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The moon may be shrinking … slowly
The moon could be shrink but not disappear soon. New research found cracks in the lunar crust that formed as the interior has been cooling and shrinking in the past billion years, which also means that the surface has shrunk, but no one can check at a glance.
Scientists identified 14 scarps on the surface of the moon, said Thomas Watters of the Center for Earth and Planetary Studies at the National Museum Smithsonian Air and Space.
Watters and colleagues describe their discovery in the coming edition of the journal Science.
The slopes had been noted previously in Ecuador of the satellite, but this is the first evidence in other areas, indicating which are the result of an overall process.
The study considers these slopes and cliffs _conocidos escalope_ shaped as evidence of recent fault activity on the Moon “, but in this area,” recent “may mean a thousand million years.
The cliffs stretch along some small craters, craters that tend to disappear over time, Watters said in a telephone interview. Furthermore, there is large craters on these slopes, another indication that they are relatively recent in planetary terms, he said.
“The recent failures are looking so that you can not avoid the possibility that these contractions have occurred recently and could indicate that the Moon is still active,” he added.
The size of the scarps indicates a shrinkage in the size of the moon about 100 meters (330 feet), it would not be enough to be noticed at first glance. The diameter of the moon is a quarter of the Earth.
The cliffs reach up to 10 meters (30 feet) high and a few miles long, said Watters. By comparison, Mercury is much larger scarps, indicating a significantly greater shrinkage over time.
Watters added that the moon is not going away and that shrinkage will not affect our planet in any way.
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Discover new antibiotic-resistant bacteria in India
LONDON (Reuters) – People who embark on journeys of “health tourism” to India and Pakistan to receive cheaper medical treatments are at risk of contracting and expanding a new drug-resistant bacteria, according to an international team of scientists.
Researchers have discovered a new gene called metallo-lactamase from New Delhi, or NDM-1 in patients from Asia and the United Kingdom.
The NDM-1 causes the bacteria highly resistant to most antibiotics, including the strongest class, called carbapenems, and experts say there are no new drugs to combat it.
With the boom in international travel for medical care-particularly cheaper cosmetic surgery, but scientists fear that this new superbug may soon spread throughout the world.
“Globally, this is really a concern,” said Timothy Walsh, of Cardiff University in Britain, who led the study.
“Due to medical tourism and international travel in general, resistance to this type of bacteria has the potential to spread around the world very, very fast. And there is nothing on the horizon (drug development) to combat it,” the author.
Almost as soon as the first antibiotic, penicillin, was introduced in the 1940s, bacteria began to develop resistance to its effects, which encourages scientists to generate many new generations of these drugs.
But excessive and wrong use has helped to increase infection “superbugs” resistant to drugs, such as Staphylococcus aureus resistant to methicillin (MRSA).
In a study published Wednesday in the journal The Lancet Infectious Diseases, Walsh’s team concluded that the NDM-1 gene is becoming increasingly common in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan and is beginning to export to the United Kingdom through patients returning from these countries.
“India also performs cosmetic surgery patients in Europe and America and that is as likely to be extended throughout the world,” the researchers wrote in a report on its findings.
GLOBAL PROBLEM
Multiresistant bacteria to drugs are a growing problem in hospitals worldwide, marked by the growth of infections caused by bacteria such as MRSA.
Walsh and his team collected samples of bacteria from hospitalized patients in two areas of India, Chennai and Haryana and patients referred to the national laboratory in the UK between 2007 and 2009.
This found 44 infected by these bacteria Chennai NDM-1, 26 in Haryana, 37 in Britain and 73 elsewhere in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.
A number of British patients infected had recently visited India and Pakistan to receive hospital treatment, including cosmetic surgery, the authors said.
But more worrying is that these bacteria affected by the NDM-1 are resistant to most antibiotics, including carbapenems, the researchers said, a type of these drugs whose use is generally reserved for emergencies in cases of multidrug resistant bacteria, such as MRSA and C-Difficile.
