There's a new kid on the Arduino block, and it's called the Arduino Robot. Launched yesterday at Maker Faire Bay Area, it's the company's first product that extends beyond single microcontroller boards. The Roomba-like design, which we first saw in November 2011, is the result of a collaboration with Complubot. It consists of two circular boards, each equipped with Atmel's ubiquitous ATmega32u4 and connected via ribbon cable.
The bottom board is home to four AA batteries (NiMH), a pair of motors and wheels, a power connector and switch plus some infrared sensors. By default it's programmed to drive the motors and manage power. The top board features a color LCD, a microSD card slot, an EEPROM, a speaker, a compass, a knob plus some buttons and LEDs. It's programmed to control the display and handle I/O. Everything fits inside a space that's about 10cm high and 19cm in diameter.
Pre-soldered connectors and prototyping areas on each board make it easier to customize the robot platform with additional sensors and electronics. It even comes with eleven step-by-step projects and a helpful GUI right out of the box. The Arduino Robot is now on sale at the Maker Faire for $275 and will be available online in July. Take a look at our gallery below and watch our video interview with Arduino founder Massimo Banzi after the break.
RICHMOND, Virginia (Reuters) - The most nail-biting U.S. governor's race this year is centering on whether a Tea Party Republican can win Virginia, the southern state that has twice backed Democratic President Barack Obama.
So far, the answer is: maybe.
Republican state Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, known for his anti-abortion and tax-cutting positions, is in a tight race with Terry McAuliffe, a former national Democratic Party chairman. The election will take place in November.
With Cuccinelli set to be nominated formally at a state party convention on Saturday, a Quinnipiac University poll this week showed him with 38 percent support, behind McAuliffe's 43 percent.
"The 17 percent of voters who say they are undecided will determine the Commonwealth's next governor," Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, said in a statement. "At this point, neither man seems to have much of an edge."
More than $11 million has poured into a race seen as crucial to reviving national fortunes for Republicans, and especially its Tea Party right wing, after Obama's re-election last year and the loss of two seats in the Senate.
Robert Holsworth, a political analyst who has worked for governors from both parties, said Republicans saw Cuccinelli's candidacy as a national test case.
"Would Republicans be better off running someone with clear principles like Cuccinelli or someone in the mushy middle?" Holsworth said. "Some people will read these elections as an early signal about 2014" midterm congressional elections.
More than anything else, Cuccinelli, 44, has been known for sticking to the conservative principles that have made him a darling of the anti-tax, anti-government Tea Party movement.
Cuccinelli set off a storm in Virginia by pushing through rules mandating that abortion clinics meet the same standards as hospitals. Abortion rights supporters said it could lead some clinics to close.
Cuccinelli also opposed a bipartisan transportation package Republican Governor Bob McDonnell got through the legislature because it would bring in $880 million a year from new taxes.
"WE WERE BEAT"
At a Chesterfield County Republican Party gathering in late April, Cuccinelli urged the crowd to shake off the "depression" that had set in since Obama won the state in November for the second time.
"We were beat, and we have a lot of ground to make up," he said.
With jobs and the slow-growing economy the top issues for voters, McAuliffe, a 56-year-old millionaire who headed President Bill Clinton's re-election campaign in 1996, told supporters when he kicked off his campaign this month that he woke up every morning thinking about "training a good work force."
Virginia's unemployment rate was 5.3 percent in March, more than 2 percentage points below the national average. But the state is one of the biggest recipients of federal outlays, and officials fear it could be hit hard as the U.S. government cuts spending.
Besides indicating a tight race, polls point to an electorate that is at odds with Cuccinelli and Virginia Republicans' positions on social issues.
Although Cuccinelli opposes gay marriage, a Washington Post poll this week showed 56 percent of Virginians were in favor of it. Fifty-five percent also support keeping abortion legal, the poll said.
CRITICISM
McAuliffe has been criticized because of his connection with GreenTech, a struggling Mississippi-based electric car manufacturer that he helped launch. He later quit as chairman, saying he wanted to focus on his race for governor.
Critics have said the company failed to live up to its promise and undermines McAuliffe's claim to be a successful entrepreneur.
Cuccinelli has come under fire following news stories questioning his relationship with nutritional supplement company Star Scientific and Chief Executive Officer Jonnie Williams Sr. Cuccinelli has acknowledged that he took gifts from Williams, including a catered $1,500 Thanksgiving dinner.
McAuliffe is ahead in fundraising, generating $6.7 million to Cuccinelli's $4.4 million as of March 31. By comparison, almost $41 million was spent in the 2009 governor's race McDonnell won.
In a sign of the national interest in the contest, much of the money for this year's race is from outside Virginia. McAuliffe's top donors are Robert Johnson of Monroe, Connecticut, and media entrepreneur Haim Saban of Beverly Hills, California, who both gave $250,000.
Cuccinelli's backers include the Republican Governors Association, which has given $1 million; investor Foster Friess, who backed Republican Rick Santorum's presidential bid last year; and conservative political activist David Koch.
