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Another Open Letter About Nina Simone (This One Spits Fire ...

By now, we?ve all read at least one angry screed or open letter regarding the casting of Zoe Saldana as Nina Simone. But just when you thought the topic had been entirely exhausted, here comes?Aaron Overfield, the website content manager of NinaSimone.com, with a scathing criticism of writer/director Cynthia Mort, an appeal to the public to put discussions of Saldana?s ?blackness? behind them, and a ?talk-to-the-hand? rebuke to anyone who espouses the ?don?t judge/wait and see/shut up about it? stance on the casting issue.

Says Overfield:

The most frustrating people are the ones who imply everyone should just shut up and ?wait and see? or ?leave them alone.? That kind of attitude and oppression is not in the spirit of Nina Simone whatsoever. Quite the opposite. Nina was vocal, defiant, a warrior, an activist. She would not have simply shut up and sat down. She would?ve shown up at the studio with a shotgun to speak with Ms. Mort and slapped the makeup off Zoe. So let?s get that straight first. We?re going to talk about this and those of us with strong, impassioned opinions are going to express them.

He goes on to state that, though the film?s production can?t be stopped, its more problematic notions should continue to be highlighted. Among those is the ?straightfacing? of an out gay male, Clifton Henderson, who has been previously reported to be written as Nina?s love interest in Mort?s script:

It is also the first instance of Cynthia?s script exploiting a marginalized identity by essentially putting ?straightface? on an out gay man. This is rather curious since Mort herself is a lesbian and you?d wonder how she?d feel being rewritten as a heterosexual woman under the guise of someone else?s ?artistic license.? Would Cynthia Mort be pleased with someone rewriting her own history to the point where her sexuality becomes a trivialized inconvenience? I guess someone would have to ask her that. I won?t bother.

Welp.

Above all, Overfield takes umbrage with an issue that plagues many biopics, particularly black ones helmed by non-black writers and directors. The idea of buying the rights to someone?s life story, then altering it until it?s unrecognizable just because you can, is one that we should all find unsettling. Beyond casting Zoe Saldana, Cynthia Mort has show a blatant disregard for veracity, when it comes to being the first person to bring a version of Nina Simone?s life to the big screen. As Overfield reminds us, Mort hasn?t fact-checked, consulted Simone?s family, or shown any level of concern for respectfully rendering an icon?s lived experiences?and he believes one thing alone motivates that level of arrogance ? privilege:

Cynthia Mort is not a black woman. That is a very crucial point here. I am a white man. I know that as a white man I do not have the authority to speak of the black experience because it is not my experience. I cannot and will not ?speak? for black people or assume to know the intricacies of racism, as experienced by black people. The privilege and arrogance it takes to do so is disturbing and downright disgusting.

The entire?open letter?is certainly worth a read. In conversation with some of the other careful and thought-provoking write-ups on the issue, it leaves no stone of offense unturned.

Are you over the Nina biopic issue yet? Does this open letter re-fuel your anger??

Source: http://www.clutchmagonline.com/2012/10/another-open-letter-about-nina-simone-this-one-spits-fire/

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New technique connects multi-walled carbon nanotubes

ScienceDaily (Oct. 29, 2012) ? Using a new method for precisely controlling the deposition of carbon, researchers have demonstrated a technique for connecting multi-walled carbon nanotubes to the metallic pads of integrated circuits without the high interface resistance produced by traditional fabrication techniques.

Based on electron beam-induced deposition (EBID), the work is believed to be the first to connect multiple shells of a multi-walled carbon nanotube to metal terminals on a semiconducting substrate, which is relevant to integrated circuit fabrication. Using this three-dimensional fabrication technique, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology developed graphitic nanojoints on both ends of the multi-walled carbon nanotubes, which yielded a 10-fold decrease in resistivity in its connection to metal junctions.

The technique could facilitate the integration of carbon nanotubes as interconnects in next-generation integrated circuits that use both silicon and carbon components. The research was supported by the Semiconductor Research Corporation, and in its early stages, by the National Science Foundation. The work was reported online October 4, 2012, by the journal IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology.

"For the first time, we have established connections to multiple shells of carbon nanotubes with a technique that is amenable to integration with conventional integrated circuit microfabrication processes," said Andrei Fedorov, a professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech. "Connecting to multiple shells allows us to dramatically reduce the resistance and move to the next level of device performance."

In developing the new technique, the researchers relied on modeling to guide their process parameters. To make it scalable for manufacturing, they also worked toward technologies for isolating and aligning individual carbon nanotubes between the metal terminals on a silicon substrate, and for examining the properties of the resulting structures. The researchers believe the technique could also be used to connect multi-layered graphene to metal contacts, though their published research has so far focused on carbon nanotubes.

The low-temperature EBID process takes place in a scanning electron microscope (SEM) system modified for material deposition. The SEM's vacuum chamber is altered to introduce precursors of the materials that researchers would like to deposit. The electron gun normally used for imaging of nanostructures is instead used to generate low energy secondary electrons when the high energy primary electrons impinge on the substrate at carefully chosen locations. When the secondary electrons interact with hydrocarbon precursor molecules introduced into the SEM chamber, carbon is deposited in desired locations.

Unique to the EBID process, the deposited carbon makes a strong, chemically-bonded connection to the ends of the carbon nanotubes, unlike the weakly-coupled physical interface made in traditional techniques based on metal evaporation. Prior to deposition, the ends of the nanotubes are opened using an etching process, so the deposited carbon grows into the open end of the nanotube to electronically connect multiple shells. Thermal annealing of the carbon after deposition converts it to a crystalline graphitic form that significantly improves electrical conductivity.

"Atom-by-atom, we can build the connection where the electron beam strikes right near the open end of the carbon nanotubes," Fedorov explained. "The highest rate of deposition occurs where the concentration of precursor is high and there are a lot of secondary electrons. This provides a nanoscale sculpturing tool with three-dimensional control for connecting the open ends of carbon nanotubes on any desired substrate."

Multi-walled carbon nanotubes offer the promise of higher information delivery throughput for certain interconnects used in electronic devices. Researchers have envisioned a future generation of hybrid devices based on traditional integrated circuits but using interconnects based on carbon nanotubes.