The experts who commented on the findings of Walsh said it was important to remain alert about this new superbug, and begin to monitor their presence as soon as possible.
“If this threat to public health is ignored, sooner or later the medical community could face a (bacteria) causing carbapenem resistant to common infections, which would result in treatment failures with a substantial increase in healthcare costs” , wrote Johann Pitout, University of Calgary, Canada, in a commentary in the same journal.
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Researchers use salmonella to kill cancer cells
LONDON (Reuters) – Treating certain tumors with Salmonella bacteria can induce an immune response that kills cancer cells, scientists found in a discovery that would help create accurate medication to end the disease.
Researchers from Italy and the United States who worked on cancer cells in laboratory mice and humans indicated that their study would help develop new treatments for cancer immunotherapies type or therapeutic vaccines that stimulate the body’s immune system to fight disease .
“We made first experiments in mice and then with cancer and immune cells from human patients and found that the salmonella carried out exactly the same job,” said Maria Rescigno, European Institute of Oncology in Milan, who worked on the study.
“Now we are ready to (try to advance to) humans, but we are awaiting approval,” he added.
The scientists said they believed that the salmonella bacteria, which were used in a safe manner that does not cause the disease, helped the body’s immune system to detect cancer cells and then eliminate them.
In the early stages of cancer, immune cells tend to recognize the tumor as abnormal and destroy them, the researchers of the study, published Wednesday in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
But as the cancer advances and proliferates, the cells can become invisible to the immune system by a fault in the mechanism by which a protein called connexin 43 allows communication between different cell types and enable the warning system.
In this study, researchers looked particularly cells of melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer, no cure and few treatments available.
Rescigno and colleagues found that injecting mice with salmonella in cancer and human melanoma cells raised the amount of connexin 43 on tumor cells.
As a result, formed new channels of communication and the immune cells were activated and were going to eliminate cancer cells.
The technique also protected the rodents from the spread of cancer to other parts of the body, said Rescigno, who suggested the possibility of developing a preventive strategy of the type of vaccination
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Remains of European nomadic hut 11,000 years ago
LONDON (AP) – Archaeologists believe they have discovered the site of the oldest house in Britain: a hut of nomadic hunters on the shore of a lake, dating from 11,000 years ago.
The thatched house and features very original for its time, preceding by about 6,000 years to the country’s most famous monument, the stone monument of Stonehenge. It was built in a time when Britain was not an archipelago, but was connected to continental Europe through what is now the Channel.
Several teams from the Universities of York and Manchester working on the site believe that the home, circular, was built around 8500 BC beside an ancient lake at Star Carr, near Scarborough, in northeast England.
Discoveries made at the site indicate that the house was about 3.5 meters wide (11 feet, 6 inches) and was built with wooden posts, probably with a roof of reeds and straw. The site was probably inhabited for 200-500 years and possibly there were several houses built in the area.
Archaeologists also discovered the remains of a tree trunk 11,000 years, with the bark intact. They found traces of a wooden platform, type pier, on the banks of the ancient lake that could be the first evidence of carpentry in Europe.
The house would be about 500 to 1,000 years older than a building in Howick in the north of England, which until now was thought to be the oldest in the country.
“It changes our ideas about the life of the first settlers who returned to Britain after finishing the last Ice Age. We used to think they were constantly moving and leaving little evidence behind. Now we know who built large structures and were very attached certain parts of the landscape, “said Chantal Connell, an archaeologist at the University of Manchester.
The artifacts found at the site of an oar _parte, arrowheads and skulls venado_ offer clues about the lives of residents. It is believed that dogs were domesticated, hunted deer, wild boar and elk, fished in the lake and had rituals involving the use of headdresses made of animal skulls.
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The coffee does not raise risk of prostate cancer – medicine reseacrh
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Men who take coffee in the morning can continue to do so without worry. A review of 12 published studies found that tea lovers are no more likely than their peers to develop prostate cancer.