In New Jersey, the only other state with a gubernatorial race this year, incumbent Republican Chris Christie holds a double-digit lead over his Democratic opponent, state Senator Barbara Buono, in early polling.
(Reporting by Ian Simpson; Editing by Arlene Getz and Lisa Von Ahn)
(This story is corrected to show that Johnson, Saban are top McAuliffe donors, not that McAuliffe is his own top donor in 22nd paragraph, . Removes reference to McAuliffe giving almost $300,000, as that was for a previous fundraising cycle.)
A letter from eight lawmakers poses a series of questions about Google Glass, the forthcoming Google spectacles.?
By Matthew Shaer / May 17, 2013
Google founder Sergey Brin poses for a portrait wearing Google Glass before the Diane von Furstenberg Spring/Summer 2013 collection show during New York Fashion Week in this September 9, 2012 file photo.
Reuters
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Tester units of Google Glass are here. And so are concerns about privacy ? not particularly surprising, considering that the Google goggles could allow folks to surreptitiously snap photos that people would prefer they didn't snap at all. (See also: "Blinky," the wink-powered Glass app.)
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As ABC News reports today, the latest line of questioning comes from the members of the?Congressional Bi-Partisan Privacy Caucus, who are seeking details on Google's new hardware.?
"As members of the Congressional Bi-Partisan Privacy Caucus, we are curious whether this new technology could infringe on the privacy of average Americans," reads a new letter sent by the group. "Because Google Glass has not yet been released and we are uncertain of Google's plans to incorporate privacy protections into the device, there are still a number of answered questions that we share."
The lawmakers go on to outline a series of questions, including the following: "What proactive steps is Google taking to protect the privacy of non-users when Google Glass is in use?" In other words, how exactly will Google stop Glass owners from taking creepshots??
Google, as it happens, has already started to address these queries. At a panel at the big I/O developers conference out in San Francisco, Google reps stressed that Glass was designed to make it obvious that the device is in use ? for instance, when its turned on, the small display on the glasses lights up.?
"If I'm recording you, I have to stare at you ? as a human being. And when someone is staring at you, you have to notice," Google engineer Charles Mendis said this week at I/O, according to The Verge. "If you walk into a restroom and someone's just looking at you ? I don't know about you but I'm getting the hell out of there."
Tried out Google Glass? Drop us a line in the comments section. And for?more tech news, follow us on?Twitter @venturenaut.
May 14, 2013 ? The atom-sized world of carbon nanotubes holds great promise for a future demanding smaller and faster electronic components. Nanotubes are stronger than steel and smaller than any element of silicon-based electronics -- the ubiquitous component of today's electrical devices -- and have better conductivity, which means they can potentially process information faster while using less energy.
The challenge has been figuring out how to incorporate all those great properties into useful electronic devices. A new discovery by four scientists at the University of California, Riverside has brought us closer to the goal. They discovered that by adding ionic liquid -- a kind of liquid salt -- they can modify the optical transparency of single-walled carbon nanotube films in a controlled pattern.
"It was a discovery, not something we were looking for," said Robert Haddon, director of UC Riverside's Center for Nanoscale Science and Engineering. Scientists Feihu Wang, Mikhail Itkis and Elena Bekyarova were looking at ways to improve the electrical behavior of carbon nanotubes, and as part of their research they also looked at whether they could modulate the transparency of the films. An article about their findings was published online in April in Nature Photonics.
The scientists spent some time trying to affect the optical properties of carbon nanotube films with an electric field, with little success, said Itkis, a research scientist at the Center for Nanoscale Science and Engineering. "But when we applied a thin layer of an ionic liquid on top of the nanotube film we noticed that the change of transparency is amplified 100 times and that the change in transparency occurs in the vicinity of one of the electrodes, so we started studying what causes these drastic changes and how to create transparency in controlled patterns."
An ionic liquid contains negative and positive ions which can interact with the nanotubes, dramatically influencing their ability to store an electrical charge. That increases or decreases their transparency, similar to the way that glasses darken in sunlight. By learning how to manipulate the transparency, scientists may be able to start incorporating nanotube films into products that now rely on slower or heavier components, such as metal oxide.
For instance, using nanotube films meshed with a film of ionic liquid, scientists could create more cost effective Smart Windows, that darken when it's hot outside and become lighter when it's cold.
"Smart Windows are a new industry that has been shown to save 50 percent of your energy costs," said Itkis. "On a very hot day you can shade your window just by turning a switch, so you don't have to use as much air conditioning. And on a winter day, you can make a window more transparent to let in more light."
The scientists still need to study the economic viability of using nanotube film, but Bekyarova said one possible advantage would be that carbon nanotubes are ultra thin -- about 1,000 times smaller than a single strand of hair -- so you would need very little to cover a large area, such as the windows of a large building.
Itkis said nanotube films also hold great promise in building lighter and more compact analytical instruments such as spectrometers, which are used to analyze the properties of light.
In this application, a nanotube film with an array of electrodes can be used as an electrically configurable diffraction grating for an infrared spectrometer, allowing the wavelength of light to be scanned without moving parts.