Until now, however, resistance at the connections between the carbon structures and conventional silicon electronics has been too high to make the devices practical.

"The big challenge in this field is to make a connection not just to a single shell of a carbon nanotube," said Fedorov. "If only the outer wall of a carbon nanotube is connected, you really don't gain much because most of the transmission channel is under-utilized or not utilized at all."

The technique developed by Fedorov and his collaborators produces record low resistivity at the connection between the carbon nanotube and the metal pad. The researchers have measured resistance as low as approximately 100 Ohms -- a factor of ten lower than the best that had been measured with other connection techniques.

"This technique gives us many new opportunities to go forward with integrating these carbon nanostructures into conventional devices," he said. "Because it is carbon, this interface has an advantage because its properties are similar to those of the carbon nanotubes to which they are providing a connection."

The researchers don't know exactly how many of the carbon nanotube shells are connected, but based on resistance measurements, they believe at least 10 of the approximately 30 conducting shells are contributing to electrical conduction.

However, handling carbon nanotubes poses a significant challenge to their use as interconnects. When formed through the electric arc technique, for example, carbon nanotubes are produced as a tangle of structures with varying lengths and properties, some with mechanical defects. Techniques have been developed to separate out single nanotubes, and to open their ends.

Fedorov and his collaborators -- current and former graduate students Songkil Kim, Dhaval Kulkarni, Konrad Rykaczewski and Mathias Henry, along with Georgia Tech professor Vladimir Tsukruk -- developed a method for aligning the multi-walled nanotubes across electronic contacts using focused electrical fields in combination with a substrate template created through electron beam lithography. The process has a significantly improved yield of properly aligned carbon nanotubes, with a potential for scalability over a large chip area.

Once the nanotubes are placed into their positions, the carbon is deposited using the EBID process, followed by graphitization. The phase transformation in the carbon interface is monitored using Raman spectroscopy to ensure that the material is transformed into its optimal nanocrystalline graphite state.

"Only by making advances in each of these areas can we achieve this technological advance, which is an enabling technology for nanoelectronics based on carbon materials," he said. "This is really a critical step for making many different kinds of devices using carbon nanotubes or graphene."

Before the new technique can be used on a large scale, researchers will have to improve their technique for aligning carbon nanotubes and develop EBID systems able to deposit connectors on multiple devices simultaneously. Advances in parallel electron beam systems may provide a way to mass-produce the connections, Fedorov said.

"A major amount of work remains to be done in this area, but we believe this is possible if industry becomes interested," he noted. "There are applications where integrating carbon nanotubes into circuits could be very attractive."

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Georgia Institute of Technology, Research Communications.

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. S. Kim, D. Kulkarni, K. Rykaczewski, M. Henry, V. Tsukruk, A. Fedorov. Fabrication of an Ultra-Low-Resistance Ohmic Contact to MWCNT-Metal Interconnect using Graphitic Carbon by Electron Beam Induced Deposition (EBID). IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology, 2012; : 1 DOI: 10.1109/TNANO.2012.2220377

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/matter_energy/electricity/~3/bg5KaQmezII/121030093616.htm

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Home sweet home: Quake-displaced Pandas return

China Daily via Reuters

A giant panda is seen on a tree at the new base of the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Wolong, Sichuan province, on October 30, 2012.

Pandas displaced after an earthquake struck their reserve in 2008 have begun to return home.

The first batch of 18 pandas moved into?the new base of the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda?on Tuesday, according to local media reports cited by Reuters.?They had been relocated following the 2008 Sichuan earthquake which devastated the famed Wolong reserve, one of the earliest research bases set up by the Chinese government in the early 1980s.?

Behind the Wall: Counting China's wild pandas

June 17, 2008: The epicenter of China's massive earthquake was 15 miles from one of the last habitats for the giant panda, China's beloved national symbol. NBC's Mark Mullen offers a status report on the survivors.

Source: http://photoblog.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/30/14801762-home-sweet-home-pandas-return-four-years-after-china-quake?lite

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Police detain 1, seek motive in LA family shooting

Business owner Dean Wright, 82, pauses outside his neighbor's family-owned business, United States Fire Protection Services, in Downey, Calif. Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012. A gunman killed three people and injured two, including a 13-year-old boy, Wednesday in two separate attacks on a family at their business, United States Fire Protection Services and nearby residence. Police say the five family members who were shot had been targeted by the gunman. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Business owner Dean Wright, 82, pauses outside his neighbor's family-owned business, United States Fire Protection Services, in Downey, Calif. Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012. A gunman killed three people and injured two, including a 13-year-old boy, Wednesday in two separate attacks on a family at their business, United States Fire Protection Services and nearby residence. Police say the five family members who were shot had been targeted by the gunman. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Business owner Dean Wright, 82, expresses his grief for the killings outside his neighbor's family-owned business, United States Fire Protection Services, in Downey, Calif., Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012. A gunman killed three people and injured two, including a 13-year-old boy, Wednesday in two separate attacks on a family at their business, United States Fire Protection Services and nearby residence. Police say the five family members who were shot had been targeted by the gunman. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Police investigators talk to people across the street from a family-owned business, United States Fire Protection Services, in Downey, Calif., Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012. Five people were shot and at least two died in shootings at the business and a residence in a Los Angeles suburb Wednesday, according to Downey police Lt. Dean Milligan. The shootings occurred shortly after 11 a.m. at a business and at a nearby home, where family members of the business owner live. A woman was found dead at the home, he said. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Flowers and votive candles are seen outside the home of the owners of a family-owned business, United States Fire Protection Services, in Downey, Calif. Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012. A gunman killed three people and injured two, including a 13-year-old boy, Wednesday in two separate attacks on a family at its suburban Los Angeles business and nearby residence. Police say the five family members who were shot had been targeted by the gunman. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Flowers and votive candles are seen outside the home of the owners of family-owned business, United States Fire Protection Services, in Downey, Calif., Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012. A gunman killed three people and injured two, including a 13-year-old boy, Wednesday in two separate attacks on a family at its suburban Los Angeles business and nearby residence. Police in suburban Los Angeles say the five family members who were shot had been targeted by the gunman. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

DOWNEY, Calif. (AP) ? Authorities say a man held for questioning matches the description of a gunman who killed three people and critically wounded two others at a family-owned fire extinguisher business and a relative's nearby home in suburban Los Angeles.