The findings, published in BJU International, are added to the contradictory body of evidence about the relationship between coffee and the increase or decrease cancer risk.
A month ago, a study showed that coffee drinkers had a lower risk of developing head and neck cancers than those who do not consume.
Previous studies on prostate cancer results were contradictory: some found that high consumption of coffee increased the risk of developing the disease, while others could not identify this relationship.
Now the team of Chang-Hae Park, the National Cancer Center Goyang, South Korea, reviewed the results of 12 previous studies and could not find a strong relationship between coffee drinking habits in men and risk of developing prostate cancer.
The revised study design may explain the differences between the results.
Eight studies were case-control, that is, compared to people with the disease in healthy people the same age and sex. But they have certain limitations, such as the fact that participants should remember their past lifestyle.
As consumption of coffee is considered an unhealthy habit, for example, patients with prostate cancer may remember more than the actual consumption. In contrast, healthy participants would have a better opinion about their lifestyles.
When the Park team focused solely on this type of study, observed a relationship between high consumption of coffee and increased risk of developing cancer. But that did not happen in the other four studies were cohort.
In this type of research, men without prostate cancer respond about their habits with coffee and are followed over time to identify which develop the disease.
These studies provide more solid evidence of the relationship, or lack thereof, between a “statement” (in this case, consumption of coffee) and the risk of disease case-control studies.
Since the revised cohort studies showed no link between coffee consumption and cancer risk, the team concluded that “there is no evidence to support a harmful effect of coffee consumption on the risk of developing prostate cancer.”
Still, the team noted that it is possible, according to laboratory studies, that coffee can have positive and negative effects on the risk of certain cancers.
For example, animal studies suggest that caffeine may suppress or promote tumors depending on species and stage of tumor growth when given caffeine.
Coffee also contains over 1,000 chemicals, some of which are antioxidants that protect cells from damage that leads to cancer. But it is unclear how these substances interact in the body and if coffee really influences the risk of several cancers.
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The most massive star is discovered in galaxy
LONDON (AP) – A huge concentration of gases in combustion in a neighboring galaxy may be the most massive star discovered so far with a mass hundreds of times the Sun, a group of scientists announced Wednesday.
The star, called R136a1, may have had in the beginning of his life a 320 times the mass of the Sun The astrophysicist Paul Crowther said that the star obese _the most massive double the already discovered until ahora_ “lose weight” considerably.
Furthermore, its combustion is so intense that its brilliance is almost ten million times more luminous than the Sun
“Unlike humans, these stars are born heavier and lose weight over time,” said Crowther, University of Sheffield in Britain. “R136a1 is middle-aged and experienced severe weight loss.”
The scientist said that the giant star was detected in the center of a star cluster in the Tarantula nebula, a cloud of gas and dust in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a galaxy 165,000 light years from our Milky Way.
It is the largest of several giant stars identified by Crowther and his team, according to an article in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
While other stars may be older, particularly those known as red giants, weigh much less.
Anyway R136a1 mass and those of their species means that there are tens of times larger than the Sun, in addition to brighter and warmer.
The surface temperature can exceed 40,000 degrees Celsius (72,000 Fahrenheit), seven times hotter than the Sun are also several million times brighter because they consume their energy reserves at a rate far greater than the smallest stars .
This means that massive stars live and die much more rapidly consumed before to cataclysmic explosions.
“Most live only three million years,” said Crowther. “In astronomical terms is very little time.”
His short life is one of the reasons why these stars are so obese hard to find. Another reason is that they are extremely rare and that only form in dense star clusters.
Astronomers also are limited in scope to detect them. In too distant clusters is not always possible to determine whether the telescope has detected a single star or two smaller heavy in close proximity as a binary system.
In this case, Crowther’s team reviewed data on known stars to see if they could accurately measure their weight.