Furthermore, by using addressable electrodes, the spatial pattern of the induced transparency in the nanotube film can be modified in a controlled way and used as an electrically configurable optical media for storage and transfer of information via patterns of light.
Carbon nanotubes have great potential, but there is still plenty of work to be done to make them useful in electronics and optoelectronics, Haddon said.
"The challenge is to harness their outstanding properties," he said. "They won't be available at Home Depot next week, but there is continuing progress in the field."
Pinterest works best on the web, with its big images and pinning from other browser tabs. But mobile is the future and Pinterest needs to play catch up there. Today Pinterest mobile added search suggestions to make single screen pinning easier. Its iOS and Android apps also got basics like notifications and mentions. Pinterest will need to add value, not just port its website, to win on mobile.
Choosing a cell phone carrier in the US can be a nightmare. Plans and packages vary from network to network, and you often have to deal with that tiresome two-year contract. Even as we applaud T-Mobile for going the way of the "uncarrier," it too falls trap to inflexible plans; you still have to pay a minimum of $50 for minutes and data you might not use. Going prepaid is certainly an option for those who need less, but even then expiring minutes and unexpected fees can be an issue.
Zact, which launches today, aims to change all that. Touting itself as the industry's "first smart mobile provider," Zact takes an entirely different tact to cell phone service, offering the consumer total control over voice, text and data plans, even across multiple devices. There's no minimum service, customers are allowed to change their plans on the fly, and there's even a handy parental control mode that lets concerned caretakers set curfews and app restrictions on their kid's phones. How does it do all that? Join us after the break where we outline what Zact is, and how it could change the way carriers work.
A photography lighting accessories company called B2PRO claims to have come up with a simple way to improve digital photos taken with an external flash and reflector umbrella. Instead of just being covered in a highly reflective fabric, the RGB Umbrella actually features a complex pattern of red, green, and blue dots across its surface?like a digital camera's sensor?which are claimed to reflect the colors a camera's most sensitive to.
But unfortunately the B2PRO site doesn't really explain how boosting these specific colors in the reflected light results in a better digital photo or easier processing, compared to the light from a standard bounced flash which includes the full color spectrum. And B2PRO doesn't include any before and after shots illustrating why you'd want to add this to your kit for a yet-to-be disclosed price.
Understandably some photographers are genuinely curious about how this could benefit digital photography, while others are denouncing it as digital snake oil. What do you think? Is it actually a simple and clever way to improve a digital photo, or a theory with no scientific or technological basis? [B2PRO via Strobist via PetaPixel]
A suspect appears to open fire on the crowd. (YouTube/NOPD)
Police in New Orleans have released surveillance footage of one of at least three suspects wanted in connection with the afternoon shooting that injured 19 people at a Mother's Day parade.
In the footage posted to YouTube, a male wearing a white T-shirt and dark pants can be seen standing on the side of a street in the city's 7th Ward. The man appears to open fire on the crowd, which scatters, and the man flees.
Police believe shots were fired from different guns, and three suspects were seen by officers running away from the scene in the 1400 block of Frenchmen Street and North Villere. One "was seen running on Frenchmen towards North Claiborne then unknown," the New Orleans Police Department?s Public Information Office said in a release. That suspect was described as "an African-American male approximately 18 to 22 years-old wearing a white T shirt and blue jean shorts."
Police say most of the victims?10 adult males, seven adult females, a 10-year-old male and a 10-year-old female?were only grazed by gunfire, but three of them arrived at the hospital in critical condition and underwent immediate surgery, according to NOLA.com. The 10-year-old victims "had graze wounds to the body and are in good condition," police said.
A separate, choppy video posted to the social video sharing app Vine appears to capture the moment shots were fired.
New Orleans Police and the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms are offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to "the arrest and indictment of the person(s) responsible for this crime."
Police also warned that anyone withholding information or helping "harbor, conceal, or aid the offender, knowing or having reasonable ground to believe that he has committed the felony, and with the intent that he may avoid or escape from arrest, trial, conviction, or punishment" could be charged as an accessory.
The annual parade was attended by about 400 people led a contingent of police officers.
"The specialness of the day doesn't appear to interrupt the relentless drumbeat of violence," New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said at a news conference late Sunday outside a hospital where the victims were being treated. "These kinds of incidents are not going to go unanswered. We're going to be very, very aggressive. There were hundreds of people out there today. So somebody knows who did this and the way we're going to stop the violence together in this city is everybody come together."
New Orleans has a history of street violence, and federal officials say there is no indication the shooting was an act of terrorism.
"It's strictly an act of street violence in New Orleans," Mary Beth Romig, a spokeswoman for FBI New Orleans, told the Associated Press.
"All innocent bystanders got hit," Shannon Roberts?who said her nephew, niece and cousin were each shot?told NOLA.com from a hospital waiting room. "The city needs to stop the violence. It's hurting our families."