The man was one of four people detained and questioned Thursday, Downey Police Lt. Dean Milligan said. The other three, two men and a woman, were released after detectives determined they had no connection to the shootings, which left friends and neighbors grappling for answers as authorities remained mum about a motive.

The gunman doesn't appear to be a former employee, friend or family member of the victims, Milligan said. Police, however, said they don't believe the killings were a random act of violence.

Authorities also recovered a stolen black Chevrolet Camaro, which they say the attacker used to get away after the shootings.

Milligan identified the three people who were killed as Josimar Rojas, 26, Irene Cardenas, 35, and Susana Perez-Ruelas, 34.

Rojas and Cardenas were killed at the business, United States Fire Protection Services Inc., where another woman was wounded, the Los Angeles Times reported. She remains in stable condition.

The gunman then went to the home of the business owner a few blocks away and killed Perez-Ruelas and wounded her 13-year-old son.

A portrait began to emerge Thursday of a tight-knit family who threw large parties and ran a successful company.

Prayer candles and flowers were left at the home and nearby business where the shootings took place. A sign decorated with pink hearts and flowers was left outside the house, reading "RIP Susana, to a great mother."

Workers returned to the industrial strip where the first shots were fired at the small family-owned fire extinguisher company.

"This is absolutely heartbreaking," said Dean Wright, who owns the septic supply business next door. "The guy who did this had to be absolutely crazy."

Richard Mercado, 36, a family friend, said he grew up with the two brothers who ran U.S. Fire Protection, which sells professional firefighting gear and equipment.

Property records show the business is owned by Robert Salinas, 35, and the house is owned by Antonio Salinas, 34. Attempts to reach anyone at either location were unsuccessful and others associated with the family refused to talk when reached by phone.

Mercado said the siblings made a lot of money with the business and that they also liked to buy and sell motorcycles and cars.

"If they saw money to be made they would invest in it," Mercado said. "They always had extra money."

Police said the deadly encounter began around midday Wednesday and that someone called from the business to reporting a shooting.

A few minutes after police arrived, a 13-year-old boy called dispatchers from the family house just down the street, authorities said, where the second shooting happened.

A female secretary and a male employee were killed at the business, according to Wright. At the family's home, the shooter killed the wife of one of the brothers, he said.

The woman and teenager were originally at the business, but somehow got to the home in the Camaro before being shot, according to police. Police don't know whether they drove themselves or were kidnapped by the suspect.

There was no sign of forced entry at either location and police believe the suspect spoke with the victims at both locations before the shooting began. The teen victim, however, did not recognize the gunman, Milligan has said.

The house is a duplex facing foreclosure in a process that began last December, according to real estate records. The property was scheduled to be auctioned Nov. 26 with an asking price of about $837,000.

___

Contributing to this report were Associated Press video journalist Raquel Maria Dillon in Downey; and staff writers Robert Jablon, Gillian Flaccus, Brian Melley and Shaya Tayefe Mohajer in Los Angeles.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-10-26-Suburban%20Shooting/id-984612017c74495db8502ba41149beeb

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Why Waiting to Start Kindergarten Might Be a Good Idea

Parents who decide to hold summer babies back and have them start kindergarten a year later may be onto something.

New research finds that kids born in the summer are less likely to grow up to be company CEOs, mainly because being younger puts them at a disadvantage in school, according to researchers.

A study by researchers at the University of British Columbia revealed that a person's date of birth could affect their chances at becoming a CEO. An examination of company leaders in the S&P 500 found that just 6.13 percent of CEOs were born in June and less than 6 percent in July, compared with a combined 23 percent with birthdays in March and April.

"Our findings indicate that summer babies underperform in the ranks of CEOs as a result of the 'birth-date effect,' a phenomenon resulting from the way children are grouped by age in school," said Maurice Levi, a finance professor and co-author of the study.

With cutoff dates for school admission in the U.S. falling between September and January, the researchers determined that those CEOs born between June and July were the youngest in their class during school, while those in March and April were the oldest.

"Older children within the same grade tend to do better than the youngest, who are less intellectually developed," Levi said. "Early success is often rewarded with leadership roles and enriched learning opportunities, leading to future advantages that are magnified throughout life."

Levi argues that the results add to the growing evidence that the way the current education system groups students by age impacts their lifelong success.

"We could be excluding some of the business world's best talent simply by enrolling them in school too early," he said.

The study, co-authored by Ph.D. students Qianqian Du and Huasheng Gao, investigated the birth-date effect in a sample of 375 CEOs from S&P 500 companies between 1992 and 2009. It is scheduled to appear in the December issue of the journal Economics Letters.

This story was provided by BusinessNewsDaily, a sister site to LiveScience. Follow Chad Brooks on Twitter @cbrooks76 or BusinessNewsDaily @BNDarticles. We're also on Facebook & Google+.

Copyright 2012 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/why-waiting-start-kindergarten-might-good-idea-145549084.html

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First FDA approved subcutaneous implantable defibrillator available for patients

Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Todd Medland
tmedland@nmh.org
312-926-0735
Northwestern Memorial Hospital

Northwestern's Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute among the first in the county to perform procedure

CHICAGO - Sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) is a condition in which the heart suddenly stops pumping blood. When this occurs, blood stops flowing to the brain and other major organs. Recent estimates show that approximately 850,000 people in the United States are at risk of SCA, and most of the people who have SCA, die from it. But, rapid treatment of SCA by using an implantable defibrillator can be lifesaving.

On September 28th, 2012, the FDA approved the world's first totally subcutaneous implantable defibrillator (S-ICD). Northwestern's Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute is one of the first 20 institutions in the country to have access to this technology. Since FDA approval, the Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute is one of the first ten places to implant in the U.S.

"The S-ICD system provides physicians with a new treatment option for patients who are at risk of sudden cardiac arrest," said Bradley Knight, MD, electrophysiologist and medical director of the Center for Heart Rhythm Disorders. "The system sits entirely below the skin without requiring the need for placing wires in the heart, which leaves the heart and blood vessels untouched."