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Class action lawsuit against Apple and AT & T Defective iPhone 4
NEW YORK (AFP) – The computer maker Apple and AT & T telephone company were forced to meet on Thursday with a period of twenty days to a consumer class action made by Americans who have bought iPhones complained about 4 “defective”.
This is a case before federal court in Maryland (East)
Kevin McCaffrey and Linda Wrinn explained that the device, Apple’s latest creation, released on June 24, “lost voice and data transmissions when used as a mobile phone.”
The iPhone 4, unlike previous models, is surrounded by a metal band, part of the antenna to improve reception of this signal.
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Implement a cat bionic legs – Great Britain
Oscar, the cat may have lost one of its nine lives, but his new artificial legs make it the world’s first bionic cat.
After losing their hind legs in a nasty encounter with a lawn mower in October, black cat with green eyes received metallic implants ankles together with a new artificial leg and emulate the way skin grows on the antlers of the deer. Oscar is back up and plays with rolls of paper like any normal cat.
Oscar After the accident, which occurred when he was 2 ½ years while taking the sun on the islands of the Channel, its owners, Kate and Mike Nolan, was taken to a local veterinarian. In turn, the vet sent Oscar with Dr. Noel Fitzpatrick, a surgeon in Eashing neuroortopédico, 56 kilometers (35 miles) south of London.
Together with experts in biomedical engineering, Fitzpatrick gave him two Oscar metal lugs artificial implants. These prostheses joined tailored legs and stumble a bit to mimic the natural step of a cat.
Fitzpatrick said he and biomedical engineers designed the prosthesis to join with the bone and skin. “That allows this device to function as a rocker in the tip of the legs to give the cat a normal walking,” he said. “Oscar can run and jump like any cat.”
Veterinarians implants inserted in the ankle bones of Oscar. Metallic implants are covered later with a substance that helps the bone cells grow on them. Then the cat’s skin grew over the tip of the implant to form a natural seal that prevents infection.
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Apple explains how to take the iPhone to keep the signal
There are people who never makes mistakes and, above it, Steve Jobs. The start of U.S. sales of mobile iPhone has been a success in April, as planned. Tails on the main Apple store in San Francisco, New York and Minneapolis accounted for more than 600,000 devices sold, which had been previously reserved. With sales in Japan and other countries, according to some sources, could have surpassed one million units.
However, within hours of putting in place people checked that the reception was bad and that the connection was lost too often, a failure to which the Apple faithful are not used. The problem was not the cellular network, even the device, but consumers who had left just before a few hundred dollars. When you call, your fingers cover up the antenna of the iPhone.
Steve Jobs, so far from appearances and public statements, this time sent a message to your audience to explain that Apple fans grab the phone wrong and if not correct his fault, it is best to buy a protective case for the iPhone, which, of course, has no design flaw.
The alleged failure success has not dampened sales, 70 percent of the cases, came from an audience that already had the previous model of iPhone, which once again proves the loyalty of people to the Apple brand in a world like the phone where there is frequent change of brands.
On the Net various users of the new iPhone went up several videos that show the disadvantage of the antenna in Apple’s cell phone (in English)
The premiere of the new generation iPhone has coincided with the arrival of Android 2.2, or Froy, the open operating system that drives Google.
These two systems, the closed iPhone, only Apple products, and the opening of Google, you can go on many phones (mainly Motorola and HTC) are called to be in the future rulers of the mobile always connected to the Internet, although for the moment, Nokia and RIM’s Blackberry are global market leaders.
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A skyscraper in Abu Dhabi dethrones Tower of Pisa
Abu Dhabi (AFP) – A skyscraper in Abu Dhabi has dethroned the Tower of Pisa Italy as the world’s most inclined building, the press reported on Sunday the United Arab Emirates, citing the Guinness Book of Records.
Capital Gate Tower, built by the Abu Dhabi National Exhibitions Company (ADNEC) and will form part of a complex of exhibitions in the capital, is 160 meters high and 35 floors. Unlike the Tower of Pisa, its architects sought to be intentionally tilted from the 12th floor.