FILE - In this Monday, Sept. 24, 2007 file photo, actor Kiefer Sutherland arrives at the Fox Fall Eco-Casino party in Los Angeles. Fox, facing the ebbing ratings power of "American Idol," is betting big on its first miniseries showcase, starting with a limited-edition "24," and shows from heavyweight producers Seth MacFarlane and J.J. Abrams to invigorate its schedule. The "24" miniseries will clock in at half its running length, and the 12 episodes will be chronological but will skip some hours, Kevin Reilly, Fox Entertainment chairman, said Monday, May 13, 2013. It likely will kick off the event franchise in May. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles, File)
FILE - In this Monday, Sept. 24, 2007 file photo, actor Kiefer Sutherland arrives at the Fox Fall Eco-Casino party in Los Angeles. Fox, facing the ebbing ratings power of "American Idol," is betting big on its first miniseries showcase, starting with a limited-edition "24," and shows from heavyweight producers Seth MacFarlane and J.J. Abrams to invigorate its schedule. The "24" miniseries will clock in at half its running length, and the 12 episodes will be chronological but will skip some hours, Kevin Reilly, Fox Entertainment chairman, said Monday, May 13, 2013. It likely will kick off the event franchise in May. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles, File)
In this Saturday, Oct. 1, 2011 photo, Seth MacFarlane poses for a portrait in Los Angeles. Fox, facing the ebbing ratings power of "American Idol," is betting big on its first miniseries and shows from heavyweight producers MacFarlane and J.J. Abrams to invigorate its schedule. The network is making its largest original-programming investment yet with a crop of 11 new series along with the miniseries from filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan for the 2013-14 season, Kevin Reilly, Fox Entertainment chairman, said Monday, May 13, 2013. That's more than double the five series it announced last year. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)
NEW YORK (AP) ? Fox, facing the ebbing ratings power of "American Idol," is betting big on its first miniseries showcase, starting with a limited-edition "24" and shows from heavyweight producers Seth MacFarlane and J.J. Abrams to invigorate its schedule.
The network is making its largest original-programming investment yet with a crop of 11 new series along with a miniseries from filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan for the 2013-14 season, Kevin Reilly, Fox Entertainment chairman, said Monday. That's more than double the five series it announced last year.
Fox was the second of the major broadcast networks to announce its schedule for next season, following NBC's unveiling Sunday of an even heftier load of 17 new series.
After changing the TV landscape with "American Idol," Fox is jumping on the miniseries bandwagon that started rolling with the History channel's hits "Hatfields & McCoys" and "The Bible."
Although producers of "24" had contemplated bringing the canceled show back with a big-screen movie, they decided that Fox's planned "event series" would be the right place for it, Reilly said.
The miniseries, "24: Live Another Day," will clock in at half its running length and the 12 episodes will be chronological but will skip some hours, he said. It likely will kick off the event franchise in the summer.
The next announced miniseries is "Wayward Pines," from Shyamalan ("The Sixth Sense"). Based on the best-selling novel "Pines," it stars Matt Dillon in what Fox called a "mind-bending thriller" about the search for missing federal agents in an Idaho town. It will air in midseason.
Other broadcast network miniseries are reportedly in the works, following cable's success with the genre that once was a TV mainstay but had gone dormant. Reilly said the miniseries will help Fox toward its goal of year-round programming
"American Idol" is staying put on Wednesday and Thursday nights when it returns for its 13th season next January. The same can't be said for its judges: Original panelist Randy Jackson said he won't be back, and speculation has newcomers Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban exiting as the aging series seeks a reboot.
Reilly refused to discuss their futures, saying "everything is on the table" for next season, including a likely return to the original three-judge panel. Decisions will be made shortly because the show starts taping for next season within weeks, he said.
MacFarlane, a key Fox supplier with the animated comedies "Family Guy," ''American Dad" and "The Cleveland Show," will be trying his hand at a live-action sitcom. "Dads" stars Seth Green and Giovanni Ribisi as best friends whose fathers (Martin Mull, Peter Riegert) become their new roommates.
Abrams ("Lost," ''Fringe" and the "Star Trek" movie franchise) is among the producers of "Almost Human," described by Fox as a high-tech action series set 35 years in the future, when officers are teamed with humanlike androids. The drama debuting this fall stars Karl Urban, Michael Ealy and Lili Taylor.
The second new fall drama is "Sleepy Hollow," a retelling of Washington Irving's classic 19th-century tale, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." Timid schoolmaster Ichabod Crane (Tom Mison) is resurrected 250 years in the future and discovers he must save the world from destruction.
"The Following," the Kevin Bacon drama about an alliance of serial killers that proved a hit for Fox in its freshman year, will be back on the schedule in midseason.
Fox's Tuesday-night comedy block, introduced last year, will get two new occupants this fall, "Dads" and "Brooklyn Nine-Nine," which pairs Andy Samberg ("Saturday Night Live") and Andre Braugher ("Men of a Certain Age," ''Homicide: Life on the Street") as a hotshot detective and veteran captain.