The Boston Scientific S-ICD System has two main components. One is called the pulse generator, which powers the system, monitors heart activity and delivers a shock if needed. The other main component is the electrode. This enables the device to sense the heart rhythm and deliver shocks when necessary. Both are implanted just under the skin, providing protection without touching the heart and reliable defibrillation without transvenous wires.

"Patients who previously could not undergo the implantation of a transvenous defibrillator, now have a device option to protect them from deadly arrhythmias," said Dr. Knight.

The S-ICD system is commercially available in many countries in Europe as well as New Zealand. More than 1,400 devices have been implanted in patients around the world.

###

Northwestern Medicine is the shared vision that joins Northwestern Memorial HealthCare and the Feinberg School in a collaborative effort to transform medicine through quality healthcare, academic excellence and scientific discovery.

For more information about the subcutaneous implantable defibrillator and other services at the Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute, or to schedule an appointment, please call 312-926-0779 or visit us online at www.heart.nmh.org.

About Northwestern Memorial HealthCare

Northwestern Memorial HealthCare is the parent corporation of Chicago's Northwestern Memorial Hospital, an 894-bed academic medical center hospital and Northwestern Lake Forest Hospital, a 205-bed community hospital located in Lake Forest, Illinois.

About Northwestern Memorial Hospital

Northwestern Memorial is one of the country's premier academic medical center hospitals and is the primary teaching hospital of the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. Along with its Prentice Women's Hospital and Stone Institute of Psychiatry, the hospital has 1,705 affiliated physicians and 6,769 employees. Northwestern Memorial is recognized for providing exemplary patient care and state-of-the art advancements in the areas of cardiovascular care; women's health; oncology; neurology and neurosurgery; solid organ and soft tissue transplants and orthopaedics.

Northwestern Memorial has nursing Magnet Status, the nation's highest recognition for patient care and nursing excellence. And, Northwestern Memorial ranks 12th in the nation in the U.S. News & World Report 2012 Honor Roll of "America's Best Hospitals". The hospital is ranked in 12 of 16 clinical specialties rated by U.S. News and is No. 1 in Illinois and Chicago in U.S. News' 2012 state and metro rankings, respectively. For 13 years running, Northwestern Memorial has been rated among the "100 Best Companies for Working Mothers" guide by Working Mother magazine. The hospital is a recipient of the prestigious National Quality Health Care Award and has been chosen by Chicagoans as the Consumer Choice according to the National Research Corporation's annual survey for 13 years.

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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.

Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Todd Medland
tmedland@nmh.org
312-926-0735
Northwestern Memorial Hospital

Northwestern's Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute among the first in the county to perform procedure

CHICAGO - Sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) is a condition in which the heart suddenly stops pumping blood. When this occurs, blood stops flowing to the brain and other major organs. Recent estimates show that approximately 850,000 people in the United States are at risk of SCA, and most of the people who have SCA, die from it. But, rapid treatment of SCA by using an implantable defibrillator can be lifesaving.

On September 28th, 2012, the FDA approved the world's first totally subcutaneous implantable defibrillator (S-ICD). Northwestern's Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute is one of the first 20 institutions in the country to have access to this technology. Since FDA approval, the Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute is one of the first ten places to implant in the U.S.

"The S-ICD system provides physicians with a new treatment option for patients who are at risk of sudden cardiac arrest," said Bradley Knight, MD, electrophysiologist and medical director of the Center for Heart Rhythm Disorders. "The system sits entirely below the skin without requiring the need for placing wires in the heart, which leaves the heart and blood vessels untouched."

The Boston Scientific S-ICD System has two main components. One is called the pulse generator, which powers the system, monitors heart activity and delivers a shock if needed. The other main component is the electrode. This enables the device to sense the heart rhythm and deliver shocks when necessary. Both are implanted just under the skin, providing protection without touching the heart and reliable defibrillation without transvenous wires.

"Patients who previously could not undergo the implantation of a transvenous defibrillator, now have a device option to protect them from deadly arrhythmias," said Dr. Knight.

The S-ICD system is commercially available in many countries in Europe as well as New Zealand. More than 1,400 devices have been implanted in patients around the world.

###

Northwestern Medicine is the shared vision that joins Northwestern Memorial HealthCare and the Feinberg School in a collaborative effort to transform medicine through quality healthcare, academic excellence and scientific discovery.

For more information about the subcutaneous implantable defibrillator and other services at the Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute, or to schedule an appointment, please call 312-926-0779 or visit us online at www.heart.nmh.org.

About Northwestern Memorial HealthCare

Northwestern Memorial HealthCare is the parent corporation of Chicago's Northwestern Memorial Hospital, an 894-bed academic medical center hospital and Northwestern Lake Forest Hospital, a 205-bed community hospital located in Lake Forest, Illinois.

About Northwestern Memorial Hospital

Northwestern Memorial is one of the country's premier academic medical center hospitals and is the primary teaching hospital of the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. Along with its Prentice Women's Hospital and Stone Institute of Psychiatry, the hospital has 1,705 affiliated physicians and 6,769 employees. Northwestern Memorial is recognized for providing exemplary patient care and state-of-the art advancements in the areas of cardiovascular care; women's health; oncology; neurology and neurosurgery; solid organ and soft tissue transplants and orthopaedics.

Northwestern Memorial has nursing Magnet Status, the nation's highest recognition for patient care and nursing excellence. And, Northwestern Memorial ranks 12th in the nation in the U.S. News & World Report 2012 Honor Roll of "America's Best Hospitals". The hospital is ranked in 12 of 16 clinical specialties rated by U.S. News and is No. 1 in Illinois and Chicago in U.S. News' 2012 state and metro rankings, respectively. For 13 years running, Northwestern Memorial has been rated among the "100 Best Companies for Working Mothers" guide by Working Mother magazine. The hospital is a recipient of the prestigious National Quality Health Care Award and has been chosen by Chicagoans as the Consumer Choice according to the National Research Corporation's annual survey for 13 years.

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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.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-10/nmh-ffa102512.php

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Business Marketing Event Planning | FreeThinkBham

Business Marketing Event Planning

you can find customers who are near, but in reality you can grow your business by opening up the marketing of their environment through online networks.

2. Start small ? Reviews of each marketing technique before making a full blown campaign, with his face. If you are a beginner, avoid large marketing and expensive advertising campaigns in magazines and radio ads. Continue marketing techniques you can try first before making a full blown campaign.