The Guinness Book of Records recognized that most lopsided building in the world, with an inclination of 18 degrees. That is, four times more than the Tower of Pisa, according to the press.
It is anticipated that the works of this tower of the capital of the UAE are completed in late 2010. House inside a five star hotel and offices. The economic capital of the Emirates, Dubai, on its part welcomes the world’s tallest tower, the Burj Khalifa, of 828 meters. It was inaugurated last January and has 200 floors.
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How to fix the mobile phone
Asif Noorani hates to miss a call or a text message. So when Dallas businessman went water skiing last summer, did not hesitate to take their new iPhone 3Gs. Noorani carefully protect your phone with a self-closing bag and placed in a storage compartment with hinged cover personal watercraft. However, when he came out, saw that the bag had condensation. The device was dead.
Everyone passes. We want to take your mobile everywhere and well just under the water, soil or under someone’s shoe (or, even worse under a wheel.) Repair technicians say they have found phone rescued from the fryer, thrown from moving car, used as bottle openers or even as a weapon in a fight. The result? printed circuit boards corroded, broken screens, stuck buttons, keys falls …
There are some remedies that we can apply at home, but if the break is serious, we have to resort to a professional. And now they have emerged repairers like mushrooms. Mobile phones often have their warranties, but damages caused by what the industry calls “abuse or neglect” are not covered.
Some phones tend to break always the same. Screens large glass of the iPhone from Apple (AAPL – news – people) tend to end up shattered. Before the wheels of the BlackBerry jam often, though now that the manufacturer Research In Motion (RIMM – news – people) has been replaced by the optical flat pads, things are changing.
The BlackBerry also tend to load failures, if the area is welded around the port of loading is loosened. The original BlackBerry Storm was a regular repair shops, because the touch screen consisted of an LCD display and a digitizer: if it failed one of the two layers, the two had to be changed.
The problems are similar throughout the world. The workshops in the United States say they have many European customers and even receive terminals as far away as Australia or India. A company claims that often send spare parts to the soldiers stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Noorani is one of those entrepreneurs, the founder and owner of a chain of mobile repair shops in Texas, Dr. Cell Phone, has spent years tinkering with damaged terminals. After repairing your own iPhone soaked, managed to save all data from the contacts I had stored, but could not repair it completely. After that, says his company is investigating ultrasonic cleaning methods capable of repairing serious damage resulting from liquid.
If you are in a similar situation, experts suggest immediately remove the battery and SIM card (the memory chip laptop), if any. Then you have to let the phone dry, in air or in a plastic bag to cook rice with rice without boiling. Leave the bag in the sun for at least 24 hours should eliminate some of the water, at least, said Ryan Arter, president of the company Mission: Repair, Kansas.
The type of fluid, however, can increase the complexity of the problem. Repair technicians say they have seen phones soaked in beer, wine, soda, coffee, salt water, chlorinated water and bath water. “The company says you can fix the damage caused by fluids, lies,” said Noorani. Paul Normand, executive director of PDA Repair World of Houston, says his employees are able to recover about 80% of the phones that come with liquid damage.
Between the cost of express delivery, spare parts and labor, the repair of a phone can get expensive. Dr. Cell Phone charge up to $ 350 for the repair of new models such as the Nexus One of Google (GOOG – news – people), Noorani said that although most repairs cost between $ 65 and $ 75. Arter, Mission: Repair, says his stores charge between 39 and 149 U.S. dollars to repair the screen of a mobile.
Sometimes, the phones are so damaged that repair is useless unless the device has some sentimental value or save valuable content such as photos. One of the rules to be applied is not worth repairing phones with three or more major broken (eg, screen, battery, or network connector circuit board software).
Typically, mobile users do not feel comfortable opening your phone to take a look at the logic circuit board. Kyle Wiens, co-founder iFixit repair, try that this situation will change, giving a new impetus to old concept of “do it yourself.” “Our goal is to fix the maximum number of objects possible,” said Wiens. Its originality lies in that instead of repairing their own appliances, iFixit wants to teach others to repair their own terminals.