"The Mindy Project" and "New Girl" will return to Tuesday, and the latter sitcom has earned the prized post-Super Bowl spot next February, Fox said.
Their block mate, "Raising Hope," is moving to Friday for its fourth season, where it will be paired with "Enlisted," about a man who returns home to reconnect with his two brothers and take charge of a group of misfits on a small Florida Army base.
Its cast includes Geoff Stults, who starred in the now-canceled "Ben and Kate."
Other series canceled by Fox include "Touch," ''Goodwin Games," ''Mob Doctor" and the long-running "Cops," which has been picked up by the Spike network.
One new reality show, a cooking competition for youngsters ages 8 to 13 and with the working title, "Junior Masterchef," will debut in the fall with Gordon Ramsey among its coaches.
In midseason, Greg Kinnear will take on his first continuing broadcast series role in "Rake," a legal drama based on a hit Australian series of the same name. The actor, whose movie credits include "Little Miss Sunshine" and "Baby Mama," starred in the cable miniseries "The Kennedys."
Fox's other new shows, all set for midseason, are:
"Gang Related," about a gang task force in Los Angeles confronting the city's most dangerous criminals, stars Terry O'Quinn ("Lost") as the task force's leader and rapper-producer RZA, founder of the Wu-Tang Clan, and Ramon Rodriguez as members.
"Us & Them," a comedy based on the British hit "Gavin and Stacey," stars Jason Ritter ("Parenthood") and Alexis Bledel ("The Gilmore Girls") as a young couple who find their relationship complicated by family and friends.
"Surviving Jack," based on Justin Halpern's semi-autobiographical book, is set in 1990s Southern California and stars Christopher Meloni ("Law & Order: Special Victims Unit") in a coming-of-age sitcom about a man and his son.
"Murder Police," an animated comedy about an inept detective and his colleagues, features the voices of Will Sasso, Chi McBride, Jane Lynch and Jason Ruiz, one of its executive producers.
Did helping granny set up that Netflix account cause you to be late to your friend's big On Air Hangout? What would've been a calamity last week is but a minor hitch now. Earlier today, Google updated its live video streaming service with a new set of "highly requested" features. In addition to restarting a broadcast at will, recordings are now available on YouTube immediately after an On Air Hangout ends. As for you hams, video quality has been improved for mobile devices, so you'll look your absolute best no matter which screen your adoring public is watching you from. As a caveat, Google notes that you may experience some delays when setting up a broadcast, but it feels like a small price to pay given the upsides.
To environmentalists throughout the country, denying the Keystone XL oil pipeline would be the most important sign that President Obama is committed to combating global warming.
To people close to Obama, the pipeline is not nearly that important, and they think the debate surrounding it is overblown, if not misplaced. In interviews with National Journal Daily, people who have advised Obama over the years, including former White House aides, downplayed the effect the pipeline would have on climate change or much of anything really, besides politics.
?It?s important we focus on things that make the biggest difference in terms of global climate change and do the most to actually reduce carbon emissions, like economy-wide carbon policy or use of the Clean Air Act,? said Jason Bordoff, who left the White House this January after advising Obama on energy and climate issues in senior policy positions since April 2009. ?I don?t know how much building or not building one pipeline is going to affect either how much oil is produced in Canada or in global greenhouse-gas emissions.? Bordoff now heads up Columbia University?s new Center on Global Energy Policy.
A relatively small but loud contingent of environmental groups, led by 350.org and the Sierra Club, has harnessed the 1,700-mile, Alberta-to-Texas pipeline as their rallying cry to fight global warming. The type of oil the pipeline would move?extracted from formations called oil sands?has a heavier carbon footprint than most oil drilled in other parts of the world. This issue is so important to the Sierra Club that the group, one of the oldest and largest environmental organizations in the world, announced earlier this year it was for the first time in its 120-year history lifting its policy against civil disobedience to hold a massive protest against the pipeline in Washington, in partnership with 350.org.
?Individual decisions in and of themselves are not that important,? said Joseph Aldy, who worked on energy and climate issues in the White House for the first two years of Obama?s presidency. ?If oil is $100 a barrel, Alberta will find a way to get the oil out.?
Aldy?s comment isn?t far from what then-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in October 2010, several months before environmentalists had succeeded in making the Keystone XL pipeline a political lightning rod in the 2012 presidential election. The State Department must approve any transcontinental energy project like Keystone.
"We're either going to be dependent on dirty oil from the [Persian] Gulf or dirty oil from Canada," Clinton said during an event in San Francisco, according to media reports at the time. ?We're not yet signed off on it. But we are inclined to do so.?
In fact, when Aldy and Bordoff were in the White House and Clinton was in her first year as secretary of State, the administration approved in August 2009 a pipeline similar to the Keystone XL project in two key ways: It?s 1,000 miles long and moves carbon-heavy oil sands from Alberta to Wisconsin.
?We already approved one [such] pipeline when I was in the White House,? Aldy said. ?It happened before. It?s going to come up again.?