3. Build a website ? If you build a web identity you have a place for people to find you online. You can really sell you here. If you create a link to your site from your social network for people who intend to work with, go to your website and sold on your services.

4.

Attend weddings, events and other related shooting ? It helps to be able to meet new people who might be potential customers. It also helps to meet the event planners and others to know what they have achieved and what does not work for them.

5. Ask former clients for references ? sometimes even forget satisfied customers refer business to their friends and family. Send an e-mail from former clients and thank you for your business and tell them that you appreciate all the references you could provide.

In recent years, economic recession, the event?s organization has felt the pressure. Now more than ever it is crucial to the success of an event planning business to get online and start being aggressive marketing through all the different places that online marketing has to offer. Do not be afraid to invest some money to get your business online. Local advertising can go a long way, networks can go far, but the Internet technology can skyrocket the number of tracks, you can get for your event planning business.

If your marketing budget is tight, be sure to test each method of marketing carefully before you begin to pay the money in a single procedure. If this Expo will be too expensive, consider some of the online advertising, which are directly related services.

You can follow any responses to this entry

Source: http://www.freethinkbham.com/37/business-marketing-event-planning

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International Paper Q3 profit down by nearly half

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) ? International Paper Co. said Thursday its third-quarter net income dropped by nearly half as it rang up charges for restructuring and for absorbing smaller rival Temple-Inland.

The paper maker reported its net income fell to $237 million, or 54 cents per share, in the July-September quarter, down 49 percent from $468 million, or $1.08 per share, in the third quarter of 2011.

Restructuring and other charges totaled $59 million in the third quarter, nearly doubled from $32 million a year earlier.

Excluding special items and charges, International Paper said it earned $330 million, or 75 cents per share, in the latest quarter. That compares with $352 million, or 81 cents per share, in last year's third quarter.

On that basis, analysts were expecting 77 cents a share for the latest quarter, according to FactSet.

Third-quarter sales rose 6 percent, to $7.03 billion from $6.6 billion a year earlier. Analysts were looking for $7.07 billion.

The company, based in Memphis, Tenn., has manufacturing operations in North America, Europe, Latin America, Russia, Asia and North Africa. It completed its $3.51 billion acquisition of Temple-Inland in February.

International Paper announced Wednesday that it is forming a new joint venture with a unit of Brazil's Grupo Orsa to support its global packaging business. The U.S. company said it will invest about $470 million for a 75 percent stake in the joint venture with the Brazilian corrugated packaging producer.

Shares of International Paper fell $1.12 to close at $35.26.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/international-paper-q3-profit-down-nearly-half-215318843--finance.html

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Ex-Goldman exec given 2 years for inside trades

Former Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. board member Rajat Gupta, center, arrives outside federal court in New York Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012. Gupta is to be sentenced after being found guilty insider trading by passing secrets between March 2007 and January 2009 to a billionaire hedge fund founder who used the information to make millions of dollars. At right is Gupta's attorney Gary Naftalis. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

Former Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. board member Rajat Gupta, center, arrives outside federal court in New York Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012. Gupta is to be sentenced after being found guilty insider trading by passing secrets between March 2007 and January 2009 to a billionaire hedge fund founder who used the information to make millions of dollars. At right is Gupta's attorney Gary Naftalis. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

Former Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. board member Rajat Gupta, left, arrives outside federal court in New York Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012. Gupta is to be sentenced after being found guilty insider trading by passing secrets between March 2007 and January 2009 to a billionaire hedge fund founder who used the information to make millions of dollars. At right is Gupta's attorney Gary Naftalis. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

Former Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. board member Rajat Gupta, center, declines to answer a question from a reporter as he arrives outside federal court in New York Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012. Gupta is to be sentenced after being found guilty insider trading by passing secrets between March 2007 and January 2009 to a billionaire hedge fund founder who used the information to make millions of dollars. At right is Gupta's attorney Gary Naftalis. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

Former Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. board member Rajat Gupta, right, arrives at court in New York Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012. Gupta is to be sentenced after being found guilty insider trading by passing secrets between March 2007 and January 2009 to a billionaire hedge fund founder who used the information to make millions of dollars. At left is Gupta's attorney Gary Naftalis. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

Former Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. board member Rajat Gupta, center, arrives outside court in New York Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012. Gupta is to be sentenced after being found guilty insider trading by passing secrets between March 2007 and January 2009 to a billionaire hedge fund founder who used the information to make millions of dollars. At right is Gupta's attorney Gary Naftalis. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

NEW YORK (AP) ? A former Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble Co. board member was sentenced to two years in prison Wednesday, culminating a spectacular fall from grace for a man whose good deeds worldwide brought him leniency after he was convicted of feeding inside information about board dealings to a billionaire hedge fund owner who was his friend.

Rajat Gupta, 63, of Westport, Conn., learned his fate from U.S. District Court Judge Jed Rakoff, who defended the length of the prison term he levied, blasting federal sentencing guidelines that he said called for Gupta to serve at least 6? years behind bars. He also ordered him to pay a $5 million fine.

Citing information he received under seal, Rakoff said Gupta's crimes may have occurred because Gupta may have "longed to escape the straightjacket of overwhelming responsibility, and had begun to loosen his self-restraint in ways that clouded his judgment."

The Harvard-educated businessman long respected on Wall Street was one of the biggest catches yet for the federal government in its five-year crackdown on insider trading that has so far resulted in 69 convictions.

Gupta was ordered to report to prison on Jan. 8.

Reading from a statement, he said: "The last 18 months have been the most challenging period of my life since I lost my parents as a teenager.

"I regret terribly the impact of this matter on my family, my friends and the institutions that are dear to me. I've lost my reputation I built for a lifetime. The verdict was devastating."

The dealings by Gupta that were highlighted at his spring trial stemmed from his relationship with Sri Lanka-born Raj Rajaratnam. The one-time billionaire hedge fund boss controlled up to $7 billion in accounts, giving him a firm footprint in the financial markets and influence that impressed someone as widely regarded as Gupta.

"His conduct has forever tarnished a once-sterling reputation that took years to cultivate," U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said after sentencing. "We hope that others who might consider breaking the securities laws will take heed from this sad occasion and choose not to follow in Mr. Gupta's footsteps."