To attract a community of chapucillas, iFixit uses its website to accommodate repair manuals for devices ranging from a minivan to a mobile terminal. The site also hosts guides for tracking and troubleshooting, online forums where you can find answers to general questions and a shop where they sell parts and tools. The result is a website where visitors can find everything you need, or, as Wiens, “The Wikipedia of repairs.” The iPhone owners could use the troubleshooting guides or forums iFixit to diagnose damage to the device, request the parts you need and repair the phone thanks to the online repair manual. All resources are free, except for the purchase of parts.
IFixit contains information on 49 models of phones. Its mission is to promote repair in the audience and away from specialized technicians. Wiens said that this change is inevitable, because every day the terminals are more numerous and complex. “We want all that information on reparations that some people have in their heads is available to everyone,” he says.
Of course, many people will never have the skills to fix their own terminals. In this case, it is best prevented. Experts say phone owners should invest in a sheath or protective cover, keep out phones for babies and pets and, tempting as it may, they should avoid to take him to the bathroom. The lavatory, toilet, shower and wet steam are the cause of death of many terminals.
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10 Things without which we can not live
We had to get rid of almost everything. A few months after losing his office job in the summer of 2008, Brianna Karp, age 23, got rid of their furniture, a beloved piano and most of his books in order to move with their parents. When that did not work, moved to an old mobile home to which he had inherited a family, settling in an informal Traveller community in a parking lot of Wal-Mart in Brea, California. By the summer of 2009, lived without electricity, shower, no home-cooked meal without the most basic amenities.
However, Karp clung to a material possession: his laptop. He spent hours in a nearby Starbucks, using the wireless connection to surf the Internet looking for work. A friend suggested she start a blog and write about his life on the edge of the cliff, he called Girl’s Guide to Homelessness. It generated enough attention to help you get a part-time internship in a magazine. Then came an offer to write a book about her ordeal, to be published in 2011-and could become a movie. With some money for the advancement of the publication of the book, Karp bought a mobile home park now more equipped in the house of a friend and is contemplating buying a Victorian house to remodel and live there permanently. However, some yearn for material things has resigned, while friends and treasured the opportunities he has discovered online. “When you run with a survival mentality, delete everything,” says Karp. “That makes the online community is much more important.’s Online, someone will support me.”
The severe recession that began in 2007 has rectified the priorities in the U.S. and now the thrift is considered a virtue for the first time in decades. Despite recent increases in spending, retail sales are still lower than three years ago. Sales of homes, cars and appliances have collapsed. Consumers have reduced their expenditures for toilet paper and cigarettes, which were once recession-proof. Even sales of pornography have decreased. It seems to be no limits on savings.
However, Americans have clung to some amazing needs, reflecting changes in society that go beyond saving. Food, clothing and shelter have long been the most obvious basics. But emerging data whilst eventually fades recession show that we also need a bit of training and one or two drinks delicious. The company is as important as ever-even if not human. Y and can not even find a job in these times without Internet access. While redefining what is really important, these are the new 10 basic things to Americans:
Laptops. While IPAD is the latest rigor device, the computing power transcends trends. Brianna Karp, for example, found many homeless people in line and many of them came to the Internet with their own laptops, like her. Shipments of notebook PCs at home have soared over the past three years and sales in 2010 will probably amount to double 2007 sales, according to the Consumer Electronics Association. Part of the upturn is due to the cheaper netbooks, but the laptops of all sizes are becoming ubiquitous while we socialize, communicate, we shop, we see news and live our lives becoming increasingly online. Sales of desktops, meanwhile, have dropped steadily while mobility than stability.