He added, though, that environmentalists are forcing a debate that helps bring climate change to the front burner. ?It?s trying to focus attention in the media and in the public sphere about doing something on climate change,? Aldy said. ?I think there is a real value to this debate.?
Aldy and Bordoff are now saying publicly what many Democratic energy and climate advisers have said more privately over the past couple of years: The Keystone XL pipeline is not that big of a deal.
?We are essentially jamming our national energy policy debate through a 30-inch pipe. It?s an unfortunately narrow space, and the tone and quality of the discussion reflects the constraint,? said Jason Grumet, president of the Bipartisan Policy Center, who has advised Obama on energy and climate issues and is close with the administration. "In the absence of a more meaningful energy-policy discussion, Keystone has become a symbolic referendum for a much larger set of issues.?
Environmentalists have been so successful at making the pipeline a referendum on Obama?s commitment to global warming that people on both sides of this issue are now genuinely unsure whether he will approve the pipeline, a decision that?s expected to come in late summer or fall.
Administration officials are careful to avoid direct answers about the pipeline and instead trot out talking points about the official regulatory review process for the project. Given the administration's reticence, the views of Obama's former advisers offer a glimpse into what the president may be thinking.
The environmentalists leading the charge against the pipeline dismiss the comments from Obama confidantes that downplay the pipeline?s impact.
?Obama's guys hate Keystone because they know he's exposed,? said Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org. ?It?s the one place where he can't blame his climate weakness and inactivity on Congress, since Congress has nothing to do with it.?
One notably high-profile former Obama adviser whose position differs from the several people interviewed both on and off the record for this article is Carol Browner. Browner was Obama?s top energy and climate adviser until she left in January 2011.
"Until we do have a climate policy, the idea that we should be supportive of a pipeline that will increase greenhouse-gas emissions is deeply troubling," Browner said at an energy forum in November 2011, according to a Reuters article.
She hasn?t publicly commented on the pipeline since then, and she declined to be interviewed for this article.
Genome sequencing provides unprecedented insight into causes of pneumococcal diseasePublic release date: 5-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Todd Datz tdatz@hsph.harvard.edu 617-432-8413 Harvard School of Public Health
Technology will allow better surveillance of bacterial populations, understanding of vaccine effectiveness
Boston, MA A new study led by researchers from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in the UK has, for the first time, used genome sequencing technology to track the changes in a bacterial population following the introduction of a vaccine. The study follows how the population of pneumococcal bacteria changed following the introduction of the 'Prevnar' conjugate polysaccharide vaccine, which substantially reduced rates of pneumococcal disease across the U.S. The work demonstrates that the technology could be used in the future to monitor the effectiveness of vaccination or antibiotic use against different species of bacterial pathogens, and for characterizing new and emerging threats.
The study appears online May 5, 2013 in Nature Genetics.
"This gives an unprecedented insight into the bacteria living and transmitting among us," said co-author William Hanage, associate professor of epidemiology at HSPH. "We can characterize these bugs to an almost unimaginable degree of detail, and in so doing understand better what helps them survive even in the presence of an effective vaccine."
Pneumococcal disease is caused by a type of bacteria called Streptococcus pneumoniae, which is present in many people's noses and throats and is spread by coughing, sneezing, or other contact with respiratory secretions. The circumstances that cause it to become pathogenic are not fully understood. Rates of pneumococcal diseasean infection that can lead to pneumonia, meningitis, and other illnessesdropped in young children following the introduction of a vaccine in 2000. However, strains of the bacteria that are not targeted by the vaccine rapidly increased and drug resistance appears to be on the rise.
The research, led by HSPH co-senior authors Hanage; Marc Lipsitch, professor of epidemiology; and Stephen Bentley, senior scientist at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, aimed to better understand the bacterial population's response to vaccination. Whole genome sequencingwhich reveals the DNA code for each bacterial strain to an unprecedented level of detailwas used to study a sample of 616 pneumococci collected in Massachusetts communities from 2001 to 2007.
This study confirmed that the parts of the bacterial population targeted by the vaccine have almost disappeared, and, surprisingly, revealed that they have been replaced by pre-existing rare types of bacteria. The genetic composition of the new population is very similar to the original one, except for a few genes that were directly affected by the vaccine. This small genetic alteration appears to be responsible for the large reduction in the rates of pneumococcal disease.
"The widespread use of whole genome sequencing will allow better surveillance of bacterial populations even those that are genetically diverse and improve understanding of their evolution," said Lipsitch. "In this study, we were even able to see how quickly these bacteria transmit between different regions within Massachusetts and identify genes associated with bacteria in children of different ages."
"In the future, we will be able to monitor evolutionary changes in real-time. If we can more quickly and precisely trace the emergence of disease-causing bacteria, we may be able to better target interventions to limit the burden of disease," said Bentley.
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Support for the study was provided by the National Institutes of Health, the Wellcome Trust, and the AXA Foundation.