Prosecutors described how Gupta raced to telephone Rajaratnam with stock tips sometimes only minutes after getting them from board conference calls, helping Rajaratnam make more than $11 million in illegal profits for him and his investors. Rajaratnam is serving an 11-year prison sentence after his conviction last year.

The narrower insider trading case against Rajaratnam and his co-conspirators resulted in 26 convictions and was described by Bharara as the biggest insider trading case in history, successful in part because of unprecedented use of wiretaps more familiar to juries at mob and drug trials.

Prosecutors say Rajaratnam earned up to $75 million illegally through his trades while Gupta's attorneys point out that their client earned no profits.

At trial, Gupta was convicted of three counts of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy, insider trading charges that prosecutors said should result in a prison sentence of up to 10 years in prison.

Rejecting defense arguments that a community service sentence would be sufficient, Rakoff said a prison sentence was necessary to send a message to insider traders that "when you get caught, you will go to jail."

"While no defendant should be made a martyr to public passion, meaningful punishment is still necessary to reaffirm society's deep-seated need to see justice triumphant," the judge said. "No sentence of probation, or anything close to it, could serve this purpose."

Defense attorney Gary Naftalis promised to appeal, saying his client had suffered a fall "of Greek tragedy proportions."

Prosecutors accused Gupta, a former chief of the global consulting firm McKinsey & Co. and a onetime director of the huge consumer products company Procter & Gamble, of "above-the-law arrogance" in feeding Rajaratnam inside tips between March 2007 and January 2009.

Goldman Sachs chairman Lloyd Blankfein testified at trial that Gupta appeared to have violated the investment bank's confidentiality policies.

Naftalis told the judge that Gupta had "one of the best reputations on the planet. His loss of reputation is severely strong punishment."

He urged that Gupta, who was born in Kolkata, India, be ordered in lieu of prison to work with the Rwandan government in rural areas to fight HIV, malaria and extreme poverty or focus on developing new initiatives in India that would address accelerating migration to India's cities. More than 400 letters written to the judge on Gupta's behalf included documents signed by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

Rakoff said he could not spare Gupta from prison and only order him to perform community service. "It's not a punishment. It's what he finds satisfaction doing," the judge said.

At Gupta's trial, which began in May, the government highlighted a Sept. 23, 2008, phone call it said was made from Gupta to Rajaratnam only minutes after Gupta had learned during a confidential conference call about Warren Buffett's planned investment through Berkshire Hathaway of $5 billion in Goldman.

Moments after the phone call ended at 3:55 p.m., Rajaratnam purchased $40 million in Goldman stock ? an 11th hour trade that ended up making him nearly $1 million ? at the height of the financial crisis that had engulfed the country.

The judge at sentencing called that phone call "the functional equivalent of stabbing Goldman in the back."

In another recorded phone call in 2008, Rajaratnam told one of his traders that he had gotten a tip "from someone who's on the board of Goldman Sachs" that Goldman was facing an unexpected quarterly loss.

Gupta, prosecutors said, was motivated to help Rajaratnam because he had a financial stake in some of the hedge fund manager's business ventures.

In his attack on federal sentencing guidelines that are meant to be advisory, Rakoff said "mechanical adding-up of a small set of numbers artificially assigned to a few arbitrarily-selected variables wars with common sense."

He added: "Whereas apples and oranges may have but a few salient qualities, human beings in their interactions with society are too complicated to be treated like commodities, and the attempt to do so can only lead to bizarre results."

___

Associated Press Writer Tom Hays contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-10-24-Hedge%20Fund-Insider%20Trading/id-1a06a529c1ea46449ccb39a100c1b3bd

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Challenging Parkinson's dogma

Public release date: 24-Oct-2012
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: David Cameron
david_cameron@hms.harvard.edu
617-432-0441
Harvard Medical School

Scientists may have discovered why the standard treatment for Parkinson's disease is often effective for only a limited period of time. Their research could lead to a better understanding of many brain disorders, from drug addiction to depression, that share certain signaling molecules involved in modulating brain activity.

A team led by Bernardo Sabatini, Takeda Professor of Neurobiology at Harvard Medical School, used mouse models to study dopamine neurons in the striatum, a region of the brain involved in both movement and learning. In people, these neurons release dopamine, a neurotransmitter that allows us to walk, speak and even type on a keyboard. When those cells die, as they do in Parkinson's patients, so does the ability to easily initiate movement. Current Parkinson's drugs are precursors of dopamine that are then converted into dopamine by cells in the brain.

The flip side of dopamine dearth is dopamine hyperactivity. Heroin, cocaine and amphetamines rev up or mimic dopamine neurons, ultimately reinforcing the learned reward of drug-taking. Other conditions such as obsessive-compulsive disorder, Tourette syndrome and even schizophrenia may also be related to the misregulation of dopamine.

In the October 11 issue of Nature, Sabatini and co-authors Nicolas Tritsch and Jun Ding reported that midbrain dopamine neurons release not only dopamine but also another neurotransmitter called GABA, which lowers neuronal activity. The previously unsuspected presence of GABA could explain why restoring only dopamine could cause initial improvements in Parkinson's patients to eventually wane. And if GABA is made by the same cells that produce other neurotransmitters, such as depression-linked serotonin, similar single-focus treatments could be less successful for the same reason.

"If what we found in the mouse applies to the human, then dopamine's only half the story," said Sabatini.

The surprising GABA story began in the Sabatini lab with a series of experiments designed to see what happens when cells release dopamine. The scientists used optogenetics, a powerful technique that relies on genetic manipulation to selectively sensitize cells to light. In laboratory dishes, researchers tested brain tissue from mice engineered to show activity in dopamine neurons. Typically in such experiments, other neurotransmitters would be blocked in order to highlight dopamine, but Tritsch, a postdoctoral fellow in the Sabatini lab, decided instead to keep the cell in as natural a state as possible.

When Tritsch activated the dopamine neurons and examined their effects on striatal neurons, he naturally expected to observe the effects of dopamine release. Instead, he saw rapid inhibition of the striatal neurons, making it clear that another neurotransmitter which turned out to be the quick-acting GABA was at work. This was so unusual that the team launched a series of experiments to confirm that GABA was being released directly by these dopamine neurons.