High-speed access to the Internet. Many people have discontinued their cable TV services, telephone and even gas and electricity. But once you have Internet access, there is no way to stop. In a survey by the Pew Research Center last year, the high-speed Internet was one of three things that most people saw a need in 2009 than in 2006. Appliances such as microwaves, dryers and dishwashers, in contrast, were deemed less essential in 2009 than before. And data from the Association of Telecommunications Industry (TIA, for its acronym in English) shows that the rapid increase in the number of subscriptions to broadband Internet barely decreased in 2008 or 2009. By 2013, more than 90 percent of all Internet connections in the United States will be high speed.
Smartphones. The cell-phone sales fell for the first time in its history in 2009. But sales of smartphones, which have access to email, Web browsing and make a variety of things, “increased by 7 percent, according to the TIA. And sales could rise 25 percent this year, while people who have been putting off updating your mobile phone finally buy the iPhone or a Blackberry of their dreams. Like laptops, smart phones have become a lifeline for those who pretend not to be the kind of people busy doing a thousand jobs at once.
Education As Kevin and Deanna Daum were heading into bankruptcy in 2009, decided they could do without their two cars, two houses and most of its amenities. But they insisted on continuing to pay the tuition of his son, then he was in the final year of high school in a private school. Many Americans seem to think so. Although the data clearly show the families how much they spend on education, many said they had given up other things in order to protect their children’s education, whether a school or private school, tutoring, supplementary programs or academic activities. The private school enrollment fell less than 1 percent between 2008 and 2010, and enrollments in private universities have increased over the last couple of years. This is due in part to a shortage of jobs, but also that Americans value education. “This is an investment that pays off very well,” Sandy says Baum, an economist at the College Board. “People are willing to borrow to pay for it and know it is short-sighted to ignore it.”
Movies. Sales of tickets for movies fell in 2008 but recovered in 2009, reaching its highest point in five years. One major reason was Avatar and other films in 3-D, which accounted for 11 percent of box office revenue in 2009, compared to 2 percent a year earlier. Any increase in box office figures is a victory for the cinema, which until last year had been losing customers because theater systems at home and broader proposals movie on cable and the Internet.
Television. Americans spend less on entertainment, but watch more TV. A recent survey by consulting firm Deloitte showed that the average American sees 18 hours of television programming in their home every week, two hours longer than a year earlier. But TV could also seem like a cheap alternative to sports events, concerts and buying DVDs. And diehard fans of the TV did not have much to tighten the belt, taking into account that sales of HDTVs have increased steadily during the recession.
Download music. The need for mobility also applies to music. CD sales fell 21 percent in 2009, but downloads of singles and full albums increased by almost the same amount. The Pew survey comparing the luxuries and necessities helps explain why: most people thought that an iPod is a necessary item in 2009 than in 2006, despite the recession.
Pets. Now, Fido also sits at the table. Maybe even to the head. Although Americans have reduced their personal expenses, expenses for food, supplies, grooming, veterinary care and clothing (“wearing?) Pet continuously increased almost 5 percent a year. Industry officials attribute this to the “humanization” of pets, which in turn has led many owners to reduce the “quality of life gap” between their animals and themselves. Do not be surprised if it goes on sale soon a Iguaçu.
Alcohol. Smoking does not make us less than fully virtuous. Americans have moved away from alcoholic drinks expensive, but cheap alternatives are drinking enough to compensate for that fact, which is a common trend during recessions. The beer and wine sales have also risen in recent years. By taking into account sales at bars and restaurants have declined, this suggests that more people are drinking alcohol at home, probably while watching television.
Café. Americans have actually heeded this advice to save and have reduced their consumption of lattes daily $ 5. But they compensate by buying more coffee to drink at home. Almost 56 percent of American adults drink coffee, a proportion that has not changed in recent years. However, a recent poll by the National Coffee Association found that 86 percent of fans prepare you coffee house, as opposed to 82 percent the previous year. And the number of people who drink coffee brewed elsewhere (eg Starbucks) fell from 31 percent in 2009 to 26 percent in 2010. Of course, if people drink more alcohol at home, it makes sense to also take more coffee there. If the economy improves, you may not need both these drinks.