"Population Genomics of Post-Vaccine Changes in Pneumococcal Epidemiology," Nicholas J. Croucher, Jonathan A. Finkelstein, Stephen I. Pelton, Patrick K. Mitchell, Grace M. Lee, Julian Parkhill, Stephen D. Bentley, William P. Hanage, Marc Lipsitch Nature Genetics, online May 5, 2013
Harvard School of Public Health brings together dedicated experts from many disciplines to educate new generations of global health leaders and produce powerful ideas that improve the lives and health of people everywhere. As a community of leading scientists, educators, and students, we work together to take innovative ideas from the laboratory and the classroom to people's livesnot only making scientific breakthroughs, but also working to change individual behaviors, public policies, and health care practices. Each year, more than 400 faculty members at HSPH teach 1,000-plus full-time students from around the world and train thousands more through online and executive education courses. Founded in 1913 as the Harvard-MIT School of Health Officers, the School is recognized as America's first professional training program in public health.
The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute is one of the world's leading genome centres. Through its ability to conduct research at scale, it is able to engage in bold and long-term exploratory projects that are designed to influence and empower medical science globally. Institute research findings, generated through its own research programmes and through its leading role in international consortia, are being used to develop new diagnostics and treatments for human disease.
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Genome sequencing provides unprecedented insight into causes of pneumococcal diseasePublic release date: 5-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Todd Datz tdatz@hsph.harvard.edu 617-432-8413 Harvard School of Public Health
Technology will allow better surveillance of bacterial populations, understanding of vaccine effectiveness
Boston, MA A new study led by researchers from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in the UK has, for the first time, used genome sequencing technology to track the changes in a bacterial population following the introduction of a vaccine. The study follows how the population of pneumococcal bacteria changed following the introduction of the 'Prevnar' conjugate polysaccharide vaccine, which substantially reduced rates of pneumococcal disease across the U.S. The work demonstrates that the technology could be used in the future to monitor the effectiveness of vaccination or antibiotic use against different species of bacterial pathogens, and for characterizing new and emerging threats.
The study appears online May 5, 2013 in Nature Genetics.
"This gives an unprecedented insight into the bacteria living and transmitting among us," said co-author William Hanage, associate professor of epidemiology at HSPH. "We can characterize these bugs to an almost unimaginable degree of detail, and in so doing understand better what helps them survive even in the presence of an effective vaccine."
Pneumococcal disease is caused by a type of bacteria called Streptococcus pneumoniae, which is present in many people's noses and throats and is spread by coughing, sneezing, or other contact with respiratory secretions. The circumstances that cause it to become pathogenic are not fully understood. Rates of pneumococcal diseasean infection that can lead to pneumonia, meningitis, and other illnessesdropped in young children following the introduction of a vaccine in 2000. However, strains of the bacteria that are not targeted by the vaccine rapidly increased and drug resistance appears to be on the rise.
The research, led by HSPH co-senior authors Hanage; Marc Lipsitch, professor of epidemiology; and Stephen Bentley, senior scientist at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, aimed to better understand the bacterial population's response to vaccination. Whole genome sequencingwhich reveals the DNA code for each bacterial strain to an unprecedented level of detailwas used to study a sample of 616 pneumococci collected in Massachusetts communities from 2001 to 2007.
This study confirmed that the parts of the bacterial population targeted by the vaccine have almost disappeared, and, surprisingly, revealed that they have been replaced by pre-existing rare types of bacteria. The genetic composition of the new population is very similar to the original one, except for a few genes that were directly affected by the vaccine. This small genetic alteration appears to be responsible for the large reduction in the rates of pneumococcal disease.
"The widespread use of whole genome sequencing will allow better surveillance of bacterial populations even those that are genetically diverse and improve understanding of their evolution," said Lipsitch. "In this study, we were even able to see how quickly these bacteria transmit between different regions within Massachusetts and identify genes associated with bacteria in children of different ages."
"In the future, we will be able to monitor evolutionary changes in real-time. If we can more quickly and precisely trace the emergence of disease-causing bacteria, we may be able to better target interventions to limit the burden of disease," said Bentley.
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Support for the study was provided by the National Institutes of Health, the Wellcome Trust, and the AXA Foundation.
"Population Genomics of Post-Vaccine Changes in Pneumococcal Epidemiology," Nicholas J. Croucher, Jonathan A. Finkelstein, Stephen I. Pelton, Patrick K. Mitchell, Grace M. Lee, Julian Parkhill, Stephen D. Bentley, William P. Hanage, Marc Lipsitch Nature Genetics, online May 5, 2013
Harvard School of Public Health brings together dedicated experts from many disciplines to educate new generations of global health leaders and produce powerful ideas that improve the lives and health of people everywhere. As a community of leading scientists, educators, and students, we work together to take innovative ideas from the laboratory and the classroom to people's livesnot only making scientific breakthroughs, but also working to change individual behaviors, public policies, and health care practices. Each year, more than 400 faculty members at HSPH teach 1,000-plus full-time students from around the world and train thousands more through online and executive education courses. Founded in 1913 as the Harvard-MIT School of Health Officers, the School is recognized as America's first professional training program in public health.