A standard way to detect GABA is to look for vesicular GABA transporter, or VGAT, a protein that packages and carries GABA into neurotransmitter vesicles. The scientists silenced the gene that makes VGAT in mice and found that the dopamine neurons released GABA even in the absence of VGAT.

The researchers then tested other transporters, zeroing in on one that ferries dopamine and a variety of other neurotransmitters. For reasons they don't yet understand, this protein the vesicular monoamine transporter also shuttles GABA.

"What makes this important now is that every manipulation that has targeted dopamine by targeting the vesicular monoamine transporter has altered GABA as well. And nobody's paid any attention to it," said Sabatini. "Every Parkinsonian model that we have in which we've lost dopamine has actually lost GABA, too. So we really have to go back now and think: Which of these effects are due to loss of GABA and which are due to loss of dopamine?"

Anatol Kreitzer, an assistant investigator at the Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease in San Francisco, who was not involved in the research, called the findings remarkable.

"It was totally unexpected," said Kreitzer, who is also an assistant professor of physiology and neurology at the University of California, San Francisco. "At the molecular level, nobody really expected dopamine neurons to be releasing significant amounts of GABA. At the functional level, it's surprising that this major modulator of plasticity in the brain, which is so critical for Parkinson's, for learning and rewards, and for other psychiatric illnesses, can also release GABA. That raises a question as to what role GABA has."

GABA can very quickly change the electrical state of cells, inhibiting their activity by making them less excitable. Sabatini wonders if the loss of GABA in dopamine neurons could explain why hyperactivity is sometimes seen after chronic loss of these neurons.

The next challenge will be to explore whether other neurons that express the vesicular monoamine transporter also release GABA in addition to neurotransmitters such as serotonin and noradrenaline.

"These findings highlight how little we actually know about the most basic features of cell identity in the brain," said Sabatini.

Tritsch said what started out as a straightforward project to understand dopamine quickly changed direction, with lots of starts and stops on the way to some exciting new findings.

"It can be nice to come up with a hypothesis, test it, verify it, and have everything fall into place," he said. "But biology rarely works that way."

###

This research was funded by a Nancy Lurie Marks Family Foundation postdoctoral fellowship and by grants from the National Institutes of Health (NS046579 and 4R00NS075136).

---

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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.

Public release date: 24-Oct-2012
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: David Cameron
david_cameron@hms.harvard.edu
617-432-0441
Harvard Medical School

Scientists may have discovered why the standard treatment for Parkinson's disease is often effective for only a limited period of time. Their research could lead to a better understanding of many brain disorders, from drug addiction to depression, that share certain signaling molecules involved in modulating brain activity.

A team led by Bernardo Sabatini, Takeda Professor of Neurobiology at Harvard Medical School, used mouse models to study dopamine neurons in the striatum, a region of the brain involved in both movement and learning. In people, these neurons release dopamine, a neurotransmitter that allows us to walk, speak and even type on a keyboard. When those cells die, as they do in Parkinson's patients, so does the ability to easily initiate movement. Current Parkinson's drugs are precursors of dopamine that are then converted into dopamine by cells in the brain.

The flip side of dopamine dearth is dopamine hyperactivity. Heroin, cocaine and amphetamines rev up or mimic dopamine neurons, ultimately reinforcing the learned reward of drug-taking. Other conditions such as obsessive-compulsive disorder, Tourette syndrome and even schizophrenia may also be related to the misregulation of dopamine.

In the October 11 issue of Nature, Sabatini and co-authors Nicolas Tritsch and Jun Ding reported that midbrain dopamine neurons release not only dopamine but also another neurotransmitter called GABA, which lowers neuronal activity. The previously unsuspected presence of GABA could explain why restoring only dopamine could cause initial improvements in Parkinson's patients to eventually wane. And if GABA is made by the same cells that produce other neurotransmitters, such as depression-linked serotonin, similar single-focus treatments could be less successful for the same reason.

"If what we found in the mouse applies to the human, then dopamine's only half the story," said Sabatini.

The surprising GABA story began in the Sabatini lab with a series of experiments designed to see what happens when cells release dopamine. The scientists used optogenetics, a powerful technique that relies on genetic manipulation to selectively sensitize cells to light. In laboratory dishes, researchers tested brain tissue from mice engineered to show activity in dopamine neurons. Typically in such experiments, other neurotransmitters would be blocked in order to highlight dopamine, but Tritsch, a postdoctoral fellow in the Sabatini lab, decided instead to keep the cell in as natural a state as possible.

When Tritsch activated the dopamine neurons and examined their effects on striatal neurons, he naturally expected to observe the effects of dopamine release. Instead, he saw rapid inhibition of the striatal neurons, making it clear that another neurotransmitter which turned out to be the quick-acting GABA was at work. This was so unusual that the team launched a series of experiments to confirm that GABA was being released directly by these dopamine neurons.

A standard way to detect GABA is to look for vesicular GABA transporter, or VGAT, a protein that packages and carries GABA into neurotransmitter vesicles. The scientists silenced the gene that makes VGAT in mice and found that the dopamine neurons released GABA even in the absence of VGAT.

The researchers then tested other transporters, zeroing in on one that ferries dopamine and a variety of other neurotransmitters. For reasons they don't yet understand, this protein the vesicular monoamine transporter also shuttles GABA.

"What makes this important now is that every manipulation that has targeted dopamine by targeting the vesicular monoamine transporter has altered GABA as well. And nobody's paid any attention to it," said Sabatini. "Every Parkinsonian model that we have in which we've lost dopamine has actually lost GABA, too. So we really have to go back now and think: Which of these effects are due to loss of GABA and which are due to loss of dopamine?"

Anatol Kreitzer, an assistant investigator at the Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease in San Francisco, who was not involved in the research, called the findings remarkable.

"It was totally unexpected," said Kreitzer, who is also an assistant professor of physiology and neurology at the University of California, San Francisco. "At the molecular level, nobody really expected dopamine neurons to be releasing significant amounts of GABA. At the functional level, it's surprising that this major modulator of plasticity in the brain, which is so critical for Parkinson's, for learning and rewards, and for other psychiatric illnesses, can also release GABA. That raises a question as to what role GABA has."