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Men infected with computer virus
A British scientist claims that he is the first human on the planet are infected with a virus …
Dr. Mark Gasson, University of Reading, which has contaminated a chip inserted into the hand with a computer malware, as published by the BBC News website.
After testing in a laboratory, Gasson showed how this chip inserted in his hand was able to contaminate other external devices and control systems with computer viruses, as if it were a contagious disease.
The expert admits that these tests have important implications for the future as long as medical devices like pacemakers or cochlear implants become more sophisticated, they also run the risk of being contaminated by a virus that may have another implant.
“With the benefit of these technologies also have risks.
We can improve in many ways, but as in the progress of other technologies like cell phones, for example, also increase risk and vulnerability. ”
For his part, Professor Rafael Capurro, Institute of Information Ethics in Germany, says that from an ethical point of view, monitoring of digital implants in the body can be both positive and negative.
“The supervision and monitoring of the implant can be part of the medical care of patients, but on the other hand if someone else gains access can do much harm.”
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The dog is man’s best friend, also in the field of genetics
A group of researchers from the European Union has shown that dogs are man’s best friend also in the field of genetics, to provide useful information about the pathogenesis of diseases such as cancer, epilepsy, diabetes and cardiovascular problems.
This project is part of the cutting-edge research funded by the European Commission, some of which have been presented this week at a Conference on Research and Innovation in Health in Brussels.
The initiative is called LUPA, in honor of the wolf nursed the twin founders of Rome, and brings together 20 countries of 12 veterinarians, since 2008, collected DNA samples from purebred dogs healthy and others affected by diseases similar to those experienced by humans.
Financing with 12 million euros, this work completed in 2012 and has been presented at a press conference by Kerstin Lindblad-Toh, a professor at the University of Uppsala, Sweden.
The scientist explained that many canine diseases could share the same genetic basis than human and, like the dogs have been bred in isolated populations, because of different races, it is easier to detect genetic defects that lead them to a pathology and extrapolate then to people.
Lindblad-Toh has advanced study in dogs that help improve the understanding of genetic disease which is relevant in the context of personalized medicine.
“Dogs are more than man’s best friend, they help us better understand the genetic origin of diseases such as cancer, epilepsy, cardiovascular problems or diabetes,” said.
The fact is that living in the same environment, people and dogs suffer from the same diseases but these animals are “genetically much simpler,” said the expert.
More than 200 genetic diseases have been reported in recent years, while the canine population has more than 400 purebred each being “a genetic isolate with unique features.”
The genome of affected dogs compared to the healthy of the same type to identify defects in the mechanisms underlying these disorders and thus also may reduce the high incidence of canine inherited diseases.
“Once we found the gene in animals, we studied what role it plays in humans,” said Lindblad-Toh.
The races are analyzed, including the Golden Retriever and German Shepherd for cancer, the English Cocker Spaniel for aggressive behavior, the Doberman and Boxer for hypothyroidism, the Great Dane and Irish Wolfhound for cardiovascular disease, and the Greyhound and for monogenic Collie.
Professor Fredrik Sebelius, University of Lund (Sweden), has announced the development of “Smart Hand”, an intelligent hand prosthesis bioadaptive that not only imitates the movements of a real hand, but also provides the user feel and touch.
The aim of this prosthesis, with funding of 1.8 million euros, is to improve the quality of life of disabled people, increase mobility and decrease pain ghost associated with amputations.
Philippe Simon Hoerstrup, University of Zurich, presented the project “LifeValve” funded with 10 million euros, an investigation into the use of stem cells in treating children with congenital valvular defects.
It is heart valve implants with growth potential and regeneration, and endothelial tissue formed by introducing a catheter through a minimally invasive technique.
This method would replace the mechanical prostheses that do not grow with the surrounding tissue, may calcify and require subsequent operations.
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