The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute is one of the world's leading genome centres. Through its ability to conduct research at scale, it is able to engage in bold and long-term exploratory projects that are designed to influence and empower medical science globally. Institute research findings, generated through its own research programmes and through its leading role in international consortia, are being used to develop new diagnostics and treatments for human disease.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
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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.
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Support for Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak fell among all the country's main racial groups in an opinion poll, signaling the tough fight he faces in an election in the Southeast Asian country on Sunday.
The survey, conducted between April 28 and May 2 among 1,600 voters, showed 42 percent of respondents believed the opposition Peoples' Pact of former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim should be given a chance to govern. That was narrowly ahead of the 41 percent of respondents who said that only Najib's ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition could govern the country.
Seventeen percent were either unsure or refused to answer. It was the first time Merdeka had put such a question to voters.
The same poll showed that 50 percent of respondents had a positive view of the BN, while 34 percent had that view of the opposition. The poll did not cover Malaysia's Borneo island states of Sabah and Sarawak, a stronghold of the BN.
A Malaysian government spokesman called the poll "excellent news" for the ruling coalition, noting that Najib's rating remained relatively high.
Stocks on the local bourse fell 1.09 percent, reflecting unease over the election and partly offsetting gains this week.
"The fear of the outcome of the election and the uncertainty have been around for quite some time, but for those people who still have not sold, they have suddenly become fearful that the (National Front) may lose," said Ang Kok Heng of Phillip Capital Management Sdn Bhd.
Merdeka's poll showed support for Najib had slipped to 61 percent from 64 percent in March. Dips were recorded within all three main ethnic groups -- 75 percent of majority Malays backed him against 76 percent in March, while support among minority Chinese fell to 31 percent from 37 percent and among Indians to 68 percent from 70 percent.
Ethnic Malays are the bedrock of support for the coalition, which has been largely abandoned by ethnic Chinese voters, more than a quarter of Malaysians.
Merdeka Center attributed the falls to the fleeting effect of government cash handouts to low-income groups and of increased pay and pensions for 1.4 million civil servants.
The coalition suffered its worst electoral showing in 2008, losing its two-thirds parliamentary majority for the first time.
Most analysts predict the National Front will win narrowly on Sunday, but a failure to improve on the 2008 result could cost Najib his job and raise uncertainty over policy.
Despite robust economic growth of 5.6 percent last year, those polled expressed most concern about economic conditions.
The poll found support for Najib was highest among poorer Malaysians, reaching 75 percent among households earning less than 1,500 ringgit ($500) a month and lowest among households earning more than 5,000 ringgit a month, at 43 percent.
(Reporting By Siva Sithraputhran and Yantoultra Ngui; Editing by Ron Popeski and Michael Perry)
May 5, 2013 ? Step into a class of 30 high school students and look around. Five of them have been victims of electronic bullying in the past year.
What's more, 10 of those students spend three or more hours on an average school day playing video games or using a computer for something other than school work, according to a study to be presented Sunday, May 5, at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Washington, DC.
"Electronic bullying of high school students threatens the self-esteem, emotional well-being and social standing of youth at a very vulnerable stage of their development," said study author Andrew Adesman, MD, FAAP, chief of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics at Cohen Children's Medical Center of New York. "Although teenagers generally embrace being connected to the Web and each other 24/7, we must recognize that these new technologies carry with them the potential to traumatize youth in new and different ways."
The researchers analyzed data from the 2011 Youth Risk Behavior Survey of 15,425 public and private high school students. The school response rate was 81 percent, and the student response rate was 87 percent.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention conducts the survey on a nationally representative sample of high schoolers every two years to monitor six types of health-risk behaviors that contribute to the leading causes of death, disability and social problems among U.S. youths.
For the first time, the 2011 survey asked students whether they had been a victim of electronic bullying in the past 12 months, including through email, chat rooms, instant messaging, websites and texting. They also were asked how many hours they play video or computer games or use a computer for something that is not school work.
Results showed:
One in six high school students (16.2 percent) reported being electronically bullied within the past 12 months.
Girls were more than twice as likely to report being a victim of cyberbullying than boys (22.1 percent vs. 10.8 percent).
Whites reported being the victim of cyberbullying more than twice as frequently as blacks.
"Electronic bullying is a very real yet silent danger that may be traumatizing children and teens without parental knowledge and has the potential to lead to devastating consequences," said principal investigator Karen Ginsburg, also at Cohen Children's Medical Center of New York. "By identifying groups at higher risk for electronic bullying, it is hoped that targeted awareness and prevention strategies can be put in place."
Results regarding video game and recreational computer use showed:
Thirty-one percent of high school students reported spending three or more hours daily playing video games or using a computer for something other than school.
Boys were more likely than girls to report playing for more than three hours a day (35.3 percent vs. 26.6 percent).
"As technology continues to advance and computers become that much more accessible, cyberbullying will continue to grow as a hurtful weapon against kids and teens," Dr. Adesman concluded.
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by American Academy of Pediatrics, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
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Public release date: 5-May-2013
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