GABA can very quickly change the electrical state of cells, inhibiting their activity by making them less excitable. Sabatini wonders if the loss of GABA in dopamine neurons could explain why hyperactivity is sometimes seen after chronic loss of these neurons.

The next challenge will be to explore whether other neurons that express the vesicular monoamine transporter also release GABA in addition to neurotransmitters such as serotonin and noradrenaline.

"These findings highlight how little we actually know about the most basic features of cell identity in the brain," said Sabatini.

Tritsch said what started out as a straightforward project to understand dopamine quickly changed direction, with lots of starts and stops on the way to some exciting new findings.

"It can be nice to come up with a hypothesis, test it, verify it, and have everything fall into place," he said. "But biology rarely works that way."

###

This research was funded by a Nancy Lurie Marks Family Foundation postdoctoral fellowship and by grants from the National Institutes of Health (NS046579 and 4R00NS075136).

---

[ | 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.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-10/hms-cpd102412.php

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Judge Napolitano: Did Government Have a Legal Obligation to Tell ...

10:58 am ET October 24, 2012

It may seem like an obvious question ? but the answer may surprise you. This morning, Judge Andrew Napolitano discussed new documents revealed to Fox News showing that the White House knew the September 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Libya was pre-planned terrorism, even though the administration maintained it wasn?t for a stretch of time after the attack.

Fox Business Network?s Stuart Varney raised the question of whether or not the president or government officials hold any legal obligation to tell the truth. Napolitano?s answer? No.

The government has no obligation legally to tell the truth or reveal it, he told Varney. A moral obligation, however, yes.

?It?s unfortunate for the president, but fortunate for the voters,? Napolitano continued, citing the fact that now, voters get the chance to respond in way of votes as to how they feel about the current administration?s handling of the Libya attack.

Source: http://foxnewsinsider.com/2012/10/24/judge-napolitano-did-government-have-a-legal-obligation-to-tell-the-truth-about-libya-attack/

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Instant Personal Loan Approval: Fast Cash At The Time Of Your ...

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If you?re past credit history is satisfactory, these lenders don?t take time in approving cash for you as they don?t see any risk and don?t have any doubt about your repaying capacity. This all leads to instant personal loans for bad credit approval. All described affects your loan sanction so bear in your mind all these facts if you want to get finance immediately.

Instant personal loan approval comes very fast in secured and unsecured form of loan. To get large amount of money for long repayment period and low interest rates you need to provide security against loan amount. Secured loans are also approved with poor credit score including arrears, defaults, late payments, skip installments, bankruptcy etc. to get cash through unsecured form of loan you will get small amount of money for limited period. Interest rates will also be high in comparison of secured loans. To get cash from unsecured form of you need to prove your repaying capacity.

There are numberless loan lenders who are willing to offer instant personal loans approval online in no time without boring procedures of credit check and faxing. Neck to neck competition of loan industry is always good for the borrowers. Thus, the applicants can get finance on reasonable interest rates. To get cash on right deal don?t forget to compare interest rates of various loan lenders. You should make payment of every loan installment on time for escaping penalties. It will also help you improving your credit score.

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Source: http://www.briefingwire.com/pr/instant-personal-loan-approval-fast-cash-at-the-time-of-your-desperate-needs

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New insight on managing fungal meningitis

ScienceDaily (Oct. 24, 2012) ? As the number of fungal meningitis cases in the United States continues to rise, physicians across the country are faced with how best to provide the early treatment that can save lives.

A University of Michigan Health System infectious disease expert is the lead author of a New England Journal of Medicine report detailing how the outbreak evolved and the complexities of providing anti-fungal treatments.

Carol F. Kauffman, M.D., has served as an advisor to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as it investigates the more than 200 cases of fungal meningitis linked to a contaminated steroid injected in patients for pain relief. A large number of patients in the outbreak are older adults, many of whom have substantial coexisting illnesses that make care decisions challenging.

Kauffman, a former board member of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, has focused her research career on diagnosis and treatment of fungal infections, especially in immunocompromised hosts, and prevention and treatment of infections in older adults.

"Treatment recommendations will certainly evolve as clinicians gain more experience with managing these infections," says Kauffman, chief of infectious diseases at the VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System and professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan Health System.

"Given the (lack) of data pertaining to treatment and the complexity of management, decisions about the treatment of patients with proven or suspected infection should be made with the input of an infectious diseases specialist," she says.

Patients found to be infected are being treated with a fairly high dose of voriconazole, which can cause side effects including visual disturbances, confusion, hallucinations, nausea, and liver test abnormalities.

"There is appropriate concern about the toxicity of voriconazole, particularly at the doses recommended to treat meningitis," Kauffman says. "Visual hallucinations have been especially problematic in patients treated in this outbreak and appear to be related to high serum levels. Decreasing the dose of the drug will obviate this effect."

There are also significant drug-drug interactions. Administering voriconazole to patients who are already taking agents such as blood thinners, statins, benzodiazepines, and certain seizure medicines, to name just a few, should be done with care, Kauffman and others advise. Doctors should play close attention to decreasing the doses of other medicines and monitoring blood levels.

The CDC reports the death toll has risen to 20 people with 254 fungal meningitis cases confirmed in 16 states, including Michigan. Infections have only been found in patients injected with methylprednisolone acetate from the New England Compounding Center, which has been recalled.

The CDC advises patients who feel ill and are concerned they were injected with recalled products to contact their physicians. Doctors should be aware of symptoms of fungal meningitis and seek rapid diagnosis and treatment to prevent serious complications and deaths.

Typically in this outbreak, symptoms -- such as headache, fever, nausea, and neck stiffness -- have appeared one to four weeks following injection. But fungal infections can be slow to develop and patients should be vigilant about onset of symptoms for up to two months.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Michigan Health System.

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

---

Journal Reference:

1. Carol A. Kauffman, Peter G. Pappas, Thomas F. Patterson. Fungal Infections Associated with Contaminated Methylprednisolone Injections ? Preliminary Report. New England Journal of Medicine, 2012; : 121019102855009 DOI: 10.1056/NEJMra1212617

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

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

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_science/~3/XVUSHti2QNQ/121024093310.htm

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